Freedom?

Aung San Suu Kyi No Responses »
Nov 132010

The world's only imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

As I write this shortly after midnight on Saturday, still no word on the release of Aung San Suu Kyi. If you have been following the news and her story, then you are aware that she has been detained for 15 of the last 21 years by Burma’s military rulers.

It’s being suggested that she may not accept a conditional release if it excludes her from political activity. I hate to hit the sour note, but I wonder if Aung San Suu Kyi will ever be free. The last time she was physically free was in 2003. However, the generals put her under house arrest for the fourth time since 1989 following “The Depayin Massacre” in May 2003, when at least 70 people associated with the National League for Democracy (Aung San Suu Kyi’s political party) were killed by a  government-sponsored mob. No one really understands the true story of the 2009 trespass incident. So, this time will the government use some trumped up charges to arrest her again? Will they provoke another incident and hold her to blame? Will they just decide to get rid of her?

Aung San Suu Kyi's dilapidated lakeside home in Yangon, Burma (AP Photo/Khin Maung Win)

Life for Aung San Suu Kyi under house arrest is not at all easy. She is not allowed visitors, except for her doctor. She lives with two assistants in an old house that had its roof blown off in May 2008, after Cyclone Nargis hit Burma. She also lost her electricity and the only light she has had at night is candlelight. Plans to repair the house were announced in August 2009. From what I understand, so far very little has been done. I believe that is in the general’s hands as well.

I’m not into a lot of mystic stuff, but I do believe in good vibrations. So, regardless of whether she is released or not, I think it would be nice if many people sent her warm thoughts of loving-kindness, and good vibes for her continued safety and for her health and happiness.

Yesterday’s post was about rebels. Aung San Suu Kyi is not a rebel. She is a revolutionary. There’s a difference. She captures the spirit of what I mean in this from her book Freedom from Fear:

The quintessential revolution is that of the spirit, born of an intellectual conviction of the need for change in those mental attitudes and values which shape the course of a nation’s development. A revolution which aims merely at changing official policies and institutions with a view to an improvement in material conditions has little chance of genuine success. Without a revolution of the spirit, the forces which produced the iniquities of the old order would continue to be operative, posing a constant threat to the process of reform and regeneration. It is not enough merely to call for freedom, democracy and human rights. There has to be a united determination to persevere in the struggle, to make sacrifices in the name of enduring truths, to resist the corrupting influences of desire, ill will, ignorance and fear.

Posted by David at 1:11 am Tagged with:

Rebels Without A Cause, Buddhas Without A Pause

Buddhism No Responses »
Nov 112010

James Dean, The Rebel King

You were the lowdown rebel if there ever was
Even if you had no cause

- The Eagles

Some months ago, I began to notice references online for “Rebel Buddha”. I went to the web site by the same name and learned that it was a book, a web site, a tour, and maybe more. Something about it bothered me and it mainly had to do with how I felt was getting a sales pitch. It didn’t resonate and I went to other things.

I had pretty much forgotten all about it, until yesterday I received an email from a publicist promoting the Rebel Buddha book, offering a review copy.  The first thing I did was go to the web site, not for the book but for the company the publicist works for, where I learned that they develop web sites for authors, books and publishers, and do online promotion on their behalf. I seemed to recall that the author of Rebel Buddha was a Tibetan monk, and it made me wonder why a guy like that would need a publicity machine. So now I looked into it a bit deeper.

I don’t know why this bothered me, about the author having a publicist. I might be bothered less (or not at all) were the author a lay dharma teacher or someone on that order. Why should being a monk make a difference? Not to mention that I was making an assumption: perhaps the publisher hired the agency.

The author in question is Dzogchen Ponlop, who according to Wikipedia, is “one of the highest tülkus in the Nyingma lineage and an accomplished Karma Kagyu lineage holder.” Other than that, I know next to nothing about him, but I have seen his name around.

I ran across a page on Shambala Sun’s web site promoting the Rebel Buddha book and it posed the question, “Do you relate to the idea of the Rebel Buddha?” Not really. I relate to rebels. All my heroes were rebels. And I relate to Buddhas. But Rebel Buddhas, I don’t know . . .

I have some experience in marketing and I understand how words can trigger certain feelings, and images in our minds. Rebel is a word that suggest being against something. What are Buddhas rebelling against? Sufferings? Delusions?  For me, Rebel and Buddha does not seem a good fit.

