REFLECTIONS

Bringing Joy to Others by Nichiko Niwano

Imagine that your stomach is empty else’s happiness and joy, it can make life Nichiko Niwano is president of and there is a single rice ball. However, more meaningful. Rissho Kosei-kai and honorary everyone around you is just as hungry An ancient Indian text says, “From president of Religions for Peace. as you are. Well, everyone, what would doing good deeds for others, you should He also serves as an advisor to you do with it? Some will put other peo- expect no repayment, no praise, and no Shinshuren (Federation of New ple first. Others will share it. And yet reward. Why is this? Because doing so is Religious Organizations of ). others might, from extreme hunger, nothing more than for one’s own plea- begin snatching it away from each other. sure.” When we give benefits to others, she could truly understand how suffering Saicho (767–822), the founder of we experience a happiness and joy that people felt. Her sense of oneness with the denomination of Japanese cannot possibly be had otherwise, tran- them gave rise to her consideration for , said that the highest form of scending any form of praise or calcula- them and enabled her to quickly grasp practicing compassion is to “forget the tion of profit and loss. with just the right timing what lay deep self and benefit others.” As Buddhists, in their hearts. Although it is not easy we should let others eat the rice ball The Joy of Being to do, we also want to cultivate our own first, but there is a side to us that can- Considerate of Others consideration for others. not readily let go of our desires. Even if we are not capable of the That may be true, but we innately No matter how much we may be think- same degree of consideration of others have the potential to experience joy and ing about the other person, however, if as she was, or even if the other person happiness that go far beyond the fulfill- we ignore his or her feelings and cir- does not accept our thoughtfulness, we ment of our wishes. The face and appear- cumstances, we may come off as smug. still can get great joy in discovering ance of a happy person is the switch that In some cases, our efforts to help will that we ourselves have hearts that enjoy turns on such sensitivity in us. end up being unwanted and irritating. giving to others. Besides, we should A woman who took presents to a Today Cofounder Myoko Naganuma feel relieved knowing that, by being Seniors’ Day event at a nearby facility is still called “the compassionate mother” able to put others first, we are also rid- was told by one senior, “I can’t accept of Rissho Kosei-kai because she was so ding ourselves of greedy desires. For a gift from someone I don’t know.” The fervent in showing consideration to oth- example, even if the offer to help is woman replied with a request: “I want ers that when she saw someone in need, not heartfelt or the show of compas- to share in your good luck of living a she could not stop herself from reach- sion is insincere, when these actions long life, so would you rub my head?” ing out to that person. Founder Nikkyo are repeated again and again, we will The senior then rubbed her head until Niwano said of her, “In every situation, feel joy, and our hearts and minds will her hair was completely disheveled. she would appropriately and promptly be inspired and grow. When then asked to accept the gift as grasp the feelings of the other person. The feeling of being refreshed and a thank-you, the senior did so with a When someone seemed to need some- the joy that we receive from making beaming smile and told the woman, thing, she would generously give it to others happy through donations made “Thanks.” him or her. . . . She possessed a man- with our bodies, hearts, and minds, giv- This episode proves that the joy ner of guiding others that was always ing freely of ourselves, as well as dona- we receive from doing something for adapting to the circumstances while tions of material things, make us feel others is greater than the joy received meticulously taking care of the details.” like continuing to do more practices of when someone does something for us. Because Cofounder Naganuma had her- consideration. Then, whenever we are At the same time, this story shows us self experienced more of the sufferings practicing consideration, we can more that when our action leads to someone of illness and poverty than most people, fully experience the joy of being alive. ≥

Dharma World January–March 2016 1 JAN.–MAR. 2016 VOL. 43

FEATURES: Dual Religious Identity: Can One Practice Two Religions?

1 Bringing Joy to Others by Nichiko Niwano World presents Buddhism as a practical living religion and promotes interreligious dialogue for world peace. It espouses views 3 Multiple Belonging that emphasize the dignity of life, by Gene Reeves seeks to rediscover our inner nature 7 Many Religions, One Reality and bring our lives more in accord by Joseph S. O’Leary with it, and investigates causes of human suff ering. It tries to show 11 Buddhist-Christian how religious principles help solve Double Belongings problems in daily life and how the by Kunihiko Terasawa least application of such principles 14 Religions in Japan: has wholesome eff ects on the world Many or None? around us. It seeks to demonstrate by Gaynor Sekimori truths that are fundamental to all religions, truths on which all people 19 Religious Syncretism can act. in the African Diaspora by Terry Rey Publisher: Hirofumi Mizuno 24 On Being a Christian Infl uenced by Buddhism Director: Kazumasa Murase by Jay McDaniel Senior Editor: Kazumasa Osaka Editor: Katsuyuki Kikuchi Editorial Advisors: Miriam Levering, Gene Reeves, Yoshiaki Sanada, 28 Buddhism and Social Engagement (3) Dominick Scarangello, Social Reform and Environmental Protection Michio T. Shinozaki by Ranjana Mukhopadhyaya Copy Editors: 32 Islamic State and the Questions It Now Poses William Feuillan, Gary Hoiby, by Yoshiaki Sanada DeAnna Satre, Catherine Szolga Editorial Staff : 35 Th e Lotus : Time, Space, and Culture Ryuichi Kaneko, Satoe Izawa by Adam Lyons Subscription Staff : Kazuyo Okazaki 40 Twists and Turns on the Path to Peace Layout and Design: Abinitio Design by Nikkyo Niwano Cover: Photo: Shutterstock.com Photoshop work by Abinitio Design THE THREEFOLD LOTUS SUTRA: A MODERN COMMENTARY 44 Th e Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Law Chapter 25: Th e All-Sidedness of the Regarder of the Cries of the World (2)

Dharma World is published quarterly by Kosei Publishing Company, 2-7-1 Wada, Suginami-ku, Tokyo 166-8535. E-mail: [email protected]. Copyright © 2016 by Kosei Publishing Company. All rights reserved. Printed in Japan by Komiyama Printing Company. Change of Address: Please provide both old and new addresses. Six weeks’ advance notice is requested. Requests for permission to reprint all or part of any article in this issue must be made in writing to the editor of Dharma World. FEATURES

Multiple Belonging by Gene Reeves

Gene Reeves has researched and I believe we are called today . . . to move beyond our own lectured on the Lotus Sutra worldwide tribalisms, our racial and ethnic and national and class for more than a quarter century. He smallness, and let our vision of human wholeness become was a visiting professor at Peking a basis for a more genuine community, a model of what University and a professor at Renmin can be. One way [to do this] is by participating in multiple University of China in Beijing until religious traditions. retiring in 2012, and he serves as an international advisor to Rissho Kosei-kai. His recent works include Personal identity is a tricky thing. I have was Saint Jude’s, a small, working-class, The Lotus Sutra and The Stories of not always known who I am. Sometimes, Episcopal church. Among other respon- the Lotus Sutra (Wisdom Publications, perhaps, I tried to fi nd myself. And even sibilities there, I was the janitor. As jan- 2008 and 2010). now, having entered the ranks of “the itor, I had keys to the small, three-room elderly,” I’m not sure I know who I am. building built in the shape of a cross. Multiple Belonging Many years ago, when I was invited Late one night, under cover of darkness, to preach at the Unitarian Church in I sneaked into the building with one In Cape Town I was suggesting that Cape Town, South Africa, I wanted to of my best friends, a Roman Catholic, I am in some ways Jewish, Christian, encourage the struggling congregation to just to show him what the inside of a Unitarian, and Buddhist. Even today, broaden their outlook, and for this pur- Protestant church looked like. We had if someone were to ask me whether pose I chose a passage from the Jewish to sneak in because at that time Roman I am Christian or Unitarian, under bible, from the book of Isaiah: “Make Catholics were not allowed even to enter most circumstances I would reply in your tent larger, lengthen your cords and a Protestant church for any reason. the affi rmative. Th at is basically for two strengthen your stakes” (54:2). Th e Second Vatican Council, oft en reasons: First, I fi nd that both Christian I explained to the congregation called Vatican II, convened by Pope John and Unitarian sensibilities, even biases that I was raised Christian. At twenty XXIII in 1962, pretty much brought an and prejudices, are deeply imbedded in I became a Unitarian. At thirty I became end to that attitude, with Catholics not me, in my values, in my ways of think- a Unitarian Universalist. And at fi ft y I only allowed to enter non-Catholic facil- ing and being. Moreover, there is much became a Buddhist. But not once did I ities and holy places but oft en encour- in Christian and Unitarian teachings think of those becomings as a conver- aged to engage with members of other and symbolism that I affi rm. I am not sion from one faith to another. And so religious traditions both for improving a fatalist but believe strongly in the I remain, in my own self-understand- personal understanding and for bene- reality and ever-present possibility ing, Christian, Unitarian, Universalist, fi ting the world. In reference to various of personal transformation. I learned and Buddhist. Th e sermon, I claimed discussions before the Second Vatican that, even took it into my being, from in Cape Town, could be understood as Council actually convened, Pope John Christianity. I also believe fi rmly in the Jewish, Christian, Unitarian, Universalist, XXIII is oft en quoted as saying that it importance of respecting other religious and Buddhist. was time to open the windows of the traditions. I learned that at a young age When I was young, even among Church to let in some fresh air. And from Unitarianism. But there are also Christian sects and denominations, he invited organizations outside the other traditions and occupations that being religiously more than one thing Catholic Church to send observers to are part of my self-identity, some by was not allowed. My family’s local church the Council. choice, others by circumstance.

Dharma World January–March 2016 3 It is common to divide personal Gene.” Am I, like the colonels, generals, what I am but an ambivalence rooted identities into two kinds—those that governors, and presidents, to have that in a strong sense that many Buddhists title forever? To me it does not seem would not regard me as Buddhist. association with some group or orga- appropriate, but obviously others have nization, and those that one inherits or other views. For them, being a profes- For many Buddhists, the only way to be adheres to because of the circumstances sor is part of my identity. a “real” Buddhist is to be a monastic, a one happens to be in. But while this monk or a nun, and to follow some form distinction between chosen identities personal identity is not as clear-cut as of a code of behavior for monastics, the and circumstantial ones can be useful, we sometimes think. Individuals have . Accordingly, for some Buddhists it is not very clear or strictly applicable. many identities, some very important there are practically no Buddhists in Take, for example, nationality. I was to themselves, others not; some cho- Japan, since even Japanese Buddhist born and raised as an American. I did sen, others not; some clearly applica- clergy typically marry, eat meat, and not choose to be an American. But I can ble, others not; some quite permanent, drink alcoholic beverages. With such a choose to no longer be an American by others not. resigning my citizenship and becom- be Buddhist, I am clearly not a Buddhist. ing, for example, a Japanese citizen. But On Being Buddhist were I to do that, would I also become East Asia Japanese? Hardly! To my way of thinking, I have several other identities that might being Japanese is at least as much a mat- be worth discussing, but the one that I ter of ethnic identity as it is of national- would most like to mention here is that been living in East Asia, primarily in ity. One can become a citizen of Japan, of being Buddhist. Japan, but also in China, and with occa- Partly I think because of my history sional extended visits to Taiwan, Korea, from being “Japanese.” But not every- as a Unitarian Universalist minister and and Singapore. In all of these countries, one thinks the way I do on this matter. the head of a Unitarian Universalist and in other smaller areas with Chinese So there are, in fact, people who have become citizens of Japan, though they asked whether I am now Buddhist. My may disagree with each other on many are not ethnically Japanese, who think - of themselves, and would like others response suggests a kind of ambivalence, ues and Confucian sensibilities are still to think of them, as Japanese, which an ambivalence not in my own sense of very strong. At the same time, in much in at least one sense they actually are. of East Asia, Buddhist institutions are But I would not understand myself to also strong and growing stronger, both be Japanese even if I became a citizen in numbers and in vitality and cultural of Japan. I am also a professional philosopher especially Taoism in China and Taiwan and think of myself, to some degree, and in Japan, are doing well in as a philosopher. Being a philosopher various ways, though their institutional is part of my identity. And it seems to embodiments may not be quite as strong me, it is part of my identity whether I as the Buddhist temples and associations. choose it or not. It’s true, of course, that And sometimes these old traditions are I originally made a choice to study phi- embodied in “new” religions, where they losophy and, in that sense, to become a philosopher. But since then, it has been strong connection between the tradi- part of my identity, part of my being— tional religious tradition and the new whether I like it or not. In one sense it religion is not explicit, and may even be is a chosen identity; in another it is not. denied, but is there nonetheless. In addi- Until fairly recently, all of my adult tion, in many places in East Asia, “for- life I have been a university profes- eign” religions, especially Christianity and Islam, are growing and increasing I chose. But now, in retirement, some their public prominence. still address me as “Professor,” some as “Professor Reeves,” others as “Professor not all the same, not even with respect

4 D January–March 2016 to religious institutions. For example, China there is a strong Christianity is very strong in Korea and sense among them of growing rapidly in China, despite gov- belonging exclusively ernment opposition, or perhaps because to Islam. of it, while in Japan Christians remain make here, without put- one thing I think all of these countries ting it too strongly, is and cultures have in common is wide- that in East Asia, more spread tolerance of multiple religious than in the West, there customs and traditions. is, and has long been, Not only is mutual tolerance wide- a kind of openness to spread in East Asia, so is multiple belong- participating in and belonging to more than to be precise about this, but it seems as one religious tradition. though the majority of people in Japan I have thought that this who support a or belong would be less so among to relatively new Buddhist organizations religious professionals, such as Rissho Kosei-kai also occasion- but I will never forget ally visit and pay their respects at Shinto being guided around a shrines. In fact, in most of the new lay Taoist temple in Taiwan Buddhist organizations, both Buddhist by a Buddhist nun, who insisted strongly participation in multiple religious tra- and Shinto are recog- that even in their most bizarre portrayals ditions has been going on for centuries. nized and incorporated into religious life ther t aditional Taoist or popular Chinese in various ways. In Rissho Kosei-kai, for gods should be suitably respected and - - honored. For her, I suppose respect for gious identity. A Japanese Buddhist who porates a . In China, too— and even veneration of Taoist and pop- goes to a Shinto shrine at New Year’s though in most parts of the country Taoist ular deities is not felt to be multiple does not necessarily think of himself or traditions are not as well institutional- belonging. It’s just being Chinese. But herself as Shinto, just as a young Shinto ized as Shinto shrines are in Japan— clearly something like multiple belong- couple, closely related to a Shinto shrine, where Taoist temples exist, there does ing is involved. who have a Christian-style wedding In East Asia generally, it seems to me, service do not thereby think of them- tension between Buddhism and Taoism selves as Christian. or between being Buddhist and Taoist at not always been true, certainly not every- Mutual tolerance and even partici- where. One does not have to look far to pation in practices and rituals of other case in Singapore where a large Taoist religious traditions do not constitute temple is owned by a nearby Buddhist intolerance toward other religious tra- multiple belonging and do not mean the temple and run by its Buddhist monks. people involved have a religious iden- such intolerance involves, on one side tity that is consciously rooted in more respect and multiple belonging is the or the other, an Abrahamic tradition, than one tradition. But such tolerance Abrahamic religions of Christianity Muslim or Christian. Today in western and participation do get one close to and Islam, where, for the most part, Myanmar, for example, which is gen- multiple belonging and open a way, so being a Christian or being a Muslim erally a Buddhist country, it is not safe pretty much precludes being Shinto, to be Muslim. In parts of Bangladesh, to come to see oneself as belonging to a Muslim country, it is not safe to be more than one tradition. that there are not exceptions, where, Christian or Buddhist. Generally, when If we think of multiple belonging for example, some Japanese Christians such intolerance and hatred of other reli- as only a matter of chosen, conscious, are free to participate in Buddhist ritu- gious traditions exist, multiple belong- identity, then perhaps it is no more com- als and may even regard themselves as ing is impossible or at least extremely in East Asia than it is in America being Buddhist in some ways. I’m less or Europe. But if we can allow that there familiar with Muslims in East Asia, but But even with important excep- is such a thing as circumstantial multi- it seems to me that in both Japan and tions, though not o en recognized, ple belonging, a multiple belonging that

Dharma World January–March 2016 5 Jewish state for several decades, and It is not enough, this prophet said, now Cyrus, the Persian king, was win- for Israel alone to be restored. “Behold ning battles everywhere and was about my servant [Israel], whom I support; to take Babylon itself. To many Jews, my chosen in whom my soul delights; there seemed to be no ground for hope. I have put my spirit upon you; you will Some even began to doubt the existence bring forth justice to the whole world. of their god, Yahweh. You will not fail or be discouraged until But this prophet, Isaiah, spoke with a you have established justice over all the vision, a vision that transcended the pres- earth” (42:1, 4; emphasis mine). “I have ent moment and difficulties. Basically he given you as a covenant to all people, told the exiled Jews two things. First, he a light to all nations, to open the eyes assured them that their lives were very of the blind and to bring from prisons important, that they had a purpose in those who sit in darkness” (42:7). “It is the world and therefore the strength too small a thing that you should be my to move forward. “Comfort, comfort servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob my people, says your God. Speak ten- and to restore . . . Israel. I will give you derly to Jerusalem, and cry to her, that as a light to the nations, that my salva- her warfare is ended, that her iniquity tion shall reach the ends of the earth” is pardoned” (40:1–2). (49:6). “For my house shall be called a is not so much a matter of consciously “Haven’t you known? Haven’t you house of prayer for all peoples” (56:7). chosen personal identity as it is a mat- heard?” he said. “Your God is everlast- In other words, no more business ter of participating in more than one ing, the creator of the world. He never as usual. You have a new task as a peo- religious tradition and drawing signifi- gets tired or weary, and he strengthens ple—to bring justice to all the earth, that cant spiritual sustenance from them, those who are tired and weak” (40:28– the blind may see and the oppressed be perhaps multiple religious belonging 29). “The grass withers, the flower fades; liberated and a covenant made with all is actually quite common in East Asia. but the word of our God will stand for- peoples. ever” (40:8). “Even young people become How was this to be accomplished? Second Isaiah weak and get weary . . . but those who Toward the end of the prophecy, the trust God shall renew their strength, they prophet says, “Make your tent larger, Scholarly views of the Old Testament shall mount up with wings like eagles; lengthen your cords and strengthen book of Isaiah have changed rather dra- they shall run and not be weary; they your stakes” (54:2). matically in recent decades. But I think shall walk and not faint” (40:30–31). Make your tent larger. Like those Jews we need not trouble ourselves with that And then the prophet promised the peo- in their Babylonian captivity, I believe we here. Regardless of what actually hap- ple that despite all that had happened, are called today, each one of us is called, pened in history, we have a story, a story despite their sins and captivity, they would to make our tents larger, to move beyond that can contribute to our understand- return to Israel and rebuild the Temple our own tribalisms, our racial and ethnic ing of religious tolerance and multiple and the walls of Jerusalem. So the first and national and class smallness, and let belonging. part of what the prophet said was a word our vision of human wholeness become Around the middle of the sixth cen- of comfort, promise, and encouragement. a basis for a more genuine community, tury BCE, with the Jews in captivity in But the second thing this prophet a model of what can be. Babylon, a prophet arose in their midst. said was that this was not to be simply One way—to be sure, not the only We now know him as Second or Deutero another restoration project. “Behold, the way—to make our tents larger is by par- Isaiah, because his story is found in the former things have come to pass, and ticipating in multiple religious traditions. second section, or second half, of the new things I now declare” (42:9). “Sing By doing so, we can perhaps glimpse, book of Isaiah. to the Lord a new song” (42:10). “For or even come to know deeply, perspec- This was an extremely difficult time I create new heavens and a new earth” tives not our own. We can learn to see for the seminomadic Jews. Pinched (65:17). Something new was about to the world through the eyes of a Muslim, between Egypt and Babylon, they had happen, and this new thing was to be and thereby even be a Muslim, with- been thrown out of their homeland and a kind of universalism. No more nar- out casting off the identity with which made captives of the Babylonians. There rowness, no more petty nationalism, we entered our too small, but growing, had been nothing like a functioning no more small-time tribalism. tent. ≥

