Soaring Crude Oil Price: Congruence of Conditioning Factors
K.S. Chow
When we seek for the opinions of ordinary people about the soaring oil price, different people put forwards different opinions based on personal feelings and thoughts. We might have heard the common opinions presented by the ordinary people including ordinary politicians and business men. Their opinions or views are expectedly diverge but incomprehensive. Only Wisdom generates comprehensiveness of thought. Those economic savants or intelligentsia are more comprehensive and accurate in their worldview. Many people never realize that those theosophists with the mind of God backed up by fundamental economic knowledge can too analyze and unveil more profound truth about economic environment. In fact, those who perceive according to the Buddha’s or God’s perceptions may also be more reliable and acceptable undoubtedly. Thus, being esoterically religious stands at an extra advantage. An academic economist with no knowledge of theosophy may not have discerned the empirical world as profound as a theosophist. An economist is at dept at the knowledge at economic phenomenology. A religious Knower or Gnostic is dept at both phenomenology and theology or Buddhology.
One may opine thus, “ Pure speculation has pushed the crude oil price at USD147.02 on July 11, 2008.”
If one accepted the pure speculation as the sole price hike of crude oil, Buddhistly put, one would be considered to have been deluded. Such linear substantial view is not compatible with Buddhist fundamental doctrine of Dependent Co-arising (Paṭiccasamuppāda) and Monotheistic process philosophy of the ontology of becoming. The Law of Dependently Co-arising and Whiteheadian Monotheistic Doctrine of Process and Reality states that every phenomenon is not conditioned by a single cause or condition. It is conditioned by the unity of contigent conditions. Linear view of causality is erroneous and process view of ontology of becoming is the right view. Gotama Buddha promulgates that linear substantial view is erroneous as it mirrors a false view of substantial ontology. Gotama Buddha advocates the process philosophy of the ontology of dynamic becoming. Process philosophy is the ontology of Insubstantiality or Emptiness.
Every phenomenon or existent is dependently co-arisen from multiple, diverge conditions or factors. A conditioned phenomenon is the fruit, outcome, event, incident, result or occurrence dependently co-arisen from the unity of multiple, diverge contigent conditions. This unity of existence or becoming arisen from contigent conditions is dissimilarly designated by different major world religions. When a positive event occurs, some perceive it as the grace of God. When a negative event occurs, some perceive it as the retribution of God. Such perception actually concurs with divine Truth if one apprehends theosophy and pantheism. In actuality, the knowledge of God helps us understand everything under the sun because every thing encompasses the essence of God.
In monotheism, such as Islamic Sufism, Sufi philosopher Ibn ‘Arabī expounds this Unity of Existence (Waḥdāt al-Wujūd) as the essence of God. In fact, every necessary existent or conditioned phenomenon itself is God. The Mahāyāna Philosopher, Nāgārjuna expounds that this Unity of Existence is the essence of Emptiness (Śūnyatā). Emptiness states that every phenomenon is empty of permanent, immutable self-nature (niḥsvabhāva). Every phenomenon is the unity of its conditioned or contigent parts. There is no single part existing in a single phenomenon. The parts constituting the phenomenon are manifold, and diverge and most importantly they are interdependent and interconnected..
Thus, it is worthwhile to glean more opinions of others pertaining to the surging price of crude oil plaging the global consumers who are currently economically hard pressed and mentally distressed. A more comprehensive survey will produce a more reliable and accurate conclusion which is compatible with the Truth of Emptiness or the Unity of God. An energy economic savant may have put forwards the following conditioning factors which condition the incessant skyrocketing of the price of crude oil in the year of 2008 since 1999.
- Increasing demand of crude oil due to rapid national
development of new industrialized or leading economies
- Tight supplies of crude oil due to depletion and reduced
exports by oil producing countries
- Pure financial speculations by institutional investors
- Bio-fuel production of non-conventional source of oil
- Middle east crisis
Thus, the authoritative energy economic savant furnishes a more comprehensive picture of the causes of crude oil price hike when he or she unveils that the soaring crude oil price is the congruence of diverge, multiple factors or conditions. Such an macro-economic view concurs with the Truth of Emptiness or the Unity of God expounded by Mahāyāna philosophy or Sufi Theosophy respectively. The Theosophy of Emptiness or God resonates with the Right View (Sammā Diṭṭhi) of dependently co-arisen Unity or Non-duality (Advaita) expounded by Śākyamuni Buddha and also by Sufi Supreme Master, Ibn Arabi who authored the classic ‘ Seal of Wisdom’ (Fuṣūṣ al Ḥikam). This Classic of Sufism has exerted a great impact upon the muslim scholars as well as the non-muslim scholars hitherto. Therefore, we conclude that Emptiness or Buddha-nature and God are synonymous in terms of the communal Truth of Wisdom of Theosophy. Theosophy is the knowledge of the relationship between the manifest world and the unmanifest or hidden Absolute Truth.
What I intend to drive home is that religion can explicate more comprehensively and accurately the truths of the mundane or secular knowledge because religion penetrates into both the manifest and unmanifest or hidden dimension of the world. Economics only deals with manifest or exoteric dimension of the phenomenal world. In fact, mundane or secular knowledge is part of the Absolute or supramundane Truth. What is mundane is only the image of the supramundane. They are inseparable. What is manifest as the phenomenal world, such as oil crisis correlates with the absolute Truth of the Buddha-nature or Essence of God.
The phenomenal world. which is impermanent and mutable, is the knowledge of the conventional truth (saṃvṛti satya). The eternal and immutable Buddha or God is the realm of ultimate Truth (paramārtha Satya). Therefore, the knowledge of Buddha (Buddhism) or that of God (Monotheism) enhances and in fact, perfects the knowledge of the secular life. Briefly put, those with knowledge of the Absolute (God or Buddha) understands both the exterior and interior dimensions of life.
Vimalakīrti Sūtra of Mahāyāna tradition expounds that a lay Buddhist can also reach the summit of spirituality- salvation or liberation. The Mahāparinirvāṇa of Mahāyāna tradition expounds the concept of Nirvāṇa as Eternity, Bliss, Self and Purity. These four supramundane characteristics are parallel to the four Divine Attributes of God in Monotheism. Thus, Buddhist Nirvāṇa and the Union with God (Baqā) are synonymous theosophically. Monotheism connotes that only the Absolute Truth is real and the phenomenal world is unreal. The One is real, eternal and immutable. The many or multiplicity is unreal, impermanent and mutable. The One is the absolute Truth; the many is the conventional truth. The ultimate Reality of the empirical world is that One is in the many and many is in the One. Correspondingly, it connotes that spirituality encompasses secularity and secularity is not separate from spirituality. Though the phenomenal world is unreal absolutely, it is real relatively just like a dream. The acknowledgement of the two-fold reality of the phenomenal world is the middle path expounded by both Buddhism and Sufism. Thus, theosophically and pantheistically, Buddhism and Sufism are identical relatively and absolutely.
The ordinary perception that spirituality and secularity are not compatible is erroneous. Religion is promulgated by the Supreme Masters to eliminate such ignorance and resultant perversion. Religion rectifies, perfects and saves Man. The frequent clashes of civilizations in our currently imperiled world is due to the fact that modern education trains us to perceive the world exoterically but not esoterically. The esoteric dimension of religion has either been ignored or has not been taught accurately in schools and in even in some universities. Epic racial and religious discriminations almost everywhere mirror that modern religious education is problematic in our secularized world. Religion, in essence, teaches non-discrimination. Why does the logical paradox occur rampantly ? |
