Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche, an unofficial blog by a devotee
Without a single scientific tool, Prince Siddhartha sat on a patch of kusha grassbeneath a ficus religiosa tree investigating human nature. After a long time of contemplation, he came to the realisation that all form, including our flesh and bones, and all our emotions and all our perceptions, are assembled – they are the product of two or more things coming together. When any two components or more come together, a new phenomenon emerges – nails and wood become a table; water and leaves become tea; fear, devotion, and a savior become God. This end product doesn’t have an existence independent of its parts. Believing it truly exists independently is the greatest deception. Meanwhile parts have undergone a change. Just by meeting, their character has changed and, together, they have become something else – they are “compounded.”
He realized that this applies not only to the human experience but to all matter, the entire world, the universe – because everything is interdependent, everything is subject to change. Not one component in all creation exists in an autonomous, permanent, pure state. Not the book you are holding, not atoms, not even the gods.
- Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche, from What Makes You not a Buddhist
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