Asian Philosophy
Vol.7 no.1
Mar.1997
Pp.5-22
Copyright by Journals Oxford Ltd.
Edward Conze once observed of the thirty-eight books constituting the Prajnaparamita Sutras that their central message could be summed up in two sentences: (1) One should become a Bodhisattva (or Buddha-to-be), i e. one who is content with nothing less than all-knowledge attained through the perfection of wisdom for the sake of all beings. (2) There is no such thing as a Bodhisattva or as all-knowledge or as a being or as the perfection of wisdom or as an attainment. [1] It seems to me that Conze was profoundly correct, as far as he went, and that what he said of the Prajnaparamita literary corpus might apply to other Mahayana Sutras, as well. One test of this broad application of Conze's observation to the whole of the Mahayana scriptural tradition lies in a close reading of one of the Mahayana Sutras from that tradition, the Saddharmapundarika Sutra, "the scripture of the lotus blossom of the wonderful law", or the Lotus Sutra. The Lotus Sutra not only makes Conze's point, as I shall try to show, but it goes further in offering a new middle path between the two summary sentences above. In doing this it brings forth a practical ethical-religious way for Buddhists and others to follow who will be caught in the sufferings and terrors of the 21st century. We shall refer to this way as "the way of the Lotus" or "the Lotus way". In what follows I want to attempt three things. First, using Edward Conze's summary sentences above, I identify and explicate three ways to liberation in the Lotus Sutra, viz. the way of ethics and attachment, i.e. "the Bodhisattva way" ("One should become a Bodhisattva..."); next, the way of emptiness and unattachment, i.e. "the Buddha way" ("There is no such thing as a Bodhisattva..."); and, finally, the Lotus way wherein the Bodhisattva way and the Buddha way combine to form a single and powerful new way of liberation. This third way is indirectly referred to in the remark which Edward Conze makes in his summary of the Prajnaparamita immediately following his previous two sentences: "To accept both of these contradictory facts is to be perfect". [2] To accept the Bodhisattva way together with the Buddha way yields the Lotus way. Second, I demonstrate the significance of the Lotus way as a practical way of solving moral problems for Buddhists and others in the 21st century. Third, and finally, I raise and attempt to answer and solve several questions and puzzles about the Lotus way as a way to peace and liberation for Buddhists and others in the 21st century. Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1997 Journals Oxford Ltd. I. The Bodhisattva, Buddha, and Lotus Ways of the Saddharmapundarika Sutra The Saddharmapundarika Sutra probably dates from sometime in the first or second centuries of the Christian era. We know that it already existed by 255 CE when it was first translated from Sanskrit into Chinese. But from what source-language that Sanskrit text was taken is not known. Recently, several Sanskrit manuscripts of the Lotus were found in Nepal, Central Asia, and Kashmir but these texts contain discrepancies that mark them as quite different from the best and most authoritative Chinese version of the Sutra that we possess. That Chinese version is dated from 406 CE and it is by the Central Asian translator-scholar-monk Kumarajiva (344-413). It is that version from which the Saddharmapundarika Sutra has come to be known throughout the Asian world that has made it one of the most influential works of religious literature the world has ever known. [3] The Lotus Sutra is a devotional text ranking in beauty and significance with the Bhagavad Gita of Hinduism and the Gospel of St. Matthew of Christianity. Like those two previous works it establishes its warrant as a sacred scripture by doing two essential things. First, it presents us with a Saviour doctrine wherein devotees are urged to dedicate themselves to the person and the message of a divine being in human form in order to achieve liberation; second, it establishes its legitimacy by attacking rival and competing traditions. Just as Lord Krsna assaulted both brahmins and the Vedas [4], and Jesus of Nazareth assailed certain conservative Jews and the Mosaic law, [5] so also the Buddha in the Lotus censures Theras or Elders and among them the Arhats whom he characterises as "rubbish", together with their beliefs and practices, which he refers to as "partial, shallow, and selfish". [6] In the process, all three persons reveal a new doctrine characterised by devotion, faith and love toward themselves as Saviours. Thus the Buddha announces a new doctrine, a new way or yana wherein inter alia, the supernaturalism and the transcendence of the eternal Buddha will be celebrated. [7] The aim of the Lotus Sutra would seem to be to find a permanent and ultimate spiritual foundation on which human religious aspirations can find legitimate grounding and expression. To this end the Sutra sets out to claim, first, that all previous messages of the Buddha are now null and void and are to be superseded by a new testament; second, this new way, the Bodhisattvayana, is open to everyone, nuns as well as the followers of the Lesser Vehicle, and that by following this new way antepenultimate Bodhisattvahood is possible for everyone; third, that the new way is established on the words of the eternal Buddha, a Krsna-Christ-like figure, transcending time and history, who now offers a guide to the devotional practice for securing penultimate Buddhahood and, as it turns out, something else, ultimately, even beyond that. But these three claims of the Lotus Sutra can be restated in terms of the two other claims that dominate the Sutra viz. become a Bodhisattva because that is the way to Buddhahood, "the Bodhisattva way", as we shall call it; and there is no such thing as a Bodhisattava, "the Buddha way". Let us explore these two ways to peace and liberation and then turn to that other ultimate "something else". I. 1. The Bodhisattva Way to Action The Sutra establishes the rules by virtue of following which one can become a Bodhisattva. These are rules of appropriate and inappropriate behaviour promulgated by the Buddha-to-be followed by all those who would follow the Mahayana path to Bodhisattvahood. It is important to realise, as the Buddha constantly reminds his listeners gathered by the millions to hear the new law, that this Bodhisattva way will not lead directly to Buddhahood, the penultimate goal, but only to Bodhisattvahood, the antepenultimate goal. The Bodhisattva way is found throughout the injunctions for behaviour and meditation in the Noble Eightfold Path which tend to parallel, in several ways, the moral and religious injunctions of the Mosaic decalogue and Jesus of Nazareth's Sermon on the Mount. Here are those eight rules of the Noble Eightfold Path recommended as worth following if one would become a Bodhisattva: Right views is to know suffering, the origin of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the path that leads to the cessation of suffering. Right intentions are the intentions to renounce the world and to do no hurt or harm. Right speech is to abstain from lies and slander, from reviling, and from gossip. Right acts are to abstain from taking life, from stealing, and from lechery. Right vocation is that by which the disciple of the Noble One supports himself, to the exclusion of wrong modes of livelihood. That completes the first five rules that we might denominate "the ethical path". This is followed by three more rules enjoining "the meditation path". The meditation path is concerned with the stages of mind training, viz. concentration, meditation (deeper concentration), and samadhic deeper meditation. I quote the three remaining rules only in part: Right endeavour [effort] is when...