Friday, April 20th

Every Day Thanksgiving


Here is my reflection from the January WLABT newsletter:

This year, I spent Thanksgiving with my wife's family in Georgia. I have always thought of Thanksgiving as the most Shin of all American holidays. Not only does it celebrate family and community, it is specifically based on the idea of recognizing our indebtedness and expressing gratitude for the things we receive. Surely this is the heart of Shin Buddhism. Whether you are saying the nembutsu at temple or counting your blessings over a shared turkey dinner, the attitude of Thanksgiving is what we aim for in Buddhism.

Gathering with the family also means that many generations come together in one place. In the past, it was common for multiple generations to live in one household or at least one village. But today we often live separated from much of our family, and these holidays take on extra meaning because children, parents, and grandparents can be with one another. Family is the most natural place for us to learn about indebtedness: even if we can't see the more abstract ways in which all people and things contribute to our lives, we can at least acknowledge the direct effect of parents and ancestors in bringing us into the world and raising us. The separation of family members in the modern world is surely part of the difficulty we have in developing thankful hearts.

When families gather, little dramas naturally play out as well. One of my sisters-in-law is only seven years old, so she is still learning about manners and the way the world works (of course, at thirty-one I too am still learning these things). One big problem she has is with saying "thank you." When she receives a present, she is clearly happy, but she has a hard time actually saying thank you in front of other people. It isn't clear whether this is embarrassment, greed, forgetfulness, or what exactly is going on. She got in trouble at one point and was sent to her room, followed by a lecture on thankfulness by her parents.

This incident got me thinking. How do we understand this little girl's lack of gratitude in reference to Shin Buddhism? We often talk about how we need to be thankful to Amida and that it is the heart of entrusting, the grateful heart, that leads to our birth in the Pure Land. If my sister-in-law never learns to be grateful, will she be forever shut out of the Pure Land?

In my understanding, even an ungrateful person will be born in the Pure Land. Amida accepts us just as we are, even when we don't accept ourselves or others find us unacceptable. As Shinran noted, Amida knows us as persons deeply sunk in delusion and attachment, yet allows us to ride on the power of the Primal Vow all the same. Shinran affirmed that even murderers will be accepted into the Pure Land, so surely the ungrateful will be too.

Yet, this doesn't take away the necessity for gratitude. Let us look again at the situation of the little girl. She is ungrateful, but nevertheless she is embraced by great compassion. Other Power works to awaken her, through the voice of her parents, teachers, and friends. She will not be abandoned. But while she persists in being ungrateful, she is harming herself. Stuck in a self-centered mindset that greedily wants things but doesn't want to acknowledge the source of her benefit, she is closed-off from the very human connections that seek to share love and happiness with her. She thinks of herself as a solitary unit, missing the joy of her interconnection with others. Her refusal to say thank you hurts the feelings of people who care for her, and worries those entrusted to be her guides. She is only able to enjoy one half of her presents: the things themselves. She cannot enjoy the other, better half: the joy of the receiving itself, which is only felt to its utmost by the open heart of thankfulness. In short, her life is worse off because she cannot manifest a grateful heart.

Sometimes people talk about Pure Land Buddhism as being other-worldly. But to me, it is heavily oriented toward this world. The other world is already taken care of completely by Other Power; there is nothing that we have to do in relation to the next life. In fact, there is nothing at all we can do, since our birth in the Pure Land and return to this world to help others rests solely on the Primal Vow. That means that Shin Buddhism is fundamentally concerned with our lives right now, in this situation, dealing with our troubled experiences before the release of nirvana after death. When we are implored to be grateful, I do not understand it as the key to attaining a reward after death. To me, it means the key to being happy in this very life. It is possible to live a long life without ever learning to be thankful, but it hardly seems like a real life to me. The true and real life is only touched when we wake up to our fundamental indebtedness and learn to live a life that makes every day Thanksgiving.

Jeff Wilson on 04.20.07 [link]




Thursday, March 15th

Togetherness


Here is my reflection from the December WLABT newsletter:

Perhaps if I had only one word to describe what most moves me about the Pure Land tradition, that word would be "togetherness." Togetherness is an important concept in Buddhism. It is expressed in the Sutras as the desire to be born together with all beings in Amida's realm. We don't just seek our own salvation--we are only happy when we can be born together with all others. No one is left behind by Amida, no one is left out. This is not the sort of world that we live in today, but it does give us something to aspire for. Amida's vows include that all people in his realm will have an appearance of gold, that is, that regardless of what we look like we will all be highly valued. This togetherness has a technical term in Pure Land Buddhism: kyosei, "co-living" or "symbiosis."

