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Two Kinds of Truth is the 31st novel written by Michael Connelly . It features LAPD detective Harry Bosch and is the twentieth in the series of books featuring the character . Also, this is the eighth to feature Los Angeles defense attorney Mickey Haller . The book was released on 31 October 2017 in the United States .

• 1 Development
• 3 Characters
• 4.1 Part 1 - Cappers
• 4.2 Part 2 - The South Side of Nowhere
• 4.3 Part 3 - The Intervention
• 5 Audiobook
• 6 References

Development [ ]

Synopsis [ ].

Harry Bosch is back as a volunteer working cold cases for the San Fernando police and is called out to a local drug store where a young pharmacist has been murdered. Bosch and the town’s 3-person detective squad sift through the clues, which lead into the dangerous, big business world of prescription drug abuse.

Meanwhile, an old case from Bosch’s LAPD days comes back to haunt him when a long-imprisoned killer claims Harry framed him and seems to have new evidence to prove it. Bosch left the LAPD on bad terms, so his former colleagues aren’t keen to protect his reputation. He must fend for himself in clearing his name and keeping a clever killer in prison.

The two unrelated cases wind around each other like strands of barbed wire. Along the way Bosch discovers that there are two kinds of truth: the kind that sets you free and the kind that leaves you buried in darkness.

Characters [ ]

• Detective Harry Bosch
• LA Defense Attorney Mickey Haller - Bosch's half-brother
• Esme Tavares - subject in unsolved missing person case
• Detective Bella Lourdes - San Fernando PD, Bosch's current partner
• Detective Oscar Luzon - San Fernando PD, colleague in Bosch's squad
• Detective Danny Sisto - San Fernando PD, colleague in Bosch's squad
• Captain Trevino - San Fernando PD, Bosch's commanding officer
• Chief of Police Anthony Valdez - San Fernando PD
• Detective Lucia Soto - LAPD open unsolved unit, Bosch's former partner
• Detective Bob Tapscott - LAPD open unsolved unit, Soto's new partner
• Horace Tapscott - late South LA jazz musician and community activist (non-fictional mentioned character)
• LA Assistant District Attorney Alex Kennedy
• Preston Borders - convicted murderer seeking exoneration
• Detective "Huey" - San Fernando PD, robbery squad
• Detective "Duey" - San Fernando PD, robbery squad
• Detective "Luey" - San Fernando PD, robbery squad
• LA District Attorney Tak Kobayashi
• Danielle Skyler - murder victim, killed by Preston Borders
• Donna Timmons - murder victim, believed to have been killed by Preston Borders
• Vicki Novotny - murder victim, believed to have been killed by Preston Borders
• Lucas John Olmer - deceased convicted rapist, implicated in Preston Borders case

Chapters [ ]

Part 1 - cappers [ ].

• Chapter 1 - Bosch is interrupted while working on the Esmerelda Tavarez cold case in the cells at San Fernando PD by a visit from his old partner Lucia Soto. Soto is accompanied by ADA Alex Kennedy and has bad news - a murderer Bosch put away, Preston Borders, is seeking exoneration by claiming Bosch framed him.
• Chapter 2 - Bosch is thrown by the challenge against the solid case he built against Borders. He learns that a review of the samples obtained at the crime scene has shown DNA from another man who died in prison years earlier. Bosch is convinced of Borders' guilt and initially believes the evidence must have been tampered with. However, Soto shows him video of them reviewing the evidence and the intact seals they found. Lourdes enters with news of a double homicide at a pharmacy. Bosch is informed that should Borders be exonerated he plans on suing both the city and Bosch personally.
• Chapter 3 - Bosch arrives at the pharmacy and takes command of the crime scene. He nominates Lourdes as lead investigator and tells her to observe everything. Forensics arrives.
• Chapter 4 - Bosch explores the scene, discovers a ~50 yr old male pharmacist shot at close range behind the counter of the small family pharmacy. A second body of a male in early 20s was found shot three times from behind evidently trying to flee, including a point-blank shot in the rectum. Two different weapons were used and no shell casings were found. The pharmacy had surveillance cameras. Pills were scattered around the floor, and there are signs others had been stolen. Soto calls, saying she's trying to deflect blame to Harry's former partner or the lab. Harry requests all files, and Soto declines. The wife and mother of victims arrives and Lourdes agrees to interview her, with Bosch advising her to focus on the son, saying the rectal shot indicates the shooter knew him and wanted to make a statement.
• Chapter 5 - Cameras reveal two ski-masked gunmen executed the pharmacists in a well planned operation. Bosch returns home and receives an envelope from Soto containing the Skyler files and spends the night reviewing them, remembering how aspiring actors Border and Skyler met in a casting agency.
• Chapter 6 - Bosch continues to review the old file, documenting the missing seahorse necklace from the victim and taking Borders in for questioning. He's charged and a search of his house finds the seahorse necklace and two other pieces of women's jewelry hidden which were traceable to other victims, but without strong enough connections to Borders, no charges were made. The seahorse necklace proves to be the key piece of evidence at trial, and a conviction is reached. Borders is sentenced to death.
• Chapter 7 - Bosch calls Mickey Haller who informs him that he is unlikely to be held personally financially liable in any lawsuits that follow the Borders case, but warns him that ADA Kennedy is not to be trusted.
• Chapter 8 - The detective team meets, reviews the video. Interviews with the mother indicate the victims were not getting along at the time of their deaths.
• Chapter 9 - Bosch contacts Soto, who implies there is more in the old file than new DNA evidence. Lourdes informs Bosch that records confirm that Junior had filed a complaint against a clinic in nearby Pacoima for overprescribing oxycodone. His father had been filling the prescriptions, either enjoying the additional sales or fearful of the consequences of not filling them. Junior declares he will no longer fill them. Bosch and Lourdes visit the clinic where a van of suspected "pill shills" arrive and leave 20 minutes later, with the van taking them to nearby Whiteman Airport. The van leaves, and a small plane takes off.
• Chapter 10 - They visit air traffic control to ask after the small plane, where they are told that the plane flies regularly with 15-20 vagrants flying in and out most days. The owners of the craft receive paperwork in Calexico and are not required to file flight plans and flights are also free to come and go at any time in the evening, when the airport is unsecured and even used for drag racers. The pilot reportedly has a Russian accent. Bosch inspects the records of the comings-and-goings of the airfield, with the involved plane being used most often. Video footage exists for up to a month. The plane should be equipped with a transponder and can be tracked with a day's notice.
• Chapter 11 - Bosch and Lourdes meet with the Medical Board, where Bosch's former partner Jerry Edgar is now an investigator. Edgar informs them that Pacoima Pain and Urgent Care is headed by a Dr. Efram Herrera who has been writing hundreds of prescriptions per week. Edgar that "cappers" recruit unscrupulous doctors and pharmacists to fill prescriptions and provide pills for destitute addicts, with the pills kept by the cappers for resale. Edgar notes that a Russian-Armenian cartel is one of the illicit industry's largest players and is run by a "Santos" who is supposedly based in the desert in mobile caravans, and that the DEA is aware of the operation. Edgar provides the contact to DEA Agent Charlie Hovan.
• Chapter 12 - Bosch receives a call from the prison where he learns that Borders and the deceased Olmer have the same lawyer. They return to the office where video from the pharmacy shows an altercation between the van driver and Jose, followed by an argument later between father and son. They agree to get a search warrant for Whiteman Airport and to involve the DEA.
• Chapter 13 - Continuing to work through the Borders case file, Bosch learns how the proceedings to vacate the conviction were initiated, and that Borders has told investigators that Bosch had planted the seahorse necklace in his possession before the original arrest.
• Chapter 14 - Watching over the video footage at the airfield, the detectives see two men land and later fly out of the airport, allowing ample time for the shootings. Bosch develops a plan to approach the van driver and attempt to scare him into giving up his bosses within their organization. They also take the clipboard with records of air traffic from the air-field. Harry talks to Maddie as he drives home and, upon arriving, finds Edgar waiting outside for his return. Edgar tells him that he had vouched for Bosch with DEA Agent Hovan. He says he is unsatisfied with his job and misses Detective work, and has come to ask if he could be involved in the case. Bosch invites him to join the war-room meeting the following morning.
• Chapter 15 - Bosch notices in the old records that Olmer's DNA had been supplied earlier to his attorney and that there was no record of it being returned to the State. Haller calls and Bosch tells him he wants to use his services to oppose the release of Borders, but that at this stage he did not have any proof that the evidence box had been tampered with. Haller tells Bosch that Borders previous lawyer David 'Legal' Siegel was their father's former partner, and that he was still alive and remains close to Haller, and that Haller will set up a meeting between Bosch and the aging lawyer. Bosch arrives at the war-room meeting, with Edgar and Hovan both in attendance.
• Chapter 16 - Hovan suggests that instead of scaring a driver into reporting a higher-up will not work. Boss Santos will be too insulated for that to work. He proposes Bosch go undercover with the vagrants who are all similarly aged to him and insert him into the group of pill-shills. Bosch agrees.
• Chapter 17 - Bosch meets Haller and Siegel at a nursing home. In a video recording, Haller interviews Siegel over the original Borders case. After summarizing the original case, Siegel states he's aware of the new proceedings and that he's been accused of suborning perjury. Siegel denies this and says that he had urged Borders to not testify at all, and that the detectives that investigated the case were unimpeachable.
• Chapter 18 - Bosch realizes that lawyer Cronyn was the architect of his framing, motivated by the money from the ensuing civil suit. Having preserved Olmer's DNA, he then approached Borders with the opportunity to be cleared and receive a large settlement. Bosch considers the means by which the DNA could have been planted on the victim's pajamas in the sealed evidence box.
• Chapter 19 - Harry meets Haller's investigator Cisco to help prepare him for undercover life as an opioid addict. Cisco gives him a knee brace and a cane that turns out to contain a concealed weapon. They watch the box opening video together and Cisco spots another man watching from outside as the box was being opened who Bosch recognizes as a civilian employee of the evidence center. Bosch enlists Cisco's help to track the property officer. Cisco tails him home and calls Bosch informing him that the staffer's name is Terry Spencer and that he may be in debt against his home. Bosch places a call to Cronyn posing as Spencer at it becomes clear that they have some kind of relationship.
• Chapter 20 - Bosch tells Cisco to carefully follow Spencer further, and alerts Cisco that Spencer is likely aware of the surveillance. Haller confirms that Spencer has major urgent financial trouble and is about to lose his home. Haller then tells Bosch that Spencer's foreclosure lawyer later became Cronyn's wife.
• Chapter 21 - Bosch and Haller develop a theory on how Spencer became involved. Cisco sends them both a video of Spencer meeting with Kathy Corbyn.

Part 2 - The South Side of Nowhere [ ]

• Chapter 22 - Bosch goes to a pain clinic and is searched by two Russians at the same same time as the DEA busts their other shills
• Chapter 23 - Russians return with prescription and recruit Bosch as a replacement shill. He has his phone and gun confiscated and is put in a van, then boards a plane filled with 11 other "pill shills" - addicts who are working for the drug ring to collect prescription medications in slave like conditions. The plane transports them to a desert camp where the addicts live.
• Chapter 24 - Bosch arrives at the encampment, and gets in a scuffle with a man named Brody, costing Brody a second pill. He is given food and a cot in an old school bus and warned by a tattooed woman that Brody will be coming for him.
• Chapter 25 - Bosch is attacked by Brody in his cot but easily subdues him. He then asks another man where the bathroom is and uses that as an excuse to explore the camp further. He sees the two killers playing cards in a room, with a naked woman on the sofa beside them. Security notice him and he claims to be retuning from the toilet. Questioned by the assassin he keeps his cover, despite having to play a round of Russian roulette with his own doctored gun.
• Chapter 26 - Bosch and the pill shills are flown and driven around the state to collect pills from various pharmacies. Back in LA, Lourdes waits for him in a pharmacy and tells him they lost him the previous day. He tells her the location of the camp and asks her to arrange a raid, removing Brody and the tattooed woman who had tipped him off to the risk. The van flees without the 4 people arrested in the raid.
• Chapter 27 - Bosch is woken Sunday morning and bundled into a plane by the two Russians. It takes off, with Bosch sure he's not supposed to survive the journey.
• Chapter 28 - One of the Russians shows Bosch a newspaper article on the DNA case, recognising Bosch from the photo. He admits to the pharmacy killing as well as the killing of Santos then attacks Bosch who produced the blade from the cane and stabbed him to death. Bosch took his gun and the other Russian jumps from the plane into the water below. Bosch approaches the pilot, directs him to return to LA and radios control to inform Hovan at DEA of the status.
• Chapter 29 - Bosch is taken in for a debriefing where he first reads the LA Times article. He denies it to those in attendance and explains what happened in the plane.
• Chapter 30 - Bosch cleans up, finds an envelope on his table, then drives home to a mountain of messages from his daughter, lawyer, a journalist and former partner.
• Chapter 31 - Harry tells Maddie the full story of the pharmacy murders and the Borders frame. She leaves and Bosch calls to check on the tattooed woman - Elizabeth - and Brody. Both had been released. He leaves to try to find her.
• Chapter 32 - Edgar tells Bosch of a nearby clinic where Elizabeth may go. He finds Brody waiting for her. Brody attacks him and is beaten once again. Bosch raids the clinic and finds her. He accosts the doctor and learns that he had had sex with Elizabeth. Edgar arrives to the clinic.
• Chapter 33 - The doctor slips out. Bosch takes Elizabeth and places her in the care of recovering addict Cisco.
• Chapter 34 - Bosch and Haller meet. Haller informs him that Spencer had been hidden but Cisco had tracked him and he's been subpoenaed to appear in court. Haller requests Bosch track down the victim's sister Dani as a potential witness.
• Chapter 35 - Bosch returns to SFPD an finds media waiting. Lourdes shows him a video of the second Russian's body being recovered from the water and learns additional background on their identities and organization. He then looks into Dani's whereabouts and finds an updated address for her.