[one] brings his will to bear..., struggles and strives with all his heart to stop bad and wrong qualities [from arising to consciousness, i.e. one exerts whole-hearted concentration]. Right mindfulness is when realizing what the body is--what feelings are--...and what the mental states are--...[one] dwells ardent, alert, and mindful in freedom from the wants and discontents attendant on any of these things [i.e. one plunges into meditation, i.e. deep concentration]. Right samadhi is when emptied of lusts and wrong dispositions...[one arrives by stages to deeper and deeper trance states, i.e. one enters into ecstatic samadhic states]. [8] In a sense, the Bodhisattva way reads like a decision procedure for solving a difficult problem, suffering, in order to arrive at a solution, nirvana. It is, on another level, a physician's prescription for liberation from suffering. The Buddha of the Lotus Sutra, our physician to all patients in suffering, appears to confirm this algorithmic approach to the problem of bondage as he explains his method of the upayas. [9] To all of those who approach him with love, faith, and devotion, to all those worthy of liberation, the Buddha employs various methods of upaya, i.e. "divine cunning" or "liberative tactics", in order to bring about their Bodhisattvic "nirvana". Here, for example, is such a skill-in-means, being employed by the Buddha in the famous parable of the phantom city. The myth of the phantom city. The Buddha begins by explaining his employment of upaya at critical moments in a disciple's journey to liberation: The Thus Come One [the Buddha] in his use of expedient means penetrates deeply into the nature of living beings. He knows how their minds delight in petty doctrines and how deeply they are attached to the five desires. [10] And because they are like this, when he expounds nirvana, he does so in such a way that these persons, hearing it, can readily believe and accept it. [11] Prior to this introduction to upaya the Buddha had recounted how when he had preached the Lotus of the Wonderful Law to instruct the Bodhisattvas about their next stage in liberation, all had understood except "...the other thousand ten thousand million types of living beings [who] all gave way to doubt and perplexity". [12] But those monks and Bodhisattvas who had heard and understood the Lotus have now left the Bodhisattva way and entered, as the Buddha recounts it, the Buddha way: They heard the Law [the Lotus Sutra] from us and attained anuttara-samyak-sambodhi ["supreme-perfect enlightenment, the enlightenment of a Buddha"]. Some of these living beings are now dwelling in the ranks of the voice-hearers ["those who follow the teachings of Hinayana Buddhism"]. But we have constantly instructed them in anuttara-samyak-sambodhi, and these persons should be able, through this Law, to enter into the Buddha way, albeit gradually. [13] Having made the point that not only can Bodhisattvas but also voice-hearers be carried up to the Buddha way by proper upaya--though, he admits, the latter may be a little slow--the Buddha now turns to the myth of the phantom city. Suppose, the Buddha says, there is a stretch of bad road some five hundred yojanas (25,000 miles?) long beyond which lie some rare treasures. Some people want to reach those treasures but the way, like "the bad road of birth and death and earthly desires", is "long, steep and difficult, wild and deserted, with no inhabitants around, a truly fearful place". The people have a wise leader who now notices that the group is becoming disheartened. We cannot go on, they tell him, we want to turn around and go back. The leader, a man of many upayas, expedients, thinks to himself, "What a pity that they should abandon the many rare treasures they are seeking and want to turn around and go back!" With this thought the wise leader now ...resorts to the power of expedient means and when they have gone [several thousand miles] along the steep road, conjures up a city. He says to the group, "Don't be afraid! You must not turn back, for now here is a great city where you can stop, rest, and do just as you please. If you enter this city you will be completely at ease and tranquil. Then later, if you feel you can go on to the place where the treasure is, you can leave the city." The group is overjoyed. They press on and enter the phantom city conjured by their wise leader and experience the promised ease and tranquility. The leader, later perceiving that the group is rested, now wipes out the phantom city and says to the people: You must go now. The place where the treasure is is close by. That great city of a while ago was a mere phantom that I conjured up so that you could rest! [14] Now what is going on here and how does it relate to the three ways to liberation? The Bodhisattva way, the way of samsara, is the way of the world where moral behaviour and love and compassion toward fellow beings is commanded for all. The Bodhisattva way is the way fraught with pain and difficulties, the path with sickness, old age and death bestrewn everywhere. It is the path where incentives to right action, upayas to liberation, are needed and necessary. It is the path where phantom cities, Pure Lands, can make the moral choices easier and more bearable. The law of the Buddha becomes the guide along this most difficult path as we attempt to follow the Noble Eightfold Path and become Bodhisattvas. In addition, the moral precepts for practice at this stage often go beyond the First Noble Five as the Buddha counsels: One should not associate with persons of overbearing arrogance or those who stubbornly adhere to the Lesser Vehicle.... Monks who violate the precepts, arhats who are so in name only, nuns who are fond of jesting and laughter, or women lay believers who are profoundly attached to the five desires or who seek immediate entry into extinction-- all these one should not associate with. [15] The Bodhisattva path is strewn with prescriptions and admonitions but the reward, the heavenly promise of peace and tranquility, makes obedience to the law of the Buddha all worthwhile. The upaya of the Buddha keeps us on the path to the next stage of liberation. I.2. The Buddha Way to Emptiness But the phantom city is a phantom. It is just as empty of reality as the Bodhisattvas, themselves, who have reached the city. The ethical law of the Buddha is now replaced by the metaethical law of emptiness. We are told that beyond the phantom heavenly city of the Bodhisattva there is another