Editing IH61ZKA-T

{{DISPLAYTITLE:Ichikawa Hakugen, “Zen, Kegon, and Anarchism”}}
__NOTOC__

'''Zen, Kegon, and Anarchism''' (''Zen, Kegon, anakizumu'' 禅・華厳・アナキズム) is a 1961 essay by Ichikawa Hakugen 市川白弦. This working English translation follows the text reproduced in volume 3 of ''Ichikawa Hakugen chosakushū'' 市川白弦著作集 (Kyoto: Hōzōkan, 1993), pp. 319–343, with references on pp. 344–345.

'''Japanese original:''' [[IH61ZKA|禅・華厳・アナキズム]]

== Contents ==
:[[#section1|I]]
:[[#section2|II]]
:[[#section3|III]]
:[[#section4|IV]]
:[[#section5|V]]
:[[#section6|VI]]

== Translation ==

{{tpage|319|original|IH61ZKA}}

<span id="section1"></span>
=== I ===

What is known as the “Nishida philosophy” of Nishida Kitarō (1870–1945), the foremost representative of modern Japanese philosophy, was established in his 1926 essay “Place.” Although the idea of “place” (basho 場所) emerged through the concept of topos (place) found in Plato’s Timaeus and Aristotle’s De Anima, it was more fundamentally connected with the Mahāyāna Buddhist concepts of emptiness (kū 空; Sanskrit śūnyatā) and the dharma-realm (hokkai 法界; Sanskrit dharmadhātu), especially the realm of the non-obstruction of phenomena (jiji muge hokkai 事々無礙法界), a world of experience in which individual things and events mutually interpenetrate and mutually determine one another. In other words, Nishida’s thought was fundamentally connected with the philosophy of prajñā and Kegon philosophy. His central idea—that the mutual determination of individual things within the place of “absolute nothingness” is simultaneously the self-determination of the universal—expressed, through the mediation of the modern Western logic of the individual ego, the fundamental unity of the logical structures of prajñā emptiness and Kegon’s non-obstruction of phenomena. In essence, this philosophy should have established a metaphysical foundation for thoroughgoing freedom and equality through the Eastern logic of nothingness. It contained the possibility of establishing a philosophy of freedom that rejected all external authority (Autorität) and power (Macht), even casting off the clothing of so-called “religion.”<ref group="Editorial" name="E1">Nishida’s philosophy of place. Nishida Kitarō’s 1926 essay “Place” (Basho 場所) develops the notion of a locus in which individual things are constituted through relationships and self-determination. Ichikawa argues that this philosophy’s rejection of a fixed, substantial universal ought to support freely associated individuals, rather than an emperor-centred political order.</ref><ref group="Editorial" name="E2">The four dharma-realms. In Huayan/Kegon thought these are the realm of phenomena (事法界), the realm of principle (理法界), the non-obstruction of principle and phenomena (理事無礙法界), and the non-obstruction of phenomena with one another (事事無礙法界). Ichikawa centres his political reading on the final realm, without assuming that interdependence automatically entails political equality.</ref>


{{tpage|320|original|IH61ZKA}}

Yet as imperial Japan’s wartime system expanded, and as pressure from the political Right and the military against the “liberal” tendencies of Nishida philosophy and the Kyoto School intensified, this philosophy of the place of absolute nothingness—or the philosophy of the “self-determination of facts”—gradually developed a logic that provided an ideological foundation for the Imperial Way and the “holy war.”

Ōya Sōichi went so far as to say that Nishida had “sold his soul to secure the safety of his body.” Among Nishida’s writings from this period were “The Principle of the New World Order” (1943) and “On the National Polity” (1944). The latter subsequently appeared as the fourth supplementary essay in his Philosophical Essays, was published in the journal Tetsugaku kenkyū 哲学研究, and was included in the Complete Works of Nishida Kitarō. The former, however, was not included in the collected works.

Nevertheless, the logic of place, or the philosophy of the non-obstruction of phenomena, should not have provided a foundation for the Imperial Way. On the contrary, it should have provided a foundation for anarchism. In my essay “The Stumbling of Absolute Nothingness: The Case of Nishida Kitarō” (published in Shisō 思想, January 1959, and reprinted in the present volume), I wrote the following in its conclusion:

The place of absolute nothingness, the dialectical universal, forms the principle of world-formation through its self-conscious determination. This principle and the Imperial Way constitute an absolute contradiction that cannot be reconciled. Within the sphere of objectifying logic, the two assert themselves against and mutually exclude one another by their very nature. If the Imperial Way were genuinely to become subjective beyond the domain of objectifying logic, then, in the very process of becoming subjective, it would have no alternative but to dissolve itself by negating those accidental, particular, and irrational elements that constitute its essential nature. In the process of fully realising itself as subject, the Imperial Way must relinquish the ego. It loses itself by returning to the place of absolute nothingness, the true historical world. Conversely, the logic of the place of absolute nothingness—the logic of the predicate—is something that fundamentally negates the Imperial Way conceived as subject. Nishida’s “theology of the logic of place” should not have provided a foundation for Japan’s founding mythology and the politico-religious philosophy of the eternal imperial order. Rather, it should have furnished a logical system that brought these to an end. Likewise—


{{tpage|321|original|IH61ZKA}}

—and, contrary to what happened in Nishida’s own case, it should have been a philosophical system that regarded even national morality as fundamentally illusory (koke 虚仮). As a philosophy of place, in which absolutely free individuals are mediated by a universal that mediates without any mediating entity, this system should have provided the foundation for a democratic association of free individuals in the deepest sense. It should have demanded that the Imperial Way shed its former character, anticipated the disappearance of the state, and provided the foundation and promise of a community without coercive power. The logic of the predicate began with Nishida the philosopher, only to founder in Nishida the imperial subject.

According to Nishida, the actual world must be a world of individuals—I, you, and others. An individual might initially be understood as a determination of the universal, such as existence or living beings. By adding specific differences to what is universal, proceeding through successive classifications, and finally passing beyond them, one might conceive of the individual as a limiting point. Yet an individual conceived in this manner is not a genuine individual. Such an individual can never escape being merely a part of the universal. The individual must determine itself. Only something that determines itself—that is, something that becomes conscious of itself, forms itself, and chooses for itself—can truly be called an independent individual. Yet an individual can determine itself only in relation to other individuals. I exist as myself in relation to you, just as you exist as yourself in relation to me. “An individual must be conceived as standing in relation to another individual. It is only through standing in relation to another individual that an individual can be conceived as such. It is impossible to conceive of a single individual existing alone. For mutually independent things to stand in relation to one another is precisely what it means for things to act upon one another. […] For mutually independent things to enter into relations, some form of mediation must be conceived between them.” (Emphasis added by Ichikawa.) If this mediator were some universal that unified the individuals—


{{tpage|322|original|IH61ZKA}}

—then that universal would itself amount to another individual, and the independence of the original individuals would necessarily be lost. (It would be rather like two people who could meet only in the presence of a guardian.) Behind individual beings there is no overarching universal that encompasses them. What mediates independent individuals cannot be some positive, substantial universal. Rather, it must be a dialectical universal understood as the determination of the place of nothingness. Within the place of absolute nothingness, individuals engage with and cooperate with one another while remaining genuinely independent. I remain entirely myself, and you remain entirely yourself; yet at the same time I am you, and you are me. Each is an autonomous, self-governing existence possessing an irreplaceable individuality, yet each may freely become subject or object in relation to the other, working and cooperating together. This is how the world of historical reality must truly be constituted. Borrowing a term from Kegon philosophy, Nishida calls this world of existential encounter and interconnection the “realm of the non-obstruction of phenomena” (jiji muge no sekai 事々無礙の世界).