6 Dharma World January–March 2016 FEATURES

Many Religions, One Reality by Joseph S. O’Leary

Joseph S. O’Leary is an Irish Catholic Here [when nonsectarian dialogue occurs] “religious identity” theologian resident in Japan since takes on a new meaning, pre-Buddhist and pre-Christian, and 1983. He taught in the Department of our belonging to either or both of the constituted traditions English Literature at should be opened up to a deeper belonging that we share in Tokyo, and currently holds the with all human beings. Roche Chair for Interreligious Research at Nanzan University in Aichi Prefecture. He is the author owt ecitcarp ro eveileb eno nac woH“ woH“ nac eno eveileb ro ecitcarp owt “thusness,” or tathatā. Christianity, too, of Religious Pluralism and Christian teaches an outlook on reality as such, Truth (Edinburgh University Press, their doctrines are contradictory? . . . best expressed in the Synoptic Gospels 1996) and Conventional and Ultimate Studying and practicing a second reli- (Mark, Matthew, Luke): “Consider the Truth (University of Notre Dame Press, 2015). also be a path to salvation or spiritual ent ways. To adopt both religions is to Dierence: How Some ought-Motifs liberation?” (Dharma World editors) practice seeing reality as such from dif- from Derrida Can Nourish the Catholic- I suggest that the conundrums intro- ferent perspectives, attaining a more all- Buddhist Encounter, Robert Magliola duced above could be defused if one around perception of reality as a whole. urges us to “face up to doctrinal di er- placed the accent on the fact that both On the practical level, both religions ences” and sees the resultant tensions Buddhism and Christianity are con- urge a contemplative that as giving a new vitality to interreligious cerned with reality as such and with is attuned to the splendor of reality, or encounter (Angelico Press, 2014; see the goodness of being, and a compas- my review in e Japan Mission Journal the case of Buddhism, with its account sionate responsiveness that engages with 69 [2015]:185–89). But it seems to me of the marks of existence (imperma- that doctrinal di erences can look aer nence, painfulness, nonself, and empti- “Reality itself ” is of course a rather themselves and that doctrine itself is ness), of dependent origination, and of not immune to processes of change, development, and reinterpretation that is dead and what is living in religious can undercut e orts to state stark dif- traditions. But if we accept that real- ferences. Reality is the judge of doc- ity is the judge of religion, not religion trine, not doctrine the judge of reality. the judge of reality, just as “the Sabbath Applying this to Christian piety, one was made for humanity, not human- could say that someone who recited ity for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27), then the rosary every day, a meditation on each religion is faced with the task of determining what reality itself is and of mately attuning to reality itself under aspiring to be adequate to it. Buddhism and Christianity can collaborate on this Buddhism in one’s practice is to multi- task, which takes place at a more basic ply the colors, so that one might med- level than that of doctrinal formulations. itate on reality itself under the rubric In his book Facing Up to Real Doctrinal of the Buddha’s enlightenment along

Dharma World January–March 2016 7 with meditating on it under that of in the key of stale speculation about Christ’s resurrection. such topics as kenosis or the Trinity, Christians and Buddhists are mov- drawing on philosophies such as pro- ing together in the same direction, using cess thought that have only further their respective complex traditional equip- ment—which can sometimes look like Buddhism and Western philosophy is “shabby equipment always deteriorating” currently far more vibrant, at least intel- (T. S. Eliot, “East Coker”)—as a skill- lectually, than the Buddhist-Christian ful means in their shared creative task dialogue because it focuses not on eso- of thinking anew about matters of ulti- teric theological claims but on the ques- tion of the nature of reality, a question be a theme for interesting discussion, that haunts every human being in one but they should not become a blockage way or another. To restart the interreli- to spiritual wisdom or engaged compas- gious dialogue, Christians need to fore- sion. Rather, the debate should itself be ground an understanding of faith that guided by the overarching question of sees it as the embrace of reality itself. how these ancient traditions serve the Buddhism begins by dismantling human quest for truth and salvation today. the Brahmanist idea of a securely sub- stantial God, whereas Christianity is know what reality is, so why do we need religion to tell us?” And most people and even reinforces it by Platonic struc- - tures of transcendence wherein God is ity that they know best and that famil- located as supreme eternal being. Here hardened into a black-and-white oppo- iarity has made comfortable to them. we seem confronted with an irresolu- sition. All religions have faith in the Religion stands or falls by its claim that ble contradiction that makes “double sense of generosity of vision and exis- true reality is elusive. Buddhism and belonging” impossible. But even within tential trust that goes beyond the war- Christianity are two traditions of proven Platonizing Christianity the notion of rant of narrow empiricism and implies God has many traits of Buddhist emp- a relation to gracious ultimacy. Positive reality, and the breakthroughs to the real claims about the election of Israel and in both traditions remain a criterion of - the saving role of Jesus Christ are put religious authenticity today. Study of stantial attributes—everything about in perspective when interpreted as Buddhism does give “fresh insights” notes within the opening up to reality into Christianity by helping us see it itself that is the essential action of faith. as a religion of awakening to reality. It incomprehensible, or ungraspable. Going Subscription to creedal articles of faith focuses the attention of Christians on beyond this metaphysics, we encoun- is secondary to this. Faith is something what is most essential in their faith and ter the dynamic Johannine and Pauline like the adhimukti (aspiration) of which conception of God as an event of Spirit, the Lotus Sutra speaks, an opening up identity,” such that this no longer means light, love. Here again is a reality that to a divine life and light and grace per- obsessing over church claims or life- - vading the whole of reality. styles but, rather, means a return to the Credibility is strained by the startling basics of the outlook on reality taught doctrine of the divinity of Christ can particularity of the Christian claim that and lived by Jesus Christ. be translated back into these phenome- the salvation of the entire world, includ- Some have argued that Christian nological terms so that it, too, becomes ing all of humanity stretching back to its truth today can be more luminously an opening up to reality itself. ancient evolutionary origins, has been To be sure, the Buddhist sense of decided by an event that happened on Buddhist analytical methods and onto- reality and the Christian sense of reality logical insights than in the old frame- scandal of the claim is lessened when works formed in dialogue with Greek that they “live by faith” (Rom. 1:17) or we remind ourselves that the event of ontology. But the dialogue between “walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Cor. 5:7) grace encountered here reveals the ulti- the two religions seems to have stalled, in a sense that has no Buddhist equiv- - largely because it has been conducted alent. But this nuance should not be ular event has a universal meaning and

8 D January–March 2016 ceases to be that event unless experi- Vatican II urged Christians to read Some argue that one can give total - “the signs of the times,” that is, to tune in adhesion to only one religion, usually ner who is “ransomed, healed, restored, to here-and-now realities and to reart- the religion of one’s childhood, so that forgiven” by the power of Christ’s death iculate the gospel in response to them. when people speak of double belong- and resurrection encounters not a past Buddhism, in its exercise of discern- ing, all they mean is that they have a event but ultimate reality as active here ment and compassionate action, reads supplementary sympathy with or inter- and now. the very same signs. For instance, both est in the second religion. A Japanese religions are cultivating awareness of the person, accustomed to thinking of reli- have a role in orienting Christians toward ecological crisis and emphasizing “care gions as a pluralistic menu, a smor- reality if they are skillfully deployed. gasbord, might engage in Buddhist But they are less central than the ori- on their understanding of their respec- and Christian activities on appropriate entation given by the gospel message tive traditions, leading to a new empha- occasions without any sense of con ict- itself: the primacy of love, the superi- sis on the earth-friendly dimensions ing loyalties. Is this double belonging? ority of the life-giving Spirit to the let- to be found in tradition and a critique Or is it a refusal to think of religion as ter that kills (2 Cor 3:6), the abundance of rhetoric or philosophical outlooks requiring a total belonging? Would it - that denigrated or undercut the value be comparable to committing bigamy tion by faith in Christ, the assured tri- of earthly realities. Buddhist-Christian or to shallow promiscuity? Such ques- umph of the eschatological Kingdom. collaboration on ecological projects tions go beyond the merely psycholog- thus brings the two religions together ical or sociological level and raise the to make full sense of them they should not only on the plane of praxis but also deeper question of what a religion is. all be interpreted as coterminous with in critical querying of their doctrinal Perhaps Buddhism does not demand the unconditional surrender of faith pursue their self-critiques or self-rein- demanded by the message of salvation the transcendence of limiting concep- terpretations separately, for the entire through Jesus Christ, so that Christians tual regimes to an experience of freedom method and process of rethinking an can embrace the essence of Buddhist that demands ongoing contemplative ancient tradition in light of contem- wisdom without diluting their faith, perception and that cannot be reduced porary problems and insights is com- just as they embraced the essence of mon to all religions that undertake it. Greek philosophy in earlier times. A Modern Buddhist thinking from D. T. Buddhist, conversely, could embrace by a delusive ego anxious to shore up its Suzuki to Critical Buddhism is clearly the Christian message while preserv- identity and fearful of letting go. As to ing the essence of Buddhist wisdom. the Kingdom of God, it cannot be any- - It is rather regrettable that Buddhist thing less than reality itself: the world in enced by a Buddhist sensibility to the scholars such as Paul Williams and which we breathe here and now must be conventional fabric of religious dis- course as skillful means. conversion to Catholicism in terms

Dharma World January–March 2016 9 of renouncing Buddhism and polemi- essential or vital aspect of this message religions but should rather aim at cre- cizing against Buddhist errors. rather than on theoretical or doctrinal ating something, a new configuration, In any case, worrying about the pos- dimensions. Salvation is of course an through the conversation itself. Extended sibilities and problems of dual identity unconditional gift that lies beyond the to those who have no religion or who is ultimately a rather sterile occupation. machinery of religion (Rom. 5:1–17); it reject religion, dialogue can reach down It is a quarrel about recipes that gets “is coming into the world” (John 11:27), to a level of faith that subsists when one in the way of actually eating. Here we reaching us right where we are, and is not peels away all the religions, a primor- might apply the wisdom of non- something we reach up to; but insofar dial embrace of the goodness of real- thinking and nonduality to free our- as that “machinery” can impede or aid ity, which is not achieved by academic, selves from the tyranny of cut-and-dried perception of this gift, then Buddhism theoretical discussion but in a nonver- dichotomous categories. What both may play a key role in improving the balized encounter. Buddhists and Christians must do is functioning of the Christian machin- Here “religious identity” takes on reach out to the riches of the other tradi- ery, clarifying how it can be a skillful a new meaning, pre-Buddhist and tion, which may often serve to comple- means. A Christian can thus embrace pre-Christian, and our belonging to ment or correct perceived deficiencies Buddhism wholeheartedly, albeit as a either or both of the constituted tradi- in their own and may at least provide complement to Christian faith. tions should be opened up to a deeper a stereophonic religious awareness that Or perhaps there is a faith that lies belonging that we share with all human is healed of sectarian identity fixation. deeper than any constituted religious beings. Our belonging to “reality itself” Such an awareness is spiritually liber- faith, a faith that consists in openness sets the basic context of all dialogue, ating, and so must be conducive to or to reality as such. Would this prede- in which one talks to the other not as aligned with salvation, the ultimate lib- nominational faith be a saving faith? Christian to Buddhist, or vice versa, but eration. The question “Can dual religious For Paul the faith of Abraham is sav- as one person to another sharing basic identity be a path to salvation or spirit- ing faith, even though it comes before human questions. Could we imagine ual liberation?” asks if adding Buddhism Moses, Judaism, or Christianity. Today someone born into the unchartered to Christianity increases rather than we should perhaps aim to get back down condition of this basic predenomina- diminishes the salvific power or prom- to this primordial level, and the shock tional faith who would discover at one ise of one’s Christian faith (or if add- of encounter between Christianity and and the same time the Buddhist and the ing Christianity to Buddhism increases Buddhism may be the catalyst for this. Christian traditions, cultivating them the promise of Buddhist spiritual lib- If interreligious dialogue is only both and growing in them? This would eration). I would suggest that for many between the religions, it remains rather be an exemplary achievement of dou- Christians, has exclusive, especially at a time when so ble belonging, but it would be grounded the effect of bringing the gospel mes- many no longer subscribe to any for- on the prior belonging to the gracious sage of salvation into clearer perspec- mal religion. Dialogue should not be a reality accessed in a more basic open- tive by training the mind to focus on the matter of negotiation between specific ness of faith. ≥

10 Dharma World January–March 2016 FEATURES Buddhist-Christian Double Belongings by Kunihiko Terasawa

Kunihiko Terasawa received his PhD Double belongings might be necessary for us to deepen our in Religious Studies from Temple understanding of reality, including the self and the world, University, Philadelphia. Dr. Terasawa through our ultimate and various religious experiences. is an Assistant Professor of Religion in the Department of Religion and Religious pluralism has had a large belongings may differ. Why do we seek Philosophy at Wartburg College, Iowa. impact on the spirituality of double religion? We know certainly that with- He has been working for interreligious or multiple religious affi liations (dou- out human beings, there is no religion. dialogue for peace, especially ble belongings). Many people claim We ask why and how human beings Buddhist-Christian dialogue, as well that they are Buddhist-Christians, came to exist and where they will go. as doing critical research on religion, Sufi -Christians (Sufi sm is a mystical More concretely, we inquire what “I” nationalism, war, and transnational dimension of Islam), or Buddhist- is. Why, how, and where do I exist? All dialogue of religion in the United Confucianists. In the United States, religions ask about the meaning of the States and East Asia. for example, Buddhist meditation self, then about relationships between has been practiced at some mainline ourselves and others, such as family, Christian churches. Also, Paul F. Knitter, friends, society, our nation, and the it as a seeing-God experience: “Blessed a Jesuit and a retired theology profes- world. Furthermore, we question our are the pure in heart, for they will see sor at Union Theological Seminary in relationship not only with other peo- God” (Matt. 5:8 [New Revised Standard New York, has recently written about ple but with nature, the environment, Version]). these double belongings in his Without the universe, and eventually the ulti- Both experiences have something Buddha I Could Not Be a Christian mate (God, or dhamma). One seeks in common that goes beyond words or (Oneworld Publications, 2009). the ultimate experience in which the languages. Gautama Siddhartha, there- I believe that the spirituality of dou- self, the world, the universe, and God fore, remained profoundly silent for ble belongings or multi-belongings will or dhamma are profoundly intercon- a time aft er attaining enlightenment. increase. Moreover, double belongings nected. One calls this ultimate reli- Jesus oft en went to quiet places to pray might be necessary for us to deepen gious experience. alone. Even though religions have several our understanding of reality, includ- Kitarō Nishida (1870–1945), a aspects, such as doctrines, scriptures, ing the self and the world, through our Japanese philosopher of the school, and liturgy, which are oft en expressed ultimate and various religious experi- described the ultimate experience as through languages, those aspects would ences. Here, I would like to focus on a “spiritual fact” or “spiritual event” not have existed without the founders’ double belongings in Buddhism and (“Bashoteki ronri to shūkyōteki sekai- ultimate experiences. Christianity. kan” [Th e logic of place and the religious Double belongings are typically Before discussing double belong- worldview], in Nishida Kitarō tetsugaku considered a synthesis of liturgy, scrip- ings in Buddhism and Christianity, ronshū [Kitarō Nishida collected philo- tures, and doctrines, which are parts one needs to discuss what religion sophical papers], ed. Shizuteru Ueda of the object of faith. This type of syn- is: its purpose and relationship with [Iwanami Shoten, Publishers, 1989], vol. thesis may occur often in the case of human experience, the so-called reli- 3, 299). Gautama Siddhartha experi- double belongings. For example, Japan gious experiences. Depending on how enced it as an enlightenment experience has been historically accustomed to you defi ne religion, our understanding at the age of thirty-fi ve aft er his rigor- synthesizing different religious tradi- of Buddhism, Christianity, and double ous spiritual journey. Jesus experienced tions, such as Shinto and Buddhism

Dharma World January–March 2016 11 (shinbutsu-shūgō). It has also been com- describes, it is necessary to attain enlight- a not an A, therefore it is an A.” They mon in China for an individual to be enment as the Buddha did or experience are neither one nor two but a relation- affiliated with Confucianism, Daoism, God as Jesus did, along with seeking ship. Relationship precedes substance. and Buddhism, according to the stages other Buddhist and Christian religious Thus the world’s sufferings are one’s of life. In the East, religious double experiences, to enlarge one’s holistic own sufferings, so that helping oth- belongings or multi-belongings have experience of the ultimate. ers is unconditional and unself-con- not been a large problem. People in Even the words of the Buddha and scious. Just as my finger hurts after I the East intuitively understand that God from those founders came out of cut it while cooking, the pain is sensed experience of religious practices has a profound experience of the ultimate. by my whole body, which works uncon- a much more significant depth than Founders’ experiences, such as those of ditionally and unconsciously to heal theories and doctrines cutting across Jesus and , help enlarge the finger. different religious traditions. one’s interconnection with the self, the Furthermore, God in the New On the other hand, Abrahamic reli- world, and the universe to find a much Testament tells us in Philippians 2:5– gions such as Judaism, Christianity, and deeper ground of the self. This is done 7, “Let the same mind be in you that was Islam have historically emphasized exclu- not only cognitively (dialogue of the in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in sive faith in one God, creed, and doc- head) but also aesthetically (dialogue the form of God, did not regard equality trine. However, those religions cannot of the heart) and practically (dialogue with God as something to be exploited, ignore religious pluralism under the of the hands), as described by Leonard but emptied himself, taking the form pressure of globalization and multicul- Swidler in his Dialogue for Interreligious of a slave, being born in human like- turalism, which the West has ironically Understanding ([Palgrave Macmillan, ness.” It is the so-called kenosis, self-emp- promoted through industrialization and 2014], 17). tying God. In other words, God must a free global market. A very common theme is that of negate himself to be a creator (Nishida, Skepticism about double belongings the similarity of the love of God in “Bashoteki ronri to shūkyōteki sekaikan,” has often been aroused by people who the New Testament and the Buddhist’s 328–30). To be God, God must negate believe in an ultimate Transcendental compassion (karuna) through sun- himself. This is close to prajna, “A is a not Other as an object of faith outside them- yata (emptiness). Jesus emphasizes an A, therefore it is an A” (, selves, requiring exclusive faith. They God’s unconditional love of human- “Emptiness,” in Zen and Comparative believe that affiliation with another ity and nature: “For he makes his sun Studies, ed. [University faith community would compromise rise on the evil and on the good, and of Hawaii Press, 1997], 42–47). Thus, their faith in a Transcendental Other. sends rain on the righteous and on the God is not God, therefore it is God. It On the other hand, if one seeks the unrighteous” (Matt. 5:45), describ- is God who constantly empties God in sacred or the ultimate immanently ing the primary unconditional con- God’s self in order to relate with crea- within oneself beyond objectification tact with people and nature. On the tures for creation and re-creation at of faith, double belonging may not mat- other hand, Buddhism emphasizes that every moment. ter much. People who do this need buddha-nature penetrates all people This view of God is quite different several religious experiences in the and other sentient beings, especially from traditional Christian theology, process of their inner journey in order bodhisattvas, who give up the search in which God is seen as Transcendent to find their true selves in the image for their own enlightenment in order Other, uninfluenced by his creations or of God within them without objectify- to help others attain enlightenment human emotions. In the Hebrew Bible, ing God or the Buddha or a creed. The first, out of unlimited compassion for however, there are many occasions on names of God, the Buddha, a creed, all sentient beings. which God manifests his compassion, and scriptures are analogous to fin- Why is that possible for Buddhists? regrets, and even anger over people’s gers pointing toward the moon with- It is because of their experiences in responses to his callings or covenant. out being the moon themselves. One interdependent co-arising (co-origina- Before passing judgment on humanity can learn this from Zen Buddhism’s Ten tion) and sunyata (emptiness). Nothing and flooding the earth, God regretted Pictures for Finding the Bull; objecti- has a separate identity but exists in having created humanity. His response fication of faith makes the bull—sym- emptiness and interdependent co-aris- to Abraham when passing judgment bolizing the Buddha, enlightenment, ing. In other words, there is no self and on Sodom was that if there were ten or God—disappear. no “other.” There is no separate iden- righteous people there, he would not If one focuses on the kind of ulti- tity as an independent substance. Thus destroy the city (Gen. 18:32). During mate or pure experiences that Nishida the wisdom of sunyata as prajna “A i s the Exodus, God changed his mind