place beyond good and evil, beyond opposites, beyond feelings, beyond attachments: Because all phenomena are uniformly empty, tranquil, without birth, without extinction, without bigness, without smallness, without overflows, without action. And when one ponders in this way, one can feel no delight or joy. Through the long night with regard to the Buddha wisdom, we were without greed, without attachment, without any desire to possess it. Through the long night we practiced the Law of emptiness, gaining release from the threefold world [the worlds of desire, form, and the formless, realms inhabited by unenlightened beings who transmigrate within them] and its burden of suffering and care. [16] Even though the Buddha way leads to a higher stage of liberation, it cannot be the final way for Buddhists but only a penultimate way. The Buddha way contains one danger recognised by the Buddha and that is this: when the disciple sees that all is empty, there may be a temptation to remain totally in a state of inaction thereby leaving all those who follow this way in a state or condition of nihilistic rejection of the world. In other words, the metaethical insight of the Buddha way can lead to abandonment of the world and not merely abandonment of attachments to the world. The Lotus Sutra seems quite clear in explaining the Buddha way. Here is the Buddha's disciple, Shariputra [sic], describing his ascent to this sunya path: Formerly I was attached to erroneous views, acting as teacher to the Brahmans. But the world-Honored One, knowing what was in my mind, rooted out my errors and preached nirvana. I was freed of all my errors and gained understanding of the Law of emptiness. At that time my mind told me I had reached the stage of extinction, but now I realize that that was not true extinction. [17] Shariputra concludes by stating what he believes his future to be as a Buddha, a knower of the true way of emptiness: I am certain I will become a Buddha, to be revered by heavenly and human beings, turning the wheel of the unsurpassed Law and teaching and converting the bodhisattvas. [18] Shariputra has a long way to go it seems but he does recognise the two stages and ways in this cosmological, soteriological scheme. But the danger that the abandonment of desire can lead to the abandonment of both the world as well as the teaching and converting of Bodhisattvas, remains. The Buddha way, by itself, appears to tend in that very direction. [19] So what is going on here with the nirvana of the Buddha way? According to a possible Chinese Taoist misunderstanding (according to Hurvitz, at least) of nirvana the ultimate goal of the Buddha way and of the Lotus, itself, is the production of zombie-like Beings incapable of action because incapable of overcoming the divine torpor of being desireless and passionless in heaven. The conclusion, of course, is that another way beyond the Buddha way must be found to avoid the possible nihilistic conclusion that now threatens. The Lotus Sutra will provide that third way. One has to be careful, at this point, in dealing with the Sunya-fied Buddha way, not to take Edward Conze's second summary statement, "There is no such thing as a Bodhisattva", too literally; that is to say, there may be something else going on here that goes beyond ordinary meanings. For Conze and for the Buddha ethics of the Buddha way, there is, after all, no such thing as a Buddha either; neither is there any such thing as an ethics, nirvana, nor anything else to which one can cling. The Buddha ethics is really a sunyata ethics, an ethics of emptiness, and here again one must be wary. It might be asked, "can one have an ethics of emptiness? Can one have an ethics prescribing acceptable behaviour where there are no rules onto which one can fasten one's concerns or commitments?" That is to say, "can one have an ethical rule where there are no rules? Is it possible for the non-rule, the non-ethics, to become the rule, to become the ethics?" I am going to try to show that one can. Let us go slowly and creep carefully into this one. An eschatological ethics. When Jesus of Nazareth announces that the end of the world is at hand, he goes on to state that there are those present and listening to his words who will live to see it all come to pass as the Son of Man returns and on that last day makes judgment on all. We have here the unusual conditions for an ethics that has come to be called "an eschatological ethics". Such an ethics stands above ordinary recommended norms of behaviour, beyond an ordinary ethics. It says, in effect, "Do not make plans for the future because there is no future. Should you marry, get a divorce, build a house, carry out sacrifices, etc?" An eschatological ethics answers, "Not if it depends on time and results, on the future, and on the fruits or results of your actions being right or wrong. There is barely enough time to get your affairs in order, much less follow the Mosaic law." Jesus of Nazareth counsels: Take heed, watch, for you do not know when the time will come. It is like a man going on a journey, when he leaves home and puts his servants in charge, each with his work, and commands the doorkeeper to be on watch. Watch therefore--for you do not know when the master of the house will come in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning--lest he come suddenly and find you asleep. And what I say to you I shall say to all: Watch. [20] But a watch ethics, like sunyata ethics, it must seem, is no ethics at all. What can you do where there is no time left to do it in? Well, for a start, you can let go of the ethics of Moses (see note [5]), compose yourself, and have faith, the Christians counsel. Eschatological ethics may have no normative ethics, but it is still an ethics, a watch ethics. That is to say, eschatological ethics says that you cannot do anything to reach some goal or other (there is no time) but you can let go of all of your other goals and then watch and wait with patience and hope. Eschatological ethics like Buddha ethics are metaethical ways to salvation or liberation. But the danger remains that this watch ethics will end up as misunderstood wu wei, inaction (see note [19]), and with that a new bondage would result. A predestination ethics. A similar ethics is also found in the later Christian tradition. St. Paul establishes the foundation for this ethics of emptiness when, assuming God's foreknowledge of events, he argues that all human effort towards salvation is useless. Salvation depends not on human effort but on God's mercy alone: For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son.... And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified. St. Paul then poses this question: What shall we say then? Is there justice on God's part? [21] A good question. For we have done nothing to warrant either salvation or damnation; nor can we do anything now to gain salvation and avoid damnation. We are all "vessels of wrath made for destruction"--it is a glorious miracle that any at all are saved. So what must we do in order to be saved then? "Nothing", is the answer: for there is nothing that we can do, except perhaps watch and wait with