| Article from the November 1999 Buddhist Temple of Chicago (BTC) Bulletin | |
| About the Author DR. TAITETSU UNNO  HAVING RETIRED FROM SMITH COLLEGE IN DECEMBER 1998, Taitetsu Unno is now the Jill Ker Conway Professor Emeritus of Religion. He taught Buddhism and Japanese aesthetics at that institution since 1971. Dr. Unno is an ordained Shin Buddhist minister, and received his baccalaureate from the University of California, Berkeley, and his master’s and doctorate from Tokyo University. He has published many articles and books on the subject of Buddhism. His latest work, River of Fire, River of Water, published by Doubleday, has undergone several reprintings.  Dr. Unno’s wife, Alice, is originally from California, and their son, Mark, is assistant professor of religious studies at Carleton College in Minnesota.The seminar on Saturday, November 27, is open to all interested members and friends without charge; however, free-will donations will be accepted.Ho-on-ko seminar--Sat., Nov. 27, 1999 Ho-on-ko services--Sun., Nov. 23, 1999 |
Self-Power and Other Power Dr. Taitetsu Unno The terms, self-power and Other Power, are central to understanding the Shin Buddhist experience. First used by the Chinese master T’an-luan (476-542), they became crucial in the teaching of Honen and Shinran. According to the latter, self-power refers to a person who is always “conscious of doing good” (Tannisho III), whether that “good” be in terms of moral deeds or religious pieties. Such a good is rooted in unconscious ego-centeredness; this is self-power that defiles every thought, action and speech with self-interest. Manifested in willful calculations and contrivances, it plunges a person ever more deeply into the quagmire of samsara. Other Power is defined by Shinran as “that which is devoid of self-centered calculations.” In that sense it is the opposite of self-power, yet the two are not absolutely disjunct, for Other Power is none other than great compassion, embracing self-power as an essential part of itself. When Other Power is seen opposed to self-power, that is an objectified, conceptualized view that has no relevance to Shin Buddhist life. Thus, Saichi, the unlettered Shin devotee, wrote,There is no self-power The person who is driven by self-power on the path of enlightenment
inevitably fails because of its self-serving nature, yet very few of us are free of self-power. This is clearly recognized by Shinran when he describes himself as a person “who cannot become freed from the bondage of birth-and-death through any religious practice, due to the abundance of blind passion” (Tannisho III). The major obstacle on the Buddhist path is not the difficulty of practice, lack of good teachers, or inadequate support systems, but self-power or blind passion (bonno) that lies hidden within our unconscious. Blind passion erupts in greed, anger and folly; it is the source of hatred, jealousy and violence; it gives rise to arrogance, hypocrisy and self-hate. But such a person, called a “foolish being” (bombu) is the primary concern of Amida’s compassion. Shinran made this point clearly in Tannisho IX:The working of blind passion also causes us not to want to go to the Pure Land and makes us feel uneasy, worrying about death when we become even slightly ill. Impossible it seems to leave this old house of agitation where we have wandered aimlessly since the beginning of time... This is due to blind passion, so truly powerful and overwhelming. But no matter how reluctant we may be, when our life in this world comes to an end, beyond our control, then for the first time we go to the land of Fulfillment. Those who do not want to go immediately are the special concern of true compassion.Other Power is not an absolute being, a miracle worker, or something separate from ourselves. Rather, it is dynamic life, open and boundless, realizing itself in a foolish being. In so doing, the being of self-power and blind passion is transformed into its very opposite, liberated, free and authentic. In the words of Shinran, “When I do not contrive, it is called ‘made to become so by itself’ This is none other than Other Power” (Tannisho XVI). The Japanese original for “made to become so by itself” is jinen which is composed of two parts: ji or “self” and nen which means “made to become so.” In other words, each ji, whether a person, a flower, a tree, a mountain, or any other phenomenal particular, each possessing its own unique selfhood, realizes its fullest potential completely. In the same way the Primal Vow of Amida works on each foolish being, liberating one from a fictive self to become authentic in the fullest sense. Shoji Hamada, an eminent Japanese potter, felt this sense of Other Power, when he wrote:If a kiln is small, I might be able to control it completely, that is to say, my own self can become a controller, a master of the kiln. But man’s own self is but a small thing after all. When I work at the large kiln, the power of my own self becomes so feeble that it cannot control it adequately. It means that for the large kiln, the power that is beyond me is necessary. Without the mercy of such an invisible power I cannot get good pieces. One of the reasons why I wanted to have a large kiln is because I want to be a potter, if I may, who works more in grace than in his own power. You know nearly all the best old pots were done in huge kilns This working of Other Power is praised, above all, as great compassion by one who comes to realize the limited, imperfect and mortal self, for it converts the lowest into the highest, evil into good. This is what Shinran meant when he says, “bits of tiles and pebbles are transmuted into gold.” The inner dynamic of this transmutation or transformation is contained in the following assertion: “Evil karma, without being nullified or eradicated, is made into the highest good, just as all river waters, upon entering the great ocean, immediately become ocean water.”The radical transformation, made real by the Primal Vow of Amida, occurs throughout the life of the foolish person, inevitably and necessarily culminating in supreme enlightenment. This process at the core of Shin life is called shinjin, rendered as “true entrusting” or “pure faith.” In both cases “true” and “pure” denote the Buddha’s compassionate activity within us which insures our entrusting or our faith. Thus, shinjin may also be rendered as “endowed trust,” because it is a gift from Other Power. At any rate, this central experience of shinjin is not a matter of attitude, belief or conviction but of being awakened to unlimited, immeasurable life that sustains our limited human existence.Reprinted by permission from Unno T, trans. Tannisho: A Shin Buddhist Classic. Honolulu: Buddhist Study Center Press; 1996; pp 49-52. |
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