The Soka Gakkai has “Human Revolution.” They’re selling something, too. But revolution has a more positive, even construction connotation. For instance, an artist might “revolutionize” an art form without directly opposing anything. Human Revolution refers to the inner struggle to win over oneself. In this sense, we are all revolutionaries, and yet, being a “rebel” suggests something else, something outwardly directed.

Johnny Yuma was a rebel. [A reference for old folks.] James Dean was a rebel without a cause. Rednecks from the deep south are often rebels. The Buddha? Not so much. It’s a different sort of rebellion.

It reminds me of Chogyam Trungpa and his “crazy wisdom” which only rationalized and encouraged a lot of bad behavior. Westerners, particularly Americans, don’t need their sense of individuality stroked any more than it is, at least in relation to Buddhism. The problem is that we can’t lay it down long enough to really absorb the teachings. Usually we are too busy filtering dharma through our own prejudices and preconceived notions. That’s my opinion, at any rate. I don’t feel Rebel Buddha sends the right message.

Checking out the RebelBuddha.com site yesterday, the first thing I noticed were all the Tweets: “Congrats Rebel Buddha on the big release today!” read one by a rather high-profile Buddhist blogger. Yesterday was the official release of the book. Most of the other tweets were Rebel Buddha book giveaways and discounts. Apparently they had been counting down the clock. At 11pm it read 0 min 0 hours 0 days. The Buzz page promotes the book with offers of 20 percent discounts. The Create page is where you can make your very own Rebel Buddha poem!  There’s also Rebel Wake Up (which is either beer or a health drink and, I assume, a joke), the Rebel Buddha bloggers and the Rebel Buddha Tour panelists (who are virtually the same people, and some are well-known), and yes, the Rebel Buddha Tour itself (heavy guitar music here), and blog posts like: Rebel Buddha is here! The rebellion starts now!

So what is Rebel Buddha? It appears to be more than a book, more than a tour. It has some big names lending support, participating, and endorsing. Is it an attitude? A new form of Buddhism? Just another take on Buddhism? And do we need any of that stuff?

Haven’t we enough forms, brands and takes on Buddhism already? Why is there a need to keep creating new ones? Engaged Buddhism. True Buddhism. Humanistic Buddhism. Hardcore Zen. Dharma Punkz. Yadda. Yadda. Yadda. When anyone asks me what kind of Buddhist I am, I answer back that I am just a Buddhist. I don’t feel the need to belong to a sect or indentify myself with any particular form of Buddhism. I am just a Buddhist.

I think that frame of mind is more of the wave of the future if we really want to promote dharma as opposed to promoting some new and improved version. It was Alfred, the heavy set janitor in Miracle on 34th Street, who said it best when he commented to Kris Kringle, “Yeah, there’s a lot of bad ‘isms’ floatin’ around this world, but one of the worst is commercialism.”

Again, I don’t know Dzogchen Ponlop and he may be the greatest most sincere teacher in the world. I guess I just don’t get the point, particularly with the marketing blitz. If it were a bit more subtle, that might be something else, but this seems a little over the top to me. What am I missing? Am I just projecting my own sensibilities onto this? Prejudging? After all, I have not read the book or listened to the teacher teach.

Tickets prices for the tour are extremely reasonable from what I can tell. $25. So I am not suggesting that anyone is getting rich, or even out to make money. I also don’t mean to suggest that there are ulterior motives involved or anything untoward. At the same time, no one launches a marketing campaign of this magnitude without a reason, without some goal in mind. Or do they? Is this the new reality for disseminating dharma, using the media, social networking – is this Engaged Publicity, or Humanistic PR? Am I behind the times?

And who are they? It is just Dzogchen Ponlop? Or is it Dzogchen Ponlop and Tricycle and Shambala Sun, all three, a cabal? Maybe, a conspiracy. Perhaps there is a master plan being hatched here.

Obviously I have more questions than answers. If the Rebel Buddha web site had an About page it might help. I’ve looked elsewhere and can’t find that summing up that I think I need. In the meantime, there are just some aspects of the whole thing that seem, well, unseemly, that come across as crass and that other “c” word, the one Alfred used.