Part 3 - The Intervention [ ]

• Chapter 36 - Bosch and Maddie head to the courthouse. One by one witnesses, lawyers and the DA team arrive. Finally Borders is led into the courtroom.
• Chapter 37 - Court convenes. Haller's motion is heard first, over objections from both the state and the defense. However the judge rules that the LA Times article had damaged his reputation and he was allowed to answer to that in his own defense. Spencer arrives, shocking the defense. Haller asks for a private meeting in chambers to present his case. The judge clears the courtroom instead.
• Chapter 38 - Haller lays out the entire conspiracy to frame Bosch, free Borders and sue the city for the judge, ending with Spencer's willingness to go on the stand.
• Chapter 39 - Borders laughs and condemns his lawyers. The state withdraws its motions. Borders is taken out of the court. The judge cautions the Corbyns, finds then the n contempt and asks a deputy to take them into custody. The judge says he will be telling the media what had happened and demands the State apologize publicly to Bosch. Cisco tells Bosch that Spencer planned to take the 5th.
• Chapter 40 - Bosch briefs an LA Times reporter, sees Maddie off, then joins Haller and Cisco at a bar. He tells Haller he knows he tipped the LA Times previously to make it public and ensure the reputation defense strategy would be valid. Bosch objected to the strategy, saying it nearly got him killed undercover and damaged Maddie's opinion of him. A staredown follows and Cisco brokers a tentative peace with a "cheers" and glass-clink.
• Chapter 41 - Bosch arrives home and finds Soto waiting. She knows now that Spencer was taking the 5th, but got a warrant, searched his house, and learned that he was able to open and reseal old boxes with a stockpile of old tape he'd collected. He'd also been stealing and pawning old evidence when it was valuable. The Corbyns are negotiating their future. She apologises and Harry accepts. He asks her to pull the file on Elizabeth's murdered daughter - Daisy Clayton - and she agrees.
• Chapter 42 - Bosch opens his safe and takes all his emergency earthquake cash - about $10000 - and heads out, calling Lourdes for a rehab center recommendation. He gives the money to Cisco and asks him to take her to a center. He returns home and finds the envelope from 3 days earlier. It's a tip on a cold case for Esmerelda Tavarez, the case he'd been working on at the beginning.
• Chapter 43 - Angela - the author of the note - turns out to be Esmerelda, having fled an abusive relationship and abandoned her baby daughter, moving to Utah and then later back to LA and living under another new name. She has surfaced now so that a lawyer could process her divorce and she could remarry.
• Chapter 44 - Harry returns to his storage cell to process the paperwork and mull the cases. He calls Soto to ask about Daisy, she's reviewing it and he asks to be involved in the investigation.

Audiobook [ ]

The audiobook is narrated by Titus Welliver , who plays Harry Bosch in the television adaptation Bosch .

References [ ]

• Amazon.com product page
• 1 Eleanor Wish
• 2 Mickey Haller
• 3 Irvin Irving

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Home » Two Kinds Of Truth (2017) » Two Kinds Of Truth Excerpt

Bosch was in cell 3 of the old San Fernando jail, looking through files from one of the Esme Tavares boxes, when a heads-up text came in from Bella Lourdes over in the detective bureau.

LAPD and DA heading your way. Trevino told them where you are.

Bosch was where he was at the start of most weeks; sitting at his makeshift desk, a wooden door he had borrowed from the Public Works yard and placed across two stacks of file boxes. After sending Lourdes a thank-you text, he opened the memo app on his phone and turned on the recorder. He put the phone screen-down on the desk and partially covered it with a file from the Tavares box. It was a just-in-case move. He had no idea why people from the District Attorney’s Office and his old police department were coming to see him first thing on a Monday morning. He had not received a call alerting him to the visit, though to be fair, cellular connection within the steel bars of the cell was virtually nonexistent. Still, he knew that the surprise visit was often a tactical move. Bosch’s relationship with the LAPD since his forced retirement two years earlier had been strained at best and his attorney had urged him to protect himself by documenting all interactions with the department.

While he waited for them, he went back to the file at hand. He was looking through statements taken in the weeks after Tavares had disappeared. He had read them before but he believed that the case files often contained the secret to cracking a cold case. It was all there if you could find it. A logic discrepancy, a hidden clue, a contradicting statement, an investigator’s handwritten note in the margin of a report—all of these things had helped Bosch clear cases in a career four decades long and counting.

There were three file boxes on the Tavares case. Officially it was a missing-persons case but it had gathered three feet of stacked files over fifteen years because it was classified as such only because a body had never been found.

When Bosch came to the San Fernando Police Department two years before to volunteer his skills looking at cold case files, he had asked Chief Anthony Valdez where to start. The chief, who had been with the department twenty-five years, told him to start with Esmerelda Tavares. It was the case that haunted Valdez as an investigator, but as police chief he could not give adequate time to it.

In two years working in San Fernando part-time, Bosch had reopened several cases and closed nearly a dozen—multiple rapes and murders among them. But he came back to Esme Tavares whenever he had an hour here and there to look through the file boxes. She was beginning to haunt him too. A young mother who vanished, leaving a sleeping baby in a crib. It might be classified as a missing-persons case but Bosch didn’t have to read through even the first box to know what the chief and every investigator before him knew. Foul play was most likely involved. Esme Tavares was more than missing. She was dead.

Bosch heard the metal door to the jail wing open and then footsteps on the concrete floor that ran in front of the three group cells. He looked up through the iron bars and was surprised by who he saw.

“Hello, Harry.”

It was his former partner, Lucia Soto, along with two men in suits whom Bosch didn’t recognize. The fact that Soto had apparently not let him know they were coming put Bosch on alert. It was a forty-minute drive from both the LAPD’s headquarters and the D.A.’s office downtown to San Fernando. That left plenty of time to type out a text and say, “Harry, we are heading your way.” But that hadn’t happened, so he assumed that the two men he didn’t know had put the clamps on Soto.

“Lucia, long time,” Bosch said. “How are you, partner?”

It looked like none of the three were interested in entering Bosch’s cell, even if it had been repurposed. He stood up, deftly grabbing his phone from beneath the files on the desk and transferring it to his shirt pocket, placing the screen against his chest. He walked to the bars and stuck his hand through. Though he had talked to Soto intermittently by phone and text over the last year, he had not seen her. Her appearance had changed. She had lost weight and she looked drawn and tired, her dark eyes worried. Rather than shaking his hand, she squeezed it. Her grip was tight and he took that as a message: be careful here.

It was easy for Bosch to figure out who was who between the two men. Both were in their early forties and dressed in suits that most likely came off the rack at Men’s Wearhouse. But the man on the left’s pinstripes were showing wear from the inside out. Bosch knew that meant he was wearing a shoulder rig beneath the jacket and the hard edge of his weapon’s slide was wearing through the fabric. Bosch guessed that the silk lining had already been chewed up. In six months the suit would be toast.

“Bob Tapscott,” he said. “Lucky Lucy’s partner now.”

Tapscott was black and Bosch wondered if he was related to Horace Tapscott, the late South L.A. musician who had been vital in preserving the community’s jazz identity.

“And I’m Alex Kennedy, deputy district attorney,” said the second man. “We’d like to talk to you if you have a few minutes.”

“Uh, sure,” Bosch said. “Step into my office.”

He gestured toward the confines of the former cell now fitted with steel shelves containing case files. There was a long communal bench left over from the cell’s previous existence as a drunk tank. Bosch had files from different cases lined up to review on the bench. He started stacking them to make room for his visitors to sit, even though he was pretty sure they wouldn’t.

“Actually, we talked to your Captain Trevino, and he says we can use the war room over in the detective bureau,” Tapscott said. “It will be more comfortable. Do you mind?”

“I don’t mind if the captain doesn’t mind,” Bosch said. “What’s this about anyway?”

“Preston Borders,” Soto said.

Bosch was walking toward the open door of the cell. The name put a slight pause in his step.

“Let’s wait until we’re in the war room,” Kennedy said quickly. “Then we can talk.”

Soto gave Bosch a look that seemed to impart the message that she was under the D.A.’s thumb on this case. He grabbed his keys and the padlock off the desk, stepped out of the cell and then slid the metal door closed with a heavy clang. The key to the cell had disappeared long ago and Bosch wrapped a bicycle chain around the bars and secured the door with the padlock.

They left the old jail and walked through the Public Works equipment yard out to First Street. While waiting for traffic to pass, Bosch casually pulled his phone out of his pocket and checked for messages. He had received nothing from Soto or anyone else prior to the arrival of the party from downtown. He kept the recording going and put the phone back in his pocket.

Soto spoke, but not about the case that had brought her up to San Fernando.

“Is that really your office, Harry?” she asked. “I mean, they put you in a jail cell?”

“Yep,” Bosch said. “That was the drunk tank and sometimes I think I can still smell the puke when I open it up in the morning. Supposedly five or six guys hung themselves in there over the years. Supposed to be haunted. But it’s where they keep the cold case files, so it’s where I do my work. They store old evidence boxes in the other two cells, so easy access all around. And usually nobody to bother me.”

He hoped the implication of the last line was clear to his visitors.

“So they have no jail?” Soto asked. “They have to run bodies down to Van Nuys?”

Bosch pointed across the street to the police station they were heading toward.

“Only the women go down to Van Nuys,” Bosch said. “We have a jail here for the men. In the station. State-of-the-art, single cells. I’ve even stayed over a few times. Beats the bunk room at the PAB, with everybody snoring.”

She threw him a look as if to say he had changed if he was willing to sleep in a jail cell. He winked at her.

“I can work anywhere,” he said. “I can sleep anywhere.”

When the traffic cleared, they crossed over to the police station and entered through the main lobby. The detective bureau had a direct entrance on the right. Bosch opened it with a key card and held the door as the others stepped in.

The bureau was no bigger than a single-car garage. At its center were three workstations tightly positioned in a single module. These belonged to the unit’s three full-time detectives, Danny Sisto, a recently promoted detective named Oscar Luzon, and Bella Lourdes, just two months back from a lengthy injured-on-duty leave. The walls of the unit were lined with file cabinets, radio chargers, a coffee setup and a printing station below bulletin boards covered in work schedules and departmental announcements. There were also numerous wanted and missing posters, including a variety showing photos of Esme Tavares that had been issued over fifteen years.

Up high on one wall was a poster depicting the iconic Disney ducks Huey, Dewey, and Louie, which were the proud nicknames of the three detectives who worked in the module below. Captain Trevino’s office was to the right and the war room was on the left. A third room was subleased to the Medical Examiner’s Office and used by two coroner’s investigators who covered the entire San Fernando Valley and points north.

All three of the detectives were in their respective work stations. They had recently cracked a major car theft ring operating out of the city and an attorney for one of the suspects had derisively referred to them as Huey, Dewey and Louie. They now took the group nickname as a badge of honor.

Bosch saw Lourdes peeking over a partition from her desk. He gave her a nod of thanks for the heads-up. It was also a sign that so far things were okay.

Bosch led the visitors into the war room. It was a soundproof room with walls lined with whiteboards and flat-screen monitors. At center was a boardroom-style table with eight leather chairs around it. The room was designed to be the command post for major crime investigations, task force operations, and coordinating responses to public emergencies such as earthquakes and riots. The reality was that such incidents were rare and the room was used primarily as a lunchroom, the broad table and comfortable chairs perfect for group lunches. The room carried the distinct odor of Mexican food. The owner of Magaly’s Tamales up on Maclay Avenue routinely dropped off free food for the troops and it was usually devoured in the war room.

“Have a seat,” Bosch said.

Tapscott and Soto sat on one side of the table, while Kennedy went around and sat across from them. Bosch took a chair at one end of the table so he would have angles on all three visitors.

“So, what’s going on?” he said.

“Well, let’s properly introduce ourselves,” Kennedy began. “You, of course, know Detective Soto from your work together in the Open-Unsolved Unit. And now you’ve met Detective Tapscott. They have been working with me on a review of a homicide case you handled almost thirty years ago.”

“Preston Borders,” Bosch said. “How is Preston? Still on death row at the Q last time I checked.”

“He’s still there.”

“So why are you looking at the case?”

Kennedy had pulled his chair close and had his arms folded and his elbows on the table. He drum-rolled the fingers of his left hand as if deciding how to answer Bosch’s question, even though it was clear that everything about this surprise visit was rehearsed.

“I am assigned to the Conviction Integrity Unit,” Kennedy said. “I’m sure you’ve heard of it. I have used Detectives Tapscott and Soto on some of the cases I’ve handled because of their skill in working cold cases.”

Bosch knew that the CIU was new and had been put into place after he had left the LAPD. Its formation was the fulfillment of a campaign promise made during a heated election in which the policing of the police was a hot-ticket debate issue. The newly elected D.A.—Tak Kobayashi—had promised to create a unit that would respond to the seeming groundswell of cases where new forensic technologies had led to hundreds of exonerations of people imprisoned across the country. Not only was new science leading the way, but old science once thought to be unassailable as evidence was being debunked and swinging open prison doors for the innocent.

As soon as Kennedy mentioned his assignment, Bosch put everything together and knew what was going on. Borders, the man thought to have killed three women but convicted of only one murder, was making a final grab at freedom after nearly thirty years on death row.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me, right?” Bosch said. “Borders? Really? You are seriously looking at that case?”

He looked from Kennedy to his old partner Soto.

He felt totally betrayed.

“Lucia?” he said

“Harry,” she said. “You need to listen.”

