Why Is Zen So Prominent in Western Writing on Japanese Religions - Essay Example

Zen Buddhism in the West Table of Contents Introduction 3 Principles of Zen Buddhism 3 Initial Popularization of Zen Buddhism in the west by prominent Western Intellectual 5 The influence of Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki on the spread of Zen to the West 9 Flourishing of Zen in the Modern Western World 13 Conclusion 15 References 16 Zen Buddhism in the West Introduction Zen Buddhism, or as it more popularly known in the West, Zen, is a branch of Mahayana Buddhist belief that has gone through many changes since its origins in the ideas of the founder of Buddhism, Siddhartha Gautama, or Buddha in the 5th century B.C. Buddhism has been transplanted from its land of origin in India to become one of the predominant faiths of South East Asia, China, Japan and Sri Lanka. There are two major schools of Buddhist belief, the Theravada and Mahayana and many sects and variations and yet despite the divisions it has not been characterized by the violent strife of the schisms of many other religions. Today the popularity of Buddhism is increasing in the West, in particular Zen Buddhism. There are many reasons for this surge in interest in Zen Buddhist philosophy and practice. This paper will outline the principles of Zen Buddhism concentrating in particular on the Japanese form of Zen Buddhism and explore the reasons for its increasing popularity in the Western world. Principles of Zen Buddhism The principles of Zen Buddhism grew out of the original ideas of Buddha who laid down the central principles of Buddhism, of the 4 Noble Truths and the associated 8 Fold path to Enlightenment. The first two Noble Truths essentially stated that all experience was suffering and the root of this suffering was lust or desire. The third Noble Truth was the quest to free oneself from desire and thus end suffering. The fourth Noble Truth was the following of the 8 Fold Path to enlightenment which were the right views, the right intentions, the right speech, the right action, the right livelihood, the right effort, right mindfulness and the right concentration. Buddhism traces a path from the world as we know of it categorized as a group of so-called aggregates which were labelled Skandhas and include one physical component, form, composed of the body and 6 senses, and 4 mental : a sensation of feeling without a weight on emotion, perception of a cognitive form, habitual behaviours , and the sense of consciousness. These Skandhas or Aggregates as they were known defined the world as most saw it, and as it was defined as Samsara by Buddhists. Buddhist practice as first outlined by Buddha outlined a path to negotiate from Samsara to enlightenment, to Nirvana, through the middle way of meditation. The middle referred to the balance asked of adherents with a neither an emphasis on pure asceticism or on the converse on excess. On the path to Nirvana, ideally, the adherent came to the realisation of the three seals of Dharma, of Dukkha or realisation of the essential lack of satisfaction in the world, of the impermanence of all things and of the absence of a true self. With these three realisations would come wisdom and a closer step to enlightenment. Essentially Buddhism emphasized a relinquishing of the worldly aspects of the world and in this regard it borrowed its ideas from the Sanyassi tradition of Hinduism where the devotee would give up his worldly attachments but with the already mentioned proviso that it stressed balance and not the extreme asceticism of the Sanyassi; however, very much like Hinduism, Buddhism stressed the freedom from the endless cycle of rebirth through the achievement of Nirvana. Zen Buddhism grew out of the original ideas of Buddha and was influenced by the cultural practises of the new locations to which it spread. It developed in China heavily influenced by Taoism, then in Japan it took these ideas and produced a new incarnation, which while it still focused on the meditative origins of the Buddha, refocused on many different disciplines that made it imminently attractive to the west. The three main schools of Zen Buddhism in Japan today are the Soto, the Rinzai and the Obaku. All of them emphasize the importance of Zazen or the acts of meditation from which the name Zen derives. The initial popularity of the Zen in the West arose out of the popularisation of the practice by Prominent western Intellectuals. Initial Popularization of Zen Buddhism in the west by prominent Western Intellectuals In the period following World War I there were a number of atypical artistic traditions that developed. They challenged the old of conventions that were based on an idea of Christian Morality and the sense of meaning in the world. These ideas grew out of a sense of revulsion to the horrors of the War where so many died apparently meaningless deaths. Dada was one such movement that that did away with the old artistic conventions of order and symmetry and meaning. The mindset