patience and faith. A predestination ethics, like an eschatological ethics, is no ethics at all. Both lack the moral rules that any ethics must have, either because the rules do not exist (predestination ethics) or because the rules no longer apply (eschatological ethics). And, without rules, both of these ethics have become watch ethics, i.e. ethics without prescriptions or decision procedures. As watch ethics each stresses the futility of human effort, either because there is no time or because there is nothing that one can do anyway. But, and here is the new insight of both watch ethics, each invites the listener or reader to let go. In letting go each mirrors, as we shall see, the Buddha ethics of the Lotus Sutra. A Buddha ethics. The Buddha ethics, like the watch ethics of Jesus and St. Paul, states that there is a meta-rule of behaviour which, if followed, will lead to salvation and transformation. The meta-rules of both Jesus and St. Paul seem to say, in effect, that there is no rule so let go--and that is precisely the meta-rule of the Buddha way of the Lotus Sutra. Chapter 14, "Peaceful Practices", of the Lotus Sutra is a fine compendium of all three of the ways that we are discussing and it will serve as a bridge from the Buddha way to the Lotus way. It is here that we find the Bodhisattva way and the Buddha way woven skillfully together to yield what we shall refer to as "the Lotus way" to liberation. The Buddha begins by discoursing on the Bodhisattva ethics with its do's and don't's for those on the Bodhisattva way: They should not associate closely with non-Buddhists, Brahmans or Jains, or with those who compose works of secular literature or books extolling the heretics, nor should they be closely associated with Lokayatas or Anti-Lokayatas [materialists or their enemies]. They should not be closely associated with hazardous amusements, boxing or wrestling, or with actors or others engaged in various kinds of illusionary entertainments, or with chandalas, persons engaged in raising pigs, sheep, chickens or dogs, or those who engage in hunting or fishing or other evil activities. [22] A familiar enough list worthy of a St. Augustine, a Tertullian or a St. Jerome. But then matters suddenly shift as the Buddha leaves off the advice and admonitions for those on the Bodhisattva way to those prepared for the Buddha way, the way of sunyata: Next, the bodhisattva or mahasattva should view all phenomena as empty, that being their true entity. They do not turn upside down, do not move, do not regress, do not revolve. They are like empty space, without innate nature, beyond the reach of all words. They are not born, without true being. They are without volume, without limits, without hindrance, without barriers. Reminding his listeners that all is anitya and subject to pratityasamutpada the Buddha concludes: It is only through causes and conditions that they exist, and come to be turned upside down, to be born. Therefore I say that one should constantly delight in viewing the form of phenomena as this. This is what I call the second thing that the bodhisattva or mahasattva should associate himself with. [23] The first thing was, of course, what the Buddha called "the practices of the Bodhisattva" in the older verse section of the chapter. These practices are "the first set of rules for the Bodhisattva to abide by". [24] The second thing is "the position the wise man [he who knows through prajna] associates himself with". The Buddha's advice to those wise men who would follow the Buddha way is quite clear: Place yourself in quiet surroundings, learn to still your mind, remain tranquil, unmoving, like Mount Sumeru. And what is it that one discovers in this non-action meditation? One sees that all is empty, that there is nothing to cling to. This verse section of the Lotus then repeats what the prose section had offered earlier: Look upon all phenomena as having no existence, like empty space. [25] The old problem of inaction now looms, once again, of course. But the Buddha does not leave our Bodhisattva immobile, sessile, zombie-like, resembling a mountain. He moves his Bodhisattva-Buddha on to the third way, to the Lotus way: If a bodhisattva will at times enter a room and with the correct mental attitude will view phenomena according to the doctrine [of emptiness] and then rising from his meditation, will for the sake of the ruler, the princes, ministers and people, the Brahmans and others, unfold, propagate, expound and preach this sutra, then his mind will be tranquil free of quailing and timidity. [26] Let us look more closely at the Lotus way as the ultimate `something else' constituting the acceptance of the two previous ways (viz. become a Bodhisattva, and there is no such thing as a Bodhisattva) that entails a `rising' and a `preaching'. I.3. The Lotus way to unattached action. If the chief cause of bondage and suffering faced by the authors of the Prajnaparamita texts, as well as the Mahayana literary corpus, was grasping, desire and attachment, then finding a solution to that problem must have been uppermost in their minds. If attachment to things and views in this world as well as to things and views in the Pure Land of the Buddhas was solved by the discovery through prajna that this world as well as heaven were phantoms, then a new problem resulted, the problem of inaction. That is to say, the Bodhisattva way solved the problem of attachment to worldly values by the promise that if you worked at these attachments hard enough a heavenly reward would result. But this Bodhisattva way then entailed a new attachment, viz. to heaven, to the upayas, and to becoming a Bodhisattva. Enter the Buddha way with the realisation that all is empty, that there is nothing to become attached to, that the city was a phantom since everything is sunya. But this Buddha way then led to yet another attachment, viz. to inaction, to meditation and solitude, and to letting the suffering world go its own way. The solution to these problems of attachment, to worldly and heavenly values and to inaction, is about to be proclaimed. The new way, the Lotus way, will involve, to paraphrase Edward Conze's words, the acceptance of both of the two previous ways and in the process it will solve the problems of attachment. The letting go within the Lotus way will be a letting go of things, views, and inaction, as well as a letting go of emptiness, itself. The language that the Lotus Sutra uses to describe the Lotus way is most frequently couched in terms of "preaching the Law". Chapter 14, "Peaceful Practices", of the Lotus Sutra had opened with a question by the Buddha's chief Bodhisattva disciple, Manjushri [sic]: ...World Honoured One, in the evil age hereafter, how should these bodhisattvas and mahasattvas go about preaching this sutra? [27] The Buddha answers, as we have seen above, by recounting, first, the Bodhisattva way and then the Buddha way as almost necessary prerequisites for the preaching. But as we have also seen, the former leads to bondage to phantoms and the latter leads to inaction. Again and again, the Buddha uses the language of unattachment in the context of preaching the Law. It is the language