Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan: Indic Roots of Mantra 9781350037267, 9781350038110, 9781350037274

Table of contents :
Cover
Half-title
Title
Copyright
Dedication
Contents
List of Figures
Preface
Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
1. Extraordinary Language Use
2. Is Language Communication? Extraordinary Language in the Face of Philosophy of Language
3. Indic Understandings of Language—From Vedas to Tantra
4. East Asian Understandings of Language
5. Emptiness and Cosmogenesis in the Tantric Buddhism of Japan
6. The Clear Light Mantra: Religious Agency in Medieval Japanese Buddhist Ritual
7. The Authority of the Speech of the Buddha: Aural Dimensions of Epistemology
8. Dharani in the Lotus Sutra: Indic Context for the Power of Words
9. Ajikan: Visualizing the Syllable A
10. Concluding Reflections
Character Glossary
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan

Also available from Bloomsbury Buddhism and Iconoclasm in East Asia, Fabio Rambelli and Eric Reinders Buddhism in America, Scott A. Mitchell A Buddhist Theory of Semiotics, Fabio Rambelli

Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan Indic Roots of Mantra Richard K. Payne

BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2018 Paperback edition first published 2020 Copyright © Richard K. Payne Richard K. Payne has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. For legal purposes the Acknowledgements on p. xi constitute an extension of this copyright page. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Payne, Richard Karl, author. Title: Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan : Indic roots of mantra / Richard K. Payne. Description: London : Bloomsbury Academic, 2018. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018008551| ISBN 9781350037267 (hardback) | ISBN 9781350037274 (ePDF) | ISBN 9781350037281 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Language and languages--Religious aspects--Tantric Buddhism. | Tantric Buddhism--Japan--Doctrines. Classification: LCC BQ8923.5.J3 P39 2018 | DDC 294.3/9250952--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018008551 ISBN: HB: 978-1-3500-3726-7 PB: 978-1-3501-5209-0 ePDF: 978-1-3500-3727-4 eBook: 978-1-3500-3728-1 Typeset by Integra Software Services Pvt. Ltd. To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters.

To my wife, Bonnie, who has been with me all the steps of this journey.

Contents List of Figures Preface

viii ix

Acknowledgments

xi

List of Abbreviations

xii

Introduction

1

1 2

7

Extraordinary Language Use Is Language Communication? Extraordinary Language in the Face of Philosophy of Language 3 Indic Understandings of Language—From Vedas to Tantra 4 East Asian Understandings of Language 5 Emptiness and Cosmogenesis in the Tantric Buddhism of Japan 6 The Clear Light Mantra: Religious Agency in Medieval Japanese Buddhist Ritual 7 The Authority of the Speech of the Buddha: Aural Dimensions of Epistemology 8 Dhāraṇī in the Lotus Sūtra: Indic Context for the Power of Words 9 Ajikan: Visualizing the Syllable A 10 Concluding Reflections Character Glossary Notes Bibliography Index

23 43 65 77 91 101 117 125 151 158 160 204 228

List of Figures 9.1 Syntactic Structure of Zoei’s Ajikan 9.2 Syntactic Structure of Miyata’s Ajikan

146 148

Preface Provenance of the work This work draws on materials from several lectures, conference presentations, and publications that began in 1993. In chronological order, these were: 1. Language Conducive to Awakening: Categories of Language Use in East Asian Buddhism began life much more humbly as a response to William Stablein’s paper “The Structure of Extraordinary Sounds and Letters in Buddhist Tantra: The Soteriological Model of the Rite of the Great Black One (Mahākala),” presented at the Conference on Extraordinary Language, which was organized by Naomi Janowitz and Martin Schwartz and held at the University of California, Berkeley, on April 30, 1993. It was then extensively revised and expanded, and published in 1998 as the second in the Buddhismus–Studien/Buddhist Studies series from Hauses der Japanischen Kultur, Düsseldorf. That monograph is chronologically the earliest publication on the topics discussed in this work. 2. “Dhāraṇī in the Lotus Sutra” was presented on May 4–7, 2002 at the Lotus Sutra and Asian Culture, Fifth International Lotus Sutra Conference sponsored by the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, at Marburg Universität. My thanks to Michael Pye for inviting me to participate in this conference. 3. “Ritual Uses of Language” was presented in two versions, the first at the Lotus Sutra conference sponsored by Rissho Kosei Kai at Bandaisan, Japan, in August 2001. A revised version was presented at the conference on Language and Discourse in the Transformation of Medieval Japanese Buddhism held at Green Gulch Zen Center in September 2001. My thanks to Gene Reeves for inviting me to participate in the first conference, and to Rissho Kosei Kai for its generous hospitality in hosting that conference. Regarding the second conference, I am deeply grateful to my coorganizer, Taigen Dan Leighton, and the San Francisco Zen Center, which cosponsored the Green Gulch conference along with the Institute of Buddhist Studies (IBS). Aside from my own, papers from this conference, together with those from an American Academy of Religions (AAR) panel (see Item 4 here), were published under the title Discourse and Ideology in Medieval Japanese Buddhism, coedited by Taigen Leighton and me (London and New York: Routledge, 2006). I call this work to the reader’s attention as including other essays related to the themes of this present work. 4. “Awakening and Language: Indic Theories of Language in Japanese Esoteric Buddhism” was presented as part of a paper session on “Discourse and Rhetoric in Medieval Japanese Buddhism” in the Buddhism section at the 2002 AAR conference in Toronto, Canada. I organized this session as a follow-up to the 2001 Green Gulch conference (see Item 3 here), and I wish to express my thanks to the Steering Committee

x

Preface

of the Buddhism Section for accepting my proposal and to the other participants in that session. 5. “Turning the Wheel of Syllables: Cosmogenesis and Emptiness in Shingon Ritual Praxis” was presented at the Thirteenth International Association of Buddhist Studies conference in Bangkok, Thailand, in January 2003. My thanks to Prapod Assavavirunlhakarn for including my presentation in the pair of panels he organized for this conference. 6. “Awakening and Language: Indic Theories of Language in Buddhism and Buddhist China” was presented at the Faithful/Fateful Encounters: Religion and Cultural Exchanges between Asia and the West conference held in Beijing, 2004, which was jointly sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Graduate Theological Union. My thanks to Judith Berling and Philip Wickeri for including me in this conference. 7. “Clear Light Mantra” was presented in the session “Spells in Buddhism” at the AAR conference, November 20–23, 2004, in San Antonio. My thanks to the organizers, the other participants, and the respondent. 8. “Meaning and Mantra” was presented on February 2, 2006, at the University of Oregon, Eugene, under the auspices of the Jeremiah Lecture Series of the Asian and Pacific Studies Center and the Department of Religious Studies. My thanks to Mark Unno and Andrew Goble for inviting me to make this presentation, and to Steve Shankman and the Oregon Humanities Center for supporting the lecture. 9. “Authority of the Buddha” was presented at The Boundaries of Knowledge in Buddhism, Christianity, and the Natural Sciences conference held at Trinity Lutheran Seminary, Columbus, Ohio, on November 10–11, 2006. My thanks to conference organizer Paul Numrich for inviting my participation and to the Templeton Foundation for its sponsorship of the conference. While the chapters of this work draw on these earlier works, they have been thoroughly rewritten to eliminate redundancies, to expand sections needing greater clarification or additional examples, and to integrate more recent research.

Acknowledgments for Permission to Reprint Chapter 7 is a revised version of “The Authority of the Buddha: The Limits of Knowledge in Medieval Indian Buddhist Epistemology,” Acta Orientalia Vilnensia 11.1 (2010): 13–36. Chapter 9 draws together material from “Ajikan: Ritual and Meditation in the Shingon Tradition,” in Re-Visioning “Kamakura” Buddhism, ed. Richard K. Payne (Honolulu: University of Hawai΄i Press, 1998): 219–248, and “The Shingon Ajikan: Diagrammatic Analysis of Ritual Syntax,” Religion 29 (1999): 215–229.

Acknowledgments My first expression of appreciation is to Ryūichi Abé, who many years ago encouraged me to pursue this project of converting several different conference essays into a coherent work. I hope this fulfills the expectations he had at that time. Also, thanks to Loriliai Biernacki, Sthaneshwar Timalsinha, Ron Davidson, Jacqueline Stone, and Cristina Scherrer-Schaub, for their assistance. Thanks also to Marianne Dresser who assisted by copyediting all of the earlier versions, and compiling the draft bibliography, so that when I got to revising much of the less than lucid writing had already been untangled. What remains is a consequence of my own overly convoluted thinking. As always appreciation goes to my friends and colleagues at the IBS, especially Rev. Dr. David Matsumoto, now president, and Dr. Scott Mitchell, now dean. The transitions have not only brought renewed energy to the IBS but also allowed me to invest the time and energy required to bring this work to completion. Direction of the IBS is now in very capable hands, I’m pleased to say. My thanks also to Lalle Pursglove and Lucy Carroll of Bloomsbury for their support and guidance. My wife, Bonnie, deserves all of the appreciation that I can possibly express for the support and encouragement she has given me over many years and most recently as I’ve secluded myself in order to bring this work to completion. And, her willingness to read drafts and talk with me about such abstruse matters is awesome.

List of Abbreviations Skt. Tib. Jpn. Ch. T. P. Ger.

Sanskrit Tibetan Japanese Chinese Taishō shinshū daizōkyō Pāli German

Introduction

This work brings attention to a particular kind of language use, one that differs from ordinary language use, and which we therefore call “extraordinary language use,” using extraordinary in the literal sense of outside the ordinary.1 Almost from the very beginning of the academic study of the religions of South and East Asia, various forms of extraordinary language use have received a great deal of scholarly attention.2 Despite this, there has been no unifying category allowing recognition, much less discussion of the group as a whole. Like so much in the history of religious traditions, there are no clear boundaries for the category of extraordinary language. It is my contention, however, that this is not a mere artifice—a category created by the assertion that it exists—but rather a coherent set of practices and beliefs, many of which were mutually influential over the course of three millennia.

What follows The first chapter introduces the concept of extraordinary language use and provides examples of it that are found in Japanese Buddhism. Because the argument is that extraordinary language cannot be encompassed by existing categories and theories of language, it is necessary to proceed by example. Four examples are drawn from Japanese religions, both tantric and in what I call the tantric penumbra—traditions of practice where both tantric and non-tantric overlap. These four are mantra, dhāraṇī, nenbutsu, and daimoku—the very diversity of terms, including Sanskrit and Japanese, indicates the spread of these practices throughout the Buddhist cosmopolis. Proceeding by example, rather than by means of a preliminary definition, is intended to avoid simply replicating existing presumptions about religion inadvertently, reifying Buddhism as a monolithic ahistorical entity or interpreting Buddhist praxes against the structures of liberal Protestant theology. An argument regarding the need for a coherent category that will allow us to discuss the similarities between a variety of language forms previously treated in isolation from one another is also presented. One of the first areas that I turned to in order to understand extraordinary language was contemporary philosophy of language and linguistics. Chapter 2 effectively records the failure of my search. As a consequence of that failure, however, the category was formulated more clearly as one that incorporates instances of language-like expressions that do not communicate information between two parties. Included in that discussion

2

Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan

is the encryption model of language, which structures ideas about ordinary language use in philosophy of language and linguistics. Given the failure of my attempts to formulate an adequate understanding of extraordinary language employing the conceptual tools of philosophy of language and linguistics, Chapter 3 turns to understandings of language found in Indic religio-philosophic thought. Language is central to Vedic praxis, and reflections on language are found particularly in the Mīmāṃsā and tantric traditions. The chapter also examines Indian Buddhist conceptions of language—protective in the parittas, conventional and constructed in abhidharma and Madhyamaka, and the identity of mantra and deity in Buddhist tantra. These ideas about language, and the power of such ritual forms as mantra, informed tantric Buddhist thought, which was in turn transmitted to East Asia. Because theories of language found in Confucian thought might have been precursors to conceptions found in Japanese tantra, these are examined first in Chapter 4. Confucian ideas regarding language are largely oriented toward social ends and as such prove to be fundamentally different from the conceptions of language found in Buddhist tantra. The influence of Indic sources is, however, found in such perhaps seemingly unlikely places as Tanluan’s justification for the efficacy of reciting the name of the buddha Amitābha. Tanluan presents the Indic idea that although most words are referential in nature, certain words, such as the name of Amitābha, are identical with their referents. The following chapters are more focused studies, particularly tantric Buddhist practices from the Japanese Shingon corpus. Chapter 5 gives a general overview of such practices in Japan and then turns to the wheel of syllables. The wheel of syllables is found in two of the four rituals for training a Shingon priest—reflecting the centrality of seed syllable mantras (Skt. bīja mantra) in the tradition. One of the many practices employing extraordinary language found in medieval Japan is recitation of the clear light mantra (Jpn. kōmyō shingon). Use of this mantra was propagated by several medieval priests. One of those was the well-known Myōe, who focused on it because its potent ability to erase pollution, whether karmic or accidental, gave it the power to cure the ill or assure the deceased birth in the Pure Land. In the ritual corpus of contemporary Shingon, there is a votive fire ritual (Skt. homa, Jpn. goma) in which the chief deity evoked in the ritual is the clear light mantra. Exploring the issues of agency that such a use implies reveals the ambiguities of anthropomorphic and nonanthropomorphic deities in Shingon ritual. The power of speech involves both transformative and epistemological powers, and in Chapter 7, we look specifically at the authority of the speech of a buddha (Skt. buddhavacana). Most of the focus on the authority of speech in Anglo-American philosophy treats it in a strictly epistemological manner under the category of testimony. That focuses attention on the speaker or what we can call the oral dimension. In addition to the qualifications of the speaker, Indic considerations also look at the act of hearing, which is the aural aspects of the power of speech. The Lotus Sūtra is one of the best-known Mahāyāna sutras, playing a very prominent role throughout East Asia. As a text that is generally not considered tantric, the prominence of dhāraṇī in the text helps to highlight the question of the role of

Introduction

3

dhāraṇī in the formation of Buddhist tantra. Clearly not inherently tantric, dhāraṇī were collected, and such collections of dhāraṇī together with descriptions of the rituals appropriate for them provided a textual basis for the gradual development of the textual traditions of tantra. In Chapter 8, we look at the way that the Lotus Sūtra dhāraṇī are presented and what the absence of any justification for them in the text implies. The syllable A is a particularly significant mantra and links the visualization practices in Shingon to Indic speculations about the vibratory manifestation of the cosmos. Symbolically, A integrates the origin of all being, the common factor throughout all being, and the termination of all being. Chapter 9 looks at visualization of the syllable A (Jpn. ajikan), which is both a preliminary practice in the training of a Shingon priest and itself a stand-alone practice. Chapter 10 concludes the work, highlighting three themes. These are, first, the importance of positive views of language in Buddhist praxis, alongside the negative views that are often treated as representative of the entire tradition; second, extraordinary language use as a coherent category identifying a set of practices and ideas about those practices; and, third, the transmission of extraordinary language practices to East Asia, which also meant that ideas about the powers of language that support the use of extraordinary language were transmitted as well.

Caveats Before the reader proceeds into the work itself, it will be helpful to clarify what this project is not; that is, what it does not attempt to do and what it has not included in its scope.

Not a comparative project One rationale for the study of philosophical traditions outside the intellectually hegemonic forms of Western3 philosophic thought is the claim to be seeking “resources” that can be employed in the solution of the existing problems of those hegemonic forms. For the study of language, this would start by identifying problems within Western philosophy of language that have also been addressed by Indic thinkers. The expectation is that these outside sources can provide perspectives or concepts that will help to solve the problems found in the dominant tradition. This justification for comparative philosophical inquiry is widespread and commonly treated in academe as natural and unproblematic—it is taken as the natural way to do things; that is, the concepts, categories, and concerns of Western philosophy are taken as unproblematically natural and therefore universal.4 This approach is, for example, exemplified in the work of Mark Siderits, who focuses on sentential unity (as a problem that should be of importance to the Western philosophy of language), the sense-reference distinction, and nonexistent objects. These topics, while inherently valid, reveal an exploitive rationale, made explicit in Siderits’ opening sentence, “What can the philosophy of language learn from the classical Indian philosophical tradition?”5 Such a narrow definition of comparative study might be called the

4

Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan

selective or restrictive approach—selecting particular problems or topics that are similar enough to be identified as philosophical and then restricting one’s study to those. It may also be considered intellectually neocolonialist to the extent that it seeks to exploit the resources of a foreign tradition for the benefit of contemporary Western intellectual problems. Eivind Kahrs has framed comparative studies as a tension created by juxtaposing two systems of thought based on different presumptions. First, “concepts and thought patterns that are clearly indigenous” are required; however, “such an approach runs the risk of merely replacing one set of concepts and values with another.”6 The opposite approach, which explains “another culture in terms of concepts and thought patterns that are clearly imposed from the outside,” is also not acceptable. “For the comparative endeavour I believe one needs both and that it is indeed in the application of both sets of concepts and values that a fruitful basis for comparison lies.”7 Thus, in keeping with Kahrs’ concerns, an approach more inclusive than that seeking to benefit EuroAmerican philosophical thought would attempt to understand Indian discussions of language in their own terms, and this would complement the specific sets of questions originating solely from the perspective of Western philosophy of language. This may be referred to as a dialogical approach, but it entails the same risk of being dominated by one party to the dialogue as found in any conversation. Beyond the complementarity discussed by Kahrs, however, an even more important opportunity may be found in attempting to understand Indian conceptions of language and their extension to East Asia simply within their own intellectual frameworks. The discussions of various traditions’ conceptions of the nature of language that are found in this work do not constitute a comparative project but are instead structured in response to the guiding question—how did East Asian tantric Buddhist practitioners think about language such that Indic practices like mantra and dhāraṇī could be adopted and adapted into their own practice? Because it is not oriented toward solving any problems of the modern Western philosophic tradition, this entire project might initially seem to be merely an instance of intellectual antiquarianism, that is, a fascination with old things for their own sake and without any consideration as to their present value—which simply presumes that the only present value is service to Western philosophy. What will emerge as a consistent theme, however, is that the constraints imposed by a dualistic conception of language—the conception that language is meaningful because it communicates propositional content or meaningless because it does not—are too narrow.8 The idea that language is communication necessarily entails the question of what is being communicated and what is the propositional content that is being transferred from one person to another. This dualistic conception of language reflects and reinforces— that is, exists in a dialectic with a dualistic conception of mind, which likewise imposes constraints—preconceptions that structure understanding of the human condition. Although this can only be a beginning step toward that broader set of issues, it is hoped that by considering how others have understood the efficacy of language, a more nuanced understanding—of both language and mind—that does not automatically revert to the standard dualisms of Cartesian ontology can be developed.

Introduction

5

What else this work is not Topics that the informed reader might reasonably expect to find discussed here are the idea of “twilight language,” extraordinary language use in Tibet, kōans, and written forms. Twilight language (Skt. sāṃdhyabhāṣā), or “secret language,”9 refers to the idea that there is a special system of communication employed in tantric works and teachings. Using the explanation found in the Hevajra tantra, Judith Simmer-Brown has asserted that this means a novice requires direct instruction from a teacher in order that the teachings be understood.10 Both the secrecy and the hermeneutics of the tantras are issues that have been written about at great length by other scholars.11 A problem is that the issues very quickly move from contested etymology to sectarian claims of authority over interpretations and polemics. Given the politicized nature of such debates rooted in secrecy and authority, power and control, addressing the issue of secret language in the tantras would have been too great a digression from the main task of this work, exposition of the concept of extraordinary language use. Much scholarship has also been devoted to the issues of language and epistemology in the Tibetan traditions. Although we will brush up against Tibetan sources in the body of this work, attention has mainly been on the East Asian traditions. We can note in passing that although extraordinary language use is also found in Southeast Asian religions, we will also only encounter that most briefly here. The same is true of the study of kōans—we will engage some of the extensive scholarship but only as directly related to conceptualizing extraordinary language, and not addressing the issues involved in kōans per se. Particularly in East Asia, writing is central to Esoteric Buddhist praxis—not so much in the discursive sense of reading texts of the tradition for didactic content but rather in the form of written amulets, talismans, oracles, and spells. We note the work of James Robson,12 Paul Copp,13 Saroj Kumar Chaudhuri,14 Christine Mollier,15 and the late Michel Strickmann16 as instancing the extent to which this area of inquiry has grown and how rapidly. This is, however, another area where we have to acknowledge that it lies outside the scope specific to this work, while at the same time emphasizing its importance for a more general understanding of the place of language in the praxis of East Asian tantric Buddhism. Having given the reader an overview of what this work is, and what it is not, let us proceed to an examination of the concept of extraordinary language use.

1

Extraordinary Language Use

When I was training in the Japanese esoteric tradition of Shingon Buddhism on Mount Kōya, one of my regular practices was to walk from my training temple to the mausoleum of Kūkai, known as Okunoin. Posthumously named Kōbō Daishi, Kūkai is the founder of Shingon.1 Walking the path to Okunoin, through one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the world, leads one eventually to a small bridge over a stream. Crossing the bridge the path continues straight on to a large temple building. Going up a flight of stone stairs and reaching the top, instead of going inside, one turns left and goes around to the back of the building to where the actual mausoleum of Kūkai is located. Behind the temple is a fenced enclosure and it is here that, according to tradition, Kūkai sits in perpetual meditation, awaiting the coming of the next buddha, Maitreya. After offering incense and mantra, the clockwise circuit continues around the temple, and in my case I would then return to my training temple for the afternoon practice session. If one goes to Kōyasan today, one can follow this route behind the temple building to the area between the temple building and the mausoleum enclosure. At the far end of this narrow walkway is a post, about waist high. It is not uncommon to encounter a barefoot pilgrim walking back and forth from in front of the mausoleum to that post, clockwise around it and back again—all the while reciting the Heart Sūtra in the Sino– Japanese pronunciation familiar from almost every tradition of Japanese Buddhism. After finishing my studies on the mountain, while considering the use of extraordinary forms of language in East Asian Buddhism, it struck me that probably most of these pilgrims had little or no idea what the philosophic interpretations of the Heart Sūtra claim the meaning of the text to be; they were not reciting it for its discursive content, nor as a mnemonic device by which they could recall the Mahāyāna critique of the abhidharma categories as empty—a key element of the brief sutra. Rather, their ritual acts, which I was told are often undertaken in fulfillment of a vow, are part of the range of extraordinary uses of language found throughout East Asian Buddhism. This range of usages, which includes mantra, vidyā,2 dhāraṇī, daimoku, nenbutsu, and others, is broadly grounded by Indian philosophical reflections on language. Motivating this inquiry into the place of extraordinary language in Buddhist thought is the continuing disconnect between the popular representation of Buddhism as a tradition exclusively devoted to silent contemplation and my own experience as a Buddhist practitioner and as a scholar of Buddhist thought. The same disconnect is found in Southeast Asia

8

Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan

as well, where a reform strain of Theravāda has obscured the language-based practices of the yogāvacara tradition, which are in many significant ways similar and even identical to the practices discussed in this work.3 Despite the popular representations of Buddhism in the West today, mantra and similar uses of language continue to play an important role in contemporary Buddhism globally.4

Why “extraordinary language”? Over the almost three decades that this material has at times been the active object of my attention, or for many extended periods lain fallow, I have experimented with a variety of terms or phrases to identify a category of language use that has been overlooked but is important for understanding the history of Buddhist praxis. These experiments included “ritual language,” “efficacious language,” “anomalous language,” “language conducive to awakening,” and “non-discursive language,”5 until finally returning to “extraordinary language.” Each of these phrases attempted to identify a type of language usage that I find constitutes a coherent category by raising up some characteristic of the members of that category. Since each attempt is not fully adequate, I ask the reader to allow the category to emerge gradually, partially by explanation and partially by exemplification, rather than expecting a clearly demarcating definition here at the beginning. It is also important to note that another difficulty with formulating a clearly demarcating definition is that the category has fuzzy boundaries; in other words the category is not an hermetic one. The phrase “extraordinary language” was employed by Naomi Janowitz and Martin Schwartz in the title “Conference on Extraordinary Language” (University of California, Berkeley, 1993). They used it as a cover term for similar practices across a variety of different traditions, and use of the phrase here derives from Janowitz and Schwartz’s terminology. Despite the variety of different phrases I have tried out at various times, “extraordinary language” remains the most adequate because it captures an essential characteristic of all of these uses of language—that it is not ordinary language. It is outside the realm of ordinary, communicative uses of language, while at the same time having language-like characteristics comparable to what John L. Locke calls the “word-like sounds and sentence-like prosodies” found in infant precursors to ordinary language use.6 Ordinary language—language as it is ordinarily conceived—has as its essential characteristic the communication of information.7 As our examination discloses, this understanding has been naturalized such that it appears to be self-evident and is accepted as axiomatic by the vast majority of writers on the topic of language. By “extraordinary” is literally meant “outside the ordinary,” the ordinary in this case being language understood as communicative of information. The phrase “extraordinary language” then refers to uses of language that are not communicative in the way that language is ordinarily understood to be; that is, such uses do not convey information, make requests, function ceremonially, act as expletives, express poetically, or perform actions.8 Use of the term “extraordinary” should not, therefore, be taken to indicate such positive connotations as excellent, superlative, and so on.

Extraordinary Language Use

9

One of the broader theoretical purposes for distinguishing between ordinary language as that which communicates information and extraordinary language as that which does not is to further thinking about language differently, that is, as something that is not exclusively communicative. Although there continues to be widespread acceptance of the identity of language and communication, over the last several decades many scholars have refuted that idea. Frits Staal, for example, has argued that “there is a difference between communication and human language”9 and suggested that something identifiably language-like existed first and was only later discovered to be good for communication.10 Similarly, while suggesting that the cognitive functions that provide the basis for language are primarily those related to representation, and only coincidentally about communication, Derek Bickerton has emphasized that language and communication are distinct from one another.11 Theorists who propose a social origin of language suggest that it initially had some function other than communication of information, such as social bonding.12 And, Robbins Burling has suggested that language originates first from comprehension of others’ intents, and that expression develops later.13

Terminology As noted earlier, recognizing that other phrases would emphasize other issues that would in turn have other theoretical consequences, I have experimented with using several different terms and phrases. While some of these were simply attempts to nuance the phrase in one way or another, other phrases have been more substantive alternatives. Some have been tried out in my own previous work, and others have been employed by scholars working on the topic. The more substantive of these are discussed here. Ritual Language. The phrase “ritual language” is already in use, and indeed this familiarity might suggest its use in this context as well. Donald S. Lopez, Jr., uses it, for example, in his very important study of the Heart Sūtra.14 In our work here, however, study focuses on a narrower category of language use, a subset of the language used in ritual, which might be taken to be the meaning of the phrase “ritual language.” In the Shingon rituals that I have studied, there is a great deal of communicative use of language, such as instructions from the ritual author to the practitioner, and vows made by the practitioner, to take two quite distinct examples. While communication is generally defined as the transmission of information (normally in propositional form) from one party to another, the terminology of “ritual language” focuses on the specifically ritualized context of language use, including the four examples discussed later in this chapter. However, as there is a lot of language used in ritual that is quite ordinary, and as this work does not examine all language used in ritual, a different phrase was called for. Spells. Some scholars have chosen the term “spell” to render key instances of the kind of language use under consideration here, such as mantra and dhāraṇī. In the kinds of usages they are considering, this appears to be workable. Paul Copp notes, however, that it is necessary to distance the discussion from Euro-American conceptions of magic as semiotically paired in opposition with religion.15 The range of forms that I am suggesting forms a larger whole, however, and thus “spell” is too narrow. As discussed more fully

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below, both nenbutsu and daimoku do not, for example, function in the same way that a spell does, and a broader category is needed as a cover term for all of these instances. Language Conducive to Awakening. Another phrase employed in a different context was “language conducive to awakening.”16 This phrase was created with the specific intent to discuss the problematic status of the presumption that language is inherently an obstacle to spiritual insight and must therefore be either abandoned or transcended. As will be discussed more fully below, this latter notion derives ultimately from the Romantic conception of language and entails a particular philosophy of mind and epistemology. The corollary is the presumption common in both popular and academic study of religion that this view of language as an impediment to awakening is somehow “naturally” the religious view of language and that Buddhism shares this understanding of language. Natural language. Robert A. Yelle is one of the other authors who have struggled with terminology in this regard. Yelle has suggested the term “natural language” as the appropriate way to talk about mantra. By this he means the “idea of a language that, having a direct connection with reality, is both true and effective.”17 By using this term, Yelle emphasizes the idea that because mantra are so deeply integral to the natural order of things, they are capable of being effective. While this usage does indeed reflect the understanding of mantra found in much of Indic religious philosophy of language, the attempt to employ a term that is already so heavily laden with philosophic meaning (i.e., the paired opposition of natural language vs. “artificial” language) seems to me to overburden the tool of stipulative definition beyond its abilities. Yelle also notes, and rejects, Umberto Eco’s term “perfect language,” which is able to carry the significance of the efficacy of mantric language as something set apart from merely human, conventional language/speech.18 Yelle’s use of the term follows the argument made by Cratylus that language depends on nature. The Cratylus “addressed the question of whether language depends on nature (physis) or, alternatively, on convention (nomos).”19 This idea has also been referred to as “linguistic realism,” explained by Steve Farmer as “the belief that words are tied to reality, which also has a magical component.”20 Meaningless object of meditation. Another interpretation of mantra was offered by the late Tibetan Buddhist teacher Chögyam Trungpa. Trungpa is famously reported as having said that mantra are meaningless sounds. He asserted that they are merely objects of meditative concentration and have no other meaning or purpose—one might just as well repeat the phrase “Coca-Cola,” as it would work equally well for that purpose. We note that this involves two important rhetorical moves on Trungpa’s part. First, it moves mantra recitation out of the category of “mindless ritual”—or worse, superstitious nonsense—and relocates it into the positively valued realm of meditation.21 At the same time, it demystifies mantra recitation, presenting it as simply having a pragmatic psychological function. This double rhetorical shift doubtless has great appeal for the propagation of Buddhism in contemporary Western society. Described in this way, mantra can be seen to fit into our contemporary psychologized religious culture in which Buddhist practice is understood to be exclusively meditation, and meditation is a kind mental technology. This view, however, represents only one dimension of the ways that mantra have been understood within the full history of the Buddhist tradition.

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Performative speech. Several scholars have explored the similarities of mantra and performative speech acts.22 This is a complex theoretical issue and will be discussed more fully in Chapter 2. Here we simply note that the social dimension is necessary to support performatives, which when carefully construed create changes in socially determined categories. Extraordinary language, however, is employed in ways that do not lead to the same kind of transformative social effect as do performative speech acts. Having given an explanatory grounding for the phrase “extraordinary language,” we can now consider some instances that exemplify the meaning of the phrase.

What are they doing there? Throughout East Asian Buddhism, one finds instances of language usages originating from the Sanskritic subcontinent—mantra, dhāraṇī, and several related usages— instances of what we are calling “extraordinary language.” Given the presence of these usages of language in East Asian Buddhism, we might well ask, “What in the world are they doing there?” Broadly speaking there are two approaches to answering this question—historically oriented and philosophically oriented. Historically such uses of extraordinary language were part of Indian Buddhist practice that was transmitted to East Asia. As narrowly understood, an historical approach would aim to describe a causally linked set of events, with as few gaps between events as possible—each link firmly connected to both the one before and the one after. As José Cabezón writes, however, “Given the state of Buddhist studies at the present time, where a vast amount of textual material remains to be explored and analyzed, such an approach is unrealistic.”23 There is also an inverse problem that not everything that was transmitted flourished; that is, while something may form part of the textual history of the tradition, it did not necessarily become an active part of the lived tradition. The alternative approach to the historical is asking about the relation between uses of efficacious language and the religio-philosophic and even broader intellectual, social, and literary contexts within which they were employed, allowing them to be transmitted from India to East Asia. The distinction between these two possible approaches is not intended to be definitive, but rather to highlight the importance of question-driven research. In other words, we are not starting from one method or the other, but rather from the question “What are such usages of language doing in Japanese Buddhist tantric practices?” This question is itself ambiguous in that “doing” might be taken to lead the reader to expect either an historical or a philosophical answer. Both connotations are important, and the following section is an attempt to frame this question so as to make it possible to answer.

Extraordinary language in practice: Examples Throughout Buddhism forms of language are employed as a part of religious practice, including language uses that can be distinguished from conventional language use to communicate information. These usages of language have an intellectual history, one that connects linguistic practices found, for example, in Shingon rituals with Indic

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philosophic speculations on language. Several East Asian Buddhist figures, such as Tanluan and Kūkai, discussed in more detail in later chapters, express an understanding of language that is grounded in a transmission of ideas about language that traces back to medieval Indic Buddhism and in fact even further. When we attempt to understand something like these approaches to language, that intellectual background must be brought to bear. Certain concepts do have definite meanings rooted in their histories and cannot (or at least should not) be simply reinterpreted for the sake of either argument or literary flourish. Following are two examples of why such grounding in the intellectual history of Shingon and Esoteric Buddhism is important. One of the key concepts in Shingon thought is the “three mysteries” (Jpn. sanmitsu). This refers to the realization through ritual practice that the practitioner’s body, speech, and mind are identical with the body, speech, and mind of the buddha, bodhisattva, protector or other figure evoked as the chief deity of a ritual. This is a well-developed concept in Shingon and is directly connected to tantric and Mahāyāna understandings originating in early medieval India. The same is true of the central term “mantra,” which in the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese translation, “shingon,” gives the Shingon tradition its name. Both are directly related to the role of language in Esoteric Buddhist practice, and therefore it is important to clear away misleading interpretations. Apparently in accord with common preconceptions regarding the nature of “religious mysteries,” Paul Ingram has interpreted the three mysteries, saying: “They are ‘mysteries’ insofar as they can be directly and immediately experienced, but not completely expressed in normal discursive language.”24 This reads modern EuroAmerican oppositions between experience (as pre-/non-/extraverbal) and language (as discursive) onto the idea of the three mysteries. First, this interprets Buddhist philosophy of language into the understandings of neo-Romantic religious culture; second, it is not what is meant in the tradition by the mysterious character of the three mysteries. Despite Ingram’s gloss, the meaning of the three mysteries is not a “mystery” in the sense of something that cannot be known or understood except experientially, but rather something that is special, amazing, secret, esoteric, and extraordinary.25 Where Ingram interprets for the sake of argument, Thomas Kasulis apparently interprets for literary flourish when he claims that because shingon (i.e., mantra) “actually” means “truth word,” “Kūkai’s personal quest … can be understood in terms of his search for the truth of words.”26 While this rather free association does indeed have a pleasing literary élan, it could be misleading regarding Kūkai’s intent. While Kūkai was concerned with the nature of language, Kūkai’s interest in language is conditioned by its role in ritual practice as the means for realizing one’s own already awakened nature, not the truth of or about words.

Four instances The following four examples are intended to help us avoid preinterpreting the significance of extraordinary language in the tantric Buddhist praxis of Japan. The four instances are from the Pure Land, Lotus Sūtra, and tantric traditions. Juxtaposing these shows how four apparently different instances can be seen to constitute a coherent

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category, “extraordinary language,” and raises the question of how, across different sectarian traditions, they were understood to be effective. The four instances are mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu. Each of these four instances of extraordinary language is ritualized; that is, each is used in particular, ritualized ways in particular contexts, sometimes involving particular actions and material settings.27 As just noted, extraordinary language as we are forming the concept here forms an overlapping set with the category of ritual language. “Mantra” and dhāraṇī are Sanskrit terms used for particular linguistic forms found in a wide variety of different Indian religious traditions. Both were brought to East Asia in the context of Mahāyāna Buddhist practice. Daimoku and “nenbutsu” are Japanese terms for ritualized language expressions found in two particular Buddhist traditions. Daimoku refers to the recitation of the title of the Lotus Sūtra in the form namu myōhō renge kyō, a practice found in the Nichiren sects. Nenbutsu is most commonly used to identify recitation of the name of Amitābha Buddha in the form namu Amida butsu, a practice found in the Pure Land sects.

