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12/15/2005

Nembutsu light & life

When I first visited the community of Amida Trust in France I met people who uttered every moment without any understandable pattern some Japanese sounding syllables:
Namo Amida Bu. When they where offered a biscuit, opened a door, greeted each other Namo Amida Bu. Although I knew vaguely that there was a sect in Japan in which they thought that enlightenment was to be attained only by calling the name of the Buddha, I could not immediately see the connection thanks to my expectations
Because it was not immediately clear from the book New Buddhism, what kind of practice this community had and I presumed a mixture between Zen and Vipassana meditation, because that were the approaches I had some experience with. I got shock on shock, praying before the meal, devotion, much bowing and singing and the practice of which I secretly hoped they were not doing: the walking meditation with Namo Amida Bu. But they did. Preposterous, strange. I sat before in retreats, hours and days, my legs falling off, my back a piece of wood, before I was granted a snippet of peace in my mind. Easy doing this practice, but does it work?
Could not prevent me to ask what does Namo Amida Bu meant. Asked it David (called him David those days, my tongue came in a knot with his Buddhist name) on a walk the second day, he said: ‘It’s just a slogan.’
Later a very emotional seminar with Sr Modgala, theme: What does Namo Amida Bu mean. Read a poem about it in the poetry section (Not going 1).

And now three years later, a sleepless night again, because I was afraid of having the black nightmares back, that left me for sometime, but suddenly out of the blue returned to me as a malignant sadness that is sleeping in me like a volcano.
(See poetry section. Not going 2)

So this is the simple question to talk about in a while, what does Namo Amida Bu mean?
(If you where to be asked to give a spontaneous and personal answer.)
This is my answer to begin with. I wrote it this night, without references to one of the many books I had beside my bed or the web, just as it came. Can do not much more as a very Bompu for the moment.
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The Nembutsu does not come without background.
So I like to give a very succinct answer about what Pureland Buddhism is.

Pureland Buddhism:

Aspiring the Pureland
Entrusting yourself to the Buddha.

Bringing two dualities that have to be worked through because they are unbearable:
This world – Pureland
Self – Buddha
The first is the teleological vector and the second the interpersonal vector.
The two vectors each represent a tension hat is never totally resolved, but the practice of the Nembutsu just goes beyond the two dichotomies. Or you can say the Nembutsu is the place where the tensions are emerging, there is no other place where you can really see this two axis of our faith coming together in what I for this opportunity would like to call the Nembutsu field. In the end of this meditation on Pureland and Nembutsu we will see what this two tensions embody and what the substance of the Nembutsu is, or if you like the essence, or its mystical core. Meanwhile I hope I have found the words to describe and ponder a bit on the Nembutsu.

The tensions should not be overcome by a synthesis a la Hegel, nor as an integration or any other conceptual strategy that tries to deny the existential reality of the two splits Because they are the birth place of two other dimensions: the compassion- and creation axis.
Amida represents: measureless life and measureless light, one can understand measureless as infinite, which is by definition without measure, where can you begin if what you want to measure stretches out to all directions in time and space without end.
I prefer to translate measureless however as abundance, because abundance has the quality of more than enough. At last enough, the definitive stilling of an existential thirst or lack. There is more than enough love and compassion and enough creative power for everybody regardless how big the need of the individual and the collective is.
So one can stop competing, striving and worrying there is enough, don’t worry!
So going beyond the [self-buddha] dualism brings you in the realm of Quan yin, the living-, warmth-, love and compassion realm, that does not resolve the tension but makes it a possibility to live with our biggest lack: love and compassion. So if we do obviously not love enough because we hate so much and not have com-passion enough because we lust (passion) too much, then that is in abundance compensated for in the love and compassion of Amida’s warmth of living or the shift from passion of having to passion of living that is vitality. It is what one can become aware of as a song to heaven, the sheer and never ending miracle of life and living.
The realm of Quan yin is one aspect of Amida: the live, warmth, vitality, tenderness and exstatic outcry. The triumphant cry of the buzzard.
And by the way perhaps we should liberate Quan yin in this postmodern times from a somewhat bleak sexless serene nun to a vital warm woman or man in jeans, age not important with a beautiful voice, that has abundant vitality and dances, always dances and sings and plays with the children dries their tears and cleans their nappies, I don’t Must we go on with the image of a serene Chinese princess to the end of time?