Bosch felt like the walls of the war room were closing in on him. In his mind and in reality, he had put Borders away for good. He didn’t count on the sadistic sex murderer ever getting the needle, but death row was still its own particular hell, one that was harsher than any sentence that put a man in general population. The isolation of it was what Borders deserved. He went up to San Quentin as a twenty-six-year-old man. To Bosch that meant fifty-plus years of solitary confinement. Less only if he got lucky. More inmates died of suicide than the needle on death row in California.

“It’s not as simple as you think,” Kennedy said.

“Really?” Bosch said. “Tell me why.”

“The obligation of the Conviction Integrity Unit is to consider all legitimate petitions that come to it. Our review process is the first stage, and that happens in house before the cases go to the LAPD or other law enforcement. When a case meets a certain threshold of concern, we go to the next step and call in law enforcement to carry out a due diligence investigation.”

“And of course everyone is sworn to secrecy at that point.”

Bosch looked at Soto as he said it. She looked away.

“Absolutely,” Kennedy said.

“I don’t know what evidence Borders or his lawyer brought to you, but it’s bullshit,” Bosch said. “He murdered Danielle Skyler and everything else is a scam.”

Kennedy didn’t respond but from his look Bosch could tell he was surprised he still remembered the victim’s name.

“Yeah, thirty years later I remember her name,” Bosch said. “I also remember Donna Timmons and Vicki Novotney, the two victims your office claimed we didn’t have enough evidence to file on. Were they part of this due diligence you conducted?”

“Harry,” Soto said, trying to calm him.

“Borders didn’t bring any new evidence,” Kennedy said. “It was already there.”

That hit Bosch like a punch. He knew Kennedy was talking about the physical evidence from the case. The implication was that there was evidence from the crime scene or elsewhere that cleared Borders of the crime. The greater implication was incompetence or, worse, malfeasance—that he had missed the evidence or intentionally withheld it.

“What are we talking about here?” he asked.

“DNA,” Kennedy said. “It wasn’t part of the original case in ’eighty-eight. The case was prosecuted before DNA was allowed into use in criminal cases in California. It wasn’t introduced and accepted by a court up in Ventura for another year. In L.A. County it was a year after that.”

“We didn’t need DNA,” Bosch said. “We found the victim’s property hidden in Borders’s apartment.”

Kennedy nodded to Soto.

“We went to property and pulled the box,” she said. “You know the routine. We took clothing collected from the victim to the lab and they put it through the serology protocol.”

“They did a protocol thirty-years ago,” Bosch said. “But back then, they looked for ABO markers instead of DNA. And they found nothing. You’re going to tell me that—”

“They found semen,” Kennedy said. “It was a minute amount, but this time they found it. The process has obviously gotten more sophisticated since this killing. And what they found didn’t come from Borders.”

Bosch shook his head.

“Okay, I’ll bite,” he said. “Whose was it?”

“A rapist named Lucas John Olmer,” Soto said.

Bosch had never heard of Olmer. His mind went to work, looking for the scam, the fix, but not considering that he had been wrong when he closed the cuffs around Borders’s wrists.

“Olmer’s in San Quentin, right?” he said. “This whole thing is a—”

“No, he’s not,” Tapscott said. “He’s dead.”

“Give us a little credit, Harry,” Soto added. “It’s not like we went looking for it to be this way. Olmer was never in San Quentin. He died in Corcoran two years ago and he never knew Borders.”

“We’ve checked it six ways from Sunday,” Tapscott said. “The prisons are three hundred miles apart and they did not know or communicate with each other. It’s not there.”

There was a certain gotcha smugness in the way Tapscott spoke. It gave Bosch the urge to backhand him across the mouth. Soto knew her old partner’s triggers and reached over to put a hand on Bosch’s arm.

“Harry, this is not your fault,” she said. “This is on the lab. The reports are all there. You’re right—they found nothing. They missed it back then.”

Bosch looked at her and pulled his arm back.

“You really believe that?” he said. “Because I don’t. This is Borders. He’s behind this—somehow. I know it.”

“How, Harry? We’ve looked for the fix in this.”

“Who’s been in the box since the trial?”

“No one. In fact, the last one in that box was you. The original seals were intact with your signature and the date right across the top. Show him the video.”

She nodded to Tapscott, who pulled his phone and opened up a video. He turned the screen to Bosch.

“This is at Piper Tech,” he said.

Piper Tech was a massive complex in downtown where the LAPD’s records and evidence property archives were located, along with the fingerprint unit and the aero squadron—using the football field-sized roof as a heliport. Bosch knew that the integrity protocol in the archival unit was high. Sworn officers had to provide departmental ID and fingerprints to pull evidence from any case. The boxes were opened in an examination area under twenty-four-hour video surveillance. But this was Tapscott’s own video, recorded on his phone.

“This was not our first go-round with CIU, so we have our own protocol,” Tapscott said. “One of us opens the box, one records the whole thing. Doesn’t matter that they have their own cameras down there. And as you can see, no seal is broken, no tampering.”

The video showed Soto displaying the box to the camera, turning it over so that all sides and seams could be seen as intact. The seams had been sealed with the old labels used back in the eighties. For at least the last couple of decades the department had been using red evidence tape that cracked and peeled if tampered with. Back in 1988, white rectangular stickers with LAPD Analyzed Evidence printed on them along with a signature and date line were used to seal evidence boxes. Soto manipulated the box in a bored manner and Bosch read that as her thinking they were wasting their time on this one. At least up until that point, Bosch still had her in his court.

Tapscott came in close on the seals used on the top seam of the box. Bosch could see his signature on the top center sticker along with the date September 9, 1988. He knew the date would have placed the sealing of the box at the end of the trial. Bosch had returned the evidence, sealed the box and then stored it in archives in case an appeal overturned the verdict and they had to go to trial again. That never happened with Borders and the box had presumably stayed on a shelf in archives, avoiding any intermittent clear outs of old evidence because he had also clearly marked on the box “187”—the California penal code for murder—which in the evidence room meant “don’t throw away.”

As Tapscott manipulated the box, Bosch recognized his own routine of using evidence seals on all seams of the box, including the bottom. He had always done it that way till they moved on to the red evidence tape.

“Go back,” Bosch said. “Let me just look at the signature again.”

Tapscott pulled the phone back, manipulated the video and then froze the image on the close up of the seal Bosch had signed. He held the screen out to Bosch, who leaned in to study it. The signature was faded and hard to read but it looked legit.

“Okay,” Bosch said.

Tapscott restarted the video. On the screen Soto used a box cutter attached by a wire to an examination table to slice through the labels and open the box. As she started removing items from the box, including the victim’s clothing and an envelope containing her fingernail clippings, she called each piece of property out so it would be duly recorded. Among the items she mentioned was a seahorse pendant which had been the key piece of evidence against Borders.

Before the video was over, Tapscott pulled the phone back and killed the playback. He then put the phone away.

“On and on like that,” he said. “Nobody fucked with the box, Harry. What was in it had been there since the day you sealed it after the trial.”

Something about Tapscott—a stranger—using his first name bothered Bosch. He put that annoyance aside and was silent for a long moment as he considered for the first time that his thirty-year belief that he had put a sadistic killer away for good was bogus.

“Where’d they find it?” he finally asked.

“Find what?” Kennedy asked.

“The DNA,” Bosch said.

“One microdot on the victim’s pajama bottoms,” Kennedy said.

“Easy to have missed back in ’eighty-seven,” Soto said. “They were probably just using black lights then.”

Bosch nodded.

“So what happens now?” he asked.

Soto looked at Kennedy. The question was his to answer.

“There’s a hearing on a habeas motion scheduled in Department one-oh-seven next Wednesday,” the prosecutor said. “We’ll be joining Borders’s attorneys and asking Judge Houghton to vacate the sentence and release him from death row.”

“Jesus Christ,” Bosch said.

“His lawyer has also notified the city that he’ll be filing a claim,” Kennedy continued. “We’ve been in contact with the City Attorney’s Office and they hope to negotiate a settlement. We’re probably talking well into seven figures.”

Bosch looked down at the table. He couldn’t hold anyone’s eyes.

“And I have to warn you,” Kennedy said. “If a settlement is not reached and he files a claim in federal court, he can go after you personally.”

Bosch nodded. He knew that already. A civil rights claim filed by Borders would leave Bosch personally responsible for damages if the city chose not to cover him. Since two years ago Bosch had sued the city to reinstate his full pension, it was unlikely that he would find a single soul in the City Attorney’s Office interested in indemnifying him against damages collected by Borders. The one thought that pushed through this reality was of his daughter. He could be left with nothing but an insurance policy going to her after he was gone.

“I’m sorry,” Soto said. “If there were any other…”

She didn’t finish and he slowly brought his eyes up to hers.

“Nine days,” he said.

“What do you mean?” she said.

“The hearing’s in nine days. I have until then to figure out how he did it.”

“Harry, we’ve been working this for five weeks. There’s nothing. This was before Olmer was on anybody’s radar. All we know is he wasn’t in jail at the time and he was in L.A.—we found work records. But the DNA is the DNA. On her night clothes, DNA from a man later convicted of multiple abduction-rapes. All cases home intrusions—very similar to Skyler. But without the death. I mean, look at the facts. No D.A. in the world would touch this or go any other way with it.”

Kennedy cleared his throat.

“We came here today out of respect for you, Detective, and all the cases you’ve cleared over time. We don’t want to get into an adversarial position on this. That would not be good for you.”

“And you don’t think every one of those cases I cleared are affected by this?” Bosch said. “You open the door to this guy and you might as well open it for every one of the people I sent away. If you put it on the lab—same thing. It taints everything.”

Bosch leaned back and stared at his old partner. He had at one time been her mentor. She had to know what this was doing to him.

“It is what it is,” Kennedy said. “We have an obligation. ‘Better that one hundred guilty men go free than one innocent man be imprisoned.’”

“Spare me your bastardized Ben Franklin bullshit,” Bosch said. “We found evidence connecting Borders to all three of those women’s disappearances and your office passed on two of them, some snot-nosed prosecutor saying there was not enough. This doesn’t fucking make sense. I want the nine days to do my own investigation and I want access to everything you have and everything you’ve done.”

He looked at Soto as he said it but Kennedy responded.

“Not going to happen, Detective,” he said. “As I said, we’re here as a courtesy. But you’re not on this case anymore.”

Before Bosch could counter, there was a sharp knock on the door and it was cracked open. Bella Lourdes stood there. She waved him out.

“Harry,” she said. “We need to talk right now.”

There was an urgency in her voice that Bosch could not ignore. He looked back at the others seated at the table and started to get up.

“Hold on a second,” he said. “We’re not done.”

He stood up and went to the door. Lourdes signaled him all the way out with her fingers. She closed the door behind him. He noticed that the squad room was now empty—no one in the module, the captain’s door open and his desk chair empty.

And Lourdes was clearly agitated. She used both hands to hook her short dark hair behind her ears, an anxiety habit Bosch had noticed the petite, compact detective had been exhibiting since coming back to work.

“What’s up?”

“We’ve got two down in a robbery at a farmacia on the mall.”

“Two what? Officers?”

“No, people there. Behind the counter. Two one-eighty-sevens. The chief wants all hands on this. Are you ready? You want to ride with me?”

Bosch looked back at the closed door of the war room and thought about what had been said in there. What was he going to do about it? How was he going to handle it?

“Harry, come on, I gotta go. You in or out?”

Bosch looked at her.

“Okay, let’s go.”

They moved quickly toward the exit that took them directly into the side lot where detectives and command staff parked. He pulled his phone out of his shirt pocket and turned off the recording app.

“What about them?” Lourdes said.

“Fuck them,” Bosch said. “They’ll figure it out.”

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"Two Kinds of Truth" Quiz

By Michael Connelly

mystery | 417 pages | Published in 2017

Harry Bosch is back as a volunteer working cold cases for the San Fernando Police Department and is called out to a local drug store where a young pharmacist has been murdered. Bosch and the town's 3-person detective squad sift through the clues, which lead into the dangerous, big business world of pill mills and prescription drug abuse.Meanwhile, an old case from Bosch's LAPD days comes back to haunt him when a long-imprisoned killer claims Harry framed him, and seems to have new evidence to prove it. Bosch left the LAPD on bad terms, so his former colleagues aren't keen to protect his reputation. He must fend for himself in clearing his name and keeping a clever killer in prison.The two unrelated cases wind around each other like strands of barbed wire. Along the way Bosch discovers that there are two kinds of truth: the kind that sets you free and the kind that leaves you buried in darkness.

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Test your knowledge about the book "Two Kinds of Truth". We have come up with 10 quiz questions for the book. Hit play and start testing your knowledge. Each correctly answered question gives one point.

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• How does the concept of truth play a central role in the novel 'Two Kinds of Truth' by Michael Connelly?
• Discuss the significance of the title 'Two Kinds of Truth' in relation to the events and characters in the book.
• Analyze the character of Harry Bosch in 'Two Kinds of Truth' and how he evolves throughout the story.
• Examine the theme of justice and its portrayal in 'Two Kinds of Truth'. How do the characters navigate the blurred line between right and wrong?
• Discuss the role of corruption and its impact on the plot and characters in 'Two Kinds of Truth'.
• Explore the significance of the dual narrative structure in 'Two Kinds of Truth' and how it enhances the storytelling.
• Analyze the relationship between Harry Bosch and his half-brother Mickey Haller in 'Two Kinds of Truth'. How do their interactions shape the events of the novel?
• Discuss the theme of redemption and its portrayal in 'Two Kinds of Truth'. How do the characters seek redemption, and do they ultimately find it?
• Examine the depiction of the criminal justice system in 'Two Kinds of Truth'. How does the novel critique or comment on the system?
• Analyze the role of investigative journalism in 'Two Kinds of Truth'. How does it contribute to the unraveling of the mystery?