Mantra Mantra date from Vedic India, and Jan Gonda points out the age of the practice by showing parallels in Avestan literature. The Avestan correlate to mantra is “a powerful word, phrase, verse or formula which being formed and communicated by the Lord [Ahura Mazdāh] and being pronounced by men is, for instance, capable of destroying or chasing away evil powers.”28 This long history of mantra and the key role it has played in many different traditions means that mantra have been employed in a variety of ways and interpreted equally variously. Gonda introduces his study by pointing out that [t]he concept of mantra covers much more than “prayer” or “invocation”, than “praise” or “formula”. A mantra is now invocatory, then evocatory, now deprecatory, then again conservatory. It may be beneficent or hurtful, salutary or pernicious.29

The long and complex history of mantra means that the term cannot be reduced to a simple equivalent, one reason for retaining the Sanskrit term, despite its recent appropriations into popular culture to mean a slogan. The problematic character of mantra was recognized rather early in the history of Euro-American study of Indian religions. In 1913 one of the earliest Western students of Hindu tantra, Sir John Woodroffe (1865–1936), said that [a] mantra may, or may not, convey on its face its meaning. Vija (seed) mantra, such as Aing, Klīng, Hrīng, have no meaning, according to the ordinary use of language. The initiate, however, knows that their meaning is the own form (svarūpa) of the particular Devatā, whose mantra they are, and that they are the dhvani which makes all letter sound and which exists in all which we say or hear.30

After listing a variety of renderings, Gonda suggests that folk etymology may provide insight into “the opinions entertained by the adepts and adherents of a doctrine, belief

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or tradition.”31 He explains that in such analyses it is divided into two components, trā, meaning to save or rescue, and man, referring to the mental. Thus, according to such views mantra means that which “liberates when properly meditated upon.”32 Beyond this folk etymological explanation, he goes on to cite with approval Sir John Woodroffe, saying that “[t]he essence of a mantra … is the presence of the deity: only that mantra in which the devatā has revealed his or her particular aspects can reveal that aspect. The deity is believed to appear from the mantra when it is correctly pronounced.”33 Attempting to summarize the meanings the term carried in its early usages, Gonda says that A mantra may therefore, etymologically speaking and judging from the usage prevailing in the oldest texts, approximately be defined as follows: “word(s) believed to be of ‘superhuman origin’, received, fashioned and spoken by the ‘inspired’ seers, poets and reciters in order to evoke divine power(s) and especially conceived as means of creating, conveying, concentrating and realizing intentional and efficient thought, and of coming into touch or identifying oneself with the essence of the divinity which is present in the mantra.”34

This complex of understandings provides the background for the appropriation of mantra into Buddhist tantric praxis. For the most part tantric Buddhist use seems to have been supported either by the understanding of identity between mantra and deity just described or by a theory of phonemic emanation,35 the idea that the sequence of Sanskrit phonemes is identical with the emanation of the manifest world, discussed more fully in Chapter 3. The theory that mantra are meaningful by their use in a ritual framework was most clearly developed in the Mīmāṃsā school of Indian philosophy, which largely concerned itself with asserting the efficacy of Vedic ritual. “Mīmāṃsā rejects the notion that mantras have separable, intrinsic value apart from the sacrifice.”36 The theory that mantra are effective because of their phonemic value appears to have been adopted from Mīmāṃsā theorizing by the tantric forms of Indian religions, both Hindu and Buddhist.37 Indeed, in the nondual Śaiva tantra of Kashmir studied by Gavin Flood, mantra are identified with the body of a deity (mantradevatā) and with a metaphysical level of being. “Layers of cosmic sound which are levels of the cosmos are also regarded as deities.”38 The use of mantra was so fully integral to Indian religious culture that the Pāli canon records several instances where the Buddha teaches his followers a snake charm, one probably pre-buddhist in origin, but adapted into an expression of universal metta, loving-kindness.39 Buddhist practitioners shared a concern over proper pronunciation, viewing the Sanskrit phonemes—the specific sounds of the mantra—as centrally important in and of themselves. For example, this lies behind the concern with incorporating Sanskrit expressed by Kūkai, founder of the Shingon tradition of tantric Buddhism in Japan: The mantras, however, are mysterious and each word is profound in meaning. When they are transliterated into Chinese, the original meanings are modified and the long and short vowels confused. In the end we can get roughly similar sounds but not precisely the same ones. Unless we use Sanskrit, it is hardly possible to differentiate the long and short sounds. The purpose of retaining the source materials, indeed, lies here.40

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Mantra form a key element in Shingon practice. In many cases when included in rituals, mantra are matched with mudrās, iconic hand gestures, forming an integral ritual action. For example, at the start of the Fudō Myōō protective fire ritual (homa), the practitioner is directed to form the vajrāṅjali mudrā in which the hands are held together as in a prayer gesture, except that the fingers are interlaced with the right fingers uppermost, right thumb crossed over the left. This is accompanied by reciting the mantra of “universal homage”: oṃ sarva-tathāgata-pāda vandanaṃ karomi.41 Such combinations of mantra and mudrā are in a sense the building blocks of Shingon ritual practice. Broadly speaking, there appear to be two major conceptions regarding mantra found in the Buddhist tradition. One is that mantra are powerful forms of language, efficacious in and of themselves, particularly in a ritual context. In contrast to dhāraṇī, discussed next, mantra are used in ritual performance, usually either to evoke the presence of a deity or to effect a ritual action. The other conception is that mantra are simply objects that can be useful in developing mental concentration; in other words, they serve as a meditative tool—as per Trungpa’s explanation given earlier. This latter interpretation of mantra is often supported by philological exegeses that derive the term from “support for the mind.” Similar to that by Gonda discussed earlier, Robert A. Yelle gives the etymology as deriving “mantra from the verbal root man—(to think, contemplate) and the agentive or instrumental suffix tra, so that mantra would mean ‘an instrument of thought’.”42 The etymology of the next category under consideration, dhāraṇī, is close enough to the etymology of mantra that the two categories symbolically converge toward one another. The derivation of dhāraṇī is from √dhṛ, meaning to hold or to maintain. The use of dhāraṇī in meditative and ritual practices draws on this meaning, as it is often explained as a way of holding something in mind. In this way the practical significance of the term, that is, its relation to meditation and ritual, is very similar to that given to mantra. In some systems of classification, mantra are considered to be a subset of dhāraṇī.

Dhāraṇī Dhāraṇī have at least as long and complex a history in Buddhist praxis as does mantra. There are a large number of dhāraṇī scriptures in the Buddhist canons, and they have been subject to repeated revising over time. Koichi Shinohara has traced an historical sequence in which early versions of dhāraṇī teachings were oriented toward “thisworldly goals, such as cures from sickness and the defeat of enemies.”43 Later additions to texts introduced understandings of “dhāraṇī practice as a distinctive and competing path, separate from, and even more efficacious (‘quicker’) than the conventional path of observing monastic precepts and engaging in other practices that result in enlightenment, such as meditation.”44 Over the centuries the dhāraṇī scriptures have also accumulated a body of commentary, not only historically, but in the present as well, and continue to form an important practice in present-day Buddhist communities.45 Paul Copp cautions that “It is not useful to regard dhāraṇī scriptures as forming a true genre of Buddhist writing. Instead, the term refers to works from quite different textual genres, ranging from technical manuals, written (like others of its kind) in mainly

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unadorned declarative language, to prosimetric sūtra narratives rich in metaphor and literary conceit.”46 One commonly noted contrast between mantra and dhāraṇī is descriptive: mantra are generally fairly short; dhāraṇī are typically much longer. Alternatively, a version of the functional distinction noted earlier is sometimes made on the basis that dhāraṇī are mnemonic and mantra are performative. Dhāraṇī are also sometimes said to have originated as summaries of doctrine that are intended to be relatively easy to memorize. According to another explanation, dhāraṇī are aids to memory. Jens Braarvig translates a section of the Akṣayamatinirdeśa as answering the question What then is the imperishability of dhāraṇī? Dhāraṇī is to keep, retain in memory and not forget, to truly retain by remembrance the eighty-four thousand multitudes of religion, that by means of the remembrance originating from earlier potentialities for the good, this is dhāraṇī. Again, dhāraṇī is that by which one retains the words of all the buddhas, that by which one retains the sayings of all the bodhisattvas, pratyekabuddhas, śrāvakas and all living beings, that by which one retains all good sayings without remainder.47

Richard McBride notes that Dhāraṇī comprise a large portion of the Buddhist canon of scripture and most of the important Mahāyāna sūtras conclude with or include sections on dhāraṇī, for example the Heart Sūtra and the Lotus Sūtra. Various types of dhāraṇī are mentioned in Buddhist literature, for example, spell-type or mantra-dhāraṇī, by which a bodhisattva acquires charms to allay plagues, and mnemonic dhāraṇī, by which a bodhisattva’s memory and perception are enhanced to remember sūtras or salient points of doctrine.48

Based on an extensive examination of the dhāraṇī literature, Ronald Davidson has disputed these interpretations of dhāraṇī as either mnemonic or summaries. “In reality, we seldom see dhāraṇīs that are actually effective mnemonic devices or that summarize abstract principles, in distinction to the hundreds employed in non-intellective purposes, including many of the earliest.”49 The last qualification reflects Davidson’s denial of the claims made by earlier scholarship that dhāraṇī begin with intellectual purposes such as memorization, but gradually degenerate into magical formulae. As indicated by Davidson’s comments, the pattern of decline from intellectual sophistication to magic and superstition attributed to dhāraṇī by earlier scholars is without grounding and an instance of what I call the “rhetoric of decadence”—the widespread historiographic narrative that presumes that religious traditions start in a pure rational and ethical form and then decay into superstition and immorality over time. Dhāraṇī are pervasive throughout Mahāyāna Buddhism, being found not only in the regions traditionally identified as Mahāyāna, but also in South and Southeast Asia, where they form part of the long overlooked history of Mahāyāna and tantra in that region.50 Jacob Dalton notes that several scholars have argued that the texts focused on dhāraṇī, the dhāraṇī sutras, “are best seen merely as Mahāyāna sūtras and as distinct

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from the generally (though not always) later tantras.”51 While he is in agreement with this limited claim, Dalton points out that a focus on dhāraṇī as such overlooks the fact that they were used “within a wider ritual context, embedded within larger dhāraṇī-sūtras, liturgical collections, or ritual manuals.”52 The context of performance is very important and supports our claim here that extraordinary language use is not communication in the ordinary sense of conveying propositional information. As Dalton notes “Dhāraṇīs were read less for their deep philosophical insights than for the meritorious ritual of reading’s own sake. In this sense, how dhāraṇīs were used was often more important than the significance of their content.”53 Dalton examines two kinds of closely related works that put dhāraṇī to use—liturgical works (Skt. dhāraṇīsaṃgraha) and ritual manuals (Skt. vidhi, kalpa). The former are handbooks for reciting dhāraṇī in which different dhāraṇī can be placed into a three-part liturgical structure of “opening invitations–dhāraṇīs–closing prayers.”54 Given the importance of dhāraṇī in Mahāyāna tradition generally, the Lotus Sūtra, which is considered by many to be one of the exemplary Mahāyāna texts, provides one instance that allows us to explore the uses to which dhāraṇī were put. As will be discussed more fully in Chapter 8, the Lotus Sūtra contains six dhāraṇī in its brief twenty-sixth chapter.55 While dhāraṇī occur in many Mahāyāna sutras, that chapter focuses our attention on those found in the Lotus. Doing so, we find that they are all uniformly presented as serving for the protection of “teachers of the Dharma.” There is no discussion of how it is that these dhāraṇī are efficacious. One possible conclusion that may be drawn from this silence is that the efficacy of dhāraṇī is simply taken for granted by the compilers of the Lotus. Likewise, the absence of any justification for the appearance of dhāraṇī in this context would seem to indicate that the use and knowledge of dhāraṇī was not considered problematic as an element of Mahāyāna Buddhist practice. When dhāraṇī recitation was imported into the Chinese context, more explanation seems to have been needed than had been required in the Indian context, where such recitation practice was indigenous. Turning to Daosheng’s commentary on the Lotus Sūtra, we find him explaining dhāraṇī in several ways. First, although “simple” people may not have faith in the profound teachings of the Lotus, they desire to avoid calamities and misfortunes that may result from the workings of karma and of astral influences. The dhāraṇī of the sutra can avert these harmful events and people will have faith. Additionally, such harmful events are the work of demons and spirits, and dhāraṇī can control their actions. In this way people will be led to receive the Lotus and “keep it with great care.”56 Daosheng also explains that dhāraṇī, “being the words of demons and spirits, are not translatable.” He goes on to name various demons and spirits and identify their characteristics. These instances of dhāraṇī in the Lotus call into question the two common distinctions between mantra and dhāraṇī mentioned earlier. First, that while mantra are employed to effect a variety of practical goals, dhāraṇī are employed mnemonically, that is, as compact expressions of doctrinal assertions that are easily remembered and recalled. The Lotus, however, identifies these dhāraṇī with no specific teaching as such, but rather as practical devices, like tools that have a specific pragmatic function. Specifically stated in the Lotus is that these dhāraṇī provide protection, one of the

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functions also associated with mantra. The second distinction is that mantra are short and dhāraṇī are long. However, one of dhāraṇī, aṭṭe naṭṭe vanaṭṭe anaḍe nāḍi kunaḍi,57 is as brief as any mantra and briefer than many. Dhāraṇī were part of the Mahāyāna tradition coming out of medieval Indian Buddhism to East Asian Buddhist praxis and found widely in non-tantric as well as tantric traditions.

Daimoku The term daimoku refers to recitation of the title of the Lotus Sūtra as a mantra and is particularly prominent in the Nichiren sects of Japan. These originate with the teachings of Nichiren Shōnin (1222–1282), who promoted the Lotus Sūtra as the single most important Buddhist text.58 The Lotus originated in Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism and was transmitted to China, where Zhiyi (538–597), founder of the Tiantai school, gave it a central place in his scholastic systematization of the great variety of Buddhist scriptures. Saichō (767–822) brought the Tiantai school (Jpn. Tendai) to Japan and established Enryakuji monastery on Mt. Hiei, outside of the capital of Heian (presentday Kyoto). During the Kamakura era (1185–1333) several Tendai priests emphasized different aspects of Buddhist praxis, giving rise to new sects. The majority of these new sects either faded away entirely after the death of their founder or continued into the present only in almost vestigial form.59 However, some of the new sects, including Zen, Nichiren, and Pure Land, are among the largest, best known, and most widely practiced traditions in present-day Japan. While usually treated as the direct lineal descendant of Tiantai, Saichō’s Tendai included Esoteric Buddhist teachings and practices that were not part of Tiantai. Nichiren objected to the presence of such practices and sought to purify Tendai through exclusive adherence to the Lotus Sūtra. His tradition was initially known as the Hōkke-shū, the Lotus Sūtra school, but is now known eponymously as the Nichirenshū. Nichiren had taught that in the Final Dharma age, by arousing the mind of faith in the sūtra and chanting its title or daimoku in the phrase “Namu-myōhō-renge-kyō,” one can realize Buddhahood with this very body. In this act, the identity of the Buddha and the ordinary worldling is manifested, and the place of practice becomes the Buddha land. This modality has obvious continuities with the esoteric Tendai tradition from which Nichiren had emerged.60

These continuities include the “nonlinear model” of awakening as well as the identity of sound, practitioner, and deity—a three-way identity similar to conceptions that we will discuss more fully in the next chapter. The idea of “realizing Buddhahood with this very body” also places Nichiren’s teachings in the tantric penumbra, tantric teachings being held to be superior because they enabled one to attain awakening quickly, in this lifetime, rather than over the course of countless eons.

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A variety of different practices that focused on the Lotus Sūtra in one way or another became an important part of Buddhist praxis in Japan. These include such practices as reciting the sutra in its entirety. However, due to the enduring influence of Nichiren, probably the most familiar one today is recitation of the title of the Lotus Sūtra in the phrase namu myōhō renge kyō, or “praise to the scripture of the Lotus of the Wondrous Law.”61 This practice was promoted as a way of making present/immanent the Lotus Sūtra’s miraculous, protective power— either in the condensed form of its title or through recitation in its entirety. Belief in the sutra’s miraculous power was reinforced through the circulation of stories about its potency. In the medieval period such stories were gathered into several story collections (called in some cases ryōiki or reiki, “records of wonders”), including the Miraculous Tales of the Lotus Sutra62 and the Miraculous Stories from the Japanese Buddhist Tradition. The latter contains two complementary stories regarding the power of the Lotus Sūtra, both involving practitioners who recite the entire text of the sutra. In the first story a Lotus Sūtra devotee is never able to recite the text correctly because he cannot remember one particular character. In a dream he sees that in his previous life he had accidentally burned that character in a copy of the scripture with a lamp. The dream also informs him who his parents were in that previous lifetime. After he awakens he travels to his previous home where he is recognized as the reincarnation of the family’s son. Shown the copy of the Lotus Sūtra he had used in his previous life, he is then able to repair the text. Thereafter he was able to remember the entirety of the text correctly and recite it without error.63 In the second story, an arrogant novice ridicules a mendicant who recites the Lotus Sūtra while begging for alms. As a karmic consequence, the novice’s mouth immediately becomes twisted and the disfigurement cannot be cured. This is explained by a quotation from the text of the Lotus Sūtra itself: “Those who laugh at and slight this scripture will lose many teeth and get a twisted mouth, a flattened nose, crippled limbs, and squint eyes.”64 Clearly a text that can both reach across lifetimes to enable its devotee to repair a copy and punish someone who ridicules its devotees is a powerful text. These kinds of stories informed the practice of recitation of the Lotus Sūtra in medieval Japan. In its modernized expression found in the forms of Sōka Gakkai rising in the United States in the 1970s, daimoku recitation practice seems to have interacted with longstanding American forms of magical thinking and the “gospel of prosperity.”65 Recitation of the daimoku was said to bring health, prosperity, and happiness, which may be in the form of a new job, a new car, or a new relationship. Such worldly gains are possible if one recites properly, with the requisite faith, and after the appropriate initiation and installation of the Lotus Sūtra maṇḍala (gohonzon, designed by Nichiren) in one’s home.66 It is not the ritualized context of daimoku recitation alone that establishes it as an instance of extraordinary language use. The absence of informative content being communicated from one person to another indicates that it is not communication in the ordinary sense. It is in other words the absence of any second party as the recipient of the recitation that establishes daimoku as an extraordinary use of language.

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Nenbutsu Nenbutsu is the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese term nianfo, itself a translation of the Sanskrit term buddhānusmṛti. All three of these terms mean “to keep the Buddha in mind” or “to recall the Buddha,” reminiscent of the meditative and ritual significance of mantra and dhāraṇī noted earlier. In East Asian Buddhism the term is associated primarily with the Pure Land traditions. Originating in medieval Indian Buddhism, this tradition focuses on the figure of Amitābha Buddha, the Buddha of Unlimited Light.67 In East Asian Buddhist thought Amitābha came to be identified with Amitāyus Buddha, the Buddha of Unlimited Life, in some cases the same Chinese characters being used to render the two names.68 The name is simply “Amida” in Japanese pronunciation. Two major types of “buddha-recollection” practice were visualization of the Buddha, his retinue, and his pure land; and recitation of his name. As Pure Land thought developed in China and Japan, the idea that the teachings (Skt. dharma, Ch. fa, Jpn. hō) were in a process of gradual decline (Ch. mofa, Jpn. mappō) came to be widely accepted.69 This decline meant that human beings of the present era were incapable of accurately understanding the teachings. As a consequence, we are also unable to practice effectively, and therefore there is no longer any possibility of awakening. In light of this apocalyptic understanding of the human condition, human beings can only depend on the vows made by Amida, described in the larger Pure Land sutra. This text tells us that Amida vowed that anyone who recalled him as few as ten times70 was assured birth in the “land of bliss” (Skt. Sukhāvatī, Jpn. Gokuraku) where it is possible to understand the teachings accurately, put them into effective practice, and become awakened. Given the widespread belief in the age of mappō, with its dire prediction of the decline of human capacity for effective practice, reciting the name of Amida in the form namu Amida butsu (“praise to Amitābha Buddha”) was seen as the best means for keeping the Buddha in mind and leading to birth in his pure land. This was the understanding of buddha-recollection promoted within the Pure Land school as it developed in China and Japan. From the time of the Kamakura era, when it developed into a distinct tradition of Buddhism, Pure Land Buddhism71 has become one of the most popular forms of Buddhism in Japan. In contemporary Japanese Buddhism, and its representation in Western scholarship, nenbutsu has come to be almost exclusively identified with the recitation of the name of Amida (Jpn. shōmyō nenbutsu), while the complementary visualization practices are so little practiced in Japan that they have effectively become little more than historical footnotes.

Conclusion: Understanding language as Buddhist practice None of these four kinds of language use are ordinary language: they are not propositional; that is, they do not convey information. Some theorists claim that the meaning of such expressions is what the ritual agent intends. However, closely distinguishing between the expressions when they are used ritually, and the intentions of ritual agents, the expressions as such make no claims, they assert nothing, they inquire about nothing,

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and they request nothing—as these functions are understood in the theories of language discussed in the next chapter. According to many theories of meaning, the conclusion that would then be drawn is that they are meaningless or perhaps purely “ceremonial.”72 Although a “translation” may be rendered by tracing them back to a Sanskrit original, such meanings are not for the most part the expressive intent of speakers.73 However, it is certainly clear that such language practices are significant— though not meaningful in the explicit sense of having propositional meaning. We are drawing here a distinction between the linguistic function of conveying meaning and a social function of marking a difference, that is, making a “sign”—being “significant.” It makes a difference whether one says namu daishi henjō kongō (a mantra used in the Shingon tradition) or namu amida butsu. Although he was speaking specifically of mantra, André Padoux’s assertion, “A mantra has a use rather than a meaning—a use in context,”74 can be applied to all of these forms of language use. Although the term “philosophy of language” is used here in relation to Indic and Buddhist thought, it should not be understood to mean that a coherently articulated and logically systematic philosophy of language was transmitted to Japan. Rather, as suggested by Glenn Wallis’ work on the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa in which he discusses what he calls “implicit doctrine,”75 certain ideas about language are implicit in the ways that extraordinary language—mantra, dhāraṇī, nenbutsu, daimoku, and so on—is used in ritual. As Talal Asad notes more broadly in relation to religious practice and religious discourse, Discourse involved in practice is not the same as that involved in speaking about practice. It is a modern idea that a practitioner cannot know how to live religiously without being able to articulate that knowledge.76

In other words, to explicate Shingon or, more generally, East Asian Buddhist views of language requires not only a narrow focus of attention on the explicit formulations regarding the ritual efficacy of efficacious language, but also a broader focus including the “indirect assertions” regarding language and conceptions regarding extraordinary language implicit in its use. In this chapter we have sought to establish that there is a coherent category of language use identified here as “extraordinary language.” The four examples drawn from tantric praxis and the tantric penumbra in Japan—mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu—were introduced to provide the reader examples of the category “extraordinary language.” In the next chapter we will examine several different theories of language found in Euro-American philosophy and linguistics. The goal of the examination in the next chapter will be to demonstrate to the reader that because those theories all share a common presumption that language is communicative, they cannot explain extraordinary language.

2

Is Language Communication? Extraordinary Language in the Face of Philosophy of Language

Having introduced four instances of extraordinary language use in Japan—mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu—we turn in this chapter to examine some of the obstacles to conceptualizing extraordinary language. This examination entails two dimensions: first, the implicit presumptions regarding language rooted in neoRomanticism, and second, the explicit theories of language from philosophy of language and linguistics. The presentation of these latter is neither comprehensive nor systematic but rather seeks to identify the kinds of limitations shared by all such theories that inhibit their application to extraordinary language.

Romantic and neo-Romantic theories of language The Presumption of Apophasis East Asian Buddhism, and indeed Buddhism more generally, is popularly identified with a position that regards language as deceptive and an obstacle to awakening: the representation of Buddhism as “anti-language.” It is not uncommon, for example, to find discussions of Buddhist theories of language framed in terms of an oppositional relation between “conventional language that undergirds everyday experience and the ‘silence of the Buddhas’ about reality as experienced from the perspective of enlightenment.”1 Framing the issue this way—language vs. silence—also then entails the further rhetorical pairing of language with deluded, ordinary consciousness and silence with the awakened consciousness of a buddha.2 This representation, however, is itself a polemic weapon in modern Western debates about the nature of religion. Positions are taken up that can be broadly grouped into either Enlightenment views of religion as a fundamentally rational system of morality or Romantic views of religion as fundamentally nonrational, that is, affective or emotional, and rooted in transformative experience. By the mid-twentieth century the neo-Romantic side of the ongoing religious debates had successfully promoted a particular representation of Buddhism. Out of the wide range of Buddhist practices,

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one practice—individual, silent, seated meditation—had been selectively chosen,3 and views regarding language and rational reflection as counterproductive to spiritual practice were claimed to be representative of all of Buddhism. The Romantics and neoRomantics were able thereby to bring the full weight of an exotic and ancient religious tradition to bear on their side of the Western debate.4 Frequently, for example, links are made between Chan expressions regarding the direct transmission of mind outside the scriptures and the attitude toward language (believed to be) expressed in the opening lines of the Dao de jing: “the way that can be named is not the true way.” Only beginning in about the last quarter of the twentieth century has the logical, epistemological, and psychological dimensions of Buddhist thought become a matter of consistent, systematic, and extended study in Euro-American scholarship. Despite this sea change in the scholarly world, many popular representations of Buddhism continue to promote the neo-Romantic understanding.5 Such views of language, however, were not the only ones to be found in East Asian Buddhism and may not have even been the predominant ones. This is manifestly evident when we consider, for example, the vast extent of the scholastic commentarial literature created in East Asian Buddhism, including in the Zen tradition, one that has long been considered paradigmatic of silent contemplation. This in itself poses another perspective on the question of the typification of an East Asian Buddhist attitude toward language as mystical or apophatic. Why has the extensive scholasticism of East Asian Buddhism been almost entirely ignored? This question becomes particularly stark when the treatment of Tibetan Buddhism, whose philosophical tradition is promoted as especially deep and complex, is contrasted with that of East Asian Buddhism.6 Although comparable works exist in East Asia, the Tibetan commentarial tradition is much more actively studied today. The characterization of East Asian Buddhism as having a negative view of language and the ignoring of the scholastic dimensions of East Asian Buddhism are not unrelated issues. Why bother studying the texts or commentaries of a tradition if the modern (popular) representatives of that tradition tell you that all language and rational reflection are simply obstacles to direct perception of reality, and that direct perception of reality is the goal? This situation seems to be in large part the result of historical accident. Romanticism has long had a positive attitude toward the exotic other, which resulted from its rejection of nineteenth-century modernization, industrialization, and urbanization. Early Romantics focused on India,7 most frequently portrayed as a mystical and enchanting realm, more than China, which was seen as the realm of Confucian rationalism and social thought, and which was much more appealing to the Enlightenment philosophes.8 In addition to a fascination with the exotic other as an alternative to their own society, Romantics generally elevated aesthetic experience as a primary value, even identifying it with mystical experience and regarding both as inexpressible in ordinary language.9 Neo-Romantic epistemology frames language in the same fashion as it does reason: both language and reason are seen as dualistic and therefore destructive of an originally undifferentiated wholeness.10 In contrast, an emotive or aesthetic response is conceived of as nondual, unconditioned, or prereflective, therefore whole and, in a further questionable leap, epistemologically privileged because immediate.11 The idea that aesthetic and emotional responses are entirely spontaneous is unsupported by recent research.12

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The continuing popularity of William James’ treatment of mystical experience as both central to religion and ineffable demonstrates the entrenched character of this discourse. Although rarely expressed explicitly, this understanding of Buddhism constitutes a hegemonic metanarrative. In other words, according to this view all religions have as their ultimate goal the attainment of mystical experience in silent, single, and solitary contemplation, and Buddhism is one more instance of this general picture or metanarrative of religion.13 This view of religion is hegemonic because by being simply assumed, it has come to determine what questions can be asked, and what questions cannot be asked, about religion. Mid-twentieth-century neo-Romantics14 inherited both trends: the fascination with the exotic other and the rejection of rationality and ordinary language as impediments to direct experience.15 That the nonrational is the hallmark of all religion has become a commonplace in modern popular religious culture. For example, in a discussion of the relation between psychotherapy and “Eastern religions,” it is presented as unproblematic that “spiritual matters lie beyond the province of academic proof ”; that is, “they fall outside the scope of logic and empirical assessment.”16 Because of the Pacific War, contact with Japan and with sectarian Japanese Buddhist scholarship served to mediate the entirety of the perception of East Asian Buddhism. These interests were then matched up with a preexisting rhetoric developed within Japanese Zen, which itself drew on European Romanticism, especially German Idealism.17 An example is found in the works of the Kyoto school of modern Japanese philosophy. This is an instance in which a kind of mutually reinforcing feedback loop18 was created—looking for the mystical East, mid-twentieth-century neo-Romantics found it, and then valorized their representation of it, using it to legitimate their preexisting conceptions of religion. Understandably, modernizing members of the Zen tradition, themselves influenced by the Kyoto school, were not opposed to having their own sectarian self-representations given a privileged position in the Western understanding of Buddhism. One instance of this privileged position is the dominance of Masao Abe, heir to the Kyoto school of philosophy, during the early decades of Buddhist–Christian dialogue.19 Tibetan Buddhism’s entry into the world’s mediascape was, however, moderated by different historical conditions, which tended to accentuate the scholastic traditions of Tibet. One of the first rationales for the importance of Tibetan Buddhism was as a museum in that it had preserved in Tibetan translation many important materials lost in Sanskrit, and providing, therefore, a resource for extending doctrinal studies based in Sanskrit sources. For this reason, much of the early scholarship on Tibetan sources focused on what might be called “salvage textual studies” (drawing on the model of “salvage ethnography”) in the attempt to recover Indian Buddhist source materials before they were lost forever. Another culturally important factor is that while East Asian Buddhism was approached from across the Pacific, Tibetan Buddhism emerged in the context of the Indian subcontinent, a culture that places high value on its Sanskritic heritage, including scholasticism and the philosophy of language. Hence what we see, in both the anti-intellectual caricature of East Asian Buddhism and the characterization of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism as scholastic, is the result of a series of historical accidents and the ordinary workings of the sociology of knowledge.

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These ideas regarding language have informed popular understandings of Buddhism. However, when in the 1970s I began to study tantric Buddhism, first in its Tibetan form, and later in its Japanese form, what I encountered was a tradition that in fact had a very different view of language, a view that is not, however, simply an inversion of the neo-Romantic or a return to the Enlightenment views, as it is not framed by the dichotomy of mystical silence and reasoned language. The full significance of this, such as the centrality of language in many other forms of Buddhism, did not come to me as a sudden insight but rather as the consequence of a lengthy process by which I began to be able to reflect critically on the presumptions of neo-Romanticism and the effect of those presumptions on our understanding of Buddhism.20

An example: “Neo-Romantic” Zen The study of East Asian Buddhism continues to be structured by lingering neoRomantic interpretations of Zen, found, for example, in the works of D.T. Suzuki.21 This neo-Romantic version of Zen constituted the most common representation of East Asian Buddhism in the United States for the middle half of the twentieth century and implicitly continues to inform representations of Buddhism generally throughout modern popular religious culture, even where there is no explicit reference to Zen per se. The Romantic vision of religion in general emphasizes an irreducible and indescribable immediate experience as fundamental to all religion, a characterization that is then applied to Buddhism, either without critical reflection or simply by definition. One of the consequences of the emphasis on “experience” in this Perennialist view is that primacy is given to the aesthetic and the spontaneous as unmediated, and therefore authentic, responses to immediate experience.22 This neo-Romantic interpretation of Zen is then represented as a matter of writing haiku poetry or practicing flower arrangement, calligraphy, bonsai, the aesthetic appreciation of landscape gardens, tea ceremony, or martial arts. All of these have been valorized as expressions of the spontaneous clarity of being fully present in the moment and as being either directly informed by or even equivalent to the practice of sitting meditation (zazen). Marginalized to the point of invisibility are such practices as ritual performance, debate, and philosophic commentary, all of which play an important role in the full spectrum of Buddhist practice. The point here is not to denigrate sitting meditation or to imply that it has not been important in the history of Buddhist praxis but rather to dislodge it from its privileged position as paradigmatic for all of Buddhism.23 As noted briefly earlier, a consequence of neo-Romanticism is the creation of a particular representation of Buddhism that emphasizes those aspects that match its own preconceptions, including the elevation of silent, seated, and fundamentally solitary meditation to the status of the paradigmatic practice for Buddhism. We find, for example, instances of Śākyamuni Buddha being called “the Silent Sage”24 despite engaging in a teaching career involving intellectual discourse with many different interlocutors for over five decades, the cognitive and rational characteristics of which are made evident later in the Buddhist canons. During that half century, the Buddha gave many teachings that included key conceptual formulations of how we understand ourselves, others, and the world around us, such formulations intended to correct—

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or reformulate—our ordinary mistaken ways of engaging the world conceptually and emotionally (jñeyāvaraṇa and kleśāvaraṇa, respectively). The Western treatment of sitting meditation as paradigmatic for Buddhism also rests on the continuing spiritualized legacy of the dualistic philosophical anthropology deriving from René Descartes. That philosophical anthropology divides human beings into physical and mental components, with the mental side being given primacy.25 Since in a dualistic anthropology of this kind Buddhist meditation holds the ground of the mental and inward, practices involving the active use of language, such as ritual, debate, and philosophic commentary, are necessarily, therefore, relegated to the physical and outward, and consequently devalued. The distinction and relative valuations of meditation and ritual found in contemporary American religious culture have their own historical origins in the Protestant Reformation with its critique of Catholic sacramental practices, an evaluative judgment that Carl Seaquist has called “prejudicial theology.”26 This has come to pervade Western, or at least American, popular religious culture with stereotypical attitudes expressed in clichés about “empty ritual.” The common parlance “empty ritual” refers to something done without thinking, by rote. An action done without self-reflective conscious motivation is considered to be of no particular significance or value.27 Often meaning is equated to intent—the claim being that the meaning of an action is just exactly the actor’s intention; therefore, the absence of (conscious) intention renders an action meaningless.28 Superficially, such attitudes might appear contradictory to the pervasive neo-Romantic valuation of creative spontaneity in action. Creative spontaneity, however, is taken as evidencing an authenticity of intention, not its absence. This complex of preconceptions and values prejudices religious studies generally, and the study of ritual in particular, by its implicit privileging of silence over language, spontaneity over reflection, and the aesthetic, emotional, and experiential over the pragmatic, reasoned, and conceptual. The neo-Romantic theory of language, which as we have seen also engages a theory of religious experience and an epistemology, is a significant impediment to approaching an adequate understanding of the role of language in Buddhist praxis. Having addressed those preconceptions, we are now ready to look into possible applications of Euro-American thought—philosophical and linguistic—to the understanding of extraordinary language. Having begun my intellectual training with the study of philosophy, I naturally thought that the philosophy of language would provide the conceptual tools needed for such a project. Indeed, most of philosophic discourse presumes that it is unproblematically universal—its own historical, social, economic, and cultural locatedness being made invisible: the conceptual ocean in which philosopher fishes swim.29 The next section explores the limits of the conceptual tools available from philosophy of language and linguistics.

