You can’t do it alone!

One of the strongest aspects of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism is its emphasis on inter-dependency. Shinran, in writing his major work, the Kyōgyōshinshō (教行信証) often quoted from the Flower Garland Sutra, and influences from the famous Hua-Yan school of Chinese Buddhism are apparent, through his upbringing in Tendai Buddhism.

In practical terms, Jodo Shinshu teaches two important points:

• In spite of selfish behavior, we live each day through the kindness and compassion of others, and ultimately through Amida Buddha, who embodies this compassion.
• When we recite the nembutsu, we are reiterating our oneness with Amida Buddha. It’s less a practice and more of an affirmation.

This may not seem like Buddhism at first, but careful examination shows that this goes along quite nicely with more traditional teachings. The Buddha taught even in the earliest texts the notion of “conditioned arising” meaning that nothing comes into existence on its own. Its existence depends on other factors and conditions. Because all phenomena, including ourselves, are conditioned, there’s nothing we have that’s separate from the rest of existence. To get into some weird science for example, the chemicals that make up my body were manufactured in the nuclear furnace of some star that exploded billions of years ago, and this is true for other things on this planet. On a more mundane level, what happens here affects people elsewhere. What happens elsewhere trickles back and affects us.

People when they first get into Buddhism see how the Buddha became enlightened under a tree and think, “hm, I can do that too”. They assume a kind of lone-wolf attitude, try to meditate a lot, and guess what? It doesn’t work.

There’s more to the story of the Buddha’s enlightenment. Remember that before the Buddha sat under the famous Bodhi Tree, he left the other ascetics and was starving by the river. It was then that a nearby peasant girl offered some rice gruel for him to eat. If he hadn’t eaten, would he have survived and become Enlightened? Who knows.

Don’t forget too that the Buddha first decided to renounce the palace life after he journeyed out and saw the sick man, the dead man, and the peaceful ascetic. His own path began due to the existence of these people, so his Enlightenment is likewise contingent on them.

So, in Jodo Shinshu, when it is taught that we live through the kindness and compassion of others, there’s a lot of merit to this teaching. We are in many ways pretty helpless if we were alone. So, although I don’t consider myself a Jodo Shinshu follower these days, I still think this is one of the best things I learned from Shinran and the sect, and just wanted to share it today for some reason. Jodo Shinshu can be pretty cryptic, but one who follows it sincerely definitely learns to be humble and grateful, which are two things the world is sorely lacking.

Namuamidabu