Specifically, kyosei is the application of "born together with all beings" to our present, imperfect world. I don't believe that this difficult, stressful world of ours can ever fully become a Pure Land. But the Pure Land is never apart from this world, and we have the ability to work toward a better approximation of it here. Thankful for the blessings we receive, we can try to be kinder, more open-minded, and more accepting of one another. And we can work to eliminate barriers between people, so that our togetherness is brought to light and honored.

During my time in Japan I encountered something that seemed to drive home the fundamental heart-feeling of togetherness in Pure Land Buddhism. Chionji is a temple in northeastern Kyoto, belonging to the Jodo Shu school. The temple has a very unusual artifact: the largest nenju (Buddhist "rosary") in the world. The nenju is made out of large wooden beads about the size of a person’s fist, strung together in a string so long it loops around and around the inside of the large hondo. But the nenju is more than just an incredible artifact--it is also a practice. On the fifteenth of every month, laypeople and priests come together to chant one million nembutsu while holding the nenju as a group.

I was very stirred by this giant nenju and the million nembutsu practice, because to me it symbolizes the deep feeling of Pure Land Buddhism. Everyone, monk and lay, gathers with one another and holds onto the nenju--thus they are all equal and connected. The nenju is a huge circle, so there is no beginning or end to the nembutsu and the people who embody it, and no one higher or lower. Although they each have an individual encounter with the Buddha, they are expressing a wish to be born together. Thus even as they sort out their own birth, they acknowledge the importance of the community and the relationships that they hold dear. This seems like togetherness given concrete form, in a commonly held nenju, in a shared nembutsu chant, and in hearts beating as one in the wish to embody and express our fundamental togetherness.

Jeff Wilson on 03.15.07 [link]




Sunday, February 18th

Awakening: A Dirty Job


I forgot to mention that my last post was my November reflection for the West Los Angeles Buddhist Temple newsletter. Here's last September's reflection:

There's a show on the Discovery Channel called "Dirty Jobs." The premise is that the host goes around visiting people who have really dirty, smelly, messy jobs: plumbers, trash collectors, worm farmers, and so on. He hangs out with them, tries his hand at doing their job (usually poorly), and demonstrates just how awful their jobs are. But the point isn't just to laugh at how miserable these jobs are or to feel glad that we don't have jobs as gross as theirs. The real point of "Dirty Jobs" is that thousands of people are working everyday at really undesirable jobs so that we can enjoy the relative comfort, hygiene, and convenience of modern life. The host wants us to acknowledge their sacrifices and feel thankful to them for enabling us to live in a way that isn’t "dirty."

I really admire this show "Dirty Jobs." Before I watched it, I didn't have a clear sense for how many factors must come together to allow me to live as well as I do. Sure, I saw the guys haul off the trash and recycling every week from behind my building, and every now and then I had to call a plumber for help. But all the while there were so many people I wasn't aware of who toiled in dirty jobs so that I could eat, enjoy my apartment, receive electricity, gas, and water, wear decent clothes, and basically do virtually anything and everything that I do.

In Buddhism, these connections between us and other people are called interconnection. The late Shin Buddhist thinker Kaneko Daiei also used the term "inner togetherness." Whether or not we are aware of them, our whole lives exist only because of the existence of other lives. The whole world comes together in my living, which is especially apparent in our modern globalized situation, where I can type this message for an American temple on my Japanese computer while wearing Chinese clothing, eating some Italian food (probably prepared by Mexicans), and listening to music from Africa.

When we think of interconnection, sometimes we tend to think of the amazing aspects, like eating food and listening to music from another part of the world. But there are also the very mundane or even unappealing aspects as well. Interconnection means that I can have a clean job (such as being a teacher) only because someone else has a dirty job (hauling away my trash) that supports me. Even if we aren't aware of it, what those people are doing affects us. Interconnection also means that even if we aren't aware of it, what we do impacts others too. Somehow, on some level, what I do affects the violence in the Middle East, the homeless people down on Skid Row, the migrants working in the fields, and everyone else. We all share this inner togetherness.