that embraced this way of looking at the world also sought a philosophy that that did not stress the importance of the individual and an ego based meaning. Zen Buddhism became immediately attractive to the West that was looking for a way to explain the suffering to which it had been witness. Eugen Herrigel, a prominent professor of philosophy from Germany was exposed to the sentiments of Post war Europe and bore witness to the influence of the Dada Movement and its motivations. He studied and taught Eastern philosophy in Japan in the 1920's and while there he studied Archery as pastime. Toward the end of his life in 1948 he adapted his experiences into a book , Zen in the Art of Archery which became an enormous success. Ironically the book did not refer to Zen Buddhism per se but rather the amalgamation of Zen and other arbitrary ideas of the instructor that taught Herrigel but it became the initial blue print of how westerners viewed Japanese Zen. There was the idea of the studying at the feet of a master for many years and all manner of strange exercises that did not bear direct relation to the act of archery itself. Then there was the sense that after years of practice, that in the end, the act of archery was ideally releasing all conscious thought and allowing the act to take place. As Herrrigel put it : The archer ceases to be conscious of himself as the one who is engaged in hitting the bull's-eye which confronts him. This state of unconsciousness is realized only when, completely empty and rid of the self, he becomes one with the perfecting of his technical skill, though there is in it something of a quite different order which cannot be attained by any progressive study of the art. (Herrigel 10) This sense of mysticism aroused great interest in the west and it replayed later as will be discussed in the themes of films, in the aspects of design and art and literature. In fact, Herrigel made it clear in his own work that this was the aspect of Zen that he believed surpassed the rationalism of the West: " "Here we come to the connection between Zen and archery, and such other arts as swordsman. ship, flower arrangement, the tea ceremony, dancing, and the fine arts.....Man is a thinking reed but his great works are done when he is not calculating and thinking. 'Childlikeness' has to be restored with long years of training in the art of self-forgetfulness. When this is attained, man thinks yet he does not think." (Herrigel 11) While this may not been the true face of Zen as it related to its Mahayana Buddhist roots, it was the way the West was to continue to adopt Zen practice and belief in countless ways. The idea of tapping into a collective unconsciousness as it were has echoes of the work of famed psychiatrist Carl Jung but interestingly Jung himself disassociated himself with the popularisation of Zen in this way. This may have been as much a personal distaste that Jung had for Herrigel whom he believed was a Nazi sympathizer during the war as Heisig points out: “ 'It is just pathetic to see a man like Herrigel acquiring the art of Zen archery, a non-essential if ever there was one, with the utmost devotion…'. Jung's comment should be read as a criticism not of the Zen art, but of a man whom he knew to have been a confirmed Nazi distracting his conscience through Eastern religion.” (Heisig 47) Alan Watts, an American philosopher, continued the tradition of adopting the mysticism of Zen much in the way of Herrigel before him, emphasizing the romanticism of a mysticism, to a sense of interconnection between things that could not be perceived without surrendering to a sense of freedom from association. He did much to popularize a particular brand of Zen that the West seemed to take to in great numbers. His book The Way of Zen echoed the ideas of Herrigel for a new generation but with more elaboration of some of the subtleties of Zen beliefs. For example, on the on the mistake of intellectual deliberation on questions, he outlined the Zen view of the dilemma, “This is just what happens to the human being, to the mind, when the desire for certainty and security prompts identification between the mind and its own image of itself.... The identification of the mind with its own image is, therefore, paralysing because the image is fixed--it is past and finished.... To cling to it is thus to be inconstant contradiction and conflict.” (Fouts,1) In this sense Alan Watts was echoing the teachings of D.T Suzuki who was perhaps the first Japanese Zen practitioner who made the crossover from the Western popularizers of the belief to a Japanese Zen master who successfully connected with a large Western audience. It seemed that the years of exposure to the popular ideas of Zen had significantly provoked a potential western audience to the tipping point of pursuing the authentic source. The influence of Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki on the spread of Zen to the West Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki was perhaps the most important