All Beings Are Without Blame (Part Three)

I think it safe to say that without a doubt, the unease and resistance people feel when confronted with the argument against “moral responsibility,” comes from the difficulty they have with what becomes of “free will.” After all, “free will” and “moral responsibility” are generally seen as inseparable. And, when both are based upon the assumption of some supernatural, transcendent soul or essence, known as atman in the Indian philosophical context, acting completely independently of causality, then yes, such a free will and moral responsibility are indeed inseparable. This inseparability is well-voiced by Janet Radcliffe Richards: “Free will is thought of as the capacity to be genuinely responsible for actions and genuinely deserving of praise or blame for the choices that are made.” (2000, 136)

This inseparable connection between free will and moral responsibility forms the generally unquestioned assumption behind all arguments for moral responsibility. Libertarians assert that their viewpoint supports both free will and moral responsibility; compatibilists believe that their view can accommodate both free will and moral responsibility, and hard determinists argue that determinism makes both free will and moral responsibility impossible. The common thread here is that free will and moral responsibility either stand or fall together!

But again, this understanding of the inseparability of free will and moral responsibility arises only because the account usually given of free will was originally developed to support moral responsibility: that is, to support the claim that it is fair and just to punish and reward because individuals could always choose to do otherwise independent of all causality!

A solid, naturalistic conceptualization of free will – one that the buddhist tradition holds – is possible, and it can be held without having to hold the view of moral responsibility.

Let us begin by asking “What is free will?” The most “person on the street” definition would seem to be that it is the ability to make a free choice among alternatives. If we then ask, “So, why do you want to be able to make your own choices among alternatives?” the responses tend to be weak and circular: “I want to make my own choices because I don’t want to be forced to choose anything in particular.” The weakness and circularity of the reasoning is an indication that the desire for freedom is so deeply embedded in our nature, that it is hard to give any further justification.

Evolutionary biologists have discovered that our very survival depends upon us keeping our options open! Even mice have a degree of variability built into their behavior, so that once they’ve learned a path to food in a laboratory setting, they still will occasionally choose an “incorrect” path. This variability is adaptive to conditions in the wild. Food isn’t always to be found in the same direction; there are many relationships in the natural setting that are not so strictly prescribed. The same holds true for humans; those with very rigid behaviors are at a disadvantage in a world that is always changing. The inclination toward exploring options is part of what psychologists call “sensation-seeking.”

The natural need for open alternatives is an important element of freedom. It involves “spontaneous behavior.” This isn’t the acausal, miraculous ability to act free of any antecedent causes and conditions, but simply the natural desire to occasionally take a different approach to a given situation, to try something new, and to deviate from the pattern. It is a “conditioned” evolved tendency toward spontaneous action: those animals that tried new paths found more food and more escape routes and thus were more likely to survive, procreate, and pass along their tendencies to deviate.

This “relative” free will depends upon conditions! We need freedom to respond differently when environmental conditions change, and our natural inclination to preserve options was itself shaped and determined in such a way as to make our behavior more adaptive to the changing environmental conditions.

The buddha did not isolate “will” from among all other mental formations as being absolutely free and unconditioned. I did not choose the conditions that made me open to try buddhist mediation practice. That I did was conditioned by my inclination to try alternatives. Some alternatives (like homeopathy) I found lacking and useless and so dropped them; meditation proved valuable and I kept up the practice. The practice itself became a cause and condition that determine my behavior. I do not “deserve” any praise for my having taken up the practice, nor in continuing the practice and changing my unwholesome behaviors toward more wholesome ones, though I did choose to do so freely!

Richards, Janet Radcliffe. 2000. Human Nature After Darwin: A Philosophical Introduction. New York: Routledge.

All Beings Are Without Blame (Part Two)

Most people, including contemporary buddhists, are likely not to have thought through what the belief in moral responsibility implies. Pico della Mirandola, writing over 500 years ago explained the uniquely human capacity for moral responsibility as “miraculous.” God, he said, gave special characteristics to every realm of his creation, and then created humans in order to have some beings with the capacity to love its beauty and admire his handy-work. With all the “special gifts” already parceled out there was nothing left for humans. Thus, god decreed that humans would have the special power to make of themselves whatever they chose to be, “constrained by no limits”…set at the center of the world. “We have made thee neither of heaven nor of earth, neither mortal nor immortal, so that with freedom of choice and with honor, as though the maker and molder of thyself, thou mayest fashion thyself in whatever shape thou shall prefer.”

This is the central assertion of those who believe in moral responsibility: we make ourselves through our own uncaused and unconditioned choices; past history, genetics, social and cultural influences and circumstances play no part! It really is a “miracle.” Of course, buddhism rejects both the idea of a ‘creator’ and of a ‘self’ that is, or even can be, ‘self-made,’ and asserts that all phenomena – including the empirical or existential ‘self’ – are caused and conditioned. Nothing exists independently and ‘from its own side.’

That such “free will” and moral responsibility requires a miracle is not at all problematic for religious believers, but those of us who reject such miraculous supernaturalism, and who are aligned with a naturalist world view that has no place for gods, ghosts, miracles and other supernatural entities must see how problematic and even nonsensical (from within the naturalist perspective) any assertion of moral responsibility and free will is.