Western theories of meaning and language use As noted earlier, this is not intended to be a comprehensive review of the philosophy of language30 or linguistics. Instead it attempts to provide some background to the concept of extraordinary language as being distinct from ordinary forms of communication

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and the shared presumptions that limit the application of existing conceptual tools from philosophy of language and linguistics to the understanding of extraordinary language.

Referential theory The referential theory of meaning—the idea that words have meaning because they refer to some object—is perhaps the simplest and most commonly held theory of language, one that many theorists believe to be unredeemably naive, though others argue that it is foundational to the development of language as such. James R. Hurford has argued that the latter position is the case phylogenetically,31 while Robbins Burling has argued that this is the case ontogenetically. Burling has asserted, for example, that “Language is not a disembodied set of rules, and it is impossible to learn a language without relating it to things and events.”32 Under this theory, the meaning of the word chair is those objects in the world on which we sit—the extension of the category name. Eve Sweetser refers to this as an objectivist semantic theory, wherein meaning is thought of as basically a relationship between word and world, that is, between a linguistic form and an object or state of affairs referred to or described by that form.33

Both Sweetser and George Lakoff have critiqued objectivist semantic theory, for different reasons. Rather than explicating their objections at length, an example of the limitations of this theory is the set of conceptual errors known as category mistakes. The classic example of a category mistake is when someone, after having been shown around a college campus, asks at the end of the tour, “Where’s the college? I’ve seen classroom buildings, libraries, dormitories, and administrative buildings, students, professors, janitors, gardeners, and administrators, but I’ve not yet seen the college.” There is nothing other than what they’ve seen that is the college, but instead the college exists in a different ontological sense than do the observed buildings and their inhabitants. Objectivist semantic theory is one instance of a two-term formulation of a theory of meaning. A different kind of two-term formulation links words and concepts (or “objective meanings” as per Bolzano, Frege, and Husserl34), such as the two-stratum theory of language propounded by Edmund Husserl. Husserl’s Logical Investigations was critiqued by Jacques Derrida for employing the metaphor of strata to explain meaning. According to Derrida, this has two implications: that “meaning is founded on something other than itself ” and that “meaning constitutes a stratum whose unity can be rigorously delimited.”35 Although avoided by careful philosophers, many formulations regarding the relation between meaning and expression implicitly assume that meaning as concept and the form expressing that concept can be separated from one another—frequently employing a metaphor of expression as container and thought as contained, with all of the metaphorical entailments thereof. Considered as a metaphysical issue, this presents an unresolvable problem. Setting metaphysical preconceptions aside, however, it seems clear that a concept can only be separated from its expression as the result of analysis.

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In other words, the distinction between meaning and form is an analytic product, not an ontological distinction. This issue is related to one of the longest ongoing debates in contemporary philosophy of language, perhaps best known in terms of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. In its strong version, this is the assertion that “language shapes culture and cognition”36 or, more colloquially, that linguistic form determines cultural meaning. Despite the currently fashionable tendency to dismiss the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis as implying more than it can deliver, the case has recently been remade by Anna Wierzbicka37 and Zoltán Kövecses.38 The interdependence of cognition and language apparently seems unproblematic to many when the relation is understood to be from culture and cognition to language. However, the converse—the idea that language structures thought—is apparently for many people much more problematic. Sweetser argues that the metaphorical extension of categories provides a clearer version of the idea that language shapes culture and cognition. She gives the example of the metaphoric use of colors to indicate moral qualities, such as “white magic” vs. “black magic.” When a specific linguistic usage, based on such a metaphorical structure, becomes no longer consciously metaphorical … then we can say that the linguistic form has acquired a metaphorically motivated secondary sense.39

What Sweetser has identified here as the loss of conscious awareness of the metaphorical character of a specific linguistic usage, Paul Ricoeur has called “dead metaphor.”40

Frege’s threefold theory The philosophy of language seems to invariably begin with the notion of meaning and the communication of meaning. Perhaps the most common way of understanding meaning is to tie it to individual words and their relations to concepts (intension) and objects (extension). The most influential formulation of this way of approaching meaning in modern theories of language was established by Gottlob Frege in the second half of the nineteenth century. The example of category mistakes discussed earlier demonstrates that the meaning of some terms is conceptual rather than physical. Frege’s theory of language meaning extends this to assert that meaning always depends on a three-way relation between a sign (such as a word), its reference (such as an object in the world; Ger. bedeutung), and its sense (the objective meaning of the sign; Ger. sinn). As Mark Johnson writes, “In Frege’s terminology, a sign (such as a word) has a public meaning, its sense, by means of which it picks out a reference.”41 It is important to note that for Frege sense is objective, not dependent on individual, subjective concepts (psychologism) or social constructions. The three—sign, sense, and reference—are involved in discussions of meaning, even for those asserting only a two-part relation.42 For example, this three-part conception of sign, sense, and reference is foundational to symbolic logic, which distinguishes between the proposition (concept), its expression (form), and its truth conditions (taken by some to be the meaning as

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per Tarski).43 The use of this distinction is what allows for the assertion that natural language expressions can be rendered formally without any loss of meaning—or, to express this in its alternative form, without any loss of truth conditions.44 Thus, all three of the following statements, Cats are awake at night. Katzen wach sein am nacht. ∀x (xC ⊃ xA), where C stands for “cats,” A stands for “awake at night,” are held to be equivalent expressions (that is, having the same truth conditions) of the same propositional meaning. In his work Speech Acts, John R. Searle takes this idea as axiomatic: Whenever two illocutionary acts contain the same reference and predication, provided that the meaning of the referring expression is the same, I shall say the same proposition is expressed.45

In a parenthetical aside, a few pages later, Searle seems to indicate that this is not entirely unproblematic: It ought, incidentally, to be regarded as an extraordinary fact, one requiring an explanation, that a sentence in one language can be translated into sentences in another.46

Indeed, there seems to be growing agreement with what we take to be the implications of Searle’s unease with the Fregean notion of a proposition as separate from its expression.47 One of the problems with this notion is that if this were the case, then translation would indeed be the purely mechanical act of substitution one might imagine it to be before actually undertaking it. It is difficult, however, to apply this three-part structure to extraordinary language, for example, mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu. Although extraordinary language is not literally nonsense (despite what some have claimed), its significance is not created by the additive process of putting words that have some particular referent (either intensional or extensional) together with other words, some of whose function is grammatical, in an ordered sequence so as to convey a proposition— compositionality.48 Certainly as extraordinary language is used, however, it does not fit this description. It is important to stress the qualification as used: taken out of the context of ritual use it may be possible to construct any number of plausible explanations of meaning that are irrelevant to the actual use in ritualized contexts—one such exercise is to treat mantra and dhāraṇī as Sanskrit expressions abstracted from any pragmatic context and then attempt to discern lexical and grammatical content, claiming that these latter are the meaning.49 As used, then, extraordinary language is neither novel nor is it constructed in the grammatical fashion in which ordinary speech is constructed. It is also not communication in any ordinary sense. Frits Staal emphasizes this point:

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From the point of view of their ritual use, there is no difference in treatment between mantras we would regard as meaningful and mantras we would regard as meaningless. … Though believers and scholars may have gotten used to mantras, their use does not, therefore, make sense … mantras are not used like a special kind of language, such as the language of hunters, carpenters, musicians, or mathematicians. Mantras are used in ritual or meditation to bring about effects that are stated to be “ineffable” and “beyond language.” This renders it all the more difficult to conceive of mantras as arising from language.50

In his study of the origins of language, John L. Locke makes a terminological distinction between “talk” and “speech.” Speech, in his use, is communication, including not only a propositional content to be conveyed but also necessitating a “theory of mind,” knowing that one’s interlocutors have subjective, first-person experiential lives of their own. Locke calls attention to the fact that In typical language development, infants engage in sound-making and talking long before they know that others have mental lives that differ from their own, and presumably unaware that the talkers to whom they are exposed are exchanging information with arbitrary symbols. My personal attraction to talking as a precursor to language in the species began with the observation that normally developing infants take vocal turns, use word-like sounds and sentence-like prosodies, and in some cultures talk on toy telephones long before they produce words and do anything grammatical.51

A plausible interpretation of infant behaviors such as talking on a toy telephone is that it is (merely) imitative behavior, clearly not speech in Locke’s sense of interpersonal communication. Although he does not address this idea of imitative behavior directly, the additional evidence Locke offers from nonhuman primates clearly indicates that they are not engaged in imitative modeling of the behavior of human “parents.” For our understanding of extraordinary language, the characteristics noted by Locke that “infants take vocal turns, use word-like sounds and sentence-like prosodies” seem very similar to descriptions of certain phases of Vedic rituals. Infant “proto-speech” is often highly repetitive, unlike the too often highlighted character of adult speech as novel. Noam Chomsky’s view that novelty is one of the hallmarks of human speech has been widely influential. Extraordinary language, however, is given whole—that is, intended to be repeated in the same way each time. The four instances introduced earlier (mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu) do, of course, have their origins in Sanskrit, and some may be “translated” (after a fashion) as a response to the question, “What do they mean?” But these extraordinary uses of language are so different from ordinary speech that such a semantic treatment distracts from their significance rather than clarifying it. In other words, attempting to explain the meaning of mantra, and so on, by translation would be an instance of the etymological fallacy: “the common belief that the meaning of words can be determined by investigating their origins,”52 rather than looking at their current use.

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The encryption model of communication One of my fondest memories from early adolescence is of watching a television series on linguistics—hardly an ordinary entertainment for a teenage boy, and I suspect that it was important to me because it was one of the few activities I shared with my father. In retrospect, I think that this program may have been part of a televised class he was taking for credit from the local community college—an early precursor of the wide variety of distance learning opportunities available today. So while most of my friends were learning about baseball—and life—by playing catch with their fathers, I was learning about diagramming sentences and conjugating verbs. Aside from the pleasant nostalgia of this memory of early interaction with linguistics, it also sets the ground for a theoretical point that became clear over the more than two and a half decades of work on this topic. One of the programs in the series discussed the Navajo “code-talkers,” Native Americans who were recruited during the Second World War to send radio messages in their native language. The program explained that the Navajo language was so complicated that the code-talkers could use a simple substitution code with one another, and the Japanese were never able to decode their messages. My father loved this story and repeated it many, many times. In fact, I thought everyone knew about the Second World War code-talkers and was surprised that many people only first learned of them from the 2002 movie Windtalkers. What that story never pointed out, however, is that the Japanese code-breakers were probably treating Navajo as a coded version of the English language and not approaching it as a natural language in its own right. The common conception of ordinary language is that it involves a process of encoding–decoding; that is, the speaker encodes his/her thought into linguistic form, which the hearer then decodes back into thought (a version of the two-term formulation discussed earlier). It seems to me that the truly critical point of the story of the code-talkers is that language is in fact not a process of encoding–decoding and that this model of language is a misleading metaphor. Once we understand how much of what we think is only possible because of language—that language structures thought at levels much deeper than conscious discursive awareness—it seems obvious that the model, which implies the existence of (quasi-)propositional thought existing prior to its formation in language, cannot be correct. What I am calling here the encryption model of communication has become integrated into both the philosophy of language and linguistics so thoroughly that it has effectively become an unquestioned presumption. This is in other words the most common understanding of the relation between language and meaning.53 In this model of language there is a meaning that exists in the mind of a person. That person wishes to convey the meaning to another person and so encodes it in linguistic form, eventually resulting in the issuance of spoken (or written) language that is then conveyed to another person. The recipient must then reverse the process, taking the spoken (or written) expression and decoding it so as to understand the meaning. Upon reflection, it seems clear that this is an instance in which we have been seduced into taking a metaphor based on our own technology too literally and that the metaphor is now dead. In this particular case, I suspect that the invention

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of modern telegraphy at the end of the eighteenth century is the basis for the now effectively invisible metaphoric understanding of language as a process of encoding and decoding a message. With the advent of cybernetics and computers, awareness of the metaphoric character of the encoding–decoding model of language has completely vanished from discussions of language.54 The metaphor has become naturalized— that is, accepted as simply the natural way to understand language. The way in which we think about communication to, from, and through machines—whether a line of semaphores stretching from Paris to Lille in Revolutionary France or a desktop computer in California communicating via e-mail to another desktop in Hong Kong— has become the way in which we think about our conversations with each other. Julia Kristeva’s Language the Unknown demonstrates the depth of the entrenchment of the encoding–decoding metaphor: The introduction into the linguistic field of the notions necessary to communications theory has contributed to a reformulation of the langue/speech distinction and has given it a new and operant signification. The founder of cybernetics, Norbert Wiener, noted that no fundamental opposition exists between the problems encountered by specialists of communication and those encountered by linguists. Engineers, for example, send a message by means of a code, that is, a minimal number of binary decisions. In other words, they use a classification system or, let us say, a diagram representing the invariable and fundamental structures of the message, structures belonging to both the sender and the receiver, with which the receiver himself can reconstruct the message. In the same way, the linguist can find in the complexity of the verbal message distinctive features whose combination furnishes him with the code of that message. As Roman Jakobson has remarked, interlocutors belonging to the same linguistic community can be defined as the actual users of one and the same code; the existence of a common code sets up the communication and makes possible the exchange of messages.55

We can note the centrality of technology in Kristeva’s claims, and highlighting those, suggest that just as in the common assertion that the mind is a computer, here the metaphoric character of the claim has been lost, impeding critical reflection. In some greater schematic detail, Alan Cruse has laid out this model of communication: (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) (v) (vi) (vii) (viii) (ix)

The speaker normally has a purpose in communicating. The speaker constructs a message to be communicated. The speaker constructs an utterance with which to convey the message. The speaker transforms the utterance into a physical signal. The speaker transmits the signal. The addressee receives the signal. The addressee decodes the signal to recover the utterance. The addressee reconstructs the message from the utterance. The addressee infers the purpose of the communication.56

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Despite the authority with which the encoding–decoding model of language has been invested, the story of the code-talkers demonstrates its inadequacy. If language is merely a code, then the Japanese code-breakers, approaching Navajo as a coded form of English, should have been successful in their efforts to break the code. However, apparently because they treated it as a code they were unable to understand that they were dealing with a natural language. The connection to our topic here is that the encryption metaphor, which dominates almost all contemporary discussions of language, gives primacy to the informational content of communication. The contemporary philosophy of language also gives primacy to the informational content of communication in its discussion of language functions. This overdetermination contributes to the limitations of contemporary philosophy of language, which usually takes the communication of information as normative and fundamental, and all other uses of language as failures of communication, or as constituting some kind of exception that requires explanation, or as a “proto-informative” message that when theorized is treated as having propositional content as its meaning. Frege’s theory makes it clear that a philosophy of language entails a philosophy of mind. Wolfgang Carl paraphrases one of Frege’s foundational conceptions: “A sentence contains a thought.”57 This implies, for example, that thoughts are discrete items that are separate from the sentence that contains them. Note that the Fregean concept cited by Carl refers to “assertoric sentences which are complete,” meaning propositions. The link with a theory of mind reveals one of the key problems with the encryption model of communication. This is its assumption of the existence of something like a homunculus inside of one’s mind, an entity that, having decoded the message, understands the meaning. But in what form does this homunculus understand the meaning?58 In some form other than language? Or in some kind of “mentalese”?59 Clearly, once reduced to its simplest outlines, such a model of language is simply an infinite regress, with the homunculus then needing to translate or decode the meaning from whatever form it is in when he or she receives it into some other form, the meaning of which he or she is able to understand.

Metaphor theory One area of study that has recently challenged semantic theories of meaning—in which the meaning of a word is a lexical concept60—is metaphor theory. As it is usually understood, metaphor indicates a situation in which two words (or signs) are understood to be interchangeable, an understanding of metaphor referred to by Paul Ricoeur as the substitution thesis.61 This is a lexical understanding of metaphor, and it can provide some explanation of how the meaning of an unknown word is communicated by reference to a known word. However, since mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu are not made up of individual words that are themselves units of lexical meaning in the same way that sentences are constructed from words (the principle of compositionality discussed earlier), but rather are learned as entire blocks of speech, a lexical theory of metaphoric meaning is not explanatory.

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Recent work in metaphor theory, such as that of Mark Johnson, George Lakoff, and Eve Sweetser, has considerably extended the concept of metaphor and initially appears more promising. This extension points to embodied experience as the foundation from which the meaning of one term or concept is metaphorically extended into another domain of experience or thought. As Sweetser notes, “it is an essential feature of metaphor to map a concept onto another concept from a distinct domain.”62 This understanding of metaphor radically shifts away from the substitution thesis and provides a grounding for semantic theory in lived experience. However, since these extraordinary uses of language lack explicit conceptual content, it is not the case that there are two domains between which there is a metaphoric linkage. The specific form of metaphor theory that treats metaphor as linking concept to concept therefore does not explain how extraordinary uses of language in a ritual context can be significant. Despite this limitation, by pointing toward the importance of embodied experience for cognition, this approach suggests an understanding of the experiential bases of the ritual contexts within which ritual uses of language become personally significant. An example might be of how in a Shin temple a child may be led to the incense burner at the front of a temple and shown by his or her grandmother how to make the incense offering—how to put incense into the censer, fold their hands, bow, and recite the nenbutsu. These actions, repeated during weekly service after weekly service, create a bodily and affective association with the recitation that makes it personally significant, if not “meaningful” in the sense of conveying information.

The performative function of language The performative function of language was formulated by John L. Austin in his classic series of lectures, published under the title How to Do Things with Words.63 Austin’s insight is that certain kinds of linguistic expressions are in themselves actions of social import; for example, the action of saying “I now pronounce you man and wife” is not a statement of fact, that is, not a proposition, but an action that once taken has significant and meaningful consequences. The expression’s meaning is, or at least includes, those consequences, whether consciously intended or not.64 Stanley Tambiah extended Austin’s insight in his own now-classic essay, “A Performative Theory of Ritual.”65 He expands the idea that certain linguistic expressions were themselves social actions to the idea that ritual actions are socially effective in the same way. Just as certain nondiscursive, nonpropositional expressions have social effects, so too do certain ritual actions.66 While this idea is compelling,67 it is only partially explanatory of our examples of extraordinary language. It does not, for example, correspond well with certain doctrinal conceptions of the kinds of language under consideration here—specifically, for example, the Shin understanding of the nenbutsu as a spontaneous expression of gratitude. Expressive language is distinguished from performative language in which the former performs no illocutionary action other than expressing the emotion that gave rise to it. The difference between someone saying “Oh, lovely!” upon opening a gift and then saying “Thank you so very much” is an instance of this difference. The Shin emphasis on the nenbutsu as a spontaneous expression of gratitude that arises without

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performative intent theorizes a distinction from mantra, for which the performative significance is explicitly intended. For example, in the performance of the Shingon votive fire ritual (Jpn. goma) one evokes the jeweled carriage conveying the buddhas, bodhisattvas, and other deities to the site of the ritual by reciting the mantra naumaku shitchirya jibikyanan tatagyatanan on bazara ginyau kyara syaya sowaka three times, while making the appropriate ritual hand gesture (Skt. mudrā). It may be argued that such doctrinal interpretations have little to do with the actualities of how extraordinary language is significant. Indeed, given the way in which many mantra appear to be used with some performative intent—though not expressed in the usual form of performatives as discussed by Austin—the idea that all extraordinary language is performative has a prima facie appeal. However, the standard performative forms—promise, apologize, and so on—upon which the idea of a performative function of language is built, depend upon semantic significances familiar to both parties to the performative act. Again, communication between two parties is essential to the performative function of language, and in these nondiscursive, ritual uses, there is no such communication. Additionally, there is also the issue that both parties (one of which may be a group) must already understand the meaning of the performative speech act. If I say Sumimasen (“pardon me”) to an American who speaks no Japanese, then it can reasonably be argued that no performative speech act has in fact been effected.

Pragmatics and context “Pragmatics is the study of language use in context.”68 That is, it addresses those aspects of language use beyond grammar and semantics that enable language to function as a vehicle for communication.69 This shifts the focus of attention from meaning as located within either a pre- or extralinguistic strata of meaning, or within an individual person in isolation, to the social realm of interpersonal relations. Considered under the pragmatic approach, one of the central questions is, “To whom is the expression of mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, or nenbutsu directed?” Once this question is asked, however, it seems clear that mantra, dhāraṇī, nenbutsu, and daimoku are not communication between people in the same sense as is ordinarily meant. Pragmatics emphasizes actual instances of located speech.70 The term “context” usually includes the time and place of instances of actual speech as, for example, in understanding what is meant by a statement such as “Mine is the green one,” accompanied by a gesture (i.e., a nonverbal sign) pointing out a specific car in a parking lot. However, the term “context” is usually employed to identify much more than simply the time and place of a speech event that is the focus of attention. When the issue of context is raised it is typically argued that the focal event cannot be properly understood, interpreted appropriately, or described in a relevant fashion, unless one looks beyond the event itself to other phenomena (for example, cultural setting, speech situation, shared background assumptions) within which the event is embedded, or alternatively that features of the talk itself invoke particular background assumptions relevant to the organization of subsequent interaction.71

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While this explanation of context attends to normal, propositional meanings, use of mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu indicates that context, broadly understood, is equally important in understanding the significance of extraordinary language. The importance of contextualization for ritual uses of extraordinary language includes the kinds of qualifications required of the speaker of a performative that Austin discussed.72 Glenn Wallis notes that “the system of rules implicit in mantric language does not concern linguistic features, but social, doctrinal, and ritual ones. A mantra, like an ordinary word, is effective only when spoken under the proper conditions; and the proper conditions exist only once numerous social, doctrinal, and ritual rules have been strictly followed.”73 Qualifications of ritual practitioners are a wellknown requirement in theories of ritual efficacy and constitute an essential part of any performative analysis of extraordinary language. These extraordinary uses of language differ significantly from the kinds of language use in which a novel expression is made to communicate a message at a particular time and place. Furthermore, extraordinary language does not emphasize novelty. Instead there is a strong emphasis on repetition of the same expression without variation, no matter how frequently repeated.74 The practitioner learns when and where to repeat the expression in a ritual context, but without any intention to communicate any message to any other person. There is, however, significance indirectly communicated to both self and others through the act of repeating one expression rather than another, due in part to the sectarian and doctrinal identifications of the different expressions. For example, one of the things that saying namu daishi henjō kongō, the mantra of Kōbō Daishi Kūkai, signifies is a different self-identity or religious affiliation from that signified by reciting namu myōhō renge kyō, the Nichiren recitation. More important, the act of making such an expression not only expresses a particular aspect of one’s self-identity, it also goes toward forming that very self-identity. Thus, part of the significance of these expressions is the formation and assertion of a particular religious self-identity. It is not the propositional or discursive content that is being communicated, but an aspect of how one conceives of oneself, one’s relation to others, and one’s understanding of how the world we share works.

Structuralist theory At its core, a structuralist theory of language is the idea that meaning is created by contrasts.75 Specifically, this is the idea that meaning exists by reference to sets of contrasts found within a language system at a particular time. The qualification of “at a particular time” is important to avoid the etymological fallacy mentioned previously and is one of the key distinctions Saussure introduced between the synchronic and diachronic study of language. Given this—and despite the best efforts of schoolteachers to make existing usages normative—word meanings and grammatical usages change over time, so it is important to look at an entire language system as it exists at a particular moment, that is, to hold one variable constant. The reality of change has been taken as a basis for a critique of Saussure and structuralist analysis of linguistic meaning, yet Saussure himself was aware of linguistic change

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and proposed a synchronic approach for methodological reasons.76 While this was not Saussure’s focus of attention, only from such a synchronic understanding is it then possible to go on to develop more meaningful studies of change over time, the diachronic dimension. Two sets of contrastive relations are important in Saussure’s analysis: syntagmatic and paradigmatic.77 Syntagmatic relations are those between linguistic elements that are at some sense at the same level of meaning and can be combined to form larger units of meaning. The phrase “a new car” is a construct (i.e., syntagm) of the three units “a” (indefinite article), “new” (adjective), and “car” (noun). As used by Saussure, “paradigmatic” refers to the way in which other words can be substituted for a particular word in a syntagm, creating a new phrase. For example, there is a paradigmatic relation between “new” and “blue” such that the new, and meaningful, phrase “a blue car” can be created by substituting one for the other. Certainly when treated as sentential forms the construction of mantra, such as a mantra for the Kūkai, namu daishi henjo kongō, which originates in Japan modeled on Sanskrit mantra, demonstrates both of these kinds of relations. We are, however, looking beyond the details of the meaning of individual words to the way in which contrasts existing within the same religious culture can serve to create one kind of significance for mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu. At one level, the meaning of the phrase namu daishi henjō kongō can be unpacked semantically.78 As mentioned previously, this is not the most important aspect of the significance such a phrase has in the context of ritual use—because it is not the case that semantic content is being conveyed to another person. Although in the context of a ritual most mantra have a quasi-performative function, this cannot be the entire explanation for how all four of these extraordinary language uses are significant. In terms of the larger religious culture, the contrasts created between recitation of namu myōhō renge kyō, namu Amida butsu, and on abogya beiroshanō makabodara mani handoma jimbara harabaritaya un (the komyō shingon, “clear light mantra,” popular in Shingon Buddhism) are central to the meaning of the phrases. The significance of the daimoku, for example, derives neither solely from the semantic meanings of the words nor solely from the doctrinal significance attributed to it, but also from the fact that within the context of Nichiren-shū, where the daimoku is most significant, it is not paradigmatic with either the Shingon mantra namu daishi henjō kongō or the Pure Land nenbutsu namu Amida butsu; that is, one cannot be simply substituted for the other paradigmatically. A structuralist approach does seem to accord with a Madhyamaka analysis of language in some ways. Although it is too brief to be called a theory of meaning, Nāgārjuna exemplifies interdependence (pratītyasamutpāda) by reference to mantra in his *Vyavahārasiddhi. What he has to say there is at least congruent with the fundamental view of structuralism, which I suggest is relevant to understanding the significance of mantra, dharāṇī, nenbutsu, and daimoku. One of Nāgārjuna’s cryptic kārikās can be interpreted to suggest that a mantra is exactly an organized (i.e., structured) set of syllables and that the syllables are only significant as part of the mantra. The mantra is not just a set of syllables but is structured in such a way as to create significance:

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One syllable is not a mantra; many syllables are not a mantra either. Dependent upon syllables that are [thus] insubstantial, this [mantra is neither existent] nor nonexistent.79

A structuralist understanding of extraordinary language locates the ability of such language to convey significance in the system of relations that exist with other linguistic and cognitive elements. Like meaning, significance is not separable from the system. Letters (bīja), words, and phrases are significant within the system they form. At the same time, as Nāgārjuna is suggesting here (and elsewhere in his writings), the system is not separate from the items that comprise it. The attention given earlier to context broadens our perspective so that we can avoid the mistaken conclusion that the idea of structure as the source of meaning is a purely conceptual matter, divorced from the realities of the social and political existence of religious institutions. A system of religious language, for example, that of Shin-shū, Jodō-shū, Nichiren-shū, or Shingon-shū, is not what in the terminology of systems theory would be called a “closed system.” Rather, it is a permeable system that interacts with a wide variety of other systems while at the same time retaining its own structure and integrity—a pattern of relations I have called “semi-autonomous.” A religious language interacts, for example, with systems of social, political, economic, or military power, and the language systems employed in those. It would be mistaken, however, to see this as a unidirectional relation in which power deploys language. The relation is bidirectional (or actually multidirectional): the language system in turn conditions the ways that power may be deployed. In other words, systems of religious language do not exist in an abstract realm of Platonic ideal forms; instead they are enmeshed in social, political, economic, and military realities. At the same time, a religious language participates in the wider conceptual world of the religious tradition as a whole, such as Mahāyāna. It also interacts with other systems of religious language, most evidently in the form of rhetorical strategies of distinction in order to reaffirm separate sectarian identity. And finally, it interacts with other “language ideologies” found in the social systems of which it is a part. Language ideologies are representations, “whether explicit or implicit, that construe the intersection of language and human beings in a social world” and are not about language alone, but they envision and enact ties of language to identity, to aesthetics, to morality, and to epistemology. Through such linkages, they underpin not only linguistic form and use but also the very notion of the person and the social group, as well as such fundamental social institutions as religious ritual, child socialization, gender relations, the nation-state, schooling, and law.80

The characterization of language as communication is part of the language ideology of present-day Euro-American society. The encryption model constructs an abstraction of language as the process by which a necessarily preverbal message is encoded in language, sent from one person to another, and decoded by the recipient who, then, understands the message. Rather than simply being an objective description to be taken for granted, such a model is built upon and reinforces individualistic conceptions of the person that enmesh with personal morality and social values.

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Most theories of language, however, do take as axiomatic the idea that language is essentially or primarily communicative, and by doing so they cannot provide any adequate means of understanding extraordinary language use. This is simply the consequence of the limitation imposed by the definition of what constitutes language. Because structural and contextual approaches locate language in the realm of the social, they do move toward an understanding of the significance of mantra, dhāraṇī, daimoku, and nenbutsu.

Conclusion In his study of Western mysticism, Michel de Certeau describes the relation between the two views of language—that it can express the highest religious truths and that it cannot—as existing in a kind of oscillation. He traces this to two sources: first, the early Christian tradition in which God has spoken, which means that the revelation in language is the basis for mystical knowledge, “behind the illocutionary tactics that invent ‘words for that [revelation],’ there is, ultimately, the principle of a ‘concord’ between the infinite and language.”81 De Certeau identifies the second source as the Greco-Roman tradition that leads the mind toward silence … and designates with the term “ineffable” not only a critique of language but its absence; it departs in the direction of an unknown god … who silences all thought because he is beyond being.82

The metaphor of oscillation is as accurate for the Buddhist tradition as it is for the Western mystical traditions of which de Certeau writes. And, we note, the poles of the oscillation do not originate in the all-too-familiar sources of Western culture that de Certeau cites. Furthermore, it is more accurate than the assumption that Buddhist tradition accords entirely with the Romantic presumption that language is a barrier to the direct experience of reality, a notion that continues to inform contemporary religious studies and its interpretation of Buddhism. Just like de Certeau, Fabio Rambelli has noted that there are two views within Buddhism regarding the putative opposition between speech and silence: Plus particulièrement, il est possible de cerner dans le bouddhism deux attitudes de base envers les langages et les signes. Selon la première, la langue ordinaire, conçue comme arbitraire et conventionnelle, ne peut qu’ètre source d’erreur et son montrer incapable de représenter la réalité telle qu’elle est; elle est par conséquent dénuée d’utilité (voire délétère) lorsqu’il s’agit d’atteindre le salut. Selon une autre attitude, cependant, il existe une langue non ordinaire, «authentique», parfaitement adaptée à la re-présentation du monde et qui conduit les ètres vers l’éveil spiritual. Cette langue est celle que parle le Bouddha: du fait de son statut ontologique et épistémologique, les paroles du Bouddha sont, croit-on, dotées d’un pouvoir magique et thamaturgique.83

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(In particular, it is possible to identify in Buddhism two basic attitudes towards languages and signs. According to the first, ordinary language, conceived as arbitrary and conventional, can only be a source of error, and sees it as unable to represent reality as it is; it is therefore deprived of any utility (and is even deleterious) when it comes to achieving salvation. According to another attitude, however, there is a non-ordinary, “authentic” language, perfectly adapted to the re-presentation of the world and which leads beings to spiritual awakening. This language is that which the Buddha speaks: because of its ontological and epistemological status, the words of the Buddha are believed to have magical and thaumaturgic power.)

Jacqueline Stone has described a semiotically related opposition in the discourse on original awakening (Jpn. hongaku shisō) in medieval Tendai, the sect from which Pure Land and Nichiren sects arose. She analyzes that discourse into two strands. The first of which “sees all phenomena as deriving from an originally pure mind, which, coming into contact with defilements, give rise to the differentiated phenomenal world.”84 The second does not recognize the mind as being prior to phenomena but holds the two to be simultaneous and mutually encompassing. This view valorizes all things, just as they are, as expressing the true aspect of reality: simultaneously void of substance (emptiness); existing contingently in dependence on conditions (conventional existence); and at once both empty and existing but never either exclusively (the middle).85

While expressed in more general terms, Stone goes on to explain that these two strands lead to different understandings of the language of the Lotus Sutra. The first strand of original awakening corresponds to the negative view of language as part of the worldly defilements that the originally pure mind encounters, then giving rise to discriminations. The second corresponds to a positive view of language, one in which language is part of the phenomena that exist simultaneously with the mind in a mutually encompassing relation. The view that ultimate truth is accessible to or compatible with language and cognition has been widespread in India and in the Indian sources of East Asian Buddhist tantra.

3

Indic Understandings of Language—From Vedas to Tantra

As perhaps happens frequently, the inquiry at the core of this chapter was stimulated by a disagreement—a good-natured disagreement, but still a disagreement. Several years ago now, a respected colleague and I were discussing Tanluan’s theory of two kinds of names, which appears in his “Commentary on the ‘Rebirth Treatise’” (T. 1819, Jing tu lun zhu).1 In explaining the efficacy of recitative nianfo (Skt. buddhānusmṛti; Jpn. nenbutsu), Tanluan claims that there are two kinds of words: those whose meanings are referential in character and those that are identical with their meaning. My colleague maintained that this is a Chinese idea, specifically an extension of the familiar Confucian idea of the rectification of names. In contrast, I asserted that it demonstrates the influence of tantric Buddhist conceptions of language use. In light of further work on extraordinary language use in the Lotus Sūtra,2 I became convinced that while my position in this difference of opinion was a bit overstated, fundamentally it was correct. While the theory of language underlying Tanluan’s assertion is not specifically tantric in character, it is part of a more general Indic understanding of language introduced to China by Buddhist practitioners, particularly tantric ones. It was received there not only because it resolved some particular problem in Chinese Buddhist thought as with Tanluan, but also no doubt because of certain familiar resonances with existing Chinese conceptions of language. This chapter introduces a variety of different theories of language found in Indian religious thought, and then in the next chapter Chinese conceptions will be examined. The latter includes an examination of Tanluan’s claim and supports the conclusion that the source for Tanluan’s distinction is not China but India.

Two different philosophic approaches In the preceding chapter we examined some of the theories of language from EuroAmerican philosophy of language and linguistics. In this chapter we now turn to Indic understandings of language. As in the preceding chapter, this is not intended as a comprehensive examination, but the goal here is to introduce a variety of concepts regarding language that constitute the background of extraordinary language use in East Asian Buddhist praxis.

