3-2-98 MAHAVIRA AND THE DOCTRINE OF RELATIVISM

Mahavira was an ancient sage who played a key role in promoting the Jain religion in India. This religion has few members when compared to its two sisters religions, Hinduism and Buddhism, largely because of its highly ascetic approach to spiritual development. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, who was himself raised in a Jain family, blames this religion and its fanatical practices for India's preoccupation with life-negation and other-worldly life styles.

He cites the Jain injunction that monks should not stay in one place for more than a day or two. Nevertheless, the Jain religion has shown great longevity and its sophisticated teachings still appeal to a small number of easterners and westerners alike.

One particular aspect of the Jain teaching which is in harmony with the main principles of The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living is that truth is multidimensional in nature. When Mahavira was asked a question, he always gave a sevenfold response, with one answer often contradicting another, knowing that any other approach could not do justice to conventional truth. The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living gives a clear reason why this is necessary: each person expresses through a predominant strength of personality of which there are seven or eight major aspects. Thus, there will always be seven or eight fundamentally different types of people and styles of functioning.

A modern day philosopher might label this doctrine relativism, but this label does not do justice to Mahavira's insight. The doctrine of relativism is too often used to assert that one truth is as good as another. It encourages intellectual laziness. Quoting the philosopher Paul Brunton: "The doctrine of relativity has a grave danger of its own. When we see that numerous standpoints may rightly exist, we may claim despairingly: Beauty, truth and righteousness have no real existence but only an imagined one'."

The modern day doctrine of relativism can also be used to dismiss the views of others rather than to honor them. This is a perversion of Mahavira's teaching, which suggests that every person's stance or perspective has value in the overall scheme of things.

The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living is a clear and detailed paradigm of knowledge which indicates why Mahavira's fundamental insight is a valid one and demonstrates how it is reflected in all eight fields of living. However, it is also important to point out how Mahavira's insight has, over time, become somewhat corrupted. The seven or eightfold nature of human viewpoints only applies to relative or conventional knowledge, not to the ultimate or absolute "knowledge" called Brahman, God or the Tao. Unless this distinction is preserved, one can distort this teaching. Again, quoting Paul Brunton: "Philosophy says that its highest teaching is necessarily paradoxical because the one is in the many and the many, too, are one, because non-duality is allied to duality, because the worldly and limited points to the Absolute and the Unbounded: hence the doctrine of two Truths."

The sevenfold nature of relative life was bound to become a lost teaching some three to four thousand years ago with the decline and loss of the true science of the stars. Only with the advent of The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living is a modified form of relativism gaining hold once again. It will be a improved relativism because The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living suggests that there is a structure to all conventional knowledge; it is not random and chaotic. There are only eight possible archetypal perspectives in each of the eight fields of living and each has its legitimate place in defining truth. This is why the American Indians had a council of seven wise elders to make policy for their tribes and why each member's opinion was respected and valued.

The Art of Multi-Dimensional Living further suggests that it is not enough to distinguish two forms of knowledge, absolute and relative. A third form sits between these two and has been called Platonic Forms, the Devas or Spirits, archetypal forms, or universal laws of nature. It is at this level of knowledge that seven foldness of approach is seen most clearly. In this regard, you may wish to review my article on Aristotle and his categories.

Symbolizing this sevenfold nature of life are the seven major planets: Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn. One of these planets will always have a predominant influence in one of the eight fields of living, creating a particular perspective about the issues relating to that field. For example, in the field of spiritual life, if Saturn dominates that field, then one's approach will be physical, analytic and skeptical in nature. For this Saturnine being, this is the most efficacious way to seek God, but he would be misguided to project his approach onto others. This is the proper way to understand relativism and its relationship to conventional truth. Ultimate truth, however, is indivisible and beyond distinction; Here relativity has no place.