For the\npast twenty years, Robert M. Ellis has been steadily developing his Middle Way\nPhilosophy. His ideas can be found in his more popular books such as Migglism<\/em> and Truth on the Edge<\/em>, as well as in the recently published omnibus\nedition of Middle Way Philosophy<\/em>,\nwhich runs to more than 700 pages of demanding argument and reflection. In order to translate his ideas into forms of\npractice that meet the challenges of living in the modern world, Ellis has also\nestablished the Middle Way Society, which offers podcasts, online discussions,\nretreats and other events. (http:\/\/www.middlewaysociety.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ellis is a\nrigorous thinker in his own right. While acknowledging his debt to the Buddha\nas the first proponent of the Middle Way, he has distanced himself from\nBuddhism and no longer identifies as a Buddhist. He has sought to uncover the\nprinciples of the Middle Way as they are found throughout human culture: in\nChristianity and Judaism, various secular philosophies, as well as in\npsychology and the natural sciences. Moreover, since the Middle Way is to be\npractised in the context of our actual lives as ethical beings, Ellis applies\nits principles to our political and economic existence, our understanding of\nhistory and our engagement with the arts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In The Buddha\u2019s Middle Way<\/em>, Ellis returns\nto Buddhist sources and presents us with a compelling account of how Buddhism\nas it is currently taught can serve both to obscure and illuminate the Middle\nWay. In becoming a world religion based\non metaphysical beliefs, Buddhism has, for Ellis, frequently lost touch with\nthe very principle of the Middle Way that it claims to embody. Through focusing on the pragmatic and\nskeptical dimensions of Buddhist thought, in recovering the potency of its\nclassical metaphors, and by highlighting how Gotama interacted with his own\ncontemporaries, Ellis reveals how the principle of the Middle Way infuses the\ntotality of what the Buddha taught.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To practise\nthe Middle Way entails more than just avoiding the extremes of self-indulgence\nand self-mortification, as it is defined in the Buddha\u2019s first sermon in the\nDeer Park at Sarnath. Avoiding such extremes provides no more than a useful\nexample to illustrate a far broader principle. For Ellis, the Middle Way is a\nmetaphor for an entire way of life that relinquishes all metaphysical\nabsolutes. It is, in Ellis\u2019s words, \u201ca principle of judgement, focusing on how\nwe respond to our experience rather than claims about how things finally are.\u201d\nAs such, the Middle Way unfolds entirely within the provisional, ambiguous\nworld of our lives as uncertain yet ethical beings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I hope this\nprovocative book will encourage Buddhists to reconsider the Middle Way that\nlies at the core of their tradition and to appreciate how this principle links\ntheir tradition to many others, both ancient and modern, secular and religious.\nThe Buddha\u2019s Middle Way<\/em> will at the\nsame time provide an excellent critical introduction to the Buddha\u2019s life and\nteaching for those less familiar with Buddhism. \nAs a result of Ellis\u2019s groundbreaking work, the Middle Way may cease to\nbe thought of as an exclusively Buddhist idea but a universal legacy of being\nhuman. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Stephen\nBatchelor <\/p>\n\n\n\n Aquitaine, September 2018<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Middle Way, as far as we know, was probably first\nexplicitly taught by the Buddha. The Buddha was a man who is said to have lived\nin the north-eastern Indian subcontinent about 2500 years ago. However, it\u2019s\nimportant to understand and practise the Middle Way in relation to the issues,\nnot of his time, but of ours. The Middle Way can provide a key to living our\nlives more adequately in every sphere of experience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n How can we deal with stress whilst maintaining effectiveness\nin a demanding job? By practising the Middle Way in meditation, maintaining an\ninterval of effective relaxation between fixed, wilful ways of operating and\ninadequate surrender. How do we make moral judgements in a world where old\ncertainties have dissolved? By finding the Middle Way in which no moral\nprinciple is absolute, but all moral principles can potentially provide us with\nreflective tools to promote moral adequacy. How do we deal with a polarised\npolitical debate? By following a Middle Way of critical reflection, in which we\nexpect to find some conditions addressed in all perspectives. Nevertheless, we\u2019ll\nrecognise a need for decisive judgement to meet the present conditions as well\nas we can. In personal practice, in science, in ethics and politics, in work,\nin relationships, and in our response to environmental crises, we need the\nMiddle Way today. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For a long time I have been writing about the Middle Way\nitself, but avoided writing about the Buddha. Why? Because too many people\nthink of the former only in dependence on the latter. The Buddha did not create\nthe Middle Way, any more than Newton created gravity. It\u2019s the Middle Way\nitself that needs the primary attention. This point also gets forgotten far too\nreadily in partisan debates between scholars or schools of Buddhism. To write\nabout the Buddha is often to subject oneself to much irrelevant partisan\nreaction. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, there are also some strong positive reasons to\nwrite about the Buddha. As humans, we are storytelling creatures, and we need\nstories to inspire us. Not only does the Buddha provide a great archetypal\nstory through which to start to understand the Middle Way, but many people will\nonly have heard of the Middle Way in the first place because they have heard of\nthe Buddha and Buddhism. Buddhism, for all the complex issues it raises as a\ntradition, also remains a major source of understanding of the Middle Way. It\nis only through Buddhism that I myself first started to understand it. People\nwho approach the Middle Way from this direction often need clarification of the\nissues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It is in this spirit that I am setting out to write about\nthe Middle Way in relation to the Buddha. Though there are critical issues at\nmany turns, my main goal is to provide a clear and positive account of the\nMiddle Way through<\/em> its exemplification\nin the stories about, and teachings of, the Buddha. Starting with what the\nBuddha did and said is one way of gaining a basic appreciation of the Middle\nWay. We can then move on to consider other possible directions from which we\ncan understand it. I will be narrating the early life of the Buddha as a\ndemonstration of the process of discovering the Middle Way, leading up to the\nfirst detailed account of its meaning in 1.f.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The helpful re-interpretation of the Buddha and of Buddhism\nfor today has taken considerable steps forward in recent years through the work\nof several Western and Secular Buddhist teachers and writers. These have inched\ntheir way towards a clearer and more helpful account of the Buddha\u2019s teachings\nfree of dogmatic accretions. Foremost amongst these, Stephen Batchelor must\nparticularly be mentioned. Batchelor\u2019s recent book After Buddhism<\/em> offers in my view the best attempt yet to\ndisentangle the helpful path from the traditional dogmas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n However, none of these writers seem to have yet managed to\ndivest themselves of the final encumbrance to discussion of the Buddha \u2013 that\nof appealing to historical authority. They want the Buddha they argue for to be\nthe real<\/em> Buddha, who is more\nauthoritative because he is found in the earliest (or most canonical) texts.\nAll such arguments are hostages to fortune, dependent on changing historical or\ntextual claims. However well justified these may seem now, they are subject to ambiguous\nevidence, and endless scholarly disputes over the interpretation of that\nevidence. Moreover, they have no relevance to the content<\/em> of the Buddha\u2019s insights, which \u2013 if they are worth\nanything at all \u2013 should certainly be able to stand in their own right. So, in\nthis book, I want to offer the book that I wish someone else had written before\nnow: an interpretation of the Buddha\u2019s recorded teachings based only on\npractical criteria, rather than on disputable assumptions of how we could know\nabout the \u2018real\u2019 historical Buddha.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Why am I concerned with the Middle Way primarily, rather\nthan the Buddha\u2019s other teachings? The ones that generally receive more emphasis\nin Buddhist accounts are the Four Noble Truths, The Eightfold Path, The\nThreefold Refuge, Conditioned Arising, and so on. The argument for this\nemphasis will emerge more completely as the book goes on. The key point of this\nargument will be that all these other teachings require the Middle Way to be interpreted helpfully<\/em>. If we begin\nwith them and interpret the Middle Way in their terms, we may end up with dogma\nthat is inadequate to helping humans in their changing conditions. The Middle\nWay, however, is a genuinely universal teaching which focuses on human\njudgement rather than on claims about reality. It thus provides a starting\npoint for the helpful interpretation of every other teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Middle Way, as I shall understand it and present it\nhere, is a metaphor for a practical method of improving our judgements at every\npoint that conditions present to us. The way begins right now at whatever point\nyou have reached, and stretches indefinitely into the judgements of the future.