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Despite the tendency for many scholars trained solely in Euro-American traditions of philosophic thought to decontextualize philosophy as both unitary and universal, there are important fundamental differences between Indic and Euro-American philosophic traditions. Specifically, contemporary Euro-American philosophy of language is largely based on logic and the ways of discussing truth and meaning that derive from taking logic as fundamental to understanding language.3 One effect of privileging logic is a division between a static and a dynamic conception of the object of inquiry. For Gottlob Frege, “logic is the study of the eternal and unchanging structure of thought, not the study of the psychological process of thinking.”4 In contrast to either thought or thinking, that is, logic as static or psychology as dynamic, Indic philosophy of language originates instead from a concern with the place of language in cosmology5 and cosmogony, with attention being given to the functioning of language in ritual.6 Discussing the problems involved in the study of Indian philosophy, Elisa Freschi has called attention to centrality of ritual, “in most cases Mīmāṃsā texts presuppose the knowledge of rituals and use ritual examples as explanatory tools.”7 There are, however, some notable commonalities between the Euro-American philosophy of language and Indic understandings of language. These include (1) the relation between the meaning of a word and the meaning of a sentence (known as the problem of sentential unity or the question of compositionality8); (2) the distinction between sense and reference, which was central to the development of Frege’s conceptions of the philosophy of language; and, (3) the problems of empty subject terms and negative existentials.9 Despite these similarities of some technical aspects of philosophy of language, the fundamental differences between Euro-American and Indic philosophic approaches to language are profound. Most important, in Indian conceptions of language it is not understood as separate, derivative, or reflective of what actually exists, but in many traditions is instead understood as constitutive of the cosmos and all things within it. The meaning of “constitutive” here is literal; it does not simply refer to the idea of constituting the categories of experience, as in the well-known Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, but rather to metaphysically constitutive.10 It is possible to distinguish several interrelated theories of language efficacy and meaning in the religious culture of India that contribute to the development of Buddhist thought and would have been introduced into East Asian Buddhist tantric praxis as implicit understandings of language. These theories are most clearly formulated in discussions of extraordinary language use found in religious contexts. This chapter considers Vedic ritual use, the idea of phonematic emanation, the identity of a deity and the meaning of the deity’s mantra, known as the sphoṭa theory, later schools of Hindu tantra, the epistemological significance of verbal testimony, ideas regarding language found in the abhidharma, the practice of paritta, the Bodhisattvabhumi, and Buddhist tantric praxis.

Vedic ritual performance The Vedic use of mantra in ritual performance is characterized by employing fragments of the text of the Vedas to frame ritual actions in cosmic terms.11 As described by Frits

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Staal, “Vedic Mantras are bits and pieces of the Vedas put to ritual use.”12 In other words, a piece of Vedic text that matches the ritual action in some fashion will be recited during the performance of that action. The agent of the Vedic text recited during the performance of the ritual action is one of the gods. In this sense, the mantra reframes the ritual action being performed by a human agent as a divine action. The ritual actors and their actions are identified with the gods and their actions. This ritual identification is similar, if not identical, to what is found in many strains of tantra. It is intended to contain and direct the power of the sacrifice so that it fulfills the desires of the ritual’s sponsor (Skt. yajamāna). In Vedic conceptions of the relation between ritual and mantra, the sacrifice generates the power, while the mantra directs it to accomplish the desired goal. For some later theorists, such as the early eleventh-century literary theorist Bhoja, Vedic mantra did not need to be meaningful to be effective; in other words, the efficacy of mantra did not require the communication of meaning.13 In the view of Vedic theorists, the proper name or description of something is identical with that thing. This identity is also key to theories of the efficacy of later ritual uses of mantra that have their origins in Vedic ritual. Patton E. Burchett writes: In Vedic times, mantras were used in the context of ritual sacrifices in which their primary role was to actualize and make explicit the correspondences believed to exist between powerful divine forces and various objects in the human world. In the ritual context of the sacrifice, these homologies with the divine—once actualized by the chanting of various mantras—could be controlled to the benefit of the ritual performers.14

Sukumar Sen claims that the earliest use of dhāraṇī for the purposes of protection appears in the Atharvaveda.15 From there the use of both mantra and dhāraṇī was adopted into Āyurvedic medicine. According to Arian Rosu: Les mantra interviennent notamment dans les accouchements difficiles et pour guérir les maladies nerveuses et mentales ainsi que les morsures des bêtes venimeuses. L’exorciste chasse par des formules sacrées les mauvais esprits prétendument responsables de nombreuses maladies. Jusqu’à nos jours les mantra, qu’ils soient écrits ou énoncés, sont considérés comme de puissants protecteurs contre les maux.16 (The mantra intervenes especially in difficult deliveries, to cure nervous and mental diseases, as well as the bites of poisonous beasts. By sacred formulas the exorcist hunts the evil spirits allegedly responsible for many diseases. Until today the mantra, whether written or spoken, are considered powerful protectors against evil.)

Although in many instances the efficacy of extraordinary language involves the notion of speech as powerful, in the case of the Āyurvedic use of mantra, written mantra are also considered to be effective. This is at least parallel to the use of written talismans in Daoist practices and such practices as dhāraṇī pillars constructed in China, discussed in the next chapter.

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Theorizing Vedic mantra: Upaniṣads and Mīmāṃsā According to Johannes Bronkhorst, the identity of word and its referent is a consistent theme found throughout early Indic thought, explicit expression beginning with the Upaniṣads: “words and the things they denote constitute a single unity, and words are not distinct from their objects.”17 Bronkhorst sees this idea as a common thread across a wide scope, from the mythic conception of the goddess Vac (speech) as the creatrix of the world18 to the semantics of Pāṇini.19 As with the oscillation between silence and revelation described by de Certeau in the previous chapter, Bronkhorst also identifies a view of language, found, for example, in the Chāndogya Upaniṣad, which holds a contrary perspective in which “language covers, as it is spoken, the reality which is hidden behind it.”20 More directly to the point of our inquiry here, Bronkhorst also attributes this understanding of word–world identity to the use of mantra. This conception is expressed in the frequent use of mantras, whether these are Vedic mantras or non-Vedic; mantras are presumed to influence objective reality, the non-linguistic, and that is because of the bond attaching words, and sometimes also sounds, to things.21

Standard treatments of classic Indian religious philosophy identify six traditions considered to be orthodox (Skt. astika) because they accept the authority of the Vedas. These six are usually grouped into three pairs based on shared positions of one kind or another: Nyāya and Vaiśeṣika, Sāṃkhya and Yoga, and Mīmāṃsa and Vedanta. Of these, the one that gave most attention to language was Mīmāṃsā, and the philosophy of the Mīmāṃsā tradition is structured by the tradition’s primary concern—justifying Vedic ritual as effective. In other words, the goal of Mīmāṃsā thinkers was to explain why Vedic ritual, which includes recitation of portions of the Vedas as mantra, was efficacious in producing the goals intended by the ritual performance. For the Mīmāṃsā, the authority of the Vedas was based on the idea not only that they are eternal and authorless but that their very existence is identical with the existence of the universe. In other words, they exist as an eternal sound (śabda)22 or vibration, and from that eternal vibration the existence of the phenomenal universe comes into being.23 When the Vedas are spoken in the proper ritual context the foundational eternal vibration is being made present, and this presencing is what makes the ritual effective.

Phonematic emanation While the idea of the power of speech pervaded the religious culture of India, more explicit theories were developed in the medieval period. These seem to have been an integral part of the tantric movement from its inception, with versions found in both Hindu and Buddhist tantra. One theory, the emanation theory, linked the sequence of Sanskrit syllables with the ongoing emanation of the cosmos. Specifically, the

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emanation theory links speech (vak) to the process of cosmogenesis. André Padoux believes that phonematic emanation’s “inception is presumably quite early”; however, the earliest sources have not yet been identified.24 He notes that while there are many different versions of this idea “depending upon different schools and texts,” emanation appears generally as unfolding from an initial luminous vibration or sound (nāda), which is an extremely subtle state of pure phonic energy, which through a series of transformations and condensations will become less subtle, forming a concentrate or drop (bindu) of sound-energy, from which, when it divides itself, worlds, humans, and language will come forth.25

Padoux has identified three different descriptions of phonematic emanation of the cosmos and its resorption into the undifferentiated mass of sounds eternally immanent within Śiva: by gradual externalization, by a four-part unfolding, and by the succession of the syllabary, all three of these describing the same process from different perspectives. In each case the process of resorption that leads to liberation is the reversal of the process of emanation.26 First, gradual externalization: in this description of the process of phonematic emanation, Śiva’s power (śakti) is the primal sound-vibration, which, as it gradually condenses, passes through an initial “resonance” (nāda), and becomes a drop (bindu) of phonic energy. The drop divides and subsequently gives birth to the matrix of phonemes (mātṛkā), to the phonemes themselves (varṇa), and to words. This sound process is “that which expresses” (vācaka), and induces thereby the emergence of “that which is expressed” (vācya), namely the world of objects (artha) or the meanings that it expresses.27

At this level, where the phonic energy is identified with the kuṇḍalinī and with the breath, access to this energy is provided through human action in the form of yogic breathing exercises. In four-part unfolding, second of the three kinds identified by Padoux, the four parts or stages in the imagery of phonematic emanation as a process of unfolding are first the supreme word (parāvāc), which is identical with the primal energy (śakti) in union with Śiva; second, the “‘seeing’ or ‘visionary’ word (paśyantī),” which marks the beginning of differentiation; third, the intermediate word (madhyamā), where differentiation becomes duality; and finally, the lowest, corporeal, fourth stage (vaikharī), which is both audible sound and the object referents. According to traditional Sanskrit grammar, there is a phonemic enumerative transmission (varṇasamāṃnāya) in the succession of the syllabary, which is Padoux’s third kind. This idea is of interest in relation to understanding Buddhist conceptions of the power of speech since it appears to have been adopted as part of the legitimizing ideology for some tantric Buddhist practices. For example, the mantra for Mañjuśrī, oṃ a ra pa ca na, is the opening sequence of one of the medieval versions of the Sanskrit syllabary. In enumerative transmission

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Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan the arising of each phoneme is looked upon as the result of a synthetic realization (parāmarśa) of Śiva, each realization and each phoneme corresponding to the emergence either of one aspect of Śiva’s energy (for the first sixteen phonemes), or of one of the thirty-four other tattvas, which form the entire cosmic manifestion.28

Padoux summarizes phonematic emanation as the sequence of Sanskrit phonemes that arise successively following the order of the “enumerative transmission” (varṇasamāṃnāya), that is, as enumerated in traditional grammar … the arising of each phoneme corresponding to the emergence either of one aspect of Śiva’s energy (for the first sixteen phonemes), or of one of the thirty-four other tattvas, which form the entire cosmic manifestation.29

According to “phonematic emanation” the universe emanates as a series of vibrations, each stage of which moves from an undifferentiated unity toward increasing differentiation, increasingly distant from the eternal or absolute that is its source. This series of vibrations is not simply represented by the sequence of sounds that are the Sanskrit syllabary; they are that sequence. To attain liberation under this conception means reversing the process of emanation, cycling back up the vibratory sequence to the eternal or absolute source. The metaphoric use of such cycles of emanation and resorption, or manifestation and dissolution are found in a variety of different applications throughout medieval Kashmir Śaivite thought and practice. Paul Müller-Ortega discusses the metaphoric power of one image of such cycles, the cakra: The image of the cakra or wheel is homologized or symbolically approximated with various natural images: the opening and closing of the petals of a flower, the expansive rays of light streaming from the sun, the outwardly concentric circles of waves from a central point of disturbance in water, the spiral whorls of pattern in the pollen of a flower, the circles of dark and light colors in the pupil of the eye. These and many other natural images are understood to reveal and replicate at the level of physical reality, this fundamental pattern of the cosmic energy which operates at the highest level as the śakti-cakra, but which “seals” (mudrā) or imprints its energetic and primordial mark throughout the layers of physical existence in this way.30

Speaking specifically of śakticakra, the indescribable vortex wheel of power, MüllerOrtega identifies the metaphor of the cakra as “a fundamental and pervasive Śaiva tantric metaphor for depicting and conceptualizing the absolute power of consciousness.”31 He continues: By its very simplicity, this metaphor is readily transposable and capable of being employed—mutatis mutandis—in any conceivable domain: (to name a few) the sequentiality of time; the unfolding and enfolding cosmogonic process; the steps of yogic or mystical ascent; the sequences of initiation; the philosophical narration of

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the principles of reality; the sequences of worship in tantric ritual; the progressive nature of knowledge; the structure of architectural design of the temple; and even the political hierarchies of human institutions of royalty, government, and society.32

Müller-Ortega then discusses the concept of krama, that is, sequence, which is related to the metaphor of the cakra: Discourse surrounding krama is the Hindu Tantra’s attempt to penetrate conceptually into the deepest recesses of that which controls and moves the orderly fabric of manifest reality, of that which rings the changes of reality step-by-step in an orderly, sequential, intelligent, and yet ever-changing progression. Śaivite metaphysics, theology, philosophical discourse, as well as its ritual and yogic forms, have sought to uncover, catalogue, and rationally organize these sequences of reality into a comprehensible and potent vision of the real. In this discourse, we find the attempt at a systematization of manifold kramas or sequences of the intelligent movement of the divine śakti. 1) Thus, there are the sequences of the śakti that first display themselves as the supreme śakti-cakra itself in manifold versions. 2) There are the sequences of the process of manifestation of the visible reality through stages from the atīta or transcendent consciousness through subtle layers of being (sūkṣma) down to the sthūla or fully manifested physical reality. 3) There are the sequences in the manifestation of the principles that govern reality, the thirty-six tattvas articulated in Śaivite metaphysics as they descend from the absolute consciousness of the Paramaśiva, and then move intelligently down to the level of gross materiality. 4) Parallel to this are the sequences of the manifestation of verbal intelligibility: the linguistic, conceptual universe in which the Parā Vāc or supreme Word—which pulsates in the silence of the supreme consciousness— allows for the emanational manifestation of the vibrating pulsation of the fifty Sanskrit phonemes. 5) These phonemes themselves are thought to move down through a sequence of four stages to arrive at the verbal, spoken word that manipulates and articulates concepts, names, and ideas.33

We cite Müller-Ortega at length in order to establish a basis for looking at the tantric Buddhist practice of “the wheel of syllables” (Skt. akṣaracakra) as practiced in Japan in Chapter 5. The image of the cakra (wheel or cycle) of syllables expresses not only the progressive manifesting forth of the cosmos, which is at the same time the process of bondage, but in its turning back it also expresses the resorption of the universe into its source, which is at the same time the process of liberation. In summary, the core associations found in Kashmiri Śaiva tantra are: emanation is bondage; resorption is liberation. These metaphors and images formed an important part of the religious milieu in which Buddhist tantra developed, and are apparently visible to us in the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra, and in the wheel of syllables practice in Shingon ritual. These comparisons point to the continuity of conceptions regarding the efficacy of extraordinary language from Indic tantras to East Asian Shingon.

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The sphoṭa theory of meaning: Bhartṛhari and mantra samādhi In his Vyākyapadīya Bhartṛhari asserts that the proper use of mantra “removes all impurities, purifies all knowledge and leads to release.”34 The power of mantra lies in their relation to the Vedas and how the Vedas are related to brahman—the absolute reality, which is at the same time the “word-principle” (śabdatattva). The Vedas are a manifestation of the ultimate word (śabda), in the sense of sound or speech. As David Carpenter writes, For Bhartṛhari the Veda is first and foremost a cosmic reality, the sonic manifestation of the ultimate ground of reality within the world of time and space. This phenomenal manifestation takes the form of powerful speech, the mantras and ritual injunctions employed in the Vedic sacrificial rites.35

Bhartṛhari’s explanation of the efficacy of mantra and dhāraṇī in terms of his theory of meaning, the sphoṭa theory, relates to a concern for proper pronunciation and proper grammar: if misspoken in recitation, their transformative potential will not be activated. Bhartṛhari’s concern with the proper pronunciation of mantra in order to avoid wasting their energy relates his explanation of the efficacy of mantra and dhāraṇī to his theory of meaning. Bhartṛhari’s view that the meaning of linguistic expressions resides in the whole, rather than in the parts, is known as the sphoṭa theory.36 Though distinct from each, this “unitary idea, gestalt”37 comprises the objective, or informational, meaning (Skt. artha), and the verbal expression (Skt. dhvani). The sphoṭa is “eternal and inherent in consciousness.”38 Contemplative repetition of a mantra (Skt. mantra samādhi) holds the eternal meaning (Skt. sphoṭa) in the mind, allowing attention to be concentrated upon it. Gradually, by perceiving the sphoṭa unity behind the merely apparent dualism of the informative meaning and verbal expression, the practitioner comes to a complete, clear, and correct perception of it. The link between meaning and ritual efficacy is not made evident in this formulation. For an understanding of this linkage, we turn to Coward’s expansion on Bhartṛhari’s psychological theory of how one understands meaning. Coward suggests linking Bhartṛhari’s theory of meaning with Patañjali’s explanation of the ritual efficacy of mantra through identification of the sphoṭa with a deity. Individual mantra are associated with specific deities, for example, oṃ, which is the root mantra out of which all other mantra arise and is identified with the deity Īśvara. According to this understanding, mantra samādhi creates the condition for clearing away the partial aspects of the mantra—that is, both the informative meaning and the verbal expression—thus allowing for a direct perception of Īśvara. In tantric forms this direct perception would also be a recognition of the practitioner’s identity with the deity. Thus, the sphoṭa of the mantra is the deity: by holding the mantra firmly in mind one realizes one’s own identity with the deity. Without both correct pronunciation and proper grammatical form, the mantra will be ineffective and the ritual in which they are used will fail.39 This idea appears to have been continuous from the Vedas through the development of the tantras40 and was then carried on to tantric Buddhism in East Asia. Bhartṛhari’s concern with proper pronunciation as

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a key to the efficacy of mantra in ritual is echoed in Kūkai’s advocacy for the study of the Sanskrit behind the Chinese renderings of mantra in order to be able to know the difference between the long and short vowels, as discussed more fully in Chapter 5.41 According to the sphoṭa theory of language, then, meaning resides in the whole rather than the parts: A simple meaning-bearing symbol, which may be a word or a sentence, is what is called a sphoṭa. It is either a word-sphoṭa or a sentence-sphoṭa, depending on the unit of linguistic sign that is accepted and assigned a whole meaning.42

For Bhartṛhari, this means that language and thought are identical and are distinguished from both the objective referent, that is, the informational content (artha), and the verbal expression (dhvani). These concepts affected the development of Buddhist philosophic thought on language and meaning.43 For religious practice, this idea is found in the notion that the meaning/sphoṭa of a mantra is the deity: through holding the mantra in mind one comes to experience the actuality of the deity’s existence.44 As discussed later in this chapter, although associated mostly with Bhartṛhari, this idea is also found in Buddhist sources such as the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa, where the mantra is said to be the deity, and the Abhisamayamañjarī, which asserts “the indivisibility of the mantra and the deity.”45 Bhartṛhari’s sphota concept can easily be confused with the “naturalist” view of language found in Western philosophy, which can be traced back to the Platonic dialogue, the Cratylus. As discussed in the preceding chapter, this interpretation of language is framed in terms of a polarity between the conventionalist thesis “according to which names result simply from a convention and an agreement … among mankind” and the naturalist thesis “according to which each object has received a ‘correct denomination’ that belong to it through a natural appropriateness.”46 There is, however, a critical difference between the sphoṭa theory and Cratylus’ theory that there is a “natural connection” between a word and its referent (a view also found in some Confucian theories of language—Chinese conceptions of language being discussed in Chapter 4). In contrast to Cratylus’ natural connection, Bhartṛhari asserts an identity between the informative meaning and the expression as word or sentence. This identity is more than simply a “natural” connection but rather implicates a metaphysical or supernatural dimension as well. For religious practice, including tantric ritual, the meaning of a mantra is the deity—though appearing as two, they are actually a unity.

Śaiva Siddhānta Medieval Śaiva Siddhānta47 shares this idea of the identity of deity and mantra, although it is expressed in light of its own “modified non-dualist metaphysics.”48 As Richard Davis writes, because Śiva “is described theologically as formless and without limit,” in his highest state, Śiva is inaccessible to human powers. But Śiva has a secondary level, through which he engages in activities and by which he comes within the range of our knowledge and action. Sadāśiva, Śiva’s body of mantra, is the most comprehensive form of Śiva at this secondary level.49

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In Śaiva siddhānta ritual practice, the mantra that transform the liṅga into the body of Sadāśiva to which offerings are made in pūjā are the same as those the practitioner has visualized ritually placing onto his own body: The divine body is composed of mantras, unlike the impure, fettered bodies of humans. It does, however, mirror the divine body that the worshipper has already imposed onto himself in ātmaśuddhi. Exactly the same mantras transform the ritualist’s body as enhance the liṅga. “He should impose mantras on the deity just as he has imposed them onto his own body,” directs Kāmikāgama (4.349). The resulting bodily parallelism of ritualist and Śiva reinforces the state of relative equality that the two come to share during worship.50

Visualizing mantra on the body is a ritual action also found in the Shingon tradition, and similar conceptions of the embodiment of mantra are reflected in the story of spontaneous appearance of mantra on the body of a modern saint in Bengal. Siddhimātā, an early twentieth-century holy woman who lived in Benares, “became known because mantras would appear on her body while she was meditating … Her body was ‘penetrated’ [kayabhedi] by sound and the mantras of gods.”51 In a prelude to the discussions of the Shingon tradition later in this work, we can note that while the Śaiva Siddhānta theory understands the relation between practitioner and deity as one of “relative equality,” in Shingon the practitioner and deity evoked are understood as identical with one another. The Shingon tradition regularly constructs its ritual practice around a mutual interpenetration of the practitioner and deity (Jpn. nyūga-ga’nyū; Skt. ahaṁkāra) through the identification of the practitioner’s body, speech, and mind with the body, speech, and mind of the deity. Additionally, there is a noteworthy difference between Śiva and Mahāvairocana Buddha: Śiva has two forms, the higher of which is inaccessible to humans; Mahāvairocana is identified as the dharmakāya and expresses the truth of the dharma in speech.

Kubjikā school of Kaula tantra In the Kubjikā school of Kaula tantra, one of the many strains of Hindu tantra, one key mantra is known as the samayamantra. Teun Goudriaan suggests that the importance of this mantra is evidenced by the fact that “the Samayamantra or Samayā as a basic, introductory revelation, was communicated to aspirants on the occasion of their first initiation into the school.”52 Kubjikā is the “Crooked Goddess” and is “a name for the Supreme Śakti as manifesting Herself in the human psychophysical identity.”53 The symbolism that runs consistently throughout most of Hindu tantra is a dichotomy in which the masculine divine, for example, Śiva or Bhairava, is passive, and the feminine divine, in this case Kubjikā, is active. This active feminine divinity is also called by the more generic title of śakti, “power,” the creative force that produces all manifest phenomena. The Kubjikā tradition identifies the samayamantra as “a form of Kubjikā Herself, a very powerful Śakti characterized as ‘Supreme Womb’.”54 When this identification of

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the mantra with the goddess is framed in terms familiar from Euro-American religious culture it leads to a conundrum. As Goudriaan notes: It is, by the way, a remarkable fact that the mystic being of a deity has been thought to reside in words which express worship of that same deity; perhaps because worship strengthens, intensifies, the inner power of the worshipped one?55

In response to his puzzlement Goudriaan suggests that the relation between the mantra and the deity as conceived in the Kubjikā tradition is one in which worship somehow magnifies the power of the deity. He admits, however, that the texts do not explicate the practices clearly enough to draw a definite conclusion.56 The function of the mantra, however, is clarified in Alexis Sanderson’s comparison of the Kubjikā samayamantra with the same mantra found in the Krama system of worship devoted to Kālī. There the function is clearly apotropaic and reparative, serving not only to invoke the goddess but also “to eliminate impediments to the fruition of the pūjā caused by inadvertent omissions or breaches of the rules which bind the worshipper.”57 For this tradition of Hindu tantra, rather than conceiving the power of the mantra as rooted in the Vedas as ultimate reality, the notion of the self-reflexive or nondual identity of mantra and deity is what is understood to give the mantra its efficacy. This conception of mantra as identical with the deity is very common throughout much of Hindu tantra, as well as in some strains of Buddhist tantra, as we will see later.

The Spanda school of Kashmiri Śaivism: Mātṛka and mantra Mark S. G. Dyczkowski describes the Spanda school as monistic Śaivism, which stresses “the importance of experiencing Spanda, the vibration or pulse of consciousness.”58 Its origins trace back to the first half of the ninth century, marking “the beginnings of Kashmiri Śaivism in our modern sense of the term.”59 Kashmir, like Indonesia, played a key role in the development of East Asian Buddhism and in the interactions that created Buddhist tantra. Kumārajiva is said to have come from Central Asia to Kashmir to study Sanskrit, and Buddhabhadra, another important translator of Buddhist texts into Chinese, was himself from Kashmir. Buddhism was first introduced into Tibet from this area, and important members of the school of Buddhist epistemologists (pramāṇikas, sometimes referred to as logicians) also came from Kashmir. In terms of the development of Buddhist tantra and sources of reflections on the nature of language, Dyczkowski notes that About the middle of the first millennium of our era, Tantra began to assume a clearly defined, although immensely varied, identity through the emergence of vast corpuses of sacred literature that defined themselves specifically as Tantric. There can be no doubt, despite the fragmentary and as yet poorly researched evidence, that Kashmir was an important centre of a wide range of Tantric cults, both Hindu and Buddhist.60

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As we have seen with other traditions, within the Spanda tradition language is seen as ambivalent. On one hand, it plays a central role in the creation of a conceptual realm that ensnares us. On the other, for one who understands the nature of language properly it can serve to liberate.61 Manifest speech is grounded on consciousness—the phonemes have as their base phonematic energies (varṇagrāma) held in a potential state in consciousness. This “mass of sounds” (śabdarāśi) is the light of consciousness (prakāśa) which makes the universe manifest and contains all things within itself.62

This internal mass of sounds is seen as corresponding to the “introverted subjectivity of Śiva Himself.”63 The power of language is, for example, evidenced by its ability to stimulate deep emotions. Again, this power is ambiguous—its liberative potential is exercised through the practice of mantra recitation. This power hidden in language, which binds us through the thought-constructs it generates, can also be used to free us of them by channeling it through Mantra. Mantric practice begins at the Individual (āṇava) level where Mantras are recited in consonance with the rising and falling away of the breath. In this way they are charged with the vibration (spanda) of consciousness and, in their turn, make consciousness vibrate. Serving as a means to concentration, they free the mind of discursive representations.64

Testimony: Śabdapramāna Another important dimension of the Indic understanding of language is the role of speech (or testimony, śabda) in Indian logic (pramāna).65 We introduce the topic here to set the ground for an extended discussion of the authority of the speech of a buddha (Skt. buddhavacana) in Chapter 7. For most schools of Indian logic, such as Nyāya,66 speech is one of the reliable sources for valid or true knowledge. As Bimal Krishna Matilal notes: In this regard śābdabodha [knowing through speech] in Nyāya is on a par with perception and inference although it must also be distinguished from them. The idea is that the knowledge episode that is arrived at through speech, i.e., śabda, has a unique status distinct from a perceptual episode or an episode of knowledge through inference based on evidence.67

More fully, Jonardon Ganeri explains that the “Nyāya theory of testimony is built upon two central doctrines. The first is that understanding an assertion normally consists in assenting directly (non-inferentially) to what is said. The second is that the beliefs we thereby form normally constitute knowledge.”68

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Though distinct in philosophically important ways, the Indian discussions concerning śabdapramāṇa parallel Western epistemological discussions about the value and problems of arguments from authority.69 In the Buddhist school of epistemologists— Dignāga and Dharmakīrti—the reliable sources for valid knowledge are reduced to two, perception and inference; in the epistemological discussions of other Buddhist schools the reliability of what a buddha says (buddhavacana) is a major issue.70 However, while the argument from authority generally focuses on issues related to the reliability of the authority cited, the question of śabdapramāṇa gives greater attention to what is heard, to the activity of hearing an utterance—that is, aural rather than oral.71 As J. N. Mohanty puts it, “do we sometimes and under appropriate circumstances acquire true cognition simply upon hearing an utterance of a sentence?”72 In this regard we note the existence of an important category of Buddhist adherents—the śrāvakas, sometimes glossed as “listeners” or “auditors,” specifically those who directly heard the Buddha Śākyamuni teaching. Usually denigrated in much Mahāyāna discourse, this perspective may give us a more positive valuation of śrāvakas. The śravaka’s experience of hearing the dharma should not be naïvely equated with a limited conceptual appropriation of the teachings— as if they were engaged in a philosophic process of reflection and came to realize the truth of emptiness by a didactic process. But instead, the very act of hearing the dharma spoken, especially by a buddha, is transformative. Similarly, consider that the rivers and streams of the Pure Land repeat the sounds “Buddha, Dharma, Sangha,” while the music of the apsaras in the trees repeats the sounds “emptiness, impermanence, no-self, dissatisfaction.” This sounding has no communicative function, no conceptual, didactic content in the normal sense of conveying information from one conscious being to another. Similarly, later in Buddhist history, Dōgen (1200–1253) asserts that one should not “see being able to preach as necessarily superior, and do not say that ‘those who are able to listen to this Dharma’ are inferior. If those who preach are venerable, those who listen also are venerable.”73 It is not the truth in the abstract—as a characteristic of some statements but not others—but rather the truth as spoken that has power. Krishna Sivaraman has also emphasized the role of speech: Writing is a secondary function and has no standing reference in the religious tradition whose hermeneutical task lies rather in reconstructing the relationship between text and speaking.74

He further emphasizes that in this view language is not a human creation but instead “is essentially revealed, part and parcel of what is authoritative in its own right.”75

Buddhist conceptions Abhidharma and a conventionalist conception of language Discussing early Buddhist conceptions of language, Collett Cox writes of the abhidharma literature that

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Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan by proposing the discrete existence of name as a meaning conveying entity apart from sound, the early Buddhist analyses presage later developments in the theory of sphoṭa, though with a distinctively Buddhist flavor that emphasizes the impermanence of names by asserting the consensual origin of the association between names and their referents.76

As we have indicated elsewhere here, there is a strong link between theories of language, ontology, metaphysics, and epistemology. Many theories of language developed within the Hindu tradition assumed some sort of a metaphysical absolute. However, from the perspective identified by Cox, it would be possible to employ mantra and dhāraṇī without necessarily entailing the notions of unchanging universals found in non-Buddhist theories of language use. The abhidharmika position described by Cox establishes a nominalist or conventionalist view at a relatively early point in the development of Buddhist reflections on language. Phyllis Granoff notes that a nominalist or conventionalist view is consistent with the Buddhist rejection of the idea of a single sacred language, of the concept that Sanskrit is especially privileged because it alone of all languages functions directly to make known its meaning, and of the theory that some language is by nature meritorious while others are by nature wicked.77

Granoff calls attention to Dharmakīrti as exemplifying this attitude and to Buddhaghoṣa as exemplifying a contrasting attitude: If Dharmakīrti could argue that all languages were equal and no one language had any special status, it is nonetheless evident that the biography of Buddhaghoṣa reveals a very different attitude towards language.78

For his part, Buddhaghoṣa privileges not Sanskrit but Māgadhī as “the language of the Buddha, the root language that lay behind all languages, and the language best suited for teaching Buddhist doctrine.”79 Again, the Buddhist tradition evidences an oscillation between attitudes toward language, in this case between the conventional nature of all language and the special nature of Māgadhī as the language of Śākyamuni. This complexity of views means that we cannot simplistically characterize the entire tradition as having any one view regarding the relation of language and reality, or the relation of language and the path.

Paritta: The speech of the Buddha Paritta exist in the intersection between ordinary and extraordinary language use. As explained earlier, these are not intended to be clearly demarcated categories, and paritta are an important instance of the fuzziness of the boundaries between them. Anne Blackburn has summarized paritta and explained their wide use in present-day Theravāda contexts.