Interestingly enough, the moral responsibility myth is so firmly entrenched, and the emotional resonance of so-called ‘retributive justice’ is so strong, that people who think of themselves as naturalistic, or as buddhist find the idea of rejecting moral responsibility --- unthinkable! Those buddhists and naturalists (and naturalist buddhists or buddhist naturalists) who see that miraculous reasoning is required for moral responsibility to ‘make sense,’ and who, being naturalists reject miracles, reject moral responsibility. But there are other naturalists who refuse to reject moral responsibility, and agreeing that miraculous powers do not exist, assert that it must be mistaken to say such powers are necessary for moral responsibility to be true. Such people are called "compatibilists." So, the question that needs to be addressed is: “Is moral responsibility compatible with a naturalism that rejects miraculous powers?”

There are many arguments proffered as to why moral responsibility can and does fit within a naturalist/determinist worldview, and there are powerful grounds for supposing that moral responsibility is fundamentally incompatible with naturalism and buddhism. “Compatiblists” tend to denigrate those who deny that moral responsibility and naturalism are compatible, and they offer many varied arguments. The naturalist argument, however, is fundamentally one: it is unfair to punish or reward others because of their various actions because their actions are ultimately the result of causal factors they did not – and could not, being causal beings – create or control; causal factors that are a matter of a variety of causes and conditions, including ‘luck.’

To be clear, I am not arguing that there are not genuinely virtuous and evil actions, or that we can relatively speak of people who are virtuous and people who are evil. I will add that there are others who have reformed their unwholesome, unskillful and even evil characters and become virtuous. But, in all cases, the capacities for good and bad behavior are ultimately the result of fortunate and unfortunate conditions, and thus there are no grounds for assigning praise or blame. The buddha, Spinoza, and Schoenberg, among others, all argue that if we could trace all causal action (karma) back in detail, we would see that all our acts would be traceable to earlier sources, causes and conditions that we did not choose, create or control! Under the closest scrutiny we would see, as Thomas Nagel writes: “If one cannot be responsible for consequences of one’s acts due to factors beyond one’s control, or for antecedents of one’s acts that are properties of temperament not subject to one’s will, or for the circumstances that pose one’s moral choices, then how can one be responsible even for the stripped-down acts of will itself, if they are the product of antecedent circumstances outside of the will’s control?” (1979, 34)

This can help make sense of the buddha’s repeated warning not to judge others because we – not being omniscient – can never know all the causes and conditions that lead to anyone’s behavior. All beings are without blame. If all phenomena are causally created, then our actions are the consequences of the laws of nature and of myriad events in the remote past. As it is not up to us what went on before we were born, nor what the laws of nature are, the consequences of these antecedent causes are not up to us. How then could we be morally responsible?

One last example of this argument against moral responsibility comes from Galen Strawson (2010): you do what you do because of the way you are, and so to be ultimately responsible for what you do, you must be ultimately responsible for the way you are. But you cannot be ultimately responsible for the way you are. My 18-month old daughter is not responsible for her genetic inheritance, or the early experience she is being exposed to (including the friends we have, the schools we choose for her, the games we buy or play with her etc.) As she ages, the ways she will change herself (through various activities she chooses, including perhaps, meditation) are themselves the result of her genetics and early experiences, none of which she is responsible for! So she cannot ever be ultimately held as morally responsible for what she does.

So, in a nutshell, the basic argument made by those – like me – who affirm a buddhist or naturalist perspective is the claim that our characters and the behavior that stems from our characters are the products of causal forces over which we ultimately had no control. Some of us have the capacity for reform, and others do not. That conditions led me to hear the dharma and to respond with interest, and thus to gradually living a more wholesome, happy, and mindfully awakening life is something I am grateful for, but I cannot take any special claim as the capacity to hear, receive and practice the dharma were all not under my control. I am indeed fortunate, but undeserving of praise. Those who never hear the dharma, or hearing it and not understanding or taking up practice, and thus are not reformed are in that situation because of circumstances they did not create, so they are not open to blame.

In my next posting, I will continue this line of argument by investigating the basic unfairness of assigning praise and blame.

Nagel, Thomas. 1979. Moral Luck. In Moral Questions, 24 – 38. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press

All Beings Are Without Blame (Part One)

It is said that the buddha taught that all beings are without blame. Of course, such a radical – perhaps even nonsensical sounding (to our ears) – statement is completely in keeping with his central teachings of dependent–origination and not-self. It’s time for buddhists to come to full understanding of the implications of this teaching and begin to work for the realization of a culture that has gone beyond the illusion of “moral responsibility.” This is the first of a series where I will offer a zen naturalist perspective on the problem of moral responsibility and the necessity to create a more compassionate and wise society.

Arguing against moral responsibility and for the abolition of it is an uphill slog indeed, with many philosophers such as Peter Strawson insisting that “we cannot take seriously” (1962, 74) the rejection of moral responsibility. Indeed, commitment to moral responsibility is rooted in deep, visceral emotional reactivity perhaps evolutionarily evolved, and then seemingly locked in place by an (often) unconscious and very rarely questioned theoretical system – or perhaps it’s more accurate to say “systems” as there are several theories designed to make sense of moral responsibility.