intermediary of the translation of Zen Buddhism to the west as well as a central figure in the representation of how the West came to view Zen. Suzuki was a remarkable individual whose position as an outsider with great intellectual curiosity and talents allowed him to present the best distillation of Zen for the western world. Born into a Samurai class at a time when the feudal system had collapsed in Japan he grew up in poverty after his father's death and thus from an early age had an outsiders eye for the world, one with a sharp analytical sense. He honed this sense with schooling at Tokyo University where he at the same time undertook training under a Zen master. The acquaintance with Zen studies prompted the precocious and adventuresome young man to study other forms of Buddhism and cultures. In the course of his studies he learned Pali, and Sanskrit and Chinese furthering his understanding of Theravada and other variations of Buddhism. He then went on the learn several European languages. In his personal life he did not prove to be culturally insular as he married Beatrice Erskine Lane an American scholar. This personal union was perhaps a fine metaphor for the way in which Suzuki successfully introduced the ideas of Zen to the west. Suzuki was able to make the intellectual connection to why the West was able to connect to Zen Buddhism in more profound way than it had to other forms of Buddhist belief, like for example its earlier Indian form. According Suzuki the Indian form of Buddhism emphasized the sense of the wandering holy man, a offshoot of the Sanyassi of Hinduism who renounces all worldly possession and pursues a spiritual journey without connection to the material world. This was certainly true even with the Buddha's call for the middle way. In China, though, as Suzuki explained the social circumstances dictated that Buddhist monks formed a household in the form of a monastery. In this social structure there was a necessary emphasis on the daily chores of the household. In this setting the confluence of meditative practices allied to the daily aspects of life led to new and deliberative approaches to such areas as gardening, housebuilding, carpentry, and in fact every area of life. The form of Buddhism that grew out of these discipline allowed the focus of zen to improve the quality of domestic life. The ultimate goal of Zen remained the same across the different forms as Suzuki points out: “ This acquiring of a new point of view in our dealings with life and the world is popularly called by Japanese Zen students 'satori' (wu in Chinese). It is really another name for Enlightenment (annuttara-samyak-saṁbodhi), which is the word used by the Buddha and his Indian followers ever since his realization under the Bodhi-tree by the River Nairañjanā” (Suzuki 229) But while the goal of enlightenment was the same, the focus was very different and herein lay the great attractive quality to the west: the focus on the real aspects of life and how better to improve them. Suzuki outlined the difference thus: "Satori is not seeing God as he is, as may be contended by some Christian mystics. Zen has from the very beginning made clear its principal thesis, which is to see into the work of creation and not interview the creator himself." (Suzuki 263) This then became the new way that the West came to see Zen, more accurately than the way the early popularizers presented it and yet still in keeping with the philosophical undercurrents that were developing in the West. In the aftermath of World War II a similar sense of revulsion to the horrors of the war occurred throughout societies as had happened following World War I with the Dada movement. In post war France, Liberation had seen the popularity of Existentialist ideas which questioned the meaning of life in new ways raising the questions of the way in which modern men must contend with the sense of absurdity in other ways than the Christian morality that had prefaced the old order. The deconstruction of previously sacrosanct ideas and precepts became widespread in throughout the arts in the Post-Modernist Movement. This new way of looking at the world tried to challenge old conventions and ways of doing things. The spiritual void left in this new widespread quest to find new individually based meaning was eloquently filled as many people started to find in the approach of Zen Buddhism. Suzuki's writings became immensely popular at this time because he offered an intellectual evaluation of the often cryptic teachings of the belief, and in this way allowed a large audience an initial understanding of the scope of Zen Buddhism which in turn attracted greater numbers to the actual immersion in the spiritual aspects of the practice. Flourishing of Zen in the Modern Western World Today the idea of Zen has found ready acceptance in many areas of life in the West because the concepts so easily fit into the outlook of an advanced Industrial society. There is a level of sophistication now in the dialogue about Zen