wherein the Buddha says of that preaching, "one must expect nothing from it" (p. 197), "one should not delight in speaking of the faults of other people or scriptures", and "not display contempt for other teachers of the Law or other people's tastes or shortcomings" (p. 201). Instead in the "preaching of the Law", The bodhisattva should at all times delight in preaching the Law in a tranquil manner. [28] The attitude is what counts here, of course. It is the heart of the Lotus way, after all, and whether one calls it "acceptance", as Conze does, or "unattachment", as the Bhagavad Gita does, or "embracing the will of God" as the Christians do, the result is the same, viz. letting go. So what is it to "preach the Law"? "Preaching the Law", or "preaching the Lotus Sutra", must be seen in the widest possible sense. Such "preaching" entails any action performed by a human being; it is not merely beating the air. [29] That such a wide context is precisely what the Buddha had in mind is easily seen in the final chapter to the Lotus. "Preaching" entails a doing together with a host of attitudes: If there are those who accept, uphold, read, and recite this sutra, memorise it correctly, understand its principles, and practice it as the sutra prescribes, these persons should know that they are carrying out the practices of Universal Worthy himself. As if to underscore the point that "preaching" entails both an attitude together with an action, the Buddha repeatedly counsels throughout this final chapter, "accept, uphold, read, and recite the sutra...and practice it as the sutra prescribes", [30] with the final phrase about practice repeated at least five more times. The Saddharmapundarika ends with the attitude (of the Buddha way) and the practice (of the Bodhisattva way) brought together as the narrator intones: "Accepting and upholding the words of the Buddha, [the heavenly company] bowed in obeisance and departed".[31] The most insightful parallel to the nature of the Lotus way's synthesis of attitude and action comes through the words of Lord Krsna to the warrior Arjuna in the Gita: Let your concern be with action alone and never with the fruits of action. Do not let the results of action be your motive [the problem of the Bodhisattva way], and do not be attached to inaction [the problem of the Buddha way]. Firmly fixed in yoga perform your actions, renouncing attachments, indifferent to success and failure. This balanced indifference [samatva] is called karma yoga [i.e. karma yoga is the Lotus way]. [32] Let us pursue this possible identity between karma yoga and the Lotus way a bit further. If such an identity could be established, it would be of enormous use in dealing with the issue of practical problems that we shall be investigating in part III. It might lead us to conclude that Hindus and Buddhists, or followers of Jesus of Nazareth and St. Paul, could all meet the problems of the 21st century in very similar ways. The Buddha says of the Bodhisattva who preaches the Lotus Sutra that he must have a "tranquil mind" and be free of "quailing and timidity" (p. 201). Leon Hurvitz translates the same passage and describes the "preaching" Bodhisattva as one whose "heart is tranquil and subject to no panic". But then Hurvitz honestly admits that he has trouble with the Chinese at this point and turns to the Sanskrit for explication. His endnote on this matter as he quotes the Lotus is worth repeating since it provides further evidence, it seems to me, that the Lotus and the Gita are both bent on precisely similar paths: For whosoever, keeping my posture and attitudes [iryapatha], shall become a mendicant monk after I am at peace shall explain this scripture in the world, and he shall have no attachment... he shall rise up and teach' it with thought unattached. [33] That is the message of the Lotus: there is nothing to cling to, everything is empty, so preach the Lotus, i.e. do your work, without clinging, clutching, and grasping to anything including the Lotus! But now we must ask, "What is the nature of that work that one must do without attachment, and how is it to be carried out?" II. The Lotus Way and Practical Ethics If the Lotus way of the Lotus Sutra and karma yoga of the Bhagavad Gita are similar, if not identical, ways of liberation from bondage and suffering through unattached action then whatever use or insights we have from one we ought to have for the other. If the work in the world or the preaching of the Lotus came to the same thing then it remains to apply the techniques of unattachment to that work or that preaching and see what happens. I would suggest that what the Lotus Sutra and the Bhagavad Gita are proposing as ways to liberation are precisely what has been proposed in similar philosophies and religions where letting go, unattachment, is essential to reaching their own versions of ultimate happiness. As a consequence, and fortunately, not only are the Lotus way and karma yoga rather common to other philosophies and religions as ways of solving practical human problems (the bright side) but, unfortunately, both are open to the same kinds of problems, puzzles, and questions that come from those other uses of letting go (the dark side). In what follows, let us explore the bright side first and then conclude with the dark side in part III, below. The Lotus way invites us to engage in action (the Bodhisattva way) but to do it with unattachment, remembering that everything is ultimately empty (the Buddha way). But a similar invitation might easily be found in the maya way of the Upanisads (where everything is a product of the magical power of Brahman, so let go of the unreal!), in the eschatological way of Jesus of Nazareth (where time is short, so pray that God's will be done and let go of your own will!), in the acceptance view of the Stoics (where a divine Providence rules over everything, so let go and accept that Providential rule!), in the predestination way of St. Paul (where God has already decided your eternal future, so let go of your useless efforts to save yourself!), in the fatalism way of Islam (where everything is the will of Allah, so accept it and let go!), in the lila way of Sankaracarya (where everything is the play or sport of God and you are part of that play, so let go!), in the bhakti way of the Bhagavad Gita (where you are in the hands of a loving and caring God, so let go!), in the wu wei way of Taoism (where learning to imitate nature by letting go of your selfish, personal desires leads to spontaneous and attachment-free action), in the pralaya way of Sankaracarya (where the world is coming to an inexorable end in this, the Kali yuga, so let go!), and, finally, in the epoche way of skepticism (where judgments about transcendental matters can only lead to further bondage and suffering, so let go!). Chief among those philosophers who have regarded letting go as a way to ultimate liberation was the great 2nd century CE Buddhist philosopher, Nagarjuna, the founder of Madhyamika. Nagarjuna's wonderfully enigmatic but profound assertion that between samsara and nirvana there is no difference whatsoever will serve as a point of comparison to the Lotus way. [34] One