The logic of the place of absolute nothingness, which makes possible free and autonomous interaction and cooperation among independent, individual existences—this was, so to speak, the fundamental logic of Nishida’s social philosophy or philosophy of the world.

Consequently, what should follow from this logic is a society of genuinely autonomous and free individuals, liberated from attachment to the ego and its objects. Such a society would not merely be free of domination through force; it would be a freely associated human community in which there was no place even for “authority” understood as power disguised in ethical clothing.

Yet this open conception of the world, grounded in the logic of place and the Zen–Kegon understanding of emptiness and the non-obstruction of phenomena, was constrained and distorted by Nishida’s samurai sensibilities, his position within the academic establishment, and the circumstances of imperialist Japan. Its possibilities were deformed until it descended into the Theory of the National Polity and The Principle of the New World Order. And this was the same course that Japanese Buddhism generally followed at the time.


{{tpage|323|original|IH61ZKA}}

<span id="section2"></span>
=== II ===

Takakusu Junjirō 高楠順次郎, one of the leading Buddhist scholars of modern Japan—supervising editor of the Taishō Revised Tripiṭaka, professor emeritus at Tokyo Imperial University, and recipient of the fourth Order of Culture (Nishida received the second)—argued in “The Principle of Totality in Buddhism” that Mahāyāna Buddhist logic and ethics were, from the beginning, totalitarian. <sup>[6]</sup> According to Takakusu, the logical structure of this totalitarianism is expressed in Kegon thought through the doctrine of the Four Dharma-Realms (shihokkai 四法界), culminating in the fourth, the Realm of the Non-Obstruction of Phenomena (jiji muge hokkai 事々無礙法界). He maintained that, with the World War as its turning point, the world had begun moving toward totalitarianism: “Today even Westerners are beginning to practise totalitarianism, whereas the Japanese have actually practised it since ancient times. Through Japan’s Yamato totalitarianism, we can provide a model for the world. Through Buddhism’s principle of totality, we can guide the world. […] Japan as it actually exists must be governed through the Imperial Way. It is truly gratifying that the Kegon principle of totality should be put into practice. […] However excellent Buddhism may be, there must be no attempt to regard it as a form of government through the Buddhist Way existing alongside Japan’s government through the Imperial Way.” Takakusu concluded: “We now find ourselves in the midst of the National Spiritual Mobilization campaign, at a time when the Japanese spirit must be manifested in its totality. […] We should fully appreciate the true meaning of Kegon and undertake service to the nation without the slightest disorder and without a trace of selfishness. All people should forget themselves, relinquish themselves, and devote themselves to national affairs. We should realise the truth that the sage has no self, yet there is nothing that is not the self.” The Kegon scholar Kamekawa Kyōshin 亀川教信, in his essay “The Structure of Dependent Origination” (Engi no kōzō 縁起の構造), <sup>[7]</sup> and Yamagami Kaizen 山上戒全, in his essay “Kegon” 華厳, <sup>[8]</sup> developed interpretations of Kegon thought along similar lines. The Zen scholar Nakane Kandō 中根環堂, in “Totalitarianism and Zen” (Zentaishugi to Zen 全体主義と禅), <sup>[9]</sup> argued that Japan’s national polity was not the flat, horizontal totalitarianism of the West. Rather, its principle of one emperor and all his subjects constituted a three-dimensional, organic unity, in which affection resembled the relationship between father and child, while duty preserved the proper distinctions between ruler and subject. Underlying this hierarchical unity, he maintained, was the Kegon philosophy of “one is many, and many are one” (ichi soku ta, ta soku ichi 一即多・多即一). The path to fully realising this unity was seated meditation. Through grasping the essence of zazen—“thinking from the standpoint of nonthinking”—one could accomplish the sacred imperial undertaking of bringing the world under one roof (hakkō ichiu 八紘一宇). The lectures on “The Problem of Japanese Culture” given by Nishida at Kyoto Imperial University’s Monday lecture series in 1938—<ref group="Editorial" name="E3">Takakusu and wartime Buddhist thought. Takakusu Junjirō (1866–1945) was a prominent Buddhist scholar associated with the Taishō canon. Ichikawa cites his “Principle of Totality in Buddhism” (「仏教の全体性原理」; Ichikawa’s source reference 6) as evidence of the use of Kegon categories to defend wartime totalitarianism. The passage documents Takakusu’s interpretation, not an uncontested meaning of Kegon doctrine.</ref>


{{tpage|324|original|IH61ZKA}}

—and Kōyama Iwao’s subsequent lectures on “Cultural Typology” likewise sought to contribute to the construction of a “New Order in East Asia” by invoking the Kegon logic of phenomena.

Yet all these attempts were nothing other than distortions of Kegon philosophy and Zen thought. Let us return once more to Takakusu for an example.

In his Commentary on the Avataṃsaka Sūtra (Kegongyō tangenki 華厳経探玄記), Fazang (Hōzō 法蔵, 643–712), the third patriarch of the Chinese Huayan school, classifies the infinite mutual identity and interpenetration of phenomena within the world of experience into ten categories, known as the “Ten Profound Forms of Dependent Origination” (jūgen engi 十玄縁起). The tenth is called the “Gate of the Complete Illumination and Possession of Virtues by Principal and Companion” (shuhan enmyō gutokumon 主伴円明具徳門). The countless phenomena of the experiential world alternately become principal and companion, forming an endlessly interconnected symbolic world. If one phenomenon is taken as principal, all the others become its companions and are subordinated to it. But if another is selected as principal, all the remaining phenomena—including the one formerly taken as principal—become its companions and are encompassed by it. This is the principle of the complete illumination and possession of virtues by principal and companion. Takakusu paraphrases the doctrine in concrete terms: “Both principal and companion should work together harmoniously and openly, those above and below acting with one heart. Totalitarianism means that parent and child do not oppose one another but join forces and work together. If this cannot be accomplished, it is not totalitarianism. […] When similar things come together, one becomes their centre and principal. We may therefore apply this to the actual relationship of one emperor and all his subjects.” He also declared: “Our country has been totalitarian since the very beginning of its founding. […] Through the Meiji Restoration, it returned to its original totalitarianism.” And further: “We Japanese, who already possess the principle of totality in our actual national existence, are bringing the vision of Kegon’s one true dharma-realm into reality. This is something truly precious.” Takakusu thus maintains that the truths of the non-obstruction of phenomena, the completeness of principal and companion, and the identity of one with all and all with one are already realised within the system of one emperor and all his subjects—a system that regards democracy as contrary to the national polity and rests upon an authoritarian, status-based morality. This is a typical example of philosophy placed at the service of the authorities.<ref group="Editorial" name="E4">Principal and companion. Fazang’s “principal and companion” (shuhan 主伴) allows different phenomena to become the focus of a relationship, with the others functioning as companions. Ichikawa argues that making one hereditary sovereign permanently principal defeats the reciprocity that the doctrine is meant to express.</ref>


{{tpage|325|original|IH61ZKA}}

The condition of Japanese Buddhism described above had already taken root in the period of the Taika reforms. Leaving aside for the moment the earlier circumstances of state Buddhism in China, the new government, established through the reforms of 646, eventually undertook the construction of the Great Buddha Hall at Tōdaiji. It enshrined Vairocana Buddha there and established provincial monasteries and nunneries throughout the country, where scriptures for the protection of the state were to be recited. In this way, temples, monks, and nuns came under the control of state authority.

