Most westerners are familiar with Zen Buddhism. Although D.T.
Suzuki's writings popularized that order of Buddhist thought in America,
Suzuki also had deep interest in Shin Buddhism and made significant
contributions to its study. As you well know, Shin Buddhism is based on
the teachings of Shinran (1173-1263), one of the Kamakura Buddhist
leaders who brought new force and depth to Buddhism 800 years ago in
Japan. The center from which this spiritual movement emanated was
ancient Kyoto, and the monasteries on nearby Mt. Hiei.
At the age of 29, after 20 years of strenuous Tendai Buddhist
practice and discipline, Shinran walked out of the monastic life and
down into Kyoto, impelled by a sense of utter failure and a desperate
urgency to find a meaning in his life with which he could come to terms
with life itself, and with death. In the considerable number of his
writings that have survived, Shinran speaks to modern man across the
bridge of eight centuries. He speaks of the problem of alienation and
the barricades of self-deception built by the ego, of fear and
loneliness and anxieties. He speaks in a new dimension of good and evil
and ourselves. His Shinshu teachings afford a fresh perspective of
existential meaning and spiritual depth.
Jean Paul Sartre, the prophet of modern existentialism, ends in
despair, accepting life as absurd. Shinran began with despair, accepted
his own absurdity, and his own capacity for self-deception and evil. He
found existential meaning and consequent spiritual breadth and depth in
Amida Buddha. Amida (or Amitabha, Amitayus), is a symbol in the Pure
Land Mahayana Buddhist tradition of the Buddha of limitless life and
light who spiritually frees and affirms life as it is (without the ego
barriers of self-deception) and embraces all life with universal
compassion.
Generally speaking, I am a follower of the philosophy expressed in
Herman Hesse's "Siddartha." Ultimately, we all must learn for ourselves.
Some people may help us along the way, but the task is really ours alone
-- as is also indicated in the stark existential perspective of
Shinran, when he declared to his questioners: "It is up to you to
decide." Buddhism has the ideal of the zenchishiki, the good friend
who instructs, and it is as the good friend in this analysis of Shinran,
Shinshu and the problems of contemporary life and religion, that I wish
to pool my thoughts and experiences with those which you, the reader,
bring to this study. I hope, in the following chapters, to think along
with you concerning how we may understand Shinshu's contribution to the
modern world and, more specifically, how Shinran's interpretation of
Buddhism can be made meaningful despite the centuries that intervene
between our lives and his.
There is a difference in the way I, as a convert, approach Shinran.
Some may have been raised in the Honganji (Shinshu) tradition since
childhood, in Japan, in Hawaii, in Canada, on the U.S. Mainland or in
South America. Converts such as myself now have Shinshu groups also in
London, Berlin, Brussels, Salzburg, Budapest, Paris, in areas of
Switzerland and in Poland.
In my case, I virtually stumbled on Shinran, as if by accident, while
I was a deeply committed Christian of the fundamentalist type, and
preparing to become a missionary in Japan. All my life I had considered
Christianity the unique and only true religion. However, that
understanding was shattered as the result of a chance situation in Tokyo
during the occupation period following the end of World War II. I was
then teaching English by preaching in a church. When I spoke of the
Christian idea of Grace, the Christian minister interpreted this by
referring to Amida. I had never heard of Amida, and I did not know
sufficient Japanese to inquire. The minister could not speak enough
English to clarify the comparison, or to explain the concept of Amida to
me. I was shocked and asked him how anything else could be like
Christianity, but I had to wait years to work out this problem. It later
became the basis for my doctoral study of Shin Buddhism which was
published in 1965 under the title "Shinran's Gospel of Pure Grace."
(Eventually, my inquiries into the teaching resulted in my personal
commitment and the writing of this study.)
That initial meeting with Shinran in 1946 was also related to
personal problems in my life. I was undergoing a developing sense of
failure in my religious life and was really quite hypocritical. As a
known Christian, indeed as a Christian theological student and, later, a
Christian minister, I had to maintain a front with which I was
increasingly disenchanted. It is a complicated story from my childhood,
but traditional Christianity tends to inculcate guilt in various ways,
despite the affirmation that one is saved and accepted by God.
