The Foundations of Buddhism

No Self ISS

twelvefold formula. Dependent arising describes the structure

of reality however, wherever, and whenever we dissect it. The

application of the formula to a thought moment has some in-

teresting implications. The formula describes a process, and we

usually conceive of processes as by definition taking place over

a period of time, and yet for the Abhidharma such a process occurs

quite literally in one moment: the twelve links arise simultane-

ously. This is something that touches upon complex tensions

and issues in the history of Buddhist thought. The point that is

being made is that reality is at heart something dynamic, some-

thing fluid; however one looks at it, reality is a process; analyse

reality down to its smallest possible components or constituents,

and what one finds are, not static buildingblocks, but dynamic

processes. This is vividly summed up in the notion of 'death' as

something we live through in each moment:

From the standpoint of ultimate truth the moment of a being's life is

extremely short-just the occurrence of a single thought. Indeed just

as the rolling wheel of a cart rolls on just one point of its rim, and rest-

ing rests on just one point, exactly so the life of a being lasts but the

moment of one thought, and as soon as that thought has ceased the being

has ceased ... Life, personality, pleasure and pain all come together in

a single thought-the moment passes swiftly; the aggregates of one who

dies or of one who remains are all alike-gone never to be met with

again. Without the occurrence of thought the world is not born, with

its arising it lives, with its passing it dies. This is understanding in the

ultimate sense.^39

Yet again we move from the macrocosm of beings dying and being
reborn to the microcosm of our changing thoughts. But the fact
that reality is at heart a process relates also once more to the

notion of the middle way. True process, true change cannot be

explained either in terms of eternalism (a thing exists unchang-

ing) or annihilationism (a thing exists for a time and then ceases

to exist). The process of change as described by dependent aris-

ing is thus a middle between these two extremes, encapsulating
the paradox of identity and difference involved in the very notion
of change.