The Way of Jodo Shinshu

Koso Wasan 67

Although practicing principally the Buddha's Name.
Those who pray for earthly gains
Are also called (those of) mixed practices and
Are denied - not one in a thousand (will attain birth).

The Enlightenment and the Awakened One

From the time of François Marie Arouet de Voltaire (1694 - 1778) we have lived under the ægis of the 'Enlightenment'. The main assumption of this new development in human attitudes is that we can be governed by reason rather than authority. Since the time of Voltaire, when this view of the world became prominent, there have been many attempts to reverse what is clearly an inexorable trend. I do not count myself among those who would try to turn back this tide. I prefer to see this new level of human thinking as an incremental development; not one that eclipses the old. We are encouraged in this way of seeing things by the physicist and philospher Henri Atlan, who expounds the idea that mysticism (his word for 'religion') and science are unrelated but complementary fields of human endevour. Atlan thinks that we enrich our lives by embracing the Enligtenment of religion (Atlan is a Kabbalist) and the Enlightenment of reason together, not abandoning either.

In this way, it is possible to live in the world that comes to us courtesy of reason - science, artificial intelligence, representative government, and so forth - and religion: that which addresses our profound hunger for awakening, meaning, relationship to the whole and wholeness, along with our deep-seated and unnamed fears and anxieties. I regard religion as integral to the 'good' life, along with reason and the creative arts. Both science (rational knowledge) and religion can fill every aspect of our life. Henri Atlan summarises his detailed thesis - Enlightenment to Enlightenment: Intercritique of Science and Myth - by way of an analogy drawn from our experience of the rules of games. He says that we can play and enjoy tennis and football, but they have nothing in common, except that they are similar forms of human endevour.

People who truly desire to reverse the movement characterised by the 'European Enlightenment' should remember that prior to this era, it was feudalism and unquestoning obedience to authority, which held sway. We do well to ask ourselves if we can honestly yearn for a return to this kind of world-view. Indeed, it is probably very difficult to give an honest assessment of this prospect, because the old social constructs are incomprehensible to us, in our time. Instead, let us learn to live in a world in which we can cherish, love and benefit from both old and new, not confusing the two; just as tennis and football have nothing in common, except that they belong to a particular genre. I sincerely believe that we find greater happiness and inner understanding if we resist the temptation to confuse the Enlihgtenment of religion with the Enlightenment of the modern trend, which informs much that is also good and beneficial.

When the confusion of science and religion comes into play in the consideration of the teaching of the Awakened One a truly sad distortion occurs. The original teaching of Shakyamuni is not known. He seems to have been illiterate and we are not entirely certain what language he spoke. We also know little of early Buddhism with great certainty until the Second Council in around 383 BCE at which the Sthaviravadins (Pali: Theravadins) and Mahasanghikas split the community in two - each claiming to be authentic heirs of the Dharma. For much of the subsequent four centuries there are many dark patches, but just before the beginning of the Common Era the picture becomes clearer. We know for example that the Theravadin school was thriving in Sri Lanka, that the Prajñaparamita school was also in existence - as was a nascent Pure Land tradition. Modern research has uncovered the possibility that the Pure Land School is one of the oldest surviving Buddhist traditions. It was probably associated with the spiritual life of those who maintained the stupas, which housed the reliquaries, mainly containing remnants of Shakyamuni's ashes.

The Pure Land School predates the Bodhisattvayana by at least two hundred years, Ch'an (zen) by at least seven hundred years, the Madhyamika by at least three hundred years, Yogacara by at least four hundred years and Vajrayana by at least as much. Yet, in spite of its venerable bona fides as an integral and long-standing part of the life of the Dharma since the time of Shakyamuni, it is largely despised in the west. Why should this be? In my view it is largely because the Fourfold Noble Truth looks deceptively like a medical ætiology. It looks as though it is contrived by means of an entirely rational process. In this way an 'Enlightenment' view of the Buddha has cast a rationalist shadow over True Awakening (Sk. bodhi), the event which re-cast him as, in his words, 'no longer a man but a Buddha.' For the True Awakening did not come by rational analysis but by serendipity - a burst of understanding, like a 'bolt out of the blue'.

Once, however, the fundamental discovery of Shakyamuni is given an (European) Enlightenment aura and believed to be the result of mere rational analysis, a process of selection begins, whereby everything in the great mass of his teaching which has the aura of reason about it is accepted as authentic, while everything that does not fit into this prejudice is rejected. We forget that reason is a fragile construction, and if it is not built upon a firm and far deeper foundation, it becomes cold and cruel.

From beneath the harsh but fragile light of reason has emerged a new and sanitized Buddha-Dharma. Shakyamuni stands before us as an ancient and urbane precursor to Voltaire. It seems to me that this re-made, Enlightenment Buddhism is a skeletal remnant of the deep and enriching Dharma, the source of - yes! - ineffable light for millions of people these last two and a half thousand years. Even meditation is purloined for therpeutic use; no longer the pathway to samadhi and union with that which is true and real. It is now a vehicle for self-improvement: the mental equivalent of Michael Jackson's make-over... so that others will approve and we will improve. This Buddhism - the new Buddhism - is a museum exhibit available for analysis, utility and admiration; no longer permitted to speak for itself.

It is, then, ironic and paradoxical - in view of what I have said - that Shinran Shonin should, albeit unwittingly, have been so scrupulous about keeping the Dharma pure and free from contamination that he established a religious way which co-incidentally befits conditions in our Enlightenment world. Along the way of 'earthly gain' in our society lies medical science, technology, hard work, enterprise, social security and the principles of human rights. The way of earthly gain lies within the ethos of our modern secular society. It is a secular and not a religious endevour.

There is, says Shinran, another window, though. It is the window of our hearts. It throws light upon those deep and enduring, existential concerns that need to be nurtured and honoured in the world of the spirit. To confuse this world and these needs with secular endevours is, he says, utterly outrageous and wildly aberrant. As far as I am concerned - and let me stress the paradoxical nature of this - this stricture of Shinran, while obviously not prescient, is certainly fortuitous. His insistence that we adhere to a pure and unadulterated interpretation of the Buddha Dharma means that the way, which he outlines for us, matches perfectly the way of religion that sits comfortably alongside the realities of the world in which we now live.

- October 27, 2003.

Lilac.