Re-Visioning Dōgen Kigen’s Attitude toward the System (Kenmitsu Taisei 顕密体制) in Considering the Concept of Aspiration (Kokorozashi 志) and Just-Sitting Mediation (Shikan taza 只管打坐)

Introduction

Some scholars say that the most challenging and important issue in researching the history of Japanese Buddhism is how to interpret the so-called Kamakura New Buddhism (鎌倉新仏教).¹ Monks such as Genkūbō Hōnen 源空房法然 (1133–1212) and Dōgen Kigen 道元希玄 (1200–1253) and other such “Kamakura Buddhist Founders” emphasized the new idea of an “exclusive practice (senju 専修)” in which one practice was singled out as effective and the remaining practices of “old Buddhism” (kyūbukkyō 旧仏教) were largely discarded or perceived as unnecessary. In this paper, however, I will ask two main questions in order to reconsider a general understanding of Dōgen’s “just-sitting meditation” (shikan taza 只管打坐), regarded as an exclusive practice in the context of the Kamakura New Buddhism debate: (1) whether or not Dōgen’s shikan taza shares the same characteristic of exclusivity as Hōnen’s “exclusive recitation practice” (senju shōmyō nembutsu 専修称名念仏); and (2) if it was used by Dōgen as a rhetoric to resist the system in a way that he should be categorized in “heresy” (itan 異端) or “anti-system” (han-taisei 反体制) in the scheme of modern scholastic discourse.²

In general, this insistence on an exclusive practice in many ways contradicted the preexisting tendency toward religious syncretism and, as such, these claims of exclusive practice (and consequent effect) had a tremendous impact on the history of Japanese Buddhism. Referring to the concepts of exclusive practice, Japanese historian Ienaga Saburō 家永三郎 regards Hōnen’s Pure Land thought as the basis of the “New Buddhism” of the Kamakura period³ because others such as Dōgen began to insist on shikan taza as an exclusive practice after he was “taught and moved by ‘reciting the name of the Amida Buddha’ (shōmyō nembutsu 称名念仏) practitioners who resisted the secularization of Buddhist society and its tendency toward this worldly benefits.”⁴

Following Ienaga, in his main work Nihon chūsei no kokka to shūkyō 日本中世の国家と宗教 (State and Religion in the Medieval Japan), Kuroda Toshio 黒田俊雄, famous for his “exoteric-esoteric system theory” (kenmitsu taisei ron 顕密体制論), calls a central institution that utilized a combined form of exoteric-esoteric doctrine “the system” (taisei 体制). According to Kuroda, the system is “orthodoxy (seitō 正統),” in that it is the main stream of medieval Japanese Buddhist society and refers to those who criticized or refused it as characterizing “heresy.” He posits their exclusive practice as one of the criteria of their being heretics.

Although there are many other scholars who have stated the connection of the exclusive practice and an anti-system (the position of opposing the conventional system of esoteric-exoteric Buddhism),⁵ it is generally thought that Dōgen’s shikan taza as an exclusive practice is homogeneous with the exclusive practice in Hōnen or Zenshinbō Shinran’s 善信房親鸞 (1173–1263) recitation practice (nembutsu 念仏). Also, it is typically thought that Dōgen had taken a critical attitude against the system due to his exclusive practice, and thereby refused to have a relationship with people in the system.

However, should Dōgen’s shikan taza simply be understood in this way? In order to investigate the aforementioned questions reexamining Dōgen’s view of exclusive practice, I argue that the concept of “aspiration” (kokorozashi 志), which is the attitude of the practitioner, should be understood in light of the relationship between Dōgen’s shikan taza and the system. In conclusion, for the first question regarding exclusivity, I claim that Dōgen’s shikan taza should not be put in the same category with Hōnen’s exclusive nembutsu because Dōgen intended to tell us that the way of the Buddha cannot be accomplished without an aspiration called “kokorozashi.” In other words, Dōgen’s idea of exclusivity has the following logic: it is difficult to achieve the way of the Buddha by performing an “easy practice” (igyō 易行), including Hōnen’s nembutsu; therefore, one should perform a “difficult practice” (nangyō 難行), which is shikan taza, and shikan taza cannot be fully performed without aspiration.

For the...