\nThat way is the \u2018middle\u2019 way not because it is necessarily moderate or\ncompromising in any conventional sense. Rather it is \u2018middle\u2019 because it avoids\neither positive or negative absolute claims. As we will see, the Buddha\u2019s life\nand teachings provide many inspiring demonstrations of this basic, practical,\nuniversal Middle Way. However, the Middle Way has also been presented in less\nhelpful ways. Issues of comparison between different models of the Middle Way\nin Buddhism will be tackled later in the book (section 4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Positively, then, this book aims first to offer an account\nof the Middle Way through the Buddha. However, there are various other things\nthat I should point out at the outset that it is not<\/em>, to avoid any possible misunderstanding. It is not a promotion\nof, nor an apology for Buddhism. I have learnt a great deal from Buddhism, and\nat an earlier stage of my life was formally committed to it, but am so no\nlonger. I am aiming to communicate some things I have learnt from the practice of\nBuddhism, and relate them to other sources of insight, rather than to promote\nthe Buddhist tradition as such. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Nor, on the other hand, is this a scholarly book in the tradition of Buddhist Studies, even though it does have a serious academic case to make. As already mentioned, I am not aiming to uncover the \u2018true\u2019 or \u2018historical\u2019 Buddha by the examination of texts, nor indeed by any other method. I will refer to texts about the life and teachings of the Buddha (mainly those from the Pali Canon) so as to acknowledge sources of inspiration. I will not be trying to prove anything through their authority, whether explicitly or implicitly.<\/em> This point needs to be stressed at the outset, because it is one that seems to be easily forgotten by readers who are familiar with traditional Buddhism and its scholarship as they read through this book. An appeal to authority should not be read into my arguments at any point, and it should not be assumed from the texts I select that I accord them more historical authority than others. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I will generally\nselect what are commonly held to be earlier texts, only because they tend to\noffer a clearer, more consistent, and more balanced view of the Buddha, not\nbecause of their age per se. Rather than a \u2018proof\u2019 in the terms of the tradition\nor of its academic interpretation, I am seeking a practically<\/em> helpful interpretation of what the traditions about the\nBuddha offer us. Cultural acceptability is thus also a factor in my\nselection of texts, because I want to encourage such helpful interpretations of\ntexts that are already widely meaningful to people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This means that, for the most part, I will be working with\nthe translated texts available to English readers. I won\u2019t be getting too\ninvolved with questions about the origins or translations of those texts. This\nis not because I am unaware of the linguistic and textual questions that\nsurround the texts (I have studied Pali at Cambridge with the great scholar,\nK.R. Norman). Rather it is because I consider those questions as for the most part\nhaving little practical consequence. It is only if we absolutise the authority\nof religious texts, assuming that they are the unquestionable source of truth,\nthat we need to start worrying unduly about their authenticity. As I shall\nargue, the practically helpful message of the Middle Way itself precludes\ngiving that kind of absolute authority to texts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I am primarily a practical philosopher rather than a\nscholar. I am grateful for the past labours of scholars in translating the\nBuddhist scriptural texts. However, my experience of Buddhist scholarship has led\nme to the conclusion that its general impact is often an unnecessarily\nconservative one. By constantly focusing people\u2019s attention on questions of the\nlanguage and historical authority of texts, they reinforce the unhelpful belief\nthat we should give these texts pre-eminent authority as sources of belief. In\nmy experience, scholars usually avoid exploring the practical content<\/em> of texts critically, or even appreciating\nit symbolically. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I am interested in the content<\/em>\nof the texts in the sense of what they can tell us that will help us to develop\nand improve our lives. Much other material regarding texts can and should be\ndispensed with \u2013 not before the texts have been acknowledged as sources, but long\nbefore the discussion of them starts to become an end in itself. Of course, it\nis always possible that we could be mistaken in our interpretation of ancient\ntexts (as indeed, we could with modern ones). However, a reasonable attempt to\nunderstand the range of meaning of key Pali, Sanskrit or other words is enough,\nbefore it becomes an end in itself. We should reach a point where it is\nacknowledged as far more important to find a practically<\/em> helpful interpretation than one that is merely justified\nby \u2018accuracy\u2019, howsoever determined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am undertaking this task fresh from the completion of a\nsimilar one in relation to Christianity (\u2018The Christian Middle Way\u2019[1]<\/a>).