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Truth is Blind: Hannah Arendt’s division of truth and politics

The expression ‘“Love is Blind” was coined by Chaucer in his 1405 “Merchant’s Tale”, and was yet further immortalised, by Shakespeare’s usage of the phrase in Act II, Scene I of his “Two Gentlemen of Verona”. Proverbs such as this prove so powerful because they contain an element of truth that resonates with the people that adopt it into their vocabulary. Yet it is “truths” in fact, that are perhaps the “blindest” force of all in human affairs. Whereas, the human will to love, fight, or whatever else, always has the opportunity to wax and wane; “truth” simply is, or it is not. Like the wind and the rain, it is beyond our control, but of the utmost importance to our survival.

In her seminal 1961 essay “Truth & Politics”, Hannah Arendt distinguishes ‘factual’ from ‘rational’ truth, arguing that the former is susceptible to distortion in politics. Born to secular Prussian-Jewish parents in Hanover in 1906, Arendt suffered the loss of her father aged seven. A fraught relationship with her mother persisted into adulthood. After completing her studies in philosophy at Marburg, and receiving her PhD at Heidelberg in 1929, she began her journey from German tyranny toward America, via France and Portugal, briefly working for the Paris branch of the Youth Aliyah. Her travels informed her work; her philosophy focused heavily upon the nature of evil and politics.

Arendt defines factual truth as truths derived from the record of events in the ever-changing landscape of human affairs. Rational truths are those which are largely derived from solitary thought, such as those of mathematics and philosophy. Arendt explains that the political realm possesses the exclusive ability to ‘guarantee reality’ to mankind. She later states that the power within it is based on the opinion of the realm, that being the people who make up the polis. If this realm ‘guarantees reality’, then it follows that when the reality of factual truth disrupts the political realm’s pursuit of change that she describes, those seeking change will distort factual truths to forge the reality least disruptive to their aims.

By disregarding the idea of a permanent reality supported by factual truths, those in power attempt to create an inaccurate image of the past most convenient to their political aims. This illustrates how the manipulation of the definition of truth to resemble something created by the mind, akin to an individual’s opinion, rather than an absolute, is common in societies where every opinion is deemed of equal merit. A striking example of the aforementioned phenomenon, would, of course, be the ideological and cultural relativism that has diffused to wider society via politics and academia in the post-war era.

This vulnerability is exclusive to factual truths. The rational truths of philosophy and mathematics are generally irrelevant to political opinion. It is not these truths that are required to be evaluated as a prerequisite for proposing a change in human affairs. Arendt uses Hobbes’ admission that ‘dominion oversteps’ its boundaries when it ‘assaults rational truths’. This implies that humans are eternally accustomed, and thus impartial, to the attack on factual truths by political power. It is seemingly impossible to eliminate immediately this practice. This also implies that it is only factual truth is under threat of political distortion. Just as Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I’s proclamation “Let justice be done, though the world perish”, is now seen to signify nothing mo Rational truths are derived in solitude.

This is another reason why Arendt proposes that factual truth is particularly vulnerable to political distortion. She traces this tension back to the clash in Plato’s Republic between ‘life in plural’, being a citizen, and ‘life in singular’, being a philosopher. Factual truths methods of being proven lie upon shaky grounds. For example, testimonies may be intentionally falsified or misremembered. Thus, factual truths might conceivably be destroyed, as they only verifiably exist in the lives and documents that prove their existence.

Unlike mathematical proofs, Arendt stresses that solitary thought could never have the power to restore the knowledge of millennia of documents which support factual truths. She provides the examples of mass deception under the totalitarian regimes of Stalin and Hitler. This made such a world imaginable to her seasoned twentieth-century readers. Arendt was acutely aware that the factual truths of our past are susceptible to destruction and distortion by ruthless political authorities.

Critical to Arendt’s thesis is that, unlike the opposites of rational truth, namely error or illusion, the opposite of factual truth is deceit. To lie constitutes an action for the purpose of changing a situation. Thus, the enemy of factual truth is always political by its very nature, whilst illusion and error that might counter a scientific truth, for example, are not. Yet, truth can be translated into a form of action, and only then shall it possess the potential for political persuasion that it is generally powerless to access alone. Furthermore, Arendt suggests that any political power relies on the consensus of opinion (generated by persuasion), whereas truth simply exists whether there is consensus or not. Truth represents a direct and natural opponent to the opinion, which is the foundation for political change.

However, Arendt’s characterisation of truths as despotic is perhaps the most comforting element of the essay. Rather than attempting to provoke connotations of unbound evil in the reader’s mind, Arendt is proving how truth is always beyond the control of political powers. Truths are beyond our control Truth has a monopoly on itself, there will never be a permanent concrete substitute for it in our universe.

Yet this very fortitude is what makes them vulnerable to political authorities. She also stresses that though factual truths are uniquely politically relevant, they are impotent in their ability to be political, as they alone cannot inspire political movements. It is true that a factual truth itself may confirm something of the utmost relevance to politics such as a governmental corruption scandal. However, it is the reaction shaped by the people that may inspire political action, not the fact unsupported. This means that the fact is vulnerable to political distortion by these actors, and is powerless to prevent this when alone. It is true that rational truth also possesses this inertia, yet it rarely possesses relevance to threaten political power. Thus, factual truths always face the risk of being distorted into the murky category of opinion when they enter the political realm. Facts alone cannot function to support political aims. This could mean the public elevation of some facts over others to frame a certain narrative’s aims or the placing of facts and unverifiable opinion on the same relative footing.

Arendt thus demonstrates how totalitarian regimes depend on eliminating accurate impressions of the past in favour of glorifying their own image, whilst governments reliant on electoral approval prove her thesis, as both rely on consensus, and thus, even if not consciously, are in competition with absolute truths. Arendt acknowledges the main limitation of her essay: the failure to robustly define truth. However, she counters this by claiming that as she is examining its role in the public realm that considers only the commonly-accepted definition, that it is this that is sufficient.

She goes on to highlight that the disclosure of factual truth may support the political aims of minority ethnic and social groups. This example, rather than proving that factual truths can be political without risk of distortion, in fact, proves the opposite. If truth can become political in these instances, it follows that they are indeed at risk of distortion. This is because they first risk manipulation by the group seeking to display it as evidence for their claims, but also of the political majority who may find them abrasive. They even face the potential of damage and distortion within these social and ethnic groups, from members who oppose actions that frame them in a particular way, and of course risk being distorted into opinion in each instance. The truths of history may indeed help minorities secure rights, but they may equally be misinterpreted and furnished with that which obscures their true meaning.

It follows that Arendt is arguing that factual truth must always: (1) become an opinion to achieve political change, and (2) achieve (1) by being manipulated via enhancements of rhetoric and persuasion. Arendt is not arguing that truth has no place in politics, nor that politics cannot be great. Arendt herself knew well, these two distinct trajectories of the public realm, having fled from the fascist Third Reich to the booming and significantly more politically and fiscally liberated USA. Factual truths are always at risk of distortion when entering this realm, whether for the good, such as being transformed into a valuable persuasive argument, or the bad, such as its elimination entirely. Arendt had experience of the latter with her intimate acquaintance with of totalitarian regimes.

The factual truths of our history and culture are at constant risk of political distortion. However, rational truths are rarely politically relevant. They do not experience this same risk. Although Arendt’s thought here may appear abstract and irrelevant to our political lives, it is far from being so. Arendt was no politician; she never offers a step-by-step guide to leaving our own front doors and applying her framework of truth in daily reality and political life. For Arendt, the division of truths and their characteristic strengths and weaknesses is useful in and of itself. Arendt makes it evident that we must remain diligent in questioning all authority, especially political authority, and how these authorities may distort and disregard the very truths that give us our sense of reality.

This piece solely expresses the opinion of the author and not necessarily the organisation as a whole. Students For Liberty is committed to facilitating a broad dialogue for liberty, representing a variety of opinions. If you’re a student interested in presenting your perspective on this blog,  click here to submit a guest post!

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Georgia Leigha

Georgia is a student at King's College London, studying History. She is also the Vice-President of the King's College London Libertarian Society, and a Local Coordinator with Students For Liberty.

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Two Kinds of Truth Quotes

When Bosch was a young homicide detective, he worked with a partner named Frankie Sheehan, who always kept an old milk crate in the trunk of their unmarked car. He's carry it into every scene, find a good vantage point, and put the crate down. Then he's sit on it and just observe the scene, studying its nuances and trying to take the measure and motive of the violence that had occurred there. -- Narration (chapter 3) Importance : While this quote is discussing the habits of Bosch's old (now-deceased) partner, it is effectively a thesis statement for how Bosch himself conducts investigations. First, Bosch is incredibly diligent about collecting information at a crime scene via his fine-tuned observation of details. Also, Bosch is incredibly attuned to the relationships between mentor or partner detectives. Just as he once astutely learned the ropes from Sheehan, he expected Bella Lourdes to learn from him in a similar way...

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The Theory of Two Truths in Tibet

Tibetan philosophers argue that the two truths theory is not only core ontological doctrine as it is understood within the Indian Buddhist thought, it also makes the central theory behind epistemology and soteriology. The Indian Buddhist schools are named after the theories of the two truths they each upheld as in the entry on the theory of the two truths in India . The same cannot be said about the schools of thought in Tibet. All Tibetan philosophers and the schools [ 1 ] —Nyingma, Kagyü, Sakya, and Gelug—they established are self-confessed followers of the Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka school of thought, and follow Candrakīrti closely. Tibetans agree that Candrakīrti is the undisputed authority in commenting and interpreting Nāgārjuna’s Madhyamaka theory of the two truths. The Tibetan Prāsaṅgikas however disagreed, debated and fought fiercely amongst themselves concerning many philosophical questions. Who is the Prāsaṅgika? Does the Prāsaṅgika hold any position? What is it that constitutes the Prāsaṅgika’s core philosophical position? How should Candrakīrti’s hermeneutic approach towards Nāgārjuna be assessed, evaluated and interpreted? The debate amongst the Tibetan philosophers stems on a large part from the way in which they each differently interpreted and understood Candrakīrti’s theory of the two truths and its philosophical implications. The parameters within which this debate is conducted either in the monastic debate courtyards or in their philosophical writings, took a form around certain philosophical themes. Those themes later became the standard paradigmatic focus of any discussion on the subject of the two truths.

• Basis of the division: What is divided into the two truths?
• Etymological analysis (sgra bshad) of the two truths
• Definition (mtshan nyid / nges tshig) of the two truths: Subjective or objective?
• Enumeration (grangs nges): Is there one or two truths?
• Classification (rab dbye): Are there many types of conventional truth or one?
• Relation: Are the two truths distinct or identical?

Keeping with the Tibetan Madhyamaka traditions, the present essay on the theory of the two truths in Tibet focuses on the philosophical issues arising from and associated with these themes. Therefore our concern in this article is not historical evolution of the schools, or the philosophers and the ideas to which they each are associated, our concern is rather, first and foremost philosophical.

2. Kagyü

5. implications, other internet resources, related entries.

Longchen Rabjam sets out the course of the Nyingma theory of the truths and the later philosophers of the school took similar stance without varying much in essence. In Treasure he begins the section on the Madhyamaka theory of the two truths as follows: “The Madhyamaka tradition is the secret and profound teachings of the [Śākya]mūni. Although it constitues five ontological categories, the two truths subsume them” (Longchen, 1983: 204f).

Nyingma defines conventional truth as consisting of unreal phenomena that appear to be real to the erroneous cognitive processes of the ordinary beings while ultimate truth is reality which transcends any mode of thinking and speech, one that unmistakenly appears to the nonerroneous cognitive processes of the exalted and awakened beings. In other words (1) ultimate truth represents the perspective of epistemically correct and warranted cognitive process of exalted beings (‘phags pa); whereas (2) conventional truth represents the perspective of epistemically deceptive and unwarranted cognitive processes of the ordinary beings (Mipham Rinpoche 1993d: 543–544).

Let us consider these two definitions turn by turn. Nyingma supports definition (1) with two premises. The first one says that cognitive processes of the exalted (‘phags pa) and awakened beings (sang rgyas) are epistemically correct and non-deceptive, because “It is in relation to this cognitive content that the realisation of the ultimate truth is so designated. The object of an exalted cognitive process consists of the way things really are (gshis kyi gnas lugs), phenomena as they really are (chos kyi dbyings) which is undefiled by its very nature (rang bzin dag pa)” (Longchen 1983: 202f). However ultimate truth for Nyingma is not an object per se in the usual sense of the word. It is object only in the metaphorical sense. “From the [ultimate] perspective the meditative equipoise of the realised (sa thob) and awakened beings (sangs rgyas), there exists neither object of knowledge (shes bya) nor knowing cognitive process (shes byed) and so forth, for there is neither object to apprehend nor the subject that does the apprehending. Even the exalted cognitive process (yeshes) as a subject ceases (zhi ba) to operate” (Longchen 1983: 201f). Therefore “At this stage, [Nyingma] accepts the total termination (chad) of all the continua (rgyun) of the cognitive processes (‘jug pa) of the mind (sems) and mental factors (sems las byung ba). This exalted cognitive process which is inexpressible beyond words and thoughts (smra bsam brjod du med pa'i yeshes), and thus is designated (btags pa) as a correct and unmistaken cognitive process (yang dag pa'i blo ma khrul ba) as it knows the reality as it is” (Longchen 1983:201f).