I suppose I will email the publicist and decline the offer of a book. I hate to turn down a freebie, but I am too far behind in my reading already. I may ask what her agency’s rates are, as I may need them later on down the road. I am writing a couple of books. Not about Buddhism though.

But, some day I may write my great tome on Buddhism. I need to think of something revolutionary first. A new take on the old dharma. And come up with a catchy name for my new form of Buddhism. All the good ones have been taken. I like simplicity, so maybe I will just call it Buddha Buddha or Buddhism Buddhism, because really that’s all it is. And of course, I’ll have a line of beer – featuring me!

He’s a rebel and he’ll never be any good.
He’s a rebel cuz he never, never does what he should.
And just because he doesn’t do, what everybody else does.
That’s no reason why I can give him all my love.

- The Chrystals

Love me, I’m a rebel at heart.

Posted by David at 1:51 am Tagged with: , , ,

Original Enlightenment Pt. 2

Buddhism 2 Responses »
Nov 102010

The definitive work on hongaku shiso or “original enlightenment thought” is without question Jacqueline I. Stone’s Original Enlightenment and the Transformation of Medieval Japanese Buddhism (Kuroda, 1999). In Chapter One, she succinctly captures the essence of this thinking:

The Buddhas who appear in sutras, radiating light and endowed with excellent marks, are merely provisional signs.  The “real” Buddha is the ordinary worldling.  Indeed, the whole phenomenal world is the primordially enlightened Tathagata [Thus-Gone One]. Seen in their true light, all forms of daily conduct, even one’s delusive thoughts, are, without transformation, the expressions of original enlightenment. Liberation is reimagined, not as the eradication of mental defilements or as achieving birth in a pure land after death, but as the insight, or even the faith, that one has been enlightened from the very beginning.

One must read beyond the introductory pages, however, in order to appreciate the full implications of this viewpoint. As Stone later remarks, “Hongaku (original enlightenment) thought is best understood not as a tightly organized philosophical system that rejected inconsistent elements, but as a broad perspective from which the entirety of the received [Buddhist] tradition could potentially be reinterpreted in immanentalist terms.” She goes on to say that this “perspective” traditionally did not exclude or dismiss various forms of Buddhist practice but rather they were seen in a different light.

Original enlightenment is essentially the product of Japanese Tendai Buddhism, the school based on the Chinese T’ien-t’ai sect. Where in T’ien-t’ai, original enlightenment is implied (as the innate potential for awakening possessed by all living beings orBuddha-nature), in Japanese Tendai, hongaku is nothing less than the original nature of all phenomena.

But no concept is born without antecedents. In the case of original enlightenment they are numerous and varied.  One source was Nagarjuna, the starting point for almost everything Mahayana. It was T’ien-t’ai master Chih-i who was perhaps the first to emphasize the thread of harmony and unity within Nagarjuna’s teachings. In particular, the idea that there was one essence or one nature of all things both stained and pure. This is articulated in Nagarjuna’s conception of the dharma-dhatu or dharma-realm.

K. Venkata Ramanan in Nagarjuna’s Philosophy notes,

Dharmadhatu is a reference to the ultimate reality, Nirvana, the ultimate nature of all that is conditioned and contingent. In dharmadhatu, “dharma” stands for Nirvana . . . “Dhatu” conveys the sense of the essential, intrinsic, inmost nature, the fundamental, ultimate essence . . . It is the primary aim of the wayfarer to realize the dharmadhatu.”

Ramanan quotes Nagarjuna as saying,

Even as it is the very nature of water to flow down by reason of which all waters return to the great ocean, blend and become of one essence, just in the same way all determinate entities, all natures general and particular, return ultimately to dharma-dhatu, blend and become of one essence with it. This is dharma-dhatu. Even as the diamond which is at the top of the mountain gradually settles down until it reaches its destination, the field of diamonds, and having got there it will have got back to its self-nature and only then does it come to a stop, this is the case with all things. Through knowledge, through discrimination, (the mind seeks the true nature of things and thus) gets to tathata [thusness]. From tathata, the mind enters its original nature, where it remains as it ever was, devoid of birth (and death) and with all imaginative constructions put an end to. This is the meaning of dharma-dhatu.