And the [This world – Pureland] tension is transcended by the power of creation, the abundance of light, giving colour and beauty. It is interesting to hear Pureland Buddhists speaking of Birth, capital B. So here we seem to have the counterpart and companion of live: appearance, coming to light, emergence. The birth as revelation in light. The evolutionary creative force, and the forces of procreation too. Here we talk about the overcoming of the death forces of the time-bound existence and its perversions in time- anality; from the time that ends to the time of the eternal beginning, from the deadline, or mortal time to a new morning, a new possibility a new awakening a new challenge and above all of new beauty.
And here again can we find a new image for Tai chi chi in stead of a Chinese princess from one of the dynasties? Can we substitute this image with Iggy Pop? Can we use the marvellous texts of some rocksingers as the message of Tai chi chi?

It is seductive, seeing in this three great Bodhisattva’s of Pureland Buddhism the three great rest-places for the soul in Greek philosophy:
Amida, (absolute) truth, Quan yin (absolute good), Tai chi chi (absolute) beauty.

Nembutsu is positioned on the crossroads of this two vectors in a double sense as we will see. It has the aspect of faith, or the entrusting in Buddha. This makes faith interpersonal: this is the fides part in faith. And it has the credo part in faith, the faith that is given to us as creation as going beyond the gap between this world and the Pureland.
Faith has an inner and interpersonal aspect in the secrets of the human heart. In the intimate relationship with the Buddha, one finds the esoteric side of faith: the gnosis, the silent Nembutsu.
In the expressive aspect, the credo side, one finds that the Pureland is immediately there where the credo is spoken, the verbal Nembutsu.
So this the Nembutsu: as fides, trust, and as expression, credo, the spoken prayer, the exclamation for which the whole Sangha is necessary.
Pureland is born in our midst by exclamation and not by contemplation!
That’s probably why in our summary of faith and practice the Nembutsu is not seen as a form of meditation.
We must talk about the counterpart of faith as well, the two sides of the same coin, the reason d’etre of Quan yin, without which she would be unemployed. This is the contrition and forgiveness or salvation, the real soteriological aspect of the Nembutsu. Because those who say the Name shall be saved. But not without contrition. Not without the Nei Quan practice with its three pressing questions:
What did you receive? (The gratefulness aspect of Nembutsu,)
What did you return? By return, one must think of returning something for everything we got. But we can never return enough.
And the deep reflection on the troubles and difficulties we caused. (The contrition aspect of Nembutsu).
For this last aspect Nembutsu is temporary solution too, in a most practical sense. In doing the Nembutsu, for time being, the troublemaking and the difficulties stop. You may not see it like that and making your rounds in the shrine room in a highly troubled state, you may even hardly be able to sing the Nembutsu properly because the tears of regret are taking your voice away, but at least you cannot do much harm for a while.
The quan aspect is the most physical and bodily aspect of the Nembutsu as practice: the body is ‘forced’ to bring the stuff that you put away to the surface again. This is an effect of the singing and the endless vibrations of the diaphragm in the spasms of which, the fears, sadnesses and angers are living. With the affect-energy that is loosened up in the walking and singing, images appear: the mind mirrors what happens in the body: the tears that we have postponed, the angers that we did not work through, the fears we could not face. They will come up as distractions, as persistent irritations we can no longer deny.
We do the Nembutsu as a community practice as a sangha, as a mini society as the ultimate form of community as communication as breathing together. Communication is thus: building community.
The recent innovation in our Nembutsu is very powerful and effective, because it forces me to listen very carefully, very mindfully to the other members of the sangha. You cannot comfortably go into half-sleep, giving yourself to ruminations, you have to turn your energy outside, there where the work is, there where the action is, the action of the other. An so one can reflect: the Nembutsu is the non-self via the action of the other, one becomes oriented to and dependent of the actions of the other, and it is here, precisely here that we can turn back to our two vectors in the beginning. The going beyond is here the going to the other and the coming of the other to us. Now all of a sudden harmony gets a very vital, aesthetic and dynamic meaning: music made together. A choir, beauty regained, singing the Pureland towards us as it where. And sometimes all of a sudden the work, the circambulation of the Buddha-rupa harmonizes itself. It cannot be organized other than a collective effort and good spirit, but suddenly it can happen that the deepest of all mysteries of the Nembutsu is revealed, the Dharmakaya experienced in the Sanghakaya so to say.
I want to relevate another aspect, the aspect of tranquillity. Like every religious and devote activity, the Nembutsu can give one a profound feeling of serenity, tenderness and love. This is the Chi or Samatha aspect of the Nembutsu. The other way around: serenity and concentration help the Nembutsu as practice, the deeper the active, vital and lively absorption, the more power the Nembutsu will have, undeniably. But remember the Nembutsu is not a sort of meditation. Although it is a liturgical, highly ritualized and choreographed practice, its workings are not systematic. Its workings are wild and unpredictable. This is because the expressive character of the Nembutsu in which Amida in its Name is expressed bodily and uniquely via every Nembutsu practitioner in her or his own right. On the other hand and that is the living paradox, all of us are already saved in the same abundant way of a mercy that encompasses every sentient being and more… An abundance of love so huge that we can not even begin to imagine a sliver of understanding. So this is the paradox: the Nembutsu in its expression is varied and diverse but at the same time one and the same. Not understanding this paradox, how haunting that may be is better than trying to solve it logically, initially, like the summary of faith and practice is stating. Later or secondary pondering the implications and ramifications of the Nembutsu in one’s life can give the Nembutsu and one’s life profundity.
That brings us to the last part of my musings.