<span id="section3"></span>
=== III ===

Immediately after Japan’s defeat, Suzuki Daisetsu, in “The Construction of a Spiritual Japan” (September 1946), argued that a new Japan must be constructed upon the principle of the dependent origination of the dharma-realm (hokkai engi 法界縁起) found in Kegon philosophy.

“To place the emperor above the people is a symbol of the will to power. […] Rather, the emperor should possess a quality of immanence, becoming interconnected with the people in endlessly overlapping relationships. […] Just as the entire world should constitute a dharma-realm mandala of nations, so within Japan itself, the emperor and the people must become a single whole in which phenomena are mutually non-obstructing. Only then will a spiritual Japan become possible.

“If we express this schematically, Japan up to the present has resembled Figure 1. Although there appears to be a connection between those above and those below, it can be severed at any point along the way. Before the wishes of those above reach those below, they must pass through military cliques, bureaucrats, and financial interests. Those below have no clear idea where these directives originate. Moreover, the people themselves have no direct connections with one another. […] They do not know how to think for themselves—”

Figure 1. Suzuki Daisetsu’s original diagram (printed p. 325).

[[File:IH61ZKA_Figure1_Source.png|thumb|Figure 1. Suzuki Daisetsu’s representation of Japan’s hierarchical order (reproduced in Ichikawa, p. 325).]]


{{tpage|326|original|IH61ZKA}}

“—[…] All that was demanded of them was reverent obedience to imperial commands. […] The system of one emperor and all his subjects symbolises the will to power on the one hand and, on the other, extinguishes the autonomy of individual citizens.” (pp. 158–159)

Suzuki goes on to describe the dharma-realm mandala that ought to be constructed by the emperor and the people. Although the passage is lengthy, I shall quote it.

“When the emperor descends from the Plain of High Heaven and joins ordinary human beings upon this earth, the people, for their part, must abandon their servile sense of inferiority. […] They must establish their own autonomy and recognise fully that nothing can replace the value of individual personality.

“They must understand that respecting oneself is also the basis for respecting others. Each individual is complete in themselves, and at the same time all phenomena are mutually non-obstructing. […] Because each is complete, all are non-obstructing; because all are non-obstructing, each is complete.

“The political form of Japan as a dharma-realm mandala may be represented schematically in Figure 2. A, B, C, and so forth represent the people, the countless inhabitants of the nation. Yet each is an individual, a monad capable of autonomous action, thought, and sensation.<ref group="Editorial" name="E5">Suzuki’s diagrams. Figures 1 and 2, reproduced from Suzuki Daisetsu’s postwar account, respectively depict an elevated apex with disconnected subjects and a circle of mutually related individuals. In Figure 2, S still represents the emperor. Ichikawa’s question is why even the revised, immanent arrangement requires a fixed hereditary centre.</ref>

“Each is complete in themselves. Each is an independent and free personality. Precisely for this reason, each enters into inexhaustibly interconnected relationships with others. These monads have thrown their windows wide open, sharing their own light with others while receiving the light of others in return.<ref group="Editorial" name="E6">Monad with open windows. Suzuki reverses Leibniz’s well-known image of monads as having “no windows.” His metaphor of open windows expresses both distinct individuality and reciprocal exchange, but it does not itself settle the problem of the emperor’s status in the political whole.</ref>

“The chords and straight lines within the circle represent communication, reciprocal interaction, and mutual interpenetration among the monads.”

Figure 2. Suzuki Daisetsu’s original diagram (printed p. 326).

[[File:IH61ZKA_Figure2_Source.png|thumb|Figure 2. Suzuki Daisetsu’s interconnected dharma-realm mandala (reproduced in Ichikawa, p. 326).]]


{{tpage|327|original|IH61ZKA}}

“The S at the centre is an inward reflection of that which comprehensively encompasses the surrounding A, B, C, and so forth from without. A, B, C, D, and the others are each independent, yet each possesses totality. Accordingly, A, B, C, and D are joined by curved lines to form a great circle. This great circle, just as it is, represents each individual monad, each individual ‘blade of grass’ among the people. To express this meaning, it is concentrated and reflected in the small circle at the centre.

“The great circle encompasses the people as a whole, but merely saying that it encompasses them does not provide anything concrete that can be pointed to. For this reason I have placed S at the centre. S is none other than the emperor, the centre of the national polity. […]

“It might seem possible to remove S from the great circle surrounding it and place it above. But doing so would introduce a considerable danger that the will to power and a dualistic conception would reappear. The feudal mentality would inevitably be reproduced. Moreover, placing S within the circle should serve to strengthen the unity of the circle itself. […]

“As Japanese and as East Asians, we must establish a new national polity through our own autonomy, freedom, and constructive vision. Needless to say, its establishment must be spiritual through and through; it must be built upon spiritual awakening. Only then can it attain universality. Only then can something emerge from among us that will contribute to the advancement of world spiritual culture and to the various institutions of practical life.” (pp. 160–163)

This work by Suzuki may be regarded as the foremost postwar document in which a Buddhist thinker sought, with enthusiasm and sincerity, to envision a new political order for Japan.

As is already clear, there is a fundamental distance and difference between Takakusu’s wartime interpretation and Suzuki’s postwar interpretation of the Kegon doctrine of the dependent origination of the dharma-realm, understood in relation to the realities of Japan. (We should pay particular attention to Suzuki’s insistence that the new order must be built upon spiritual awakening through and through.)

In Takakusu’s case, we may wonder whether, had he lived into the postwar period, he would have recognised the need to revise his earlier interpretation. In Suzuki’s case, we might ask whether truth acquires its illumination—


{{tpage|328|original|IH61ZKA}}

—and power precisely when it is spoken at a time when speaking it is both necessary and difficult. Nevertheless, judging from what we have before us, we cannot avoid concluding that Suzuki’s interpretation is the one that truly brings the meaning of Kegon thought to life in contemporary Japan.

In Takakusu’s and Suzuki’s interpretations, the position of the emperor differs in the way represented by the two diagrams discussed above. At the same time, this difference in position may also reflect a difference in the position of Vairocana Buddha, the prototype of the emperor’s position.

In Takakusu’s account, we find the following statement:

“In Kegon terms, the great Vairocana Buddha at the centre is active. All the attendant beings of the outer Vajra circle are active as well. The great mandala of the total mobilisation of principal and companion is manifested. This is the phenomenal manifestation of the dependent origination of the Kegon dharma-realm—the manifestation of the true dharma-realm.” (pp. 251–252)

Suzuki, on the other hand, argues:

“When the original form of Japan’s national polity is understood in this way, the sequence of ideas suggested by expressions such as ‘the benevolence of the sovereign’ and ‘the light of the imperial reign’ acquires a different meaning from that traditionally attached to them. ‘Benevolence’ will no longer be associated with power, but will instead become something characterised by reciprocity. Nor will ‘light’ be something that shines only from above. Rather, it will signify the reciprocal illumination of the original light possessed by each individual.” (p. 164)

Yet neither account clarifies the most fundamental issue: the internal and logical relationship between Vairocana Buddha and the emperor (in Suzuki’s case, the emperor understood as a human being).

Since Takakusu asserts government through the Imperial Way while refusing to recognise government through the Buddhist Way, he must explain what logic he adopts in relation to the doctrine of original ground and manifest traces (honji suijaku 本地垂迹).

Suzuki speaks of the “benevolence of the sovereign,” meaning the emperor’s benevolence. But what, concretely, does that benevolence signify? Similarly, when he says that “light” does not come only from above, what exactly is the “light that comes from above”? Is there still an “above” within Suzuki’s dharma-realm mandala? If so, what does that position represent? Is it a position above others occupied by the emperor as a human being? These questions remain unanswered.