This one essence is, in actuality, all-essences or all the natures of all things. It is the totality of phenomena and experience and is said to be “one” in order to emphasize the interdependency of all things, or, as Tendai phrases it, the mutual possession of all natures. Dharma-dhatu should not be seen as a realm outside of our lives. To flow into the ocean of dharma-dhatu is to speak figuratively. Here, it is a sign for Nirvana, which, as the ultimate reality, is not separate from this very world of suffering.

Equally influential was the Buddha-nature (Buddha-svabhava) theory that evolved from the work, The Awakening of Faith, and the conception of the tathagata-garbha (realm of the Thus-Gone), which did a great deal to inform Tao-sheng’s assertions based on the Nirvana Sutra. This, in turn, influenced T’ien-t’ai/Tendai thinking, due in part, because of the relationship of the Nirvana Sutra to the Saddharma-pundrarika (“Lotus Stura”), although it could be the other way around.

Tao-sheng, an early Chinese Buddhist scholar, held that icchantika (beings too defiled and deluded to realize awakening) could attain Buddhahood. According to Junjiro Takakusu in The Essentials of Buddhist Philosophy, the followers of this line of thought do “not admit to the existence of the icchantika who are destined never to attain Buddhahood. Further study disclosed the theory that all beings without exception have the Buddha-nature.”

It is not that people with delusions do not exist, but they are not a category unto themselves, for all people are with delusions. Were the delusions not present, there would be nothing to transcend, thus no need for Buddhist teaching or practice or any need for Buddhas or attaining Buddhahood. It’s easy to see how this informed Chih-i in his teachings on the inherent nature of evil. Once again, the aim is to dispel any sense of dualism, which is perhaps the king of all delusions. Good and evil, pure and impure, deluded and Buddha do not exist from their own sides, unconnected to anything else. Just as in the case of the doctrine of “The Ten Life-conditions and their Mutual Possession” discussed in Pt. 1., all conditions of life co-exist with one another, penetrate and are possessed by all.

The primary influence for Tendai, was, of course, the Lotus Sutra, as the Tendai sect holds this sutra in the highest regard. Lines such as the following seem to point in the direction of inherent Buddha-nature, so providing a doctrinal foundation for original enlightenment, supposedly from the Buddha himself:

Among those who have heard the Dharma,
None will fail to become Buddha.
All Buddhas have taken the vow:
‘The Buddha-way which I walk,
I desire to enable all livings beings
To attain the same way with me.’

To reiterate from the words of Dr. Stone at the beginning of the post, Buddhas “are merely provisional signs.” Were we to imagine them as a class of beings who from beginningless time have appeared in the world, their only purpose then would be to bring enlightenment within the reach of all beings. They are the guides who point to the potential within which only can activate. Only we ourselves can realize our Buddha-nature. The Buddha empowers us, but the power does not come from the Buddha – it is our inner-power we tap into, which is of the same nature as Buddha.

Here I have presented just a few of the sources for original enlightenment. There are many others, but I thought it would be helpful to cite these in order to provide some background.

There will a third and final post on this subject (for now), but tomorrow’s post I think will be a sort of rebel yell . . .

With a rebel yell- “more, more, more”

Posted by David at 1:34 am Tagged with: , ,

The King of Bohemia

General No Responses »
Nov 092010

This post is a day late. I always get discombobulated whenever we switch time.

Sadakichi Hartmann in 1899

Yesterday, November 8, was the birthday of a very interesting guy named Sadakichi Hartmann. He hung out with Walt Whitman, danced with Isadora Duncan, introduced the symbolist poetry music to America (along with haiku and tanka poetry), invented the psychedelic light show, published some of the earliest avant garde magazines, wrote a play called Buddha (and one called Christ), appeared in the Thief of Bagdad with Douglas Fairbanks, Sr., and was BDB (that’s Best Drinking Buddies) with John Barrymore and W.C. Fields.

Sadakichi Hartman was born in 1867. His Japanese mother died in childbirth, and his father, a German trader, placed him in the care of one of his German uncles. By the 1880’s he was in America, and already having had met Whitman, was an art critic for several Philadelphia newspapers. His accomplishments and projects are too numerous to go into here. Suffice to say that he was a champion of art and artists, uncommon thinking and the free spirit; he protested the rising tide of conformity, and published books on subjects ranging from photography to Shakespeare to Whistler.