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In Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia, and in much of the South and Southeast Asian diaspora, selected texts from the Theravādin Buddhist canon chanted by monks to assure protection from human and supernatural harm. These texts are called paritta, a Pali word derived from root meaning “to protect.” Broadcast daily on the radio, chanted hours by monks at the installation of cabinet ministers and in short or all-night ceremonies to mark major transitions in human lives, and to bring good fortune in a variety of circumstances, the recitation of texts is one of the most common forms of ritual practice in the Theravāda tradition.80

It is now well recognized that the image of the Pāli tradition as rational, humanistic, and the only legitimate lineage representing the true teachings of Śākyamuni Buddha in the contemporary world was created largely by British apologists who wanted to represent Buddhism in a sympathetic light to Protestant Victorian England.81 The same rhetoric was adopted and carried forward by Theravādin apologists. This apologia has informed the larger movement now called “Buddhist modernism,” which included both native apologists and converts.82 Common to Buddhist modernists, whether they hailed from Britain, China, Japan, Sri Lanka, or the United States, was the assertion that Buddhism is a tradition that “in its true essence” did not cater to the crude superstitions of the ignorant masses, such as magic and ritualism. Many Buddhist modernists have privileged the Theravāda tradition, and this is no doubt at least partly because of the early formation of the Pāli Text Society relative to other kinds of specialized textual projects. While the Mahāyāna traditions were characterized as decadent because they maintained cults devoted to a variety of ahistorical buddhas, the Theravāda was represented as being solely devoted to the historical buddha, Śākyamuni—including interpreting him in exclusively human and historical terms. This conception of the superiority and “purity” of the Theravāda mirrored the Protestant rhetoric of cleansing Christianity of the Catholic cults of the saints and may have been particularly appealing given the instigation of “the quest for the historical Jesus” in the development of Protestant modernism in the nineteenth century, concurrently with what is known as the “Higher Criticism”—examination of the Bible as an historical document and the figure of Jesus as an historical person. The legacy of Buddhist modernism lives on in such assertions as one commonly found in Buddhist modernist apologetics in the West: Buddhism is a “philosophy of life” or a “spiritual path,” but not a religion. This seems to be suspiciously like an accommodating stance taken in order to avoid direct confrontation between a minority, immigrant and convert tradition, and a more powerful established religious majority. The effect of this for understandings of language has been that such practices as dhāraṇī and mantra, which were employed by Mahāyāna and tantric Buddhists in the context of the broader Indic religious culture, are viewed as corrupting the pristine rationalism of “true Buddhism.” Through its own circular logic, such a selective image of Buddhist history ignores a great deal of material found in the actual canon and paracanonic texts equally revered in the Theravāda tradition. As introduced earlier, the larger corpus includes several texts, called paritta, which are considered to be protective. Such texts are also known in Sanskrit, and as a more general term for both Pāli paritta and Sanskrit protective texts, Peter Skilling has

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suggested the term rakṣā, meaning “‘protection’ or more specifically ‘protective text’— because [unike paritta] it occurs in both Sanskrit and Pāli.”83 The Pāli texts have been compiled as independent compendia, and novice monks memorize and recite them as a means of providing protection, either for themselves or for the benefit of others.84 These are part of what Anne Blackburn has called the “practical canon,” which she describes as referring “to the units of text actually employed in the practices of collecting manuscripts, copying them, reading them, commenting on them, listening to them, and preaching sermons based upon them that are understood by their users as part of a tipitaka-based tradition.”85 Similar to the conception of mantra as manifesting the deity as agent of a Vedic ritual action, the unifying theme of many of the narratives regarding the paritta is Śākyamuni Buddha’s power and authority, which are greater than that of any other living being. The Buddha is presented as equivalent to the conqueror of the world (Skt. cakravartin) whose words (buddhavacana) carry the weight of a royal command, including the explicit threat of physical violence.86 One example, found in the Ahina Sutta (Anguttara Nikāya IV.67), is an invocation for protection given by Śākyamuni as the result of the death of a monk from snakebite. Śākyamuni diagnoses the cause of the monk’s death as his failure to “suffuse the four royal snake lineages with a mind of good will.”87 He then teaches an invocation in which the practitioner asserts his goodwill for the four royal lineages of nāgās, for the four classes of footless, two-footed, four-footed, and many-footed beings; his desire that they do him no harm; and his desire that they all be safe from harm. Then, invoking the limitlessness of the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha (the Triple Gem), “creeping things: snakes, scorpions, centipedes, spiders, lizards, and rats” are described as limited. Having created “this safeguard,” “this protection,” the “creeping things” are asked to depart.88 The translator of this text maintains the valuative distinction of Buddhist modernism, including an apologetic stance that implicitly privileges Theravāda over Mahāyāna. In a prefatory note he distinguishes the text from “charms taught in later forms of Buddhism, where the words themselves are said to contain power” and asserts that the power of the invocation comes “not from the words, but from the mind of good will with which they are said.” Here we no doubt see vestiges of the nineteenth-century distinction between magic and religion.89 In this interpretation, magic can be distinguished from religion on the basis of the idea that magical actions, including invocations, are themselves directly effective.90 Religion, on the other hand, is characterized by its appeal through prayer to a higher power.91 In this case, the translator creates a simplistic caricature of Mahāyāna conceptions of the efficacy of dhāraṇī and mantra as deriving from the power of the words, that is, as magic. In contrast, he asserts that the invocation’s power derives from the higher power of positive intention, “the mind of good will,”92 but without any explanation of how that effect of positive intention is effected. In contrast to this modernist interpretation we find that the historical record reveals the same kind of ambivalence about the efficacy of paritta as that framed by de Certeau mentioned previously. In the eighteenth century, the monk Saraṇaṃkara sought to relocate paritta recitation out of the realm of astrology and rituals controlling

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demons (yakṣas), which were considered inappropriate for monks, and into the realm of monastic orthopraxy.93 The way in which he did this was to give the paritta a rational interpretation. Not only did this make paritta recitation orthoprax but at the same time preserved their protective function and the societal value of paritta recitation for monks. We note that the power of the paritta is not, even when interpreted in this fashion as rational discourse, located in the realm of doctrinal authority and reasoned argumentation but rather follows from the fact that the paritta are considered to be the speech of the Buddha Śākyamuni, that is, buddhavacana. Rather than presuming an apologetic rhetoric, as the translator of the text mentioned earlier has done, we should look to the text itself. There the assertion of goodwill is a quid pro quo: I assert that I wish you no harm and in return ask that you not harm me. This quid pro quo serves to “suffuse the four royal snake lineages with a mind of good will,” in other words to create goodwill in the minds of the nāgās. Where there is a power differential, it is between the Triple Gem as limitless and “creeping things” as limited. It seems likely that this power differential is understood to be the source of the invocation’s efficacy. A paracanonical text still in use today, called simply Paritta (or Book of Protection94), brings together selections from the nikāyas that were considered essential for novices to memorize. The text contains twenty-four suttas, including the Protection of the Aggregates (Khandha Paritta), which repeats the story of a monk bitten by a snake. Other suttas in the collection are the Peacock’s Prayer for Protection (Mora Paritta), the Moon Deity’s Prayer for Protection (Canda Paritta), and the Sun Deity’s Prayer for Protection (Suriya Paritta). The Peacock’s Prayer would appear to be based on what is perhaps a pre-Buddhist tradition of prayer to the sun. The peacock addresses both the rising and setting sun, expressing its adoration and confidence that the sun will keep it “safe and secure” throughout the day and night. Matching these addresses to the sun are adorations addressed to the buddhas, requesting their protection as well. It almost seems as if the text works to assert that the protective power of the buddhas is equal to that of the sun and can similarly be propitiated. The Moon Deity’s Prayer and the Sun Deity’s Prayer are virtually identical. In each case, the deity in question is captured by Rahu, lord of the asuras. The deity, either the Sun or the Moon, then addresses the Buddha: “O Buddha, the Hero, thou art wholly free from all evil. My adoration to thee. I have fallen into distress. Be thou my refuge.” The Buddha responds by addressing the lord of asuras, “O Rahu, Candima [or Suriya] has gone for refuge to the Tathagata, the Consummate One. Release Candima [or Suriya]. The Buddhas radiate compassion for the world (of beings).” Rahu releases his captive and then goes to Vepacitta, another asura lord, and “stood beside him trembling in fear and with hair standing on end.” When asked why he had released the deity, he explains that he was asked to do so by the Buddha and that if he had not his head would have split into seven pieces—a motif found also in the Lotus Sūtra (discussed in Chapter 8). Here, the power of the Buddha is clearly greater than that of the asuras, offering additional confirmation of the interpretation that the power differential between the buddhas and lesser beings is what is considered to make the paritta effective. In contemporary Theravādin countries paritta are often employed in a ritual context that involves the use of a paritta thread and paritta water. The Vinaya allows the use of

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paritta themselves, but the use of the thread and water is based on what Peter Harvey identifies as an “anachronistic tale” found in the Mahāvamsa.95 According to this tale, on his deathbed Śākyamuni Buddha requests the god Sakka to protect the island of Lanka. Sakka in turn appoints Viṣṇu, who employs water and thread in his own act of protection. Referring to research by Melford Spiro and Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah, Harvey notes that in contemporary Burma and Thailand most people believe that the recitation of paritta releases “a power inherent in the words of the Buddha,”96 while some understand them to be effective for psychological reasons, such as increasing one’s confidence. Harvey finds that these two kinds of explanations of the efficacy of paritta reflect the kinds of explanations found in the literature. For example, loving-kindness, contemplation of virtue, faith in the triple gem, and meditative absorption are all considered to provide protection, and hearing sutta texts that describe these beneficial actions and attitudes are also used as paritta. This corresponds to the psychological explanation in contemporary understandings. Other texts, however, directly invoke the power of past buddhas, of the triple gem, and of deities. Speaking the truth about a person’s moral or spiritual qualities is also considered powerful. Again, the terminology emphasizes the verbal expression of this truth. In addition to the “asseveration of truth” (saccakiriyā), the term “truth utterance” (saccavacana) is also found.97 There are even instances in the literature in which telling the truth about one’s own or another person’s moral failings is considered effective.98 Power thought to reside in the buddhas, the triple gem, the deities, and the truth is accessed through recitation, matching the contemporaneous belief in the power of the words of Śākyamuni Buddha. Paritta recitation for protection is clearly part of a continuum of ideas that includes reciting dhāraṇī for protection, rather than being simplistically distinguished like magic and religion.

Mahāyāna The Bodhisattvabhūmi and Bhāvaviveka The Bodhisattvabhūmi probably dates from the latter part of the fourth to the early part of the fifth century. The seventeenth chapter of the first section, “Bodhipakṣyapaṭala,” describes four categories of dhāraṇī: “doctrinal dhāraṇī (dharma-dhāraṇī), semantic dhāraṇī (artha-dhāraṇī), mantra-dhāraṇī, and dhāraṇī that give rise to the receptivity of a bodhisattva (bodhisattva-kṣānti-lābhāya-dhāraṇī).”99 Matthew Kapstein explains the first two as being related to the bodhisattva’s ability to remember doctrine (scripture) and its meaning. He interprets the third as continuous with the paritta and explains that the fourth category, dhāraṇī that are considered to be conducive to awakening, constitutes “the inception of a novel and striking view of mantra-practice.”100 This is the view that mantra practice gives rise to the receptivity of the bodhisattva—receptivity, that is, to the ultimate nature of reality. … The bodhisattva discovers that such expressions are without meaning, indeed, that their meaning is only their meaninglessness. … Extending by analogy

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his inquiry to all phenomena, he comes to realize that their essential significance is, similarly, their essential ineffability. … Attaining thus the receptivity of a bodhisattva, he soon realizes the purity of an enlightened aspiration.101

Not everyone within the Buddhist tradition accepted the notion that dhāraṇī and related forms of verbal recitation actually are efficacious. For example, in his Tarkajvāla, Bhāvaviveka records a śrāvaka’s assertion that only meditative cultivation can be effective in removing faults. Bhāvaviveka responds by citing a dhāraṇī text to the effect that contemplating the dhāraṇī is simply recollection of the buddha (buddhānusmṛti).102 Kapstein notes that this argument is fully in keeping with the kind of argument given in the Bodhisattvabhūmi and that this is relevant to the question of the relation between dhāraṇī and tantric Buddhism. It therefore seems plausible to hold that the theoretical understanding of dhāraṇī, as enunciated in the Bodhisattvabhūmi (which was consistent with Bhāvaviveka’s point of departure), has provided the ingress through which a steadily expanding repertoire of “incantations and ritual” was introduced into Mahāyāna circles to aid in the practice of the path, and not merely for mundane ends.103

Mañjuśrī and the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa In phonematic emanation the vibratory quality of sound is considered to be the basic energy through which the universe manifests itself. In one version of this idea described earlier, the sequence of Sanskrit syllables is understood to correspond to the progressive manifestation of being. Conversely, the dissolution of being is seen as corresponding to the reverse order of the Sanskrit syllabary. This focus on the Sanskrit syllabary is implicit in the mantra of Mañjuśrī, the bodhisattva of wisdom: om a ra pa ca na.104 This sequence of sounds is the opening set of one of the classic Sanskrit syllabaries.105 Similarly, in the preliminaries to the ritual practices directed to Vajrayoginī, the practitioner is directed to purify his/her speech by reciting the syllables of the Sanskrit alphabet three times.106 Glenn Wallis examines the way mantra are presented as effective in the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa, a compendium that has been compared to the purāṇa literature, some parts of which have been traced to the eighth century.107 Wallis argues that the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa does not itself present a theory about the efficacy of mantra but asserts an imagistic conception of mantric efficacy, showing what a mantra does: The nature of the mantra in the ritual manual can only be understood from the images of mantric use presented in the text; it can not be known from explicit statements.108

Fortunately, we can turn to Wallis’ explicit statements to understand the way in which the authors of the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa understood mantra to be effective. According to his analysis, mantra are considered to be effective because of the power of bodhisattvas to transform themselves (bodhisattvavikurvaṇa) into mantra:

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Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan As one of the ten powers of the bodhisattva (bodhisattvabala), the power of miraculous transformation (vikurvaṇabala) is, for the Buddhist engaged in the Mmk [i.e., the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa], the mechanism generating the mantra. Mañjuśrī, by means of his powers of transformation, becomes the mantra. The mantra is an effective instrument by virtue of its being nothing less than a form assumed by the bodhisattva Mañjuśrī.109

This is so strikingly similar to the idea of sphota as formulated by Bhartṛhari that it suggests these conceptions of language were in wide circulation, being accepted implicitly as part of the religious culture.

The cult of Vajrayoginī Alexis Sanderson has suggested that some of the Buddhist tantras depend on nondual Śaiva sources. In her study of Vajrayoginī Elizabeth English summarizes Sanderson’s points regarding this dependency under three rubrics: textual, in borrowing nomenclature and “piously plagiarizing” (Sanderson’s phrase) large sections of text; thematically, taking “their wrathful and erotic orientation from Śaiva praxis”; and specifically within the Vajrayoginī cult with its “emphasis on the worship of female deities.”110 Understandings of language were also shared. The Flower Cluster of Clear Understanding (Abhisamayamañjarī) by Śākyarakśita, one of the texts important for the Vajrayoginī cult, shows how pervasive the idea of the identity of words and things was. As with the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa the idea of the identity of the deity and the mantra propounded by Bhartṛhari is also reflected in Śākyarakśita’s text. This text notes that when the body is armored with six mantra, six kāpālika goddesses are to be generated by the practitioner “‘because of the indivisibility of the mantra and the deity’ (mantradevatayor abhedāt).”111 In this connection, it is noteworthy as an instance of the continuity of practices across Buddhist tantra that the body is “armored” by means of mantra conjoined with mudrā in Shingon ritual as well. Although the Vajrayogini cult dates to the tenth to twelfth centuries,112 later than the tantras at the core of tantric Buddhist praxis in East Asia, the extent of interaction reflected in the Vajrayoginī cult suggests that non-Buddhist tantric traditions were an important part of the intellectual milieu in which the textual sources that East Asian tantric practitioners claim as foundational were formed.

Conclusion This chapter has explicated the conception that language has an identity with being and by extension an identity with deities. In a variety of permutations this begins from the use of mantra in Vedic ritual, which was theorized in the Upaniṣads and by Mīmāṃsā thinkers. It extended through the medieval developments of tantra, both Hindu and Buddhist, and continues to play an implicit role in present-day religious culture. For example, popular in the 1960s and 1970s, Transcendental Meditation taught seed mantra (bīja mantra) in its expansion into Europe and the United States.

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The idea of phonematic emanation treats the cosmos as a manifesting forth of vibrations, sounds, ordered sequentially in the form of the Sanskrit syllabary. Bhartṛhari formulated an explicit theory regarding the identity of a deity and the meaning of the deity’s mantra, known as the sphoṭa theory, which explains the efficacy of mantra samādhi. Also relevant to our exploration of Indic understandings of language is the epistemological significance of verbal testimony, which allows attention to be brought to the importance of aural experience of language. Buddhist thinkers also worked with these ideas but reframed them in the context of impermanence and emptiness. And, because realization of emptiness is liberative, the emptiness of language can also be liberative.113 These ideas informed the religious culture of India over the millennia and a half of Buddhist history there. These ideas were then carried to East Asia by Buddhist practitioners, which will be considered in the next two chapters.

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East Asian Understandings of Language

As already noted in the Introduction, the stereotype that Buddhism holds a negative view of language pervades both popular religious culture and academic religious studies in the United States. For example, in discussing the Buddhist influence on Neo-Confucianism, Chad Hansen writes, “Neo-Confucianism reflected some of Buddhism’s anti-language posture.”1 Similarly, one of the articles on Buddhism in the Encyclopedia of Religion describes Buddhism as culminating in “mystical silence.”2 This further compounds the misleading stereotype of Buddhism as being antilanguage by introducing yet another concept, mysticism, which is itself not unproblematic when applied as a generality to Buddhism. The antilanguage view attributed to Buddhism is based on the neo-Romantic theory of language as impeding direct, or immediate, perception of reality, as discussed in Chapter 2. One problem with this view is the way in which the neo-Romantic perspective tends to be assumed implicitly by many Western interpreters of both Buddhism and religion more generally. Neo-Romantic conceptions of language and experience pervade much of contemporary religious studies.3 What the stereotype places under erasure is the complexity within Buddhist tradition. Buddhism in East Asia tends to be identified with the tradition most familiar in the West, that is, Chinese Chan and its Japanese version, Zen, as represented by such well-known figures as D.T. Suzuki and Alan Watts. Some Chan proponents do hold an antilanguage view, and similar views can be found throughout the Buddhist tradition generally, which means that the representation of Buddhism as having a negative view of language is overdetermined—elements from within the tradition match preconceptions held by interpreters, and so each mutually reinforces the other. However, the Buddhist tradition as a whole is much more complex and encompasses other, more nuanced views on the nature of language. The antilanguage view is hardly the most prevalent when we take into account the practices of the vast majority of ordinary lay Buddhists, such as recollection of the Buddha through recitation of his name (Skt. buddhānusmṛti, Chin. nianfo, Jpn. nenbutsu4). An academically accurate understanding of Buddhism requires valorizing such widely characteristic practices as valid topics of research, rather than consistently marginalizing such strains as Pure Land and tantra by treated silent, seated meditation as paradigmatic. This means not essentializing the tradition on the basis of some particular sectarian interpretation, as well as considering

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the actualities of praxis of both monastic and lay Buddhists. The dominant representation of Buddhism in popular treatments and many introductory academic treatments still overvalorizes a particular strain of religious practice—meditation, which has historically been the province of a monastic elite—and takes that practice as normative for all of Buddhism. 5 Indeed it is something of a commonplace that while Christians are asked whether they are believers, Buddhists are asked whether they are practitioners—with the presumption that to practice means to meditate. In this chapter we consider the East Asian intellectual context into which Buddhist thought regarding language moved and within which it developed there. The descriptions of different strains of thought within this context that are given here are frankly impressionistic.6 They are intended to provide the reader with points of comparison and contrast for understanding that what is found in the praxis of tantric Buddhism in Japan and its penumbra is a consequence of ideas originating in the Sanskritic cultures of South Asia where tantric Buddhist praxis originates. In other words, this chapter complements the preceding one as a response to the disagreement described at the start of that chapter.

Confucianist and Daoist conceptions of language Language was one of the central concerns for early Chinese thinkers. According to Chad Hansen, language provided the crucial insights that informed the original, indigenous philosophy of China. It shaped their discussions of metaphysics, moral psychology, normative and applied ethics and political theory.7

Ming is considered to be the single most important concept for early Chinese theory of language. It is usually rendered into English as “name,” although it is used as a cover term for all words. Chinese philosophy of language is concerned with this concept of ming, not sentences, propositions, or truth conditions, which as we saw in Chapter 2 are definitive for Western philosophy of language. The centrality of the concept of ming is evidenced by Jane Geaney in an examination of the philosophic tradition of Warring States era in China (ca. fifth to third centuries BCE).8 The focus of her study is the fundamental understanding of names (ming) and meanings (shi), the other key term for much early Chinese discussion of language. From her closely detailed textual analysis of the meaning of these terms at this very early date, Geaney concludes that names (ming) are oral/aural in character, while meanings (shi) are visual. In other words, while a name is spoken/heard, its meaning is seeing the thing named. This contrasts with the more common present-day interpretation of the meaning of these terms as being rooted in the written language. Julia Kristeva, for example, represents Chinese by this latter view, describing the welding of the concept, the sound, and the thing in the Chinese language, which causes le langue and the real to construct a whole without coming face to face like

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an object (the world, the real) and its mirror (the subject, la langue), is materialized by and in Chinese writing.9

The implication that there is something inadequate or decadent about Chinese understandings of language continues when Kristeva claims that the beginning of writing is closely tied to magical rites. Writings are talismans, and represent man’s mastery over the universe. However, and this is a particularity of the Chinese conception of written language, while writing has something to do with magic, it is far from laying claim to a saintly quality, or from acquiring a sacred value. On the contrary, writing is synonymous with political and governmental power and is confused with the political function.10

Geaney’s analysis is more nuanced. Although she does not use this specific terminology, what she describes is a kind of referential theory of meaning: the meaning of a term is the object to which it refers. Following the Cratylus, this conception of language has been called a “natural” conception.11 Roy Harris employs the term “nomenclaturist” to describe not only the view of Cratylus but also that found in the Bible, arguing that both Saussure and Wittgenstein found such a conception inadequate.12 In addition, John Makeham calls this a “correlative theory” distinguishing it from a nominalist one: I define a correlative theory of naming as the view that there is a proper or correct correlation between a given name and a given actuality, determined, variously, by what is ordained by “Heaven” (tian) or by what is “naturally so/so of itself ” (zi ran), and a nominalist theory of naming as the view that it is man who arbitrarily or conventionally determines which ming should be applied to which shi.13

In summary, a referential, correlative, or nomenclaturist theory of meaning is based on a relation between two parts—a name and the thing with which it correlates, or to which it refers, or for which it is a surrogate.14 Probably the best-known instance of concern with language is the “rectification of names” (zheng ming) promoted by Confucius. According to tradition, when asked what he would do if given the opportunity to rule a state, Confucius replied that he would “rectify names.” What this evidences is not a simple pursuit of intellectual clarity, but that Confucius’ primary concern is with social order and social control: For Confucius, ming meant titles, names attached to one’s social status, and one’s kinship with others. Accordingly, the use of ming determined how one talked and related to others in one’s family and society at large. … For Confucius, ming entailed naming correctly and speaking properly for an orderly society, thus insuring the correct correspondence between social status and speech behavior. In an abstract sense, ming signified cultural code or prescribed behaviors for society and acted as a means of social transformation.15

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Here we can see one of the themes of consistent concern within the theories of language from the beginnings of Chinese thought—an awareness of the gap between the linguistic realm and the social and physical realms. In light of this awareness, the referential theory of meaning leads, seemingly naturally, to a correspondence theory of truth. In other words, names are true when they are used correctly. When they are not used correctly, they are not true names, and are consequently misleading in terms of proper behavior in social relations, and consequently lead to social disorder. In Mark Edward Lewis’ analysis, the further development of Confucian understandings of language led in three directions. First, the Xunzi “articulated a more sophisticated form of the theory of ruling through naming.” Second, the Gongyuang zhuan “identified ‘rectification of names’ with ritual correctness, and insisted that rites were the basis of the state.” And, third, a “detailed discussion of terms of kinship in the ritual classics” analyzed familial obligations and responsibilities, as well as “the social consequences of the failure to observe these strictures.”16 Mozi (ca. 468–ca. 391 BCE), founder of his own independent school, proposed a utilitarian view of language in which the proper use of words was that which would “maximize general utility.”17 A. C. Graham describes Mozi’s “theory of naming” as “purely nominalistic.” Graham explains that this means that the sharing of a name is based on similarity: You name an object “horse” and apply the name to everything which is like it, of its kind; “horse” is simply shorthand for “like the object.”18

If words are to be maximally useful as Hansen claims Mozi intends, then the nominalism attributed by Graham must not be a “pure” nominalism in which any similarity of any kind is the basis for a name, but rather a matter of social convention. In Hansen’s interpretation, Mozi emphasizes the “naturalness” of what constitutes the proper use of names, rather than their purely conventional character: To count as the constant dao, Mozi’s benefit/harm standard must itself be constant. It should be a reliable, unambiguous, and objectively correct, unchanging distinction. He alleged that since it came from tian “nature” rather than from society, convention or contingent history, it was all of these.19

In contrast to Mozi, the Laozi viewed names as contingent and, in contrast to the Confucian view, held that language interfered with true knowledge (aligning with the Romantic view, contributing to the popularity of this text with neo-Romantics). This epistemological consequence of language is described by Xing Lu: While Confucius recognized the power of ming in shaping human behavior and political structure, Laozi perceived the limitation of ming in preventing humans from seeing the totality of truth.20

Hansen also explains how—according to this view of language—learning to use one particular set of names in one particular way also has ethical consequences:

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Acquiring a language constrains our natural spontaneity and creates new, disruptive and usually competitive desires. … names, distinctions, desires and conventional actions are linked distortions of natural spontaneity. Absent linguistic embellishment, the natural desires would sustain social concerns that extend no farther than the local agrarian village.21

In these different understandings of language we consistently find a two-part theory that relates names to objects, rather than the three-part theory of word, object, and concept commonly assumed in contemporary Western theories of language as discussed in Chapter 2. At the same time, the interest in language is motivated by sociopolitical concerns. Hansen summarizes these two aspects: Chinese accounts of language are unswervingly extensional. They rarely invoke any concept such as “meaning,” “idea,” or “concept.” The language-world relation is a political matter.22

An extensional account such as Hansen describes is one in which the meaning of a term is the set of objects in the world to which the term extends, in the sense of identifying or pointing out. It contrasts with an intensional23 account that includes mental elements, such as meanings, ideas, and concepts.

Buddhist thought in East Asia Buddhist thinkers did not explicitly adopt the concept of “phonic emanation,” probably because in Hindu tantra these ideas were based on hypostatizing an absolute or eternal reality, and therefore contradictory to the principle of impermanence and emptiness. As discussed in the preceding chapter, “phonic emanation” is the idea that language is constitutive of the universe and is found in many of the Hindu tantric traditions. According to this view, the universe emanates as a series of vibrations, each stage of which moves from an undifferentiated unity toward increasing differentiation, increasingly distant from the eternal or absolute that is its source. This series of vibrations is not simply represented by the sequence of sounds that are the Sanskrit syllabary; they are that sequence. To attain liberation under this conception means reversing the process of emanation, cycling back up the vibratory sequence to the eternal or absolute source. But given that Buddhist thought developed and coexisted within a broader religious milieu in which such linguistic speculations were prominent, it is natural that Buddhist thinkers also employed these concepts—the wheel of syllables discussed in the next chapter being one example. Tantric thought made use of the idea of the unity of word and object, the idea that the proper name or description of something is identical with that thing, in conceptualizing the efficacy of mantra. This identity is key to the ritual use of mantra in tantric practices, originating in Vedic ritual. In some cases, the purpose of reciting mantra seems to have been to make the specific ritual action being performed at that moment identical with an action taken by the gods as described in the Vedas, and this link between ritual action and mantra remains central to tantric Buddhist praxis.

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Buddhist praxes Hansen gives a suggestion of the kind of thinking about language that entered China’s intellectual milieu through Buddhist thought from India. “Buddhism imported its peculiar version of the familiar Indo-European theory of language and mind (sententials, concept theory, and private mind idealism).”24 What Hansen does not mention, however, is a very important aspect of Indo-European language theory, the idea of extraordinary language.

Mantra and Dhāraṇī in China Paul Harrison and W. South Coblin have identified the Druma-kinnara-rājaparipṛcchā-sūtra as the first text containing a mantra to be translated into Chinese.25 The translation is attributed to Lokaṣema (b. ca. 147 CE), and Harrison and Coblin date the translation to within two decades, ca. 170–190 CE. They note that this is a protective mantra, and employing the terminology introduced by Peter Skilling,26 identify the mantra as one that “falls into the category known as rakṣā,” which is equivalent in function to paritta.27 Dhāraṇī are become more widely known in China relatively soon after. Richard McBride mentions that the “Central Asian monk Fotudeng … (d. 348) converted the king of a brutish confederation of Huns, foretold the future, and is even reputed to have raised from the dead the favorite prince of the Hun king by means of spells.”28 According to Henrik Sørensen, Śrimitra was a leading monk active in the first half of the fourth century who produced two versions of the “Spell of the Great, Golden Peacock Queen” (Mahāmāyūrīvidyārājñī-dhāraṇī).29 This spell is part of the literature providing protection from snakebite, one of the functions of protective texts noted in the preceding chapter, and seemingly a widespread concern of Buddhist monks living in forests. The symbolism points to the common folk belief that peacocks kill snakes, a power also carried by the mythological garuḍa. Ryan Overbey has examined the textual history of the spell, noting that the form of the text itself was highly malleable, such as to allow for integrating a wider range of protections. Over time the text expanded to include additional spells and accompanying rites, and additional protective powers, and “it spread across throughout South and East Asia with an everexpanding pantheon and ritual repertoire.”30 The Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom (Dazhidu lun) is a compendium of Buddhist thought that was highly influential in East Asian Buddhism.31 It is apocryphally attributed to Nāgārjuna but was “translated, compiled, or perhaps composed, by the famous Kuchaean translator and exegete Kumarajiva (344–413) in the early years of the fifth century.”32 The author of that text treats dhāraṇī as simply one of the many skills that monks and bodhisattvas develop and acquire.33 In addition to the etymological explanation of dhāraṇī as “capable of holding” (dhāraṇa) explained earlier, the text also explains that dhāraṇī are “capable of preventing” (vidhāraṇa).34 In response to a rhetorical question about the types of dhāraṇī, the text lists three kinds: dhāraṇī that prevent one from forgetting words or teachings one has heard (śruradharadhāraṇī), dhāraṇī that enable the holder to know “in detail the qualities

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of beings”35 (vibhayjyajñānadhāraṇī), and dhāraṇī that prevent the holder from either taking joy in or being irritated by sounds, especially not being irritated by slander or abuse. Michelle Wang has studied the relation between dhāraṇī recitation and the construction of altars and mandala during the Tang. She has examined the five texts of translations and ritual manuals associated with what she calls the “revered and victorious dhāraṇī of the Buddha’s uṣṇīṣa.”36 These texts begin with a translation by Buddhapālita, who flourished in the late seventh century. The text tells us that the benefits of the dhāraṇī range “from eradicating all negative karma and obstructions, to destroying the suffering of unfavorable rebirths, to deliverance from all hells, animal rebirths and the realm of King Yama,” the Lord of the Dead.37 In this text “the efficacy of the dhāraṇi rests upon the enactment of its sonic and auditory properties.”38 And, the text treats the dhāraṇī itself as the object of veneration in a ritual of offering.39 In later texts recitation becomes increasingly ritualized as part of an integral whole involving more elaborate elements, such as painted bodhi images. These present the event in Śākyamuni Buddha’s awakening narrative when, resisting Mara’s attempts to distract him, the Buddha makes his “characteristic gesture of touching the ground with the right hand [which] is known as the ‘earth-touching’ mudrā (Skt. bhūmisparśa mudrā) and thus symbolizes his victory over the evil intentions of Māra.”40 With the ritual manuals of Amoghavajra and Śubhakarasiṃha later in the Tang the practice prescribed evidences familiar tantric characteristics of evoking a set of deities onto the altar, visualization now becoming central while recitation is seen as supporting the visualization.41 Similarly, Bernard Faure has noted that dhāraṇī were also employed by some Chan monks in support of their meditation practices.42 The Śūraṃgama dhāraṇī43 was one of the specific practices introduced by the tantric masters during the Tang.44 As with the dhāraṇī discussed by Wang, this was also associated with a mandala in its early uses. While the trajectory traced by Wang is from a variety of practice forms that lead up to the association of dhāraṇī and mandala, Chi Chen Ho finds that after the Tang, the Śūraṃgama dhāraṇī is found to have been dissociated from the ritual use requiring a mandala and applied in a much wider variety of liturgical contexts. These include rituals for repentance, for protection during meditation, for facilitating meditative concentration (samādhi), for monastics who have died, for the protection of monasteries and the state, for the benefit of the imperial family, and for daily monastic services.45 The Śuraṃgama dhāraṇī remains in wide use in contemporary Chinese Buddhism. Paul Copp has also highlighted the plurality of functions dhāraṇī played, noting that the “logic of ‘Dhāraṇī’ as the emblem of a family of concepts and practices was maintained in Chinese Buddhism across the wide range of religious behavior, from learned scholastic writing to popular methods of preparing the corpse for burial.”46 Reflecting on the importance modern scholarship has placed on Étienne Lamotte’s interpretation of dhāraṇī, which is just based on his translation of the Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom, Copp has warned against abstracting the term dhāraṇī out of its specific textual contexts and indeed argued for a highly specific locating of the term in Chinese sources. He indicates that the fundamental sense of the term in Chinese is “helpfully approximated by the English word grasp, which maps onto the

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primary usages … basically, to hold (whether in one’s hand, mind, or nature) and to understand (including in the sense of ‘to have the knack for’).”47 Lamotte’s interpretation “has often been taken to be universally normative for the term and allowed to float free of its conditioning context, rather than seen as inextricably tied to specific lines of the Scripture of the Great Perfection of Wisdom upon which it is, by extension, a commentary.”48 Thus, it should be kept in mind that the generalized understandings of dhāraṇī, such as have been discussed here and in the first chapter, are heuristic abstractions for the purpose of linking Indic understandings of extraordinary language to East Asian Buddhist practice. The complexity of dhāraṇī is a consequence of its location in a doctrinally charged semantic range and its polysemous character. Copp explains that “Grasping”, “keeping” and “holding” … are crucial ideas in Buddhist practice and thought—not here in the negative sense of “attachment” or “clinging” … but in the sense of possession, memorization, recitation, or wielding of texts, whether they are incantations or scriptures. The Chinese translation of Dhāraṇī as “encompassing grasp” … marks it as part of this larger family of usages.49

In the first of a very important set of studies of dhāraṇī literature, Ronald Davidson has addressed this polysemy, arguing that dhāraṇī is a function term denoting “coding.” Consequently, the category dhāraṇī is polysemic and context-sensitive, capable of being applied within all the various activities so often included within the method of dhāraṇī: memory, recitation, protective mantras, inspiration, summary texts, and extended Mahāyānist works.50

The qualifications required for the effective deployment of dhāraṇī were as varied as the uses of the term. Based on his examination of a wide range of the dhāraṇī literature in Chinese, McBride notes that medieval Chinese Buddhists believed that many factors were responsible for the efficacious use of spell techniques. Some instructions emphasize the importance of producing correct sounds and rhythm, others highlight preparation and proper ritual procedure, while still others stress prescriptions for the individuals such as abstaining from certain activities and repetition of the spell words with faith more than accurate pronunciation.51

Reading this list of qualifications indicates that some of the medieval Chinese Buddhist authors were proposing requisites based on other conceptions of ritual efficacy, such as austerities, than the kinds of linguistic concerns we have seen in the preceding chapter. Dharmakīrti provides a similar list, however, as will be examined more fully in Chapter 6. Dharmakīrti’s concern is with the characteristics requisite upon someone who creates a mantra—an understanding that mantra are human creations, not the eternal vibrations of the Vedas. According to Vincent Eltschinger, there are two terms identifying the ability to create effective mantra. These are mantrahetu and

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mantrakriyāsādhana, which he glosses as “a cause [allowing one to create] mantras” and “the means of creating mantras,” respectively.52 Although the characteristics of these two categories of mantra creation are not perfectly identical, for our purposes here, we will focus on the mantrahetu. Eltschinger identifies and explains these, saying Mantrahetus are six in number: truthfulness (satya), defined as correct or objective speech (yathābhūtākhyāna), austerity (tapas), which consists of one’s subduing his sense-faculties and his mind (indriyamanasor damanam), remembrance (smṛti), for instance of one’s previous lives (paracittāvabodha), discernment (prativedha), which consists of the perception of the true reality of those things perceived (*dṛ ṣṭapadārthatattvadarśana), and ability (śakti), explained as power (prabhāva).53

In Chapter 6 we will again consider what it means to create a mantra. In their own attempts to understand and propagate the practice of dhāraṇī and mantra, Buddhist thinkers in both South and East Asia generated multiple conceptions of what allows a practitioner to use mantra and dhāraṇī effectively, what enables them to activate or manifest the power of mantra and dhāraṇī. Rather than a single, authoritative, doctrinally substantiated rationale, the importance of the practices and the variety of uses made of them stimulated the intellectual creativity of Buddhist thinkers over centuries and across linguistic and cultural boundaries.

Reciting the Name of Amitābha Introduced in the first chapter, a key example of extraordinary language use is recitation of the name of Amitābha Buddha, the practice of nianfo (Skt. buddhānusmṛti, Jpn. nenbutsu). Devotion to Amitābha is very common in East Asian Buddhism and is referred to broadly as “Pure Land” Buddhism, after the Chinese neologism—jingtu, “purified ground”—that refers to Amitābha’s buddha realm, Sukhāvatī. One of the key works for the development of Pure Land Buddhism in East Asia is a commentary54 by Tanluan (476–542)55 on the Rebirth Treatise attributed to Vasubandhu.56 The work is structured around a fivefold ritual practice (sādhana) that consists of the following five acts: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Prostrations Praise of Amitāyus Buddha Resolution to be born in the Pure Land Visualization of the Pure Land, Amitāyus Buddha, and his retinue of bodhisattvas Transfer of merit57

In explaining the second of the five ritual acts, the Rebirth Treatise establishes a pair of identities: (1) the light of the Buddha is identical with his wisdom and (2) the name of the Buddha is identical with his essence.58 This pair of identities allows Tanluan to explain the efficacy of reciting the name of the Buddha Amitābha. Tanluan raises the question of why someone who invokes the name still experiences the darkness of

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ignorance. He goes on to explain that this is because such a person has not in fact truly understood the full significance of the name of the Buddha, and as a result he or she is not sincere, single-minded, and constant. Tanluan then raises a more fundamental question. In the question and answer fashion frequently found in Buddhist exegetical work (and elsewhere), he has his imagined interlocutor make the following argument: A name indicates something, as a finger indicates the moon. If invoking the Name of Buddha causes our Resolution [to be born in the Pure Land] to be brought to completion, then a finger indicating the moon should be able to disperse the darkness; but if a finger indicating the moon cannot disperse the darkness, neither can invoking the Name of Buddha bring our Resolution to completion.