Suzuki maintains that his dharma-realm possesses universality. But can a logic and an ethics that permanently place a single human being belonging to one particular hereditary lineage at the centre of the world genuinely claim universality?

“Blood,” as something irrational and contingent,


{{tpage|329|original|IH61ZKA}}

—can it be assigned a particular cosmic and ethical significance from the standpoint of the Buddhist Dharma, or indeed from the standpoint of universal ethics?

Suzuki writes: “The unbroken imperial line will become something for which we should stake our lives when it is understood in the following way: the perpetuity of the imperial lineage symbolises the perpetuity of the ideals cherished by the Japanese people.” (p. 165)

The “ideals” mentioned here presumably refer to what Suzuki calls the “construction of a spiritual Japan.”

Leaving aside for the moment the question of who actually risked their lives to reject imperialist Japan and construct a spiritual Japan, why should the perpetuity of these ideals require a particular human being belonging to a particular hereditary lineage? What would happen if that individual, exercising their fundamental human rights, refused to serve as such a symbol? And what should peoples without such a symbol do?

Even if the emperor occupied the position proposed by Suzuki, so long as the unbroken hereditary imperial line is recognised—that is, so long as some form of the emperor system is recognised—and so long as universality is claimed for this system, does its logic not contain the possibility of developing into a new version of the doctrine of “eight corners of the world under one roof” (hakkō ichiu 八紘一宇)?

If the logic of Kegon’s dependent origination of the dharma-realm were pursued consistently, carrying Suzuki’s interpretation to its ultimate conclusion beyond Takakusu’s, would not even a “democratic” emperor system headed by a human emperor lose its logical foundation? And would not the very structure of meaning represented in Suzuki’s second diagram consequently undergo a fundamental transformation?

Nevertheless, despite these questions, Suzuki’s interpretation emphasises “the value of the individual as a morally free person, as a spiritual existence, and as an independently autonomous being who cannot be reduced to an antlike mass under the vague designation of ‘totalitarianism’” (p. 142).

Suzuki also rejects the principle of domination through force:

“There should be no power standing outside the dharma-realm. To suppose that an organisation cannot be sustained without such power is to fail to recognise the irrationality of seeking it outside itself. The dharma-realm is already a complete organisation in itself. The power that organises it is originally inherent within the organisation itself. When this power is sought outside, what exists within becomes distorted and is diverted in an unintended direction. […]”


{{tpage|330|original|IH61ZKA}}

“—The construction of a spiritual Japanese state must not take power as its fundamental principle. It must be a faithful reflection in our actual lives of the realm in which all phenomena are mutually non-obstructing.” (pp. 153–154)

Let us pay particular attention to Suzuki’s observation that the dharma-realm is already a complete organisation and that the power necessary to organise it is inherent within the organisation itself.

This recalls the anarchist idea of free association. Viewed politically, it may be understood as suggesting anarchism as the form of a new human society embodying the Kegon world of the dependent origination of the dharma-realm.

The Kegon dharma-realm, grounded in the rejection of both the principle of coercive power and the principle of private ownership, may be described as a world of Buddhist Anarchist Communism (B.A.C.)—although Suzuki, it seems to me, has never addressed the question of private ownership.<ref group="Editorial" name="E7">Buddhist Anarchist Communism. Ichikawa proposes Buddhist Anarchist Communism (B.A.C.) as one possible political expression of Kegon interdependence, combining resistance to coercive external authority with opposition to private appropriation. Although Suzuki’s self-organising dharma-realm suggests anarchist free association, Ichikawa explicitly observes that Suzuki does not address private ownership. B.A.C. is therefore Ichikawa’s extension, not Suzuki’s own political programme.</ref>

Proudhon (1809–1865), who envisaged the perfected form of society as a “unity of order and anarchy,” proposed a conception that, at least in this respect, may be applied directly to Kegon’s Lotus Treasury World (renge zō sekai 蓮華蔵世界).

The traditional position of Japanese Zen was that State Shinto and the Buddha-Dharma were fundamentally one. The Edo-period Zen master Tōrei Enji 東嶺円慈 (1721–1792) explained it as follows:

“Fundamentally, ‘kami’ means mind. When the impurities of the mind have been completely extinguished and it becomes as clear as a mirror, this is called kami. Thus, the Way of the kami takes the mirror as the representation of its essential nature.

“The mirror of the mind is originally pure, eternally abiding, and serenely still: this is called Kuni-no-Tokotachi-no-Mikoto 国常立尊. The mirror of the mind is originally perfectly luminous, and there is nothing that it does not reveal: this is called Amaterasu Ōmikami 天照大神. […]

“One should understand that the Way of the kami and the Buddha-Dharma share the same underlying principle. They are nothing other than the single Dharma of seeing one’s nature.”

The same position was held by Tōrei’s teacher, Hakuin Ekaku 白隠慧鶴 (1685–1768). The Meiji-period Zen master Imakita Kōsen 今北洪川 (1816–1892) likewise expressed this understanding:

“In our country there is the Way of imperial sovereignty. This is the great Way of the ancestral deity and the true teaching of rulers. Its transmission has continued from the distant past, with the imperial descendants forming a single unbroken lineage, into which no other family has entered. […]

“This is what makes our imperial Way uniquely distinguished among all the nations of the world.”


{{tpage|331|original|IH61ZKA}}

—A true man of our imperial nation must first establish firmly within himself the pillar of the Japanese spirit, which neither fire can burn nor water drown. Once he has suddenly penetrated through to realisation, there will be nothing deficient in his ability to judge and uphold the Imperial Way.

Tōrei’s interpretation lacks any logic capable of grounding, from the standpoint of the Buddha-Dharma, the unbroken imperial lineage that constitutes the core of State Shinto. It remains entirely unclear how the fundamental Buddhist principle that “all conditioned things are impermanent” (shogyō mujō 諸行無常) could be reconciled with Shinto’s assertion that the imperial throne will endure as long as heaven and earth. The same applies to Imakita Kōsen. Indeed, among Japanese Zen masters from Kokan Shiren (1278–1346), Hakuin, and Tenkei Denson (1648–1735) down to the present, the most fundamental questions have been almost entirely neglected. How can the kami of Shinto be identical with the fundamental subject of human existence? How can a hereditary lineage be identical with a divine lineage? And how can a religious tradition that, through monastic renunciation, takes the discontinuation of hereditary descent as a principle provide a Zen Buddhist justification for the continuity of that very descent? Hakuin, Tōrei, and virtually every other Zen practitioner have revealed a fatal weakness of vision in their understanding of Shinto.<ref group="Editorial" name="E8">Zen and the imperial lineage. Ichikawa contrasts impermanence (shogyō mujō 諸行無常) with claims about the eternal imperial lineage. His objection is to making a particular hereditary institution a necessary expression of Zen insight.</ref>

There is no relationship whatsoever between the eternity of Zen truth and the political and supposedly “ethical” continuity of a particular bloodline. No logic exists by which the unbroken imperial lineage—a survival from the customs of ancient peoples—can be justified from the standpoint of the Buddha-Dharma or Zen. Above all, the Imperial Way Zen that emerged after the Meiji Restoration represents the most extreme decadence of Zen. The only possible support for the forced identification of hereditary continuity with moral continuity seems to lie in the doctrine of karmic causation across the three times, as found in Hakuin’s “Song of Giving” (Segyōka 施行歌). Yet even this doctrine cannot establish such an identification. It can do no more than explain differences of social status and circumstances in the present life. Moreover, the doctrine itself can scarcely withstand modern criticism.