What is meant by “moral responsibility?” This question is not without contention, so I want to be clear what I mean for the purpose of this and subsequent postings. What I mean to be “moral responsibility” is that which justifies special reward and punishment. It is the issue of “praise and blame,” two of the “eight worldly concerns” that the buddha warned against getting caught within. Moral responsibility is what offers the moral justification for singling out an individual for praise or blame, reward or punishment.

Of course, a naturalist understanding of not-self and dependent origination denies that there are any ‘self-created’ individuals. While I am uniquely me and you are uniquely you, we are both caused and conditioned by a long history (much of which predates our birth) that we did not choose! So, how can we be morally responsible for what we are and how we act if what we are and how we act are determined by history?

To be sure, rejecting moral responsibility does not entail rejecting all moral evaluations: John may have done something that is morally wrong, and we can agree that his immoral behavior reflects his deeply flawed character, and facing both the wrongful behavior and the flawed character remains necessary, but John does not deserve blame or punishment. It is inherently unfair to blame or punish John for a character flaw he did not choose or self-create! Yes he has a character with major flaws that have led to some immoral behavior, but that does not change the fact that he is not morally responsible. When we critically look at the society we have created, we have to accept that the practice of moral responsibility is unjust, and that it is not an effective way to produce a safer society or better behaved individuals. In fact, the system of moral responsibility impedes progress toward creating a more peaceful and wholesome society.

Accountability

One leading argument used to bolster moral responsibility is the perception that moral responsibility is about accountability. This means that if we hold someone morally responsible for an act, then she must be able to give an account of why she acted as she did.

The problem should be obvious: people very often give a sincere and honest account of why they did something that is completely mistaken! There have been many social psychology experiments that show that people act under the influence of factors outside their awareness, and that they are often blind to external factors completely. We are now in the midst of a long, drawn-out primary race for the Republican Presidential candidate. Repeatedly, a large majority of voters say they do not like the “negative ads” that are being run on television and radio, and that they have no effect on their choice for who they decide to vote. And yet, poll after poll show that the ads do affect voting patterns.

In one interesting experiment, people who found a dime (a mere 10 cents!) in a phone booth almost all stopped to help a stranger (actually an experimenter) who had “dropped” a set of papers, and those who had not found a dime did not stop to help. Yet, those who did stop after finding the dime were both unaware and in fervent denial that finding a dime could – and did – influence their behavior!

Brain studies show that when an action – such as moving an arm – is caused by stimulating a part of the brain, subjects make up a “reasonable” explanation for why they moved their arm. All this shows that the capacity to give an account for our actions is not the same as being morally responsible for those actions.

Those who believe in a supernatural soul argue that the soul is independent of all external influences and that rationality transcends the histories, the environmental influence and biology that buddhists, and all naturalists see as conditioning reason. If we reject the kind of supernatural reason full-out libertarians posit, then we have to accept that reason is conditioned and limited; we cannot know all the influences on our behavior, so we can never give a full and accurate account of our behavior. And, if accountability is one’s argument for moral responsibility, then it becomes clear that accountability fails to justify moral responsibility.

The Emotional Commitment to Moral Responsibility

Those philosophers who argue for moral responsibility often have a difficult time arguing why. They will admit to weaknesses in any reasoned defense of moral responsibility, and yet remain unshaken in their certainty of its reality which points to some emotional source for their commitment independent of rational argument. Some even argue that the strong emotional “intuition” and commitment to moral responsibility is positive and defensible. After all, such deeply held emotional commitments as the love of our children are valuable. Yet, many strongly held emotional commitments are much less than positive – emotional commitments such as to racism, sexism, xenophobia and religious fundamentalism are irrational and harmful.

The point is, if we can acknowledge the great extent emotion and “intuition” play in the commitment to moral responsibility, then it should be at least a bit less difficult to investigate more clearly and with greater integrity the possibility that we can challenge moral responsibility and perhaps even reject it for something else; something more fair and in alignment with natural reality.

When we investigate the reasons for holding to moral responsibility, what we find is that they are all basically justifications of a visceral, universal, deeply felt emotional reaction: the evolutionarily evolved retributive impulse; the deep desire to strike back when we are harmed. It is related to the aversive reactivity the buddha said is one of the three major causes of duhkha.

Some examples:
“Sometimes vengeance is wholly called for, even obligatory, and revenge is both legitimate and justified. Sometimes it is not, notably when one is mistaken about the offender or the offense. But to seek vengeance for a grievous wrong, to revenge oneself against evil – that seems to lie at the very foundation of our sense of justice, indeed, of our very sense of ourselves, our dignity, and our sense of right and wrong.” (Robert C. Solomon, 2004, 37)

“We ought to admit, up front, that one of our strongest unspoken motivations for upholding something close to the traditional concept of free will is our desire to see the world’s villains ‘get what they deserve.’ And sure they do deserve our condemnation, our criticism, and – when we have a sound system of laws in place – punishment. A world without punishment is not a world any of us would want to live in.” (Daniel Dennet, 2008, 258)

“Personal and vicarious moral anger can be and ought to be placated by hostile responsive action taken against its cause. Wrongful actions require hostile retribution. That, despite its seeming lack of fit with the body of moral principles upheld in our culture, is actually one of the primary foundations of morality. It is a foundation that is settled in passions, attitudes, emotions, and sentiments, not in reason.” (Peter French, 2001, 97)

These intelligent, “reasonable” men, philosophers all, clearly – even somewhat brutally – base the source of the fervent belief in moral responsibility upon a feeling; the powerful, undeniable feeling that those who do wrong and cause harm should suffer. That feeling itself is rooted in another deeply held feeling: when we are harmed, we should strike back.