12 Dharma World January–March 2016 about who would enter the Promised empty mind or void but is the relation- races and nations prevailed over uni- Land, and most of the first generation of ship of absolute affirmation and fullness versally religious human solidarity and Israelites who left Egypt and were faith- of love and compassion. These dialec- compassion. less died in the wilderness, and only the tical processes of ultimate experiences That is why it is critical for world second generation entered the Promised are included in both Buddhism and religions, such as Buddhism and Land. However, under the influence of Christianity. One can call these dialec- Christianity, to work together (dialogue Greek philosophy, Christian theology tical processes of experience Immanent of the hands), despite doctrinal dis- shifted its concept of God as a relational Transcendental (Nishida, “Bashoteki agreements, in order to resist ultrana- God to the Unmoved Mover, the totally ronri to shūkyōteki sekaikan,” 396). If one tionalistic ethos at the grassroots level. Transcendent Other. sticks to objective logic, one could see Ultranationalism is a nostalgic, romantic Therefore, it would be beneficial for either the transcendental or the imma- reinvention of the origins of a people’s Christians to engage in interreligious nent, but if one sees a dynamic religious nation and race when a nation and a race dialogue with Buddhists to rediscover experience itself, one can understand feel threatened and lose confidence. It various aspects of God that have been immanent transcendence. is an emotional ethos. That was why in missed in the conventional or tradi- In terms of dialogue of the hands, Germany during the Weimar Republic tional paradigm throughout history. dealing with practical issues, this double (1919–33) and in Japan during the Taishō That is also the case for Buddhists when belonging is important. Religious wis- period (1912–26) liberal intellectuals engaging in interreligious dialogue with dom often manifests itself not only in the were helpless to stop grassroots, ultrana- Christianity. Buddhists could rediscover discussion of doctrines or philosophy tionalistic, and romantic populism. Thus, much rich heritage that has often been but also in responding to the practical, unless there is some appeal to a higher missed by fixed doctrines and teachings critical issues of reality, such as climate emotional level, transcending a narrow throughout history. change, violence, war, human traffick- ultranationalist ethos, patriotic popu- Of course, Buddhism does not talk ing, the environment, racial discrimina- lism will prevail. about God in either a theistic or an athe- tion, education, and so on. Christianity Hence, the world religions istic way, whereas Christianity always especially has quite excellent examples of Christianity and Buddhism must work talks about what is God or God’s will. resisting the social injustices of ultrana- together, since they teach universally In terms of experiencing God, how- tionalism, racial discrimination, and transnational love and compassion, ever, there is a common feature of the the like. and at the same time they are rooted ultimate experience. In other words, The Confessing Church in Germany at the local level, pastoring people at for Buddhists, in order to experience led by Martin Niemöller, Karl Barth, the grass roots. This is the emotional dhamma, or enlightenment, one has to and Dietrich Bonhoeffer denounced battle between religious transnation- experience sunyata (emptiness), abso- the Nazi policy of asserting Aryan alism and ultranationalism at the grass lute negation or absolute nothingness. racial superiority and anti-Semitism roots (Kunihiko Terasawa, “Modern Christianity also encourages one to and the New National Church’s cul- Japanese Buddhism in the Context of experience kenosis, total emptiness tural interfusion with German-ness by Interreligious Dialogue, Nationalism, beyond the self. Paul says in his let- insisting on transcendental God’s sov- and World War II” [doctoral disserta- ter to Galatians, “I have been cruci- ereignty. In Japan, although mainline tion, Temple University, 2012], 250–51). fied with Christ; and it is no longer I Buddhist institutions followed national Buddhism and Christianity can work who live, but it is Christ who lives in war policy in the 1930s and 1940s, a together as a dialogue of the hands for me” (Gal. 2:19–20). Jesus says, “For few Buddhists, such as Girō Seno’o and resistance not only to ultranationalism those who want to save their life will Shōgen Takenaka, and Christians, such and totalitarianism but also to climate lose it, and those who lose their life as Tadao Yanaihara, denounced the gov- change and environmental pollution for my sake will find it” (Matt. 16:25). ernment-ordered invasions. However, owing to the greed of capitalism and Jesus also says, “Blessed are the pure none succeeded in preventing war. One consumerism, as well as to terrorism in heart, for they will see God” (Matt. reason for that was the lack of grassroots and family and school violence. For 5:8). Jesus does not say that people interreligious dialogue and coopera- these reasons, people who have double should believe in God or have faith tion between Christianity and Judaism belongings to Buddhism and Christianity in God but see God, an experience of in Germany, and among Buddhism, can definitely help enhance not only dia- the ultimate. Christianity, and the New Religions logue of the hands but also dialogue of This concept of absolute negation or in Japan. Eventually, ultranationalis- the head and heart between Buddhism emptiness does not end with a merely tic state propaganda demonizing other and Christianity. ≥

Dharma World January–March 2016 13 FEATURES

Religions in Japan: Many or None? by Gaynor Sekimori

about religious affi liation of the Japanese The dual religiosity of the Japanese is often illustrated by conducted between 2000 and 2005, where the existence in the family home of both a Buddhist altar only about 11 percent admitted to a (butsudan), where the family’s memorial tablets are placed, personal belief, while some 23 percent and a Shinto shrine (). claimed affi liation as a family member. Th e rest did not admit to any affi liation Overall, Japanese people seem per- majority of Japanese subscribe to two or belief at all. plexed when asked the question “What religions simultaneously, Buddhism and Some of this “confusion” arises out is your religion?” Surveys by the Agency Shinto. But do these fi gures represent of the word shūkyō that was coined in of Cultural Aff airs have for decades the actual religious beliefs of individu- the mid-nineteenth century to translate reported something close to twice the als or the numbers reported by religious religion. Th is “religion” was very much population of Japan belonging to a organizations? It is not uncommon for a Western concept, newly brought to religious group. In 2009, for example, a person to be a “parishioner” of a local Japan in the wake of the great changes when the offi cial population of Japan shrine while simultaneously belonging that occurred aft er 1868. It was based was around 126 million, more than 106 to the Buddhist temple that contains the largely on a Protestant Christian idea million were recorded as adherents of family grave. We may have to redefi ne of what religion was, focusing on per- Shinto, around 90 million as adherents what religion means to the Japanese: as a sonal belief, a specifi c faith, a founder, of Buddhism, and 2 million as adherents member of a family, a person may have an organization, and a set ritual. It was of Christianity, with 9 million listed as two affi liations that nevertheless have hard to classify the actuality of the sacred “other.” Th is seems to indicate that the no signifi cance at all when it comes to realm as experienced in Japan through his or her personal belief this defi nition and its rigid categories, (or lack of it). which classed anything beyond them as This may explain superstition or folk religion, with the the fi ndings of a Gallup implication they were somehow not poll of 2012 concern- “true” religion. As a result Buddhism and ing religiosity and athe- Shinto gained a stricter, separate iden- ism, which revealed that tity than had ever been the case before. only 16 percent of the This emphasis on belief should twelve hundred Japanese not, however, be overemphasized as a respondents thought of defi ning point between Japanese reli- themselves as religious, gions and monotheistic religions. As while a very telling 23 Jonathan Freedland wrote recently in percent, the highest the Guardian, “Over the years, conversa- percentage by far of all tions with Jews, Catholics and Muslims the countries polled, have taught me that when it comes to answered they did not religion, belief is oft en optional. For know if they were reli- many, it’s about belonging and com- gious or not. Th ese fi g- munity, a matter of ethnic or familial ures closely refl ect the solidarity rather than theological creed. results of social surveys For increasing numbers of Anglicans, it

14 Dharma World January–March 2016 Gaynor Sekimori is a Research Associate in the Centre for the Study of Japanese Religions at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, and concurrently Visiting Professor at Kokugakuin University, Tokyo. She received her doctorate from the University of Cambridge in 2000. She was managing editor of the International Journal of Asian Studies (Cambridge University Press) and a member of the Institute of Oriental Culture at the University of Tokyo from 2001 to 2007.

works that way too. Singing hymns in fact quite vague, so even though there is church is a comfort, reminding them strict separation of state and religion in of their childhood or their parents, and Japan, Shinto groundbreaking ceremo- leaving them with a glow of warmth nies for official buildings can be paid for towards neighbors they might other- out of public funds, on the grounds that wise never meet” (September 26, 2015). their purpose is secular and the rite fol- The dual religiosity of the Japanese is lows general social custom. Similarly, the often illustrated by the existence in the majority of Japanese would not ascribe family home of both a Buddhist altar any religious significance to the large (butsudan), where the family’s memorial ornamental rake (kumade) (fig. 2) prom- tablets are placed, and a Shinto shrine inently displayed in Ueno Station in (kamidana), traditionally containing to make the purchase “at those special Tokyo every November, although it is perhaps images or pictures of popu- times when people feel the need to ven- provided by Ōtori Shrine near Asakusa, lar deities like Daikoku or , other erate the kami, such as building a new a religious site. kinds of engimono (good luck objects), house, getting married, or during the Though people do not admit in large a model shrine building, and talismans periodic ‘unlucky years’ (yakudoshi).” The numbers to personal faith, this does not and paper slips from both shrines and kamidana, they say, provides a focus to mean they do not engage in practices that temples (fig. 1). However, urban living, “revere the kami and ancestors to ensure seem to an outside observer to be reli- smaller houses and apartments, and the their protection and pray for the fami- gious. Enormous numbers visit popular decrease in multigenerational house- ly’s peace and prosperity.” Once again, shrines and temples over the New Year holds have led to a marked falling off of it is the family rather than the indi- period when two or three million people both butsudan and kamidana in homes. vidual faith that is the issue. In actual crowd places like Meiji Shrine in Tokyo Unless a household has a strong religious fact, so few private houses now have and the Buddhist temple of Naritasan conviction, as in Rissho Kosei-kai, nei- kamidana that the National Association Shinshōji in . Rarely ther altar may be considered necessary of Shrines distributes free altar kits to does anyone think whether the place for a newly established home. This has encourage people to buy Ise amulets, is Shinto or Buddhist; more important created a challenge for dealers in butsu­ which they would not do if they had no than sectarian affiliation is its cachet. dan. A major business in the Asakusa kamidana. Whereas most households Also, as anyone who has tried to take area of Tokyo promotes itself as a butsu­ in Japan enshrined them in the mid- long-distance transport during the o-bon dan department store and offers both 1940s, now probably no more than 10 season in July and August has experi- an enormous range in choice—from percent do so, and the lack of interest is enced, millions of people try to return butsudan­ “in the Japanese taste” to “styl- most noticeable in urban areas. Today to their ancestral homes at that time to ish” ones suiting a Western décor—and kamidana are more likely to be found in visit their family graves and attend rit- “professional advisors” who can guide business premises, particularly restau- ual services for the dead. the neophyte through the variety on rants and traditional inns, because they The three most important rites of offer with the minimum of stress and are believed to bring prosperity, rather passage are also celebrated in the name provide after-sales service, setting the than because of any particular devotion of religion, as exemplified by the well- butsudan up and furnishing it. to Shinto as a religion. The line between known phrase “born Shinto, marry Stores selling butsudan often sell Shinto as a religion and Shinto as a mass Christian, and die Buddhist.” Babies kamidana as well. Customers are urged of traditional communal practices is in are generally taken to their local shrine,

Dharma World January–March 2016 15 their ujigami, at the age of around one month to be introduced to the local protector deity. No belief commitment is assumed, and therefore this does not have the force of baptism in Christianity, where the parents and godparents are enjoined to bring the baby up in the Christian faith. Marriage was a secu- lar, household rite until the beginning of the twentieth century, when Shinto- style weddings became popular in the wake of an imperial marriage in that style. Today their popularity has been overtaken by Western-style, “white” wed- dings (that is, Christian), with perhaps 80 percent of couples being married in an unconsecrated wedding chapel by - ply a Caucasian male dressed in cleri- cal robes who conducts weddings for money. In an interview, one admitted he was not ordained, not religious, and did not understand what he was read-

incorporates a hymn, prayer, and Bible reading, no knowledge of Christianity is assumed or taught, and an actual mis- sionary pastor taking the opportunity to proselytize would probably be unwel- come in a commercial wedding hall or

over belief; couples enjoy it because it is fashionable, cool, and exotic.

and memorial services is by compari- son much more fundamental and seri- ous. Like Christian culture in the secular West, Buddhist ideas are ingrained in Japanese life and traditions. It is no coincidence that a deceased person is called hotoke, which means “buddha.” - sequent memorial services at set peri- ods, Buddhist priests ease the deceased toward in an enlightened state, or . Ideas about the spiritual progression of the dead meld in some places with native ideas about ances- tral spirits gradually ascending local mountains and becoming kami, guard- ians of the locality. People living in the

16 D January–March 2016 Shōnai Plain in Yamagata Prefecture, for example, believe that over a period of Prefecture, now a shrine, the local nine- thirty-three years, the deceased gradu- headed dragon deity was venerated as an ally ascends a mountain called Gassan. avatar of , the Buddhist deity Today the major religious presence in the area is a Shinto shrine called Dewa Sanzan Jinja, which was until 1870 a see buildings like and goma Buddhist temple called Jakkōji. Shrines halls standing within shrine precincts. generally have nothing to do with the Perhaps nothing in Japan today bet- cult of the dead, this being the preserve ter represents the actuality of traditional of Buddhist temples, yet here popular combinatory religion than Shugendo, expectati on centuries old has forced the where beliefs and practices associated shrine to erect a hall called the Reisaiden with mountains have been given expres- (Spirit Veneration Hall) to memorial- ize the dead. Outside there is a large core of Shugendo practice is moun- tain-entry (nyūbu) rituals. One of the be seen memorial tablets and even a most famous is the seven-day okugake practice in the Ōmine Mountains in Nara Gassan itself there are many Buddhist- Prefecture, where practitioners traverse style monuments, both old and contem- a series of peaks between the Yoshino porary, to the dead that are supposed and Kumano, reciting at numi- institutionally, ritually, topographically, to reside at the summit of this sacred nous sites, performing physical exercises and materially. A has remained like climbing around dangerous outcrops in the precincts of the present shrine on - Mount Haguro only because a buyer tory, Buddhism and native beliefs, and the kami - could not be found to take it away as to a lesser extent Chinese cosmologi- uals called saitō goma fuel wood. Buddhist statues and imple- cal ideas, have existed in combination ments were removed from shrine build- one with another. Modern scholars call large public ceremonies like those at this coexistence shinbutsu shūgō, which Mount Takao near Tokyo every March preserved secretly by local sympathizers has been translated by words such as - with the traditional religion. Even today syncretism, contamination, blending, tice is the mountain itself, regarded as assimilation, or amalgamation of bud- an avatar of a Buddhist deity, and also - dhas and native deities. Perhaps the as a kami ures, victims of an anti-Buddhist move- best nonjudgmental way of describing Yamagata Prefecture, the highest of the ment that was forceful in the late 1860s how Japanese religion has worked for three sacred mountains, Gassan, is con- most of its history is “combinatory.” sidered as an avatar, Gassan Daigongen, images found today in Western muse- Wherever Buddhism went in its jour- of a Buddhist divinity, the Buddha Amida ums were acquired from antique deal- ney across Asia, it absorbed local dei- (Amitābha), and as the kami Tsukiyomi ers into whose hands fell many of the ties and cults in the name of skillful no mikoto. rejected pieces of Buddhist artwork. means—local gods became protector Contributing to the confusion about deities and local concerns continued to sectarian identity in modern Japan is is not a thing of the past in Japan. be acknowledged within a new frame- the movement initiated by the new Moreover, new forms have appeared. work. In Japan, for example, the deity Meiji government in 1868 to “clarify” An interesting example is the Zen- was made the protector of the what was Shinto and to remove any Catholic combination that two Jesuits great temple of Tōdaiji in Nara and was “foreign” (that is, Buddhist) elements resident in Japan, Father Hugo Enomiya- commonly depicted wearing the robes from it. Since, with the exception of Lassalle (1898–1990) and Father William of a Buddhist priest. Most temples had the immediate surroundings of the Ise Johnston (1925–2010), promoted. Father the shrines in their grounds, and most Shrines in Mie Prefecture, every major Lassalle set up a Christian-Zen train- large shrines were in fact shrine-temple shrine in the land was actually a part ing hall called Shinmeikutsu near Ōme, complexes, where the kami were ven- of a shrine-temple complex, this caused west of Tokyo, in 1969. In form it was erated as avatars (gongen) of Buddhist major changes in the religious landscape, exactly like a Soto Zen training temple.

Dharma World January–March 2016 17 However, whereas in a zendō a statue and “reinvigorating shinbutsu shūgō as Combinatory religion is not unique of Monju is placed directly in front of the core of Japanese religious life.” At to Japan but, rather, can be seen to a the entrance, here there was a cloth- Mount Haguro, the host of Daishōbō pil- larger or smaller extent in most cultures. covered boulder for the daily celebra- grims’ lodge, Fumihiro Hoshino, though However, because of historical circum- tion of the Eucharist. Father Johnston his family has been affiliated with the stances, its existence has been obscured used to conduct sessions in his shrine since 1874, is actively teaching in Japan, and this has caused misunder- home in Hongō, near the University Shugendo with shinbutsu shūgō as its standing about the nature of Japanese of Tokyo, followed by a Mass where spiritual core. religion. An appreciation of the nature all shared the Eucharist cup, whether In March 2008, an organization of the shinbutsu can only deepen spirit- or not they were confirmed Catholics. called Shinbutsu Reijōkai (Kami- ual awareness among all of those belong- Reportedly Pope John Paul II questioned Buddha Sacred Sites Association) was ing to a Japanese religious tradition. this Catholic-Zen combination during formed in response to an appeal made his visit to Japan in 1981, but while the by the scholar Tetsuo Yamaori and oth- Vatican remains cautious about mixing ers to “bring back to the present age the aspects of Christian and Buddhist prac- spiritual climate of the past in which tices, in 1989 it did state that Catholics Japanese people respected both kami could take methods from non-Chris- and hotoke in the belief that the gods tian religions “so long as the Christian and the buddhas (shinbutsu) coexisted, concept of prayer, its logic and require- and to contribute to the peace of mind ments are never obscured.” of modern people and the stability of In Japan, too, there is a growing society.” To this end later that year more awareness of the centrality of com- than two hundred Shinto and Buddhist binatory ideas to Japanese spiritual- priests visited the Ise Shrine to mark ity. Shōkai Koshikidake, who recently the start of a pilgrimage route of 150 reconstituted the Shugendo temple in shrines and temples around Kyoto and Yamagata that his ancestors had main- Nara. It was the first time that prom- tained down to the 1870s, has stated his inent Buddhist figures had formally express aim in reviving Shugendo there visited the shrine. The organization to be “restoring and continuing pre- continues to hold seminars and events Meiji [pre-1868] combinatory rituals” to publicize its aims.

