Editing SG34BHU-T (section)

== III ==

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Buddhist faith finds its most appropriate form in “taking refuge in the Three Treasures.” Let us therefore seek the Buddhist ideal of peace through these Three Treasures.

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As for the Buddha Treasure, the personality of the Buddha and the course of his life were themselves models of peace—this is an undeniable fact. The Dharma Treasure, as I will explain below, likewise constitutes a coherent Buddhist teaching of peace that other religions cannot rival. Finally, the Sangha Treasure, the practical embodiment of this Buddhism, must provide the most appropriate model for the Buddhist peace movement.

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“Monk” (''sō'')—that is, Sangha (''sōgya'')—means a community or harmonious association. Today even one or two persons may be permitted to live the monastic life, but strictly speaking a Sangha required a communal life of four or more persons. Members of the Sangha shared their dwelling, begged for food together, distributed what they received equally, shared both suffering and happiness, yielded to one another and put an end to disputes, and devoted themselves in harmony to the practice of truth. Here the consciousness of “taking refuge in the Sangha Treasure” shines forth as the most concrete model for the peace movement. The Buddha included disrupting the harmony of the Sangha among the Five Heinous Offenses, for words and actions that destroy peace must be regarded as the source of all evil.<ref>The Sanskrit ''saṅgha'' (Japanese ''sōgya'' 僧伽; here translated “Sangha”) denotes the Buddhist monastic community; according to the Vinaya tradition, a fully constituted local Sangha normally required at least four monastics. “Creating a schism in the Sangha” (''saṃghabheda'') is traditionally counted among the Five Heinous Offenses, karmically grave acts said to entail immediate rebirth in hell.</ref>

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What, then, does the Dharma Treasure teach concerning the peace movement?

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As the Dharma Treasure, Buddhism possesses worldviews such as “suchness” (''shinnyo''), “dependent origination” (''engi''), and “no-self” (''muga''). “Suchness” offers guidance for the peace movement insofar as it sees the fundamental nature of all phenomena as equal and undifferentiated. “Dependent origination,” meanwhile, is a worldview that rejects all isolation and absoluteness: everything comes into being, develops, and passes away through relationships. It therefore permits neither self-righteousness nor exclusion. Individuals and society, nations and the world—all constitute a single interconnected living body, and this truth powerfully calls us toward the work of communal harmony.

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The same is true of “no-self.” The negation of the “self” is an awakening from the deluded and dogmatic blindness that disregards these relationships of dependent origination. A life of no-self must therefore mean nothing less than a communal-social peace movement.

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It was for this reason that the Buddha himself became a member of the Sangha and, from an early period, advocated the principle of “universal common ownership” (''shihō kyōyū'' 四方共有), working toward the construction of a communal society.<ref>Literally “common ownership of the four directions” (''shihō kyōyū'' 四方共有). The expression refers to the principle that monastic property belongs to the Sangha collectively rather than to an individual monk. Seno’o characteristically expands this monastic principle into a social and economic ideal of “universal common ownership.”</ref> It was for the same reason that he launched the great explosive charge of “equality of the four castes” (''shishō byōdō'' 四姓平等), thereby undertaking a movement to negate the class society of his age.<ref>“Equality of the four castes” (''shishō byōdō'' 四姓平等) refers to the Buddhist rejection of inherent spiritual distinctions among the four major social classes of ancient India—Brahmins, Kṣatriyas, Vaiśyas, and Śūdras. Early Buddhist texts repeatedly subordinate inherited status to conduct and karma. Seno’o radicalizes this principle into a Buddhist “movement to negate the class society” of the Buddha's age.</ref>