“Nembutsu and Amida: no difference,” said Saichi.
Extremely important and extremely difficult to understand.
So let me try.
Our summary on faith and practice states in a few places what the Nembutsu is not. For instance it is not a form of meditation, it is not to achieve something. It does not ask to make something of yourself. On the contrary it is connected with ‘truly simple faith.’
So it is primarily, just something you do, the quality can differ, the best is when you do it naturally. Doing that however is only very partly in your own hands. Although it is worth doing it with body mind and soul, full-heartedly even then, you cannot use it for achieving something like succes.
Nembutsu, just six syllables, about 1500 years old, had a whole religious movement as its effect. And this while it is not necessary to understand what one is doing only just enough to know how you can do it.
The Nembutsu is absurd because it just means nothing. It does not point to a reality outside itself. The Name and the One are the same in the same time. The One named is Amida of course and I love the radical stance that Shinran seems to take.
Amida is a living experiential reality that gives one after a while under the condition of faith the overwhelming feeling of being saved, of salvation. Outside the Name as a living concrete practice as Nembutsu there is no Amida. So projecting Amida outside his Name as an independent deity unrelated as it where of the expression of his Name and the trust in him via that Name would render Amida as a myth only and not as the power to save, not as the power of religious renewal that different scholars are promising.
I am about to stop now, for an exchange of your thoughts about it or reactions on what I tried to utter here. To conclude I see Amida via his Name as the imprint of the Dharmakaya in sanghakaya. That means, that in ways that are far beyond my silly Bompu nature, I am somehow in all my crookedness good enough as I am, and doing my best does not make me better than I am. I’m saved, while, if it was for me, I would certainly deserve the lowest of hells, the smokes of which are haunting me sometimes. Doing my best only means to make life a little bit better for my co-travellers on the road, nothing more nothing less.

Thank you, Namo Amida Bu

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