18 Dharma World January–March 2016 FEATURES Religious Syncretism in the African Diaspora by Terry Rey

Formerly Professor of the Sociology of Catholicism and African religious traditions tunefully blend Religion at l’Université d’Etat d’Haïti, in the Americas and are practiced as such by millions of Terry Rey is Associate Professor people. Not only are these believers bireligious, but so are of Religion at Temple University in the divinities who inhabit their world and walk with them on Philadelphia. He is author or editor life’s way. of Our Lady of Class Struggle, Bourdieu on Religion, Òrìsà Devotion When the Saints— Mass. Among Cubans, the phrase “soy as World Religion, Churches and Charity in the Immigrant City, and and the Spirits— católico a mi manera” (I’m Catholic in my own way) is oft en heard and gener- Crossing the Water and Keeping Go Marching In ally taken to mean that its speaker is a the Faith. Currently he is working In Haitian Vodou, most spirits (lwa) are devotee of the orisha, spirits of the Afro- on books about religion and the of West African origin yet consider them- Caribbean religion of Santería. Brazil’s Haitian Revolution, Haitian churches selves to be Catholic, sometimes asking patron saint, Our Lady of Aparecida and pilgrims in Pennsylvania, and their devotees to take them to Sunday (Nossa Senhora Aparecida), meanwhile, Bourdieu and Islam.

is for many practitioners of Candomblé a manifestation of the West African feminine orisha Oxum (or Oya, and/or Yemaya). Th ese are just a few examples of the many colorful and creative ways in which Catholicism and African reli- gious traditions tunefully blend in the Americas and are practiced as such by millions of people. Not only are these believers bireligious, but so are the divin- ities who inhabit their world and walk with them on life’s way. Th e survival and spread of African- derived religions in the Americas is one of the most inspirational stories in human history. (Th e term African- derived is not without its critics. See, for instance, Todd Ramón Ochoa, Society of the Dead: Quita Manaquita and Palo Praise in Cuba [University of California Press, 2010].) It is a story of the resil- ience of the human spirit’s thriving in the face of arguably the fi ercest injustice ever orchestrated by our species, namely

Dharma World January–March 2016 19 as spirits and customs set in motion, and in which we reside originally associ- with spirits, ancestors, and nature, is an ated with one king- altogether good place, furthermore— dom or ethnic group suffering be damned—and spirits and were often adopted or ancestors help us humans thrive here. adapted by another, Therefore, in return and gratitude we as was Catholicism in serve the spirits with ritual, sacrifice, the Kongo Kingdom and song, while we are also obliged to toward the end of venerate the ancestors, which we our- the fifteenth century. selves will one day become. Change and adapta- tion notwithstanding, Africanizing Christianity divination, drum- in the New World ming, dance, healing, and spirit possession More than twelve million Africans were have remained elemen- enslaved by Europeans between 1441 tal to African religions and 1888. Most slaves were forced to on both sides of the labor in unspeakably cruel conditions on Atlantic Ocean. plantations in places like Brazil, Cuba, Being generally Saint-Domingue (colonial Haiti), and monotheistic as con- the thirteen English colonies that would cerns creation, in tradi- become the United States of America. tional African religions Though syncretism between African our world was set into religions and Christianity did occur in motion by God but was colonial societies ruled by Protestant completed by a group Europeans, it was especially Catholicism of divinities that God that lent itself to merger with African left in charge, and religion in the New World. With all of soon human beings, its saint cults and ritual paraphernalia, who were very much Catholicism proved to be quite resonant like them, were placed with traditional African religions and on the earth. (Most provided fuel for the freewheeling syn- African creation myths cretism behind Candomblé, Santería, depict God as mas- Vodou, and related religions. culine, but there are Granted, most Africans in colonial exceptions in which Brazil, Cuba, and Haiti actually received God is androgynous or little, if any, religious education from in which both a male Catholic friars. Nonetheless, the sacra- and a female creator set ments and lessons that they did receive all of this in motion. were often of deep interest to them, lead- For examples, see Ulli ing one distinguished scholar to state the transatlantic slave trade. The reli- Beier, ed., The Origin of Life and Death: that they “greedily adopted” Catholicism, gions discussed in this article were born African Creation Myths [Heinemann, though without abandoning the spirits of in and out of that horror. To be sure, 1966].) God retreated from this incom- the mother continent (Alfred Métraux, religion had flourished in West and plete creation and is perceived as being Voodoo in Haiti, trans. Hugo Charteris Central Africa prior to the incursion so distant that most religious commerce [Schocken, 1972 (1959)], 331). Stories of Europeans there and the beginning for humans is with the spirits and the of slaves returning to be baptized on of transatlantic slavery in the fifteenth living dead rather than with God, even multiple occasions or of “stealing” holy century. Traditional African religion though God is affirmed as the source of water from churches are found in mis- was in fact already characterized by all and the ultimate when things sionary records, for instance, while the a capacity for change and adaptation, go very, very wrong. The world that God hagiographies of Catholic saints, whether

20 Dharma World January–March 2016 expressed in sermons or statues, seemed quite plausible to Africans and quite consistent with what they had always believed. Who, after all, could Catholic saints possibly be if not dead people who live on somewhere else and have pow- ers to intervene in our lives? Africans had always believed such things about their ancestors. Many of the attributes and symbols associated with Catholic saints thus found correlates among the lwa and the orisha. Take Saint James the Greater, for instance, who in one striking image as Santiago Matamoros sits atop a horse brandishing a sword, a knight in shining armor at his side. What else could this be but a white man’s representation of Ogún, the orisha of warfare and metals who for centuries has been the object of a devotional cult of unsurpassed prestige in much of West Africa, especially among the Yoruba people? (On the precedence on September 8, when many Santeros/ do today. (For a general overview of that Ogún takes in Yoruba religion, see Santeras participate in elaborate rituals or funerary traditions and thanatology Jacob K. Olupona, City of 201 Gods: Ilé- quiet personal devotions for Ochún, the in African and African diasporic reli- Ifè in Time, Space, and the Imagination Yoruba female spirit of fresh waters, fine gions, see Terry Rey, “The Life of the [University of California Press, 2011]). fragrances, sensuality, and femininity. Dead in African and African Diasporic For similar reasons, Saint George, often The Catholic liturgical calendar Religions” in Death and Dying in World depicted in armor, is associated with is also foundational to the cult of the Religions, ed. Lucy Bregman [Kendall Ogún (Ogum) in Candomblé. (On Ogún African dead in Haitian Vodou and to Hall, 2009], 153–67.) in Afro-Brazilian religions, see Renato the religion’s most important holiday, Ortiz, “Ogum and the Umbandista Fèt Gede, the Feast of Gede, the chief Scholarly Religion” in Africa’s Ogun: Old World divinity of all things related to death, Interpretations of Afro- and New, ed. Sandra T. Barnes [Indiana the dead, and dying. This feast takes University Press, 1997], 90–102.) place on November 1 and 2, All Saints Catholic Syncretism in Besides saints and their hagiogra- Day and All Souls Day, with commu- the Americas phies, other forms of Catholic ritual nal rituals performed in cemeteries and Until recently most practitioners of Afro- paraphernalia have also enjoyed a long streets throughout Haiti. While Gede is Catholic religions in the New World history of African and Afro-Creole adap- widely assimilated with Saint Gerard, it have not concerned themselves with tation in the Atlantic world. Candomblé, is All Souls Day, rather than that saint’s the putatively hybrid nature of their Santería, and Vodou altars sometimes feast day (April 23), that foregrounds religious lives. This has not kept schol- feature representations of the Eucharist Fèt Gede. For this there are deep and ars of these religions from being preoc- and chalice from the Catholic Mass, for tragic African reasons, especially the cupied with the issue, however. Since instance, while commonly crucifixes, spiritual trauma of the enslavement of the first anthropologists and histori- rosaries, and votive candles are found the ancestors and their/our resultant ans began researching Afro-American in sanctuaries and on the bodies of the spatial distance from the burial sites religions in Brazil, Cuba, Haiti, and the faithful. Furthermore, the scheduling of the dead in Africa, where regular United States, the question of just how of major ceremonies in these religions offerings would be performed. Enter “African” these traditions actually are is tied to the Catholic liturgical calen- All Souls Day in Haiti, which Africans has received much attention. (The first dar, as in the case of the Feast of Our appropriated to venerate the distant dead serious comparative effort made to make Lady of Charity, patron saint of Cuba, of Africa, as their Haitian descendants sense of the “survival” of “Africanism”

Dharma World January–March 2016 21 and the concomitant “reinterpretation” colonists and missionaries believed the Christian name, but also for the of Christianity in light of African tra- that African traditions were diaboli- defense and increase of the faith van- ditions is Melville J. Herskovits’s clas- cal, superstitious, and dangerous, after quish them and their kingdoms and sic The Myth of the Negro Past [Beacon, all, and they enacted legislation against habitations, though situated in the 1990 (1941)].) Generally speaking, there them. The survival of African religion remotest parts unknown to us.” (For are three basic arguments about the in the Americas thus required secrecy, the full text of this papal bull, see nature of African/European religious to be sure, lending some measure of http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal syncretism in the New World, which credence to the mask theory of reli- /indig-romanus-pontifex.html; accessed for the sake of brevity may be allitera- gious syncretism. But the reality was July 17, 2015.) tively called “mask,” “mix,” and “mosaic.” much more complex, and the histori- In Saint-Domingue, the importation Proponents of the mask theory of cal record in fact reflects genuine and of enslaved Africans increased dramat- religious syncretism in the African widespread interest in things Catholic ically in the eighteenth century, turn- diaspora argue that most enslaved among enslaved Africans. ing the colony into the French empire’s Africans did not really take an interest economic crown jewel. The devoutly in Catholicism but instead exploited Outlawed Faith Catholic king Louis XIV sought to bol- the religion in order to conceal and sus- and Rebounding ster the church there, and since the vast tain spiritual practices from the home- majority of the colony’s subjects were land. Scholars subscribing to the mix Intolerance slaves, he implemented legal measures theory feel that African religions were Long before scholars ever thought to ensure that they be brought into so blended with Catholicism during critically about the difference between the Catholic fold. Thus in 1685 the the colonial era that distinctly hybrid African customs and Christianity in king promulgated the Code Noir “to or creolized traditions emerged, which the Americas, missionaries and other maintain the discipline of the Catholic, should be considered discrete religions colonial officials pontificated about Apostolic, and Roman Church there altogether. To put it artistically, religion them and enacted laws to protect the and to regulate the status and condition blue meets religion red and religion pur- “purity” of Catholic doctrine and prac- of our slaves in our said islands.” (An ple emerges. The mosaic theory, for its tice against “pagan” additive, adoption, English translation of Le Code Noir can part, prefers the term symbiosis to syn- or appropriation. Taking justification be found at https://directory.vancouver cretism in the interpretation of Afro- from a series of papal Atlanto-Catholic religions. From afar bulls that legitimated they might indeed appear to be purple, the European enslave- but upon closer inspection one comes ment of Africans, to realize that these religions are more Catholic friars baptized like a stained-glass window made up of and catechized to slaves, distinct blue and red pieces that them- while colonial admin- selves remain more or less intact and istrators enacted harsh distinct. (Leslie Desmangles has quite legislations to stamp effectively argued for the mosaic the- out African “super- ory in The Faces of the Gods: Vodou and stition.” For instance, Roman Catholicism in Haiti [University Pope Nicholas V pro- of North Carolina Press, 1992]. For an mulgated Romanus pon- example of the mask theory, see Raul tifex in 1454, addressed Canizares, Cuban Santeria: Walking to King Afonso V of with the Night [Destiny, 1999].) Portugal, which would Though understanding the percep- “bestow suitable favors tions and intentions of historical actors and special graces on is challenging, especially those who those Catholic kings were victimized by the brutal injustice and princes, who . . . of enslavement and in effect silenced not only restrain the in the archives that historians so covet, savage excesses of the there is probably an element of truth Saracens and of other to each of the three theories. White infidels, enemies of

22 Dharma World January–March 2016 middle of the twentieth century, how- ever, this began to change, especially in Brazilian, Cuban, and African American circles. The arrival of Pentecostalism in the postwar Caribbean and Latin America led to massive conversions out of both the Catholic Church and the African spirit house, and the new form of Christianity has proven to be militantly and often successfully intoler- ant of syncretism. Partially as a response to this, in Cuba, Brazil, and the United States, communities remaining faithful to the orisha have orchestrated cam- paigns to rid their religious practice of any Catholic elements, seeking to “re-Africanize” their faith and rees- tablish some kind of African spiritual “purity” in the African diaspora. For the most part, this has not happened .wsu.edu/sites/directory.vancouver.wsu Thus despite the intentions behind in Haiti, however, where one still hears .edu/files/inserted_files/webintern02 them to curb the practice of African reli- the old adage that “to serve the lwa, one /code%20noir.pdf; accessed July 25, gions in the colonial Americas and to must be a good Catholic.” 2015.) The code stipulated that only ensure the predominance of Catholicism, Catholicism could be practiced in the some ecclesial and legal measures actu- Conclusion colonies and that slaves must be given ally contributed to the perpetuation of religious instruction and that they not African spirituality in the New World. Exactly what the future holds for these be forced to labor on Sundays or major Another key example of this was the and related religions in the Americas Catholic holidays. As concerns reli- establishment of confraternities in Brazil is difficult to predict. There are signs gious syncretism, this opened up time and Cuba, which, like the Code Noir in that Vodou is on the decline in Haiti and space for both Catholicism and Saint-Domingue, provided slaves with and even more so in the Haitian dias- African traditions to flourish among opportunities to blend their homeland pora, while Candomblé and Santería the enslaved population. Most slaves traditions with Catholicism. The con- seem to be thriving in Brazil and Cuba lived quite far from cities and towns fraternities (cofradías, cabildos) were respectively. Devotion to the orisha in that actually had churches, so the free mutual aid societies that grouped the United States, meanwhile, primarily time from work was often used to gather Africans according to ethnicity under among Latinos and African Americans, for drumming ceremonies in the fields, the patronage of a particular Catholic has been slowly on the rise since the forests, or hills, like the one famously saint. In addition to arranging burials 1940s, a form of African-derived reli- described by a white observer in 1797: and providing other forms of social assis- gious practice that increasingly rejects “What is very true of Voodoo and at tance, such societies also held “dances,” Catholic symbolic or liturgical elements. the same time very remarkable, is the which is code-speak for African reli- It is safe to say, however, that African spirit of hypnotism, which brings the gious ceremonies. Their gatherings were spirits and ancestors will always be part members to dance right to the edge thus the locus par excellence both for of the religious landscape in these and of consciousness . . . to the sounds of the perpetuation of African religious other New World locations. Having drums and of rhythmic handclapping” customs and for Afro-Catholic reli- survived the horrors of the transatlan- (Médéric-Louis-Elie Moreau de St. gious syncretism. tic slave trade, after all, there is noth- Méry, A Civilization That Perished: As a result, most practitioners of ing imaginable that could defeat them The Last Years of White Colonial Rule Candomblé, Santería, and Haitian Vodou now, and so they live on in the devotions in Haiti, trans. and abridged by Ivor D. have historically also been Catholic and of millions of people in the Americas, Spencer [University Press of America, have never seen any contradiction in many of whom are also Catholic in their 1985 (1797–98)], 5–6). their supposed bireligiosity. By the own way. ≥

Dharma World January–March 2016 23 FEATURES On Being a Christian Infl uenced by Buddhism by Jay McDaniel

into which I had briefl y fallen, and I I think Zen can enrich the incarnational emphasis of found that alternative in the writings of Christianity, which likewise fi nds the infi nite in the fi nite, the the late Catholic writer Th omas Merton. sacred in the ordinary, the word in the enfl eshedness of daily He was a monk living in a monastery life. Living Zen can help Christians enter more deeply into in Gethsemane, Kentucky, who wrote that form of living to which we aspire: life in Christ. voluminously on many topics, including war and peace, social justice, contempla- tive prayer, mysticism, and Buddhism. Many years ago, when I was in semi- with my Zen friend the meaning of the Merton’s interest in Buddhism struck nary, I had the unusual experience of well-known “What is the sound of a chord in me because I, like he, was living in two religious worlds simultane- one hand clapping?” He explained that drawn to forms of spirituality that ously: one Christian and one Buddhist. there is no rational or formulaic answer emphasize “letting go of words” and In the mornings I would take classes but that there is an “answer,” and it has “being aware in the present moment.” on Christianity under the guidance to do with not having a self separated Protestant Christianity oft en seemed of gift ed seminary professors, all of from the world. He and I were always too wordy to me. Buddhism pointed whom were preparing me to become a talking about the Buddhist idea of no to a world beyond words. minister. And then, in the aft ernoons, separate self, or anatman. One reason I especially liked Merton I would serve as the English teacher for I left our discussion wondering if was that he was sensitive to the fact that a Zen Buddhist monk from Japan who Jesus had a self in the fi rst place, and Christianity, too, points to a world had recently completed his monastic if God had one as well. Maybe they, beyond words. It points to the world of training in Kyoto, having had the too, exemplifi ed anatman. Maybe they other living beings who are to be loved (enlightenment) experience with help could hear the sound of one hand clap- on their own terms and for their own from his . ping because their selves, like that of a sakes, who cannot be reduced to the For a young seminarian fresh out of good Zen Buddhist, were empty of sub- names we attach to them. It also points college, my year as an English teacher stance and completed by the world. It to the world of divine silence as expe- for this Zen monk—who became a Zen seemed to me that the whole year was rienced in the depths of contemplative master—was very intense. I would leave like that: trying to link the amazing prayer. Merton turned to Buddhism as a morning classes thinking about the grace of God’s love with the sound of way of deepening his own understand- self’s relation to God as understood in one hand clapping. ing of the wordless, transtheological the Gospel of John, deeply steeped in Of course, this year did not emerge dimensions of Christianity, and with the richness of a Christian path. Th en in a vacuum. For me, it emerged as the his help I did the same. I would visit with a Zen monk in the outcome of a rather deep search, not Under the influence of Merton’s aft ernoon, talking about Zen and won- simply for Christian identity, but for a writings, then, I began to take courses dering if the self and God even existed. living Christian faith. I was myself sur- in world religions during my fi rst One day in seminary illustrates the prised to fi nd that Buddhism might help year in seminary, even as I also took whole year. I remember going to chapel me fi nd that faith. courses in biblical studies, the history of in the morning, before class, and singing I had fi rst become interested in Christianity, and Christian theology. At “Amazing Grace” along with my fellow Buddhism during my senior year in col- this stage, my interest in Buddhism was seminarians. I felt enveloped in God’s lege. I was looking for an alternative to satisfi ed primarily through books and love. Th at aft ernoon I then discussed a form of fundamentalist Christianity lectures in these courses. Growing up

24 Dharma World January–March 2016 Jay McDaniel is Willis H. Holmes Professor of Religious Studies at Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Institute for Postmodern Development of China. He edits and writes for the e-magazine Jesus, Jazz, and Buddhism: Process Thinking for a More Hospitable World. He is author or editor of more than ten books, including Of God and Pelicans and Living from the Center: Spirituality in an Age of Consumerism. His major concern is how religious and spiritual traditions can contribute to the common good of the planet in an age of global climate change, violence, poverty, and political oppression. He sees Buddhist-Christian dialogue as in service to that larger end. This essay originally appeared on the e-magazine.

in a middle-class Protestant setting in learn English but, rather, to brush up on your beloved, the beauty of sunsets, the Texas, I had not really known a Buddhist, English so that he could return to Japan murder of innocents, the laughter of much less a Zen Buddhist, in a personal and field questions from Americans friends, the hunger of children. When way. I had known cowboys. about Zen. Given his facility with the you respond with wisdom and compas- All of this changed when I was language, our agreement was that I would sion in the immediacy of the moment, asked by one of my professors to be teach him English by having him explain you have become living Zen. Your life the English teacher for the monk from Zen to me. Thus, we spent hours upon is your sermon. Japan. My professor, Margaret Dornish, hours talking about Zen and Buddhism. With his help, then, I came to realize taught world religions, and I was tak- As soon as we began talking about that Zen is not about arriving at another ing a course on Buddhism under her. Zen, he explained to me that the best place, called , but rather about Her request, and my acceptance of it, way to understand Zen is to undertake arriving at the place where we start— changed my life. The monk’s name was a daily practice of Zen meditation, or namely the present moment—and liv- Keido Fukushima, and he was being zazen. Under his guidance I did take ing freely in the here and now of daily sent to the United States by his master up that practice, and I have been doing life. Zen is among the most down-to- in Japan to learn English and to learn it ever since. It introduced me to that earth and concrete religions I know. It is about America. My assignment was to world beyond words—the world of pure very bodily and practical. For this rea- meet with him every day for one full year, listening—that had led me to be inter- son I think Zen can enrich the incarna- teach him English, and also take him ested in Zen in the first place. Twenty tional emphasis of Christianity, which to numerous sites throughout Southern years of Zen meditation is at least part likewise finds the infinite in the finite, California, from malls to monasteries. of the experience that I bring to this the sacred in the ordinary, the word in Indeed, I myself was to be part of the essay. The other part is twenty years of the enfleshedness of daily life. Living experience for him. In meeting me and teaching Buddhism and Asian religions Zen can help Christians enter more getting to know how young people think, to college undergraduates. deeply into that form of living to which he would be meeting an “American.” I But Gensho’s explanations of Zen we aspire: life in Christ. tried my best to be an “American” for did not stop with discussions or with As I was spending my afternoons him, but I am sure that I was, at best, zazen. The wisest teachings he gave and many an evening with Gensho, my a middle-class Texan. I worried, along me in those days were the gleam in his more conservative friends in seminary with Dr. Dornish, that I would be teach- eye, his ever-present sense of humor, worried a little about me. They knew ing Keido Fukushima to speak English and his kindness. These activities were that Zen Buddhists do not often speak with a Texas accent. for me then, and are for me now, liv- of God and that faith in God is not part I quickly learned that my student, ing Zen. Dead Zen is what you get in of the Zen world. And they worried that whom I was told to call Gensho, had books. Living Zen is what you get when I myself was falling into a dual religious already had seven years of English as you are face-to-face with a Zen person identity. One of them called it “double a student in Japan. I later learned that or, still more deeply, with life itself. As religious belonging.” gensho means “young monk” and that Gensho would often say, the ultimate I was not comfortable with this I was calling him “young monk” the koan is not the question “What is the phrase. Even as I felt that I was experi- whole time. This was odd because he sound of one hand clapping?” It is life encing two different worlds each day, I was ten years my senior, but it never itself. It is how you respond to what did not feel that I belonged to two coun- seemed to bother him. In any case, he presents itself: the birth of children, tries and had two passports. Rather, I was being sent to the United States not to the death of loved ones, the caress of felt like one person who was receiving