The issue becomes: the almost universal belief in moral responsibility, based upon this deeply felt emotion cannot be used to justify moral responsibility any more than the almost universal belief in the existence of god, or the justice of subjugating women, for instance, can be used to justify those beliefs.

The “strike-back impulse” is a deeply rooted one we share with all animals. Rats in a cage who are given an electrical shock will attack one another. Just like with humans, it doesn’t really matter who receives the brunt of retaliation; the retaliation is for our own sakes. Interestingly, those rats that are shocked but able to vent their rage against another rat – or a gnawing post – have less increase in adrenal hormone and blood pressure levels. It seems striking back is “good for us.” But we have higher-order brain mechanisms that can be trained to restrain the impulse without causing any physical problems. This is the nirodha taught by the buddha and Patanjali.

What happens when we simply give in to this strike-back impulse? It is common knowledge that when economic stresses increase we will find a corresponding increase in spousal and child abuse. When the US was attacked on September 11, 2001, and with the assailants either dead or in hiding, Iraq, which had nothing to do with the attack, bore the brunt of US strike-back aggression. It’s also common knowledge that – especially in dramatic crimes that receive major media coverage – getting someone – anyone – declared “guilty” in order to punish them often takes precedence over getting the actual perpetrator, and leads to many miscarriages of (so-called) justice.

There is one other major foundational source for the deeply entrenched belief in moral responsibility, besides the strength of our retributive emotions and the strike-back impulse, and that is the generally unquestioned (by anyone other than philosophers) belief in “free will.” This of course ends up making belief in moral responsibility an article of faith, and a faith in the supernatural at that, and one that flies in the face of dependent origination. Buddhism has always denied any “absolute” or “a-causal” free will since buddhism denies a supernatural soul and affirms the contingent nature of all phenomena. If a “person” is actually a conditioned aggregation of causes and conditions, it is irrational to exempt will from conditioning and causality.

Bruce Waller pointedly notes: “The rich variety of arguments in favor of moral responsibility may remind us of the rich variety of arguments for the existence of god and may prompt the same response to that large collection: if there were really a good argument for god or for moral responsibility, would there be so many? In contrast to the multitude of arguments in support of moral responsibility, there is one basic argument against moral responsibility – though it is available in a number of different styles and colors.”

The series of postings, of which this is the first, will be very much influenced by the work of Bruce Waller and others like George Lakoff, but with a ‘buddhist’ style and a zen naturalist color. I realize some of what I have already written – and what I will be writing – will cause reactivity in those who either haven’t given this topic much thought or who have a strong investment in the belief in moral responsibility (which is truly most of us). I hope you will be able to put your reactivity aside at least just enough to be open to hearing why the buddha said, “All beings are without blame.”

Dennet, Daniel. 2008. Some Observations on the psychology of thinking about free will. In Are We Free? Psychology and Free Will, ed. John Baer, James C. Kaufman, and Roy F. Baumeister. New York: Oxford University Press.

French, Peter. 2001. The Virtues of Vengeance. Lawrence, KS: University of Kansas Press.

Solomon, Robert C. 2004. In Defense of Sentimentality. New York: Oxford University Press.

Strawson, P.F. 1962. Freedom and Resentment. Proceedings of the British Academy 36. Page reference as reprinted in Free Will, ed. Gary Watson. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982

The Most Awesome Reality

A friend sent this link to me, and I would like to pass it along. Perhaps the music is not my favorite, but the sentiment needs to be heard. There really is no need to postulate and rest the meaning and value of THIS (this world, this life, this thusness) in some transcendent, super-natural realm!

It is not merely poetic to understand that we are not simply in the universe, but the universe is in us. Each of us, the universe in unique manifestation.

Fingerprints of God: The Search for the Science of Spirituality

Well, Barbara Bradley Hagerty set out to find the evidence of God, and the Transcendent reality she hoped to find and -- guess what? She found it! She asserts she's a "journalist" and "reporter," but her awards as a "religion correspondent" tell me more that what she is is a believer looking for any evidence -- or lacking that, any justification to lower the bar for what counts as evidence -- for grounding her belief.

She often asserts her feeling that "There has to be more" than this, and her final crowning realization is: "Earth is not our home." The problem with most religionists is right there, in that five-word negation! They look at what they see and, not happy with it because it changes, seek something that is eternal. The imagined reality is, for them, more real and more valuable than 'just this.' There is no lack of awe in the fact that sub-atomic particles, come together to form molecules that assemble to form bacteria, monkeys, you and me!

