Ph34r the Reaper

In her dream the Nun of the Second Rank asked, “Where has this carriage come from”?

“From the tribunal of King Enma,” [Lord of the Dead] was the reply, “It has come to fetch His Lordship [Taira no Kiyomori]…”

“And what does the plaque mean?” she asked.

“…King Enma’s tribunal has decreed that the perpetrator shall fall into the depths of the Hell of Never-Ceasing Torment…” [Avici Hell]

–Tales of the Heike, Book Six: Death of Kiyomori

Hi all,

Haven’t posted for a few days, but I have been continuing my read of Shantideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra or “Way of the Bodhisattva“* and in Chapter 7 he talks about vigor, and its opposite, sloth.

The chapter is a powerful exhortation for the Buddhist disciple to make the most of the time he has here on this earth:

5. You do not see those of your own herd as they are killed one by one? You even go to sleep like a [water] buffalo at the butcher.

6. When Yama [King of the Dead] is sizing you up and at every turn the way is blocked [by death], how can it please you to eat? How can you sleep? How make love?

The quote from Tales of the Heike and this are somewhat related. In the Hindu pantheon, the god of Death and the Underworld is King Yama,** which is adapted into Chinese and then Japanese Buddhism as Enma (閻魔). Although Hindu gods play a very, very minor role in Buddhism, they are often used as supporting characters in stories and myth. In the Tales of the Heike, the wicked Lord Kiyomori had killed a lot of monks and burned down the Todaiji temple, and so Enma’s troops came to spirit him away. In Shantideva’s writings, Yama is doing the same role. In modern, western culture, we would replace Yama/Enma with the Grim Reaper:

Here, it really doesn’t matter what hell is like, whether it exists or not, and so on. Such speculation is pointless. What Shantideva is really telling people is that when one contemplates their own mortality, and really comes to grip with the fact that death is inevitable, no matter which way we turn, then how can we indulge in pleasures the way we did before? In the simile of the herd of buffalo, some of the buffalo are slaughtered before us, but if we’re smart, we realize that our time will come sooner or later. When one realizes this, and they know they can’t escape death, they will treat the time they have left on earth as something very precious, not to be wasted on frivolous pursuits.

Meditation on death and mortality is also something found in the old Buddhist texts in the Pali Canon, including the famous Satipatthana Sutta (MN 10):

[6] “Furthermore, as if he [the monk] were to see a corpse cast away in a charnel ground — one day, two days, three days dead — bloated, livid, and festering, he applies it to this very body, ‘This body, too: Such is its nature, such is its future, such its unavoidable fate’…

In Buddhism, a human rebirth is extremely rare, as is cited in many passages in Buddhist texts. In the Dhammapada for example is the verse:

182. Hard the winning of a human birth.
Hard the life of mortals.
Hard the chance to hear the true Dhamma.
Hard the arising of Awakened Ones.

And for most, the inevitable fate is into fall for a time into one of the lower realms of animals, fighting spirits, hungry ghosts, or even one of the Buddhist Hell realms.

Shinran, founder of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism, lamented his own fate in the Tannisho after failing as a monk, and later being exiled and breaking his precepts and getting married:

…But since I am absolutely incapable of any religious practice, hell is my only home.

Centuries before, the Tendai monk, and patriarch of Japanese Pure Land Buddhism, Genshin, had written a vivid account of Hell and the Pure Land called the Ōjōyōshū which had a deep influence on Shinran’s mentor, Honen, who had studied the text at length.

So, for us Pure Land Buddhists, the words of Shantideva, Genshin, Honen and Shinran, not to mention the Buddha himself are a stark reminder to make good use of the time you have left here. Make as good use of the Dharma and put as much into practice as you can, nembutsu, moral precepts, and all.

Or take the words of Shantideva:

13. Hey you, expecting results without effort! So sensitive! So long-suffering! You, in the clutches of death, acting like an immortal! Hey, sufferer, you are destroying yourself!

14. Now that you have met with the boat of human life, cross over the mighty river of suffering. Fool, there is no time for sleep! It is hard to catch this boat again.

Namuamidabu

P.S. Title of this post is a play on an episode of Red vs. Blue, among other references. It’s also a play on leetspeak, and looks nice when used in Buddhist texts.

* – The translator in this edition says that a more correct translation is Way to Awakening. Based on my very basic understanding of Sanskrit, I’d bet he’s right.

** – Many Hindu gods wind their way into Japanese religion without most people noticing. One of the Seven Gods of Fortune in Japanese popular religion is actually the Hindu goddess, Sarasvatī, but is named Benzaiten.

Also, Yama was a very cool character of the same role in the Roger Zelazny novel, Lord of Light, one of my personal favorite.