obvious parallel between Nagarjuna and the Lotus is found in seeing that in Nagarjuna's assertion he is talking about the non-difference between the Bodhisattva way (samsara) and the Buddha way (nirvana). That neither way, alone and by itself, can offer the way to liberation, that each is, ultimately, to be sunya-fied within Nagarjuna's philosophic system, that each must be accepted and neither should be clung to nor grasped at since each is empty. But that means, does it not, that when one is working in the world, i.e. preaching the Lotus, one ought to remember that whatever one does (for the Lotus) or whatever view one adopts (for Nagarjuna) must be done or adopted without attachment and grasping? If there is an ethic in Madhyamika, it is probably the ethic of the Lotus way. I do not mean to trivialise the Lotus way by pointing to its many parallels throughout history. What the parallels all have in common with the Lotus way, it seems to me, is simply that they all suggest that we "lighten up!" and get some perspective on our lives and the world. Each of these ways reminds us that we can become uselessly concerned about things which we either cannot prevent or change anyway (we lack the power) or which we ought not to change (we lack the wisdom). As a result, we are reminded through the Lotus way that we are bound up continually by desire and ignorance; and when we "preach the Lotus", we must learn to do it with the greatest humility. Letting go is, after all, precisely that: behaving in the world without attachment to those things which increase desire and foster ignorance. The way to peace is the Lotus way, a way that leads to liberation for the agent and happiness for the world. What else is there? III. Some Problems and Questions There are three minor puzzles to which the foregoing discussion of the Lotus way of the Lotus Sutra would seem to lead. The first problem is methodological, the second is ethical, and the third is conceptual. I believe that the Buddhists have a proper response to each of these puzzles and after presenting each problem I shall try to lay out in two instances that response. III. 1. The Lotus Way--A Methodological Problem A critic of the Lotus way might very astutely ask, "Granted that letting go is the way to approach works and views, how do I learn to let go? All I can see is that too much letting go lands me in inaction and abandoning the world and that's no good; and too little letting go keeps me right where I am now, grasping and clinging, and that's no good either. So how do I get around this antinomy of grasping? Can it be learned?" A good question to be sure. Is there a middle way between too much unattachment and too little, and how do we get it? The Lotus Sutra suggests a way, the Buddha way, and I am going to reiterate what was said earlier. The Buddha way is the way of meditation, really, and it may be that through dhyana yoga, some sort of prajna is achieved wherein the wise person realises either that letting go can happen or that it has happened. The other philosophies and religions that parallel the Lotus way have all indicated their own versions of dhyana yoga. Some call it bhakti yoga, prayer, watching and waiting, calm acceptance, epoche, or whatever. The point is that the mind is stilled and quieted and calmed, one gains perspective at such moments, and the middle path is taken. I do not know how else to say it. Dhyana yoga, the Buddha way, is the mind's way of counting to ten before some great decision is to be made, some great venture is to be undertaken. Or consider this quite different example. The story is told of Apelles (350-300 BCE), the court painter to Alexander the Great. Apelles was attempting to paint a foaming mouth on one of his pictured horses. It never seemed to come out right. He would paint, step back, see it was wrong, sponge it away. Again and again he tried and each time he failed. Finally, in disgust he gave up, let go, throwing his wiping sponge at the foamless mouth. And lo! there it was. The painted foam was perfect. [35] This is an example of wu wed, spontaneous natural action, preceded, in this case, not by prayer or meditation but by an equally practical perspective-achieving act. The intent, once again, is to act without attachment or grasping. It lies between painting no foam at all or continually painting in frustration. Throwing, in this case, was an act of the middle way, of the Lotus way. III.2. The Lotus Way--An Ethical Problem A critic might very well object that the Lotus way is inadequate as an ethical view because it lacks the passion and even attachment that is necessary to drive action. If I have no passion, no desire, then I would never engage in action and we are back to the problem of inaction all over again. When I want to "preach the Lotus", I have some end in view. I want to make money, achieve knowledge, gain someone's love, admiration or attention, build a house, repair a car, bake a cake, pass a test, make peace with North Korea or the Catholics or the Palestinians or other Buddhists or what-have-you. But I cannot do any of these things without desire, energy, and passion. But the Buddha way empties me of all passion--now I am unattached, indifferent and care-less. What kind of an ethics is this? Another good question to be sure. I would only say that the Buddha way of the Lotus way does not empty us of passion, emotion, and desire. What it does, as we have seen above, is to teach us or to give us the insight of dhyana to let go of passion, emotion, and desire. They are still there but we are not dominated by them now. Let me illustrate this with a story from my early academic career. I shared an office with an older faculty member who had developed a hand washing compulsion. Over the years it had begun to interfere with his teaching since he had to leave the classroom at least twice each hour to wash up. The chairman of the department put my colleague's classes near the men's lavatory and even gave him a reduced teaching load to try to modify his anxiety and thereby modify the compulsion. All to no avail. Finally, the dean of the college got complaints from students and in a conference with my friend and the chair he was urged to get help from psychiatrists in the medical school. When I knew him, he had already been in analysis for about 2 years. Meanwhile the hand washing behaviour continued. I asked him one day if he felt that the psychiatrist was helping him. Oh, yes, he said, very much. But Morrie, I said, you still have to wash your hands and you still have to leave your classroom several times each hour. How can you say you have been helped? True, Morrie said, I still have to wash my hands; but, you know, it doesn't bother me anymore. I would suggest that with the Lotus way what is changed is not the passion, emotion, and desire; that may all still be there together with much of the behaviour that accompanies such failings. What is changed, however, is the attitude, the perspective, that the Buddha way gives to the Lotus way that allows us to say that those feelings, if they are present, do not bother us anymore. The motivation for action is still there, preaching the Lotus