Here the interlocutor pushes back against Tanluan’s ideas by presenting a negative argument by analogy of the form: “If that which indicates the Buddha, i.e., the name, is identical with the essence of the Buddha and creates realization, then that which indicates the moon, i.e., the finger, should be identical with the essence of the moon and shed light.” In other words, the interlocutor is suggesting that language is solely referential. In reply, Tanluan makes his distinction between two kinds of names: There are names which are the same as things, and there are names which are other than things. The names of buddhas and bodhisattvas, the Prajñāpāramitā with its dhāraṇī, [Daoist] spells, and suchlike spoken phrases are all “names that are the same as things.”59

This distinction between names that are identical with the thing named and names that are separate from the thing named allows Tanluan to assert that the name of the Buddha is identical with the Buddha; therefore, invoking the name of the Buddha is effective in realizing one’s aspiration to be born in the Pure Land. “The finger pointing to the moon” is a familiar analogy for names that are separate from the things named, that is, names that are merely conventional. In contrast, Tanluan gives several examples of directly effective utterances. These include a cure for boils, a spell for protection from the five kinds of weapons, a cure for cramps, and a weapon salve.60 The implication seems to be that the efficacy of these “familiar examples” (as Tanluan calls them) is that the utterance is effective because of an identity between the utterance and the intended aim.61 Tanluan’s explanation of the efficacy of invoking the name of the Buddha distinguishes between names that are identical with the things named and names that are separate from the things named. The idea that a name might be identical with the named thing does not appear in any of the Chinese theories of language prior to the introduction of Buddhism that we have examined. As discussed earlier, all of these employ in one version or another the correlative or referential theory of meaning, just as evidenced by Tanluan’s interlocutor. In contrast, Tanluan’s explanation appears to be almost exactly the same theory as that propounded by Bhartṛhari, that is, the sphoṭa theory in which the mantra is the deity invoked.

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Recitation and Meditation As indicated by the exchange between Tanluan and his rhetorical interlocutor, the relation between recitation practice and meditation was an issue much discussed by Buddhist practitioners in China. The lifetime of Jingying Huiyuan (523–592, not to be confused with the earlier Huiyuan, the Pure Land teacher62) closely overlapped with Tanluan’s, and Huiyuan “analyzed dhāraṇī in detail in his collection of doctrinal exegesis called the Mahāyāna Compendium.”63 Huiyuan grouped dhāraṇī into four categories: dharma, meaning, spell technique, and restraint. McBride explains that the first two refer to hearing, maintaining, and remembering the dharma. And the fourth refers to the bodhisattva’s commitment to not enter into nirvana but to remain in samsara for the benefit of all living beings. Huiyuan gives three reasons why monks and bodhisattvas are able to obtain spell-technique dhāraṇī: (1) they rely on the power of cultivation and habitual practice in the present, (2) they rely on the efficacy of dhyāna—meditation, and (3) they depend on real knowledge deeply penetrating into the approach of the spell-technique dharmas; in other words, they understand the emptiness and interconnection of all things and the efficacy of the words of dhāraṇī.64

The last part includes two concepts, the emptiness of dharmas and the efficacy of extraordinary language, which were introduced in the preceding chapter. Buddhist doctrinal emphasis on emptiness has as one of its consequences the conventional nature of language—there are no absolute, eternal, unchanging, permanent essences that either give rise to or are the meaning of words. At the same time, the words of extraordinary language are efficacious, because—just as Tanluan maintained—there is an identity between a word and its referent. Huiyuan also links the ability of monks to acquire the power of dhāraṇī with their personal cultivation and meditation practice. Just as with Bernard Faure’s observation regarding the use of dhāraṇī by Chan monks, Robert Sharf has pointed out that “In various forms nien-fo [recitation of the Buddha’s name] has always been an important component of Chinese Buddhist dhyāna [meditation, Chan/Zen] tradition.”65 In other words, rather than a kind of meditation exclusivism, actual Chan monastic practice during the Tang dynasty (618– 907) involved not only sitting meditation, but also scripture chanting, and worship of the patriarchs of the Chan tradition. Reciting the name of a buddha was also part of monastic practice, though placed in the frame of Chan doctrine. The fourth patriarch, Dayi Daoxin (580–651), while advocating recitation of the name of the Buddha Amitābha, asserted that one “should not conceive of the Pure Land or the Buddha dualistically. The object of contemplation is ultimately mind itself, and the Pure Land to be attained is the fundamental purity of mind.”66 We are here, then, seeing an understanding in which recitation serves as an object of contemplation and is similar to the idea that mantra are simply objects of meditation, empty and meaningless in themselves. Sharf ’s essay references a variety of Chan sources, indicating that buddha name recitation continued to be part of Chan monastic practice and that the

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concern about the relation between recitation and meditation continued through the Tang, into the Song (960–1279), and on into the modern era. Yinguang (1861–1947) resisted the kind of Chan interpretation of the Pure Land as the purification of mind described earlier in favor of a more literal understanding of the Pure Land as located in the far west.67 Yinguang asserts that a skilled teacher responds to the abilities of the student. For those capable of “dual practice” the skilled teacher offers a balance of both meditation and buddha name recitation, while for those only capable of Pure Land practice, he teaches recitation of the name of the Buddha Amitābha.68 Given Yinguang’s rhetoric, he is operating within the familiar Pure Land framework in which recitation of Amitābha’s name effects birth in the Pure Land because of Amitābha’s vows, rather than because of any particular identity between the name and Amitābha—as was the case in Tanluan. Although not employing any of the Indic ideas regarding the nature of language per se, this is still part of a positive valuing of language, and because it is not communicative—this is not a “prayer” to Amitābha; since as a buddha he has entered nirvana, it is instead the vow that is effective—it is also an instance of extraordinary language.

Conclusion Buddhism introduced to China a very complex intellectual tradition that included speculations on the nature of word meanings, together with the more familiar “religious” doctrines of karma and awakening. This gave rise to new ways of understanding language that were not simply an outgrowth of indigenous conceptions. As we saw with Tanluan, in some cases reciting the name of the Buddha had as a philosophic justification the idea that the name of a buddha is identical with that buddha. More generally, the popularity of the practice of reciting the name of the Buddha Amitābha, nianfo, together with the widespread use of dhāraṇī in a variety of religious functions, indicates, first, that not all of Buddhism was antilanguage, and second, that much of the ways in which such extraordinary language uses were supported, whether explicitly or implicitly, drew on Indian reflections on the nature of language like those presented in the preceding chapter.

5

Emptiness and Cosmogenesis in the Tantric Buddhism of Japan

Uses of extraordinary language in the Buddhisms of Japan Despite the emphasis on doctrine and doctrinal texts that continues to structure Buddhist studies, and religious studies more generally, scholars have become increasingly interested in the wide variety of practices other than silent, seated meditation that are to be found throughout the Buddhist traditions. A few examples of such practices are chanting, reciting the sutras, repentance, circumambulation, memorial rituals,1 debates,2 and elaborate fire ceremonies,3 all of which are ritual in character. Indeed, once we call into question the Cartesian dualism that sustains the seemingly clear distinction between meditation and ritual, we can recognize the highly ritualized character of even sitting meditation itself. The vast majority of Buddhist ritual practices in Japan, and East Asia more generally, are not only both mental and physical practices but also employ various forms of extraordinary language.

Mantra and Dhāraṇī in Ritual In rituals of the Shingon tradition of tantric Buddhism specific mantra are recited as part of a ritual action. One does not simply offer incense but offers incense and recites a mantra. As with the identity of mantra and deity discussed in Chapter 3, the mantra on a ra pa ca na di evokes the presence of the Mañjuśri, the Bodhisattva of Wisdom. Mantra also perform other ritual functions; for example, the mantra on bazara dagya ta un ritually empowers the water offered to wash the body of the “chief deity” (Jpn. honzon, the particular deity who is central to the ritual being performed) during the votive fire offering (Skt. homa, Jpn. goma) to the Great Immovable Lord Fudō Myōō (Skt. Acalanātha Vidyārāja) enacted for protection (Jpn. fudō myōō sokusai goma).4 Mantra are also used to effect ritual actions on their own, outside of the context of the performative framework of a fully formal ritual. This is the case with the “clear light” mantra (Jpn. kōmyō shingon). The clear light mantra was employed not only in complex ritual performances such as the goma (discussed in the next chapter) but also

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to empower sand to be scattered over a sick person to help heal them or over a corpse to assure the deceased’s rebirth in Sukhāvatī, the Pure Land of Amitābha Buddha.5

Dharmakāya Buddha preaches At the beginning of the Heian era (794–1185), Kūkai (774–835), the founder of the Shingon school, introduced a radically different concept from the understandings of the nature of Buddhist textuality then found in Japan: the idea that the dharmakāya buddha Mahāvairocana actively preaches the dharma (Jpn. hosshin seppō). Mahāyāna thought had developed the idea that awakened being (buddha) is manifest in three bodies (Skt. trikāya). The human figure Śākyamuni is an example of one kind of buddha-body, the “transformation body” (Skt. nirmāṇakāya), which appears to living beings in order to inspire and teach. The second body is the “enjoyment body” (Skt. saṃbhogakāya), which reveals the grandeur of the buddha through adornments that show his advanced status and produce joy. The third is the identity of awakened being and impermanence (Skt. dharmakāya). A long-standing interpretation of the dharmakāya is that it transcends the realm of duality and was therefore not active, including not teaching the dharma to others. The novelty of this idea that the dharmakāya does preach is such that David Gardiner describes it as the “trademark” of Shingon Buddhism.6 Ryūichi Abé suggests that this is part of Kūkai’s rhetorical strategy in which he presents his transmission as unique and in sharp contrast to all the other forms of Buddhist teaching known to the Buddhist communities of early Heian society under the conventional classifications of yānas as described in Mahāyāna texts.7

Abé has identified one of the sources for the idea that the dharmakāya preaches as “a vajraśekhara sūtra entitled Discernment of the State of Enlightenment.”8 In this text the dharmakāya buddha preaches to “countless Buddhas and bodhisattvas” who have issued forth from his own mind. While on the one hand this is a “monologue” between the dharmakāya buddha and himself, Abé also notes that given the dharmakāya’s “omnipresence,” The Dharmakāya’s discourse takes place in his “universal palace,” the entirety of the universe, and in the “palace of Samantabhadra’s mind,” symbolic of the intrinsic potential for enlightenment all beings possess.9

This idea that the dharmakāya preaches the dharma strongly indicates a positive valuing of the role of language in the process of awakening. The Shingon tradition employs another category of extraordinary language, vidyā. The category originates in India, and both means “wisdom,” and identifies mantra with feminine grammatical form. While functionally identical with mantra, the term reveals a confluence of symbolic associations linking breath, light, mantra, and awakening, which together provide an image of what it means for the dharmakāya buddha to preach. Ryūichi Abé has noted that

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the wisdom of enlightenment is characterized as vidyā-rājñṛ … , the Queen of Wisdom/Light, the consort of the cosmic Buddha Mahāvairocana. A deeper reading of esoteric scriptures reveals that vidyā-rājñī is Mahāvairocana’s lifebreath, which is most vital to the Buddha’s being and yet exists as both inside and outside of the Buddha—symbolic of its cosmic permeation. This is why in the Mahāvairocana Sūtra and other key esoteric texts, the wisdom as the Buddha’s life-breath is understood as mantra in its most primordial form, the secret of enlightenment issued forth from the cosmic Buddha’s mouth. Thus in the Shingon system, mantra is none other than unleashing of the power of enlightenment in its feminine aspect, which is typically personified as Prajñā … , the female warrior bodhisattva who annihilates all sorts of delusions by means of her wisdom/ light … , and the Bodhisattva Buddhalocanā, the mother of all Buddhas.10

While Kūkai’s claim that the dharmakāya buddha Mahāvairocana preaches may well have served the rhetorically strategic goal of establishing the greater authority of the Shingon teachings as an hermeneutic, this move was necessarily based on a preexisting history of ideas about the relation between language and awakening, ideas that had religious and philosophic consequences. Gardiner discusses the significance of this claim, pointing out that it is not simply a strategic claim of superiority on the grounds that “my Buddha body is better than your Buddha body.”11 Rather, based on his detailed study of Kūkai’s Benkenmitsu nikyōron, Gardiner finds the central issue to be “whether or not the absolute realm of ultimate truth is accessible to/compatible with the linguistic and conceptual apparatus of the conventional world.”12 In other words this view, along with those held by the Pure Land and Nichiren traditions, questions the presumption that religious truth is necessarily ineffable.

Indic sources of Shingon praxis Central to understanding the connections between Indic theories of language and Esoteric Buddhist praxis in East Asia and Japan are the tantras and related sources that provided the textual basis for the transmission of the tradition. We will focus here on the three main tantras employed in the Shingon tradition, the Dainichi kyō, the Kongōchō gyō, and the Rishu kyō. Glenn Wallis notes in his study of mantra in the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa: Although certain recognizable Indian cultural and philosophical axioms may be present in a given theory of mantra, theoretical presentations always concern a specific; that is, they are always bound to self-delineated groups, communities, texts, and so on.13

I agree with Wallis that every conception has a specific location, such as a selfdelineated group, community, text, etc. However, the goal here is different. Here we are attempting to connect the range of conceptions regarding the efficacy of extraordinary

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language found within the Indic intellectual milieu to the formulation of Shingon praxis in Japan. Admittedly, such broad, sweeping kinds of inquiry are out of fashion, but hopefully scholarship can be capacious enough to include both attention to detailed specifics and also attempts to see how those specifics fit together into a larger, contextualized whole. Surely, any fact taken in total isolation is meaningless, indicating the need for the kind of contextualization that Wallis indicates. However, even beyond those specific contexts there are broader ones, such as the transmission of certain ways of thinking about language from India through China to Japan, which are equally important for our understanding.

The three primary sutra sources for Shingon and their dates One of the characteristics that marks many of the tantras is that they are taught by figures other than Śākyamuni Buddha. The three primary sources for the Shingon tradition are the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi-sūtra (Jpn. Dainichikyō; commonly referred to by its translation as the Mahāvairocana-sūtra), the Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgrahasūtra (commonly referred to in Japan as the Kongōchōkyō, the name of the collection of which it is the first of eighteen “assemblies,” the Vajraṣekhara-sūtra), and the Adhyardhaṣatikāprajñāpāramitā-sūtra (Jpn. Rishu kyō). All three of these sutras are said to have been spoken by the dharmakāya buddha Mahāvairocana and not by the Buddha Śākyamuni.14 Ryūichi Abé has explained the significance of this claim and its radical nature. Kūkai declared that his Esoteric Buddhism was the direct manifestation of the teaching of the cosmic Buddha Mahāvairocana and that the meditative practices prescribed in Esoteric Buddhist scriptures enabled one to attain enlightenment instantaneously. For the doctrinal schools of Nara, which Kūkai saw as representing Exoteric Buddhism and inferior to Esoteric Buddhism, it was axiomatic that all Buddhist scriptures were preached by the historical Buddha Śākyamuni and that, according to his teaching, it would require at least three eons of countless transmigratory lives of training before anyone could reach enlightenment. Kūkai’s new system, which initially appeared aberrant to the Nara Buddhist establishment, could have been rejected in its entirety as heresy.15

What then is the religious context from which these texts originate? Nakamura Hajime, citing the work of Shinten Sakai, places the Dainichikyō in “the middle of the 7th century.”16 Nakamura further suggests that the Kongōchōgyō is later and “came into existence some time between 680–690.”17 The date of the Rishu kyō as a well-established text can be placed earlier, in the mid-sixth century. Sakai Shirō bases his evaluation of the text’s date on the fact that in his Prasannapadā Candrakīrti quotes the text as an authoritative Prajñāpāramītā sūtra, and he is dated to the first half of the seventh century.18 Although Candrakīrti’s dates are themselves uncertain, the attribution of the Rishu kyō to the mid-sixth century is also suggested by the fact that its earliest Chinese translation was made by Xuanzang, and Matsunaga Yukei

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dates the translation to between 660 and 663. The fact that this text was translated and transmitted by Xuanzang confirms that it was already well established at the time of his visit to India, thus indicating “a date before the turn of the seventh century. A reasonable lower limit would be the middle of the sixth, with the actual date of composition falling some time before that.”19 Each of these three texts claims to have been taught by the dharmakāya buddha Mahāvairocana, and all date to a period from the middle of the sixth to the end of the seventh centuries. The Mahāvairocana-sūtra gives direct evidence of a concern with the nature of language. The first chapter of the sutra lists a series of errors accruing to one who does not properly understand the nature of the self as empty—that is, both the idea of an individual self inhering in persons and the idea of an essence inhering in existing entities. Two of these errors regarding the false apprehension of an essence or absolute relate directly to speech or language. As found in the sutra, the phrase itself is brief to the point of being cryptic, as evidenced in the various renderings offered by different translators: “sound and non-sound,”20 “the expressible or the inexpressible,”21 “the sound or the soundless,”22 “soit dans la voix, soit dans la négation de la voix,”23 “(divine) Word, (divine) Silence,”24 “in speech … and in non-speech.”25 The prevailing interpretation of these erroneous views is, as Minoru Kiyota writes, that the errors enumerated … represent the beliefs of non-Buddhist Indian philosophical schools, which affirm either a creator or an absolute. These schools do not deal with the theory of conditional co-arising [pratityasamutpāda] as the Buddhist does.26

In keeping with this understanding, Kiyota explains that the erroneous belief regarding speech is “the belief that the substance of sound is eternal, unchanging and indestructible, a Mīmāṃsā doctrine,” while the other is simply the “negation of the above doctrine.”27 Similarly, Ryūjun Tajima explains that the first points to a school that believes that the substance of the voice (vāc) is an eternal substance which manifests (SHOKEN) itself as a result of occasional causes. Further according to another branch of the school, the voice while making itself heard is “born” due to some occasion. Once “born” (SHŌSHŌ) it persists endlessly. [And of the second, that this] school on the contrary holds that nothing persists of the spoken word.28

The source for both Kiyota and Tajima’s understanding that these erroneous views are claims made by specific schools is Yixing’s commentary: The sūtra says: THE SOUND OR THE SOUNDLESS. “Sound” means the Śabdavāda heretics. In the case of the advocates of “manifestation of sound” (i.e., prakāśya, vyaṅgya), the essence of sound is initially existent, [but] waits for a conditioning cause to manifest it. In its essential nature it is eternal. In the case of those advocating “production of sound” (i.e., utpāda, janya), the sound to be initially produced waits for a conditioning cause to produce it. Having been

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Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan produced, it is always abiding. With this school there are again further divisions of opinion, as is explained extensively elsewhere. The “soundless” [group] is different from the preceding [groups. The preceding] think that sound is omnipresent and eternal. This [second] school now does away with it completely and reduces it to nothing and lapses into the position that there are no good or bad things and also no sounds or words; and this [state] they consider as reality.29

Linking each of the erroneous views identified in the Mahāvairocana-sūtra to a specific school of Indian religio-philosophic thought may be a bit of scholastic oversystematization, particularly when we consider the brief treatment of the second view, which is perhaps more a matter of logical consistency than an identification of some actual specific school. However, the treatment of the first erroneous view clearly reflects the kind of position found in speculations on language in Indian thought.

Wheel of syllables: The akṣaracakra in Shingon ritual The Shingon tradition identifies the idea of the three mysteries (Jpn. sanmitsu)— the identity of the practitioner’s body, speech, and mind with the body, speech, and mind of the deity evoked in the ritual, the “chief deity” (Jpn. honzon)—as the key to the liberative efficacy of its ritual practices. Like many tantric traditions, Shingon teaches that the identity of practitioner and deity is always already actual. Thus, what is experienced as the discovery of this threefold identity is ritually realized through the mutual interpenetration of self and deity (Jpn. nyūga ganyū, Skt. ahaṁkara), formal invocation (Jpn. shōnenju), and contemplation of the wheel of syllables (Jpn. Jirinkan, also akusetsura rin, Skt. akṣaracakra).30 It is the identity of the deity’s mind and the mind of the practitioner that is made manifest through reciting the “wheel of syllables” as an element in a ritual practice. The “wheel of syllables” (Skt. akṣaracakra) presents a specific instance of the process of transmission within what Robert Sharf has called the “larger pan-Indian religious movement that cut across sectarian lines, and spread rapidly throughout Indianized Asia.”31 The contemporary Shingon program for training priests (Jpn. ajari, Skt. ācārya) comprises a set of preliminary practices: prostrations, visualizing the moon cakra (Jpn. gachirinkan), and visualizing the syllable A (Jpn. ajikan, discussed in Chapter 9). These preliminaries are followed by the four rituals for which the training is named, the “four stages of prayoga” (Jpn. shidokegyō). The four rituals are practiced sequentially, beginning with the practice in “eighteen stages” (Jpn. juhachidō), then moving on to the “vajra realm” practice (Jpn. kongōkai), and the “womb realm” practice (Jpn. taizōkai), and culminating in the practice of a ritual of votive fire offerings (Jpn. goma).32 Key to the liberative efficacy of Shingon ritual practices is realization of the identity of the practitioner and the deity, not in any delusional sense that the practitioner becomes an all-powerful, all-knowing god, but rather in the sense of an awareness of oneself as awakened being. The always already identity of practitioner and awakened

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being is realized through the identification of the body, speech, and mind of one with the other by means of three ritual acts. One way in which the identity of the mind of the practitioner and deity is ritually realized is by the visualization and recitation of the wheel of syllables. In the fourfold training of a Shingon priest in the Chūin ryu tradition, the recitation of the wheel of syllables occurs in both the second and third of the four ritual practices.

The Kongōkai The Kongōkai, or Vajradhātu ritual, the second of the four Shingon training rituals, is based on the Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha-sūtra (T.18.865; Jpn. Kongōchōgyō.)33 The symbolically most important moment is when the practitioner manifests his or her identity with the chief deity who has been evoked in the ritual. This identity is performed by the three ritual elements, one each for body, speech, and mind. The identity of minds is done in two steps: visualization followed by recitation. Visualizing the wheel of five syllables, a, va, ra, ha, and kha, in Siddham script, the practitioner then recites the following short liturgy: In the syllable aṃ there is no dharma that arises; thus in the syllable vaṃ, words and speech cannot be grasped (or, are incomprehensible). Because in the syllable vaṃ words and speech cannot be grasped, in the syllable raṃ the defilements cannot be grasped. Because in the syllable raṃ the defilements cannot be grasped, in the syllable haṃ causes and their karma cannot be grasped. Because in the syllable haṃ causes and their karma cannot be grasped, in the syllable khaṃ the sameness of space (i.e., emptiness of distinctions) cannot be grasped. Because in the syllable khaṃ the sameness of space cannot be grasped, in the syllable haṃ causes and their karma cannot be grasped. Because in the syllable haṃ causes and their karma cannot be grasped, in the syllable raṃ the defilements cannot be grasped. Because in the syllable raṃ defilements cannot be grapsed, in the syllable vaṃ words and speech cannot be grasped. Because in the syllable vaṃ words and speech cannot be grasped, in the syllable aṃ there is no dharma which arises.34

This recitation is characterized by a pattern of mirror-image symmetry or what is technically known in rhetoric as “chiasmus.” This pattern is found in much Buddhist literature, including, for example, the nested narratives structuring some suttas of the Pāli canon.35 Beginning with aṃ and the emptiness of dharmas, it develops through the five syllables until it reaches khaṃ, the emptiness of distinctions.36 It then reverses order, returning to aṃ and the emptiness of dharmas. This is in contrast with the taizōkai, discussed later, which follows only the forward sequence. The circular movement is clearly suggestive of the conceptions of emanation and return found in Hindu tantra.37 The five syllables a, va, ra, ha, and kha are identified with the five buddhas at the center of the maṇḍala. In other words, the set of five syllables used in this particular form of the wheel of syllables is based on the bīja mantra of the five buddhas of the vajradhātu maṇḍala. Adrian Snodgrass gives a second set of five syllables associated with these five buddhas.38

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Buddha

Syllable in akṣaracakra

Second set

Mahāvairocana

Va

ah

Ratnaketu

Ra

a

Saṁkusumitarāja

A

ā

Amitāyus

Kha

aṁ

Divyadundubhi

Ha

aḥ

The Taizōkai A different version of the wheel of syllables is found in the taizōkai (Skt. garbhadhātu) ritual, the third of the four training rituals of Shingon. This ritual is based on the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi-sūtra (T.18.848; Jpn. Dainichi kyō).39 As in the kongōkai, there are two steps to the wheel of syllables—visualization and recitation. In the taizōkai the practitioner visualizes a moon cakra in the middle of his or her chest with the five Siddham script syllables a, va, ra, ha, and kha inscribed upon it. He or she then recites a short sequence of Sanskrit syllables: aṃ, vaṃ, raṃ, haṃ, and khaṃ. This latter sequence of syllables is associated with a set of doctrinal claims in a short liturgy recited by the practitioner: Although each of the syllable cakras is separate, their principles of enlightenment cannot be grasped (or, is incomprehensible). The teaching of the syllable aṃ is that basic non-arising cannot be grasped, and thus the teaching of the syllable vaṃ is that words and speech cannot be grasped. Since words and speech cannot be grasped, the teaching of the syllable raṃ is that defilements and purification cannot be grasped. Since the teaching of the syllable raṃ is that defilements and purification cannot be grasped, the teaching of the syllable haṃ is that the causes of karmic actions cannot be grasped. Since the teaching of the syllable haṃ is that the causes of karmic actions cannot be grasped, the teaching of the syllable khaṃ is that identity with space cannot be grasped.40

As mentioned earlier, while in the kongōkai there is the pattern of reversal, here there is only a forward sequence of syllables. An important textual source for the wheel of syllables practice is the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi-sūtra. The tenth chapter, “Akśara cakra,” works with the variations of a much larger set of syllables, transforming them from short to long vowels and adding various endings (e.g., a, ā, aṃ, aḥ).41 This larger set is four of the gutturals (ka, kha, ga, gha), four of the palatals (ca, cha, ja, jha), four of the cerebrates (ṭa, ṭha, ḍa, ḍha), four of the dentals (ta, tha, da, dha), four of the labials (pa, pha, ba, bha), the four semivowels (ya, ra, la, va), and the five spirants (śa, ṣa, sa, ha, kṣa). Twelve of the vowels (i, ī, u, ū, ṛ, ṝ, ḷ, ḹ, e, ai, o, au) and variations on the nasals na and ma (ṅa, ña, ṇa, na, ma) are given all together at the end.42

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Closer in meaning to the ritual element under consideration here is the twentysecond chapter of the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra, “Recitation for Attainment by the Hundred Letters,” in which Mahāvairocana addresses Samantabhadra: Lord of Mysteries, observe how, flowing forth from emptiness and provisionally established, the paths of samādhi, empowered by the letter A, are accomplished. Lord of Mysteries, in this manner the letter A abides as various adornments arranged in depicted positions. [This would seem to refer to the presence of the vowel A in all syllables with all their variations.] Because all dharmas are originally unborn (ādyanutpāda), it reveals its own form. Alternatively, because of the meaning of inapprehensibility,43 it manifests the form of the letter Va. Alternatively, because dharmas are far removed from activity (kārya), it manifests in the form of the letter Ka. Alternatively, because all dharmas are like empty space (kha), it manifests the form of the letter Kha. Alternatively, because going (gati) is inapprehensible, it manifests the form of the letter Ga. Alternatively, because the characteristic of agglomeration (ghana, “compact [mass]”) is inapprehensible in dharmas, it manifests the form of the letter Gha. Alternatively, because all dharmas are dissociated from birth and extinction (cyuti, “fall”), it manifests the form of the letter Ca.44

The text continues, associating the emptiness of (inapprehensibility of, or lack of connection to) a variety of concepts with the initial syllable of the Sanskrit term for that concept: cha (chāyā, shadow), ja (jāti, birth), jha (jhamala, enemies),45 ṭa (ṭaṅka, pride), ṭha (viṭhapana, nurture or [illusory] creation), ḍa (ḍamara, resentment or riot/tumult), ḍha (calamities?), ta (tathatā, thusness), tha (sthāna, dwelling place), da (dāna, giving), dha (dhātu, elements), pa (paramārtha, supreme truth), pha (phena, solidity, i.e., being foamlike), ba (bandha, bondage), bha (bhāvanā, visualization), ya (yāna, vehicles), ra (rajas, dust), la (lakṣana, characteristics), śa (śānti, quiescence), ṣa (from ṣaṭha for śaṭha, dull, meaning “fool, blockhead”), sa (satya, truth), and ha (hetu, causality). The text asserts that through these “samādhi gateways” arise the thirty-two major marks of an awakened being, a samyaksaṃbuddha. The text then mentions ṅa, ña, ṇa, and ma as operating “freely in all dharmas,” and these add the eighty minor marks.46 As in the wheel of syllables used in the Shingon rituals, we find here a Prajñāpāramitā-like set of apparent paradoxes—because something cannot be “obtained” or “grasped,” it exists in the form of a particular syllable. At the same time, the mnemonic associations created may also have been intended to serve a pedagogic function. As with many mnemonic sequences of the “a is for apple” kind, some of these associations appear rather forced, although as we will see later Ryuich Abé understands these associations to actually be much less simplistic than they might first appear. These instances of ritual syllabic manipulation correspond quite directly with the idea of phonematic emanation discussed in Chapter 3. Also evident as part of the conceptual support of this practice is the idea of the cosmos as a text.

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Kūkai’s vision: Cosmos as text In preparation for a career at court, Kūkai (then named Saeki no Mao) was sent from his birthplace in Shikōku to the capital Nagaoka to study. The curriculum was based in Confucian conceptions of education, and included composition in classical Chinese, and study of the Chinese classics. As Takagi and Dreitlein note, “It was the standard theory in both China and Japan that writing and composition were the essential model by which the nation could be peacefully governed.”47 Because of this early training, Kūkai was profoundly attentive to the nature of language and of writing. Within a few years, Kūkai abandoned his studies and engaged in a variety of Buddhist-inspired practices, including recitation of the Ākāśagarbha dhāraṇī, which like others is said to improve memory and comprehension. His recitation was part of his austerity practices, rather than the full ritual practice of Ākāśagarbha dhāraṇī recitation (Jpn. gumonjihō).48 Takagi and Dreitlein say that “Kūkai directly experienced through that practice a realization that each letter of the Buddhist texts contains within itself infinite and profound meanings, and furthermore that nature itself is vibration, sound, and language.”49 Ryūichi Abé sees Kūkai as reaching an impasse at this point in his life, the apparently unbridgeable gap between practice and study—indeed a gap that continues to plague Buddhist adherents into the present. It was at this point that Kūkai read the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra, where he found “a model of a new type of training in which the textual study and ritual practice were integrated.”50 Nara Buddhism lacked teachers who could guide him to deeper practice of the tantra’s teachings, and so he determined to travel to Tang to find a teacher who could guide him. Takagi and Dreitlein quote Abé’s description of a later realization that Kūkai had: Every phenomena in all of nature is a self-articulation of Dharmakāya, and a manifestation of what we might call a primordial language carved into the fabric of space to reveal the truth of emptiness. Phenomena are nothing other than letters, and each of those letters constitutes a primordial mantra. Long before human language ever evolved, the entire universe itself was a vast sūtra written in this primordial language, a primordial text written in the grammar of the truth of emptiness.51

Although expressed in the rhetoric of direct experience, there is a strong similarity between this conception that the universe is a text and conceptions found in the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra’s teachings, such as the Wheel of Syllables (Skt. akṣaracakra). These include a consistent emphasis on cosmos, text, and language as all empty. Abé explains Kūkai’s equation of cosmos and text as one of Kūkai’s central theses on language: anything that distinguishes itself from other things by its own pattern (mon)—by shape, color, or movement—is a letter (ji). That is, a letter’s identity derives from differentiation (shabetsu), the way in which it differentiates itself from other letters; and difference holds primacy over

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identity. Each letter therefore embodies what Buddhist philosophers refer to as “emptiness,” for there is no such thing as essence inherent in every letter that is prior to its difference from or relation to other letters. Not only the letters of the alphabet but all things in the world—even trees, mountains, and streams—have the same claim as letters, and together they form the “cosmic text.” … There is never a hard and fast distinction between text that describes the world and the world that is described in the text.52

Furthermore in the background we can glimpse ideas originating in India about the status of the Vedas as a cosmic text, and the cosmos as a vibratory reality, as discussed earlier in Chapter 3. This indicates that these ideas traveled from India through China to Japan, probably not in a single line, but via a variety of practices, teachings, and texts. In Kūkai’s case the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra played a particularly important role; having read it and found no one who could explain it to him, he was motivated to undertake the trip to China. Also, given, for example, the use of related ideas about language by Tanluan, these conceptions were also more generally part of the Buddhist substratum throughout East Asia. Certainly, as discussed in the preceding chapter, these ideas about the nature of language as cosmic vibration are not Chinese in origin— although Kūkai’s understanding of the import of calligraphy did have roots in Chinese practice interpreted from the perspective of Esoteric ritual practice. “For Kūkai, the practice of calligraphy—quieting the mind, grinding the ink, choosing a brush, and writing the characters by concentrating one’s thought on the tip of the brush—was not different in any way from forming mudrās, reciting mantras, and practicing yogic meditation in order to realize truth.”53

Emptiness as the message of the akṣaracakra The liturgical use of the akṣaracakra in Shingon ritual seems to combine two strains of thought. One is tantric cosmogonic speculations regarding the sequential origin of all existing things through the emanation of sounds—the phonematic origins of all things, the nondual link between word/sound and objective referent, found from the Vedas and Upaniṣads on and throughout tantra. The sequential pattern of five syllables (A, VA, RA, HA, KHA) repeated in order and then reversed is structurally similar to the ideas of emanation and resorption of the phonemes of the Sanskrit syllabary. The concern with the entire set of Sanskrit phonemes and their variations found in the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra is also indicative of this stream of thought. The other stream of thought is the consistently Buddhist emphasis on emptiness. Philosophically, the wheel of syllables builds on themes of the emptiness of all things common within Mahāyāna thought.54 The importance of the concept of emptiness for the tradition is evident in the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi’s first chapter, which includes an exposition of the thirty errors made by those who do not understand the emptiness of self discussed earlier. The tantra also explains dependent arising by reference to ten metaphors: it is like “an illusion, a mirage, a dream, a reflection, a gandharva city, an echo, the moon [reflected] in water, bubbles, a flower in empty space, and a whirling

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wheel of fire.”55 This list of ten metaphors contains many of the exact same items as found in the list of eight given by Nagārjuna in his Seventy Stanzas: “Produced phenomena are similar to a village of gandharvas, an illusion, a hair net in the eyes, foam, a bubble, an emanation, a dream, and a circle of light produced by a whirling firebrand.”56 The emphasis on emptiness is also indicated by the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi’s identifying the syllable A as indicating emptiness. This emphasis on emptiness is also found, for example, in the brief twenty-third chapter, “The Mantra Method for the Hundred Letters,” which reads: “Next, Lord of Mysteries, in this samādhi gateway one will, empowered by emptiness, become sovereign over all dharmas and accomplish supreme perfect awakening. Therefore, this letter [A] is regarded as the deity.” [The World-honored One] then spoke these verses: Lord of Mysteries, you should know that the letter A is the primary state, Its bright dharma all-pervading and surrounded by a circle of letters. This deity has no [differentiating] characteristics and is far removed from seeing [subjects] and [seen] characteristics; Yet although without characteristics, holy deities manifest characteristics and come forth from its midst. Sounds emerge from the letter [A], the letter produces mantras, And mantras effect results—so have the honored world-saviors taught. You should know that the nature of sound is empty and that it has been created by emptiness. [But] all kinds of beings are wrongly attached [to external objects] in accordance with words [expressed in sound]. Neither empty nor sound, it is taught for the practitioner, And if he enters into liberation by means of sound, he will then realize samādhi. Intercorrespondence with the allocation [of the letters] according to rules is illuminated by the letters, And hence there are the conceptual [distinctions] of immeasurable mantras of the likes of the letter A and so on.57

In addition to emptiness per se, this short chapter indicates the compound of three significations of the syllable A. At the same time that the syllable A signifies the origin of all things, as per the theory of phonematic emanation discussed earlier, it indicates the universality of emptiness—it is simultaneously the vowel sound present in all syllables, even when concealed by the variations that create the other vowels and that which negates the existence of all things as the negative prefix.58 Kūkai’s discussion of the meaning of the Sanskrit syllabary, the Bonji shittan jimo narabi ni shakugi (Essential Characters of the Sanskrit Siddham Script and Their Interpretations),59 exhibits the same emphasis on emptiness and draws on the same symbolism of the syllable A. Abé writes that for each of the forty-six syllables, Kūkai explains the meaning of the syllable with a note beginning “the unattainability of all things as ….” The syllable Va is linked with speech, vac, and is explained as “the unattainability of all things as speech.”60 In other words, as Abé explains, the meaning

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attributed to the syllables by Kūkai is not that they are a set of “ciphers of doctrinal concepts,” as we may first think, but rather “the characterization in writing of a different shade of the force of the originally nonarising—the letter A that hides itself in each letter’s graphic form.”61 Kūkai’s interpretation of the meaning of each of the syllables as the emptiness of all things draws on the three different significations attributed to the syllable A by tantric interpreters. With its three different functions in Sanskrit, the syllable A has been interpreted as representing a threefold cosmic pattern of creation, sustaining, and destruction (see Chapter 9). Although not an identical conceptualization of language, another perspective on the nature of language is that it is purely conventional and lacking any permanent essence. This is an early view, already established in the abhidharma, as was noted earlier in Chapter 3. The conventionalist interpretation is consistent with the emphasis on emptiness found in Kūkai and the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi. For example, Collett Cox writes about the Sarvāstivāda-Vaibhāṣika position that though name, as the underlying signifier of object-referents or the conveyor of meaning exists as a discrete real entity, the specific content of any given particular name is not inherent within its object-referent, but is determined simply by consensus. Whatever its specific content, a name, once elicited, performs its own function; that is, it manifests the object-referent conventionally associated with the arrangement of phonemes of which it consists.62

Cox explains that this is specifically a rejection of the Mīmāṁsaka theory of the eternal character of language—that is, that the relation between a word and its object-referent or meaning (śabdārthasaṃbandha) is natural and infallible, not subject to human invention or to the vicissitudes of human intention.63

This emphasis on the conventional character of language (name, phrase, syllable, and sound) is congruent with that found in the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi, which identifies as erroneous the notions of the eternality of speech and speaker, as well as the nihilist negation of the eternality of speech and speaker.64 This itself is in turn the same as Kūkai’s emphasis on the “letters of the world-text” as “a system of differentiation,” which, as Abé explains, means that the letters/things are of dependent co-origination and therefore without origin. Because the letters of human language are already a part of the letters of the worldtext, they are also grounded in their mutual differences. If letters in this narrow sense have any origin, it cannot be anything but the dependent co-origination, which is originally nonarising.65

Buddhist linguistic speculations, from the abhidharma emphasis on the conventionality of the relation between name and the objective referent to the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra’s emphasis on emptiness, and carried forward into Kūkai’s interpretive strategies,

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consistently reject any concept of an absolute existence, either in words or as the metaphysical source of their meanings.