Dharma World January–March 2016 25 Just as the ocean is always already here

always already here for human beings. Our task, as humans, is to awaken to what is always already here. I have said that from a panentheis- tic perspective God is more than every-

the case for process theologians. Just

swimming in it, so God is more than nourishment from two intravenous For my part, I felt this grace most tubes: one the dharma of Buddhism vividly not in ideas learned from books Mexico in North America and imagin- and the other the wisdom of Christ. I ing that it knew everything about the borrow this metaphor from a wonder- in the beauty of the natural world, in the ful Zen teacher in the United States, the depths of dreams, in hopes for peace, coasts of New Zealand and South Africa late Susan Jion Postal. Intuitively I knew in the silence of the soul, in the eyes - the two medicines were compatible, but of animals, in the mysteries of music, ing its own experience of God with the whole of God. something beautiful in our world even Unfortunately, that is what I did knew that if I had to choose one medicine amid its tragedies. For me, this beauty during my senior year in college when is God. God is the lure toward beauty I was a fundamentalist. I was pretty was not all Buddhist and all Christian, in the universe, plus more. And God sure that I knew the whole of God and or half Buddhist and half Christian, that others who disagreed with me were world is God’s body. wrong. And that is why I am so glad to Admittedly, even in seminary, I did did indeed feel compatible and mutually not always envision God as a male deity helped me realize that the divine ocean enriching, so I wasn’t forced to choose. is always more than our experience of it, Each had a healing quality that could professors, especially those who were and we can lie back gently in its waters. add to the other. process theologians. With their help I From Merton I learned about God the What, then, was the healing qual- arrived at a way of thinking about God moreness and about how silent listen- ity of Christianity? Of course, it has a that has made sense to me ever since. ing was a profound way to be connected lot to do with God and with the healing with this God. power of faith in God. Part of this heal- not outside God, like a servant seated far ing quality can be described if I go into beneath a throne on which sits a king, went to sleep at night, I would pray to greater detail about the chapel service but, rather, inside God, like developing the divine moreness. Not only the con- embryos are inside a womb or schools - described but also the more traditional ers, I felt that there was indeed a grace inside the sky. prayer of address that is at the heart of at hand, both in the lyrics and melody My professors called this perspective so much lived religion. I would open and in the people singing it. We were panentheism: a term that was coined my heart to the divine ocean and say somehow together in a communion of in the nineteenth century that literally “Please be with them, O Lord” or “I am means that everything is in God even as I sensed that there is a mysterious and God is more than everything. It seemed beautiful” or “May all beings be happy.” encircling presence—a sky-like mind— to me then and seems to me now that Indeed, in times of sadness, I would in which we live and breathe and have panentheism is closer to the truth of also pray the harder prayers, the lam- our being, and that this mind is amaz- amazing grace. Grace is not something entations and protests, such as “Why ingly graceful. We can live from this we approach from afar, like a throne on did you let this happen?” and “Where grace and even add to it. which sits a king, but rather something are you, anyway?” and “Why have you

26 D January–March 2016 forsaken me?” These were for me a kind capacities for vulnerable love. Their have met people whose lives have been of primal speech of the heart, more like victims need our special love and care, empowered to deal with great suffer- poetry than prose. They were reach- and our hope that somehow the jour- ing, with great courage, through this ing out into the vastness of a mystery ney of life continues afterward, so that image of God. But I do indeed have a beyond my imagination yet present even their hearts find peace. And those with problem with people who imagine this in its absence. power-hungry eyes also need our love. male deity as having the power to give At first I felt a little guilty about these This is a teaching of the Buddha and but not to receive, the power to issue harder prayers. I knew that you find Jesus. We must not draw boundaries commands but not to empathize, the this kind of praying in the Bible quite around love. power to act in the world but not to be often, in the Psalms, for example, but I think that the ocean of compas- acted upon by the world. When God is for some reason I thought I was sup- sion is also an ocean of listening. It is imagined in this way, we have, as the posed to be nicer to God than the bib- affected by everything that happens at philosopher Alfred North Whitehead lical authors. Thankfully, my professors all the time: omnivulnerable, like a man once put it, rendered unto God that explained that all of these ways of pray- on a cross. I had a few friends in sem- which belongs to Caesar. ing are authentic if they come from the inary, and I have many friends now, I’m with Whitehead. A God who heart, because the divine ocean is big who do not believe in prayer. Some of lacks the power to receive, who doesn’t enough and powerful enough to receive my friends in the college where I teach need the world in any way, is too monar- and absorb all doubts, pains, sufferings, don’t believe there is a divine ocean chical. He is a lot like Caesar but not and even all sins. in the first place. They believe that the much like Christ. When I say “God” in How did they know this? Most of great receptacle in which the universe this essay, I mean the Christ-like God them appealed to experience and also unfolds is an empty space rather than as opposed to the Caesar-like God. I to Jesus. In the minds of most of my an amazing grace, more like a vacuum mean the God who is present to each teachers, Jesus was not a supernatural than an opened heart. And, of course, living being on our planet and through- figure who descended to the earth from they may be right. When it comes to out the universe with a tender care that above but, rather, a man among men the mystery within which we all swim nothing be lost. I mean the God who is whose opened heart revealed a special like fish in the sea, we all see through filled by the universe, just as an embryo aspect of God: namely God’s openhearted a glass darkly. No one can grasp the fills a womb or stars fill a dark and star- reception of the world into the divine ocean, not even Christians. lit sky or fish fill the sea. I mean the life, with a tender care that nothing be Additionally, I have other religious God whose face is compassion, not lost. If we imagine God as an ocean, friends who do indeed believe in a divine power, whose body is the world itself. they said, then let us imagine Jesus as mystery of sorts but do not believe it I mean the God who is an ocean. The a fish among fish, whose opened heart receives prayers. They see the mystery God whom Christians see revealed, reveals the empathy and eros of ocean more like an energy or force that can but not exhausted, in the healing min- itself. Jesus was, as it were, a window to act upon things but that cannot be acted istry of Jesus. the divine. I liked to think of Jesus as upon. It has the power to give but not Faith in God is trust in the availabil- one of those fish with especially shin- to receive. Our task, they say, is to do ity of fresh possibilities. And life in God ing eyes. You would look into his eyes the will of God, cognizant that God lies in being present to each situation in and see the ocean. Its name was not does not need us in any way. For these a kindly way, open to surprise, honest power or control or fear. Its name was friends, God is more like the male deity about suffering, and seeking wisdom compassion. You could feel this ocean residing off the planet than an ocean of for daily life. I saw this kind of faith every time you listened to other fish compassion. He stands above the earth, in Gensho. He did not have an image and cared for them. You could feel it watching from time to time, and inter- of God in whom he placed that faith. when you had compassion for yourself, vening from time to time, but he would When God becomes an ocean, we must too. It was a very wide ocean, without do just fine if the earth and the whole sit loose with images, too, lest we make boundaries, and somehow people saw universe ceased to exist. idols of them. Still we can have faith in it in the eyes of Jesus. Not his alone, of For my part, I have no objection to something more, maybe even someone course, but also in the eyes of others. other people’s imagining God as a male more: someone who listens and seeks Of course, not all eyes reveal com- deity residing off the planet. I think we our well-being. This is a faith to which passion. Some are all about power and need many different images of God in I am drawn, moment by moment, as I control. People with power-hungry our imaginations and that this image try to walk with Christ with help from eyes have somehow lost sight of their is one among many that can help us. I Zen. ≥

Dharma World January–March 2016 27 ESSAY Buddhism and Social Engagement (3) Social Reform and Environmental Protection by Ranjana Mukhopadhyaya

their economic condition, and he started Spiritual development underlies the economic development many periodicals, by these means giv- that Buddhists and development monks are working toward, ing a voice to the dissatisfaction felt by in contrast to modern theories of economic development that members of the oppressed classes. As ignore spiritual cultivation and growth. India’s fi rst law minister and a key fi g- ure in the draft ing of the Constitution of India, he aimed to improve the eco- Social Reform Between 1927 and 1932, he and his sup- nomic condition of members of the porters launched movements demand- lower castes, working for the expansion Buddhism teaches that this world is ing the rights of untouchables to enter of education among them and proposing marked by suff ering and that the ulti- Hindu temples, from which they were job quotas for them in the civil service, mate objective of human existence is excluded, and to use public wells and public bodies, and schools and colleges. attainment of nirvana and liberation water tanks. He also established an insti- On October 14, 1956, shortly before from the shackles of reincarnation. tution called the Bahishkrit Hitakarini his death the following December, With the development of Sabha to promote education and culture Ambedkar took part in a mass cere- Buddhism, this goal became centered among the untouchables and to improve mony of conversion from Hinduism to on bodhisattva practice: individuals do Buddhism for around half a million lower- not pursue nirvana for themselves alone caste people as a way of eradicating the but work in a spirit of compassion for deep-rooted discrimination inherent in the liberation of all living beings from the caste system. Th is was the beginning suff ering and the cycle of transmigra- of the movement to revive Buddhism tion. Many Buddhists pursue the bodhi- in India, the so-called Neo-Buddhist sattva way by working to build an ideal movement. People like Ambedkar who society based on Buddhist teachings converted to Buddhism and those who and to combat various forms of social continue his ideals and reform movement inequality and social ills, such as gen- are known as Neo-Buddhists. der discrimination, human rights vio- Ambedkar, who had converted to lations, and poverty. Buddhism as a way to escape the tra- One such person was the Indian ditional caste system, looked to the politician and social reformer Bhimrao Buddha’s teachings for a spirit of social Ramji Ambedkar (1891–1956). Born revolution, as is clear in his Th e Buddha into the lowest caste of Hindu society, and His Dhamma, published in 1957. the untouchables, he overcame a great Here he displayed an understanding of many social obstacles to acquire a higher Neo-Buddhism as very diff erent from education, studying at famous univer- traditional Buddhism, denying fatalis- sities in the United States and England tic concepts like karma, transmigration, and eventually becoming a lawyer. He and rebirth—ideas that he considered advocated an anticaste movement to underpinned the caste system and dis- improve the human rights and the socio- crimination; questioning the role of the economic condition of low-caste people. clergy; and regarding the Four Noble

28 Dharma World January–March 2016 Ranjana Mukhopadhyaya specializes in sociology of religion and Japanese religion. She is an Associate Professor at the Department of East Asian Studies, University of Delhi, teaching Japanese society, culture, and language. She received her doctorate in Religious Studies from the University of Tokyo in 2003 and has taught as an Associate Professor at Nagoya City University. She is the author of Nihon no shakai sanka bukkyō ( in Japan) (Tōshindō, 2005).

Truths as non-Buddhist. He proclaimed sharing), and awakening (enlighten- Joanna Macy, an American scholar of a rational interpretation of Buddhism, ment) (Buddhism at Work: Community Buddhism and an activist who has stud- one that functioned as the ideology of Development, Social Empowerment, and ied the Sarvodaya movement, explains social improvement and appealed to the Sarvodaya Movement [Kumarian why it adopted the awakening of peo- the intellect of modern people. Press, 2003], 126–33). Ariyaratne wrote: ple as its motto. She wrote in her 1983 Perhaps the best-known movement work, Dharma and Development, that a for social betterment and development Advocacy of the idea of Sarvodaya or root problem standing in the way of the is the Sarvodaya Shramadana move- the well-being of all necessarily fol- alleviation of poverty and of economic ment of Sri Lanka (http://www.sarvo lows that the Sarvodaya Movement development is people’s unconscious- daya.org/). It had its beginnings in 1958, has to accept Metta—Loving- ness and their sense of powerlessness. when A. T. Ariyaratne, a high school Kindness—which is the opposite of Advocates of the Sarvodaya movement teacher, took a group of students to a violence. So non-violence becomes a have as their aim a cognitive revolution, poor farming village to offer their labor, cardinal principle of Sarvodaya. Does a shift in the consciousness of people, and it grew to become the largest grass- this mean that Sarvodaya accepts in based on their indigenous religious cul- roots movement in Sri Lanka, active principle unjust structural arrange- ture. A person so awakened can display in a large number of villages. Today it ments in the present day world which a physical, intellectual, and spiritual runs programs in some fifteen thousand keep the vast majority of people in potential through which eventually social villages, concerning health, education, want and misery? When Lord Buddha reform can take place. agriculture, welfare, local industry, and rejected Tanha and showed it as the There are also Buddhist reform small-scale financing. root cause of all suffering it was and social improvement movements in Sarvodaya means “the awakening clear that he rejected the promo- Thailand. These propose a return to the of all,” and shramadana means “sharing tion of acquisitive instinct in man original form of Buddhism and aim at labor.” The movement is one of social but encouraged Dana—Sharing social improvement through a modern development through people and Beneficence—a means to real- interpretation of Buddhism. A pioneer their labor in a spirit of sharing. It is ize egolessness and supreme happi- here was Buddhadasa (1906– not concerned only with policies to ness. Non-violence could be utilized 93). He criticized Thai Buddhism and relieve poverty and encourage growth as a very effective weapon more than the for compromising with the in rural villages. By highlighting the violence to bring about lasting struc- monarchy, nationalism, capitalism, ideal of awakening the individual, the tural changes without demeaning and superstition and advocated a ratio- village, and finally the nation, it also the dignity and worth of the human nal explanation of Buddhism. Going attaches great importance to religion being. What Sarvodaya is attempting back to the original scriptures, he and traditional culture and to spirit- to do is to apply the Buddhist princi- severely criticized traditional interpreta- ual and ethical values and looks to con- ples in development action including tions regarding transmigration, depen- struct a society based on self-reliance. an effort to eradicate social, economic dent origination, and . For example, According to George D. Bond, the con- and political evils and injustices that he rejected the explanation that depen- cept of sarvodaya derives from Gandhi’s plague our societies. (“Sarvodaya in dent origination arises over three con- philosophy of nonviolence and pacifism, a Buddhist Society,” in The Sri Lanka nected lifetimes, the past, the present, which Ariyaratne has interpreted in Reader: History, Culture, Politics, ed. and the future; rather, since it rises out Buddhist terms, introducing the ideas of John Clifford Holt [Duke University of everyday events, it shows us how to metta (loving-kindness), dāna (giving, Press, 2011], 377) bring about the cessation of suffering,

Dharma World January–March 2016 29 communism prioritize. It seeks the peace Japanese scholars who have conducted and prosperity of the whole society, not research into Thai development monks, just the interests of particular people see a reform of Buddhism and its doc- within it. This idea of a society based trines in Thailand coming from within on Buddhadasa’s own interpretation of traditional Buddhist culture. Moreover, Buddhism provides an ethical founda- they have also found that there is a turn- tion for social engagement by monks in ing away from “economist” development both the cities and the countryside, as paradigms toward a human-centered well as for social activities by Buddhist development policy advocated by the laypeople. It has exerted a great influ- Buddhist monks as well as the intellec- ence on Buddhist reform movements tuals and NGOs allied with them. This in Thailand (Christopher S. Queen and policy is voluntary and autonomous and A Buddhist monk and lay believers take Sallie B. King, eds., Engaged Buddhism: is based on the wisdom of coexistence care of planting stock in a temple precinct. Photographed by the author in Cambodia Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia and the unique traditional culture, that is, in 2008. [State University of New York Press, Buddhism in a Thai context (Nishikawa 1996], 167–79). and Noda, Bukkyō, kaihotsu, NGO, 17). he asserted, emphasizing the practice There are many other examples of Thailand and other developing countries of religion in this life. He also regarded social reform movements by Buddhists, have introduced Western developmen- the Three Treasures (the Buddha, the and their common feature is not only tal models and encouraged economic Dharma, and the Sangha) as obstruc- the material improvement and social growth, but development policies that tions to the attainment of nirvana. He advancement of the poor and victims overemphasize growth have resulted criticized the centrality of the idea among of discrimination but also an empha- in the destruction of the environment laypeople that making offerings to monks sis on a shift in their consciousness, through pollution and the cutting down accumulates merit and that karma is because human awakening is indis- of forests. The rural development and related to these allegedly merit-making pensable to social reform. The role of environmental protection movements of activities. Asserting that it was possible Buddhist thought in such movements monks at the grassroots level are note- for monks, who normally do is to stimulate such an awakening. worthy as a voluntary and sustainable not work, to work instead of only study- development model that contrasts with ing as they cultivated “the three ways of Environmental extrinsic development policies put in learning” (keeping the precepts, mas- Protection place from above. tering meditation, and obtaining wis- Development, as conceived in the dom), he called on monks to engage with As environmental issues have grown activities of the development monks, society (Kōji Nozu, “Puttatāto biku no more serious, Buddhists are increasingly places great importance on both the shisō to shōgai” [The ideas and life of becoming involved in environmental material and the spiritual. The forest Buddhadasa Bhikkhu] in Bukkyō, kai- protection movements. Theravada monks preservation movements and rural devel- hotsu, NGO: Tai kaihotsu-sō ni manabu in Thailand and throughout Southeast opment work in which monks have taken kyōsei no chie [Buddhism, development, Asia, for example, have been working to the initiative do not aim simply to raise and NGOs: Wisdom for harmonious protect forests, based on Buddhist ideas living standards and beautify the envi- coexistence learned from development of dependent origination and the wisdom ronment but also to encourage spiritual monks in Thailand], ed. Jun Nishikawa of coexistence. They are called develop- development and awakening through and Masato Noda [Shinhyōron, 2001], ment monks (phra nak phathanaa) or means such as meditation. They aim at 85–107). ecology monks (phra nak anuraksaa). rural development and self-reliance, at Buddhadasa also advocated the con- In Thailand, monks traditionally self-restraint in the face of excess materi- cept of “Dhammic socialism” (Thai, do not engage at all in labor or profit- alism and consumerism, and at envi- Thammik sangkhomniyom) as the ideal making economic activities but live sup- ronmental protection based on spiritual society of Buddhism, based on teach- ported by the almsgiving of laypeople. awakening. Yoshihide Sakurai, who has ings including dependent origination, Since the 1980s, however, a new ten- studied social movements by monks the repaying of kindness, and the Middle dency for engaging in rural development in northeastern Thailand, an area that Way. His socialism emphasizes people’s or environmental protection move- has produced large numbers of devel- spiritual development rather than the ments can be discerned among them. opment monks, writes: “Development materialistic benefits that capitalism or Jun Nishikawa and Masato Noda, two monks’ understanding about growth

