Annapolis Ten Mile Run, 2018

The Annapolis Ten Mile Run was held Sunday, August 19, 2018. The weather was warm and cloudy, with a temperature of about 75 degrees at start time (7:00 a.m.). The course was very hilly, with the start and finish in the parking lot at Navy Marine Corps Memorial Stadium. One of the longest uphill and downhill sections was along Naval Academy Bridge (over the Severn River), which we crossed eastward at mile 4 and westward at mile 8. The continuous hills along the course made it a very difficult run.
      The overall first place finisher in the men's division was Jeffrey Stein, from Washington, D.C., with a time of 54:29:01 (he also won in 2016, and was third in 2017), and the overall first place finisher in the women's division was Julia Roman-Duval, from Columbia, MD, with a time of 59:10:29 (she also won in 2017). In the youngest age group (14 and under), the winner in the boy's division was 12-year-old Billy Foulk, with a time of 1:17:17, and the winner in the girl's division was 14-year-old Haley Walker, with a time of 1:25:03. In the oldest age group (75 and older), the winner in the men's division was Harold Rosen, with a time of 1:37:50, and the winner in the women's division was Molly Sherwood, with a time of 1:58:31.
      Julia Roman-Duval, the overall women's first place finisher, is an astrophysicist at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. She runs with the Howard County Striders, and competed at the women's Olympic Marathon trials in 2016, finishing 50th out of 206 runners.
      I finished in 439th place out of 2529 finishers at the Annapolis Ten Mile Run, in 4th place out of 59 in my age group, with a time of 1:25:15 (for a pace of 8:31.15 per mile). I was pleased with the results, since this was a better time than I did in June over a course that wasn't nearly as difficult as this one.

Two of Nagarjuna's Most Radical Suggestions

Nagarjuna (c. 150–c. 250 CE) was an Indian philosopher who founded the Madhyamika school of Mahayana Buddhism. His best-known work is the Mulamadhyamakakarika (Fundamental Verses on the Middle Way). His other writings included the Yuktisastiki (Sixty Verses on Reasoning), and the Shunyatasaptati (Seventy Verses on Emptiness).

      His disciple Arydeva (c. 200-c. 250 CE) became a leader of the Madhyamika school. Arydeva’s best-known work was the Catuhshataka (Four Hundred Verses).

      In the Fundamental Verses on the Middle Way, Nagarjuna says that “whatever is dependently arisen is unceasing, unborn, unannihilated, impermanent, not coming, not going, without distinction, without identity, and free from conceptual construction.”¹ Nothing arises without causes or conditions (of its existence). Everything depends on causes and conditions of arising (or existence), and therefore the ultimate reality of things is that no real distinctions can be made between them. Our attempt to make distinctions between things is based on our perception of their conventional, but not their ultimate reality. When we make distinctions between things, we act as if they had self-nature or self-existence. But the ultimate reality of things is that they are dependently arisen. Their arising depends on causes and conditions beyond themselves. Everything shares unbornness (a lack of self-nature), impermanence, a lack of self-identity, and a lack of inherent existence. Nothing is self-caused or self-existent. Everything is empty of self-nature, self-causation, and self-existence.

      Nagarjuna also says that if everything is empty, then there is no (self-)arising and no (self-)ceasing or passing away (Chapter XXV). Thus, he makes the radical suggestion that if everything is empty, then nirvana is just as empty as samsara, and there is no real difference between them. Nirvana is not something that can be “attained,” and not something that “arises.” It's also not something that is permanent or compounded, and it's not something that can be possessed or relinquished. It's not self-caused or inherently existent, and neither is samsara. Nirvana is neither (self-)existent nor (self-)non-existent, so those who abide in nirvana are likewise neither said to be (self- or inherently) existent nor said to be (self- or inherently) nonexistent.

      Nagajuna also makes the radical suggestion that if everything is empty, then the Four Noble Truths are empty. The Four Noble Truths do not inherently exist, and neither does the Dharma (the teaching of the Buddha). Suffering doesn't inherently exist (it's not self-arisen or self-existent; its arising or existence depends on causes and conditions beyond itself), and neither do arising or ceasing. To be able to truly recognize suffering, as well as its “arising,” its “cessation,” and “the path to its cessation,” we must be able to recognize dependent arising (Chapter XXIV).

FOOTNOTES

¹Nagarjuna, The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way: Nagarjuna’s Mulamadhyamakakarika, translated by Jay L. Garfield (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 2.

Baltimore Ceasefire Parade, Saturday, August 4, 2018

The Baltimore Ceasefire Parade took place from noon to 1 p.m. today on Park Heights Ave. This was the first Ceasefire event I've attended. It was very inspiring and uplifting. Baltimore Ceasefire 365 is a movement whose goal is to prevent murder and gun violence in Baltimore. This is the fifth Ceasefire weekend (the first took place in August 2017, and they've continued taking place every three months.) Among those who could be seen in the crowd at the corner of Park Heights and Belvedere prior to today's parade were Erricka Bridgeford, a Ceasefire organizer, and Catherine Pugh, Mayor of Baltimore. The goal for this weekend was for there to be no murders or shootings in Baltimore from Friday, August 3rd thru Sunday, August 5th. (Tragically, two people were killed and five were injured in multiple shootings by the end of the weekend.)