On the dignity of humanity, the poet Walt Whitman (1819–1892) wrote: “There can be no god more sacred than yourself. And this is what the oldest and the newest myths alike ultimately mean.” (“Laws for Creation”)

Proudhon, writing of human sovereignty, declared, “Every citizen is king.”

Yet to identify Amaterasu Ōmikami with the fundamental subject of human existence, as Japanese Zen has done, is ultimately to negate State Shinto—


{{tpage|332|original|IH61ZKA}}

—and to deny any necessary, intrinsic connection between Zen and the Japanese national polity, or between Zen and the emperor system.

Does not the fact that Japanese Zen practitioners have failed to recognise and openly acknowledge this conclusion demonstrate that their Zen thinking has remained insufficiently thoroughgoing, and that they have not genuinely achieved the condition of being “independently liberated, dependent upon nothing” (dokudatsu mu’e 独脱無依; Record of Linji, Rinzairoku 臨済録)?

The Christian existentialist philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev (1874–1948), who advocated religious libertarian communism, was described by the philosopher Heinemann as a “mystical anarchist.” The French philosopher Simone Weil (1909–1943), who took an interest in Eastern thought, especially Zen, and criticised Christian theology, was an anarchist who participated in the Spanish Civil War.

In my view, the social philosophy of Zen may be described as Prajñā–Śūnyatā Anarchist Communism—an anarchist communism of wisdom (hannya 般若) and emptiness (kū 空). (See my book Hannyakyō 般若経, published by San’ichi Shobō.)

<span id="section4"></span>
=== IV ===

Why is it that Western religious anarchists have resisted state power—Berdyaev, for example, became a communist under imperial Russia and was imprisoned—whereas not only do we find almost no comparable examples in Zen or Kegon Buddhism, but examples of precisely the opposite tendency are overwhelmingly numerous? Let us consider two or three circumstances that may help explain this situation.

The first is the obscuring of the difference in level between the world of experiential reality and the world of ordinary empirical experience, between the world of selfless intuitive action and the actual world of the empirical individual ego. This produces a “mixture or confusion of two worlds of reality.” The realm of the non-obstruction of phenomena (jiji muge no sekai 事々無礙の世界) belongs to the reality disclosed in the experience of prajñā. Yet this realm readily overlaps and merges with the ordinary world of empirical facts, so that the tension arising from the discontinuity between the two is never firmly established. We may recall that Nishida, the author of An Inquiry into the Good (Zen no kenkyū 善の研究), acknowledged in replying to Takahashi Satomi’s criticism that he had failed to recognise a qualitative distinction between pure experience and impure experience—


{{tpage|333|original|IH61ZKA}}

—a point that has important implications for both Zen studies and Buddhist studies. [Reference 14]

The circumstances described above are connected with the fact that Buddhist practitioners have traditionally placed the emphasis of their religious training upon the attainment of peace of mind. As Nishida wrote in his diary, “Do not run after the peripheral matters of scholarship and forget the foundation of peace of mind.” Consequently, the culmination of their practice tends toward an attitude of being at home wherever one finds oneself—expressed in the saying, “Wherever one lives becomes home.” To that extent, there is a psychological tendency to beautify and rationalise the circumstances of each particular moment. Moreover, the subject of prajñā intuition is characterised as something that reflects and receives, as suggested by expressions such as “ocean-seal samādhi” (kaiin zanmai 海印三昧), “precious-mirror samādhi” (hōkyō zanmai 宝鏡三昧), and the “place of absolute nothingness” (zettai mu no basho 絶対無の場所). This characteristic corresponds to the orientation toward peace of mind described above. Even before a sustained determination to transform the surrounding environment can emerge, the practitioner has already entered the contemplative enjoyment of things. The fact that the East, characterised by what has been called “Asiatic stagnation,” has excelled in the arts of cultivation, and that much of “Zen culture” has taken an artistic form, is connected with this tendency. It is interesting that archery and martial techniques, originally intended for combat against enemies, became in times of peace the disciplines of kyūdō 弓道 and budō 武道, directed toward confronting oneself, and were subsequently internalised, intellectualised, systematised, and transformed into forms of contemplation. Everything associated with the “Way” (dō 道) has a contemplative character. In other words, it finds a place of repose within the framework of established social conventions and institutions. Affluent Buddhist practitioners enjoying leisure in periods of social stability could readily immerse themselves in the contemplative world of Kegon. Anxious Buddhists living through periods of crisis likewise entered this world of contemplation in search of peace of mind. In such a world, empirical historical reality becomes veiled by the harmonious non-obstruction of all phenomena. It is beautified and, in proportion to this beautification, accepted and rationalised.

All phenomena in the world are said to appear within ocean-seal samādhi, mutually interpenetrating in infinitely overlapping relationships. In my view, the Lotus Treasury World (renge zō sekai 蓮華蔵世界) described in the Avataṃsaka Sūtra (Kegongyō 華厳経) is both a realm of reality disclosed through the active intuition of prajñā and a visionary world constituted through creative imagination around that experience. Here, however, harmonious non-obstruction refers to the actual activities of practitioners living within the rigid framework of caste society, together with the mutually non-obstructing phenomena of their visionary world. It does not mean that the raw, living reality inhabited by the masses is itself a world of harmonious—<ref group="Editorial" name="E9">Ocean-seal samādhi. Ocean-seal samādhi (kaiin zanmai 海印三昧) evokes a comprehensive religious vision in Kegon thought. Ichikawa cautions against treating the harmony experienced or imagined in such a state as already realised in historically unequal or conflictual societies.</ref>


{{tpage|334|original|IH61ZKA}}

—non-obstruction. Within ocean-seal samādhi, three layers of reality must surely appear: the mutually non-obstructing facts of the practitioner’s immediate activity, the harmonious interpenetration of phenomena within an intuitive vision, and the dark reality of conflict and contradiction. It would be a mistake to paint over this three-dimensional world with a single, flat colour of harmonious non-obstruction.

In contrast, we may recall the following words of Herbert Read (1893–1968): “Religion is closely connected with art (poetry). […] During the Spanish Civil War, observers were struck by the religious fervour of the anarchists. In that country of a latent renaissance, anarchism inspired not only heroes but saints—new kinds of people who devoted their lives, through sensuous imagination and practical action, to creating a new form of human society.”

The following criticism may be applied to the misguided realism that results from confusing worlds belonging to different levels of experience:

“It is clear that Fazang’s Kegon philosophy—its doctrine of the harmonious interpenetration of phenomena and of the absoluteness of phenomena mutually non-obstructing—expresses a truth that can be realised only through the fundamental intuition of ocean-seal samādhi, understood through the doctrine of the arising of phenomena from their true nature (shōki 性起). “When this becomes merely an intellectual doctrine, however, it denies the mediation of practice and turns into a facile, absolutist worldview. […] “The doctrine of the harmonious interpenetration of phenomena certainly does not mean simply accepting the ‘things’ of existing reality as they are and asserting their harmony. Genuine non-obstruction among phenomena unfolds upon the foundation of religious intuition. […] “The Kegon system is a religious worldview manifested through ocean-seal samādhi. If this is forgotten, and the ‘things’ of empirical reality are accepted merely as they appear to the discriminating consciousness of ordinary people, and their harmony is then proclaimed, the result is an entirely different philosophy. “Phenomena are absolute because each constitutes part of the Lotus Treasury World. To ignore this and claim that every phenomenon possesses absolute significance amounts to affirming existing reality just as it stands. One misstep, and this becomes an unconditional affirmation of existing structures of domination and social organisation. “A philosophy of absolute affirmation can thereby become a philosophy in the service of rulers who sanction existing reality as it is.” (Kamata Shigeo 鎌田茂雄)


{{tpage|335|original|IH61ZKA}}

This criticism may be said to identify correctly the errors and pathologies into which Kegon thought, and indeed Mahāyāna Buddhism more generally, have been liable to fall, and into which they have frequently fallen in practice—as, for example, in the cases of Sengzhao (384–414) and Dahui (1089–1163).