30 Dharma World January–March 2016 and expansion is based on the devel- temples and act as advisers to the farm- of rural development bureaus from all opment of a human being who has ing community. They are involved, for over the country to seminars and work- acquired the subjective yardstick taught example, in repairing roads and bridges, shops that he has organized. BFD con- by Buddhism and rejects the objective digging irrigation ponds, and protect- ducts projects to combat poverty and standard of wealth created by capital- ing forests. This traditional social role raise living standards in rural villages ism, so that farmers will have self-respect of temples and monks has been restored by making loans available through, for and a sense of well-being at the level of along with Buddhism itself in the post– example, rice banks, livestock banks, and independent regeneration” (Tōhoku Tai civil war era. microcredit; provides courses in health no kaihotsusō: Shūkyō to shakai kōken An example of a Buddhist-based and hygiene; and addresses the problem [Development monks in northeastern development model in Cambodia is of HIV. BFD also seeks to democratize Thailand: Religion and social contri- Buddhism for Development (BFD), Cambodian society by promoting partic- bution] [Azusa Shuppansha, 2008], 94 whose founding director is Heng ipation in human rights education and [translated from the Japanese]). Monychenda, a former Buddhist priest. local governance (according to an inter- Development monks’ social work After the invasion of Cambodia by the view with Heng Monychenda at a BFD is an application of the traditions of Vietnamese army in 1979, Heng fled to office in Anlongvil in Battambang mutual assistance that exist within vil- a refugee camp inside Cambodia and City, March 17, 2008). lage communities to relieve poverty there took ordination as a monk (he Another prominent Cambodian and promote self-reliance and focuses has now returned to lay life). Later he development organization is the Santi on setting up mutual aid associations, moved to a camp on the Cambodian- Sena Organization, founded in 1994 to such as cooperatives, rice banks, and Thai border, where he opened a Buddhist work for village restoration and devel- credit unions. The monks also engage school and directed the Khmer Buddhist opment, centering on environmental in ecological conservation projects by Research Center. In 1990 he founded protection. Its main activities, which are cooperating with NGOs concerned with BFD in the camp as a local Buddhist- based on a philosophy of encouraging environmental protection. They work to based NGO. He returned to Cambodia in both physical and spiritual development, protect forests, encourage the employ- 1993, after the end of the war, and con- focus on afforestation, agricultural and ment of natural farming methods and ducted developmental activities, mainly village development, distribution of sap- multiple cropping, and conduct “tree in Battambang Province. BFD’s vision is lings, and education in environmental ordination” to prevent forests’ being for “an educated, democratic society free protection. Santi Sena has made com- cut down. They are not, however, con- from poverty and preventable illnesses, mon cause with environmental protec- cerned solely with rural issues. They law abiding and respectful of human tion movements both within Cambodia now actively tackle urban problems rights and the environment. A moral and abroad, and they play a guiding role as well, in matters such as the care of society with respect for Buddhism and in the Association of Buddhists for the AIDS sufferers; the promotion of eth- Cambodian culture and traditions whilst Environment, organized by monks and ical and moral education to combat being aware of the threats and oppor- laypeople connected with various con- the collapse of traditional values and tunities presented by globalization.” servation groups (according to an inter- the resulting moral deterioration; the According to Heng Monychenda, view with Santi Sena staff at Wat Prey establishment of educational projects Buddhist development means sharing Chlak in Svay Rieng Province, March and vocational training in the slums; the Buddha’s enlightenment and aim- 11, 2008). the development of drug addiction pro- ing to raise the living standards through Spiritual development underlies the grams; and the opening of meditation compassion and wisdom. Understanding economic development that Buddhists centers for spiritual care. rural development and the preserva- and development monks are working In Cambodia, the Buddhist sangha, tion of Khmer culture to be the impor- toward, in contrast to modern theories which was devastated by the Pol Pot tant ingredients in the rehabilitation of of economic development that ignore regime, has been revived in recent years. Cambodia, he emphasizes the key role spiritual cultivation and growth. The An important part of this revival has of Buddhist monks. His development Buddhist development model, which been the social engagement of monks model accordingly uses monks in their takes local participation and the preser- through community development activ- position as community leaders as the vation of nature into account, based ities. Buddhist temples () stand at core persons in local development. He on local religious traditions and social the center of village society, and monks has therefore thrown his energy into the order, is receiving growing attention. traditionally have an active social role. training of monks, inviting young monks, They teach in schools attached to the people of religion, and representatives To be continued

Dharma World January–March 2016 31 ESSAY Islamic State and the Questions It Now Poses by Yoshiaki Sanada

Why then did Islamic State emerge Why have Islamic State and radical groups like it continued in Iraq? In short, it was nothing less than to engage in fi erce armed combat despite strong criticism in a product of the United States’ inva- the Islamic world of the non-Islamic nature of their military sion of Iraq. activity? How do Islamic militant groups and the religion of On March 16, 2015, US president Islam interrelate, spiritually and politically? Barack Obama offi cially recognized the failure of the Iraq War when he acknowl- edged in an interview with Vice News Just what is the organization known in the Islamic world of the non-Islamic that Islamic State is a “direct outgrowth as Islamic State that is now exciting so nature of their military activity? How of al-Qaeda in Iraq that grew out of our much media interest? Are its members do Islamic militant groups and the reli- invasion, which is an example of unin- simply terrorists, or are they champi- gion of Islam interrelate, spiritually tended consequences” (as reported by ons of an Islamic movement? and politically? And why the current Fox News and other media outlets). Such The true picture is hard to grasp upsurge in armed “terrorist” insur- an admission comes infuriatingly late from media reports alone. What was gents in the Islamic world? Fair, objec- in the day, however, as just such an out- originally behind the emergence of tive, and insightful information that come had been predicted even before Islamic State in the Middle East? Why is untainted by Orientalism and that the outbreak of the war. have Islamic State and radical groups would help us answer these questions Following the commencement of like it continued to engage in fi erce seems to be either never or only very hostilities, President Hosni Mubarak of armed combat despite strong criticism rarely reported. Egypt had told Egyptian soldiers in the city of Suez on March 31, 2003, “Th is The Chaos of war will have horrible consequences. Postwar Iraq and Instead of having one [Osama] bin Laden, we will have 100 bin Ladens” Islamic State (“Mubarak warns of ‘100 bin Ladens,’” It was in April 2013 that Islamic CNN.com., April 1, 2003, http://edition State’s predecessor, the Islamic .cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/03/31 State of Iraq and al-Sham (al- /iraq.egypt.mubarak.reut/). In fact, daulatu al-’islamiya fi al’-iraqi wa Mubarak’s prophecy was overly opti- al-sham, known by the sobriquet mistic, and the situation engendered “Da’ish”), emerged. Th e Islamic by the war turned out to be even more State of Iraq (al-daulatu al-’iraqi serious than he had imagined. al-’islamiya), active in Iraq since Organizations declaring their support 2006, adopted this name when it for and allegiance to Islamic State have moved into Syria, and the name sprouted all over the world, including “Islamic State” (al-daulatu al- Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and ’islamiya) then began to be used Yemen in the Middle East; Tunisia, Egypt, following the announcement of Libya, Sudan, Algeria, and Nigeria in the establishment of the caliph- Africa; and Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, ate at the end of June 2014. Indonesia, and the Philippines in Asia.

32 Dharma World January–March 2016 Yoshiaki Sanada is director of the Peace Research Institute of Religions for Peace Japan and a Professor Emeritus of Chuo University, where until March 2007 he was a law professor. Dr. Sanada is also a former president of the Society for the Study of Legal Culture. He has also been a visiting professor at the Institute of Comparative Law of the China University of Politics and Law in Beijing. This essay originally appeared in Japanese in Candana, no. 262 (June 2015) (Tokyo: Chuo Academic Research Institute).

Islamic State Rose Factors Allowing from the Ashes of Iraq Islamic State In March 2003 the United States invaded to Function as Iraq, without the support of the UN Quasi State Security Council, on the grounds that What made it possible for Islamic State Iraq was developing and possessed weap- to gain military control of a vast area ons of mass destruction—despite the stretching from Iraq to northern Syria, fact that this was later discovered to be to create a quasi-state apparatus there, a fabrication—and two months later the - regime of Saddam Hussein fell. eral reasons for this, although here we Iraq is a complex state that is multi- will consider only three of them. ethnic, multitribal, and multireligious First, Islamic State counted among its in makeup, and it was the autocratic number technocrats with experience of dictatorship of Saddam Hussein that government and administration under the pre–Iraq War regime, and former collapse also led to the dismantling of the Iraqi military and security appara- Iran-Iraq War, Gulf War, and Iraq War tus, leaving more than half a million and were familiar with what had been Iraqis unemployed. some of the most modern military tech- nology and hardware in the Arab world, regardless of nationality and ethnicity, the war, the groups that had been and they have played a leading role in oppressed by the Hussein regime— whether they are motivated by money, namely the Shias and the Kurds— Second, the states of today’s Islamic by the need for employment, or by ide- ology, herein lies the real reason why those regions with Sunni majorities, the nineteenth- and twentieth-century there are Muslims in Western society which had tended to be supporters of colonialism of the European powers. as well as in the Islamic world who join the former regime, uprisings repeat- As these states were created with disre- gard for ethnic, religious, cultural, and suppressed by the US-led occupation traditional identities, people’s national The Teachings of Islam sense of belonging to these states was and Islamic State people of Iraq (including civilians) in inevitably weakened. the process. And third, for this reason the Islamic Islamic State is designated “Islamic,” but community, or Ummah (ummat al- does Islam really endorse the atrocities conditions for a crucible of violence. Islamiyah), became the ultimate ide- committed by Islamic State? Certainly ological and behavioral rallying point not. Islam is a religion of peace whose concrete goal is to protect people’s lives, the foundations that allowed new armed Islam, that is, Muslims. Whenever the persons, property, and honor. groups to run rampant, and thus emerged Ummah itself is beset by a critical situ- In the Qur’an, it is written that God Islamic State. ation, Muslims will unite in solidarity, said, “Because of that We ordained for the

Dharma World January–March 2016 33 Children of Israel that if anyone killed a armed force against Western coun- person not in retaliation of murder, or tries? From the viewpoint of the ordi- (and) to spread mischief in the land— nary Muslim, the US military and its it would be as if he killed all mankind, allies have been nothing but aggressors. and if anyone saved a life, it would be Accordingly, Muslims’ “terrorist acts” as if he saved the life of all mankind” are simply jihad waged in self-defense (Sura 5:32). Moreover, Islam prohibits to liberate territory and peoples from Muslims from waging wars of aggression the United States and its allies. and permits only wars of self-defense: In this sense, too, it must not be for- “And fight in the Way of Allah those gotten that at the bottom of terrorism who fight you, but transgress not the in the Islamic world is the creation of limits. Truly, Allah likes not the trans- the state of Israel and partitioning of gressors” (Sura 2:190). Palestine, and in particular the acts of Fighting an enemy in a war of self-de- expulsion, terrorism, and massacre against fense to protect Islam and the Ummah Palestinian residents; the subsequent is jihad. The Arabic word jihād is often flouting of international law and UN Third, humanitarian aid for refugees translated as “holy war,” but this transla- decisions and the inhumane attacks on and victims of war must be delivered by tion is tainted by Western Orientalism, and massacres of Palestinians by Israel; appropriate international humanitarian and the term’s true meaning is to “strive the waning influence of Arab countries aid agencies, such as the International hard in Allah’s Cause as you ought to as a result of the repeated Arab-Israeli Red Cross and Religions for Peace (also strive” (Sura 22:78). wars; and the double standards of Western called the World Conference of Religions Rules of conduct to be followed by countries’ foreign policies. The terror- for Peace, an international nongovern- the Ummah and warriors engaging in ism now sweeping the Islamic world is mental organization that has engaged jihad are established by the framework in a very real sense an outgrowth of the in conflict resolution, humanitarian of Islamic international law for wartime, violence bred by the wars with Israel. assistance, and other peace-building called siyar. Twelve centuries ago, the activities through dialogue and coop- Islamic world already had international Severing the Chain of eration among religions), without the law to rank alongside present-day inter- Islamic State Violence involvement of “aggressor” states that national humanitarian law, such as the have used military force. Third Geneva Convention on the treat- How then should we go about solving Fourth, conflicts and confrontations ment of prisoners of war, signed in 1949. this problem? The challenges are legion within a country should be tackled by Under the siyar, the beheading of hos- and the solutions diverse, so here I would creating an environment that allows tages, slaughter of enemy soldiers and like to suggest just five starting points. a democratic, independent solution hostile tribespeople, terrorist bombings First, the prime concern should be respecting the country’s internal con- targeting innocent civilians, and wars of with finding a political, peaceful solu- ditions and interests, led by its people. Islamization are all unlawful and cer- tion based on direct dialogue between And fifth, the most important con- tainly not permitted under Islamic law. the parties concerned, without recourse cern should be with finding a perma- Why then have acts of violent ter- to force and unaligned with the US-led nent solution to the Palestinian problem. rorism engulfed Iraq, Syria, and other “war on terror” waged by military means. Moving from resolution through force parts of the Islamic world? On this point Second, a clear stand should be taken to resolution through dialogue, efforts it is worth reflecting on the words of against Islamic State’s unique interpre- should be made to render effective an Jacques Attali, the first president of the tation of Islam and its enforcement of agreement between Israel and Palestine European Bank for Reconstruction and compliance with this interpretation, under UN leadership to suspend mili- Development, who observed that the through religious dialogue with fair and tary action. ≥ word terrorism has often been used by enlightened religious figures of author- the powerful to belittle national liber- ity in the Islamic world. This religious ation movements. dialogue may on occasion be led by the All excerpts from the Qur’an in this article are Who in the Islamic world has been and in some instances from Muhammad Taqi-ud-Din Al-Hilali and Muhammad Muhsin Khan, trans., e Noble the aggressor and who the victim of aided by leaders of the world religions aggression? Are there today any Islamic engaging in similar dialogue and pro- and Commentary [King Fahd Complex for the countries that have sent troops and used viding religious cooperation. Printing of the Holy Qur’an, 1998].

34 Dharma World January–March 2016 SEMINAR REPORT The Lotus Sutra: Time, Space, and Culture by Adam Lyons

Adam Lyons is a PhD student in the Committee on the Study of Religion This is a report on the 2015 International Lotus Sutra Seminar, at Harvard University and a visiting sponsored by Rissho Kosei-kai and held May 28–June 1, 2015, fellow at Waseda University in Tokyo. at the National Women’s Education Center of Japan in the His dissertation deals with prison town of Ranzan, Saitama Prefecture. chaplaincy in Japan from the Meiji period (1868–1912) to the present day. He is a member of the American Th e annual International Lotus Sutra origination” of particular texts—in this Academy of Religion, the Association Seminar sponsored by Rissho Kosei-kai case, sutras and miracle tales—does not for Asian Studies, the Japanese provides a forum of intellectual exchange mean simply addressing cultural con- Association for the Study of Religion for leading scholars from various fi elds text. Rather, Dr. Campany employed a and Society, and the Japanese to discuss a constellation of issues con- theoretical model from communica- Association for Religious Studies. nected to the Lotus Sutra and its history, tions theory to assert that these texts, or practice, and philosophy. Th is year’s con- rather, genres, exist in relation to each ference on the theme “Th e Lotus Sutra: other. Th us “there is an interlocking, rhe- Time, Space, and Culture” heard from torical function between miracle tales specialists representing a variety of dis- and sutras, a dovetailing of rhetorical of the Buddhist canon. What if ciplines, including Japanese literature, structures in these two genres.” Miracle was actually responding to the place of Chinese religions, Buddhology, and tales show the claims that sutras make the Lotus in the broader culture? Th en modern Japanese religions and society. in action in people’s lives. what factors may have contributed to In what follows, this report briefl y sum- One important implication of Dr. its success? marizes each presentation and ensuing Campany’s work is that he off ers an Dr. Campany argues that the sacred conversation. insightful answer to a vexing problem: authority of a text like the Lotus Sutra Why do some texts “succeed” where functions in a network with other texts “Miracle Tales as Scripture others fail? Success here means being and not in a vacuum. Miracle-tale texts Reception: A Case Study transmitted and bearing an infl uence. therefore serve to bear witness to the of Tales Involving the Scholars know that there were once thou- claims for sacred authority made in the Lotus Sutra in China, ca. sands of sutra texts circulating in China. Lotus. In this sense, commentaries (both 370–720 CE” However, the overwhelming major- ancient and contemporary) can also be Rob Campany, Vanderbilt University, ity of these have been lost or forgotten understood as texts functioning in the Nashville, TN (that is, they have failed). On the other textual network that orbits the Lotus hand, the Lotus Sutra has been passed Sutra and contributes to its transmission, Dr. Rob Campany opened the fi rst down from generation to generation infl uence, and authority. Dr. Campany panel session with a nod to an overlap and has had a tremendous infl uence. It concluded: “I am arguing that the Lotus between Buddhist metaphysics and aca- is therefore an example of a successful Sutra teaches very interesting and pow- demic methodology: “I am interested in text. However, this success cannot be erful ideas that come to life when peo- studying religion to see how things arise explained simply by the fact that Zhiyi ple respond and interact with it, and codependently.” He went on to note that (538–97) opted to give the Lotus Sutra the miracle tales are the textual record seeking to understand the “codependent pride of place in his systematization of such responses.”

Dharma World January–March 2016 35 of two primary teachings: “everyone has the capacity to be a buddha, and the Buddha is present everywhere, all the time.” Dr. Levering’s study of Thich Nhat Hanh serves as a call for a recon- sideration of the relationship between mindfulness movements and the other Buddhist traditions. “The Influence of Modern can see that the history of East Asian Japanese Sectarian Buddhism has been profoundly influ- “Making Buddhism Taxonomies on Modern enced by the dual processes of imper- Personal: Yamada Etai ” aliasm and historiography. Moreover, and Tendai Practice in Erik Schicketanz, University of Tokyo these processes are connected to the Contemporary Japan” development of the concept of religion, Stephen Covell, Western Michigan Dr. Erik Schicketanz presented a or shūkyō (lit., sectarian doctrine), in University, Kalamazoo, MI paper outlining his research on the East Asia. interactions between Chinese and Dr. Stephen Covell presented a paper on Japanese Buddhists in the late nine- “Thich Nhat Hanh and the an important figure in twentieth-cen- teenth and early twentieth centuries. Dr. Lotus Sutra” tury Tendai Buddhism, Etai Yamada. Schicketanz noted that when Chinese Miriam Levering, Professor Emerita, Dr. Hiroshi M. Niwano, president of Buddhist reformers tried to make sense University of Tennessee, Nashville, TN the Rissho Kosei-kai Gakurin Seminary, of Chinese Buddhism, they employed noted the significance of the friend- a sectarian taxonomy originally devel- Dr. Miriam Levering discussed her ship between Rissho Kosei-kai founder oped by the thirteenth-century Japanese research about the contemporary Nikkyo Niwano and Etai Yamada, the scholar-monk Gyōnen (1240–1321). Vietnamese Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh, man who became the leader of Tendai. Gyōnen’s taxonomy was an influen- who has a wide audience throughout Their common interest is perhaps most tial document in Japan at the time. It the world. It is common in recent pop- closely evident in a shared desire to divided Japanese Buddhism into thir- ular Buddhist literature to refer to him make religion personal and to share teen sects, or shū, and this schema as one of the founders of the mindful- the teachings of the Buddha. Dr. Covell became the textbook understanding ness movement popular in the Western writes, “Yamada strove to plant the seeds of the history of Japanese Buddhism. world. He is known for combining an of Buddhism and create religious sen- In that sense, Gyōnen’s work has cast emphasis on mindfulness with a com- timent in his audience. For Yamada, a long shadow on historical studies of mitment to social action. religion was fundamental to character and beyond. Although some have criticized Thich development and the recovery of spirit- When Japanese missionaries trav- Nhat Hanh’s Buddhist teaching as dis- ual strength.” Of course, for Yamada, eled to China around the turn of the connected from the mainstream of the call to develop religious sentiment twentieth century, they used Gyōnen’s Vietnamese Mahayana Buddhism, Dr. was connected with a call to reform and taxonomy to make value judgments Levering argues that the story is more revive temple Buddhism. about the state of Chinese Buddhism. complex: in recent years, Thich Nhat Dr. Covell extracted two main The typical narrative was that “Chinese Hanh has in fact drawn on the Buddhist themes from Yamada’s body of work: Buddhism is in a state of decline.” This textual tradition. Dr. Levering explores the centrality of prayer and faith, and story provided a rationale for Japanese some of the ways in which Thich Nhat the importance of experiencing the Buddhist missionary activities in China. Hanh has attempted to ground his teach- divine, or numinous. It is important Thus, a discourse on “reviving sectarian ings in Mahayana doctrine. Nhat Hanh to note that these themes undergird movements in China” was developed by has written commentaries on the Lotus Yamada’s vision of a possible future Japanese missionaries and their Chinese Sutra. Since 2003, his sangha has also for temple Buddhism. He wanted to counterparts. Dr. Schicketanz argues practiced an ordination rite that refer- see Tendai imbued with the “new reli- that Japanese academic ences Avalokitesvara, the bodhisattva gion spirit” of personalized religion. exported influence onto the structures of compassion (Jpn., Kannon), who Yamada hoped that temple Buddhism of modern sectarian Chinese Buddhism appears in the Lotus Sutra. Thich Nhat could change its moribund image and through Gyōnen’s taxonomy. Thus, we Hanh interprets the Lotus Sutra in light transform its focus from performing