\nIf you believe that the Middle Way is essentially<\/em>\nBuddhist, please look at my discussion of Christianity for a disproof through\ncounter-example. There I similarly offered an interpretation of the gospels and\nthe Genesis Creation story that was led by the practically-helpful meaning we\ncould get from them. I took context into account sufficiently to offer a\ncoherent interpretation of the text, but not so as to be drawn into irrelevant\nscholarly or sectarian disputes. The Middle Way can <\/em>be articulated in relation to any tradition whatsoever, whether\nreligious, philosophical, political or artistic, and is not the sole preserve\nor monopoly of any one tradition. That can be the case even though traditions\nengage with it to greatly varying degrees (\u2018The Middle Way in Nazism\u2019 might be\nrather a limited study). <\/p>\n\n\n\n So what I am aiming to do in this book is to explore the\nelements of the Middle Way that I find in the traditions about the Buddha, not\nto adopt uncritically any Buddhist account of the Middle Way. Buddhism, like\nany tradition, offers elements of the Middle Way through which it addresses the\nconditions it encounters, but lapses into dogma in others. A critical process\nis necessary in order to distinguish these elements in any tradition. However,\nwhen considering Buddhism, a special appreciation is nevertheless necessary for\njust how far and how explicitly Buddhist tradition has conveyed the Middle Way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So who is this book for? The primary people whom I expect to\nread it will be Buddhists. Such Buddhists will need to be open to the\npossibility of understanding the Buddha in ways that are led<\/em> by the Middle Way. That means led by a case about the practical\nvalue of the teachings and the need to avoid abstract absolutes. I hope that\nthey will then be able to adopt, or at least be influenced by, such a practical\nreading of the significance of the Buddha. In the process they will have a new\nresource to counteract both traditionalist dogma on the one hand and scholarly\ndistraction on the other. It\u2019s quite possible to be inspired by the Buddha\u2019s\nMiddle Way in a way that is held in common with every human being, Buddhist or\nnot. Thus we can also understand the significance of that inspiration in a way\nthat, via the Middle Way, is compatible with the inspiration and guidance found\nin other traditions of discourse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, this book could also be of interest to people who\nare not Buddhist, but have been put off by the predominance of traditional\nauthority and dogma in Buddhism. I hope this book might help such people to\nisolate what is most helpful and relevant to their lives in Buddhist tradition,\nand more readily chart its relationship to what can be found in other\ntraditions. Again, it should be humanity that comes first, Buddhist tradition\nsecond. Tackling things that way round may help people engage with Buddhist\ntradition who would not otherwise do so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The course of this book, then, begins with the basic stories\nof the Buddha\u2019s life and teachings. These are selected from their original\ncontext with an eye to their practical understanding in relation to the Middle\nWay. Discussion of some of the Buddha\u2019s most famous analogies, and of the\nEightfold Path, should then also help to offer Middle-Way-led interpretation of\nsome other key Buddhist teachings. Unavoidably, in relation to this, I will\nthen need to engage more fully and critically with the limitations of\ntraditional Buddhist teaching and the ways that it has developed that are\nevidently in conflict with the Middle Way. Very often this is a matter of\ninterpretation, but nevertheless it needs to be clearly acknowledged that some\nvery common interpretations of Buddhist teachings are incompatible with the\nMiddle Way. These criticisms were the theme of my earlier book, \u2018The Trouble\nwith Buddhism\u2019[2]<\/a>.\nHowever, in this one I hope to put those criticisms much more in the wider\ncontext of a positive account of the valuable resources Buddhist teachings do\noffer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The last part of the book offers parallels between the\nBuddha\u2019s Middle Way and a number of other possible models for the Middle Way.\nSome of these go back to ancient philosophy and religion, but the majority are\ndue to more recent advances in scientific theory. Even those who started off\nbeing mainly interested in the Buddha alone, then, should finish the book with\nan awareness of the manifold forms that the Middle Way can take, and its\nvariety of expressions in human experience. [1]<\/a>\nEllis (2018)<\/p>\n\n\n\n [2]<\/a> Ellis (2011a) <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\nIntroduction<\/a><\/h1>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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