In the later decades of his life, the primary role he played was that of the ex-King of Bohemia, and it was also the way he made his living, giving lectures, and when paid appearances were not in the offing, he freeloaded. It led George Santayana to call him an “importunate beggar,” and W.C. Fields to say he was a “bum and a moocher.” They were compliments.

By the 1930’s Hartmann was, as George Knox describes him, “An almost forgotten figure in American art and letters, [living] in a clapboard shack he called ‘Catclaw Sliding’ amid the chaparral of the Morongo Indian Reservation east of town.” The town being, Banning, California.

You can read Knox’s essay “Sadakichi Hartmann’s Life and Career” here. In 2005, the New York Sun did a profile available here.

Perhaps, the best account of Hartmann is in Gene Fowler’s book Minutes of the Last Meeting which also chronicles the misadventures of The Bundy Drive Boys, Hollywood’s original Rat Pack, a group that included the aforementioned Barrymore, Fields, and Fowler, as well as Errol Flynn, John Decker and some other Tinsel Town characters. Sadakichi Hartman was their court jester.

Here are a few fragments from the mind of the man Walt Whitman referred to as “that dammed Japanee”:

Every true artist is a revolutionist by instinct, by special endowments, by necessity. His talents, no matter in what direction they exert and propagate themselves, are always exceptional, this in itself constitutes revolt, as the public, bent on enjoyment without study or meditation, will accept willingly and cheerfully on the conventional and traditional in exchange for monetary recompense. The artist who lives, survives, and ‘does’ is entrenched most of his life; he takes part in many skirmishes, carries the torn flag of beauty and liberty through the firing lines to summits far beyond the fighting crowds.

A great statesman is rarely a great humanitarian. He is occupied with the routine of the existing, and the desire to make a good impression on those he rules.

The trouble is that there are two kinds of morality. One which everyone feels – a man’s conduct towards women, his family, animals, his business associates, community and state interests, which concerns all – and we regulate these actions more by intuition, an inner urge to do right, than anything from outside, while the other morality that clergy and government, religious and political reformers, founders of new creeds and social orders, force upon us (necessary as they may be for mob discipline) is hypochondriac and hypocritical, false and destructive of what it is desirous to being about.

Do something absolutely berserk and you are sure of immortality among men.

Every person one meets bristle with advice like an angry porcupine, and although spines may hurt, people take more readily to bad advice than to reliable directions.

Zen Buddhism in direct opposition to Confucianism raised nature worship almost to a cult, Confucianism was becoming dry and hard, forstering a strict obedience to the letter of the law, not unlike Christianity in the hands of the Calvinists. Zen, on the other hand, held that nature and man (similar to Swedenborg’s doctrine) were two parallel forces running perfect sympathy through universal life.

Slander is like throwing mud at a wall. If it does not stick, it will at least leave a mark.

What can the individual do? I advise myself like this: Do what you like and what you can do best. Try and be more of an individual, influence stagnant crowd-thinking and mass-meeting mentality. Don’t bother too much about others, but give actual personal help when you can. Be sure not to harm anyone directly or indirectly. There is little else that can be done. However, this can be done by everybody.

Posted by David at 2:35 am Tagged with:

The Art of Silence

General No Responses »
Nov 062010

Chaplin's classic roll dance from "The Gold Rush"

I was seventeen years old when I saw my first silent film. Previously, my only exposure had been the Fractured Flickers segment on The Bullwinkle Show. It was my third or fourth week at college, the occasion was a five-day film festival at a local theater, and the film was The Gold Rush by Charlie Chaplin.

Unfortunately, this occurred just two days after my first viewing of Citizen Kane, which, in the vernacular of the time, completely blew my mind. Two days after I watched the Chaplin film, I saw 2001: A Space Odyssey, another mind-blower. Never before or since have any films affected me the way those two did. I couldn’t stop thinking about them for weeks. They changed forever what I looked for in films and how I enjoyed them.

The Gold Rush was primitive and cliché-ish in comparison. I did not give up on silents, however. Years later when I moved to Los Angeles where there were plenty of revival movie houses around, including one that showed only silent films, I tried to develop an appreciation. It took a while. A silent film is a different art form and they seem so antiquated and melodramatic. Well, they are. But one thing I’ve come to realize is that almost everything that’s done in movies now, were done in silent films first.