The second premise comes from Nyingma’s transcendent theory. According to this theory ultimate truth constitutes reality and the reality constitutes transcendence of all elaborations. Reality is that which cannot be comprehended by the means of linguistic and conceptual elaboration, as it is utterly beyond the grasp of words and thoughts which merely defile the cognitive states. Given that exalted beings are free of defiled mental states, all forms of thoughts and conceptions are terminated in their realization of the ultimate truth. Ultimate truth transcends all elaborations, thus remains untouched by the philosophical speculations (Longchen, 1983: 203f). “In short the characteristic of [ultimate truth] is that of nirvāṇa, which is profound and peaceful. It is intrinsically unadulterated domain (dbyings). The cognitive process by means of which ultimate truth is realized must therefore be free from all cognitive limitations (sgribs pa), for it is disclosed to the awakened beings (sangs rgyas) in whose exalted cognitive processes appear the objects as they really are without being altered” (Longchen, 1983: 204f).

Nyingma’s defence of the definition (2) also has two premises. The first one comes from its theory of error, the most commonly used by the Nyingma philosophers. According to this theory, conventional truth is, as matter of fact, an error confined to the ordinary beings (so so skye bo) who are blinded by the dispositions (bag chags) of confusion (ma rig pa). It is argued that under the sway of confusion the ordinary beings falsely and erroneously believe in the reality of entirely unreal entities and the truth of wholly false epistemic instruments, just like the people who mistakenly grasps cataracts and falling hairs to be real objects. Conventional truths are mere errors that appear real to the ordinary beings, but they are in fact no more real than the falling hairs that are reducible into the “modes of apprehensions” ( snang tshul ) (Mipham Rinpoche 1993c: 3, 1977: 80–81ff, 1993d: 543–544).

The second premise comes from its representationalist or elaboration-theory which says that conventional truths constitute merely mental elaborations (spros pa) represented to appear (rnam par snang ba) in the minds of the ordinary beings as if they are realities having the subject-object relation. They are thus deceptive since they are produced through the power of the underlying cognitive confusion or ignorance, and that they do not cohere with any corresponding reality externally. Confusion is saṃvṛti because it conceals ( sgrib) the nature, it fabricates all conditioned phenomena to appear as if they are real. Even though conventional truths are to be eventually eradicated (spang bya), the representational images of the conventional reality will nevertheless continue to appear in the minds of even those who are highly realized beings, that is, until they achieved a complete cessation of mind and mental states (Longchen, 1983: 203f). It is argued that when the eye that is affected by cataracts mistakenly sees hairs falling in containers, the healthy eye that is not affected by cataracts does not even perceive the appearances of falling hairs. Likewise, those who are affected by the cataracts of afflictive confusion see things as intrinsically real, hence for them things are conventionally real. Those noble beings who are free from the afflictive confusion and the awakened beings who are free from even the non-afflictive confusion see things as they are (ultimate truth). Just as the person without cataracts does not see the falling hairs, the noble beings and awakened beings do not see any reality of things at all.

Mipham Rinpoche also proposes another definition of the two truths which diverges significantly from the one we saw. As we saw Longchen’s definition is based on two radically opposed epistemic criteria whereas Mipham’s definition, as we shall see, has two radically opposed ontological criteria—one that withstands reasoned analysis and the other that does not withstand reasoned analysis. In his Clearing Dhamchoe’s Doubts ( Dam chos dogs sel ), Mipham says that: “Reality as it is (de bzhin nyid) is established as ultimately real (bden par grub pa). Conventional entities are actually established as unreal, they are subject to deception. Being devoid of such characteristics ultimate is characterized as real, not unreal and not non-deceptive. If this [reality] does not exist,” in Mipham’s view, “than it would be impossible even for the noble beings (ārya / phags pa) to perceive reality. They would, instead, perceive objects that are unreal and deceptive. If that is the case, everyone would be ordinary beings. There would be no one who will attain liberation” (1993a: 602).

Mipham anticipates objections to his definition from his Gelug opponents when he writes, “Someone may object: although ultimate truth is real (bden p), its reality is not established ultimately (bden grub), because to be established ultimately is for it to withstands reasoned analysis (rigs pas dpyad bzod)” (Mipham 1993a: 603). The response from Mipham makes it even clearer. “Conventional truth is not ultimately real (bden par grub pa) because it is not able to withstand reasoned analysis, in spite of the fact that those that are conventionally real (yang dag kun rdzob) are nominally real (tha snyad du bden pa) and are the objects of the dualistic cognitive processes” (Mipham 1993a: 603). In contrast: “Reality ( dharmatā / chos nyid) , ultimate truth, is really established (bden par grub pa) on the ground that it is established as the object of nondual exalted cognitive process. Besides, it withstands reasoned analysis, for no logical reasoning whatsoever can undermine it or destroy it. For that reason so long as it does not withstand reasoned analysis, it is not ultimate, it would be conventional entity” (Mipham 1993a: 603). According to Mipham’s argument, that an object that cannot withstand reasoned analysis is the kind of object that mundane cognitive processes find dually, and it is not the kind of object found by the exalted cognitive processes that perceive ultimate truth nondually (Mipham 1993a: 603).

As we have noticed, Mipham’s definition seems to have departed from Longchen’s some what significantly. In the final analysis, however, there does not seem to be much variation. Mipham Rinpoche also is committed to the representationalist argument to ascend to nonduality: “In the end,” he says, “there are no external objects. It is evident that they appear due to the force of mental impressions … All texts that supposedly demonstrate the existence of external objects are provisional [descriptions of] their appearances”(Mipham 1977: 159–60ff). Consequently whatever appears to exist externally, according to Nyingma, “is like a horse or an elephant appearing in a dream. When it is subjected to logical analysis, it finally boils down to the interdependent inner predispositions. And this is at the heart of Buddhist philosophy” (Mipham 1977: 159–60ff).

Following on from its definition, Nyingma argues that there is no one entity that can be taken as the basis from which divides the two truths; since there is no one entity which is both real (true) and unreal (false). Hence it proposes the two truths division based on the two types of epistemic practices “because it confirms a direct opposition between that which is free of the elaborations and that which is not free of the elaborations, and between what is to be affirmed and what is to be negated excluding the possibility of the third alternative. Thus it ascertains the two” (Longchen, 1983: 205–206ff). Nyingma has two key arguments to support the claim the two truths division is an epistemic. The first argument states, “It is definite that we posit the objects (yul rnams) in dependence upon the subjects (yul can). The subjects are exclusively two types—they are either ultimately (mthar thug pa) fallacious cognitive processes (khrul ba'i blo) or ultimately (mthar thug pa) non-fallacious cognitive processes (ma ‘khrula ba'i blo). The fallacious cognitive processes posit [conventional truth]—all saṃsāric phenomena—whereas as the non-fallacious cognitive processes posit the [ultimate] reality. Therefore it is due to the cognitive processes that we posit the objects in terms of two [truths]” (Longchen, 1983: 206f) The second argument states that ultimate truth is not an objective domain of the cognitive processes with the representational images (dmigs bcas kyi blo'i spyod yul), for the reason that it may be known by means of the exalted cognitive processes (yeshes) with no representational image (dmigs pa med). (Longchen, 1983: 206f) In contrast conventional truth is an objective domain of the cognitive processes with the representational images (dmigs bcas kyi blo'i spyod yul), for the reason that it may be known by means of the cognitive processes having the representational images (dmigs bcas kyi blo'i spyod ul).

Nyingma categorically rejects commitment to any philosophical position, for it would entail a commitment to, at least, some forms of elaborations. This is so since “the Prāsaṅgika rejects all philosophical systems, and does not accept any self-styled philosophical elaboration (rang las spros pas grub mtha’). (Longchen, 1983: 210ff) The Prāsaṅgika therefore presents the theory of the two truths and so forth by merely designating them in accordance with the mundane fabrications (sgro btags) (Longchen 1983: 211f). “Therefore ultimate truth which is transcendent of all elaborations cannot be expressed either as identical to or separate from the conventional truth. They are rather merely different in terms of negating the oneness (Longchen, 1983: 192–3ff, Mipham 1977: 84f). Interestingly Mipham Rinpoche also says that “the two truths constitute a single entity but different conceptual identities (ngo bo gcig la ldog pa tha dad) . “This is because,” he says, “appearance and emptiness are indistinguishable. This is ascertained through reliable cognitions (tshad ma) by means of which the two truths are investigated. What appears is empty. If emptiness were to exist separately from what appears, the reality of that [apparent] phenomenon would not be empty. Thus the two [truths] are not distinct” (Mipham 1977: 81f). The identity of ultimate truth at issue here, according to Mipham, is that of absolute ultimate (rnam grangs min pa'i don dam ste), rather than provisional ultimate. This is because the kind of ultimate truth under discussion when we are discussing its relation with conventional truth is the ultimate truth “which is beyond the bound of any expression, although it is an object of direct perception” (Mipham 1977: 81f).

According to Karmapa Mikyö Dorje, Ātisha and his followers in Tibet, are the authoritative former masters of the Prāsaṅgika. It is this line of reading of the Prāsaṅgika that Kagyü takes it to be authoritative which the later Kagyü wholeheartedly embraces as the standard position (Mikyö Dorje, 2006: 272–273). Karmapa Mikyö Dorje cliams that it is a characteristic of Kagyü masters and their followers to recognise the ancient Prāsaṅgika tradition to be philosophically impeccable (‘khrul med) (2006: 272).

Unlike the other Tibetan schools, Kagyü rejects the more dominant view that each philosophical school in Indian Buddhism has its own distinctive theory of the two truths. “There are those who advance various theories proclaiming that the Vaibhāṣika on up to the Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka, for the purpose of distinctive definitions of the two truths, unique rational and unique textual bases. This is true,” says Karmapa Mikyö Dorje, an indication “of the failure to understand the logic, and the differentiation between the definition (mtshan nyid) and the defined example (mtshan gzhi)” (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 293). The Indian Buddhist philosophical schools only disagree, according to Kagyü, on the issue concerning the defined example (mtshan gzhi) of the two truths. The instances of ultimate truth in each lower school are, it argues, their philosophical reifications, hence, they are the ones the higher schools logically refute. There is nevertheless no disagreement between the Indian Buddhist schools as far as the definiendum (mtshon bya / lakṣya) and the definition (mtshan nyid / lakṣaṇa) of the two truths are concerned. If they disagree on these two issues, there would be no commonly agreed definition, but there is a definition of the ultimate which is common to all schools, even though there is no commonly agreed defined example to illustrate such definition (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 293).

Where the Indian Buddhist philosophical schools party their company, Kagyü argues, is their conception of the defined example of the ultimate. For the realists (dngos smra ba) ultimate truth is a foundational entity (rdzas su yod pa) that withstands rational analysis. The Madhyamaka rejects this and argues that if ultimate truth is a foundational entity, it is not possible to attain an awakening to it. If it is possible to attain awakening, then ultimate truth is impossible to be a foundational entity, for the two mutually exclude each other. The foundational entity, like the substance of the Brahmanical metaphysicians, does not allow modification or change to take place whereas the attainment of awakening is an ongoing process of modification and change (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 294).

From the position Kagyü takes, it is clear then, that it does not endorse Gelug’s position that the Prāsaṅgika has its own theory of the two truths which affords a unique framework within which a presentation of the definition and the defined example of the two truths can be set out. (See Yakherds 2021 vol. 1 for the Gelugpa critiques)Kagyü argues that the Prāsaṅgika’s project is purely for pedagogical and heuristic reasons, “for it seeks to assuage the cognitive errors of its opponents—the non-Buddhists, our own-schools such as Vaibhāṣika on up to the Svātantrika—who assert philosophical positions based on certain texts” (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 294). The non-Prāsaṅgika philosophical schools equate the definition of the ultimate with the defined example, and this is the malady that the Prāsaṅgika seeks to allay. Therefore the Prāsaṅgika’s role, as Kagyü sees it, is to point out the absurdities in the non-Prāsaṅgika position and to show that the definition of the ultimate and the defined example are rather two separate issues, and that they cannot be identified with each other (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 294–95). The Prāsaṅgika does not, like Nyingma, entertain any position of its own, except for the purpose of a therapeutic reason, and for which “the Prāsaṅgika relies on the convention as a framework for things that need to be cultivated and those that are to be abandoned. For this, our own position does not need to base the linguistic conventions on the concepts of definition and the defined example. Instead [our position],” says Kagyü, “conforms to the non-analytical mundane practice in which what needs to be abandoned and what needs to be cultivated are undertaken in agreement with the real-unreal discourses of the conventional [truth]” (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 295).

Therefore according to Kagyü, the position of all Indian Buddhist philosophical schools—be it higher or lower—agree in so far as the definitions of the two truths are concerned. (1) “[Ultimate truth] is that which reasoned analysis does not undermine and that which withstands reasoned analysis. Conventional truth is the reverse. (2) Ultimate is the non-deceptive nature and it exists as reality. Conventional [truth] is the reverse. (3) Ultimate is the object of the non-erroneous subject. Conventional [truth] is the object of the erroneous subject” (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 294). Of these three definitions, the first one proposes conventional truth as one that does not withstands reasoned analysis whereas ultimate truth does indeed withstand the reasoned analysis. “Conventional [truth] is a phenomenon that is found to exist from the perspective of the cognitive processes that are either non-analytical (ma dpyad pa) or slightly analytical (cung zad dpyad pa), whereas ultimate [truth] is that which is found either from the perspective of the cognitive process that is thoroughly analytical (shing tu legs par dpyad pa) or meditative equipoise” (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 274). Conventional truth is non-analytical in the sense that ordinary beings assume its reality uncritically, and become fixated to its reifications in virtue of how it appears to their uncritical minds, rather than how it really is from the critical cognitive perspective. When conventional truth is slightly analysed, however, it reveals that it exists merely as collocations of the codependent causes and conditions (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 273). Therefore conventional truth is “one that is devoid of an intrinsic reality, rather it is mere name (ming tsam), mere sign (rda tsam), mere linguistic convention (tha snyad tsam), mere conception (rnam par rtog pa tsam) and mere fabrication (sgro btags pa tsam)—one that merely arises or ceases due to the force of the expressions or the conceptual linguistic convention” (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 273). Ultimate truth is defined, on the other hand, as one that is found by analytical cognitive process or by a meditative equipoise of the exalted beings, for the reason that when it is subjected to analysis, phenomena are fundamentally, by its very nature transcendent of the elaborations (spros pa) and all symbolisms (mtshan ma) (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 273).

