wpg@mendel.acc.virginia.edu (William Gardner) (07/04/89)
I have learned a lot from the recent postings on `Tradition' by Wingate, Hedrick, Siemon, and several others. They are serious, thoughtful, and do credit to the group and the net. As I often do, I find myself agreeing with Michael Siemon, who writes (article 1038): ``Since everything human is changeable, we constantly revert to this fixed witness as a rein on excesses of reason (or of tradition.) But *to the extent that we can trust them* the witness in the Spirit by the community of the Church to what derives from that apostolic community has the *same* status as scripture.'' However, any errors in what follows are _mine_, and not inspired by Michael. It may interest others to read a parallel discussion from another tradition. As you may know, Zen places the practice of Buddhism above scholarly study. It also privileges the direct, personal transmission of enlightenment from master to disciple. The value for this group may be that they talk about what this means in a concrete way. I have to disclaim expertise here -- I'm not a Buddhist and, more importantly, have never met a Zen master. Dogen (1200-1253) seems to have been the great reformer of Japanese Buddhism. He wrote that "the raft of discourse is like yesterday's dream, and you [must] cut off your old understanding bound up in the vines and serpents of words." (From `Guidelines for studying the way,' in _Moon_in_a_dewdrop_, an unfortunately titled selection of translations from _The_treasury_of_the_true_dharma_eye_, ed. Kazuaki Tanahashi, North Point Press). This is not a sola scriptura reformer! But I doubt that Dogen was anti-intellectual, he was clearly a scholar and a shattering writer. His point is iconoclastic, directed against an idolatry of scripture. Or perhaps it is a strategy for attacking intellectual self involvement. This critical side of Zen is well known. The positive side seems less appreciated. Dogen says that enlightenment is transmitted, face-to-face, from master to disciple. This began when ``Shakyamuni Buddha... held up an udumbara flower and winked. Venerable Mahakashyapa smiled. Then Shakyamuni Buddha said, "I have the treasury of the true dharma eye, the inconceivable mind of nirvana. This I entrust to Mahakashyapa."... Thus venerable Mahakashyapa received the transmission directly face to face, mind to mind, body to body, and eye to eye.'' (this and the following from "Face-to-face transmission," same book.) The same event is held to have occurred, in unbroken succession, through the authentic lineages of Zen masters. ``All ... authentic heirs are the buddha face; each of them has received face-to-face transmission from the original buddha face.'' What is transmitted, and remains constant through the lineage, is, I guess, the information about enlightenment discovered by Shakyamuni. Dogen believes that the non-verbal component is necessary, though not sufficient, and can't be seen without intensive preparation. But Dogen thinks that transmission isn't just line: "...the 51 buddha ancestors are not present side by side or in one line. But it is face-to-face transmission among all the buddha anscestors at the same time. If you do not see in just one generation all the masters, you are not a disciple. If you do not see in one generation all the disciples, you are not a master." I don't fully understand this, but then I don't completely understandwhat we mean by the body of Christ. Nevertheless, Dogen's discussion clarified an important experience I'd had years before. A minister handed me a piece of bread and told me that it was "The body of Christ, broken for you." I looked at her face and saw that it was. [][][][][][][][][][][] William Gardner [][][][][][][][][][][][][][][] [] /_ o / / Department of Psychology wpg@virginia.edu [] [] /__) / / / University of Virginia 804-924-0669 [] [][][][][][][][][] Charlottesville, VA 22903 FAX: 804-924-7185 [][]