continues, and the ethical way is maintained. III. 3. The Lotus Way--A Conceptual Problem A critic might very well question the concept of, and the entire program of, upaya as so hopelessly relative as to be totally meaningless within the Lotus way. Consider the following: There is an interesting parallel between the concept of `deconstruction' and the doctrine of upaya (`skill-in-means', `useful means', `divine cunning', `liberative technique', or `tactics') as described by the Buddha in the Lotus. Recall these passages: Because the Buddha can see the desires that are in the minds of living beings, he guides and protects them, and for this reason does not immediately preach to them the wisdom that embraces all species. [36] ...the World-Honoured Ones preach the Law in accordance with what is appropriate. [37] ...he adjusts to the person's power when preaching [38] And in accordance with what each is capable of hearing, he preaches the Law for them in an immeasurable variety of ways.... [39] Deconstruction, as I understand it, is taken to be the relationship between a reader and a text such that three things would seem to follow. First, the reader is said to produce the text by reading it which means, of course, that there can be as many texts as there are readers; second, the reading and the text that is produced by it are conditioned by the reader's own cultural and social background and training; third, the consequence of both of the above conditions is that the meaning of the text is never fixed or stable which means, of course, that there can be not only as many texts as there are readers but as many meanings as there are such readers and texts. Now what is going on with deconstruction is precisely what is going on with upaya since whatever holds for the written text can also hold for the aural message. The Buddha preaches his message and each hearer hears it, i.e. deconstructs it, as his or her own message of the way to liberation according to his or her own cultural and social background and training. The consequence is, of course, that the listener hears what the listener is trained to hear with the result that there may be as many messages, identical, similar, contrary or contradictory as there are auditors. The meaning of the Buddha's message is not only never fixed or stable but it never can be fixed or stable. Any upaya is necessarily a logical consequence of pratityasamutpada and it must ultimately lead to problems for Buddhologists. For consider: (1) If there are as many messages as there are auditors then there would be no message at all. The Four Noble Truths would or could conceivably end up as the Fourteen Noble Truths or the Fourteen Thousand Noble Truths. Upaya as deconstruction would seem to end in some difficulty. (2) If upaya as deconstruction is the case then blaming anyone who does not get the message is useless since there is no the message. But then what is the point in the Lotus of the Buddha or others blaming the Theras for not getting it when there is no it to get? (3) If the aim of the upaya doctrine as presented in the Lotus is to defend the notion that the Buddha teaches in conformity with the mental capacity of his auditors then, while this may be good pedagogy under some conditions, this leads to problems under the deconstruction interpretation of upaya. First, it is technically impossible for the Buddha to take into account the mental capacities of all of his auditors in large groups, so it is nonsense to say that everyone's needs are there being met; second, for the face to face, one on one, encounters with an auditor, it means that the Buddha would run the risk of preaching contradictory or contrary messages to each auditor whenever the nature or content of the message is made to be a function of the auditor's experience as the deconstruction interpretation of upaya suggests; for under the conditions where the auditor controls the message, i.e. where the auditory tail wags the oratory dog, a stark relativity of the message obtains and this means, once again, that there need be no message at all (see problem 1, above): from profusion for many at one time or for one at many times there can only come confusion. The conclusion to all of the above three problems, the critic concludes, is probably this: while upaya may still be good pedagogy, the claims made for it in the Lotus always bid us keep our critical wits about us. I leave the perspicacious reader to render the appropriate Lotus way response to the above conceptual problem. NOTES [1] CONZE, EDWARD (1960) The Prajnaparamita Literature, (s'Gravenhage, Mouton), p. 15. [2] Ibid. As if in confirmation of Conze's three summary sentences of the Prajnaparamita, Zenryu Tzukamoto in summarising the views of both Chih-i (538-597 CE), the founder of Tien-T'ai (Tendai in Japan) sect of Buddhism, and the Lotus Sutra, which is "the core Chih'i's system", states: "It is, so to speak, the Chinese expression of the Buddhist theories of the Indian Nagarjuna. Chih'i's doctrines are an expression of the appropriate application of three kinds of mental activity. The first is the act of direct affirmation, called establishment or illumination. Second is the act of denying the first, called abolition or obstruction. And last is the act of embracing, then surpassing the first two, called the double illumination and double obstruction." HURVITZ, LEON (Transl.) (1956) Buddhism in China and Korea, in KENNETH W. MORGAN (Ed.), The Path of Buddhism, Buddhism Interpreted by Buddhists (New York, The Ronald Press), p. 201. The present paper is merely a pursuit of Conze's and Tzukamoto's observations into the realm of practical ethics. [3] For more on the history and background of the Saddharmapundarika Sutra and its place in the Mahayana tradition, see WATSON, BURTON (Transl.) (1993) The Lotus Sutra (New York, Columbia University Press), pp. ix-xxix; and HURVITZ, LEON (Transl.) (1976) Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma (New York, Columbia University Press). Hurvitz' early translation for the same publisher is meant for an audience of scholars and specialists containing as it does a remarkably successful attempt to relate the earlier Sanskrit text to the later Chinese text. Watson's later translation has an educated lay audience in mind and it is the text that I shall be using in what follows. [4] See B.G. II.46, 52, 53; VI.1, 46; VIII.28; IX.20, 21; XI.48, 53. For example, repeating this quotation from the Mundaka Upanisad I.2.12, Lord Krsna tells Arjuna: "When you escape from this tangle of delusion then you shall ascend to the level of indifference [nirveda, which also means `disgust'] as to what should be heard and has been heard in the Vedas." B.G. II.52. [5] See The Gospel According to Matthew 5.17 48. Even though Jesus of Nazareth says, "Think not that I have come to abolish the law and the prophets; I have come not to abolish them but to fulfill them" (Matthew 5.17. Revised Standard Version), it is clear that his notion of `fulfillment' goes far beyond the usual sense of that concept and embraces `abolition' clearly and plainly: "You have heard that it was said [in the Mosaic law and tradition "not to kill", "not