Returning from the absolutely wonderful of “opening the relative and revealing the wonderful” to the world of conventional reality and relative existence brings this world to life by making the absolutely wonderful alive in this world. In terms of emptiness, it is to go from the conventional duality of A and B into their nondual emptiness. Yet one does not stagnate in nonduality or emptiness but returns to the duality of conventional existence, bringing emptiness into one’s life in order to have a true realization of nonduality and emptiness. This is why Zhanran, the sixth patriarch of Tiantai, maintained that “nonduality is dual, and duality is nondual.” Small Vehicle Buddhists stagnated in nonduality and emptiness, forgetting to reenter the actual world and make such truth alive there. As a consequence of this they fell into deep nihilism.

We should pay careful attention to realizing that seeing the divine in the human or entering the actual world and bringing it to life is neither to affirm humanity, just as it is, as divine, nor to affirm reality, just as it is, as absolute. It is an undeniable fact that humanity is not divine, and that the actual world is finite and relative. Based on this, we have to posit the divine over against humanity, and we have to posit the absolute over against the actual. Thus, we must assert the relatively wonderful. In other words, the “absolutely wonderful” of “opening the relative and revealing the wonderful” does not mean to ignore such facts and affirm humanity, as it is, or to affirm the actual as absolute. In this sense, the “relatively wonderful” of “breaking the relative and revealing the wonderful” is included in “opening the relative and revealing the wonderful.” Moreover, the “supreme truth of the middle way” is posited as the synthesis of “entering emptiness from conventional existence” and “entering conventional existence from emptiness.” Finally, the “threefold contemplation” is taught as a conclusion–the perfect and immediate calming and contemplation of the identity of emptiness, conventional existence, and the middle way.

Thus did Tiantai Zhiyi’s view of absoluteness reach its culmination. We can say that the Lotus Sutra’s teaching of the unifying truth (the Wonderful Dharma of One Vehicle) gained theoretical coherence here. We can conclude that actuality is a plural, finite, and relative world. This is actuality as factual. Zhiyi insists on always acknowledging its factuality as a fact, seeing the unifying truth in it, and thereby gaining a glimpse of an absolute state. If we put this in the context of the eternal life of the Buddha revealed in chapter 16 of the Lotus Sutra, this actual life is transient—human beings live toward death. Based on this, one can realize the Everlasting Buddha, i.e., eternal life. It is in this way that one discovers the true or original Buddha.