Silent films are highly stylized and it’s tempting to dismiss the acting performances because of the overacting. At the same time, directors in silent films had a tendency to hold their shots, keeping the camera on actors while reacting for an extended length of time, giving them the opportunity to convey a range of different, and sometimes very subtle, expressions. To appreciate these films you have to adjust your mind to a different pace, a different look, and understand that because it is storytelling based on pantomime, it has its drawbacks but also its advantages. If you can get past the overacting, the clichés, the lack of sound dialogue, a silent film can be a rewarding experience.

I bring all this up for two reasons. One is that earlier this week Turner Classic Movies, the world’s greatest cable channel, presented a number of silent films by the Thomas Edison studio, along with the early work of two other film pioneers, D.W. Griffith and Georges Melies. Some of these were the very first pieces of film ever made, lasting only a minute or less, such as The Kiss. So, I’ve got silent films on my mind.

A scene from Fritz Lang's "Metropolis"

The second reason is that on Sunday night Turner Classic Movies, the world’s greatest cable channel (did I mention that already?), is giving everyone a chance to watch a newly restored version of Metropolis, the 1927 landmark film by Fritz Lang. Following this is a documentary about the discovery of a complete print at a film museum in Argentina. And, if that were not enough, another silent by Lang, Spies, and then, Lang’s classic tale of murder, M, the 1931 film that made a star of Peter Lorre.  A veritable festival of film fun.

I thought I would give a heads up  for any readers who are interested in this film, its director, or silent movies in general, and for anyone who has never cultivated an appreciation but think they might like to. Metropolis is a great introduction to this art form. If you are a sci-fi fan, this is practically a must-see. TCM describes Metropolis as “A futuristic look at the schism created in mankind as industrialization and technological advancement serves to alienate the humans from one another.” I watched it just a few years ago and I looked to tuning in Sunday to see it again and catch the 25 minutes of restored footage.

You can read more about Metropolis at Wikipedia and more about the discovery of the complete print here at Kino. The restored original version “debuted” earlier this year in Berlin, where it premiered in 1927, with showings at the Friedrichstadtpalast in Berlin, the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, on German TV, and at a public showing at the Brandenburg Gate.

Check your local listings for Sunday’s show time, and also in the vernacular we used back in the day, be there or be square.

Posted by David at 12:13 am Tagged with: , , , ,

Original Enlightenment Pt. 1

Buddhism No Responses »
Nov 052010

One view of nirvana is that it is the termination of undue influence by trsna, literally “thirst” but signifying “desire” or “craving.” As noted previously, unwholesome desire is considered to be like a fever, and as Professor Trevor Ling notes in The Buddha,

Cessation [of passion] may be thought of as a ‘cooling’ after fever, a recovery of heath. In fact,  in the Buddha’s time the associated adjective nubbuta seems to have been an everyday term to describe one who is well again after an illness. It is evident from this that the original Buddhist goal, nirvana, was the restoration of healthy conditions of life here and now, rather than in some remote and transcendent realm beyond this life.

This is why in Mahayana Buddhism we say that samsara, the world of suffering, is nirvana. When one is afflicted by dis-ease, when one is stricken by the fever of unwholesome desire, then this is indeed a world of samsara. However, when one is healthy and free of fever, the world appears different, we see it in more positive, wholesome light, and this is nirvana. It is not about the absence of suffering, but the transcendence of suffering.

Buddhas do not obtain some special knowledge that the rest of us do not have. Rather, they have changed the way they know the world.

When we recover from a fever, we cannot be assured that we will never be sick again. The potential for disease is always present. Alternately, the potential for health is present. Health in this sense is realizing the world as nirvana.  We are not speaking of two separate worlds, one that is full of suffering and one that is full of peace. We are speaking of the disintegration of dualistic thinking.

In this same way, a common mortal and a Buddha are not two different persons. Because the potential for enlightenment is present, a common mortal can realize enlightenment and become a Buddha. To combat our tendency toward dualistic thinking, we say that the common mortal is already a Buddha, albeit an unrealized one.