Consequently, an individual may form deep self-hatreds, while yet
throwing himself or herself more deeply into religion. As I became more
broadly educated in the post-war years, I had the opportunity to acquire
a knowledge of the Japanese language, to study Shinran's writings in
their original form and to come to know many devoted Shinshu people. In
this process, I was able to formulate a more positive understanding of
life than I had had previously. I thus became a convert to Shinran's
teaching and this fact will, I feel, account for some differences in my
attitude and perspective, from the attitude and perspective of the Shin
Buddhist who has inherited his faith as a result of family nurture.
Generally, those who inherit a tradition accept the given religious
institution as satisfactory and meaningful for their lives. An inherited
tradition is like a pair of old and comfortable shoes. The religion is
intertwined with family and social community and, as a result, there is
usually less tendency to question or even to try to really understand
what is given.
The convert, however, tends to focus on the vitalizing experience of
the personal encounter with the teaching. It is not part of one's family
or community. The individual must stand alone justifying to oneself the
decisions that have been made. Consequently, one's interest lies more in
the life and experience of the founder who originally set the teaching
in motion, than in the institution which was founded to preserve that
teaching. (Of course, without the institution the teaching might not be
preserved.)
Converts are not necessarily anti-institutional, but the motivating
force for their involvement with the institution derives from a deeply
personal commitment made on the basis of the enlightenment given to the
person by the teaching. Sometimes, there is a wide gap between the
attitudes of the convert and the members born into the tradition. It is
a crucial difference for a person such as myself, who has found a new
truth, when confronted by a member who has inherited an old truth.
As a convert, I anticipate that members understand and take a stand
on the basis of the teaching. Traditional devotees acknowledge and honor
the teaching, but may not feel impelled to explore it more deeply. They
tend to take for granted what excites the person such as myself in the
discovery of Shinshu. As a convert, also, I place my focus on Shinran
the person, the teacher, the Buddhist. As a result of my own study, I
feel close to him in my imagination. I have sometimes tried to visualize
what he must have been like in his manner of speech and attitudes. I
feel close to him because he experienced a sense of personal failure and
frustration which I, in my own way, have experienced. Just as he
identified with Yuiembo (his disciple who wrote "Tannisho") I believe he
would have identified with me in my plight. I feel close to him, because
he was a convert in the deepest sense, in breaking with an age-old
tradition of Buddhist discipline and thought in order to realize his own
personal understanding of Buddhism. It is in this area of my
interpretation that I experience some difficulty with traditional
members of Shin Buddhism who believe that they give the essence of
Shinran's view by declaring that he was merely a "faithful disciple
of Honen." (Or are merely content with the traditional round of
observances and institutional activities, frequently unrelated to the
study of the teachings.)
It is true that Shinran relied on Pure Land tradition and exalted his
master Honen, but he was not at all a slave of that tradition. Rather,
he was creative and independent in his use of tradition to point to
deeper dimensions unexplored by earlier teachers. Guided by his own
experience in religious endeavor and practice, and by Honen's teachings,
he went on to forge a new tradition or, as Prof. Kenko Futaba has
written, he opened new horizons in Buddhism.
Radical means going to the root. It also means redirecting insight.
In both ways, Shinran was a radical in the deepest and best sense of the
word. Yet, I have heard people in Honganji assert that there is nothing
radical about Shinran. This view reveals itself in their understanding
of the meaning of religious life when decisions have to be made
concerning the future of the temple.
Some years ago, there was a Shinshu slogan in Hawaii, "Let us
ask Shinran." I believe we should not be asking traditional
questions in the hope of getting traditional answers. We must allow
Shinran to speak for himself out of his life and the teaching which grew
from it. Drawing on his spirit, we should attempt to open new horizons.
Though slogans can generally be trite and empty, we could hope that the
slogan for another year, "On this foundation ... a new
dream," might in the future be nearer to a reality than what has
been the case with slogans in the past.
In any case, trite or real, these slogans express the confidence that
Shinran has something to say which is meaningful for our time. They also
suggest that we are prepared to follow his lead. Shinran becomes the
warrant or authority for the position we take in life. Further, when we
focus on Shinran, it is not merely the words he spoke on which we focus,
but on his whole life. In contemporary thought there has developed a
great interest in the concept of story. Every life is a story. Our lives
and actions tell a story of the values, convictions, and attitudes we
have. The story is important because it involves a plot, a theme, or a
direction which gives a sense of wholeness to life.