to commit adultery", "to divorce only under certain conditions", "not to swear falsely", "an eye for an eye", "hate your enemy"]...but I say unto you" [followed by a systematic rejection of each of the above admonitions]. [6] Despite Burton Watson's attempt to put a good face on it, the Buddha's mood in the Lotus is clearly not one of whatever-turns-you-on acceptance of either Theras or Thera doctrine. Watson states, "In some Mahayana texts Shariputra and the other close disciples of the Buddha who represent the Lesser Vehicle...are held up to ridicule or portrayed as figures of fun. But the prevailing mood of the Lotus Sutra is one of compassion..." (p. xvii). This assertion is difficult to support given what the Buddha repeatedly says throughout the Lotus about the pratyekabuddhas, the self-enlightened, and the sravakas, the voice-hearers, and other representatives of the Lesser Vehicle. In putting them down in order to exhalt the new Bodhisattvayana, the Buddha seems to be something less than `compassionate'. For example, in Chapter 2, "Expedient Means", the Buddha addresses Shariputra, "The wisdom of the Buddhas is infinitely profound and immeasurable. The door to this wisdom is difficult to understand and difficult to enter. Not one of the voice hearers or pratyekabuddhas is able to comprehend it" (p. 23). On the slowwittedness of the Theras see also pp. 27, 28, 29, 30, 36 and 49. For example, when five thousand Thera monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen rise from the assembly and leave in protest to the Buddha's remarks, they are described as "overbearingly arrogant". The Buddha lets them go and then says to Shariputra, "Now this assembly of mine is free of rubbish" (p. 30). Actually, both Watson and Hurvitz (p. 29) have "trees and branches" in place of "rubbish", but it is plain what the Buddha meant about these "persons of overbearing arrogance". [7] See COOK, FRANCIS H. (1978) in CHARLES S. PREBISH (Ed.), The Sutra Pitaka in Buddhism: A Modern Perspective (University Park, The Pennsylvania State University Press), p. 57. [8] Majjhima-Nikaya, iii, 250-252, in CHALMERS, LORD (1927) Further Dialogues of the Buddha, II, Sacred Books of the Buddhists, VI (London, Oxford University Press), pp. 298-299. [9] "He is like a skilled physician who uses an expedient means to cure his deranged sons" (Lotus Sutra, 16, p. 231). [10] The desires associated with the five sense organs, viz. eyes, ears, nose, tongue and body, are wealth, sex, food and drink, fame, and sleep. In the heavenly world, the rewards to good men and good women who uphold and accept the Lotus Sutra will be new surfeits and benefits associated with these five organs of sense. Such rewards constitute, presumably, satisfaction without desire. See Lotus Sutra, 19. [11] Lotus Sutra, 7, p. 135. [12] Ibid., p. 133. It is paradoxical that that very sermon that he had preached is now the very sermon that contains the story of that preaching. "The paradox of time", as we might call this puzzle, makes the past into the present and vice versa, which erases time altogether and becomes, as a result, another upaya. [13] Ibid., p. 134. Emphasis added. The point is that there is a way beyond the Bodhisattva way and that for some that way will be more difficult than for others. [14] Ibid., pp. 135-136. [15] Lotus Sutra, 14, pp. 198-199. These verse passages of the Lotus Sutra represent the older and more ancient portions of each chapter even though, oddly enough, the prose passages are placed, achronologically, before the verse passages in the text. [16] Lotus Sutra, 4, p. 93. [17] Lotus Sutra, 3, pp. 49-50. [18] Ibid., p. 51. [19] Leon Hurvitz appears to acknowledge this threat in his commentary on the following verses in his translation of the Lotus: In no long time he [the virtuous teacher of the Law] shall arrive at the Platform of the Way, Gaining the no-ado that has no outflows And broadly benefiting men and gods. Hurvitz comments: "The `no-ado that has no outflows' is supreme enlightenment that leads to nirvana. It has `No outflows' in the sense that it does not conduce to reincarnation. `No-ado' (wu wei) is a Taoist term taken over by the Ch. Buddhists, first to mean nirvana, later to mean asamskrta [non-forcing, non-causing elements producing no karmic results].... Wu wei implied for the Taoists that all action is bad, that the Sage who really understands Heaven's will [or Fate or the Will of God in the Hindu and Christian traditions] can sit perfectly motionless and let things take care of themselves There can be little doubt that the first Chinese to be attracted to Buddhism misunderstood nirvana to mean just that." Hurvitz, op. cit., Lotus Sutra, 17, p. 256 and note. [20] The Gospel According to St. Mark, 13. 33-37. Revised Standard Version. See also the Gospels According to Mark, 9.1, 13.29-31; Matthew, 3.2, 4.17, 10.23, 24.3; and Luke, 12.40, 21.6. See also St. Paul's letters, First Thessalonians, 5.2; Romans, 6.12-15; and First Corintheans, 6.10-19 for more on the pervasiveness of this moral apocalypticism. [21] St. Paul's Letter to the Romans, 8.29-30, 9.14. Revised Standard Version. [22] Lotus Sutra, 14, p. 197. [23] Ibid., p. 198. [24] Ibid., p. 201. [25] Ibid., p. 200. [26] Ibid., p. 201. Emphasis added. [27] Ibid., p. 196. [28] Ibid., p. 202. [29] Meister Johannes Eckhart (1260-1327), the great German priest, mystic and theologian, says in one of his sermons: "St. Paul said to Timothy, 'Beloved, preach the word'. Did he mean the outward word that beats the air? Nay, surely! He meant the in-born, hidden Word that lies secreted in the soul...". Eckhart, like the Lotus Sutra, saw no difference between the active life and the contemplative life since "each perfects the other": That is the Lotus way. PFEIFFER, FRANZ (1947) Meister Eckhart, C. DE B. EVANS (Transl.) Vol. I, (London, John M. Watkins), p. 16. In order to hear this Christian Nagarjuna at his very best, see Eckhart's sermon on "The Poor in Spirit" where he idealises the truly poor man as one who "wills nothing, knows nothing, has nothing" (p. 218). [30] Lotus Sutra, 14, pp. 322-323. Emphasis added. [31] Ibid., p. 324. [32] B.G., II. 47 48. [33] Hurvitz, op. cit., p. 384, n. 9. [34] Mulamadyamikakarika, ch. 25.19. An absolutely grand translation and commentary on this greatest of Nagarjuna's works is: KALUPAHANA, DAVID J. (1986) Nagarjuna, the Philosophy of the Middle Way (New York, State University of New York Press). I have always thought that while Nagarjuna may not have composed the Lotus Sutra and while it may not have influenced him, it is not unfair to suggest, given the proximity of the dates for each, with the Lotus set around 200 CE and Nagarjuna set around 150-250 CE, that there was a common source predating each of them from which each drew a common inspiration on the matter of the ways to liberation. [35] R.G. BURY (Transl.) Sextus Empiricus, (1939) 4 volumes, Outlines of Pyrrhonism (Harvard University; Loeb Classical Library), Vol. 1.29, p. 21. [36] Lotus Sutra, 5, p. 100. [37] Ibid. [38] Ibid. [39] Ibid., p. 99. A.L. Herman, Department of Philosophy, University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point, W154481, USA.