The Chinese T’ien-t’ai master Chih-i taught a doctrine called “The Ten Life-conditions and their Mutual Possession.” The Ten Life-conditions, or spiritual realms (Jpn jikkai), are potential mental states inherent in each living being. In ascending order, they are Hell, Hunger, Animality, Anger, Humanity, Rapture, Learning, Realization, Bodhisattva and Buddhahood. In the Moho Chih Kuan (“Great Stopping and Seeing”) Chih-i wrote,

One mind contains ten spiritual realms. At the same time, each of the ten spiritual realms contains all the others, giving a hundred spiritual realms. . . It is obscure, subtle, and profound in the extreme. Knowledge cannot know it, nor can words speak it. Herein lies the reason for its being called ‘the realm of the inconceivable.’

What is important here is not the numbers, but that it is another way to express the non-dualism of nirvana and samsara. Hell contains Buddhahood and Buddhahood contains hell, as well as all the other realms. Instead of being distinct worlds unto themselves, they are potentialities, conditions that we can experience at any given moment.

The potentiality for Buddhahood should not be slighted. At the same time, merely thinking that one is a Buddha does not a fait accompli make. Realizing enlightenment is a process, like peeling an onion. We strip away layer after layer, and eventually we reach the core.  Some layers do not peel away easily. We have to rip through our hard karma, tear away at our dualistic mind, our prejudices and attachments. It can be painful. Onions produce tears. But it is necessary. The core awaits.

Mahayana Buddhism stresses the importance of starting with this basic understanding of original enlightenment, inherent Buddha-nature, the mutual possession of all life-conditions – awareness that this potential exists is the first step in uncovering it.

Tsung-mi, the  the fifth and final patriarch of the Flower Garland School and a Ch’an (Zen) Master of the Ho-tse School, wrote,

All sentient beings have been endowed with the true mind of original enlightenment. From the beginningless beginning this mind has been constant, Pure, luminous, and unobscured; it has always been characterized by bright cognition; it is called the Buddha Nature or the Womb of the Awakened.

From the beginningless beginning the delusions of human beings has obscured it so that they have not been aware of it. Because they recognize in themselves only the ordinary person’s characteristics, they indulge in lives of attachment, increasing the bond of karmic power and receiving the sufferings of birth and death. Out of compassion for them, The Awakened One taught that everything is empty; then he revealed to all that the true mind of spiritual enlightenment is pure and is identical with that of the Buddhas.

More on Original Enlightenment in the next post.

Posted by David at 12:14 am Tagged with: , ,

Hummingbirds

General 2 Responses »
Nov 032010

I am writing this just before I turn in for the night and looking forward to waking up tomorrow in a Jerry Brown California. I’ve been following this guy since I read his Playboy interview back in 1976, and as previously mentioned, I worked on his 1992 presidential campaign. Obviously, I am very pleased at tonight’s outcome in that race.

So now that California at least is safe for democracy, we can turn to some other things.

I spent part of this past weekend on the lawn in front of our building. Some plants have flourished around the base of the big palm tree out there and it was attracting lots of hummingbirds. I wanted to get some close-ups so I waded right into their midst, and they zipped all around me like crazy while I tried to be fast enough to snap shots. I might have looked a little odd to someone passing by but I was too busy looking this way and then that way to notice.

It wasn’t easy to capture them. These birds are . . . well, flighty might be a good word to use. Part of my problem was the camera. A couple of years ago I received my first digital camera as a birthday present from my dad and although I enjoy the fact that I can shoot some photos, hook the camera up to my laptop, and be able to view them in just a matter of minutes (not to mention the quality), I am still having a difficult time getting the hang of how to use the camera. When outside, the viewer is often hard to see because of the light. Trying to shoot these hummingbirds who tend to blend in with the foliage was daunting because you can’t just put the camera up to your eye and zero in on your subject like you can with a traditional camera.

Anyway, I did manage to get a few good shots. Here’s one of them:

Not too shabby, if I do say so myself. There are a few others and you can see them  here.

Posted by David at 12:36 am Tagged with: ,

Some Nuts Go to Washington

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Nov 022010

I’m glad Election Day is finally here. Frankly, I’ve had enough of politics for a while. If I had my way there would be a moratorium on politicking until six months before the 2012 election. Maybe if our elected representatives weren’t so busy campaigning and slinging mud at each other, they could get something done. Dream on, right?

I may be pleased with the outcome of a few races, but in general I don’t think I’m going to be that happy a camper. The pundits say that Americans are angry. That’s what they said in ’92. And we were. And now we are again. It’s the same old cycle: throw the bums out and then complain about the new bums. This time around we’ve got some real nuts to choose from.