36 Dharma World January–March 2016 funerals to providing consultation for framework and questions posed by Dr. members of Rissho Kosei-kai to move the faithful about how to lead better McLaughlin can be applied to other forward with our simple Buddhist prac- lives. Thus, Yamada may have been a movements as well. tice inspired by this Never-Disparaging Tendai priest, but together with Nikkyo Bodhisattva.” Niwano and others, he sought to bring “The Bodhisattva Never- Buddhism into the daily lives of ordi- Disparaging” “The Other Tendai: The nary people. Hiroshi M. Munehiro Niwano, Rissho Medieval History of the Kosei-kai Gakurin Seminary, Tokyo Jimon through the Lens of “Sōka Gakkai: Buddhism Shinra Myōjin” and Romantic Heroism in Dr. Hiroshi Niwano presented a paper Sujung Kim, DePauw University, Modern Japan” about the theological significance of Greencastle, IN Levi McLaughlin, North Carolina State the Bodhisattva Never-Disparaging University, Raleigh, NC in Rissho Kosei-kai. The Bodhisattva Dr. Sujung Kim discussed her work Never-Disparaging (Jōfukyō Bosatsu) on Shinra Myōjin, an amalgamated Dr. Levi McLaughlin presented a paper appears in the Lotus Sutra. This par- Shintō-Buddhist deity associated with based on a chapter from his upcoming ticular bodhisattva was regarded by the Jimon branch of Tendai. Although book about Sōka Gakkai. He began his Founder Nikkyo Niwano as an exem- this deity is largely unknown today, the presentation by noting that there is very plary model for Buddhists to follow. Dr. primary argument of Dr. Kim’s paper is little objective scholarship about this Niwano asserted that the standard trans- that Shinra Myōjin was a much more group and that neither writers work- lation of the name Never-Disparaging important figure than has been thought. ing for Sōka Gakkai nor detractors of actually conceals another translation One significant feature of Shinra Myōjin the group ask certain kinds of ques- possibility: “never to be disrespected.” is the deity’s “international” status. Dr. tions: Why, for example, would people Thus the bodhisattva who never dis- Kim invoked the notion of an “East want to join a group that has a negative parages others is also himself never to Asian Mediterranean” to explain how public image? For scholars of religious be disrespected. this divinity associated with Korean movements, this question is particu- Dr. Niwano analyzed the chapter of immigrants eventually came to be trans- larly important—but it is not an easy the Lotus Sutra dealing with this bodhi- mitted by the Minamoto clan as they one to answer. sattva according to narrative structure were rising to power. In an effort to do so, Dr. McLaughlin by dividing the chapter into introduc- In addition to the political history employs an organizing metaphor: “Sōka tion, development, reversal, and con- of Shinra Myōjin, Dr. Kim also noted Gakkai is a mimetic nation.” This heu- clusion (kishōtenketsu). The narrative the divinity’s appearance in literary ristic provides a way to think about and theological analysis reveals that works and its role in rituals. She noted Sōka Gakkai’s organizational structure this bodhisattva’s deeds are presented that she first read about Shinra Myōjin and its history. The group has a flag, in the sutra as exemplary, while those in a thirteenth-century Tendai ency- anthems, territory, a security force, who disparage the bodhisattva are, in clopedia while studying in a graduate educational institutions, and its own turn, cast in an unfavorable light. seminar with Professor Bernard Faure sacred texts or canonical literature. Dr. Dr. Niwano concluded that it is his at Columbia University. However, the McLaughlin argues that the serialized belief that members of Rissho Kosei- deity appears in various medieval texts, novel Ningen kakumei (The human kai should continue to hold up this depicted as either a benevolent power revolution) played a central role in bodhisattva as a model of practice. He or a malignant force. In ritual practice, the expansion of the group. This work cited the practice of gasshō, or formally the deity Shinra Myōjin was connected provides a version of orthodox his- bowing to others with hands clasped, with rites at Onjōji, part of the Mount tory for members, but—as a serial- as a common daily practice that could Hiei temple complex and a center of ized novel that includes scenes based serve as an occasion for reminding our- the Jimon of Tendai. In con- upon real events and persons—it also selves to respect others in the spirit of nection with the ascension of Onjōji, provides a “participatory canon” for this bodhisattva. The bodhisattva prac- in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries group members. Understanding how ticed for many years, and although he there were grand festivals for Shinra members think about this literature was subjected to harsh criticism and Myōjin held at the temple. This pre- and why it appeals to them can help even slander, he was never disrespect- viously unknown aspect of medieval scholars to understand the growth of ful toward others. Dr. Niwano’s con- Tendai sheds new light on medieval Sōka Gakkai. Moreover, the theoretical clusion: “I believe it is important for us Japanese Tendai.

Dharma World January–March 2016 37 “The Lotus Sutra in the Zen is further evidence that even within “Why Don’t We Translate Liturgies and Teachings of individual sects, religions are not static Spells in Our Scriptures? Sukawa Kōgen, Dissident and monolithic entities—they are full Chinese Exegesis on the of Early Meiji Sōtō” of internal diversity. Untranslatable Dharani of Dominick Scarangello, International the Lotus Scripture” Advisor, Rissho Kosei-kai, Tokyo “Joining the Ranks of Ryan Overbey, University of California, Bodhisattvas: A Visual Berkeley, CA Dr. Dominick Scarangello presented a Narrative of the Lotus paper about the Sōtō Zen monk Sukawa Sutra Caves at the Dr. Ryan Overbey discussed the difficul- Kōgen’s lay proselytization efforts in the Medieval Dunhuang ties of translating dharani (spells). His 1870s. During that period, the govern- Caves” paper compares early Chinese transla- ment was establishing a Shintō charac- tions of the Lotus Sutra dharani writ- Fan Lin, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ter for itself, and thus Buddhism was ten by Dharmarakṣa (whose translation Ontario, Canada undergoing a period of persecution. approximated the meanings of the origi- The Buddhist sects were struggling Dr. Fan Lin presented a paper detail- nal) and Kumarajīva (who transliterated to find a place in the new order that ing the art found in several cave-temple phonemes). Both of these approaches was emerging in the wake of the Meiji complexes in China, including a par- imply theological perspectives, and Dr. Restoration, and part of that struggle ticularly notable cave temple created Overbey’s work traced the commentar- was developing a doctrine that could between 781 and 847 that forms part ial tradition to unearth what these per- appeal to laypersons. Kōgen’s story is a of the famous Dunhuang complex. Dr. spectives may have been. One important part of this larger story. Dr. Scarangello Fan’s paper is a study of the pictorial implication of Dr. Overbey’s work is that writes that “Kogen developed a set of relationship between the Lotus Sutra, the problems faced by Dharmarakṣa ritual practices and doctrines for lay- the Vimalakīrtinirdeśau S tra, and the and Kumarajīva are in many ways the persons he associated with the benefits Mahayana Mahaparinirvaṇa Sutra. same as those faced by contemporary of faith in the teaching of the eternal These sutras are represented in var- translators. Should the spells be trans- Buddha in the second half, or ‘original ious forms in the paintings found on lated or not, and why? gate’ (honmon), of the Lotus Sutra.” Thus the walls of cave-temple complexes, Dr. Overbey began his presentation Kōgen, a Sōtō monk, worked to create but there is much disagreement among by noting that his interest in dharani a lay form of Sōtō Buddhist religion. scholars as to how they should be is connected to his biography. He was However, the sect itself opted to move interpreted. raised in a Christian church in which in a different direction: “Within Soto, Dr. Fan began her presentation with glossolalia, or speaking in tongues, was Kogen is remembered, even dismissed, several guiding questions: “What is the practiced. This connection, he said, as one of the advocates of a heterodox relationship between text and image? was in the back of his mind when he ‘Śakyamuninenbutsu .’” Dr. Scarangello’s Why do the cave paintings take the forms began to study dharani. He then pro- paper turns scholarly attention to the that they do? Are the paintings just visual vided a brief overview of scholarship religious path developed for layper- aids to the texts and sutras?” She then on dharani. Dr. Overbey pointed out sons by Kōgen. offered a set of common features to be that early Buddhist-studies scholars and Ultimately, the Sōtō sect opted to considered: “First, there are certainly translators like Eugène Burnouf and promote a vision of “spiritual solace” intentions behind the art production— Max Müller looked down on the dharani for laypeople as expressed in the sec- and not merely on the part of the artists. chapter of the Lotus Sutra. They cared tarian creed of shushōgi (adopted in We must consider the patrons. Second, more for “rational philosophical systems” 1890), rejecting Kōgen’s proposals for there are also styles, stylistic features, than this “magic.” However, later schol- a Lotus Sutra–based soteriology. In this that can influence the form of a cave ars like Étienne Lamotte emphasized sense, Kōgen’s spiritual vision may have painting. And then there are political that dharani could serve as mnemonic been a failure. However, his dream of factors we must consider. In the case of devices to help people memorize scrip- encouraging lay devotion and engage- Dunhuang, it was controlled first by the tures. Thus, Lamotte brought forth the ment through the provision of a com- Tang, then the Tibetans, then the local idea that dharani allowed people to pre- prehensive soteriological doctrine is in people.” All of these factors may influ- serve and condense doctrine—they were many ways representative of the reli- ence the forms of the Lotus, Nirvana, and not merely magic. So the idea developed gious atmosphere of his time. Moreover, Vimalakirti sutras as they are expressed that dharani are intellectual practices, Kōgen’s vision of an alternative Sōtō in cave temple wall paintings. not merely “debased” popular practices.

38 Dharma World January–March 2016 In the 1980s and the 1990s, scholars typologies of Japanese Buddhist his- Miyazawa’s own Buddhist faith. of religion like the Buddhologist Gregory tory to speak of the Kamakura period These letters reveal aspects of Miyazawa’s Schopen argued for the significance of (1185–1333) as a sea change: Hōnen, religious beliefs and a side to his per- lived religion or religion on the ground. Shinran, Dōgen, Nichiren, and other sonal life that would remain otherwise This new direction in Buddhist studies leaders emerged whose legacies forever unknown. Dr. Holt notes that Miyazawa was informed by a recognition on the changed the Buddhist world. It has been himself wrote that he considered his part of scholars that an excessive focus argued that one common characteristic works to be part of a larger “Lotus [Sūtra] on textual or philosophical traditions of these thinkers can be found in their Literature” (Hokke bungaku). Therefore, was in part the result of a Protestant attempt to create a new universal appeal the study of Miyazawa’s letters in the con- bias in religious studies. (Protestant without restriction to class or gender. text of his corpus can help us to bridge Christian traditions favor the written Professor Blum argues that if this the- the gap between religion and literature. word over the rituals that play a central sis is true, then the place of women is Professor Holt hopes that this bridge role in Catholic Christianity.) Thus, the at the core of what makes Kamakura will “provide a way to understand how picture of Buddhism that emerged from Buddhism take the form that it does: religion shapes literary expression and, an exclusive focus on the intellectual or “[Kamakura-period Buddhist leaders’] vice versa, how literary expression aids textual tradition reflected the values of attempts to include women in their own in the development of one’s faith.” Protestant Christianity. This “Protestant salvific schema may be read as attempts Dr. Holt argues that if we take these Buddhism” came to be seen as a distor- to redefine the core of their very reli- letters seriously, then we can see that tion: ritual life has always been central to gious identities.” Miyazawa’s relationship with Kanai the practice of the overwhelming major- Dr. Blum’s paper focuses specifi- Hosaka had a tremendous influence on ity of Buddhists throughout history, but cally on the enlightenment of women Miyazawa’s written works. For example, scholars hadn’t paid enough attention as presented in the writings of Nichiren, Miyazawa appears to have recreated his to it. Schopen and others attempted Hōnen, Shinran, and Dōgen. Hōnen relationship with Hosaka in the char- to correct this oversight by studying was the first Japanese to write origi- acters of Giovanni and Campanella in lived religion. This scholarship carries nal soteriological treatises that were his most famous work, Night on the a Marxist flavor in that it attempts to not commentaries on Chinese texts. Milky Way Railway. Moreover, in Night study the practices of people other than Hōnen and these other figures all allow on the Milky Way Railway and other the elites, the nondiscursive practices of for the possibility of the enlightenment works, Miyazawa was proselytizing the masses. Dr. Overbey places himself of women in some capacity or other. faith in the Lotus Sutra just as he did in between this “lived religion” camp and Thus, one key common characteristic his letters to Hosaka. Professor Holt’s Étienne Lamotte’s philosophical bent. of these Kamakura-period Buddhist research opens new directions in the His approach is an attempt to under- reformers can be seen in the fact that study of both Nichiren Buddhist lit- stand dharani as both lived religion prac- they approach problems of gender. It erature and “epistolary conversion.” ticed at the popular level and a practice may be fair to say that all of these cler- woven into a feedback loop with exegeti- ics were trying to find ways beyond the Concluding Remarks cal and theological ideas. One advantage closed misogyny of male-only temple of this approach is that it avoids draw- complexes. As should be clear from the summaries ing a distinction between the elite and of the papers outlined above, the 2015 the popular tradition, therefore offer- “Who Miyazawa Kenji International Lotus Sutra Seminar, spon- ing the opportunity for a more compre- Saved by Proselytizing sored by Rissho Kosei-kai, was a great hensive understanding of what dharani the Lotus Sutra through success. All of the scholars involved are and how they work. Letters to a Friend” expressed their gratitude at having been Jon Holt, Portland State University, invited by their generous hosts, and “Saving Women in Portland, OR they also voiced their admiration of the Kamakura Buddhism” high-quality work of their colleagues. It Mark Blum, University of California, Dr. Jon Holt discussed the celebrated is to be hoped that this annual seminar Berkeley, CA writer Kenji Miyazawa (1896–1933) series will continue in the future, pro- and his relationship with his friend viding opportunities to build bridges Dr. Mark Blum presented a paper Kanai Hosaka as it appears in their between Rissho Kosei-kai and the aca- about attempts to rethink the role of letters. Miyazawa attempted to con- demic community and between schol- . It is typical for vert his friend—who was a nihilist—to ars from Japan and the West. ≥

Dharma World January–March 2016 39 FOUNDER’S MEMOIRS

Twists and Turns on the Path to Peace by Nikkyo Niwano

In March 1999 an autobiography by Rev. Nikkyo Niwano (1906–99), the founder of Rissho Kosei- kai, was published in Japanese under the title Kono michi: Ichibutsujo no sekai o mezashite (The path that we have walked: Aspiring to the world of the One Buddha Vehicle). The book is a lively account of the life of Founder Niwano as a leader of an international lay Buddhist association and a pioneer of interreligious cooperation who dedicated himself to liberating all people from suffering with fi rm faith in the Lotus Sutra. Dharma World will continue to publish excerpts from the book in installments.

Th e encounters I had at the fi rst assem- success, the bell of peace would imme- movements through interreligious bly of the World Conference of Religions diately toll throughout the world. Th e cooperation. An international com- for Peace in Kyoto with people of reli- conference was only one step toward mittee and an international secretariat gion from all over the world made a pro- peace. But as religious leaders contin- were set up, made up of offi cers from found impression on me, and I resolved ued to meet time and time again and the major nations, along with regional that the conference should not fi zzle exchange ideas and experiences, surely and national committees. out like a spent fi rework, since its con- strong ties would be forged among them When the Japanese committee of tinuity would make it one of the most and then among millions of their fol- Religions for Peace was inaugurated, I important movements for peace. lowers. Peace could be achieved only was appointed its fi rst chairman. Th e fi rst I shared the idea, which had been by many such small steps. event I was involved with in this capac- forged among the like-minded people Th is thinking, springing from the ity was the Inter-Religious Consultation who brought about the Kyoto conference, Kyoto conference, led to the establish- on Japanese-American Relations, which that we must not delude ourselves into ment of Religions for Peace, an organ- took place in Hawaii in June 1972 at a thinking that just because it had been a ization that aims to promote peace hotel in Honolulu, with fourteen repre- sentatives from Japan and twenty from the United States. At that time, Japan’s extraordinary economic recovery had resulted in a steady increase of exports to the United States, and trade friction between the two countries was rising. Th ere was strong resentment there, expressed when a senior American offi cial pub- licly declared, “Th e aggressive import of Japanese textiles is plunging the American textile industry into near crisis. Furthermore, the Japanese have gained a big market share of products like radios, motorbikes, cameras, and desktop calculators in the United States,

40 Dharma World January–March 2016 Nikkyo Niwano, the founder of Rissho Kosei-kai, was an honorary president of Religions for Peace and honorary chairman of Shinshuren (Federation of New Religious Organizations of Japan) at the time of his death in October 1999. He was awarded the 1979 Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion.

and Japan’s government and industry have seemed to be working together to climate was hostile. Because the Japanese and American participants in the consultation were concerned about the situation, they felt was needed to prevent a crisis. words of contrition, as a Japanese per- son of faith. “ irty-one years ago, an appalling war broke out at this very place between Japan and America. And today we are told that our two coun- tries are again facing a crisis in their relations. However, I do not agree. We Japanese cannot hear the words engraved on the hearts of all Americans, ‘Remember Pearl Harbor,’ without feel- ing pain in our own hearts. I express my deep regret and sorrow. However, we who are now assembled here at the Buddhist once said to me: ‘If we had It is not just a matter of economics. same place are like-minded in pray- known you thirty years ago, we could ing sincerely that we may bring about not have bombed Pearl Harbor, and based on emotions fueled by mutual lack peace, not war. In the event that some if you had known us thirty years ago, of understanding and misunderstand- unhappy situation should arise between you could not have rained that horren- ing. It is the task of people of religion our two countries, I venture to use the dous destruction down on Hiroshima to dispel such misunderstanding and very words ‘Remember Pearl Harbor’ and Nagasaki.’” seek paths to mutual understanding. in the sense that we who are gathered How great are the misconceptions here today seeking peace should not that grow out of a sense of being vic- forget that day.” timized, when that sense arises from a such as the peacekeeping activities of a lack of understanding of what is actu- NATO-led multinational peacekeeping McLean Greeley, the chairman of the ally going on in each other’s countries. force deployed in the war-torn regions American committee, rose and said, It is very dangerous when all the peo- of Bosnia, and the American initiatives “Rev. Niwano’s words have struck me ple in both countries are swept along deeply. As American persons of religion, by emotional rhetoric based on miscon- Palestine. So, too, is development assis- we must also repent with all our heart - tance intended to build a world where the crime of dropping atomic bombs on people can live in a truly human way. In Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A Japanese and the United States. the broad range of these activities, the

Dharma World January–March 2016 41 providing what international diplo- before I was going to board the plane, macy cannot. the general manager of Kosei General Hospital came up to me, his face seri- A Bitter Journey ous. So that the people around could not hear, he whispered in my ear, “Mr. Izumita has passed away.” I caught my many people as I was traveling around breath. He said, “It just happened, about seeking support for a world conference ten minutes ago. Doctors from Kosei of religious leaders was, “Even if people of religion organize a world conference, did what they could but it was too late.” aren’t they helpless in the face of military Takao Izumita was the husband of my might?” Similarly, some religious lead- third daughter, Yoshiko. Just two days ers involved in the activities of Religions previously, members of my children’s for Peace thought people of faith who families had come to my house for a believe in nonviolence hardly have any small party to celebrate my wife’s birth- day and to wish me a good trip. Takao that countries without military power had been in good spirits and poured sake are at the mercy of the countries that for us all. However, the following day he have it, and that global justice would collapsed during a business trip, and I ­ be destroyed without military power. was told about it that evening. He was admitted to a local hospital, and there people’s minds. It is a hard fact of the was concern for his condition. Now he problems that interreligious coopera- had passed away, just a few minutes ago. tion has to deal with are truly piling up. of that illusion, so people just revolve He had died of a heart attack. - the question in their minds. Surely the I nodded silently to the general man- ply means no war. Wars today kill many United Nations is the one international ager of Kosei General Hospital, who was more noncombatants than combatants. organization that can grapple with this biting his lip. Just then the boarding call Many are killed by brute force, in bom- bardments, for example, but many oth- None of those who had come to see me ers are victims of unseen violence, such direct approach to the UN in February - as poverty or famine. According to a byes, waved, and boarded the plane. report issued in the 1990s by Professor when it presented the UN with the con- Yoshiko had three young sons, one Kuniko Inoguchi of Sophia University ference’s proceedings—the decisions, nine, one eight, and one born just that in Tokyo, wells could be dug in three the declaration, and the reports from hundred thousand places throughout her husband, in the prime of his work- Religions for Peace sent observers to with safe drinking water, for the cost of the twenty-sixth UN General Assembly. grief. I could see her sorrowful face in just two bombers, and the cost of one I also visited UN Headquarters that my mind’s eye. underground nuclear test would pay for November when I was in New York Twenty-seven years before, when my the training of four hundred thousand attending the preparatory meetings of wife and children were sent to my birth- community health workers, so vital in the executive committee of Religions for place in Suganuma, Niigata Prefecture, Peace for the second World Assembly. I Yoshiko was in the third grade. It was U ant, a former UN secre - met Adam Malik, president of the UN only natural that our family’s ten-year tary-general, spoke of loyalty to nation- General Assembly, and told him about separation should have raised doubts in states and to humanity itself. Another the activities of Religions for Peace and important aspect of the peace movement asked for his cooperation. the separation had brought her, made should therefore be creating an inter- her distrust me. national code that seeks to reconcile it became a bitter journey I would never love of country with love of humanity. Rissho Kosei-kai at that time, which NGO activities in particular will cer- large group of people came to Haneda required me to send my wife and children tainly grow increasingly important, away to the countryside, was extremely