She leans heavily on William James and his defense of faith and non-evidential belief basically because it makes her feel good! The ethics of such a 'will to believe' leaves much to be desired, and yet, credulous folk still seek solcace in such pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking!

I had hoped for more from this book based upon the title.

Brad Warner's "Sex, Sin and Zen" A kind of review...

Brad Warner’s fourth book, Sex, Sin and Zen is thankfully a hell of a lot better than his last! It may not be as good as his first two, but it does offer plenty to think about. There is one trait that runs through his books that I do have an issue with, however. Though he will at times remind his readers that he is not speaking for all of Buddhism (in fact, he doesn’t speak for all of Zen!), he still falls into many generalizations and does indeed say things like “Buddhists believe….” when the truth is that "most" or "some" modifying what comes after would help the accuracy of what follows! Additionally, when he speaks for Buddhism, he all too often whitewashes the tradition or out and out offers wrong or misleading information.

Some examples:

1. Like many Zen teachers, he likes to talk up zazen as something ‘special’ or ‘unique,’ and perhaps not even ‘meditation.’ For instance, he says that most meditation is an attempt to “empty the mind” or “develop concentration,” while zazen has no goal and is not about concentration nor emptying the mind. While that is correct in how it is often taught and practiced nowadays, all one need do is read some of the old Chinese texts to see that they speak endlessly about “stopping the mind stream” and about developing various samadhis (which are nothing if not deep states of concentration!).
2. In response to the question: “Are Buddhists allowed to jack off?” he responds, “They’re encouraged to!” I’d LOVE to see him find a sutra where someone is encouraged to masturbate! Now, I want to be clear, I wholeheartedly endorse masturbation as a healthy and natural expression of sexuality. However, the Buddhist tradition generally sees it as unskillful (not sinful or evil) because of its sensual nature which it sees as tending to increase desire and craving.
3. He really blows it when he says “In Western culture we’ve been steeped in the religious view that sex itself is a sin. Whether it’s… within the bounds of holy matrimony or outside it…the act of sex itself is seen as a sinful activity.” This is plain bullshit wrong! First of all, in Judaism, sexual activity between married partners is a mitzvah (both a duty and a blessing) and in fact, the husband is required to make sure the wife is ‘pleasured.’ And even in Christianity, the whole point of it being called “holy” matrimony is that marriage is a sacrament, making married sex truly holy and sacred!
4. He repeatedly falls into the Zen error of speaking of some kind of “underlying reality” behind or grounding the subjective and objective aspects of experience. This monistic dhatuvada view is more Vedantic than Buddhistic, though it is an error that many in Eastern and Northern Buddhism fall into.
5. It’s become kind of “avant-garde” to criticize mindfulness and while there is some justification in the criticism of the “mindfulness industry” as it is now taking shape, there’s a lot of inconsistency and hypocrisy in the criticism. Brad says: “When you say, ‘I am mindful of (fill in the blank),’ you are already creating separation between you and your activities…This is the kind of separation we’re trying to uproot through our Zen practice.” Yet, only two pages earlier he writes, speaking of habits and attachments: “But once you become aware of them you find that you always have a clear choice whether or not to respond habitually…. If you can recognize your attachments, that in itself is very good…It’s useful to see your attachments for what they are, just thoughts inside your head.” Well, well, well. This is exactly the Third Foundation of Mindfulness! How would one become ‘aware’ of attachments and see them as mental formations without mindfulness?! Mindfulness is more than “paying attention,” which is what he seems to think it is, and because of his misunderstanding of sati, he argues that mindful sex would only bring about that ‘separation’ he seems to think mindfulness always implies.
6. His attachment to view leads him to say: “I’m not a fan of guided meditation. Meditation should never be guided.” Aside from the fact that guided meditation has its place and many have found it helpful, he can have his opinion, but he seems to go further in that absolutist condemnation.
7. He seems confused as to whether he really thinks Buddhism is a religion or not. He argues that it isn’t, that it isn’t even “spiritual,” but doesn’t explain how he can think of himself as a “monk,” or that Buddhism has its “clergy.” It may or may not have been a “religion” at the time of the Buddha and for those first few centuries, but it most certainly became one! Now, one can argue that they think that was an error, and many do as in the Secular Buddhism movement, but address the issue with more clarity next time, please!
8. He writes: “the powerful patricarchal religions of the modern world have mostly treated women like shit. Except for Buddhism.” I used to have such an idealized view until I actually met and practiced with Asian women! There are many books, written by women practitioners and academics that offer a more accurate portrayal of the lived actuality. A recent survey said that women fare best in Korea out of all the Asian Buddhist countries, where women have about 80 -85% parity with men! So, the BEST situation has women at 85% parity, and it goes down to less than 25% in other countries. This is a terrible historical situation, that thankfully, modern Western values are being brought to bear upon.
9. His weakest moment is in his handling of “right livelihood.” First, he snidely says that American Buddhists put more thought into other people’s livelihood and whether it is ‘right’ or not than into their own. This is just an example of loose talk, as I know people who, unfortunately, torment themselves with questions about their livelihood! But, he misses the boat right from the start on this topic when he says that the Buddha never offered any list of jobs or occupations that were disapproved of by him. Well, dear sir, what do we make of the following then:

"A lay follower should not engage in five types of business. Which five? Business in weapons, business in human beings, business in meat, business in intoxicants, and business in poison." — AN 5.177

Again, I actually really liked this book. I just have my own issues with Brad’s often all-too-loose scattershot teaching. And yet, this is all along with some really wonderful points, and even tender, thoughtful and compassionate ones at that! I went into this book with some trepidation – after the crapola he churned out in his third book – but I have to say I’d recommend this book to anyone curious enough about one Buddhist’s take on Sexuality.

