The Questions of Milind (henceforth, QoM) is a record of the dialogue between Milind, the great learned Greek king, and Nagasena, the great learned Buddhist monk. Their philosophical, geographical, linguistic, and family backgrounds are different. They have been living very different, not to say contrary, lifestyles. Milind as a king had everything, and Nagasena being a monk had nothing. Jorge Borges thought that it is an example of a dialogue between everything and nothing. This dialogue can also be seen as a dialogue between the west and the east.

The dialogue is in the form of questions and answers. Milind asks questions to Nagasena, and Nagasena answers back. This simple process reflects the mental attitudes of the two great men. As it is a record of dialogue, it engages the reader as a bystander and stimulates them to think about their positions. The dialogue is a device used by the famous philosopher, Plato, to bring alive mind and thoughts of his teacher, Socrates. Similarly, Mahatma Jotiba Phule used the dialogue form to expose the Brahminical exploitation and machinery to exploit India’s lowered castes. Galileo used this device of dialogue to teach scientific truths. This form of recording back and forth is an important pedagogical tool.

In the context of QoM, it is a tool to teach not only Buddhism and its key concepts, but it is also a tool, or rather training in communication. Due to its educational nature, Babasaheb Ambedkar valued and revered this text very deeply. He founded a college in Aurangabad named after Milind, and the campus of the college was given the name of Nagasena. His ideal for students was Milind and for teachers Nagasena.

The QoM expounds the heart of Buddhism in its details and it shows inter-relatedness of teachings themselves. Hence, QoM is an intellectual quest of two human beings to understand what really matters. As such Milind can be also looked upon as a model for the modern man who is educated, rich, and having every material pleasure at their disposal, and Nagasena is a model of renunciation but completely devoted to understanding deeper truths of life and living by the understanding of those truths.

However, before we undertake to learn something, for that matter, when Milind undertook to learn something, the attitude of open and free mind is the foremost condition. That critical awareness and curiosity is an important characteristic of Milind’s mind. While Nagasena shows the important quality of teacher to be able to engage and teach Milind in his own terms, and at the same time, introducing new terms gradually and carefully.

This is not to say that Milind and Nagasena are inseparable. In a sense, they represent our own dialogue within, our own mind is the locus of their discussion and dialogue. As we can also look at QoM as a game or method in communication, or as a drama with two characters. What happens when we witness a drama, we are observers and we are also judging the different characters, and as it happens, we begin to identify with one character or another. However, the QoM begins with this very question of identity. It is posed in a dramatic way, but can be simply put as “Who is debating with whom?”. It doesn’t begin with the substance of topic, but rather process of discussion. The substance of the dialogue is absent, and what is present is a process of communication, the terms of communication themselves.

So it begins with the fundamental question of identity. What is Nagasena? This is like the famous Zen koan so popularised in the Korean Zen tradition as “What am I?. And, the answer ends in reducing Nagasena, not to any entity that is permanent, self-existing, and substantial, but as it turns out Nagasena is just a name, it is just a symbol, it is just a convention used for practical reasons. And the message from the answer is clear: Do not play with language, symbols, and conventions, for they do not refer to anything that is permanent and substance, they have an only practical use.

Nagasena uses words, symbols, parables, stories, metaphors, allegories, and many linguistic vehicles to communicate with Milind, but in the end, they have no other purpose than understanding the underlying reality, or an underlying method to understand that reality which can be directly experienced. They both understand this nature of their discussion when Milind and Nagasena agree with each other that their dialogue is an exercise in understanding the truth. This happens in the very second question when questioning and answering itself is exposed to its ultimate function of a bridge that can connect two human minds.

These preliminary questions are as important as the other questions related to many terms and practices. The questions and answers is an exercise in understanding the essential, but this understanding does not take place in the hierarchy. It is not the communication based on the political power of the king or so-called spiritual power of the monk. The communication or the dialogue is carried out with only one purpose, and the purpose is to attain to wisdom.

After exposing the limits of sounds, words, syntax, grammar, and language, the dialogue is taken forward. As such it is a fairly long book and we will have to understand the structure of the QoM. However, the broader framework is clear and evident from the few initial questions. I would summarise a few key points that I think are important.

In all human communications, it is important to understand the limits of the language, and ideologies that are often built on the languages, and theories based on fanciful ideas to experience what is dynamic. Language is too static to understand dynamic.

However, the language can be used as a possible tool to communicate, clarify, understand, and at its best point out at, directed to, look at, what is ever present as a dynamic reality.

Using human communication as a method in arriving at unity in understanding.

The dialogue between Milind and Nagasena is not an ego-battle, as, in the beginning, the terms of the discussion and the purpose of the discussion are settled, and before I encourage you all the read this important book, I will summarise some important takeaways for me personally:

– Do not make any dialogue, discussion, or debate a personal issue, because communication to its very root and essence can never be personal, it is always an interpersonal process.

– Do not let the discussion take place based on the position of power or hierarchy, but it should always take place based on a common quest of truth and mutual respect

– Arguments and counter-argument without having a direction or wisdom can just become a wordplay

– It is always important to create a comfortable situation for both the parties before any discussion takes place.

Author – Mangesh Dahiwale, Human Rights Activist