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Recognition of “no-self” and “dependent origination” as this relational worldview is further brought to life as each person reflects upon their own way of living. Thoughts of gratitude and service naturally well up, giving birth to Buddhism’s distinctive concept of “indebtedness” or “beneficence” (''on'') and bringing Mahāyāna Buddhism to maturity. From this emerged the great philosophy of the “Dharma realm of the unobstructed interpenetration of all phenomena” (''jiji muge hokkai'' 事事無礙法界);<ref>''Jiji muge hokkai'' (事事無礙法界), the “Dharma realm of the unobstructed interpenetration of all phenomena,” is the culminating vision of Huayan (Japanese Kegon) thought, in which every individual phenomenon exists through and interpenetrates every other without obstruction. Seno’o presents this classical Mahāyāna cosmology as the philosophical culmination of the relational worldview of dependent origination.</ref> and as crystallizations of the bodhisattva spirit expressed in the vow “I aspire to become a Buddha and immediately save all sentient beings,” there arose such great works as the ''Lotus Sutra'' and the ''Larger Sutra of Immeasurable Life''.<ref>The phrase 「我成仏して直ちに一切衆生を救はん」 (“If I attain Buddhahood, I shall immediately save all sentient beings”) is Seno’o's classical Japanese formulation of the fundamental bodhisattva vow (''praṇidhāna''). It closely echoes formulas in the Chinese ''Larger Sutra of Immeasurable Life'', including 「誓到菩提岸，度脫諸有情」 (“I vow to reach the shore of enlightenment and liberate all sentient beings”; T12, no. 360, 267c23) and the recurring opening of Dharmākara's forty-eight vows, 「設我得佛」 (“If I attain Buddhahood”; T12, no. 360, 268a6ff.).</ref> In these ways, Buddhism’s ideal of peace was raised to its fullest expression.

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The precept against taking life is another expression of this Buddhist ideal of peace. The movement of equality and harmony does not stop at equality among the various races of humanity. The concept of indebtedness joins with a recognition of the equal right to life of every living being, developing into a movement for the protection of living creatures. Pursued to its logical conclusion, this even led to the establishment of a precept against eating meat. Although such a precept may be impossible to practice under present conditions, it nevertheless demonstrates more than adequately the extent to which the Buddhist spirit is a spirit that loves peace.

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Yet, for all this, Buddhism also firmly contains a doctrine of the sword. Fudō Myōō, standing erect amid the roaring flames of the cosmic conflagration while holding his sword, is the archetypal symbol of Buddhism’s doctrine of the sword.<ref>Fudō Myōō (不動明王; Skt. Acala), one of the principal esoteric Buddhist “Wisdom Kings,” is conventionally depicted surrounded by flames and holding a sword that cuts through ignorance and delusion. Seno’o turns this iconographic symbol into the organizing image for what he calls Buddhism's “doctrine of the sword”—the exceptional use of force in the service of liberation.</ref> The Buddhism of the sword can be found in any number of scriptures, including the ''Nirvāṇa Sutra'', the ''Sutra for Humane Kings'', and the ''Sūtra Spoken by the Great Nirgrantha Satyaka''.<ref>Seno’o cites three scriptures containing materials relevant to Buddhist kingship, protection of the Dharma, and the permissible use of force: the ''Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra'' (涅槃経, ''Nehan-gyō''; T12, no. 374), the ''Sūtra for Humane Kings'' (仁王経, ''Ninnō-kyō''; T8, no. 245), and the ''Sūtra Spoken by the Great Nirgrantha Satyaka'' (大薩遮尼乾子所説経; T9, no. 272). The last is particularly concerned with kingship and the ethical exercise of political and military power.</ref> Nevertheless, particularly in Buddhism, the doctrine of the sword can be accepted only when its purpose is “to kill one so that many may live, and to liberate the masses” (''issatsu tashō taishū kaihō'' 一殺多生大衆解放).<ref>''Issatsu tashō'' (一殺多生), literally “killing one so that many may live,” expresses the paradoxical justification of killing when the death of one is understood to save many. Its ethical logic has Mahāyāna precedents in narratives of “compassionate killing,” most famously the story of the bodhisattva ship captain who kills a would-be murderer in the ''Upāyakauśalya Sūtra'', as well as in passages concerning armed defense of the Dharma in the ''Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra''. In modern Japan the formula acquired an explicitly political—and sometimes ultranationalist—resonance; most notoriously, Inoue Nisshō invoked ''issatsu tashō'' in connection with the Blood-Pledge Corps (''Ketsumeidan'') assassinations of 1932. Writing only two years later, Seno’o strikingly joins the expression to the socialist language of ''taishū kaihō'' (大衆解放), “liberation of the masses.” Yet he simultaneously restricts violence to an exceptional and tragic expedient subordinated to peace and ultimately redirects Buddhism's “critical sword” against attachment to self and every form of absolutism (see Shields, ''Against Harmony: Progressive and Radical Buddhism in Modern Japan'' [Oxford University Press], pp. 235–236).</ref> This, too, must be a paradoxical teaching within Buddhism’s ideal of peace.

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