For me, an important part of Buddhism is waking up to the myriad ways in which I am interconnected with others. When shows like "Dirty Jobs" reveal to me my indebtedness, I feel humbled and thankful. Then, I try my best to act in ways that will make positive contributions to everyone who shares this inner togetherness with me. Just as a limited being such as myself can't know all the factors that support my life, I can't know what impact I am continually having on others. But to the extent that I am awakened to the presence of others--known and unknown--enabling me to live, I can work at returning a small portion of that gift with compassion and gratitude.

Jeff Wilson on 02.18.07 [link]




Saturday, January 6th

Charmed? I'm Not So Sure


During my time in Japan, I was struck by how different Jodo Shinshu is from other forms of Japanese Buddhism. In my research, I visited many temples and observed the practices they promote. Especially interesting to me were the charms, amulets, and oracles that seem to be the basic stock-and-trade of every Buddhist sect except Jodo Shinshu. In every country Buddhism has made some accommodation with the mundane wishes of everyday life, providing some sort of magic to influence the cosmic forces of luck and fortune. But Jodo Shinshu alone refuses to make money off selling omamori, omikuji, and similar talismans, such as the traffic-safety and good-grades trinkets found everywhere in Japan.

The difference was brought home to me most forcefully in a Buddhist cemetery. Perhaps this is significant, since the graveyard is the central realm of Buddhist practice in Japan, maybe even more than the hondo. As I wandered through a Jodo Shinshu cemetery, I mused on the fact that while the graveyard was large, most of the graves themselves were very similar. There were no statues of bodhisattvas or Buddhas and no toba (the tall wooden plaques found in most Japanese graveyards). Suddenly, in a distant corner, I saw a bunch of toba sticking up. I hurried over, but when I got there, I found a low wall in the way. I was looking over it into another cemetery next to it, belonging to a separate temple. As it turned out, the other temple was Jodo Shu. That other cemetery was full of various bodhisattvas, Buddhas, and deities, with toba of all sizes and charms hanging off many gravestones.

Jodo Shu and Jodo Shinshu are often thought of as very close to one another. Certainly, of all the types of Buddhism, none is more similar to Shin than Jodo Shu. So I think it really says something that the contrast between these two adjoining cemeteries was so stark. On the Jodo Shu side, people were unsure of the fate of their loved ones. Despite practicing the nembutsu, they clearly weren't sure of anyone's future birth. Many different Buddhist saviors were being pleaded to for salvation, toba were being made to send merit to help out people in the afterlife, and all sorts of sundry mantras and other practices were being resorted to out of desperation. Meanwhile, the Jodo Shinshu graveyard simply held memorials for the dead, so that the living could remember them and have some solace. The Shin temple didn't sell anything designed to help out the dead. With faith in Amida, such anxieties were simply settled and no longer an issue.

It is natural for us to want the comfort of magic and charms. Life is a challenge and sometimes the promise of any kind of help is heartening. But it can be a trap too: charms are just paper, cloth, or wood, with no real ability to change our fate. We are privileged to have something much more special, something exceptional in Japan and indeed in Buddhism: assurance of liberation through Other Power, which never abandons us. Whether we buy charms or not, whether we pray to one Buddha or a hundred, whether we are good or bad, it makes no difference. Our birth is settled, and so is that of our loved ones, end of story. In fact, even all those nervous people in other Buddhisms will also be grasped by Other Power as well. 800 years after Shinran, such a realization remains revolutionary in Japanese Buddhism, and in human religion generally. Abandoning fear and anxiety about this world and the next, we should appreciate what a gift we have been given and return our thanks in gratitude with nembutsu and acts of loving-kindness.

Jeff Wilson on 01.06.07 [link]




Sunday, November 12th

Back on Track


I spent the months of August, September, and November in Kyoto, doing fieldwork for my dissertation. It was great to spend so much time in contact with Buddhism: I visited hundreds of temples, talked with many people from different backgrounds, observed the tremendous variety of modern Japanese religion, and deepened my understanding of Jodo Shinshu in particular. I think in some ways my life will always be divided from now on into "Before Kyoto" and "After Kyoto," especially when it comes to religion.

At the same time, it is great to be back home with my wife. As inspiring as it is to walk the streets of Shinran and rise early in the morning to chant at Honganji, Buddhism for me is really centered mainly on my family, neighborhood, and everyday life.