What I Hate About Zen

Over the course of my life, since my introduction to Zen Buddhism in 1974, I’ve read many books about Buddhism and Zen in particular. And perhaps that in itself is a problem! But be that as it may, I’ve never fallen into the trap of thinking that reading about Zen is what Zen is about. The reading has always been secondary to ‘practice.’

Yet, over the years, there have been quite a few things about Zen, and how it’s presented by its teachers and masters, that I have found distasteful, pig-headed, and quite frankly, morally and philosophically bankrupt. I’m not about to go into every one of these things here, but I am prompted to write after reading Zen In Plain English by Stephen Schumacher. The apparent sub-title of this book is Experience The Essence of Zen and in fact, the inner cover proclaims: “This book could well be called “The Zen of Zen.” It is not simply a book about Zen Buddhism; it is a direct expression of the Zen spirit itself.” What that means is expect posturing and obfuscation, and that is what you will indeed find here – along with some very good writing and explication. Zen is, truly, a mixed bag!

Schumacher studied philosophy, psychology and sociology, and then Japanology and Sinology, before heading off to Japan where he eventually “dedicated himself entirely to Zen practice.” From 1970 to 1975, his practice was within the Sambo Kyodan tradition, under the guidance of Yasutani Hakuuin Roshi and Yamada Koun Roshi. Schumacher is the editor and co-author of the Shambhala Encyclopedia of Eastern Philosophy and Religion: Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Zen.

My qualms with Mr. Schumacher’s book begins with the first paragraph of his “Prelude.” He writes, and already begins the all-too-typical Zen blustering against historical scholarship:

"This book is a presentation of Chan or Zen from the perspective of Zen. It is not an account of facts and events which occurred in the distant past, a record that is merely meant to correct from the point of view of an academic understanding of history. A historical approach, helpful as it may be for an understanding of the development of the outward form, misses the very essence of Zen – and on should not forget that it is one of the characteristics of Zen to steer as directly as possible, towards the essential.”

The first line warns us not to expect much more than the self-aggrandizing tendency of the Zen tradition. The second reminds us that Zen will not let “facts” or historical “events” get in the way of a good story! He offers a bit of pablum by saying the historical approach can be helpful for understanding the outward form, as if the outward form can be separated from its significance and meaning! The forms took shape because of and along with, certain ideological, cultural, and political constructions, and to deny this or to turn a blind eye to this reality is simply willfully ignorant.

But finally, the major point of my criticism is this notion of “essence.” At the very least, Schumacher should clearly define what he means when he uses the term, as it is one (and he should know, considering his philosophical studies) laden with connotation for westerners. And Buddhism is an un- or even anti-essentialist teaching! What is the “essence” of Zen and what is the “essential” it allegedly “steers us toward?”

On the very next page, he goes on to argue an essentialist perspective by denying that the historical, social and cultural conditions under which an ‘enlightened Asian’ has said or done something have anything to tell us about enlightenment! Awakening is to conditions; to be ‘enlightened’ is to be enlightened about something. One of the tendencies of the Zen tradition is to reify enlightenment into something ahistorical and acontextual. Schumacher asks “Can (Zen) help me to find my solution?” and answers: “It can only do so if it is more than history, if is transmits a truth that is independent of historical circumstances. And indeed, what is transmitted by the Zen tradition is a truth of a different order than that of the historical truth of the scholars.”

The first part of that statement is bullshit. Zen doesn’t transmit some ‘transcendent’ Truth with a capital T. The ground of Buddhism, the Four Noble Truths, are not some such Truth, but truths about circumstances that we need to nobly face in order to live wholesome, free, creative lives! The second part of that statement is typical Zen tradition self-aggrandizement. Now, I am not saying there’s no difference between the academic, scholarly approach to Zen and the practitioner’s approach. What I am saying is that they are not at odds, and that increasingly so we find practitioner-scholars whose practice does not seem to be threatened or undermined by their scholarship, and indeed who find it nourished and broadened by such scholastic understanding.

One example of this is his treatment of the supposed ‘dharma transmission’ from the Buddha to Mahakashyapa. Anyone who has read any Zen at all, knows the story: a large group (some accounts say 80,000) were assembled at Vulture Peak to hear the Buddha give a teaching. (If you’ve been to Vulture Peak, you know this is one hell of an exaggerated number!). As they all awaited the Buddha’s words, he stood there, and held up a flower and blinked his eyes. Kashyapa broke out in a smile, and the Buddha said: “I have the Treasury of the Eye of the True Dharma, the ineffable mind of nirvana. I entrust it to Mahakashyapa.”