42 D January–March 2016 severe. When it comes to following the comfort and support. However, I had words of the deities faithfully, there can been entrusted with an important mis- I felt I had been able to hold a wake for be absolutely no compromise. I had to sion, so I sat up straight in my seat on him in my own way. I wrote my feel- live apart from my family, and their the plane, closed my eyes, and recited ings at this time in a letter to Yoshiko. return to Tokyo was not readily allowed the sutra, praying for Takao’s repose. because we were following divine mes- Early the following morning, alone in was very short. It reads: “Fine weather. sages conveyed through Myoko my hotel room in San Francisco, I read All things occur because of causes and [Myoko Naganuma, cofounder of Rissho excerpts from the Lotus Sutra and four conditions, but I don’t know how to Kosei-kai]. whole chapters, the twentieth, twenty- express my grief and sympathy to Yoshiko, or what words to use. Truly and they were followed by three boys. had woken during the night and could this emphasizes the Buddhist teaching At that time, the two eldest children not get back to sleep. I got up and sat that everything is transient and con- were of an age to more or less under- until dawn, as a wake for Takao. I hap- stantly changing.” stand how things were, but I was most pened to be carrying in my luggage a Of course, I am not the only one worried about how the other children, book by Professor Daigaku Hanaoka who has had to carry out an assigned in particular my three sons, would take called Jinsei no hanataba (A bouquet responsibility, keeping such sadness it. It was only natural that the boys, see- of life). One passage speaks about Ejo within me. Rissho Kosei-kai is what it (1198–1280), the second head priest is today because all of its leading mem- Suganuma, her skin burned by the sun, of the Zen temple Eiheiji, in Fukui would take her side, and inevitable that Prefecture. When he had been training they should have felt antipathy toward under Zen master Dogen (1200–1253), themselves to the Buddhist teachings. me. My second daughter, Kyoko (who the founder of the Soto Zen school of I believe Takao Izumita would have has now passed away), once came to me Japanese Buddhism, he learned that his rejoiced if I accomplish the task entrusted and said, “Father, you will lose the boys mother had fallen gravely ill. However, to me. if you continue the way you are going.” according to temple regulations, he could not return home. His fellow nov- To be continued ices urged him to get which might be called her will, forced special permission to me to change my attitude to my chil- return, since it would dren. Up until then, I had put my mis- sion before everything else, leaving no to be with his mother room to consider their feelings. I said when she was on her - deathbed. He atly tant that we should all get along with refused. “If I went one another.” So I changed my mind. against the Buddha’s teachings out of love people, and my children taught me that for my mother, even I could not insist on my own opinions though as a priest I and that nothing could be done unless have to lead her to the I took into account the views of others Buddha Way, it would to a large extent. - When Takao, carrying his son on his ial of me.” So saying, back, was leaving the small family party he continued with his just two days before my departure for training. the United States, he courteously wished When I read this, me a safe journey. I smiled and nod- I felt that the Buddha ded in response. But those words were was showing me how I should act in my sit- still see his face before me as he said uation, and I resolved farewell. I wanted to be by my daugh- to do my duty. Even though I could not

Dharma World January–March 2016 43 THE THREEFOLD LOTUS SUTRA: A MODERN COMMENTARY

The Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Law

Chapter 25

The All-Sidedness of the Bodhisattva Regarder of the Cries of the World (2) This is the 123rd installment of a detailed commentary on the Threefold Lotus Sutra by the founder of Rissho Kosei-kai, Rev. Nikkyo Niwano.

TEXT At that time the Bodhisattva Infinite Thought Before meditating on the Buddha and hearing the preach- rose up from his seat, and wholeheartedly baring his ing of the Dharma or asking to be taught, we must sum- right shoulder and folding his hands toward the Buddha, mon up and apply all our wisdom. One ought to take that spoke thus: “World-honored One! For what reason is kind of attitude toward the Buddha as well as one’s teach- the Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara named Regarder of the ers, and that is the origin of the custom of baring the right Cries of the World?” shoulder as a mark of great courtesy. It is still an Indian custom, and even on ordinary occa- COMMENTARY Baring his right shoulder. Baring the right sions, men in white robes and women in saris bare the shoulder has long been an Indian custom. Because the right right shoulder. arm is usually the more dexterous, baring it shows obedi- ence and a desire to be of service. This is why Indians often TEXT The Buddha answered the Bodhisattva Infinite greet worthy people by baring the right shoulder. Thought: “Good son! If there be countless hundred thou- Moreover, “right” symbolizes wisdom. One can recog- sand myriad kotis of living beings suffering from pain and nize this in the images of Shakyamuni flanked on the right distress who hear of this Bodhisattva Regarder of the Cries by Bodhisattva, representing wisdom, and on of the World, and with all their mind call upon his name, the left by the Bodhisattva Universal Virtue, representing the Bodhisattva Regarder of the Cries of the World will the truth, practice, and meditation (dhyana). instantly regard their cries, and all of them will be delivered.

44 Dharma World January–March 2016 COMMENTARY Regard their cries. In the Japanese names of the Cries of the World through accurate insight, flexible for Avalokiteshvara, which are Kanzeon and Kannon, the leadership making the most of that insight, and compas- character for kan means “intently observe” or “clearly dis- sion great enough to be willing to make any self-sacrifice cern.” As I have noted before, the characters for zeon refer for many other suffering people. to sounds of the world, of which the cries of human beings As practitioners of the Lotus Sutra, we disseminate the are the most important. Buddha’s teachings worldwide to guide all people in perfect- People not only cry out audibly, but silently in their ing themselves and their communities. In the spirit of great hearts. Their internal sufferings and fervent wishes are also benevolence and compassion shown by that bodhisattva, we the cries of the world. must clearly discern the worries, sufferings, and desires in The Bodhisattva Kanzeon is so named because he is the minds of those around us. If we can lead these people capable of “beholding” the cries of people, whether they flexibly with the tactful means best suited to each, we may express suffering or desires, and he delivers them from suf- effectively carry out our bodhisattva practice. fering and leads them to fulfillment of their wishes in ways best suited to each individual. TEXT If there be any who keep the name of that Bodhisattva This kind of attention is an absolutely indispensable Regarder of the Cries of the World, though they fall into a requirement for those who are in a position to teach and great fire, the fire will not be able to burn them, by virtue guide others. of the supernatural power of that bodhisattva’s majesty. If To bring up their children right, parents must always any, carried away by a flood, call upon his name, they will watch over their children’s health and states of mind, as if immediately reach the shallows. they had entered their minds and bodies. When parents sense the silent cries of their children COMMENTARY Keep the name of that Bodhisattva Regarder and notice that a child lacks some nutrient, is suffering for of the Cries of the World. There is deep significance in keep- some reason, or seeking something, the parents respond ing this name in mind, because it is a manifestation of the appropriately. They prepare balanced meals and give good entity itself. Therefore, to keep his name devoutly in mind is advice. Parents must bring up their children in ways that to become one with his entity. By banishing stray thoughts, are best for their health and inclinations. Parents worthy and keeping one’s mind only on that bodhisattva, one can of the name have to do their best for the happiness of their embody his boundless wisdom, benevolence, and compassion. children, even at the expense of themselves. This is the spirit of the Bodhisattva Regarder of the Cries of the World. This Misfortune of fire. It is said that even if one enters a fire may seem very difficult, but parents completely devoted to in that state of mind, one will not be consumed. I myself their children do this naturally. have had such an experience. When her baby cries, a truly concerned mother will When I was sixteen I went to Tokyo and became a immediately wonder why. The mother truly “regards the live-in errand boy for a retail rice shop called Isetoyo near cries” of her baby concerning hunger, wet diapers, physical Hatchobori in central Tokyo. I started work on August 28, pain, or whatever else. She then promptly takes appropri- 1923. Little did I know that a mere four days later the fate- ate measures. In doing so, the mother is a true manifesta- ful Great Kanto Earthquake would occur, on September 1. tion of the spirit of the Bodhisattva Regarder of the Cries The early hours of that morning felt hot, leaden, and of the World. somehow ominous. I recall that it was 11:58 when the shop- In the workplace, supervisors must discern each work- keeper turned to us and said, “Let’s break for lunch.” Then er’s character—his or her good points, bad points, abilities, the whole earth groaned. dissatisfactions, worries, hopes, and ambitions. They must The building trembled; dust from the crumbling clay guide and manage each employee in the way best suited to of the walls billowed everywhere. Things fell from shelves, that person. If supervisors take full account of their work- and bales of rice began rolling about. Without thinking, I ers, they can lead them, encourage them to work well, and dashed outdoors to see tiles tumbling from the roof and cultivate their abilities. Supervisors can then ensure that the the shop sign falling over me. I was certain that the world work they are responsible for is done efficiently. was coming to an end. The need for such a spirit and ability is becoming even When the initial tremors subsided, I dashed into the greater among company executives, teachers responsible street, where the streetcar used to run. People from all the for the education of many students, civil servants in charge houses around headed for the same street. But the streetcar of government administration, legislators, and government sat derailed across the road. Dangerous electrical cables dan- ministers. All leaders must emulate the Bodhisattva Regarder gled overhead. Before long, it seemed that a fire broke out

Dharma World January–March 2016 45 in nearby Kakigara-cho. Black smoke rose in great clouds. my father’s advice to me had produced impressive results. I looked around and I found fires breaking out here and I cannot assert that my quick recovery of my composure there. From all directions, I could hear the people shouting, and beginning of preparations for evacuation were solely “Fire! Fire!” and everyone was thrown into panic, scream- responsible for saving both myself and my employer and ing. I must have made part of the din. After all, I was only his family. Yet, considering that as time passed the roads a country hick come to the big city four days earlier. For a became completely jammed and that flames were rising in while, I was at a loss to know what to think or do. Then I every direction, there is no doubt. I do not say this out of remembered something my father had told me just before self-praise, but my composure was the major contributing I left home: “In Tokyo, they are always having fires and big factor in our successful evacuation. earthquakes. If you act surprised and shocked when these From this point of view, my father’s advice just to things happen, people will laugh and call you a country drink some water and calm down was truly the voice of bumpkin. Just drink some water and calm down.” the Bodhisattva Regarder of the Cries of the World. His After returning to the shop, I went to the sink, drank guidance was based on that bodhisattva’s wisdom and com- several deep gulps of cold water, and pulled myself together. passion. Thanks to this, despite being encircled by a great “I’ve got to do something fast! This place is going to burn conflagration, we were not consumed by it. down too!” I did not embrace any particular religious faith at that Then I ran into the street, where I found the shopkeeper time, but since childhood I had always listened obediently wandering about aimlessly. “Come on. We’ve got to get out to my schoolteachers and my grandparents. It may sound of here!” I urged as I pulled him by the arm. I began load- strange for me to say that ever since the principal of my ing whatever valuable possessions I could find onto two school told us, “Place your palms together in prayer before big carts. I wanted the other workers to help me, but they the gods and buddhas,” I had always prayed at my fami- were out on business. ly’s Shinto and Buddhist altars, at Suwa Shrine (a tutelary But as the shopkeeper and I were tying things down on shrine along our road to school), and before the statues the carts, they came back one by one. When we were all of Koyasu Kannon (the guardian Kannon for safe and together, I started pulling one of the big carts. The streets easy childbirth) and of Jizo (Kshitigarbha Bodhisattva) were already jammed with other people, all frantically trying along the roadside or in front of stones engraved with to get away. We decided to go to the open compound of the the name of Dainichi Nyorai (“Great Sun,” the Tathagata large temple Tsukiji Hongwanji. Of course, not knowing the Mahavairocana) placed for protection in areas of fre- way, I could only pull and follow the shopkeeper’s directions. quent avalanches. When we arrived near the temple, we saw billows of sooty It is probably because of that feeling of mine, respond- smoke, brightened by crimson tongues of flame, rising from ing to the Bodhisattva Regarder of the Cries of the World in the great roof. “This is no good! Too dangerous! We’ll have my father’s mind, that in the confusion of that great disas- to go somewhere else.” We turned back. I had absolutely no ter I clearly recalled my father’s advice. idea what route we took after that, pulling the carts behind The verse “Though they fall into a great fire, the fire will us. All I knew was that the roads were thronged with peo- not be able to burn them” moves me deeply, and I believe ple evacuating and pulling carts of their possessions. I was it to be absolutely true. later told, “If we had taken much longer, we probably would not have escaped.” At any rate, we finally came to rest in the The fire of defilements. When we speak of fire, we do not plaza in front of the Nijubashi Bridge at the Imperial Palace, mean only actual flames that burn and destroy. There is in the center of the city. I was deeply touched by my first sight also the fire of defilements. Of course, as a teaching, this is of the palace, especially since it was so unexpected, and in far more important than real fire. The Buddha often com- such extraordinary circumstances. pared human defilements to fire. His first mention of it is in As the sun set, an unbroken stream of refugees flowed the well-known “Burning” sermon in the Samyukta Agama into the plaza. Before long the huge space was packed with (Connected Discourses). people and their luggage. All around the open park roared You are probably acquainted with the story of Shakyamuni’s a sea of flames that dyed the sky scarlet. Fear aroused by first journey of his teaching ministry after his enlighten- rumors of tsunamis, which would come or had come, kept ment, from Deer Park in Benares to the ancient kingdom of all of us awake that night. On the following day, the rice Magadha, in central India. The story tells of Shakyamuni’s shop’s senior employees went to Hatchobori and returned teaching the three Kashyapa brothers, who worshipped the with the report that the Isetoyo rice shop had burned to the god of fire, and their thousand disciples at Uruvilva. ground. Nevertheless, amidst all the clamor and confusion, On his way to Rajagriha, the capital of Magadha, with his

46 Dharma World January–March 2016 new disciples, Shakyamuni climbed with them to the top of Cry Regarder. The defilements as they are will become a Mount Gaya. As he looked over the vast plain, he preached force for good. This is the concept that the defilements are to them: “Bhikshus, everything is burning. Everything is inseparable from bodhi (enlightenment). In other words, burning fiercely. Before all else, you must understand this.” the essence of defilements is nondual, or indivisible from This unexpected sermon must have astonished those enlightenment. who believed in the worship of fire until a little while ago. This is how we should embrace the teaching in the above The adroitness of the Buddha’s sermon best suited to each passage. person’s capacity and situation is apparent. “Bhikshus, what does it mean to say that everything is Misfortune of water. If any, carried away by a flood, call burning? Bhikshus, are not the eyes of human beings burn- upon his name, they will immediately reach the shallows. This ing? Do they not burn when they see something? Are not passage means being saved from the misfortune of water. the ears of human beings burning? Are not the noses of That is, survival without being nearly drowned. human beings on fire? Is not the tongue on fire? Is not the Do people drown only in water? Actually, the number skin on fire? Are not the minds of human beings on fire? of people unlucky enough to drown is extremely small. Yet Bhikshus, what is it that causes them to burn? They are we can definitely say that much of humanity is “drowning” burning with none other than the flames of greed, anger, figuratively; that is, indulging in something. and foolishness.” People drown in money, alcohol, lust, desire for fame It is hardly necessary to point out that one of the essen- or power, and vanity. tial elements in the framework of Buddhism is this tenet that Since people are weak willed, they are easily swept away true peace of mind comes from extinguishing the flames and ruined by inner desires and outer temptations. of those defilements. If, however, they invoke the Cry Regarder, they will This concept of Shakyamuni is frequently mentioned in recover the view of “the truth of the Middle,” avoiding ruin the Lotus Sutra, specifically in chapter 3, “A Parable,” where and returning to the right path. That is what is meant by he preaches that the real world is enveloped in the flames “they will immediately reach the shallows.” of defilement, but people are unaware of this because they seek gratification of the five desires. The teaching of chap- TEXT If there be hundreds of thousands of myriads of ter 3 shows the skillful means by which the Buddha’s com- kotis of living beings who in search of gold, silver, lapis passion saves people from this great fire. lazuli, moonstones, agate, coral, amber, pearls, and other Hence, here “great fire” means the causes of human treasures go out on the ocean, and if a black gale blows suffering, that is, human defilements. “Though they fall their ships to drift upon the land of the rakshasa demons, into a great fire, the fire will not be able to burn them” and if amongst them there be even a single person who means that even though life is full of defilements, they will calls upon the name of the Bodhisattva Regarder of the not consume us if we respond to the true wisdom of the Cries of the World, all those people will be delivered from

Dharma World January–March 2016 47 the throes of the rakshasas. It is for this reason that [he] is COMMENTARY Misfortune of the sword. When the named Regarder of the Cries of the World. Buddhist priest Nichiren was imprisoned by the Kamakura shogunate and about to be beheaded at Tatsunokuchi (now COMMENTARY Black gale. This is literally an ominous Fujisawa City, in Kanagawa Prefecture) in 1271, as he calmly wind that blows under black clouds or a whirlwind that recited the holy formula, or daimoku, expressing his devo- raises a cloud of dust, which blocks the rays of the sun. The tion to the Lotus Sutra, there was a sudden flash of light- reference here is to the wind under black clouds. ning and the executioner’s upraised sword was shattered. • Rakshasa demons. In rakshasa are male and rak- This is a famous story. Because this impressive scene has shasi are female. These evil demons possessing supernatural been passed down to us, we might think that being saved power were held to deceive humans or even devour them. from “misfortune of the sword” only means being spared Once they were converted to the Buddha Dharma, they physical violence. This simple understanding is all right as became guardian deities for Buddhism. This is described far as it goes, but it is only a superficial point of view and in the following chapter 26, “Dharanis.” Suffice it to say at may lead us to overlook an important point. this point that they are mysterious beings. Holy people suffer physical violence for various reasons. Jesus Christ was crucified. , a man of noble Misfortune of wind. The treasures spoken of here refer to character and one of the ten great disciples of Shakyamuni, the purposes of human life. died a violent death at the hands of non-Buddhists. The All people have something to live for, but some are sat- sixteenth president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln isfied only with having enough to eat and raising children. (1809–65), and Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948), consid- The ambitious seek wealth or advancement. Still others try ered the father of the Indian independence movement, to achieve as much as they can as scholars or artists. Then were assassinated. Even Shakyamuni was injured in the leg there are those who devote themselves to serving others in by fragments of rock hurled by Devadatta, Shakyamuni’s the cause of human happiness. cousin and a former disciple, and bled profusely. Therefore, These are the treasures some people seek. Some of these whether one escapes physical violence is not actually the treasures are so common as to be found anywhere, while essential issue. others are so precious as to be virtually unobtainable. All Far more important is to overcome psychological vio- people devote their lives to something they desire when lence. The issue is whether we are injured by hatred, jeal- launching forth upon the great sea of life. ousy, insult, or suspicion. However, life is not always as one would want it, and Today the possibility of being cut by the blade of a sword one can never tell when or where one will be struck by an or knife is much diminished as compared to former times. unfavorable wind or a windstorm. One might not reach the One is much more likely to be cut by words, whether spo- port one aims for, and may be blown to some unbearable or printed, such as rumors or public opinion. land inhabited by demons, where they fall prey to various If in such a situation one determines to keep in mind evils and become corrupted. One may be completely ruined and respond with great benevolence, compassion, and true by such evils. Indeed, we see this happening everywhere. wisdom, which are the true nature of the Cry Regarder, This is what we mean by “misfortune of wind.” and cultivates these virtues wholeheartedly, one will not be This passage of the text tells us that in a ship in a storm, injured psychologically, however many swords hang over if even one crewman or passenger invokes the Cry Regarder, one. That is because nothing is stronger than true wisdom. the ship will be saved. If we firmly maintain the notion of true wisdom, what- The person who calls the name of that bodhisattva is ever our hardships, we will feel deeply confident that we a truly honorable teacher of human life, a preacher of the will never surrender to them. So we will not be dejected Truth (the Wonderful Dharma). If such a person is with oth- or hurt, but keep calm. This is the most significant point ers aboard a ship on the sea of life and teaches them how to of this teaching. live in the light of the wisdom of “the truth of the Middle,” then those others (who have a causal relation with that per- To be continued son) will be saved from yielding to the temptation of evil. In this series, passages in the TEXT sections are quoted TEXT If, again, there be any man on the verge of [deadly] from The Threefold Lotus Sutra, Tokyo: Kosei Publishing harm who calls upon the name of the Bodhisattva Regarder Company, 1975, with slight revisions. The diacritical marks of the Cries of the World, the sword of the attacker will originally used for several Sanskrit terms in the TEXT sec- instantly snap asunder and he will be set free. tions are omitted here for easier reading.

48 Dharma World January–March 2016