which rejects the clichés that characterized the early understanding of the form. For example in 1997 the Museum of Modern Art in New York enlisted the talents of promising Japanese Architect, Yoshio Taniguchi for its new $850 million building project. The scale of the project was very large reflecting the importance of the themes it presented however there was a self-consciousness about the use of cliché: if that sounds Zen-like, the architect and his client tread a delicate balance in their joint presentation of the project. On inauguration day, for instance, Taniguchi said: 'You don't notice the architecture ... you notice only the air'. Like many of his compatriots, in conversation the architect seems cautious of any glib, Orientalist tag--of generalizations about Japanese architecture--while speaking of light and space and structure with finesse, and a slight air of mystery, that could, surely, only be Japanese. (Ryan) In film, as well, the influence of Zen philosophy has been widespread. The films of Akiro Kurosawa have been influential as Kerr describes it “ "Kurosawa's influence on western cinema seems, to me, to be enormous, perhaps more so than has been realised." (Kerr,1 ) He points out how Kurosawa's Yojimbo ("The Bodyguard") served as the template of a number of other western films such as A Fist Full of Dollars and Pale Rider both starring Clint Eastwood, involving a main character who is Zen- like in his cryptic manner of communication. The trend has continued in the Zen -like qualities seen throughout the enormously successful Star Wars series where the story of shows the forces of good battling evil, aided by spiritual leaders who tap into the mysterious universal energy known as “The Force”. In film this representation of Zen tended toward cliché but then often that was the nature of the entertainment medium. It is perhaps expected that the flip side of popularity were the vulgar representations of Zen. While it would be easy to condemn this outlook it is important to understand that was the reason that Zen came into such easy currency in the west, the fact that it appealed to the idea of self-improvement that is so common today. Ferris writing a review of R.H. Blyth' Zenin English Literature and Oriental Classics pointed out how Blyth's work challenged the easy assumptions made about Zen: “Blyth's sensibility has little to do with New Age yearnings for self-improvement or non challenging enlightenment, or with romantic idealizations of the exotic East or, for that matter, with the notion that Buddhism is nice or sweet or friendly.... real Zen means choosing, praising, blaming, liking, loathing-humorously.'" (Ferris, 1 ) The frustration that Blyth expresses points out how the cult of self-improvement in the West has at times imbued the practice of Zen with certain unrealistic expectations but this is also part of the appeal, the tension that exists between the unexplored benefits of Zen and injudicious marketing of the belief. The whole sale rejection of the self-improvement movement fails to recognize one of the main draws of Zen to the Western world, its great proven health benefits. The meditation that is at the heart of Zen is now being shown to benefit people's health in only recently discovered ways. One such study showed the benefits of meditation on cardiovascular health: More new research offers additional encouragement. In a study published last year in the journal Stroke, 60 African-Americans with atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries, practised meditation for six to nine months. (African-Americans are twice as likely to die from cardiovascular disease as are whites.) The meditators showed a marked decrease in the thickness of their artery walls, while the nonmeditators actually showed an increase. The change for the meditation group could potentially bring about an 11% decrease in the risk of heart attack and an 8% to 15% decrease in the risk of stroke. (Barbor 54) This research is just one of the initial forays into the as yet unexplored benefits of practising meditation. More studies will undoubtedly reveal the many benefits of Zen practices. Conclusion The real benefits of Zen set in the context of a consumerist society reveal the tension that Zen practice will face in the West. The writings of Zen in the West reflect this tension as well. The initial introduction of Zen to the West was made palatable by its suggested mystical qualities in the writings of Herrigel and Watts among others. Suzuki's contribution to the true representation of Zen in Western literature was immeasurably valuable. He combined great intellectual credibility and talent to a genuine wish to bridge the gap in the west's understanding of a subject that was especially dear to him. His contribution to the body of literature adds a certain degree of critical self consciousness in the reflexive use of cliché in describing the subject. Today while the there is much stereotypical representation of Zen it is typically met with quick criticism by an increasingly sophisticated public. Indeed it is often a struggle to negotiate a path in not being over cynical about the presentation of Zen which is proving to be a most beneficial and rewarding practice. The art in viewing the growth of Zen and the representation of Zen in the writings in the West perhaps lies in ideas of Zen itself : viewing the information with clarity and without prejudgement. References Abels, Janet. "How Zen Found Me." Cross Currents Spring 2000: 7. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Barbor, Cary. "The Science of Meditation." Psychology Today May 2001: 54. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Danto, Arthur C. "Japanese Avant-Garde Art." The Nation 2 Jan. 1995: 26+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Ferris, Timothy. "Past Present." The Nation 30 Apr. 1990: 609+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Finney, Henry C. "American Zen's 'Japan Connection': A Critical Case Study of Zen Buddhism's Diffusion to the West." SA. Sociological Analysis 52.4 (1991): 379-396. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Fouts, Avery M. "Satori: Toward a Conceptual Analysis." Buddhist-Christian Studies (2004): 101+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Gordon, David B. "Presenting Japanese Buddhism to the West: Orientalism, Occidentalism, and the Columbian Exposition." The Historian 67.1 (2005): 138+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Heine, Steven, and Charles S. Prebish, eds. Buddhism in the Modern World: Adaptations of an Ancient Tradition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Heine, Steven. "History, Transhistory, and Narrative History: a Postmodern View of Nishitani's Philosophy of Zen." Philosophy East & West 44.2 (1994): 251-278. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Heine, Steven, ed. The Koan: Texts and Contexts in Zen Buddhism. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Heisig, James W. "3 Jung, Christianity, and Buddhism." Awakening and Insight: Zen Buddhism and Psychotherapy. Ed. Polly Young-Eisendrath and Shoji Muramoto. New York: Brunner-Routledge, 2002. 45-66. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Herrigel, Eugen. Zen in the Art of Archery. Trans. R. F. C. Hull. New York: Pantheon Books, 1953. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Karafin, Brian. "A Buddhist History of the West: Studies in Lack." Buddhist-Christian Studies (2003): 170+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Kerr, Philip. "Samurai Warrior: The Director Akira Kurosawa Influenced Many of the West's Most Famous Film-Makers. Philip Kerr Sizes Up Japan's Original Action Man." New Statesman 7 Jan. 2002: 28+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . McIntosh, William D. "East Meets West: Parallels between Zen Buddhism and Social Psychology." International Journal for the Psychology of Religion 7.1 (1997): 37-52. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Nelson, Eric Sean. "Opening a Mountain: Koans of the Zen Masters." Buddhist-Christian Studies (2004): 284+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Richardson, Kurt. "The Hegemony of the Physical Sciences: An Exploration in Complexity Thinking." Futures 37.7 (2005): 615+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Rolston, Holmes. "Can the East Help the West to Value Nature?." Philosophy East & West 37.2 (1987): 172-190. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Ryan, Raymund. "The Art of Transparency: The Latest Phase in the Evolution of the Museum of Modern Art Refocuses, Refines and Adds to a Historic Urban Complex." The Architectural Review Feb. 2005: 40+. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Seager, Richard Hughes. Buddhism in America. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Streng, Frederick J. "Three Approaches to Authentic Existence: Christian, Confucian, and Buddhist." Philosophy East & West 32.4 (1982): 371-392. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro. Essays in Zen Buddhism. New York: Grove Press, 1961. Questia. 29 June 2006 . "TURNING JAPANESE WITH THE ART OF ZEN; Creating a Quiet 'Thinking Space' in the Heart of the City Can Be Simplicity Itself PROPERTY ON SUNDAY." The Mail on Sunday (London, England) : 24. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Tweed, Thomas A., and Stephen A. Prothero, eds. Asian Religions in America: A Documentary History. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Victoria, Daizen. "Japanese Corporate Zen." Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars 12.1 (1980): 61-68. Questia. 29 June 2006 . West, Patrick. "We're All Orientalists Now: Why Are We So Eager to Believe That Sudoku Hails from Japan When It Doesn't? Patrick West Explains." New Statesman 12 Dec. 2005: 24. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Young-Eisendrath, Polly, and Shoji Muramoto, eds. Awakening and Insight: Zen Buddhism and Psychotherapy. New York: Brunner-Routledge, 2002. Questia. 29 June 2006 . Read More