The criticism emphasises the distinction between the realm of religious experience and that of ordinary empirical experience, insisting that the latter must be purified “through the practice of the bodhisattva path and vows grounded in compassion.” In this respect, it overcomes the vulgarism characteristic of Takakusu’s interpretation and, together with Suzuki’s view cited within it, rests upon an orthodox doctrinal foundation. This position might be described as a shift from the contemplative tendency found in Fazang toward the experiential orientation of Chengguan (737–839), accompanied by an emphasis on religious instruction and propagation grounded in that experience.

The Kegon world of the non-obstruction of phenomena is the joint product of experience and vision. It belongs to a dimension altogether different from the sphere of action in which the structural contradictions of actual class society are grasped, analysed, and practically overcome. Indeed, it is a world that can exist only within that particular dimension. It possesses neither the foundation nor the logic necessary to generate objective practice capable of overcoming the fundamental structural contradictions of the world in which we live. In this respect, there is no essential difference between Fazang and Chengguan. Even if this philosophy does not affirm mere facts or empirical reality as they stand, but instead rejects them as false and illusory, such rejection occurs entirely within subjective consciousness. It does not occur within the sphere of objective, transformative practice. Consequently, in actual historical circumstances, it amounts to a “doctrine of double truth” that affirms the existing order. There is therefore nothing surprising about Buddhists who consciously distinguish the world of prajñā experience from ordinary empirical reality nevertheless acting, in practice, as defenders of the established social system.

<span id="section5"></span>
=== V ===

When Kegon thought attempts to formulate a social ethics within the actual world without overcoming the traditional characteristics and limitations examined above—


{{tpage|336|original|IH61ZKA}}

—that is, when it constructs morality through the logic of mutual identity (sōsoku 相即) and the dependent-origination logic of mutual dependence and interrelationship (sōi sōkan 相依相関), expressed in propositions such as “The principal is principal in relation to the companion, and the companion is companion in relation to the principal,” or “Mind is mind in relation to matter, and matter is matter in relation to mind”—the result will be an ethics of concord, harmony, and paternalistic benevolence.

“Without capital there can be no enterprise, and without enterprise there can be no labour. At the same time, without labour there can be no enterprise, and without enterprise there can be no capital. The joint activity of capital and labour is precisely what constitutes industry. […] If those who provide wages deserve respect, then those who provide labour deserve equal respect. Indeed, neither party is simply giving something to the other; rather, industry consists of capital and labour being brought together.” (Shibusawa Eiichi) <sup>[19]</sup>

The morality of cooperation between capital and labour expressed by this industrial capitalist is presented by a Zen practitioner in the following manner:

“If one understands that self and other are originally nondual, there should be no difficulty whatsoever. Labour is the capitalist’s capital, and capital is the labourer’s labour. How, then, could conflict possibly arise?” (Iida Tōin) <sup>[20]</sup>

The morality of harmony can also become a morality of war. A Kegon scholar writes:

“In times of peace, the understanding of dependent origination provides a foundation for harmonious relations, through the recognition of the profound karmic connections that bind people inseparably together. But in times of emergency, it also manifests itself as a spirit of fearless, unobstructed struggle, enabling Japanese citizens to fulfil their responsibilities in their respective positions.” (Kamekawa Kyōshin) <sup>[21]</sup>

“When every single member of the nation, embraced within the august imperial authority, rises with this sense of the completeness of principal and companion, the hundred million people are no longer limited to merely a hundred million. Rather, the hundred million simultaneously manifest a power multiplied a hundred millionfold.” (Ibid.)

According to this Kegon scholar, it is only through the conception of the state arising from Japanese national consciousness that the relationship between the individual and the whole can truly be perceived in its proper form, through the practical apprehension of inexhaustible dependent origination expressed as “one is all, and all is one.” <sup>[22]</sup> Yet this very logic has found concrete expression in postwar Japan in the workers’ handbook, or “Mirror,” of Ōmi Kenshi, and has continued to produce results as a morality of worker training developed through cooperation between industrial capital and Zen. The Japan Federation of Economic Organizations (Keidanren 経団連)


{{tpage|337|original|IH61ZKA}}

—supported the establishment of a Zen training centre where a recent roundtable entitled “Zen and Business” discussed the adjustment of human relations through Zen, the rationalisation of business management, and measures concerning labour. Among the statements recorded in that discussion were the following:<ref group="Editorial" name="E10">Corporate Zen and industrial relations. Ichikawa refers to Zen training supported by business interests and a roundtable on “Zen and Business,” criticising the use of self-cultivation and harmony to promote managerial efficiency while leaving labour–capital inequalities intact. His printed references 23 and 35 both identify issue 70 of the journal Zen 禅 (1961) but assign different months; this discrepancy has not yet been resolved.</ref>

“Our most important policy, as our managing director has just explained, is first of all to bring about a complete change in the attitudes associated with student life. We want participants to examine themselves, their membership in the company, and the relationship between the individual within the company as a whole and the whole constituted through individuals. We want them to analyse themselves and then begin working with a renewed consciousness of themselves as members of the company. This is our most fundamental policy.” <sup>[23]</sup>

“We received some questionnaire responses saying that, although participants had expected the monks’ talks at the Zen temple to be thoroughly religious and solemn, they found them quite approachable—even including discussions of attitudes toward romantic love—and therefore very pleasant to listen to. […] If possible, we would appreciate talks that include a little of this sort of romantic interest, since they seem to be very well received.”

What I wish to address here is Kamekawa’s interpretation of the “completeness of principal and companion” (shuhan gusoku 主伴具足), which is essentially the same as Takakusu’s interpretation. In this case, the relationship running from principal to companion is thoroughly one-directional and extremely concrete in its historical reality, since it provides a foundation for imperial absolutism under the Meiji Constitution. By contrast, the possibility of the companion becoming principal remains merely conceptual. In other words, this suggests that the logic of the completeness of principal and companion should not be applied to class society. In Kamekawa’s interpretation, principal and companion cannot genuinely be said to possess complete and perfect reciprocity. Even Fazang himself, who originally formulated this logic, probably did not entirely escape this danger. Kamata, in the essay discussed earlier, also takes up this problem and warns against confusing the reality of religious experience with empirical reality. Yet, as I have already pointed out, this criticism amounts to a “doctrine of double truth,” in which existing reality is denied at the level of consciousness but accepted in actual practice. An anarchist-communist society would surely provide the best expression of the complete illumination and mutual fulfilment of principal and companion.