On the second definition “Conventional truth is that which does not deceive the perspective to which it appears (snang ngor), or that which does not deceive an erroneous perspective (‘khrul ngor), or that which is non-deceptive according to the standard of the mundane convention” (Kun Khyen Padkar, 2004: 66). Ultimate truth, on the other hand, is defined as “that which does not deceive a correct perception (yang dag pa'i mthong ba), or that which does not deceive reality as it is (gnas lugs la mi bslu ba), or that which does not deceive an awakened perspective (sang rgyas kyi gzigs ngor)” (Kun Khyen Padkar, 2004: 74).

The third definition is based on the two conflicting epistemic practices. Here ultimate is defined as an ultimate object from the perspective of exalted beings (ārya / ‘phags pa). The ultimate reality, although, is not one that is regarded as cognitively found to exist in and of itself inherently (rang gi bdag nyid). Conventional truth is defined as the cognitive process that sees unreal phenomena (brdzun pa mthong ba) from the perspective of the ordinary beings whose cognitive processes are obscured by the cataracts of confusion. Conventional truth is unreal, for it does not exist in the manner in which it is perceived by the confused cognitive processes of the ordinary beings (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 269–70). Karmapa Mikyö Dorje puts the point in this way. “Take a vase as one entity, for instance. It is a conventional entity, for it is a reality for the ordinary beings, and it is found to be the basis from which arise varieties of hypothetical fabrications. The exalted beings,” he argues, “however, do not see any of these [fabrications], anywhere, whatsoever, and this mode of seeing by way of not seeing anything at all is termed as the seeing of the ultimate . Therefore the two truths, in this sense, are not distinct. They are differentiated from the perspective of the cognitive processes that are either erroneous or non-erroneous” (Mikyö Dorje, 2006: 274).

Although, like Nyingma and Sakya it is the view of Kagyü to maintain that erroneous cognitive process represents the nature of the ordinary beings, whereas non-erroneous cognitive processes represent the exalted beings. However, unlike Nyingma and Sakya, Kagyü insists that the distinctions between the two truths has nothing to do with the perspective of the exalted beings. Everything, it claims, has to do with how ordinary beings fabricate things erroneously—one more real than the other—and that it has nothing to do with how exalted beings experience things. “Even this distinction is made from the point of view of the cognitive process of the childish beings. Since all things the childish beings perceive are characteristically unreal (brdzun pa) and deceptive (bslu ba), they constitute the conventionality. The exalted beings, however, do not perceive at all anything in the way in which the childish beings perceive and fabricate. So ultimate truth is, according to Kagyü, that which is unseen and unfound by the exalted beings since it is the way things really are. Therefore both the truths are taught for the pedagogical reasons in accord with the perspective of the childish beings, but not because the exalted beings experienced the two truths or that there really exist the two truths (Mikyö Dorje 2006: 274). As for the conventional truth, Kagyu divides it into having two aspects: the conventional in the form of imputed concrete phenomena that are capable to appear concretely as such, and the conventional in terms of merely nominal imputations of abstract entities that are incapable of concrete appearance (Mikyö Dorje, see Yakherds 2021: 153–55).

What follows from the above discussion is that Kagyü is monist about truth (Karmapa Mikyö Dorje, 2006: 302) in that it claims only one truth and that truth it equates with transcendent wisdom. Despite minor differences, Nyingma, Kagyü and Sagya all emphasize the synthesis between transcendent wisdom and ultimate truth, arguing that “there is neither separate ultimate truth apart from the transcendent wisdom, nor transcendent wisdom apart from the ultimate truth” (2006: 279). For this reason Kagyü advances the view similar to Nyingma and Sakya that the exceptional quality of awakened knowledge consists in not experiencing anything conventional or empirical from the enlightened perspective, but experiencing everything from the other’s—nonenlightened—perspective. (Karmapa Mikyö Dorje, 2006: 141–42ff)

Finally, on the relationship of the two truths, Kagyü maintains a position which is consciously ambiguous—that they are expressible neither as identical nor distinct. Responding to an interlocutory question, “Are the two truths identical or distinct?” Karmapa Mikyö Dorjé, says, “neither is the case.” And he advances three arguments to support this position. First, “From a perspective of the childish beings, [the two truths] are neither identical, for they do not see the ultimate; nor are they distinct, for they do not see them separately” (Karmapa Mikyö Dorjé, 2006: 285). Second, “From standpoint of the meditative equipoise of the exalted beings, the two truths are neither identical, for the appearance of the varieties of conventional entities do not appear to them. Nor are they distinct, for they are not perceived as distinct” (Karmapa Mikyö Dorjé, 2006: 285). The third is the relativity argument which says, “They are all defined relative to one another—unreality is relative to reality and reality is relative to unreality. Because one is defined relative to the other, one to which it is related (ltos sa) could not be identical to that which it relates (ltos chos). This is because it is contradictory for one thing to be both that which relates (ltos chos) and the related (ltos sa). Nor is it the case that they are distinct because,” according to Kagyü’s view, “when the related is not established, so is the other [i.e., one that relates] not established. Hence there is no relation. If one insists that relation is still possible, then such a relation would not be relative to another” (Karmapa Mikyö Dorjé, 2006: 285–86).

So from these three arguments, Kagyü concludes that the two truths are neither expressible as identical nor distinct. It argues that “just as the conceptual images of a golden vase and a silver vase do not become distinct on the account of them not being expressed as identical. Likewise these images do not become identical on the account of them not being expressed as distinct” (Mikyö Dorjé, 2006: 286).

Sakya’s theory of two truths is defended in the works of the succession of Sakya scholars—Sakya Paṅḍita (1182–1251), Rongtön Shakya Gyaltsen (Rong ston Śākya rgyal tshan, 1367–1449), the translator Taktsang Lotsawa (Stag tsang Lo tsā ba, 1405–?), Gorampa Sonam Senge (Go rams pa Bsod nams seng ge, 1429–89) and Shakya Chogden (Śākya Mchog ldan, 1428–1509). In particular Gorampa Sonam Senge’s works are unanimously recognised as the authoritative representation of the Sakya’s position. Sakya agree with Nyingma and Kagyü in maintaining that the distinction between the two truths is merely subjective processes, and that the two truths are reducible to the two conflicting perspectives (Sakya Paṅḍita 1968a: 72d, Rongtön Shakya Gyaltsen n.d. 7f, Taktsang Lotsawa n.d.: 27, Shakya Chogden 1975a: 3–4ff, 15f). “Although there are not two truths in terms of the object’s ontological mode of being (gnas tshul) , the truths are divided into two in terms of [the contrasting perspectives of] the mind that sees the mode of existence and the mind that does not see the mode of existence…This makes perfect sense” (Gorampa 1969a: 374ab). Since it emphasizes the subjective nature of the distinction between the two truths, it proposes “mere mind” (blo tsam) to be the basis of the division (Gorampa 1969a: 374ab). It aruges that “Here in the Madhyamaka system, the object itself cannot be divided into two truths. Conventional truth and ultimate truth are divided in terms of the modes of apprehension (mthong tshul) —in terms of the subject apprehending unreality and the subject apprehending reality; or in terms of mistaken and unmistaken apprehensions (‘khrul ma ‘khrul); or deluded or undeluded apprehensions (rmongs ma rmongs); or erroneous or nonerroneous apprehensions (phyin ci log ma log); or reliable cognition or unreliable cognitions (tshad ma yin min) ” (Gorampa 1969a: 375b). He also adds that: “The position which maintains that the truths are divided in terms of the subjective consciousness is one that all Prāsaṅgikas and Svātantrikas of India unanimously accepted because they are posited in terms of the subjective cognitive processes depending on whether it is deluded (rmongs) or nondeluded (ma rmongs), a perception of unreality (brdzun pa thong ba) or a perception of reality (yang dag mthong ba), and mistaken (khrul) or incontrovertible (ma khrul) (1969a: 384c).

Sakya’s advances two reasons to support its position. First, since the minds of ordinary beings are always deluded, mistaken, and erroneous, they falsely experience conventional truth. Conventional truth is thus posited only in relation to the perspective of the ordinary beings. [ 2 ] The wisdom of exalted meditative equipoise is however never mistaken, it is always nondeluded, and nonerroneous, hence exalted beings flawlessly experience ultimate truth. Ultimate truth is thus posited strictly in relation to the cognitive perspective of exalted beings. Second, the view held by Sakya argues for separate cognitive agents corresponding to each of the two truths. Ordinary beings have direct knowledge of conventional truth, but are utterly incapable of knowing ultimate truth. The exalted beings in training have direct knowledge of the ultimate in their meditative equipoise and direct knowledge of the conventional truth in the post meditative states. Fully awakened buddhas, on the other hand, only have access to ultimate truth. They have no access to conventional truth whatsoever from the enlightened perspective , although they may access conventional truth from the perspective of ordinary deluded beings.

Etymologically Sakya characterizes ultimate ( parama) as a qualification of transcendent exalted cognitive process (‘jig rten las ‘das pa'i ye shes, lokottarajñāna) that belongs to exalted beings with artha as its corresponding object. The sense of ultimate truth ( paramārthasatya) grants primacy to the exalted transcendent cognitive process of the noble beings, which supersedes the ontological status of conventional phenomena (Gorampa 1969a: 377d). “There is no realization and realized object, nor is there object and subject” (Gorampa 1969b: 714f, 727–729). As Taktsang Lotsawa puts it: “A wisdom without dual appearance is without any object” (Taktsang n.d.: 305f). Strictly speaking, transcendent wisdom itself becomes the ultimate truth. “Ultimate truth is to be experienced under a total cessation of dualistic appearance through exalted personal wisdom,” and further, “Anything that has dualistic appearance, even omniscience,must not be treated as ultimate truth” (Gorampa 1969b: 612–13ff).

Therefore conventionality (saṃvṛti, kun rdzob) means primal ignorance (Gorampa, 1969b: 377b, Sakya Paṇḍita 1968a: 72b, Shakya Chogden 1975a: 30f, Rongtön Shakya Gyaltsen 1995: 288). In agreement with Nyingma and Kagyü, Sakya treats primal ignorance as to the villain responsible for projecting the entire system of conventional truths. It argues ignorance as constituting the defining characteristics of the conventional truth. [ 3 ] (Sakya Paṇḍita 1968a: 72, Rendawa 1995: 121, Shakya Chogden 1975b: 378f, 1975c: 220, Taktsang Lotsawa n.d.: 27f, Rongtön Shakya Gyaltsen 1995: 287, n.d: 6–7ff) It formulates the definitions of the two truths in terms of the distinctions between the ignorant experiences of ordinary beings and the enlightened experiences of noble beings during their meditative equipoise. Sakya’s definition is based on three reasons. First, each conventionally real phenomenon satisfies only the definition of conventional truth because each phenomenon has only a conventional nature (in contrast to the two nature theory of Gelug), and that ultimate truth has a transcendent ontological status. Second, that each cognitive agent is potentially capable of knowing only one truth exhaustively, being equipped with either the requisite conventionally reliable cognitive process or ultimately reliable cognitive process. Each truth must be verified by a different individual and that access to the two truths is mutually exclusive—a cognitive agent who knows conventional truth cannot know ultimate truth and vice versa except in the case of exalted beings who are not fully enlightened. Third, that each conventional entity has only one nature, namely, its conventional nature, and the so-called ultimate nature must not be associated with any conventionally real phenomenon. If a sprout, for example, actually did possess two natures as proposed in Gelug’s theory of the two truths, then, according to Sakya, each nature would have to be ontologically distinct. Since the ontological structure of the sprout cannot be separated into a so-called conventional and ultimate nature, the sprout must possess only one phenomenal nature, i.e., the conventional reality. As this nature is found only under the spell of ignorance, it can be comprehended only under the conventional cognitive processes of ordinary beings, and of unenlightened noble beings in their post meditative equipoise. It is therefore not possible, in Sakya’s view, to confine the definition of ultimate truth to the framework of conventional phenomena.

Ultimate truth, on the other hand, requires the metaphysical transcendence of conventionality. Unlike conventional reality, it is neither presupposed nor projected by ignorance. Ultimate truth, in Gorampa’s words: “is inexpressible through words and is beyond the scope of cognition” (1969a: 370a). The cognition is always conceptual and thus deluded. “Yet ultimate truth is experienced by noble beings in their meditative equipoise, and is free from all conceptual categories. It cannot be expressed through definition, through any defined object, or through anything else” (1969a: 370a). In fact, Sakya goes so far as to combine the definition of ultimate truth with that of intrinsic reality (rang bzhin, svabhāva). When an interlocutor ask this question: “What is the nature of the reality of phenomena?” Gorampa replies that reality is transcendent and it has three defining characteristics: namely: “It is not created by causes and conditions, it exists independently of conventions and of other phenomena; and it does not change” (Gorampa, 1969c: 326a). Like Nāgārjuna’s hypothetical , not real, intrinsic reality, Sakya claims that ultimate truth is ontologically unconditioned , and hence it is not a dependently arisen phenomenon; it is distinct from conventional phenomena in every sense of the word; it is independent of conceptual-linguistic conventions; it is a timeless and unchanging phenomenon.