The Zen mythos states that this was the first of a long line of dharma transmissions, first in India, then in China. There are many students of Zen who believe this is historically true. There are also many who, after years of believing so, have found out that this is pure legend, with no basis in historical fact, and have felt betrayed. That’s what you get when you pass along myth as “Truth.”

Now, let me be clear: I like this story of Mahakashyapa and believe it does indeed teach to a subtle, profound existential truth. And that I know it not to have actually happened doesn’t lessen this existential truth. BUT, also knowing that this story is a fabrication of the Chinese Zen school, pretty much as a strategy to gain “legitimacy” in the eyes of itself and other Chinese Buddhist schools, lessens the sectarian ‘one-upmanship’ that permeates the Zen school.

It’s clear the Buddha did not ‘entrust’ his Dharma to any one individual; that there were many enlightened practitioners; and that the Buddha exhorted his students to be rest in their own authority, as ‘lamps unto themselves.’

Listen to how Schuhmacher addresses this issue:

"If we are to believe the academic scholars of Buddhism, the lineage of Zen transmission… is a fake, a defensive lie. It is born out of the attempt by later Zen teachers, to justify their own claim to be authentic descendents of the Buddha through a lineage that was artificially constructed, a posteriori, to demonstrate an uninterrupted chain of ‘transmission of the light,’ from the historic Buddha to themselves. From a historic point of view, this may not even be completely erroneous.

Pull-eeeze! “It may not even be completely erroneous”???!!!! How ‘bitchy’ can one be? Does historical truth so threaten his faith that it has to be wrong? Of course, this is what we expect from someone (and a tradition) that likes to think of itself as ahistorical to begin with! Here again he seems to think that “a mere historical understanding of the transmission in Zen” misses “by far the essential truth of what the Awakened One taught.” Again he goes to his dearly beloved “essential truth” but it is Schuhmacher who is missing a deeper truth. If we close our eyes to the historical truth, we fall, hook, line and sinker for the political ploy of ‘transmission’ and cloud our eyes with mystic dust!

Philip Yampolsky writes: "To achieve the aura of legitimacy so urgently needed, histories were compiled, tracing the Ch’an sect back to the historical Buddha…” The whole lineage chanted in many Zen centers is more fabrication than literal truth. Indeed, the idea of lineage was Chinese manufactured, reflecting the more Confucian ideal of ancestor worship and the hierarchal stratification of Chinese society. In the Pali Canon it is explicitly made clear that the Buddha rejected naming anyone as his successor. The almost obsessive emphasis on lineage and authenticity of transmission found in Zen has led to much abuse, and ironically, we see its roots at the very beginning with the story of Mahakashyapa, and then further elaborated in the story of Hui-neng and Shen-hsiu.

But this is what the Buddha is reported to have said as he neared death, and was explicitly asked who would lead the sangha:

"The Dhamma I have taught has no secret and public versions: there is no ‘teacher’s closed fist’ about good things here. Surely it would be someone who thought this: ‘I shall govern the Sangha’ or ‘The Sangha depends on me’ who might make a pronouncement about the Sangha? A Perfect One does not think like that…each of you should make himself his island, himself and no other his refuge; each of you should make the Dhamma his island, the Dhamma and no other his refuge."

The concept of “lineage,” in the sense of meaning that every student and practitioner of the Dharma has learned from other students and practitioners, and that this line of succession goes all the way back to the Buddha in India is both unexceptional and true. It might even be accurate to call it a “truism.” And it works for our understanding and experience of continuity and connection.

However, lineage has come to mean much more than this in the Zen school. It has come to mean the “certification,” the “seal of sanctioned approval” of one Master’s enlightenment by another through a “mind-to-mind” transmission, modeled upon the example of Mahakashyapa, certifying the legitimacy of the succeeding teacher to be a teacher and leader of the Sangha. This practice can be seen as a means of ensuring that only properly certified and genuinely enlightened people are allowed to teach, which would be seen as a protection for those of us who are unenlightened from being exploited, or it can be seen as a system for maintaining priestly power and creating mystique.

It is obvious that the idea of transmission and lineage is intended to impart the aura of legitimacy, but this begs the question of why would a school or a teacher need such “legitimacy?” Presumably, the answer would be that what they have to offer is non-obvious. What they have to offer is something those of us who are unenlightened would be unable to evaluate. David Brazier, in The New Buddhism, gives the example of using the services of a greengrocer and a doctor. We do not ask to see certification from the greengrocer. We just ask if he has cabbages for sale if that is what we seek. But we do ask to see certification from our doctor because if we wait to see if he knows what he is doing through personal practical experimentation, it may be too late before we realize he is a quack! The lineage system puts Dharma Teachers in the same category as doctors and not in the same one as greengrocers.

