Japanese Philosophy: A Sourcebook

Kakuban

75 Kakuban 覚鑁 (1095–1143) Kakuban was the most creative and influential Shingonž philosophical thinker after Kūkai*. Born in Kyushu, he became a monk in Kyoto at Ninna-ji. Rising through the ranks to become abbot of the Shingon monastic center on Mt Kōya, he encountered increasing resistance to his institutional, doctrinal, and practical reforms. This led to schism, his lineage eventually becoming known as Shingi (New Interpretation) Shingon. Kakuban integrated into Shingon the increasingly popular Amidist or Pure Landž devotional tradition. In the selections below, Kakuban reaffirms Amida’sž prominence in Shingon as an incarnation of Dainichi’sž wisdom. By stressing the dynamic between the mindž of oneness and discriminative thinking, Kakuban argued that Amidism can be a way of merging with Dainichi, the cosmos-asbuddha . The two most important consequences of Kakuban’s analysis were that this world itself is Amida’s Pure Land and that Shingon can accommodate a practice exclusively devoted to Amida. [tpk] The esoteric meaning of “amida” Kakuban n.d., 149–52 As Shingonž traditionally teaches, Amidaž Buddha incarnates the wisdom to discern and recognize the cosmos-as-buddha in itself. Amida is also the pervasive basis for all ordinary beings to attain awakening. If you validate for yourself the mind of oneness, you will discern the true reality of phenomena and if you validate for yourself all phenomena, you will know the mentality of all ordinary beings. Thus, the ground and figure of the mind of oneness are not distinct and together govern all aspects of the twofold truth.15 Every sentient form of life that is not buddha is still equally endowed with all five kinds of wisdom. Therefore, the everlasting great sages of all four great kinds of mandala are incarnate within you, even though you are only a temporary aggregate of the five constituents of human existence. The buddhas always involved in the three intimacies (of ritualized thought, word, and deed) pervade the ordinary mind in its nine kinds of deluded consciousness. On one hand, since the mindž of oneness is itself all phenomena, the realm 15. [The two truths refer to the absolute enlightened standpoint and the provisional teachings that expeditiously lead ordinary beings to enlightenment.] 76 | bu d d h i s t t r a d i t i o n s of buddhas and the realm of ordinary beings are two, but in a way that they are not really two. On the other hand, since all the phenomena are themselves the mind of oneness, the realm of buddhas and the realm of ordinary beings are not two, but in a way that they are really two. In this way, your mind and the Buddha are essentially one. Moreover, do not try to make your mind into buddha . As delusions go away, wisdom appears of itself and you become a buddha in your present body. For benefiting those who have committed the gravest offenses or for guiding those whose delusions profoundly attach them to this world, some teachers may say such things as “the buddha’s body is outside your own body” or “the Pure Land is outside this ordinary, defiled world.” Accommodated to those audiences’ limited capacities, such preaching hides the real meaning and brings out only what is shallow and simplistic. But when the cosmos-as-buddha expounds the truth without such accommodations, he neutralizes those emotional attachments and opens up genuine wisdom. Therefore, whenever you realize the wellspring that is the mind of oneness, the nine-part mind-lotus will blossom into the pure mind of all nine consciousnesses. Whenever you verify your awakening in the three intimacies, the forms of the five buddhas become the same as your physical body of the five sense-organs. Who would then still long for the glorious land of treasures in the beyond? Who would still await its exquisite forms in some faraway future? Because, as Kūkai* said, “both delusion and enlightenment are within you,” there is no body of the buddha apart from your own thoughts, words, and deeds. Since the true and the delusory are inseparable, you can find paradise within any of the five realms of ordinary existence. When you awaken to this truth, your mind of that very moment is called the Bodhisattvaž of “Discerning All Existences.” Without anything holding you back, you awaken to the principle that this very mind of oneness in its impartiality is in all phenomena, whether conditioned or unconditioned. Furthermore, since you fathom this mind...