Conclusion As noted earlier, the textual source for the akṣaracakra in Shingon is the Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi tantra. However, the broader background points toward those speculations on the cosmogonic function of language that date from the Vedas and pervade Indian tantra of all kinds. The form of the wheel of syllables used in the kongōkai ritual is particularly suggestive of this relation: the pattern of reversal is similar to cosmogonic patterns of emanation and resorption found in Śaiva tantra, as described previously in Chapter 3. Cosmogonic speculation links the progressive manifestation of the universe to the progressive sequence of the Sanskrit syllabary. This phonematic cosmogenesis has as its “natural” consequence the concept that the reverse sequence of syllables matches the dissolution of the manifest universe. In addition, this cosmogonic conception is also identified with the processes of personal bondage and liberation—emanation being identified with the bondage resulting from an increasing enmeshment with the material world and resorption with liberation as a decreasing enmeshment with the material. The exegetical understanding in Japanese Shingon draws on the imagery of emanationist cosmogenesis as the sequence of syllables within the context of one of the central themes of Buddhist thought—emptiness. Our examination of the conceptual connections between Shingon tantric practices in Japan, right up to the present, and medieval Indian religious philosophy highlights the continuity of doctrinal and practical explanation of ritual practice across three languages and religious cultures. In the course of this history, it seems that even as Buddhist practitioners integrated elements from their own particular religious milieux, they maintained an identifiably Buddhist commitment to an ontology of emptiness. The ritual use of the akṣaracakra in the Shingon tradition brings together pan-tantric speculations on the function of speech as creatrix with pan-Buddhist conceptions of emptiness, conventionality of existence, and dependent co-origination.

6

The Clear Light Mantra: Religious Agency in Medieval Japanese Buddhist Ritual

Introduction The impetus for this chapter came when I learned that one of the discussions of Buddhist practice in the second edition of the Encyclopedia of Religion would be placed under the more general category of “worship and devotion.” To my ear at least, both of these terms—“worship” and “devotion”—carry a connotation of a personal relation: the object of worship or devotion is at least implicitly, if not explicitly, conceptualized as a person. The subsumption of Buddhist practice under these categories indicates the extent to which these categories have been sublated as universal for the study of religion. Rather than being unproblematically universal, the categories are generally in fact rooted in Western religious conceptions, specifically in this case the centrality of belief in a personal god. The use of these categories forces Buddhism into a structure of concepts, categories, and concerns that originates from the theistic religions.1 Today, at some remove, I find my reaction less emotionally vehement but maintain a concern with the unreflective intellectual hegemony of monotheist conceptions in religious studies. While much Buddhist thought gives primacy to the personal figures of buddhas and bodhisattvas, does this necessarily entail that the only conceptions of religious agency found in Buddhism are rooted in the notion of a superhuman agent who is the source from which religious benefits derive? In other words, are the categories of worship and devotion actually universal, or are they culturally specific in such a fashion that it is inappropriate to apply them universally? Directly related to this is the question of whether the goals of all religions can be appropriately categorized under soteriology as a general rubric, with its root conception of salvation from sin, or from this sinful world, through the actions of a superhuman agent?2 As discussed in Chapter 3, the Mīmāṃsa school developed a conception of the efficacy of the language of the Vedas that did not depend upon personalized conceptions of religious agency, reflecting ideas about the efficacy of ritual as the context within which the power of the Vedas in the form of mantra is made accessible. Such ideas regarding the power of mantra were a key part of the conceptual milieux in which the tantric traditions developed—Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, and Islamic as well. In the Japanese Shingon form of Buddhist tantra there is a significant use of mantra, including a votive fire offering (Jpn. goma, Skt. homa) focusing on the “clear light” mantra (kōmyō shingon).

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We may then ask both a general question and a specific question. First, the general question: Is there only one model of religious agency, a theistic one in which agency is located in a superhuman agent whose key characteristics are the same as those of a person, or are there alternative conceptions of religious agency? Some scholars have argued, for example, that Buddhism is primarily a gnostic tradition rather than a theistic one—for Buddhism it is wisdom (prajñā) overcoming ignorance (avidya) that is conducive to awakening (bodhi), rather than redemption by a savior being conducive to salvation from sin. Second, the specific question: Does the ritual manual for the clear light mantra goma clearly reveal a theistic notion of religious agency? Or, does it indicate a non-personal agency—that of the clear light mantra itself?

Conceptions of agency Agency is central to any consideration of religious ritual. As E. Thomas Lawson and Robert N. McCauley write, Religious rituals always do something to some thing or somebody. Religious rituals have an instrumental dimension as construed within the religion’s conceptual scheme. This is precisely the reason why concerns arise about rituals’ efficacy. Participants perform rituals in order to bring about changes in the religious world.3

In attempting to understand the possibility of various religious conceptions of causal agency4 two theoretical emphases may be made: developmental and cognitive. These are not mutually exclusive categories. Although it is beyond the scope of our study here, we note that there is an important third category, culture, which interacts with both development and cognitive analyses of religious conceptions of agency. Individual development is cultural,5 and some suggest that individual development parallels cultural development.6 Limiting ourselves to developmental and cognitive approaches, we will first briefly consider Michael Tomasello’s explication of the interface of the developmental approach and then give greater attention to the cognitive theory of E. Thomas Lawson and Robert N. McCauley.

A developmental reflection on the formation of causal thinking Michael Tomasello cites with approval the assertion of Jean Piaget to the effect that because infants first model causality through analogy to their own abilities, “infants’ initial attribution of causal powers to entities other than the self occurs with other persons.”7 Tomasello goes on to add a critical distinction to Piaget’s ideas, the distinction between animate and intentional, that is, between “understanding of others as sources of self-movement and power” and “understanding of others as beings that make behavioral and perceptual choices.”8 Tomasello describes two stages of development related to these two conceptions of agency.

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As long as infants understand themselves only as animate beings with the ability to make things happen in some generalized way, for the first seven to eight months or so, that is how they also understand persons. When they begin understanding themselves as intentional agents in the sense that they recognize that they have goals that are clearly separated from behavioral means, at eight to nine months of age, that is how they understand other persons as well.9

Infants can also extend the analogy of intentional agency to inanimate objects in which case the latter are thought of as having personal characteristics, for example, when one ball is thought of as pushing another in the same way that an infant pushes a ball. Here we are only drawing out the idea that there are two different conceptions of agency that may need to be clarified when discussing religious agency, animate agency, and intentional agency. The developmental sequence of the origin of these conceptions as described by Tomasello is not to be taken to mean that one is better or an improvement over the other. The point is that as human beings, we do have these two conceptions of agency, and therefore not all conceptions of religious agency necessarily entail intentional agency.

A cognitive reflection on religious agency In their study of the cognitive nature of ritual, Lawson and McCauley develop what may best be considered a semantic theory of ritual, although they talk about it as syntactic. They examine the ways that the symbolic elements of ritual take on meaning. In examining the source of the efficacy of these religious elements, they claim that they can all be traced back to the actions of a superhuman figure or what they refer to as a “culturally postulated superhuman agent”: “All religious rituals involve superhuman agents at some point or other in their representation.”10 In their analysis, for example, the marriage ceremony in Christianity is considered to be effective because the priest performing the ritual is properly ordained. In its turn, ordination depends on the status of the church, which was itself established by the foundational actions of Jesus. By establishing the church, Jesus’ action is considered to have authorized ordination of priests, which in turn gives the priest proper authority to perform the wedding ceremony, which makes the ceremony effective. Tracing ritual authority backward—wedding ceremony > ordained priest > ordaining church > establishment of the church by Jesus—inevitably leads to the actions of a “culturally postulated superhuman agent,” according to Lawson and McCauley.11 These actions are, then, the foundation for all ritual actions that derive from them, no matter how many intervening steps there may be. There are analogies to this kind of thinking in Buddhism. Perhaps one of the most common is the metaphor of imperial subjugation as evidence of the origins of agency. An example from Dunhuang cited by Jacob Dalton is of a prince of Vaiśali who, having accomplished seven samādhis and gained all the siddhis, subjugated all the demons of the universe and bound them to serve the buddhadharma. Because of this prior subjugation, a practitioner can summon these demons and bind them to his own service through recitation of the appropriate dhāraṇī.12 This same motif also appears in

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the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa in which Vajrapāṇi appears as the “lord of yakśas, the master of guhyakas.”13 Glenn Wallis explains that by “mastering these destructive divinities, Vajrapāṇi converts them into powers serving the aims of the practitioner.”14 Clearly this relates to the role of imperial conceptions of conquest and ascension to imperial status (Skt. rājādhirāja) in the origins of tantra, as discussed by Ronald Davidson.15 However, we should note that this metaphor is found not only in tantric or Mahāyāna settings dating from the post-Gupta era but is also in the Pāli tradition, specifically in the protective formulae known as parittas, discussed earlier in Chapter 3. Thus we find an apparent similarity between Christian conceptions of agency originating in the institutionally founding acts of Jesus and Buddhist conceptions of agency originating in images of religio-imperialist subjugation. However, similarity does not entail positing the actions of a superhuman agent as the basis for the power of mantra.16

Locating the agency of mantra The Mīmāṃsā school holds as a tenet that the Vedas, the source of mantra, are unproduced sound, eternal vibration. This conception that mantra are rooted in the Vedas, which being eternal do not originate in human speech, is however philosophically untenable for Buddhist thinkers, such as the authors of the abhidharma discussed earlier in Chapter 3 and Dharmakīrti. For instance, one of the standard examples of an argument found throughout the literature of Buddhist epistemology is a rejection of the Mīmāṃsa view in which it is argued that the characteristic of sound is that it is produced and concludes that it is therefore impermanent: Sound is produced, everything produced is impermanent, like a pot, and not like empty space, therefore, sound is impermanent.

In keeping with a conception of sound as produced and mantra as human speech, Dharmakīrti defines mantra as an utterance, though of a particular kind: What we call a mantra is nothing other than an utterance [that has been pronounced] by [persons] who are endowed with a [special] power [they owe to their own] truthfulness and austerity, [an utterance that proves] able to realize the desired purpose.17

In other words, mantra is the product of human action and not a manifesting forth of the eternal vibration of the Vedas.18 The Buddhist position, however, seems to entail another difficulty, which is explaining how a mantra which is merely produced like everything else can be effective in realizing some desired purpose. What provides a mantra with such agency if not the eternal vibratory presence of the Vedas?

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We are now in a position to explicate more fully the requisites discussed earlier in Chapter 4, where we discussed those requisites held by the variety of Chinese authors and those of Dharmakīrti. Dharmakīrti’s discussion of a dharma creator clearly indicates that the position of a Buddhist philosophy of language that mantra like all language are conventional differs from the Mīmāṃsā position that mantra make present the eternal vibrational reality of the Vedas. Vincent Eltschinger explains Dharmakīrti’s view that a mantra creator meeting the requisite qualifications establishes an “agreement” (Skt. samayavyavasthā) in a text, a tantra (other terms for such texts are mantrakalpa, and mantravidhāna). Such an agreement constitutes a “contractual and hence reciprocal dimension.”19 From the side of the author of the mantra, samaya is promise and injunction; from the side of the user of the mantra (mantraprayoktṛ), samaya consists of the set of rules (nyāya) that are laid down (vihita) in the tantra or kalpa as conducive to the success of the mantra (mantrasiddhi), and that must be observed scrupulously.20

Eltschinger groups the rules for successful mantra recitation under two rubrics: behavioral and ethical rules, and ritual rules. He goes on to explain, however, that there is an additional requisite for attaining the intended goal, and that is a proper attitude of devotion toward the mantra creator.21 In contrast to Lawson and McCauley’s assertion that a culturally postulated supernatural agent is at the base of all religious agency, we find here with Dharmakīrti’s philosophical argument that mantra constitute an agreement, one with no such supernatural agency. Instead, an accomplished human practitioner is able to create mantra and establish an agreement regarding the requirements for successful use of the newly created mantra by another human practitioner.22

Other locations of agency For Buddhism the question of causal agency—what categories of things in the world can cause things to happen—brings into the discussion such phenomena as the efficacy of relics,23 statues and images,24 amulets,25 and written dhāraṇī.26 For one example, in the case of Nichiren Buddhism, discussed in Chapter 1, the Lotus Sūtra itself, or perhaps more specifically the title of the sutra, is understood to be spontaneously effective, that is, to have agency, but not intentionality. It might perhaps be argued that because the Lotus Sūtra was spoken by Śākyamuni Buddha, the locus of agency is with him. This would, however, be an ad hoc assertion made to support the theory and not represent the understanding of Nichiren and his followers. If we interpret the understanding of Nichiren followers in this way, we create the very view we wish to claim is the effect of the practice being a religious one. As a consequence of such interpretation no counterevidence would be possible. If, therefore, we set such preconceptions aside, and look at practice, many Nichiren adherents act as if it is their understanding that it is the Lotus Sūtra, or its title, that has agency.27 This is directly comparable to the Shin understanding that the vow made by Amitābha regarding

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rebirth in the Pure Land is spontaneously effective (Jpn. jinen hōni, or ganriki jinen) in response to nenbutsu recitation.28 Like the Lotus Sūtra, the vow has agency without intentionality. In the case of relics of the Buddha Śākyamuni, belief in their efficacy is clearly based on their physical connection to the Buddha, specifically to the body of the Buddha.29 Clearly, there is a strong strain within Buddhism that does employ personalistic or anthropomorphic conceptions of agency, manifest in beliefs regarding the efficacy of relics, whether from the body of a religious figure such as a buddha or a revered teacher, or an object used by such a religious figure.30 However, the founding action of a culturally postulated superhuman agent is not the only form of agency.31 The efficacious power of relics comes from their association with a buddha or other religious figure and differs therefore from the kind of establishing action by a supernatural figure hypothesized by Lawson and McCauley. If we turn to the realm of myth, one dramatic example of the use of mantra is the subjugation of Maheśvara. According to Ronald Davidson, the locus classicus of this story is the Sarvatathāgata-tattvasaṃgraha, one of the key texts in the history of Buddhist tantra.32 In the course of this myth, as summarized by Davidson, the two Buddhist protagonists—Vairocana and Vajrapāṇi—simply employ mantra in their battle with their antagonist—Maheśvara. There is no discussion of where these powerful instruments, or perhaps in this case more accurately, weapons, originate. They are just there to be used, like the knife in the pocket of a Boy Scout. Such mythic sources may be considered to be at an extreme from the highly philosophical treatment found in the work of someone like Dharmakīrti, but the sources being canonic, they are not “merely” popular. Philosophical thought and myth, together with apologia, ritual, and popular practice, all provide us with important evidence regarding conceptions of the efficacy of mantra as spontaneously effective, that is, agents without intention.

The mantra of clear light: Kōmyō Shingon The kōmyō shingon, or clear light mantra, was popularized in medieval Japanese Buddhism largely through the work of Myōe Koben (1173–1232). The mantra itself originated in India, perhaps as early as “the first few centuries of the Common Era.”33 Based on an examination of the Chinese translations of texts in which the clear light mantra is presented, Mark Unno concludes that “there were one or two primary sources” among early Indian Mahāyāna texts and that “the basic elements of the ritual were in place from quite early on: the specific powers of the mantra, the use of the sand, and the ritual intoning of the mantra as an alternative means of birth” in Sukhāvatī, the Land of Bliss.34 As with the dhāraṇī discussed by Paul Copp and Richard McBride, the clear light mantra can empower a simple material substance—dust, mud, or sand—that becomes the vehicle for the transfer of efficacy.35 In the case of the clear light mantra the empowered sand is thought to both heal the sick and, if applied to a corpse, bring about the deceased’s birth in Sukhāvatī. Myōe played on the parallel between the power of the mantra to purify dirt and sand so that it becomes a vehicle for the transmission

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of that power, and the power of the mantra to purify the sufferings of those afflicted by pollution (Jpn. kegare). Not only were all sorts of miserable plight of a present life … linked to [a person’s] kegare in past lives, the kegare, if it remained untreated, would bind one to misfortune in his or her future transmigrations ….It appears that the reason Myōe singled out Kōmyo shingon as a means of saving his followers, especially those of laity, was that the mantra and its ritual revolves around the motif of converting dirt and sand, which are associated with filth and impurity in conventional sense, into something most pure and sacred.36

In this instance, there is no personalistic agency involved—the power originates in the mantra itself and is then transferred to the sand, which once empowered is the physical vehicle for the transmission of that power to the ill or dead recipient. The kōmyō shingon also became the object of a Shingon fire ritual, the Kōmyō shingon goma.

The Kōmyō Shingon Goma During the medieval period, the Shingon tradition developed rituals related to the kōmyō shingon, the “clear light mantra.” In Japanese the mantra is pronounced: on abogya beiroshanō makabotara mani handoma jimbara harabaritaya un, which is a transliteration of the Sanskrit: oṃ amogha vairocana mahāmudrā maṇi padma jvala pravarttaya hūṃ, and which can be interpreted in English to mean: “Praise be to the flawless, all pervasive illumination of the great mudrā [the seal of the Buddha]. Turn over to me the jewel, lotus, and radiant light.”37 In addition to other rituals devoted to the recitation of the clear light mantra, there is also a goma (Skt. homa) that takes the clear light mantra as its “chief deity” (Jpn. honzon) found in the Shingon ritual corpus. What does it mean that a verbal expression, a mantra, is the object of this ritual? Is the mantra itself thought of as having agency? If so, what does this say about Buddhist thought more generally? These questions are all the more pertinent when we consider the variety of other rituals that focused on mantra and dhāraṇī, such as the Uśṇīśavijāya dhāraṇī ritual described by Jacob Dalton.38 In other words, the clear light mantra in Japan is not a unique oddity, but rather representative of more widespread practices.

Descriptions of the chief deity in the Kōmyō Shingon Goma Like many, if not most, Shingon goma rites, the kōmyō shingon goma is organized into five sections. The first of these is devoted to the Vedic fire deity Agni (Jpn. Katen). This is as typical of Shingon gomas as is the division into five sections. The second section of most Shingon gomas is identified as that of the “Lord of the Assembly.” In the case of the kōmyō shingon goma, the second section is devoted to Amitābha (Jpn. Amida). This

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seems fully congruent with the idea that the clear light mantra is a means of assuring birth in Sukhāvatī. The third section is usually that of the “Chief Deity” (Jpn. honzon), although in this case there is no specific identification of the chief deity at the opening of this section, as is frequently the case. The fourth section is for the various Buddhist deities and protectors, specifically thirty-seven, and the fifth section is for the worldly deities. The list of worldly deities is identified here as the twelve (Vedic) deities, the seven heavenly lights, and the twenty-eight lunar mansions. Both of these final two sections of the kōmyō shingon goma are also quite typical of Shingon gomas generally. Looking specifically at the third section, that in which the chief deity receives offerings, the following text describes the invitation of the chief deity: (3.4) Next, invite the chief deity: first take one flower, recite the mantra A BI RA UN KEN, and place it on the kindling; form the Mida (Amitābha) meditation mudrā. Visualize this flower arriving in the middle of the hearth, becoming (3.5) a great lotus throne, above which is the syllable AḤ, this changes, becoming a five cakra stūpa, emitting five colored lights, this changes, becoming Dainichi Nyōrai (Mahāvairocana Tathāgata), emitting five colored lights, his magnificent body wearing the five wisdoms crown and necklace, (3.6) forming the dharmadhātu samādhi mudrā, sitting cross-legged.39

Initially, it might seem that this text confirms the idea that agency is dependent upon a deity, in this case Mahāvairocana Buddha. However, the sequence of transformations points to a greater ambiguity and complexity. First, the syllable Aḥ (one of the permutations of the syllable A discussed in Chapter 9) initially transforms into a five-element stūpa (Jpn. gorin sotoba)40 and then finally transforms into Mahāvairocana Buddha. This is similar to the various versions of the maṇḍala in which the anthropomorphic form of each of the various deities is equated with their seed syllable (bīja) mantra and ritual implements. It would be easy to treat the anthropomorphic form as primary, with the other forms representing, or pointing toward, the supposedly primary form—which would employ a theory of symbolic surrogacy. Such an interpretation would, however, presume the theistic interpretation, rather than treating the equation or identity between the various forms seriously. If one does not presume that the anthropomorphic form is necessarily primary, it makes just as much sense to consider the power of the mantra becoming a bodhisattva as it does to think of the power of a bodhisattva becoming a mantra. This transformative identity repeats the theme of deity and mantra being identical found in Hindu tantra, as discussed in Chapter 3 earlier.

Conclusion We should not, of course, expect that there is a singular, monolithic Buddhist view of agency, any more than there is a singular, monolithic Buddhist view of language— or, indeed, a singular, monolithic religious view of agency. Lawson and McCauley’s cognitive theory, however, does assert that all religious conceptions of agency, including

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Buddhist, must be symbolically or ritually derivative from the founding actions of a culturally postulated supernatural agent. From even a brief examination of a specific Shingon ritual, however, we can see that the actualities are much more ambiguous and complex. While there certainly are anthropomorphized conceptions of agency in Buddhism, there are also Mīmāṃsalike understandings of the agency of sound itself. We should avoid making an a priori presumption regarding the location of agency in some supernatural and seemingly anthropomorphic entity whose agency is itself then necessarily the source of the efficacy of mantra or of ritual practice more generally. Across the range from mythic, as in the Maheśvara subjugation myth, to the abstruse, as in the philosophical reflections of Dharmakīrti, mantra are not based on some divine primal action. The mantra recited by Vairocana and Vajrapāṇi in subjugating Maheśvara are simply powerful in themselves. Philosophically, mantra are explicitly of human origin, and therefore impermanent expressions, and it is the agency of a skilled, merely human practitioner that creates a mantra and creates the requisites for its effective use. In the case of tantra, particularly, the equations between mantra and buddhas or bodhisattvas should be taken seriously, as equations, assertions of identity, and we should not presume to judge them as instead actually being symbolic or representational relations in which the power of the mantra is derivative from the power of some culturally postulated supernatural agency.

7

The Authority of the Speech of the Buddha: Aural Dimensions of Epistemology

Introduction Euro-American intellectual history has erected a barrier that may make the following discussion of the authority of speech appear prima facie to be disconnected from our larger topic, extraordinary language use. This is the barrier between philosophy and religion, which places epistemology on one side and extraordinary language on the other. In Indic thought, however, the epistemological potency of words and the mantric potency of words are both grounded in the same conceptions regarding the nature of language. Thus, although at first this chapter may appear anomalous, the mantric potency of the Buddha’s speech cannot be separated from its epistemological potency, as if the former was a merely superstitious and irrational accretion, while the latter is rational and philosophically credible. The Indian religious traditions, including Buddhism, generally share an understanding that what is problematic about human existence is ignorance (Skt. avidya), in contrast to the view found in the Western monotheisms that sin is the problem of human existence. This creates a dramatically different religious dynamic—a religious dynamic that is generally more concerned with epistemological than with moral issues. In Indian discussions of the limits of religious knowledge, the shared intellectual framework was the idea of sources of valid knowledge (Skt. pramāṇa). In large part religious and philosophical traditions in India accepted testimony (Skt. śabda) as an autonomous source of valid knowledge, that is, the claim that testimony is irreducible to any combination of other, more basic sources of valid knowledge. Buddhist epistemologists, however, rejected the idea that testimony is an autonomous source of valid knowledge (Skt. śabdapramāṇa). For this reason an alternative explanation for the authority of the Buddha had to be created. Against this background of epistemological discussion, particular attention is given here to Dharmakīrti’s views regarding the authority of the Buddha as a source of valid knowledge regarding the ground of human existence, the path of religious practice, and the goal of awakening.

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Testimony and the sources of valid knowledge in Indian religion One of the important dimensions of Indian philosophy is the role of testimony (śabda) as a source of valid knowledge (pramāṇa). Śabda has a complex of meanings, including both sound and speech: In its widest sense, the word śabda means a sound. But in a narrower sense it means a sound used as a symbol for the expression of some meaning. In this sense it stands for a “word.” In the context of the pramāṇa doctrine śabda corresponds, therefore, to “authority” or “testimony.” Śabdapramāṇa means knowledge derived from the authority of word or words.1

Although frequently glossed as “testimony,” śabda places us in the overlap between what in our own contemporary philosophic terminology we would refer to as philosophy of language and epistemology. Loosely, prior to the division between philosophy of language and epistemology, rhetoric might have been the philosophic rubric under which considerations of śabda would have been found. Epistemological discussions were generally framed by the question of what constitutes a source of valid knowledge (Skt. pramāṇa), with particular attention to which sources are autonomous, that is, distinct such that they cannot be reduced to any of the others, either singly or in combination. Speaking specifically of śabda, Jonardon Ganeri describes this view of speech or sound as an autonomous source of valid knowledge saying that “the language faculty is a sui generis epistemic faculty, reducible to neither perception nor inference nor to some combination of those two.”2 The Mīmāṃsa claimed that there are six autonomous sources of valid knowledge: perception (Skt. pratyakṣa), inference (Skt. anumāna), comparison (Skt. upamāna), verbal testimony (Skt. śabda, including both “revelation,” that is, śruti—the Vedas as “something heard”—and the testimony of a reliable person), presumption (or postulation, Skt. arthāpatti), and nonapprehension (Skt. anupalabdhi).3 In contrast, the Nyāya school accepted only four sources of valid knowledge: perception, inference, comparison, and testimony.4 The Mīmāṃsa conception of the ritual efficacy of Vedic words (i.e., mantra) exemplifies the importance of the idea, central to some of these conceptions of meaning, that there is a strong relation (Skt. sambhanda) between the word and its referent, and this relation provides validity or authority to the act of speaking such words.5 The ability to speak this eternal vibration gives the speech of ritual performers authority, in the sense of the efficacy of speaking what is true and real. This Vedic association is one conception of śabdapramāṇa. The idea of the authority of speech, in the sense of “testimony,” was extended to include “verbal testimony of a reliable person” (Skt. āpavacanā, though in some cases the category āpavacanā is also taken to include the Vedas).6 This included extending the idea that there is a correspondence, or real relation (Skt. saṁbandha), between word and referent from the Vedas to all reliable speech. The Nyāya school was perhaps the most important interlocutor for the Buddhist epistemologists (Skt. pramāṇikas), and it also paid particular attention to issues related to epistemology and logic. As with the Buddhist epistemologists, Nyāya thought accepted perception and inference as sources of valid knowledge. However, they also accepted

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the credibility of testimony (śabda) which is a kind of indirect cognition (parokṣajñāna). One form of it is the reliability of what is commonly accepted (lokaprasiddha) except when there is overriding consideration to the contrary. Another form of it is that if the speaker or the author of the testimony is reliable, the testimony (unless there is counter evidence) is reliable.7

This attitude of accepting testimony unless there is some reason to doubt it, some counter-evidence, differs markedly from the skeptical view asserted by Buddhist epistemologists such as Mokṣākaragupta in his Tarkabhāṣā, discussed later.

Authority in Buddhism: Praxis For the authority of the Buddha, however, use of such a logic of real relation between word and referent (Skt. saṁbandha) was problematic. Fundamental to all Buddhist thought is the ontology of interdependence (Skt. pratītyasamutpāda), according to which all existing things exist only as a consequence of causes and conditions and do not have any absolute, eternal, unchanging, or permanent essence. From its earliest recorded systematic thought, such as the abhidharmikas discussed in Chapter 3, Buddhist thinkers have generally been nominalist in orientation toward words, on the basis that the connection between a word and its meaning is merely a matter of social convention.8 Yet members of the Buddhist tradition look to the words of the Buddha for guidance on the foundations of practice and ideology, conceptualizing what is sometimes referred to in Buddhist thought as the ground, path, and goal. Many contemporary Western Buddhist teachers, for example, justify their views by reference to the Pāli sutta literature, characterizing them as the oldest record of Śākyamuni Buddha’s teachings and therefore either explicitly or implicitly assuming them to be the most authoritative.9

How many sources of valid knowledge are there?: One, two, or three? Contemporary discussions of Buddhist epistemology assert various positions on the question of the number of sources of valid knowledge. Some of these discussions, however, seem to uncritically presume contemporary understandings, rather than being informed by a contextual understanding of the historical development of the issues within the Buddhist tradition itself.

One source of valid knowledge Dating from the earliest period of the Buddhist tradition, the Kālāma-sutta is doubtless presently the best-known canonic source regarding issues of religious authority. According to the text, the Buddha, upon arriving in the village of Kesaputta, is approached by its inhabitants, the Kālāmas. Describing the number of religious teachers who have visited their town and given contradictory teachings, lauding their

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own teachings while deprecating the teachings of others, the Kālāmas express their doubt and confusion. The Buddha responds to their concerns: Of course you are uncertain, Kalamas. Of course you are in doubt. When there are reasons for doubt, uncertainty is born. So in this case, Kalamas, don’t go by reports, by legends, by traditions, by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought, “This contemplative is our teacher.” When you know for yourselves that, “These qualities are unskillful; these qualities are blameworthy; these qualities are criticized by the wise; these qualities, when adopted & and carried out, lead to harm & and to suffering”—then you should abandon them.10

While some interpreters have seen this as the basis for an individualistic ethics,11 this passage has a more general application to the question of religious authority. This and other similar texts are taken by some contemporary interpreters as indicating an empiricist epistemology—the idea that experience is the sole source of valid knowledge and that authority is not a source of valid knowledge. While not citing the Kālāma-sutta per se, Elizabeth Valentine is one of those who asserts that the Buddhist tradition holds that experience is the sole and foundational source of valid knowledge. Her initial assertion regarding valid sources of knowledge in the Buddhist tradition is that “Experience is the starting point of all our knowledge.”12 In support of this, she goes on to refer not to Buddhist epistemological thinkers—despite the fact that Buddhism is the putative topic of her essay—but instead uncritically cites the physicist Erwin Schrödinger and the statistician Karl Pearson.13 On this basis, she makes a general epistemological claim that “all knowledge is essentially mental, psychological,”14 although this would seem to actually be a different claim from the claim that knowledge is based on sensory experience. She then goes on to claim that “here, as so often, Buddhism has penetrated to the truth; indeed no sharp distinction is drawn between sensations and thoughts.”15 It is more than misleading to say without any qualification that “no sharp distinction is drawn between sensations and thoughts.” While it is true that they are included in the same category under some of the organizational schemas found in the abhidharma literature (i.e., the skandhas, dhātus, and āyatanas), they are distinct elements within those categories. Mental perception of thoughts is treated on a par with the visual perception of visual objects, but there are distinctions made in the abhidharma literature between the five physical senses and the mental. More generally, however, there is a problem in simply equating the concept of experience as found in the suttas with empiricism as a Western postEnlightenment epistemological position. Valentine’s argument that experience is the sole source of valid knowledge skirts very close to solipsism, and she seems to think that Buddhist thinkers were responding to a Kantian conception regarding the object of perception as a thing in itself (Ger. ding an sich): According to Buddhism, both the external world and the self, the perceiver, are constructions, conceptual fabrications. The fundamental insight from meditation

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is that the projecting process knows itself, that is all, nothing else; there are no atomic minds and no unknowable things in themselves.16

The characterization of consciousness given by Valentine reflects the formulation of the problematic of the human condition widely shared by Buddhist thinkers, which we can refer to as the “deluded self.” The deluded self is out of touch with the realities of human existence, believing that persons (including oneself) and things have an essential self, that is, one that is permanent, eternal, absolute, unchanging.17 Under this interpretation, Buddhism seeks to address the deluded character of (most of) our worldly living. It would be a mistake, however, to accept Valentine’s characterization as indicating that Buddhism holds a solipsistic view; to do so would deny the possibility of awakening, of liberation from the deluded condition. If there is nothing known but a self-reflective process of projection, which is one way to characterize the round of suffering (saṃsara), then there is no “Archimedean point” outside of that closed, selfdeluding process that provides leverage for change. At the same time, it would be a mistake to see Buddhism as holding to the converse view, that is, a simplistic notion that perception can be direct or unmediated, as the commonly employed analogy of the mirror would seem to imply.18 In this analogy, the mind of ordinary, deluded awareness is likened to a mirror obscured by dust and corrosion, while the mind of awakened awareness is likened to a polished, bright mirror from which the dust has been removed and which then simply reflects the actuality of things as they are. This image has been invoked in many discussions of the effects of meditation, yet such a simplistic view in fact runs directly counter to both the conceptions of Buddhist thought regarding the constructed character of conscious awareness,19 as well as the findings of contemporary perceptual psychology. Absolute accuracy of perception is not the goal of Buddhist practice. Rather, freedom from the delusion of an essential self is what liberates us. Attachment to the delusion of an essential self is what is most deeply problematic for human existence. The image of the perfectly reflective mirror, and other similar metaphors for conscious awareness, structures thinking about conscious awareness in terms of a permanent observer existing separately and independently from the processes of perception. Liberation from this deluded view is what is important to awakening—not a naive empiricism.