{{tpage|338|original|IH61ZKA}}

<span id="section6"></span>
=== VI ===

There is a saying, “Kill the Buddha and kill the patriarchs” (Unmonroku 雲門録). Perhaps no tradition is as thoroughgoing as Zen in refusing to recognise externally imposed authority. The Tang-dynasty Zen master Linji Yixuan (Rinzai Gigen 臨済義玄, d. 867) emphasised the freedom of the “true person of no rank,” who “becomes master wherever one stands” and is “independently liberated, dependent on nothing.” It was in the spirit of such freedom that Danxia Tianran (Tanka Tennen 丹霞天然, 739–824) burned a Buddha image and Deshan Xuanjian (Tokusan Senkan 徳山宣鑑, 782–865) burned Buddhist scriptures. Zhaozhou Congshen (Jōshū Jūshin 趙州従諗, 778–897) declared, “I do not delight in hearing even the single word ‘Buddha.’” A king once visited Zhaozhou accompanied by his retainers, but Zhaozhou did not descend from his seat to welcome him. The following day, when the king sent an official to convey his thanks for the previous day’s reception, Zhaozhou descended from his seat and received the visitor’s greeting. When his disciples later asked why he had acted differently, Zhaozhou replied: “You would not understand. When a person of the highest rank comes, I receive him upon my meditation seat. When a person of middling rank comes, I descend from my seat to receive him. When a person of the lowest rank comes, I go outside the monastery gate to receive him. This is the custom of my house.” <sup>[24]</sup>

As suggested by the passage, “In the Western realm there is a land called Peace and Nourishment. […] There is no system of kingship there, nor any hierarchy of official ranks,” <sup>[25]</sup> the future society envisioned by Buddhists may be understood as a world of anarchist communism. Kropotkin (1842–1921)<ref group="Editorial" name="E11">Common ownership and Kropotkin. Kropotkin’s account of wealth as the accumulated product of countless people’s labour supports Ichikawa’s criticism of exclusive appropriation. Ichikawa connects this to Buddhist language about goods belonging to the wider community, but also acknowledges traditions recognising royal ownership. Buddhist ownership terminology in the Japanese text requires final source-level verification.</ref> argued that our cultural achievements and the material necessities of life are the fruits of the labour of countless people extending back into the distant past. Consequently, none of us has grounds for calling them “my own.” <sup>[26]</sup> Buddhists likewise understood these things as products of the endlessly interwoven activities of sentient beings: they are originally “property of the four quarters” (shihōmotsu 四方物), belonging to all sentient beings, and do not admit the possessive designation “mine” (mama-kāra). <sup>[27]</sup> (Nevertheless, texts such as the Brahmā’s Net Bodhisattva Precepts Sūtra already contain the notion of “property of the king.”)

The problems Buddhism must confront today in order to develop a social ethics or an ethics for the world are approximately as follows:


{{tpage|339|original|IH61ZKA}}

First, there is the problem of bringing together the recovery of Buddhism’s supranational character and the recovery of nationalism. In the expression “protection of the nation” (chingo kokka 鎮護国家), “nation” originally referred to the royal household, the territory, and the people, but its principal concern was the emperor. (In China, too, the term “state” (kokka 国家) could signify the Son of Heaven or the imperial court.) Consider, for example, the “Ten Secret Rites for the Protection of the Nation” (Chingo kokka no jikka hihō 鎮護国家の十箇秘法) in Japanese Tendai Buddhism. The majority concern the emperor personally, including rites for imperial enthronement, prayers concerning the emperor’s life, and precepts conferred for safe childbirth within the imperial household. In any event, because Buddhism was associated with state power from the earliest period of its development, it tended to lack a critical analysis and examination of the essential nature of political power. There was, of course, an intention to educate sovereigns so that they might govern benevolently, and this intention sometimes achieved positive results. Nevertheless, considerable suspicion of kings also existed. We find statements such as, “A monk should approach a king as though approaching a servant-master relationship” (Saddharma-smṛtyupasthāna Sūtra, Shōbōnenkyō 正法念経), and “Kings constantly increase taxation and arbitrarily punish people who have committed no offence. […] Though they see people suffering poverty and distress, they never give rise to compassion. They indulge in women without fearing the evil destinies” (Tang translation of the Avataṃsaka Sūtra, Kegongyō 華厳経).

As in early Buddhism, Buddhist scriptures often regarded kings as people who inflicted harm upon the population. Kings were therefore placed alongside thieves and robbers, and among the misfortunes suffered by ordinary people—calamities of flood and fire, robbery, and wicked persons—there was also the “calamity of the king.” <sup>[30]</sup>

We must discover a logic capable of bringing together a recognition of the evils of the state with the recovery of a legitimate nationalism, understood, for example, in terms of national independence and cooperation among peoples. In connection with this problem, we must also investigate how to reconcile the contradiction between spiritual freedom, expressed in the Record of Linji as “remaining unstained by birth and death, free to come and go” (shōji ni somazu kyojū jiyū 生死に染まず去住自由), and political and social freedom. “Without religion, the state could not exist,” declared Mikhail Bakunin (1814–1876). <sup>[31]</sup> Yet religion can exist without the state—although whether Zen should properly be called a “religion” is itself open to question. We have already seen how modern Japanese Zen was distorted by the state power of the emperor system.


{{tpage|340|original|IH61ZKA}}

In considering the relationship between Buddhism and the state, the next question is that of class. Marx wrote: “The ideas of the ruling class are the ruling ideas in every age. The class that constitutes the dominant material power in society is at the same time its dominant intellectual power. The class that controls the means of material production also controls the means of intellectual production. Consequently, the ideas of those who lack access to the means of intellectual production are, in general, subordinated to that class.” <sup>[32]</sup> It hardly needs explaining that the ideology of modern Japanese Zen was no exception to this general principle. Even in the process of conversion from a Japanese Zen bound by nationality under imperial Japan to a cosmopolitan Zen without national affiliation in a “cultural Japan,” this principle may have been operating to some degree. Dr. Hisamatsu Shin’ichi 久松真一, a Zen thinker internationally renowned alongside Suzuki Daisetsu, has discussed the crisis confronting the present age and the problem of world ethics. In the murderous development of atomic physics, he sees a crisis of humanism itself. He points to the unprecedented disparity between the extraordinary advances of science and the failure of morality to keep pace, insisting upon the need to strengthen our ethical capacities in order to correct this imbalance. Moreover, he maintains that such ethical capacities must not be based upon the egoism of particular nations, blocs of nations, classes, or ideologies. He therefore urges the immediate establishment of a new world ethics. <sup>[33]</sup> This is certainly a valuable suggestion. Yet, when we reconsider the matter, is the disparity between science and ethics really a crisis of humanism or an impasse in human civilisation? The overwhelming majority of the world’s peoples, together with the majority of conscientious scientists, have repeatedly protested and resisted the murderous application of atomic power. They are not in the least guilty of ideological bias. Indeed, it is precisely this vast popular struggle for peace that has prevented a revolutionary rupture between science and morality. Those who are biased, those who expose the crisis of humanism, are none other than the “merchants of death” of monopoly capital.

How, then, does the F.A.S. Zen movement centred on Dr. Hisamatsu deal with the standpoint of class in its vow to “create superhistorical history”? <sup>[34]</sup> Are the wisdom and power involved in this historical creation like distilled water—<ref group="Editorial" name="E12">F.A.S. Zen. Associated with Hisamatsu Shin’ichi, F.A.S. refers to Formless Self, All Humankind, and Suprahistorical History. It seeks to unite awakening with universal ethical action. Ichikawa welcomes its aspirations but questions whether a standpoint claiming to transcend class and national divisions adequately addresses the material interests and historical antagonisms shaping social life.</ref>


{{tpage|341|original|IH61ZKA}}

—colourless and transparent? How would its social ethics differ from the social ethics of Moral Re-Armament (M.R.A.), which grounds itself in an Absolute?<ref group="Editorial" name="E13">Moral Re-Armament. Moral Re-Armament (M.R.A.) was an international moral and spiritual renewal movement. Ichikawa invokes it as a comparison when questioning whether a purportedly class-neutral universal ethics can engage specific structures of economic power. This is a comparative reference, distinct from his criticism of F.A.S. Zen.</ref> “I can promise to be fair, but I cannot promise to be impartial,” wrote Goethe. (Ichikawa’s note: In this connection, I would draw attention to the system being developed by the materialist Umemoto Katsumi, who, in contrast to Nishida philosophy’s “active intuition” (kōiteki chokkan 行為的直観), is working out a logic of “practical intuition” (jissenteki chokkan 実践的直観) grounded in class consciousness.)

