..續本文上一頁find the insight of impermanence, then the insight of permanence will burn away that notion of impermanence.

　　That is what is very wonderful about the teaching of nonattachment to view. Non-self can be a view, impermanence might be a view, and if you are caught in a view, you are not really free. The ultimate has no view. That is why nirvana is the extinction of all views, because views can bring unhappiness—even the views of nirvana, impermanence, and no-self—if we fight each other over these views.

　　Melvin McLeod: I very much like the way you describe what other Buddhist traditions call relative and absolute truth. You describe these as the historical and ultimate dimensions. Much of your teaching focuses on the relative or historical dimension, or on the principle of interdependence, which you call interbeing. Is that a complete or final description of reality, or is there a truth beyond the insight that nothing exists independently and all things are interrelated

　　Thich Nhat Hanh: There are two approaches in Buddhism: the phenomenal approach and the true nature approach. In the school of Madhyamaka, in the school of Zen, they help you to strike directly into your true nature. In the school of abhidharma, mind-only, they help you to see the phenomena, and if you touch the phenomena deeper and deeper, you touch the ultimate. The ultimate is not something separated from the phenomena. If you touch the ultimate, you touch also the phenomena. And if you touch deeply the phenomena, you touch also the ultimate.

　　It is like a wave. You can see the beginning and the end of a wave. Coming up, it goes down. The wave can be smaller or bigger, or higher or lower. But a wave is at the same time the water. A wave can live her life as a wave, of course, but it is possible for a wave to live the life of a wave and the life of water at the same time. If she can bend down and touch the water in her, she loses all her fear. Beginning, ending, coming up, going down—these don”t make her afraid anymore, because she realizes she”s water. So there are two dimensions in the wave. The historical dimension is coming up and going down. But in the ultimate dimension of water, there is no up, no down, no being, no nonbeing.

　　The two dimensions are together and when you touch one dimension deeply enough, you touch the other dimension. There”s no separation at all between the two dimensions. Everything is skillful means in order to help you touch the ultimate.

　　Melvin McLeod: Some people I have spoken to seem to interpret the concept of interbeing as a statement that all things are one. That sounds like one of those views we”re not supposed to hold on to.

　　Thich Nhat Hanh: Yes. One is a notion, and many is also a notion. It”s like being and nonbeing. You say that God is the foundation of being, and then people ask, “Who is the foundation of nonbeing

　　” [laughs] That is why that notion of being and nonbeing cannot be applied to reality. They”re only notions. The notion of two different things, or just one, are also notions. Sameness and otherness are notions. Nirvana is the removal of all notions, including the notions of sameness and otherness. So interbeing does not mean that everything is one or that everything is different. It will help you to remove both, so you are not holding a view.

　　Melvin McLeod: You said that the Buddha was a human being. But the Mahayana says that there are countless buddhas and bodhisattvas at many levels of existence who are sending their compassion to us. How are we rationalist Westerners to understand these beings

　　 How can we open ourselves to them when we can”t perceive them with our five senses

　　Thich Nhat Hanh: In Buddhism, the Buddha is considered as a teacher, a human being, and not a god. It is very important to tell …

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