Question: What is deceptive perception, and what is correct perception?
Togpa Yulgal Rinpoche: Deceptive perception is mistaken with regard to the perceived object. The object is falsely perceived. That means that one takes for existent what does not exist. Non-deceptive or correct perception is the opposite of that. It is free from error with regard to the object. The Tibetan concept of “incorrect” or “mistaken” (Tib. norwa) always stands in relation to what is advocated in the world in a kind of agreement. It is that which in democratic fashion is taken for true. If the majority of people take it for true, then it is so. For example, this table: Everyone agrees that it is made out of wood and thus it is correct to designate it as a wooden table. To call it otherwise would be false, because there is agreement to call this material “wood.”
This was the general explanation for incorrect or mistaken. But in the context of philosophical speculation, if one works with view, then one, of course, has an exact definition of true and false. In this case, it does not matter how many people think one thing and how many think something else. In the framework of schools of philosophy one finds an example for something true and something false in the doctrine of the Samkyas1. This doctrine includes the view that sound is something eternal. The Buddhist traditions, on the other hand, say that sound is ephemeral or transient. In this example the distinction between true and false depends on the respective view. One who follows the Samkyas would call a consciousness that takes sound to be transient false. In Buddhism, the criterion for designating something as true or false is the ability to fulfill a function. If something fulfills a function, it is true. Without this definition one could not distinguish between what is true and what is not true. What is true in one tradition would be false in another, and vice versa. Only with the definition that something true must fulfill a function can one establish, more or less independently of what one thinks oneself, whether something is correct or not.
Q: Can you give any examples of this?
For example, fire: It fulfills the function to be hot. Without this function, one could not establish whether that which one experiences as fire is false or true. One would have nothing to which to apply false or true. Another example is the view of some religions that the world was created by a creator-god, whom one cannot grasp. Humans are not in a position to grasp what this creator-god is. From this perspective it follows that one also cannot grasp whether this creator-god fulfills a function or not. Then, also, one cannot say whether he is true or not. But if one has the view of Buddhism, that the habitual tendencies stored in the mind are the cause for everything, then one at least has something that one can think about. One can reflect whether these tendencies exist or not.
Q: What is the goal of Buddhism in this regard?
The goal of the Buddhist approach is to understand the ‘essencelessness’2 of all things, and in order to do this one has to see the things the way that they really are. If one understands that all things do not really exist, but are only experiences of the mind, then this understanding is termed non-deceptive in regard to the absolute truth.
In opposition to this, these explanations refer to the relative level of the Buddhist point of view. Here belong all teachings about dependent arising, correct knowing, accumulation of positive impressions, liberating actions, etc. On this level there are things that fulfill a function and others that do not. But still, whenever we speak about all the various states of mind, correct and incorrect, inferential and direct, etc., then this is merely an approach to the way things are that is bound to conceptual thinking. It is a conceptual and relative method.
The editor’s note as well as the original text was prepared by Peter Ruser, who also prepared the German text that appeared in Buddhismus Heute, Nr. 25 (1998). Translation from German by Kenn Maly. Special thanks to Detlev Goebel for his invaluable contributions to the final text presented here.