The problem of class is connected with the problem of human self-alienation, particularly alienation in labour. Unless Buddhism confronts this problem directly, it will be unable to develop a contemporary social ethics. This necessarily requires Buddhists to incorporate the standpoint of wage labourers into their own thinking. In other words, they must consciously adopt the standpoint of workers—human beings treated as commodities.

“Alienated labour alienates (1) nature from humanity, and (2) human beings from themselves, from their own active functions and life-activity. In doing so, it alienates humanity from its species-being. […] The immediate consequence of the alienation of human beings from the products of their labour, their life-activity, and their species-being is the alienation of human beings from one another—die Entfremdung des Menschen von dem Menschen.” <sup>[34]</sup>

Under capitalism, even human beings become commodities. The education of young men and women amounts to investing capital in their bodies, while young people must devote themselves to the problem of how to sell themselves in the “personality market.” This is an education and morality grounded in the commodity economy, expressed through the language of adjustment and human relations. Expressions such as “human resources,” “human dock” [medical checkups], and the “Zen boom” are profoundly revealing. Someone remarked: “At the entrance there was a sign saying, ‘Look beneath your feet.’ That is the first priority. I believe this is how sound enterprises will emerge. From the standpoint of the business community, this is a cheap investment. Something like this will come back with a ten-thousandfold return.” <sup>[35]</sup>


{{tpage|342|original|IH61ZKA}}

“Prostitution is only a particular expression of the general prostitution of the worker—allgemeine Prostitution des Arbeiters. And since prostitution constitutes a relationship that includes not only the prostitute but also the other party, whose baseness is even greater, capitalists too belong to this category.” <sup>[36]</sup>

I distinguish this kind of human self-alienation<ref group="Editorial" name="E14">Horizontal and vertical alienation. Ichikawa distinguishes social and economic “horizontal alienation” from existential or religious “vertical estrangement.” Drawing on Marx’s account of alienated labour, he insists that the Buddhist encounter with suffering must also address historically specific exploitation. The two dimensions are related but not reducible to one another.</ref>, which I call horizontal alienation, from existential and religious self-alienation, or vertical estrangement. Horizontal alienation will never be overcome by the class that enjoys it as something comfortable, but only by the class that has no choice but to experience it as suffering. (This follows the same logic and psychology as the Buddhist overcoming of vertical estrangement, which begins with the contemplation of suffering.) To adopt the standpoint of wage labourers treated as commodities, and to resolve to overcome human self-alienation in labour—which is simultaneously self-alienation in capital—is precisely to adopt a standpoint of class consciousness. A merely abstract affirmation of humanity, incapable of understanding class consciousness as anything other than class egoism, misses the fundamental problem. The claim that human self-alienation can genuinely be overcome only from the standpoint of a universal human ethics—without uniting the opposing standpoints of class and humanity—rests upon the illusion that those who comfortably enjoy alienation might suddenly awaken one morning and collectively recognise it as suffering. The genuinely practical path toward overcoming alienation must instead begin by abandoning this facile sentimentalism, adopting the standpoint of those who experience alienation as suffering, and apprehending historical reality as it actually exists. This means grasping historical reality from a standpoint that unites objectivity and partisanship.

“What is at issue here is a confession, and nothing more. For humanity to have its sins forgiven, it need only proclaim those sins publicly, precisely as they actually are.” <sup>[37]</sup>


{{tpage|343|original|IH61ZKA}}

“To proclaim those sins publicly, precisely as they actually are<ref group="Editorial" name="E15">Marx’s commodity analysis and practical intuition. Ichikawa compares Marx’s method in Capital with Nishida’s “active intuition” (kōiteki chokkan 行為的直観) and suggests a historically grounded “practical intuition” (jissenteki chokkan 実践的直観). His comparison is methodological, not an equation of Nishida’s philosophy with Marx’s critique of political economy. He insists that changing social relations cannot be replaced by inwardly “emptying” an object.</ref>”—was this not what Marx accomplished through his analysis of the commodity in Capital? And might this not be the concrete content, within the field of economics, of Dōgen’s expression “to be verified by all things”? Beginning with labour-power as a commodity, one arrives, by abstracting from its capitalist determinations, at the commodity itself (the downward movement). Through scientific investigation of this commodity, one then clarifies how its inherent self-contradiction constitutes the elementary form of the class contradictions of capitalist society (the upward movement). Might not the disclosure of this circular process—understood, moreover, as an “open system” <sup>[38]</sup>—through practical intuition constitute the social-scientific content of Nishida philosophy’s method of “becoming a thing in order to see, and becoming a thing in order to think”?’

Today, we human beings—and Buddhist practitioners themselves—live within and are sustained by a commodity-economic society, a “world of prostitution.” This entire condition is what is meant by the “falsity of the secular world” (seken koke 世間虚仮), a world of falsehood and empty words.

Karl Löwith (1897–1973) gives an illuminating account of how even Kierkegaard, Marx’s philosophical antipode, demonstrated through the circumstances of his own life the validity of Marx’s insight into the relationship between capital and labour. <sup>[39]</sup> On the other hand, when we attempt to realise objectively the mutual non-obstruction of phenomena (jiji muge 事々無礙) within an intersubjective society, we will surely have much to learn from Kropotkin’s persuasive criticisms concerning the limits of the philosophy of dependent origination. <sup>[40]</sup>

What makes us conscious of the falsity of the secular world in this aspect, and inspires us to resolve to overcome it, is historical truth—the Dharma (dharma ダルマ)—proper to this sphere. For the moment, I leave aside the objectifying-logical and metaphysical dimensions of alienation. Nevertheless, we must not neglect a rigorous criticism of attempts to “empty” the objectivity of an object rather than transforming the object itself. Here, it seems to me, lies the starting point for a dialectical relationship between social ethics and social science among Buddhists.

== Explanatory Notes ==
<references group="Editorial" />

== Source Note ==
Translated from Ichikawa Hakugen, “Zen, Kegon, anakizumu” 禅・華厳・アナキズム (1961), reprinted in ''Ichikawa Hakugen chosakushū'' 市川白弦著作集, vol. 3 (Kyoto: Hōzōkan, 1993), pp. 319–343; original source references occupy pp. 344–345. The original reference numbers are retained as superscript numerals, distinct from the translator’s explanatory notes. Suzuki Daisetsu’s two diagrams are reproduced from the scanned collected edition.

This is a working translation. Several quotations and Japanese readings require final collation; the original reference list has not yet been converted into linked footnotes. References 23 and 35 give inconsistent months for the same issue of Zen (1961).

== How to Cite this Text ==
<!-- AUTHORSHIP CHANGE LOG
Translation and annotation: Shields, James Mark.
-->
Ichikawa Hakugen (1961). “Zen, Kegon, and Anarchism” (''Zen, Kegon, anakizumu'' 禅・華厳・アナキズム). Translated and annotated by James Mark Shields. ''The Radical Buddhism Project''. Version of {{#time: j F Y | {{REVISIONYEAR}}-{{REVISIONMONTH}}-{{REVISIONDAY}} }}. <nowiki>http://radicalbuddhism.net/wiki/IH61ZKA-T</nowiki>.

[[Category:Ichikawa Hakugen]]
[[Category:English translations]]