It was nice to get back to weekly services at the neighborhood temple here in west Los Angeles. Today was the Thanksgiving service, which was fitting, because I've always thought that Thanksgiving is the most Shin of all American holidays. The sermon touched on some essential points of Shin Buddhism that I think may not be conveyed too well to people who only read Shinran and don't have contact with the living tradition of Jodo Shinshu. I don't have time to summarize the entire talk, but here are some of the main points Rev. Usuki made:

1) Form and ritual are good, but warmth, flexibility, and easygoing-ness are more important
2) the letter of the teachings is good, but the implicit meaning is more important
3) saying nembutsu is good, but the mind of gratitude--be it toward Amida, parents, or the Thanksgiving Day turkey that feeds oneself--is more important

The facilitator for the service was a new, Euro-American member who didn't know how to say any of the Japanese words. She made many mistakes, but no one minded and her efforts were met with welcoming applause at the end. In a way, I think that was the most Shin moment of the whole service, as people just accepted her for who she was and appreciated the offering she made, not the offering they wished she made or thought she should make.

Jeff Wilson on 11.12.06 [link]




Friday, July 7th

Congratulations and Welcome to the Northampton Shin Sangha!


I was excited to learn this morning that the Northampton Shin Sangha has been accepted into the Buddhist Churches of America. For those who aren't familiar with NSS, they are led by Ty and Alice Unno, and their members are part of a wider informal network of eastern U.S. Shin pracitioners with ties between such groups as NSS, ABSC, New York Buddhist Church, the Buddhist Faith Fellowship in Connecticut, and the annual Shin retreat held at the Barre Center for Buddhist Studies. I've met many of these lovely people and I'm so happy for them to have been welcomed officially in this way.

Of course, from another perspective, they have always been a part of the family. Shinran said that all people who say the nembutsu are ondobo ondogyo: fellow practitioners, with an implication of shared family bonds. This announcement is merely the public recognition of a deeper truth. We are all knit together through the inner togetherness which we all share.

I feel that newer groups such as NSS may be the key to the BCA's future. They're an important group to watch, one which I feel is strong enough to survive the eventual full retirement of Ty and continue to nurture one another in the Primal Vow. Best wishes to everyone in Massachusetts who benefits from their connection to this newest dojo.

Namu Amida Butsu.

Jeff Wilson on 07.07.06 [link]




Tuesday, July 4th

Namu Death


Here is my reflection from the July/August issue of the WLABT newsletter:

Late last year, my Grandpa died, and just recently my Great Aunt Eula Belle passed away. She was the baby in the family--in fact, she was often just called "Aunt Baby"--though she was already in her 90s when she died. But she had three older siblings, so even at her advanced age she still couldn't escape being Aunt Baby. Her siblings--my grandmother, my Great Aunt Mineola, and my Great Uncle Brother (the only boy)--all died within in the last few years. Their deaths bring to a close an epic chapter in the history of my family, and leave me without some of the most important touchstones of my life and identity. I am saddened by the loss of these family giants. And yet, as I reflect on the situation, I find that I am moved to gratitude for the fact of death amidst the wonder of life.

Shakyamuni Buddha identified death as one of the four great causes of suffering in the world. The others are birth (because it leads to the pains we experience in life), sickness, and old age. I'm certainly not going to argue with the Buddha--death is a cause of great misery. Among those left behind, we feel bereft and broken, and are often financially or otherwise imperiled by the death of another. For the dead, the process of dying itself is often tremendously hard: our primal animal self-attachment usually refuses to give up life, dragging out the inevitable. And for all of us, the worry of death--our own and that of those we care for--stains this already often difficult life.

But there is another side to death as well. We could not enjoy life without death--life exists only because of death. All living things survive on the death of countless others: from the animals consumed for meat to the plants that push their roots deep into the soil that has been fertilized by the decomposed beings that came before. Death is the necessary ingredient that sustains life, recycling precious nutrients and making room for new generations. As much as I miss them, the elder generation of my family enjoyed more than 450 years of life collectively, and had they continued indefinitely it would have removed scarce resources from the mouths of the young. So too, when it is my time to go to the Pure Land, I hope to die well and clear some space for the fresh ones coming behind me. If I don't die someday, I will rob them of resources which I am only borrowing for a time. So somehow when I say "Namu Amida Butsu" out of gratitude for all I receive, I have to include thankfulness for death along with thankfulness for life. Otherwise, my gratitude is incomplete. Namu life, Namu death, Namu ALL that sustains me and everything that lives and dies.

Jeff Wilson on 07.04.06 [link]