Interestingly, Brazier points out that the Buddha put himself in the greengrocer category. “Come and see and try it out for yourself,” he said. If you like what I offer and it helps you to overcome suffering, use it. If not, not. The Buddha did not appoint a successor (although the Mahayana created the legend of the flower sermon to legitimize the idea of succession through Mahakashyapa). The Buddha did offer his opinion as to who was enlightened when asked about particular people. However, there is a passage where Ananda, seeming to pester the Buddha with this question, is told by the Buddha that Ananda could simply see for himself whether someone is enlightened or not, telling him that the test of one’s enlightenment and understanding is how well they follow the discipline. So it seems that the Buddha thought that the matter was obvious, not non-obvious. If a person was enlightened, you could tell from what he or she did. You could know them by their deeds.

After the death of the Buddha, differing camps began to arise, each with its own slant on the teachings of the Buddha. Once the Majority Group (The Mahasanghika, the spiritual ancestors of the Mahayana) began to express willingness to change the rules and the form, criterion other than orthodoxy was required to establish legitimacy. Lineage was grasped onto as a way of showing that while the way a particular school practices or teaches may not look like the way the Buddha did; it is directly descended from and derived from him. Lineage also implies that as all the changes were made by certified enlightened Masters, they are not only authentic and true, they are perhaps even improvements on what the Buddha taught and how the orthodoxy practices! That is to say again, lineage becomes a means of legitimizing the non-obvious.

This use and understanding of lineage is highly problematic. First of all, lineage is a form of “argument from authority” which Western logic regards as a fallacious argument. Just because someone holds a high position does not, of itself, ensure that he or she is right. The Buddha himself stressed this in his "Discourse to the Kalamas" when he told them not to believe and accept something just because of the position of the person who has told you it – including himself. Things are not true simply because the Buddha says it. They are true if they are true, and regarding things that matter, like birth and death and how to live a “noble” life, while we may need wiser folk to point it out to us, we still need to test what they say for ourselves. Sadly, humans like to shirk this responsibility and simply accept authority all too easily. Those societies based upon legitimization systems, such as the Roman Catholic Church, as seen most recently in their handling of the sexual abuse crisis, tend to work quite badly.

The fact is that in the last sixty years there have indeed been some disturbingly significant examples of “legitimately authorized” Buddhist Masters acting in such ways that one must question the usefulness of lineage. I will only address one, and that is the case of Yasutani Roshi, one of Schuhmacher’s teachers, who received “transmission” and was legitimated by the lineage system of the Soto Zen School two months after publishing a book on Dogen which is full of militarist and anti-Semitic propaganda. The book uses the teachings of Dogen to support the war, deify the emperor, promote the superiority of Japan, foster anti-Semitism and encourage people to exterminate the enemy. Included in his commentary on the First Precept is the following passage: “Failing to kill an evil man who ought to be killed, or destroying an enemy army that ought to be destroyed, would be to betray compassion and filial obedience, to break the precept forbidding the taking of life. This is a special characteristic of the Mahayana precepts.” Thankfully, most teachers within the Buddhist world do not hold this non-obvious “special characteristic”.

The merits of a system that rewards someone such as this with its highest seal of approval and spiritual authority when he is confirmed in such warmongering attitudes are also non-obvious! It is clear that if the function and purpose of lineage is to offer a “guarantee” of someone’s enlightenment it has failed to do so – in this case at least. A guarantee that is unreliable is no guarantee at all. It seems to me that lineage, as an authentication system is not a system that was accepted by the Buddha and is not one he would have approved of. I believe that Buddhism is hindered, not served, by unnecessary mystification, and much of “transmission” and lineage reeks of mystification and obscuration. While I agree that people rarely become enlightened without spiritual teachers, it is ultimately the students who authenticate and authorize the teachers. An enlightened being is one who embodies the precepts, and if someone says they are above the precepts, they have not fully understood the Dharma.

What is perhaps even more troubling is the response of those who were given transmission by Yasutani to the uncovering of their teacher’s ideology. All seemed to defend Yasutani through various twists of non-obvious logic, but Jiun Kubota, the Third Patriarch of the Religious Foundation Sanbo-kyodan founded by Yasutani published an apology for his teacher’s expressions of support for war that still harbors what I feel is a dangerous doctrine. He states in his “apology” that Dharma and political ideology are two separate things and that Yasutani’s disciples were only interested in the dharma and not in the ideology. I reject this unequivocally. The task of the Dharma Teacher is, not to be perfect perhaps, but surely involves “imparting values, vision and inspiration that touch all aspects of the disciple’s lives.” The doctrine that says Dharma and social attitudes are unrelated is not what I understand to be the teachings of the Buddha. It both, once again, reeks of essentialist obfuscation and – ironically, considering how loudly the Zen school proclaims its nonduality – a fundamentally dualistic worldview: there’s Dharma, and then there’s everything else!

With both an historical consciousness and critical thinking, Zen Naturalism finds no shame in admitting it breaks from orthodoxy, and feels no need to apologize, nor create some form of external ‘legitimacy.’ If it is to have a legitimate function, that will be proved in the arena of practice, and nowhere else. It accepts what works, it is not afraid to critically evaluate tradition, nor does it shirk from creative innovation – if warranted. It is open-handed, and open-hearted and open-minded. There is a rejection of the elitism and ‘specialness’ of much of the Zen tradition that strikes me as a form of institutionalized ‘self-conceit.’ Basically, Zen Naturalism is free of what I hate about Zen!