It is significant that myths which tell of the basic values of a
community are in story form. Rather than our lives being merely a
disjointed series of unrelated events, the story concept implies they
are all related and hold together. Shinran's life is intermingled with
legend. However, there are sufficient indications from the reality he
expresses in his writings, that the theme of his life was the
realization of compassion and a deep abiding concern for the masses who,
like himself, had no hope of achieving Buddhist ideals by following the
traditional paths of discipline and purification. In this study, I shall
approach Shinran's life as story from an existential perspective, that
same perspective from which I view religion as a whole.
Existentialism is generally understood to focus on concrete
individual existence. The concrete individual is faced with the daily
necessity of deciding what is important for his or her life and what
values are primary in making judgments affecting oneself and others. To
live existentially is to develop an understanding of oneself as a center
of value and a focus of reality which radiates out to others. We are
limited, but there is a core of freedom which makes us human. Even in an
extreme situation a person can choose one's attitude -- can even choose
death, an existential choice illuminated in Victor Frankl's "Man's Search
for Meaning."
Basically, existentialism is the experience of liberation from the
domination of circumstance, whether physical, social, moral or
spiritual. Rather than experiencing oneself in a self-conscious manner,
one becomes self-aware. I use the word self-conscious in the distinct
sense of being dominated, controlled by external pressures, a condition
whose external signs are embarrassment and shame. One may visualize
oneself as a cog or tool or pawn of reality. It is a sense of
powerlessness.
To become self-aware means to see oneself as an extension of reality
into the world with the potential of joining with others to communicate
and realize one's deepest ideals and aspirations. To live existentially
or authentically is also to grasp clearly one's limitations, weaknesses,
and imperfections. It involves the tension of realizing one's powers
while yet knowing one's weaknesses, a tension Shinran acutely describes
in "Tannisho," chapter 4, where he discusses the two types of compassion.
Shinran distinguishes self-powered compassion from that of Amida, the
compassion of Other Power or Pure Land compassion. In "Tannisho,"
likewise, Shinran's existential awareness also appears in the discussion
on karma with Yuiembo in chapter 13. Shinran's existential perspective,
as it emerges in "Tannisho," helps us to understand the limitations of our
lives while, at the same time, attunes us to a power (reality) which
lifts our vision beyond those limitations. As I see it, the existential
approach to religion involves a life strategy. It means to have a
foothold, a standpoint, to take a stand within the stream of life. We
may compare it with an individual crossing a stream, and seeking out the
rocks on which he may place his foot to negotiate the swift current.
In Pure Land Buddhist tradition, the tradition of Honen and Shinran,
the type of decision and resoluteness involved in authentic existence is
indicated in Shan Tao's (Zendo) story of the White Path which is
frequently told in our temples. The individual confronting the many
challenges of existence must launch out with faith and decisiveness to
tread the White Path, the thin line which always separates us from
meaning or chaos.
In such a situation one takes responsibility for one's own existence.
Whatever meaning there is in life and the world, for yourself and others,
ultimately rests with you. This has been the Buddhist message from the
beginning when, more than 2,500 years ago, Buddha urged his disciples to
be lamps unto themselves, and not to take refuge in others. His was a
call to self-responsibility, not selfishness.
The Pure Land tradition, including Shinran's teachings, is generally
viewed as other-worldly and relating little to concerns of this life.
Over the years, memorials and funerals became the main activities of the
religious community. In Japan, it is today tagged as "Funeral
Buddhism." However, close inspection of Shinran's teaching shows
him to be more concerned with one's living in this world once faith is
established and one's future destiny is secure. In order to uncover the
essence of Shinran's teaching for our time, a considerable amount of the
traditional perspective must be revised, and the misimpression of
"Funeral Buddhism" discarded.