Sadly, I am rather pessimistic about things in America these days. It’s frustrating, hoping for change but never seeing it. Or not the kind of change I feel we need. Some of the issues we are dealing with have been bubbling over for forty years or more. When are we going to get around to solving some real problems?

I suppose it’s true that we have had some dramatic and historic change during the last two years. It’s hard to tell, though. Big change should be heralded by fanfare. Something by Wagner. The Ninth Symphony. Copeland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man.” Change needs to be accompanied by grand gestures and stirring speeches, so that we know change is taking place. All I’m hearing are some penny whistles . . .

Now, I can point to one visible change:  the way the filibuster is being abused in the US Senate. The filibuster is actually pretty cool. Have you ever seen Mr. Smith Goes to Washington?

Mr. Smith talking his head off.

James Stewart plays a sincere but naive guy named Jefferson Smith who is appointed to fill a vacancy in the US Senate. He discovers political corruption and when he decides to do something about it, his state’s political boss tries to ruin him with a phony scandal. Just before the vote to expel him from the Senate, Smith launches his filibuster to stop a bloated Works bill and to prove his innocence. Here’s how the filibuster is described by a radio announcer in the movie:

Half of official Washington is here to see democracy’s finest show, the filibuster, the right to talk your head off, the American privilege of free speech in its most dramatic form. The least man in that chamber, once he gets and holds that floor by the rules, can hold it and talk as long as he can stand on his feet providing always, first, that he does not sit down, second, that he does not leave the chamber or stop talking. The galleries are packed. In the diplomatic gallery are the envoys of two dictator powers. They have come here to see what they can’t see at home. DEMOCRACY IN ACTION.

The least man has the right to talk his head off. That’s a big part of what America is all about to me. However, it helps if you are making some kind of sense while you are talking your head off. One’s speech should be grounded in thoughts that have some resemblance to reality. And maybe the willingness to compromise thrown in every once in a while.

I did some research. Here is part of what Wikipedia has to say about “filibuster“:

The term “filibuster” was first used in 1851. It was derived from the Spanish filibustero, which translates as “pirate” or “freebooter.” This term had evolved from the French word flibustier, which itself evolved from the Dutch vrijbuiter (free outsider). This term was applied at the time to American adventurers, mostly from Southern states, who sought to overthrow the governments of the Northern and Central states. Later the term was applied to the users of the filibuster, which was viewed as a tactic for pirating or hijacking debate.

Some people are talking about doing away with it. I think that would be a shame. The filibuster has traditionally been used rather sparingly. I read where Barbara Sinclair, a political scientist at UCLA, found that 8% of major legislation faced a filibuster in the 1960s, while today is it around 70%.

“Pirating” is one way to look at it, in some cases though, it might be standing up for a principle. Jefferson Smith did not filibuster because he wanted to be disagreeable, it was for something noble:

I guess this is just another lost cause, Mr. Paine. All you people don’t know about lost causes. Mr. Paine does. He said once they were the only causes worth fighting for. And he fought for them once, for the only reason any man ever fights for them; because of just one plain simple rule: ‘Love thy neighbor’ . . . And you know that you fight for the lost causes harder than for any other. Yes, you even die for them.

Thomas Paine, author of "Common Sense"

Of course, it’s just a movie, and a melodramatic and sentimental one at that. Right up my alley. It does represent a certain kind of spirit that I admire, the same kind of spirit that motivated a character named Otter in another movie to say, “I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody’s part.” That’s right up my alley, too.

The present situation with the filibuster is representative of the current political climate, where no one can get along and people stand on principle simply for the sake of taking a stand, which really is stupid and futile.

There was another Mr. Paine, a real person, named Thomas, who left these words behind for us to keep in mind on Election day, to remind us that along with all we find unsatisfactory and distasteful, there is this one shining point:

The right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which other rights are protected. To take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery, for slavery consists in being subject to the will of another, and he that has not a vote in the election of representatives is in this case.

Our right to vote is precious. I hope everyone will exercise it today. If mixed in with all the nuts we are about to send to Washington this year, let’s hope that there is at least one Mr. Smith in the bunch.

Posted by David at 12:53 am Tagged with: , ,
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