Classic East/West Triumvirate

[Dimmesdale]

In the West we have the three transcendentals: Truth, Goodness and Beauty. They are presumed to have a transcendent source; namely God. I would agree. However, I am not in full agreement that we should bow down to these three items as if they were God, if that makes sense. I feel that all three: Truth, Goodness AND Beauty... can grow hackneyed, dull, stale, and, in the end, just boring. So they cannot on that account partake of God's own essential quality, which is Life that is... ever-new, inexhaustible, fathomless and undying. Truth, Goodness and Beauty are surely sourced in God's power, but they are also, in the end, finite and small of Potency, compared to God Himself.

In the East we have something similar: Sat-Chit-Ananda, or, Existence, Consciousness and Bliss. These three are likewise sourced in God or the Divine but are, I would argue, unlike the three Western transcendentals, by nature incapable of being exhausted, hackneyed or stale. This is because they bear a more direct and intimate connection with both God and ourselves. They partake of a unity and unicity that itself forwards the essence of God to us as it were by unmediated infusion.

We can grow tired of truth. The same old problems in mathematics and philosophy rehashed. There is nothing living in them after a prolonged amount of time. But what about existence? Existence is a constant, and is everywhere. If we give up on Existence, we don't have anything. Existence is the basis of everything, and so can never stop yielding to us Life, should we want it....

Goodness can get boring too. Moral laws exert their force, but once morality has been defended against marauders, what then? Do we just harp ad infinitum on the same moral platitudes for all time? Unlike Goodness, Consciousness makes itself felt even prior to our thinking about it. It is ever-present, ever-fresh. Whatever insights we enjoy is due to the backlighting given by consciousness.

Beauty can also get old. How many people nowadays pay that much attention to Da Vinci or Van Gogh? Why are Renaissance painters no longer in demand if they were so great, and people turn to Netflix and cheap dime novels rather than James Joyce? They have gotten stale with modernity. So people turn to other things that suits their nature.

But what of Bliss? Does Bliss get old? I would say Bliss can seem to get old.... People generally do not want to meditate for long periods. I would argue though that it is US in our finitude and waywardness, who refuse to submit to bliss, who refuse to increase our willingness to experience bliss. If we were willing, we would never get tired of Bliss. It is because we are embarrassed, and that unreasonably. It is not Bliss that gets hackneyed, it is Us who get hackneyed.

If anyone has any thoughts pro or con on the three transcendentals, or the three eastern categories, feel free to post.