To understand Shinshu, to revise the traditional perspective of
Shinran and comprehend its essential relevance to our time, I offer five
points to consider in approaching the subject of religion, and of
religious traditions. First, I am a believer in history. Everything must
be seen in its relation to history and the context from which it
emerges. Second, I am also a believer in concrete, personal existence as
the central issue of religion and thought. Whatever abstract ideal or
theory we accept must have its roots and relationship in our immediate
experience of life. Third, I believe in metaphysical and philosophical
thinking. Metaphysics attempts to clarify the mystery of existence. It
is never complete, but open. Even though few questions have final
solutions, it is necessary to question and explore. It has been said
that the unexamined life is not worth living. Fourth, to me, religion
means openness, sharing, compassion, love, justice, and community. To be
open does not mean to be apathetic or uncritical. Sharing does not mean
squandering. Compassion and love are not sentimental emotions, but
fundamental life values. Justice is not legalism; community does not
require conformity. Fifth, as I believe it was in the life of Shinran,
tradition should be a stepping stone to deeper insight and experience,
and not a barrier to growth. Tradition should not become ingrown, but it
should be out-growing as it correlates to the ongoing times. Although we
modify a quote of Dr. Radhakrishnan concerning Hinduism, we should
consider Buddhism in the following way: "Buddhism is a movement,
not a position; a process, not a result; a growing...tradition, not a
fixed revelation." [1]
The method I employ in the process of studying
religion, and the process I shall use in the following sessions on
Shinshu, is to try to discover the principle of thought which lies
behind an incident or teaching. This principle should then be considered
in relation to the Buddhist tradition which lies in the background. The
traditional Buddhist view may reinforce or contrast with the principle.
We may then proceed, after placing it in its proper context, to relate
it to the world of our experience. In relating the principle to our own
time, we apply the principle of extension. This is the Buddhist idea of
"egifuemon" which means not to be bound to the strict letter, or literal
interpretation of Buddhism. Such a process of reinterpretation at work
will be evident in our discussion of the concept of Nembutsu in later
chapters.
By extension we mean to apply a teaching to an area that has not
previously been considered as relating to that teaching. To do this, it
is important to maintain the consistency of a tradition within itself.
In this, the concept of hon'i, or original intent, is implicit. Despite
differences between himself and earlier Pure Land Tradition, Shinran is
thought to maintain the original intention or idea of universal
salvation of that tradition. Shinran's reformulation of Pure Land
teaching beyond his predecessors is also represented in the distinction
of Tradition (dento) and Personal Insight (kosho).
Pure Land teaching has traditionally been viewed as an
individualistic religion of salvation in another world. It was
originally promoted, however, as a teaching which was correlated to the
times and to the nature of being (jikiso). This original intent was
carried out by Shinran. Similarly in our day, we may apply the teaching
socially, as well as individually, in order to correlate it to the
demands of our own age. As Shinran did in his lifetime, we may analyze
it for its guidance in issues of present-day life.
It has always been a principle of Buddhism that the Dharma -- the
body of the teachings that is viewed as the vehicle of insight into the
truth -- corresponds to the needs of beings. This is the principle
behind the compassionate doctrine and method of hoben, or upaya, the
device of tactfulness or -- as it has sometimes been paradoxically
described -- the lie that tells the truth.
The necessity for religion to be relevant to human needs and concerns
is not a new emphasis in Buddhism, but in countering the tendency of
institutionalization to divorce itself from existential relevance, this
Buddhist principle should be recovered as a way to face problems, rather
than avoid them.
Buddhism's comprehensive approach to existence is symbolized in the
concept of 84,000 dharmas. This enormous figure is meant to show that
every possibility of human perspective is already a part of Buddhism. No
idea is to be rejected, so far as it is true, merely because it may not
have been taught earlier. This is a criticism Mahayana Buddhism had to
face in stories of conflict with conservative monks in the "Lotus Sutra."
Confucius also was described as a person who knew how to bring the new
out of the old. This is the role of the teacher. He does not wipe out
the past and make his own system. Instead, he contemplates the resources
of the past and brings to light new approaches and perspectives. This to
me is what Shinran accomplished. I, of course, am not Buddha or
Confucius or Shinran, but my task is the same. We must canvass the
possibilities and we must seek out the new way.
Religion must be involved with contemporary human problems, but in
canvassing the past to seek new ways for the present, we cannot expect
religion to give detailed solutions to the many issues that confront us.
Some people reject religion because they do not find the answers they
desire there. But, to me, what religion provides is an angle of view,
basic principles and values, as well as an understanding of human nature
and relationships which can contribute to our contemporary
considerations. Religion conditions our attitudes and relations to
people, which may make solutions to particular problems more easily
achieved. It is all this, in Shinran's teachings and in his life story
that open horizons of existential relevance to our modern world. Shinshu
gives us a point to stand on that is a dynamic process, a movement, not
a static position in Buddhism. Rather it is a tradition that continues
to evolve and grow, to attract people such as myself. Before we explore
Shinshu's relevance more deeply, there is the question of just what is
the contemporary religious situation of the world in which you and I
live.