It is clear then, according to Sakya view, any duality ascribed to truth is untenable. Since there is only one truth, it cannot be distinguished any further. Like Nyingma and Kagyü, Sakya holds the view that truth itself is not divisible (Sakya Paṇḍita n.d.: 32ab, Rendawa 1995: 122, Rongtön Shakya Gyaltsen, 1995: 287, n.d.: 22f Taktsang Lotsawa n.d.: 263, Shakya Chogden 1975a: 7–8ff, 1975c: 222f). It agrees with Nyingma and Kagyü that the distinction between the two truths is essentially between two conflicting perspectives, rather than any division within truth as such. In Shakya Chogden’s words: “Precise enumeration (grangs nges) of the twofold truth all the earlier Tibetans have explained rests on the precise enumeration of the mistaken cognition (blo ‘khrul) and unmistaken cognition (blo ma ‘khrul). With this underpinning reason, they explained the precise enumeration through the elimination of the third alternative. There is not even a single figure to be found who claims the view comparable with the latter [i.e., Gelug], who asserts a precise enumeration of the twofold truth based on the certification of reliable cognitive processes” (1975a: 9–10ff).

Sakya rejects the reality of conventional truth by treating it as a projection of conventional mind—it is the ignorance of ordinary beings. When asked this question: “If this were true, even the mere term conventional truth would be unacceptable, for whatever is conventional is incompatible with truth,” Gorampa Replies: “Since [conventional] truth is posited only in relation to a conventional mind, there is no problem. Even so-called real conventionalities (yang dag kun rdzob ces pa yang) are posited as real with respect to a conventional mind” (1969b: 606b). By “conventional mind,” Gorampa means the ignorant mind of an ordinary being experiencing the phenomenal world. In other words, conventional truth is described as “truth” only from the perspective of ignorance. It is a truth projected (sgro brtag pa) by it and taken for granted.

Sakya equates conventional truth with “the appearances of nonexistent entities like illusions” (Gorampa 1969c: 287c). It follows Sakya Paṇḍita on this point who puts it: “Conventional truths are like reflections of the moon in the water—despite their nonexistence, they appear due to thoughts” (Sakya Paṇḍita 1968a: 72a). According to Sakya Paṇḍita “The defining characteristic of conventional truth constitutes the appearances of the nonexistent objects” (1968a: 72a). In this sense, conventional truths “are things apprehended by the cognition perceiving conventional entities. Those very things are found as nonexistent by the cognition analyzing their mode of existence that is itself posited as the ultimate” (Gorampa 1969a: 377a).

Since mere mind is the basis of the division of the two truths wherein ultimate truth—wisdom—alone is seen as satisfying the criterion of truth, so conventional truth—ignorance—cannot properly be taken as truth. Wisdom and ignorance are invariably contradictory, and thus the two truths cannot coexist. Sakya argues, in fact, that conventional truth must be negated in the ascent to ultimate truth. Given wisdom’s primacy over ignorance, in the final analysis it is ultimate truth alone that must prevail without its merely conventional counterpart. Conventional truth is an expedient means to achieve ultimate truth, and the Buddha described conventional truth as truth to suit the mentality of ordinary beings (Gorampa 1969a: 370b). The two truths are thus categorized as a means (thabs) and a result (thabs byung) . Conventional truth is the means to attain the one and only ultimate truth.

According to this view, then, the relationship between the two truths is equivalent to the relationship between the two conflicting perspectives—namely, ignorance and wisdom. The question now arises: How is ignorance related to wisdom? Or conversely, how does wisdom relate to ignorance? It says that the two truths are distinct in the sense that they are incompatible with unity, like entity and without entity. In the ultimate sense, it argues, the two truths transcend identity and difference (Gorampa, 1969a: 376d). The transcendence of identity and difference from the ultimate standpoint is synonymous with the transcendence of identity and difference from the purview of the meditative equipoise of noble beings. However, from the conventional standpoint, it claims that the two truths are distinct in the sense that they are incompatible with their unity. It likens this relationship to the one between entity and without entity (Gorampa, 1969a: 377a).

Sakya’s claim that the two truths are distinct and incompatible encompasses both ontological and epistemological distinctions. Since what is divided into the two truths is mere mind, it is obvious that there is no single phenomenon that could serve as the objective referent for both. This also means that the two truths must be construed as corresponding to distinct spheres belonging to distinct modes of consciousness: conventional truth corresponds to ignorance and ultimate truth to wisdom. It is thus inappropriate to describe the relationship between the two truths, and their corresponding modes of consciousness, in terms of two ways of perceiving the same entity. Although the two truths can be thought of as two ways of perceiving , one based on ignorance and the other on wisdom, there is no same entity perceived by both. There is nothing common between the two truths, and if they are both ways of perceiving, then they do not perceive the same thing.

According to this view, the relationship between conventional truth and ultimate truth is analogous to the relationship between the appearance of falling hairs when vision is impaired by cataracts and the absence of such hairs when vision is unimpaired. Although this is a metaphor, it has a direct application to determining the relationship between the two truths. Conventional truth is like seeing falling hairs as a result of cataracts: both conventional truth and such false seeing are illusory, in the ontological sense that there is nothing to which each corresponds, and in the epistemological sense that there is no true knowledge in either case. Ultimate truth is therefore analogous, ontologically and epistemologically, to the true seeing unimpaired by cataracts and free of the appearance of falling hairs. Just as cataracts give rise to illusory appearances, so ignorance, according to Sakya, gives rise to all conventional truths; wisdom, on the other hand, gives rise to ultimate truth. As each is the result of a different state, there is no common link between them in terms of either an ontological identity or an epistemological or conceptual identity.

Gelug’s (Dge lugs) theory of the two truths is campioned by Tsongkhapa Lobsang Dragpa (Tsong khapa Blo bzang grags pa, 1357–1419). Tsongkhapa’s theory is adopted, expanded and defended in the works of his immediate disciples—Gyaltsab Jé (Rgyal tshab Rje, 1364–1432), Khedrub Jé (Mkhas grub Rje, 1385–1438), Gendün Drub (Dge ‘dun grub,1391–1474)—and other great Gelug thinkers such as Sera Jetsün Chökyi Gyaltsen (Se ra Rje tsun Chos kyi rgyal tshan, 1469–1544), Panchen Sönam Dragpa (Paṇ chen Bsod nams grags pa,1478–1554), Panchen Lobsang Chökyi Gyaltsen (Paṇ chen Blo bzang chos kyi rgyal tshan,1567–1662), Jamyang Shepai Dorje (‘Jam dbyangs Bzhad ba'i Rdo rje, 1648–1722), Changkya Rölpai Dorje (Lcang skya Rol pa'i rdo rje, 1717–86), Könchog Jigmé Wangpo (Kon mchog ‘jigs med dbang po, 1728–91), and many others scholars.

Gelug maintains that “objects of knowledge” (shes bya) are the basis for dividing the two truths (Tsongkhapa 1984b:176). [ 4 ] This means that the two truths relate to “two objects of knowledge,” the idea it takes from the statement of the Buddha from Discourse on Meeting of the Father and the Son (Pitāputrasamāgama Sūtra) [ 5 ] By object of knowledge Gelug means an object that is cognizable (blo'i yul du bya rung ba). It must be an object of cognitive processes in general ranging from those of ordinary sentient beings through to those of enlightened beings. This definition attempts to capture any thing knowable in the broadest possible sense. Since the Buddha maintains knowledge of the two truths to be necessary for awakening, the understanding of the two truths must constitute an exhaustive understanding of all objects of knowledge.

Gelug’s key argument to support this claim comes from its two-nature theory in which it has been argued that every nominally (tha snyad) or conventionally (kun rdzob) given phenomenon possesses dual natures: namely, the nominal (or conventional nature) and the ultimate nature . The conventional nature is unreal and deceptive while the ultimate nature is real and nondeceptive. Since two natures pertain to every phenomenon, the division of the two truths means the division of each entity into two natures. Thus the division of the two truths, “reveals that it makes sense to divide even the nature of a single entity, like a sprout, into dual natures—its conventional and its ultimate natures. It does not however show,” as non-Gelug schools have it, “that the one nature of the sprout is itself divided into two truths in relation to ordinary beings (so skye) and to noble beings ( āryas) ” (Tsongkhapa 1984b: 173, 1992: 406).

The relation of the two truths comes down to the way in which the single entity appears to cognitive processes—deceptively and nondeceptively. The two natures correspond to these deceptive or nondeceptive modes of appearance. While they both belong to the same ontological entity, they are epistemically or conceptually mutually exclusive. Take a sprout for instance. If it exists, it necessarily exhibits a dual nature, and yet those two natures cannot be ontologically distinct. The ultimate nature of the sprout cannot be separate from its conventional nature—its color, texture, shape, extension, and so on. As an object of knowledge, the sprout retains its single ontological basis, but it is known through its two natures. These two natures exclude one another so far as knowledge is concerned. The cognitive process that knows the deceptive conventional nature of the sprout does not have direct access to its nondeceptive ultimate nature. Similarly, the cognitive process that apprehends the nondeceptive ultimate nature of the sprout does not have direct access to its deceptive conventional nature. In Newland’s words: “A table and its emptiness are a single entity. When an ordinary conventional mind takes a table as its object of observation, it sees a table. When a mind of ultimate analysis searches for the table, it finds the emptiness of the table. Hence, the two truths are posited in relation to a single entity by way of the perspectives of the observing consciousness. This is as close as Ge-luk-bas will come to defining the two truths as perspectives” (1992: 49).

Gelug’s two-nature theory not only serves as the basic reference point for its exposition of the basis of the division of the two truths, their meanings and definitions, but also serves as the basic ontological reference for its account of the relationship between the two truths. Therefore Gelug proposes the view that the two truths are of single entity with distinct conceptual identities. This view is also founded on the theory of the two natures. But how are the two natures related? Are they identical or distinct? For Gelug argues that there are only two possibilities: either the two natures are identical (ngo bo gcig) or distinct (ngo bo tha dad); there cannot be a third (Tsongkhapa 1984b:176). They are related in terms of being a single entity with distinct conceptual identities—thus they are both the same and different. Since the two natures are the basis of the relationship between the two truths, the relationship between the two truths will reflect the relationship between the two natures. Just as the two natures are of a same entity, ultimate truth and conventional truth are of same ontological status.

Gelug argues that the relationship between the two truths, therefore, the two natures, is akin to the relationship between being conditioned and being impermanent (Tsongkhapa 1984b:176). It appropriates this point from Nāgārjuna’s Bodhicittavivaraṇa, which states: “Reality is not perceived as separate from conventionality. The conventionality is explained to be empty. Empty alone is the conventionality, if one of them does not exist, neither will the other, like being conditioned and being impermanent” (v.67–68) (Nāgārjuna 1991:45–45, cited Tsongkhapa, 1984b: 176; Khedrub Jé 1992: 364). Commenting on this passage from the Bodhicittavivaraṇa , Tsongkhapa argues that the first four lines (in original Tibetan verses) show that things as they really are, are not ontologically distinct from that of the conventionality. The latter two lines (in the original Tibetan verse) show their relationship such that if one did not exist, neither could the other (med na mi ‘bung ba'i ‘brel ba). This, in fact, he says, is equivalent to their being constituted by a single-property relationship (bdag cig pa'i ‘brel ba). Therefore, like the case of being conditioned and being impermanent, the relation between the two truths is demonstrated as one of a single ontological identity (Tsongkhapa 1984b: 176–77).

The way in which the two truths are related is thus analogous to the relationship between being conditioned and being impermanent. They are ontologically identical and mutually entailing. Just as a conditioned state is not a result of impermanence, so emptiness is not a result of the conventional truth (the five aggregates) or the destruction of the five aggregates—Hence in the Vimalakırtinirdeśa Sūtra it is stated: “Matter itself is void. Voidness does not result from the destruction of matter, but the nature of matter is itself voidness” (Vimalakīrti, 1991:74). The same principle applies in the case of consciousness and the emptiness of consciousness, as well as to the rest of the five psychophysical aggregates—the aggregate and its emptiness are not causally related. For the causal relationship would imply either the aggregate is the cause, therefore its emptiness is the result, or the aggregate is the result, and its emptiness the cause. This would imply, according to Gelug’s reading, either the aggregate or the emptiness is temporally prior to its counterpart, thus leading to the conlusion that the conventional truth and ultimate truth exist independently of each other. Such a view is for Gelug is completely unacceptable.

The ontological identity between being conditioned and being impermanent does not imply identity in all and every respect. Insofar as their epistemic mode is concerned, conditioned and impermanent phenomena are distinct and contrasting. The concept impermanence always presents itself to the cognizing mind as momentary instants, but not as conditioned. Similarly, the concept being-conditioned always presents itself to its cognizing mind as constituted by manifold momentary instants, but not as moments. Thus it does not necessarily follow that the two truths are identical in every respect just because they share a common ontological identity. Where the modes of conceptual appearance are concerned, ultimate nature and conventional nature are distinct. The conceptual mode of appearance of ultimate truth is nondeceptive and consistent with its mode of existence, while that of conceptual mode of conventional truth is deceptive and inconsistent with its mode of existence.

Conventional truth is uncritically confirmed by conventionally reliable cognitive process, whereas ultimate truth is critically confirmed by ultimately reliable cognitive process. Hence, just as ultimate truth is inaccessible to the conventionally reliable cognitive process for its uncritical mode of engagement, so, too, is conventional truth inaccessible to ultimately reliable cognitive process for its critical mode of engagement. This is how, in Gelug’s view, the truths differ conceptually despite sharing a common ontological entity. In summarizing Gelug’s argument, Khedrub Jé writes: “The two truths are therefore of the same nature, but different conceptual identities. They have a single-nature relationship such that, if one did not exist, neither could the other, just like being conditioned and impermanent” (1992: 364).

