BuddhaEye_FINAL.qxd
1/7/2004
3:42 PM
Page 200
The Buddha Eye free from the Eternal. In its momentariness it acts creatively at every instant, and in the creative act of every independent instant is the revelation of Eternity itself. (B) Action-intuition According to Nishida, not only the memory of the whole past but also of the whole future is stored in the Eternal Now. Does this not, even against his will, mean fatalism? By asking this question one is duly introduced to the idea of “action-intuition.” The past-present-future line of time is found in the world of cause and effect. The cause is that which determines the result unconditionally, and the law of causality prevails in the whole physical world. Strictly speaking, modern physics has begun to reveal another aspect of this problem which comes near to Nishida’s consideration of the historical world.12 But here only the classical theory of physics is to be considered. The universal validity of the law of causality is established by reason. It is the rational belief of man that nothing in the world occurs without sufficient causal ground. A teleological worldview will not change the matter completely. Teleologically, time runs from the future through the present into the past. It is also through reason that this scheme of time-order is established in the world. Praising the work of human reason, Hegel spoke to the following effect: By reason it is known that in nature the law of gravity prevails. Things are forced to go down. But by this force also, a heavy stone can be raised. For instance, the pillars of a gate sustain a stone-beam aloft against the force of gravity. Thus reason can convert the force of nature by obeying nature’s own law. The teleological world with its future-present-past scheme of time reverses the order of the physical world with its past-present-future scheme of time. Nevertheless, the causal and teleological points of view have this in common, that they consider the world objectively, i.e., from outside the world and time, as if the observer himself did not belong to it. This is natural, because reason itself does not belong in the world of time, contemplating its objects sub specie aeternitatis. It undergoes neither birth nor death. From eternity to eternity, reason remains the same, while human beings are transient always existing under the contradiction between Eternity and the present. 200