The Buddha himself invited people on all occasions to test him. “Don’t believe me because you see me as your teacher,” he said. “Don’t believe me because others do. And don’t believe anything because you’ve read it in a book, either. Don’t put your faith in reports, or tradition, or hearsay, or the authority of religious leaders or texts. Don’t rely on mere logic, or inference, or appearances, or speculation.”
The Buddha repeatedly emphasised the impossibility of ever arriving at Truth by giving up your own authority and following the lights of others. Such a path will lead only to an opinion, whether your own or someone else’s.
The Buddha encouraged people to “know for yourselves that certain things are unwholesome and wrong. And when you do, then given them up. And when you know for yourselves that certain things are wholesome and good, then accept them and follow them.”
The message is always to examine and see for yourself. When you see for yourself what is true – and that’s really the only way that you can genuinely know anything – then embrace it. Until then, just suspend judgement and criticism.
The point of Buddhism is to just see. That’s all.
(Extract from “Buddhism plain and simple” by Steve Hagen (Penguin 1997)
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