The two nature theory also supports Gelug’s view that the truth is twofold. Since the two natures of every conventional phenomenon provide the ontological and epistemological foundation for each of the truths, the division of truth into two is entirely appropriate. Both the conventional and the ultimate are actual truths, and since the two natures are mutually interlocking, neither of the two truths has primacy over the other—both have equal status, ontologically, epistemologically, and even soteriologically.

Given Gelug’s stance on conventional truth as actual truth and its argument for the equal status of the two truths, Gelug must now address the question: How can conventional truth, which is unreal (false) and deceptive, be truth (real) at all? In other words, how can the two truths be of equal status given if conventional truth is unreal (false)? The success of Gelug’s reply depends on its ability to maintain harmony between the two truths, or their equal footing.There are several arguments by means of which Gelug defends this. The first, and the most obvious one, is the argument from the two-nature theory. It argues since two truths are grounded in the dual nature of a single phenomenon, then “just as the ultimate reality of the sprout [for instance] is taken as characteristic of the sprout, hence it is described as the sprout’s nature, so, too,” explains Tsongkhapa, “are the sprout’s color, shape, etc., the sprout’s characteristics. Therefore they too are its nature” (1992: 406). Since the two natures are ontologically mutually entailing, the sprout’s ultimate truth cannot exist ontologically separate from its conventional truth, and vice versa. Neither truth could exist without the other.

The most important argument Gelug advances for the unity of the two truths draws upon an understanding of the compatible relation between conventional truth and dependent arising on the one hand, and between ultimate truth and emptiness on the other. For Gelug emptiness and dependent arising are synonymous. The concept of emptiness is incoherent unless it means dependent arising, and equally the concept of dependent arising is incoherent unless it means emptiness of intrinsic reality. Gelug argues, as Tsongkhapa does in the Rten ‘brel stod pa (In Praise of Dependent Arising, 1994a), since emptiness means dependent arising, the emptiness of intrinsic reality and the efficacy of action and its agent are not contradictory. If emptiness, however, is misinterpreted as contradictory with dependent arising, then Gelug contends, there would be neither action in empty phenomena, nor empty phenomena in action. But that cannot be the case, for that would entail a rejection of both phenomena and action, a nihilistic view (v.11–12). Since there is no phenomenon other than what is dependently arisen, there is no phenomenon other than what is empty of intrinsic reality (v.15). Understood emptiness in this way, there is indeed no need to say that they are noncontradictory—the utter nonexistence of intrinsic reality and making sense of everything in the light of the principle this arises depending on this (v.18). This is so because despite the fact that whatever is dependently arisen lacks intrinsic reality, and therefore empty, nonetheless its existence is illusion-like (v.27).

Sometimes Gelug varies its ontological argument slightly, as does Tsongkhapa in the Lam gtso rnam gsum (The Three Principal Pathways) , to stressing the unity of the two truths in terms of their causal efficiency. It argues that empty phenomena is causally efficient is crucial in understanding the inextricable relationship between ultimate truth and conventional truth. The argument takes two forms: (1) appearance avoids realism—the extreme of existence , and (2) emptiness avoids inhilism—the extreme of nonexistence . The former makes sense for Gelug because the appearance arises from causal conditions, and whatever arises from the causal conditions is a non-eternal or non-permanent. When the causal conditions changes any thing that dependently arises from them also changes. Thus the appearance avoids the realism. The latter makes sense because the empty phenomena arises from causal conditions, and whatever arise from the causal conditions is not a non-existent, even though it lacks intrinsic reality. Only when the causal conditions are satisfied do we see arising of the empty phenomena. Hence by understanding that the empty phenomenon itself is causally efficient, the bearer of cause and effect, one is not robbed by the extreme view of nihilism (1985: 252).

The argument for the unity of the two truths also takes epistemological form which also rests on the idea that emptiness and dependently arising are unified. The knowledge of empty phenomena is conceptually interlinked with that of dependently arisen phenomena—the latter is, in fact, founded on the former. To the extent that empty phenomena are understood in terms of relational and dependently arisen phenomena, to that extent empty phenomena are always functional and causally effective. The phrase “empty phenomena,” although expressed negatively, is not negative in a metaphysical sense—it is not equivalent to no-thingness. Although the empty phenomenon appears to its cognizing consciousness negatively and without any positive affirmation, it is nonetheless equivalent to a relational and dependently arisen phenomenon seen deconstructively. Since seeing phenomena as empty does not violate the inevitable epistemic link with the understanding of phenomena as dependently arisen, and the converse also applies, so the unity between the two truths—understanding things both as empty and as dependently arisen—is still sustained.

The unity between the two truths, according to Gelug, does not apply merely to ontological and epistemological issues; it applies equally to soteriology—the practical means to the freedom from suffering. As Jamyang Shepai Dorje argues that undermining either of the two truths would result in a similar downfall—a similar eventual ruin. If, however, they are not undermined, the two are alike insofar as the accomplishment of the two accumulations and the attainment of the two awakened bodies (kāyas), and so forth, are concerned. If one undermines conventional truth or denies it’s reality, one would succumb to the extreme of nihilism, which would also undermine the fruit and the means by which an awakened physical body (rūpakāya) is accomplished. It is therefore not sensible to approach the two truths with bias. Since this relation continues as a means to avoid falling into extremes, and also to accomplish the two accumulations and attain the two awakened bodies (kāyas), it is imperative, says Jamyang Shepai Dorje, that the two truths be understood as mutually interrelated (1992: 898–99).

One could object Gelug’s position as follows: If the two natures are ontologically identical, why is conventional truth unreal and deceptive, while ultimate truth real and nondeceptive? To this Gelugs replies that “nondeceptive is the mode of reality (bden tshul) of the ultimate. That is, ultimate truth does not deceive the world by posing one mode of appearance while existing in another mode” (1992: 411). Ultimate truth is described as ultimate , not because it is absolute or higher than conventional truth, but simply because of its consistent character, therefore non-deceptive—its mode of appearance and its mode of being are the same—in contrast with the inconsistent (therefore deceptive) character of conventional truth. Ultimate truth is nondeceptive for the same reason. The premise follows because to the cognizing consciousness, conventional truth presents itself as inherently or instrinsically real. It appears to be substance, or essence, and therefore it deceives ordinary beings. Insofar as conventional truth presents itself as more than conventional—as inherently real—they deceive the ordinary beings. We take them to be what they are not—to be intrinsically and objectively real. In that sense, they are unreal. “But to the extent that we understand them as dependently arisen, empty, interdependent phenomena,” as Garfield explains, “they constitute a conventional truth” (1995: 208).

Another objection may be advanced as follows: Gelug’s position contradicts the Buddha’s teachings since it is not possible to reconcile Gelug’s view that there are two actual truths with the Buddha’s declaration that nirvāṇa is the only truth. [ 6 ] For its answer to this objection Gelug appropriates Candrakīrti’s Yuktiṣaṣṭikāvṛtti which states that nirvāṇa is not like conditioned phenomena, which deceives the childish by presenting false appearances. For the existence of nirvāṇa is always consistent with its characteristic of the nonarising nature. Unlike conditioned phenomena, it never appears, even to the childish, as having a nature of arising (skye ba'i ngo bo). Since nirvāṇa is always consistent with the mode of existence of nirvāṇa, it is explained as the noble truth. Yet this explanation is afforded strictly in the terms of worldly conventions (1983: 14–15ff, cited in Tsongkhapa 1992: 312, Khedrub Jé 1992: 360).

For Gelug the crucial point here, as Candrakīrti emphasizes, is that nirvāṇa is the truth strictly in terms of worldly conventions. Gelug recognizes this linguistic convention as a highly significant to the Prāsaṅgika system and it insists on conformity with the worldly conventions for the following reasons. First, just as an illusion, a mirror image, etc., are real in an ordinary sense, despite the fact that they are deceptive and unreal, so, too, conventional phenomena in the Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka sense are conventionally real, and can even be said to constitute truths, despite being recognized by the Mādhyamikas themselves as unreal and deceptive. Second, because the concept ultimate truth is also taken from its ordinary convention, nirvāṇa is spoken of as ultimate on the ground of its nondeceptive nature, in the sense that its mode of existence is consistent with its mode of appearance. The nondeceptive nature of the empty phenomenon itself constitutes its reality, and so it is conventionally described as ultimate in the Prāsaṅgika system.

Thus Gelug asserts that neither of the two truths is more or less significant than the other. Indeed, while the illusion only makes sense as illusion in relation to that which is not illusion, the reflection only makes sense as reflection in relation to that which is reflected. So, too, does the real only make sense as real in relation to the illusion, the thing reflected in relation to its reflection. This also holds in the case of discussions about the ultimate nature of things, such as the being of the sprout—it only makes sense inasmuch as it holds in discussions of ordinary phenomena. The only criterion that determines a thing’s truth in the Prāsaṅgika Madhyamaka system, according to Gelug, is the causal effectiveness of the thing as opposed to mere heuristic significance. The sprout’s empty mode of being and its being as appearance are both truths, insofar as both are causally effective, and thus both functional.

The two truths, understood as, respectively, the empty and the dependently arisen characters of phenomena, are on equal footing according to Gelug. Nevertheless these truths have different designations—the sprout’s empty mode is always described as “ultimate truth,” while the conventional properties, such as color and shape, are described as “conventional truths.” The former is accepted as nondeceptive truth while the sprout’s conventional properties are accepted as deceptive or false truth, despite common sense dictating that they are true and real.

In conclusion Gelug’s theory of the two truths is based on one fundamental thesis that each conventionally real phenomenon satisfies the definitions of both truths for each phenomenon, as it sees it, possesses two natures that serve as the basis of the definitions of the two truths. The two truths are conceptual distinctions applied to a particular conventionally real phenomenon, and every conventionally real phenomenon fulfills the criterion of both truths because each phenomenon constitutes these two natures they are not merely one specific nature of a phenomenon mirrored in two different perspectives. As each phenomenon possesses two natures, so each verifying cognitive process has a different nature as its referent, even though there is only one ontological entity and one cognitive agent involved.

Gelug considers the two natures of each phenomenon as the defining factor of the two truths. It argues that the conventional nature of an entity, as verified by a conventionally reliable cognitive process, determines the defining criterion of conventional truth; the ultimate nature of the same entity, as verified by an ultimately reliable cognitive practice, determines the defining criterion of ultimate truth. Since both truths are ontologically as well as epistemologically interdependent, knowledge of conventionally real entitity as dependently arisen suffices for knowledge of both truths. In contasty non-Gelug schools—Nyingma, Kagyü and Sakya Non-Gelug, as we have seen, rejects Gelug’s dual-nature theory, treating each conventional entity as satisfying only the definition of conventional truth and taking the definition of ultimate truth to be ontologically and epistemologically transcendent from conventional truth. They argue, instead, it is through the perspectives of either an ordinary being or an unenlightened exalted being (āryas) that the definition of conventional truth is verified—fully enlightened being (buddhas) do not experience the conventional truth in any respect. Similarly, for non-Gelug, no ordinary being can experience the ultimate truth. Ultimate truth transcends conventional truth, and the knowledge of empirically given phenomena as dependently arisen could not satisfy the criterion of knowing ultimate truth.

For Gelug, there is an essential compatibility between between the two truths, for the reason that there is a necessary harmony between dependently arisen and emptiness of intrinsic reality. As dependently arisen, empty phenomena are not constructions of ignorant consciousness, so neither is conventional truth such a construction. Both truths are actual truths that stand on an equal footing. Moreover, according to this view, whosoever knows conventional truth, either directly or inferentially, also knows ultimate truth; whosoever knows ultimate truth, also knows phenomena as dependently arisen, and hence knows them as empty of intrinsic reality. Where there is no knowledge of conventional truth, the converse applies. For non-Gelug, the incommensurability between dependently arisen and emptiness of intrinsic reality also applies to the two truths. Accordingly, whosoever knows conventional truth does not know ultimate truth, and one who knows ultimate truth does not know conventional truth; whosoever knows phenomena as dependently arisen does not know them as empty, whereas whosoever knows phenomena as empty does not know them as dependently arisen.

While Gelug thus distances itself from the subjective division of the two truths, Nyingma, Kagyü and Sakya attempt to demonstrate the validity of their view by arguing that perspective provides the primary basis for the division of the two truths. Unlike Gelug, non-Gelug schools hold that the two truths do not have any objective basis. Instead they are entirely reducible to the experiences of the deluded minds of ordinary beings and the experiences of the wisdom of exalted being.

According to Gelug, the agent who cognizes the two truths may be one and the same individual. Each agent may have all the requisite cognitive resources that are potentially capable of knowing both truths. Ordinary beings have only conceptual access to ultimate truth, while exalted beings, who are in the process of learning, have direct, but intermittent, access. Awakenened beings, however, invariably have simultaneous access to both truths. The view held by non-Gelug argues for separate cognitive agents corresponding to each of the two truths. Ordinary beings have direct knowledge of conventional truth, but are utterly incapable of knowing ultimate truth. The exalted beings in training directly know ultimate while they are meditative equipoise and conventional truth in post meditative states. Fully awakened buddhas, on the other hand, only have access to ultimate truth. Awakened beings have no access to conventional truth whatsoever from the enlightened perspective, although they may access conventional truth from unenlightened ordinary perspectives.

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6 Common Leadership Styles — and How to Decide Which to Use When

• Rebecca Knight

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• RK Rebecca Knight is a journalist who writes about all things related to the changing nature of careers and the workplace. Her essays and reported stories have been featured in The Boston Globe, Business Insider, The New York Times, BBC, and The Christian Science Monitor. She was shortlisted as a Reuters Institute Fellow at Oxford University in 2023. Earlier in her career, she spent a decade as an editor and reporter at the Financial Times in New York, London, and Boston.

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