Three sources of valid knowledge At least implicitly, many within the Buddhist tradition accept three sources of valid knowledge: perception, inference, and testimony. Matthieu Ricard makes this epistemological stance explicit, asserting without qualification that Buddhists accept three sources of valid knowledge: perception, inference, and testimony. Buddhism suggests three criteria for determining whether a statement can be accepted or not. The first is direct proof supplied by the immediate observation of a phenomenon. The second is indirect, inferential proof of the sort that makes it possible to assert, for example, that if there is smoke there must be a fire. The third is valid testimony, like that which allows a court of law to deliver a judgment, even in the absence of physical proof.20

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Ricard does not provide any source or reference for his assertion, nor any justification or nuance. He simply claims that it is unqualifiedly and universally true of “Buddhism,” despite the fact that it is at variance with the position of the Buddhist epistemologists. That position that there are two sources of valid knowledge is well known and has long informed the Tibetan scholastic tradition. In a recent introductory survey of Buddhist reasoning and debate that draws on both Indian and Tibetan Buddhist sources, Daniel Perdue makes the point that there are “only two types of consciousness that Buddhists identify as valid cognizers/valid cognition—inferential cognizers (Skt. anumāna, Tib. rjes dpag) and direct perceivers (Skt. ptratyakṣha, Tib. mngon sum).”21 Because Ricard simply asserts this claim that Buddhism holds three sources of knowledge to be valid, we have no means of engaging this other than to point out that it is not true as a universal claim regarding Buddhist thought. It is instead simply an assertion on Ricard’s part, and there are important strains of Buddhist thought that would not agree.

Two sources of valid knowledge The Buddhist epistemologists took a view midway between these and accepted only two sources of valid knowledge, perception and inference. They considered testimony along with all the other pramāṇas as not autonomous. In relation to our considerations here of the authority of the Buddha’s speech, it is important to emphasize that the Buddhist epistemologists did not eliminate testimony as a reliable source of knowledge, only that it was not irreducible to other sources. Therefore, while testimony may be reliable, it is not an irreducible source of valid knowledge in the same way that perception and inference are, and requires further qualification. Furthermore, the question of the authority of the Buddha’s speech concerns the question of relying on him as a source of knowledge about praxis—the ground, path, and goal—and nothing else. Dignāga (ca. 480–540) is considered the founder of the school of Buddhist epistemologists, and his most important work is the “Compendium on Reliable Knowledge” (Pramāṇasamuccaya). Dharmakīrti (ca. 600–670) is the most influential member of the school, so much so that his work has effectively displaced Dignāga’s for most of the later scholastic tradition. Dharmakīrti’s best-known work is the “Commentary of Reliable Knowledge” (Pramāṇavārttika), which continues to be studied and debated by Tibetan scholastics today.22 As is often the case in Indian scholasticism, Dharmakīrti’s work is not a commentary in the same sense that we would understand a commentary, that is, as primarily an explanation of a source text. Although based on Dignāga’s Pramāṇasamuccaya, that text provides the structure upon which Dharmakīrti develops his own thinking about the same issues. Before examining Dharmakīrti’s arguments regarding the authority of the Buddha, however, we should examine Mokṣākaragupta’s work, which clears the ground of some of the more general arguments regarding testimony as a valid source of knowledge. Mokṣākaragupta, a later member of the group of Buddhist epistemologists, argues strongly in his Tarkabhāṣā for “the Buddhist theory that valid cognition is of two kinds, indeterminate (pratyakṣa) and determinate knowledge (anumāna).”23 The translator’s rendering of pratyakṣa as indeterminate and anumāna as determinate

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reflects an understanding of the epistemological consequence of the perceptual process, which moves from perception, which is epistemologically indeterminate, to inference, which is epistemologically determinate. Mokṣākaragupta considers two arguments for accepting śabda as a source of valid knowledge: first, the argument from a real connection between word and referent (Skt. sambandha); second, the argument from the trustworthiness of certain speakers. In relation to the first, the idea of a real connection existing between words and their referents, he considers two possible versions of this argument: either the connection is one of identity or it is one of causality. He argues against the idea that a word and its referent are identical on the grounds that if this were the case, there would not be a plurality of languages. Introducing a hypothetical “man from Nicobar,” a figure that stands for someone who does not speak Sanskrit, he says that if words were identical with their referents then this man should already know that agni means fire.24 For Mokṣākaragupta that the man from Nicobar does not know this equation between word and object is evidence that no such identity exists. The argument against causality as the basis for the existence of a real connection between words and their referents is more complex. Behind Mokṣākaragupta’s argument is the concept of vyapti, “pervasion,” which played an important role in the development of Buddhist epistemology.25 He argues that if there were a real connection between words and their referents then the two would pervade one another: where one is found, the other would also always be found (Skt. anvaya), and where one is absent, the other would also always be absent (Skt. vyatireka)—this is the “strong” version of the argument form used by Dignāga. As Mokṣakaragupta says, a causal relation [(is not) possible between the word and the thing-meant (i.e., its referent)], since neither concomitance in agreement (anvaya) nor in difference (vyatireka) is observed [between them].26

When it comes to the question of the authority of the Vedas, Mokṣākaragupta simply dismisses this as having already been dealt with in his argument regarding the two arguments, identity and causality, for a real connection existing between words and their referents. That this kind of argument regarding the nature of language was also known and employed by Buddhist tantrikas is evident when we compare the argument given by Mokṣākaragupta with that given in the Kalacakra. Vesna Wallace explains that the Kalacakra tantra adopts what she identifies as Madhyamaka style critiques of alternative religio-philosophic systems. One of these is a critique of Visnuism “for its view of the Veda as being self-existent, eternal, and similar to space.”27 Two points made in the text regarding this issue reflect the contention of most Buddhist systematic thinkers from the abhidharmikas on that the relation between a word and its referent is conventional. First, the word “Veda” refers to an entity that is produced (Skt. samskṛta), specifically the Veda as recited is produced by the tongue, lips, and so on. Second, the word “Veda” cannot be identical with the referent, presumably no matter what the referent’s nature. This is because “a word and its referent cannot be identical,”28 otherwise speaking the word “fire” would burn the mouth.

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Mokṣākaragupta’s argument against relying on a trustworthy speaker as a valid source of knowledge is quite striking and applies directly to the question of the authority of the Buddha: It is also not acceptable that the words spoken by trustworthy persons are a means of valid knowledge, since trustworthiness is impossible to be ascertained. The state of being emancipated from all faults (kṣıṇadoṣatva) is called trustworthiness (āptatva). Emancipation from all faults refers to a certain state belonging to another person’s mind. And this is hardly visible (i.e., determinable), since we see [sometimes] that physical and lingual actions [supposed] to be the logical mark [through which we infer the trustworthiness of the concerned person] occur in persons who are not [really trustworthy]. When it is usual that a man having passions pretends to be free from passions, how can you ascertain trustworthiness?29

Mokṣākaragupta’s skepticism offers an interesting insight into the sociology of religion in his day, similar to the questions raised by the Kālāmas noted earlier. It was apparently so common for people to engage in the pretense of being free from faults that it produced skepticism regarding all such claims. These epistemological views—that there are only two sources of valid knowledge and a skeptical attitude toward the reliability of people claiming to be trustworthy sources of knowledge—create a logical problem for the tradition, particularly regarding the authority of Śākyamuni Buddha as a source of valid knowledge about the nature of the ground of human existence, the path of practice, and the goal of awakening. In other words, this questions the status of buddhavacana, the speech of a buddha. The question of the appeal to authority cannot be treated in a narrowly epistemological framework alone; it is enmeshed with the praxes central to Buddhism, including understandings of the nature of language. The historical integrity of Buddhism as an institution depends on the idea of lineage, on the authority of Śākyamuni Buddha as the Awakened One, and the transfer of that authority to subsequent members of the Buddhist sangha. While it has broader ramifications, the metaphor of the “awakening” of the Buddha has been understood as waking up from the sleep of ignorance (Skt. avidya), and therefore the authority of the speech of the Buddha as the Awakened One is also an epistemological matter. Having followed Mokṣākaragupta’s clearing away of some of the alternative claims regarding the authority of testimony (identity, causality, and the eternity of the Vedas), we can now turn to Dharmakīrti’s constructive argument regarding the authority of the Buddha’s speech.

The structure of Dharmakīrti’s argument regarding the Buddha’s authority Dharmakīrti’s Pramāṇavārttika, his most famous and most influential text, is presented as a discussion of Dignāga’s Pramāṇasamuccaya. The “Pramāṇasiddhi” (“perfection of

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knowledge”) chapter of the Pramāṇavārttika is a lengthy comment on the opening lines of Dignāga’s text. Roger Jackson translates: To the one who has become an authority, the one who desires to benefit beings, the teacher, the sugata (“well-gone”), the savior, I bow down. In order to establish authority, I make here a single compendium of my various scattered writings.30

Jackson goes on to say, “Dharmakīrti’s primary purpose in the Pramāṇasiddhi chapter is to demonstrate that the Buddha is an authority for those intent on spiritual freedom, or liberation.”31 The five epithets of the Buddha listed by Dignāga give Dharmakīrti the basic structure for his arguments regarding the authority of the Buddha: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Pramāṇabhūta: that the Buddha has become an authority, Jagadhitaiṣin: that the Buddha desires to benefit other living beings, Śāstṛ: that the Buddha is a teacher, Sugata: that the Buddha is “well-gone,” and Tāyin: that the Buddha is a protector.32

Before attempting to demonstrate that the Buddha has become an “authority” (the first of Dignāga’s five epithets), it is necessary for Dharmakīrti to define the concept of authority itself. He identifies three characteristics of authoritative knowledge: it is (1) original and not derivative; (2) cognitive and neither apperception or some other, perceptual source; and (3) not contradicted by either of the two autonomous sources of valid knowledge, perception, or inference.33 The first step in Dharmakīrti’s definition of authority is that direct, perceptual knowledge is authoritative because it constitutes an original34 “non-deceptive” cognition.35 rGyal tshab rje, the Tibetan author of an important commentary on Dharmakīrti’s text (also translated and commented on by Roger Jackson in the same work), explains that nondeceptive cognition differs from apperception in which authoritative cognitions, such as those based on a perception (e.g., perception of a patch of blue), are “immediately and self-evidently authoritative.”36 Apperception of a perception, however, is itself only authoritative about the perception per se, not about the cognition based on it.37 The quality of being authoritative is not transitive, in other words. This is made clearer with regard to other authoritative cognitions, such as those based on prior experience, exemplified by the authoritative character of our cognition regarding the causal efficacy of “cooking, burning, etc.”38 Speech is also nondeceptive to the extent that one cognizes the meaning intended. As Richard Hayes writes, in relation to Dignāga’s understanding of this point: A linguistic sign (śabda) serves as an inferential sign (liṅga) to produce in the hearer of the symbol knowledge that the subject of discourse, the thing to which the speaker of the symbol is applying the symbol, has a given property.39

In other words, knowledge of the statement does not necessarily extend to the truth of that statement. Thus, although it may be the case that one can truly understand a

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statement, testimony is not an autonomous source of valid knowledge. That is, truly understanding a statement does not extend validity to cognition of the referent. To employ an example frequently used in Buddhist thought, one can speak of—and understand what is meant by—the phrase “horns of a rabbit.” There is no objective referent to the phrase, however, because rabbits do not have horns. Thus, one can authoritatively cognize the meaning of the speech without having that speech extend authoritative cognition to any referent. This same reasoning about the difference between the cognition of word, meaning, and referent extends to the commentaries on the words of the Buddha (i.e., śastras, treatises, as distinct from sutras; according to the tradition sutras are direct records of the Buddha’s teachings, i.e., buddhavacana). While we can have authoritative cognition of the words of a śastra and their meaning, that does not give us authoritative cognition of the referents of the words of the śastra. “Not everything for which we have a name actually exists.”40 Authoritative cognitions must also be original (new, novel).41 This is required because a derivative42 cognition such as a memory depends on, or derives from, some other cognition.43 While an authoritative cognition directly (immediately, independently) apprehends its object (as in the cognition based on the perception of a blue patch), memory (and other such derivative) cognitions do not directly apprehend their object but depend on other, prior cognitions. This indicates that in Dharmakīrti’s view and rGyal tshab rje’s interpretation of Dharmakīrti’s view, any authority of prior cognitions does not carry forward and confer an equal authority on memories.44 Again, authority is not transitive. The argument made for the position that authority is cognitive reflects a pragmatic concern regarding the Buddha’s authority for those seeking awakening. The cognitive dimension of authority is explained in terms of the mind being the causal agent for engaging in actions that are conducive to awakening and rejecting those that are not.45 This becomes even clearer as Dharmakīrti moves into his argument for the authority of the Buddha. Having defined what is meant by authority, Dharmakīrti is now ready to explain how it is that the Buddha is an authority. First, he is an authority in the sense defined because he does in fact possess “new, non-deceptive cognition.”46 The Buddha’s cognition is an accomplishment, not an inherent quality of a deity, as is asserted by theists. The Buddha has attained “method and wisdom” as a constant state of cognition.47 Dharmakīrti next goes on to identify what kind of an authority the Buddha is. According to Dharmakīrti, teachers are sought because they have a “method of pacifying suffering.”48 In other words, for the Buddhist epistemologists, “Someone is an authority who has cognition of what is to be adopted and rejected, together with the methods” for effecting that adoption and rejection.49 That the authority of the Buddha is not omniscience,50 as conceived in Western theological descriptions of the attributes of God, is made evident in Dharmakīrti’s statement, “For us, [a teacher’s] knowledge of how many insects there are is not at all useful.”51 He also says, “If it is the case that [you define] authority [by] seeing a great distance, rely on the vulture [as your teacher].”52 These assertions clarify the widely held view among Buddhists of many different lineages that while acquiring

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supernatural powers (ṛddhi) may result from meditative practice, such powers are not to be confused with the actual goal: awakening (bodhi). Because the Buddha “has complete perceptual cognition of what is to be adopted and what rejected … together with the methods” by which to do so, he “is an authority for those intent on freedom.”53 It is in this specific and limited sense that the Buddha is an authority—that his testimony on matters of liberation from misplaced affections (Skt. kleśavarana) and mistaken conceptions (Skt. jñeyavarana) can be accepted.54 Directly related to the question of the authority of the speech of the Buddha is the question of the authority of the record of the Buddha’s speech, that is, scriptural authority, which was also addressed by Dharmakīrti.

Scriptural authority In general, both Hinduism and Christianity rely on a foundational set of texts that are held by many within those traditions to be exceptional and of nonhuman authorship: the Vedas and the Bible. The Buddhist tradition is much more ambiguous about the status of its scriptural sources. The teaching that the Buddha has three bodies (Skt. trikāya) complicates the simple story propagated by Buddhist modernists. According to that story the Buddha is just a human being—an exceptional one, yes, but ontologically no different from the rest of us. Accordingly the teachings of the Buddha are simply on a par with the insights and wisdom available to anyone who has attained such a state of awakening, and further, as some modernists claim, the Buddha is on a par with other wise men throughout history.55 Beginning in the early medieval period of Indian Buddhism, the idea of a Buddha as having three bodies, or three forms of existence, developed. First, there is the historically existing figure of Śākyamuni (Skt. nirmanakāya); second, a glorious body, exemplified by such figures as Amitābha56 (Skt. sambhogakāya); and third, a body that is identical with the actual existence of all things, that is, their emptiness (Skt. dharmakāya). Clearly, the ontological status of these latter two buddha bodies differs from that of ordinary humans. Thus, the conclusion might be drawn that texts said to have been spoken by these buddha bodies would be authoritative for Buddhists in the same way that the Vedas and the Bible are authoritative for Hindus and Christians, that is, by originating from extramundane sources.57 What we find, however, is that the approach taken by Dharmakīrti and the other Buddhist epistemologists is much more measured, and they continued to employ the two sources of autonomous valid cognition as the criteria for scriptural authority as well. As is the case with so many of the topics that have been our concern in this work, not all Buddhist authors agree with this constraint to two sources, and they include scripture as a source. Candrakīrti (ca. 550 to 650) is considered one of the foremost proponents of the Madhyamaka tradition that derives from the famed Nāgārjuna (ca. second century), having authored a commentary called “Clear Words” (Skt. Prasannapadā) on the latter’s “Verses on the Middle Way” (Skt. Mūlamadhyamakakārikā), one of the foundational philosophic works for Mahāyāna Buddhism. Karen Lang tells us that his epistemological position is one that validates scripture, although as we will see in a fashion somewhat differently from Dharmakīrti.

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The proper analysis of things, Candrakīrti says, is undertaken with four means of knowledge: perception, inference in cases where things are not directly perceptible, comparison, and scriptural authority, which he defines as the testimony of reliable people who know things that are not accessible to ordinary perception. When perception and inference fail to give certain knowledge about things that are beyond the scope of the senses, the scriptural authority of the Buddha should be relied upon. In particular, the empty and illusory character of things can be understood best through scriptural testimony, which provides examples for understanding this profound teaching.58

Perhaps more important, as far as many adherents of the Buddhist tradition itself is concerned, the very nature of a buddha’s teachings, “dharma,” is true simply because it is an expression of the way things are, also called “dharma.”59 This allowed for the expansion of scripture under the principle that “All which is well-spoken, Maitreya, is spoken by the Buddha.”60 Found in the Adhyāśayasañcodanasūtra, Donald Lopez explains that this is not an unlimited license for scriptural emendation, as the sutra qualifies what it means for something to be “well-spoken” (Skt. subhāṣita). All inspired speech should be known to be the word of the Buddha if it is meaningful and not meaningless, if it is principled and not unprincipled, if it brings about the extinction and not the increase of the afflictions, and if it sets forth the qualities and benefits of nirvāṇa and not the qualities and benefits of saṃsāra.

As with scholastics in Europe, this proved problematic when differences between scriptural texts were identified, or when there was tension between a conservative, narrow emphasis and an expansive one. As Ronald Davidson notes, “during the course of its approximately seventeen hundred years in the land of its origin, Indian Buddhist communities constantly found themselves encountering the tension between the more conservative masters of Buddhist doctrine and those who, either tacitly or not, were open to the prospect of the reinterpretation and recodification of the dharma preached by the Tathāgata.”61 One solution developed was the idea of heuristics (Skt. upāya, often rendered as “skillful means,” or some equivalent) as a means of explaining differences between texts. Some texts were considered direct or definitive teachings (Skt. nītārtha), and others were merely heuristic and therefore provisional (Skt. neyārtha). While the scope of this work does not allow for a detailed investigation of these issues, they form part of the overall background when considering Dharmakīrti’s views on the status of scripture. Dharmakīrti deals directly with the issue of scriptural authority, or more specifically, with the question of inferences based on scripture, which is in fact the key epistemological issue regarding the authority of scripture. A reliable scripture is one that meets a threefold set of criteria. First, “it does not describe verifiable perceptible matters (pratyakṣa) in a way which would be in contradiction with observation.”62 Second, it “does not describe rationally accessible, but imperceptible matters (parokṣa) … in a way that would be in contradiction with … ‘objective inference’”; it is “not in any way [dependent upon] belief, acceptance or faith in someone or his words.”63 Third,

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its “description of matters inaccessible to either observation or objective inference (vastubalapravṛttānumāna) is not internally contradictory.”64 One of the consequences of Dharmakīrti’s formulation of this threefold criteria for a scripture that can be relied upon for inference is that it provides a basis for avoiding the conflict between reason and faith that has plagued Western philosophy of religion for—what, millennia? Tom Tillemans discusses Dharmakīrti’s treatment of scriptural authority: Now, if the scripture passes this triple test, it is fit to be used in “scripturally based inferences,” but with the all-important stipulation that such inferences are only to be used in case of radically inaccessible matters (atyantaparokṣa), ones which are not in the domain of observation or objective reasoning, but are only accessible once we have accepted (abhyupagata) scripture [as reliable according to the threefold test]. In short, āgamaśritānumāna [inference based on scripture] works where objective inference and observation leave off. In this way Dharmakīrti rather effectively avoids the recurring conflict between reason and faith (more technically here, viruddhāvyabhicāra), for the type of inference which depends on acceptance [of scripture as reliable] will only treat of things outside the domain of objective reasoning.65

In considering Tillemans’ description of the limitations on the use of scripture, it is important to keep in mind that the goal of Dharmakīrti’s arguments to establish that the Buddha Śākyamuni is a reliable authority is in relation to issues related to practice for those seeking awakening. This is not a general argument regarding recourse to scripture for any and all knowledge beyond “where objective inference and observation leave off,” but rather for the sake of reliable knowledge about the ground, path, and goal.

Conclusion As has been noted by some scholars involved in the project of comparative philosophy, one of the things that makes Indic thought relevant to modern philosophy is the importance of epistemology for both. Jürgen Habermas, for example, asserts that the only question for modern philosophy is “how is reliable knowledge possible.”66 For Buddhism, however, the primacy of epistemology is not an abstract set of intellectual concerns divorced from the practical issues of life, as it often appears to be in Euro-American philosophy. Rather, for the Buddhist tradition epistemology is central to the goal of awakening. The Indian religio-philosophic traditions in general do not describe the problematics of the human condition as resulting from an ethical condition (sin); instead, they see ignorance (Skt. avidya) as the primary problem. Jeffrey Hopkins opened a series of lectures with this statement: Nirvana is an extinguishment of desire, hatred, and ignorance that is often likened to the dying of a flame. Since ignorance is the fuel or source of both desire and hatred, the primary task in achieving nirvana is to remove ignorance.67

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Given the important epistemological dimension of Buddhist conceptions of the path to awakening, Buddhism has often been considered to be a form of gnosticism.68 Specifically, one in which understanding how things work in the world—not being subject to mistaken conceptions and misplaced affections—is itself conducive to awakening. It is important to note, therefore, that in the broader Indic epistemological tradition knowledge is not the possession of a “justified true belief ” by a subject, as it has largely been conceived of within the Western philosophic tradition since at least Descartes’ time. In contrast, in Indic epistemology knowledge is “a mental event that cognizes the object as a momentary knowledge event,” part of a “phenomenologically continuous” cognitive process marked by certainty. In this view, ridding oneself of delusion does not mean ridding oneself of false beliefs (heresy), but rather accurately perceiving how the world works. This allows us to avoid the frustrations (Skt. duḥkha) that arise when we want to live in a world that works the way we want it to, when in fact it does not.69 Specifically, for Buddhism the kind of ignorance that is of concern for progress on the path is ignorance regarding the nature of our existence or, to put it colloquially, of how things work. What one needs to realize—come to understand and actualize in one’s life—has been identified under a variety of rubrics during the course of Buddhist history, one of which is the three marks of existence (Skt. trilakṣaṇa): everything that actually exists is lacking in permanence (Skt. anitya), is lacking in essence (Skt. anatman), and is thus a source of dissatisfaction (Skt. duḥkha). Such a realization can be attained either through such yogic practices as meditation or through cognitive practices. Part of the rhetoric of Buddhist modernism has been to privilege meditation (i.e., one particular form of yogic practice) as the essential Buddhist practice—the sole practice leading to awakening. Although in the history of intra-Buddhist polemics this view is, of course, not without historical precedent, it is necessary to provide some balance to the modernist representations of Buddhism that overwhelmingly dominate popular culture.70 As we have already noted, the question people commonly ask in discussions about religious affiliation is “Are you a practicing Buddhist?” This question evidences the extent to which the practice of meditation has been privileged. Yet from its very earliest forms, both “right view” (Skt. samyagdṛṣti) and right practice (right mindfulness, Skt. samyaksmṛti, together with right concentration, Skt. samyaksamādhi) have been part of the Buddhist path. Lama Mipham, one of the most famous leaders of the nineteenth-century movement to unify Tibetan Buddhist teachings71 (T. ris med), addresses the role of cognitive practices in the realization of emptiness: By accustoming oneself to the ingrained tendency toward śūnyatā [emptiness, lack of inherent, permanent essence], one will eliminate the tendency toward concrete entities. Eventually, even the accustoming oneself to the complete non-existence of entities will be eliminated. When one cannot represent an entity to be investigated as “that which is non-existent,” then how can non-existence, being without a basis, remain before the intellect? When neither entities nor their negation as an abstraction remain before the intellect, then, since there is no other possibility, the discursive intellect is pacified, there being nothing to objectify.72

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Speech or sound as a valid source of cognition, śabdapramāṇa, has generally been treated in English-language philosophic discussions under the category of “testimony.” There is, however, an important nuance that serves to distinguish śabdapramāṇa and testimony from one another. And, this is a distinction that does indeed make a difference. Epistemological considerations of testimony focus (almost) entirely on the qualities or status of the “speaker.” For example, does the speaker’s knowledge have to be at firsthand for it to be considered a reliable form of testimony, or does hearsay also count? Do documents, which are “not an obvious product of [any] obvious speech act,” count as a form of testimony?73 Does the information provided by such social practices as “road signs, maps, the measurement markings on rulers, destination-markers on buses and trams, the author attribution on the title-page of a book, and so on” count as testimony?74 In Western epistemological considerations of testimony the focus is on the qualities or status of the speaker, broadly construed to include author, document, record, and so on. In contrast, classic Indian discussions of śabdapramāṇa place much more emphasis on what is heard.75

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Dhāraṇī in the Lotus Sūtra: Indic Context for the Power of Words

Introduction Like many people of my generation and interests, one of the authors I consumed was Heinrich Zimmer. I read his Philosophies of India, The King and the Corpse, and Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization, as well as dipping into his massive Art of Indian Asia out of my own interest, and later drew on them for my teaching. As Matthew Kapstein1 has pointed out, while Zimmer did not develop his works in a philosophically disciplined manner, he was a skilled storyteller. The most important skill a storyteller can have is the ability to tell a memorable tale, and one tale recounted by Zimmer has remained in my memory. It has to do with the power of the spoken truth: At one time King Aśoka asked his ministers whether there was anyone who could cause the River Ganges to flow backwards. While his ministers prevaricate, a prostitute who is standing nearby and heard the question, decides to perform her own “Act of Truth” (P. saccakiriya), demonstrating that she, despite her lowly status, has the “Power of Truth.” With this the Ganges does indeed flow backwards, amazing the king. Upon learning who was responsible, he approaches the prostitute and asks whether this is true, how it is that anyone such as she, “a thief, a cheat, corrupt, cleft in twain, vicious, a wicked old sinner who have broken the bounds of morality and live on the plunder of fools,” could have the power to reverse the flow of the Ganges. When pressed in this way she asserts that she has an Act of Truth, which gives her the Power to turn back the River Ganges. “Your Majesty, whosoever gives me money, be he a Kṣatriya or a Brāhman or a Vaiśya or a Śūdra or of any other caste soever, I treat them all exactly alike. If he be a Kṣatriya, I make no distinction in his favor. If he be a Śūdra, I despise him not. Free alike from fawning and contempt, I serve the owner of the money. This, your Majesty, is the Act of Truth by which I caused the mighty Ganges to flow back upstream.”2

One of the points Zimmer draws from this tale concerns the power of truth. He concludes that in Indian thought, the truth, specifically adherence to one’s proper role in society,3 is conceived as having the power to stop the Ganges River. Furthermore, this power is not rooted in the ethical status of the person who speaks the truth but

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rather in that person’s fulfilling his/her caste duties. This view certainly stands in stark contrast to contemporary Western philosophic epistemology, which concerns itself with the conditions under which a statement or claim is to be considered true, and these conditions only very rarely include any consideration of the speaker’s moral status. Yet Zimmer’s interpretation does have initial appeal to those Western readers who have been raised in a socioreligious milieu in which expressions such as “the truth shall set you free” permeate the culture. Reflecting on Zimmer’s own apologetic stance led me to wonder whether there is more to the story than simply a moral allegory that serves to make Indic thought less foreign and more palatable to Euro-American audiences. What must be brought to the foreground in understanding the significance of this story is that while the potency of true speech includes the strictly epistemological function of conveying reliable information, it exceeds that narrow understanding. The story itself is drawn from the Milindapañhā, a text found in the Pāli canon. The key term in Zimmer’s retelling of the story, “act of truth,”4 is saccakiriya, which Isaline B. Horner (in a more recent translation than that used by Zimmer) renders as “asseveration of truth.”5 Horner’s turn of phrase allows us to see that the aspect of the story obscured in Zimmer’s interpretation is the importance it places on the speaking of truth. Yusho Wakahara notes that the idea of the power of the spoken truth is found widely in Indian religious culture: [This] concept is found in India from ancient to medieval ages … truth is a marvelous power or force which can move the material world as well as the spiritual world. Truth here is nothing but words, speech, or utterance. It was believed that a spoken truth, or words telling the truth, had an irresistible force that would immediately cause a miraculous effect in the external world.6

This story occurs in the Milindapañhā within a literary context that supports Wakahara’s understanding. The story is framed by several instances in which apparently miraculous effects, for example, bringing rain, stopping fire, curing poisoning, are introduced with the phrase “As, sire, when some siddhas recite the truth.”7 The necessity that the truth be spoken in order for it to be effective is important for understanding the relation between Indic theories of language and the power of dhāraṇī. In East Asia, the Lotus Sūtra is one of the most popular and historically influential of the Buddhist sutras. As such, it would have been one of the most important vehicles for spreading ideas regarding language from the Sanskritic world to the Sinitic and conveying the “quasi-tantric” technology of dhāraṇī to East Asia. While the term dhāraṇī is used in several chapters of the Lotus Sūtra, there is a variety of closely related terms used in Buddhist literature, such as mantra, paritta, and vidyā. Much of the Western literature on mantra and dhāraṇī has focused on the forms of practice with which they are commonly identified, that is, tantric forms, largely ignoring the presence of mantra and dhāraṇī in texts such as the Lotus Sūtra that are not considered tantric. This aporia may well speak to the sectarian presumptions underlying contemporary scholarship, such as delineating sectarian identities along formulaic simplifications of doctrine. As noted by Richard McBride, organization of the Taishō canon, the categories of which are often uncritically deferred to by scholars, is based on sectarian presumptions of

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early twentieth-century Japan.8 Alternatively, Western language scholarship has had its own formulaic simplifications of doctrine, frequently emphasizing the Lotus Sūtra as teaching the idea of there being one vehicle (Skt. ekayāna), or for its Aesop-like allegories, or for the ethical problematics of skillful means (Skt. upaya). Within the Lotus Sūtra itself, the dhāraṇī are quite evidently understood as an efficacious use of language—while such usage does not perform the communicative function usually identified as the essential or defining characteristic of language in Euro-American linguistics and philosophy of language, it is still considered to be effective in accomplishing some goal. At the same time, it does not fit within the standard categorization of language use employed in the Western philosophy of language, such as informative, directive, interrogative, and so on. However, such language use is meaningful in terms of the way in which Roman Jakobson understood meaning, that is, in terms of marked categories.9 While Ferdinand de Saussure’s structuralism introduced the concept of semiotic contrasts as the basis for meaning, Jakobson points out that paired oppositions are not simply equal to one another. Daniel Chandler explains this relation: The concept of markedness can be applied to the poles of a paradigmatic opposition: paired signs consist of an “unmarked” and a “marked” form. … The “marked” signifier is distinguished by some special semiotic feature.10

Applying this idea of marked versus unmarked categories to the value associations that different socioreligious groups assign to their own practices in contrast to the practices of others, we can understand why it makes a difference which dhāraṇī or mantra is employed. Reciting namu amida butsu signifies something very different from namu daishi henjō kongō. At this rather minimal level, Euro-American theories of language can help us understand that these extraordinary uses of language are significant, but they do not help us understand how the authors and compilers of the Lotus Sūtra thought about dhāraṇī. Having been included in the text with no particular discussion, commentary, or explanation, dhāraṇī were apparently simply taken for granted within the intellectual milieux out of which the Lotus Sūtra originated. As Frits Staal notes, present-day theories “provide us with a better terminology than does ordinary language”11 for interpreting ideas about language that predate our own time. However, the assumptions and goals of contemporary theories about language are very different from the ideas about language we are attempting to uncover here, as has been discussed more fully in preceding chapters.12 Focusing on dhāraṇī allows us to consider how Indic theories of language active in the milieux in which the Lotus Sūtra was compiled led the authors and compilers of the sutra to understand dhāraṇī to be efficacious. Indeed, asking the question of how dhāraṇī were conceived to be effective presumes that when people engage in purposeful action, for example, writing a chapter of a sutra, they do so with the expectation that the actions they prescribe are effective ones. The twenty-sixth chapter of the Lotus Sūtra is devoted to the transmission of several dhāraṇī, all of which are said to provide protection for those who uphold the sutra. Of course, it seems likely that the reason that the vast majority of practitioners perform mantra and dhāraṇī is

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because they were instructed to do so by their teachers—but they do so in the belief that their teachers know what will be effective. The question of how such language forms as dhāraṇī and mantra were understood as having efficacy differs from the question of whether or not they are semantically meaningful. The question of conceptions of efficacy is not unrelated to theories of meaning, but it is importantly broader in scope.13 Although it continues to be a matter of scholarly contention in the present, the question of the meaning of mantra is of very long standing, at least from the time of “the ancient ritualist Kautsa”14 who maintained that mantra have no semantic significance. In Tibet, Rdo Grub-chen (1865–c. 1926) went further. He maintained that just exactly because language is purely conventional, it is an effective means for realization. Janet Gyatso explains that If language is in itself disassociated from the emotional and metaphysical additives that tend to be superimposed on it, then language as pure convention becomes just the right medium for the skillful means of the bodhisattva. It is flexible— and discardable. Ironically, what is seen as the ultimate meaninglessness of verbal expression makes it become, in certain Buddhist traditions, an ideal tool for teaching the ultimate truth, avowals of the inexpressibility of that truth notwithstanding.15

Similar to both Kautsa and Rdo Grub-chen, Bhartṛhari’s concerns with the grammar of mantra is not for the sake of formulating meaningful sentences. According to Harold Coward’s discussion of Bhartṛhari, the importance of grammar instead derives from Bhartṛhari’s desire to avoid squandering the power of mantra (Skt. mantra śakti). Without proper grammatical form and correct pronunciation, the mantra will be ineffective and the ritual in which they are used will fail.16 This conception of how mantra work (or don’t) appears to have been continuous from the Vedas through the development of tantric Buddhism in East Asia.17 As noted earlier, Bhartṛhari’s concern with proper pronunciation as a key to the efficacy of mantra and dhāraṇī in ritual is echoed by Kūkai’s advocacy for the study of the Sanskrit behind the Chinese renderings of mantra and dhāraṇī. According to Kūkai “the sound of any one single letter among the letters and words of Sanskrit contains within itself infinite meanings. When they are pronounced in Chinese, they become as the shards of a broken jewel.”18 Considering grammatical form and proper pronunciation to be important, if not essential, to efficacy indicates that it is not the communication of conceptual, that is, semantic, content that is considered to be what makes mantra and dhāraṇī effective, as would be the case if they were normal communicative forms of speech, which does not necessitate good grammar or proper pronunciation to be communicative.

Dhāraṇī in the Lotus Sūtra History of the Lotus Sūtra Andrew Rawlinson dates the emergence of what he refers to as “the Lotus school” to circa 150 BCE.19 He further identifies “three distinct sections or groups of chapters”

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on the basis of both internal and external evidence20 and concludes that in general the three sections constitute progressively later additions to the text. The third, latest group, which was added to the text from 100 to 125 CE,21 has the greatest emphasis on dhāraṇī.22 Indeed, Rawlinson notes that the term āvarta, referring to a kind of dhāraṇī, appears only in this third group. The period during which the chapters containing dhāraṇī were added to the Lotus Sūtra coincides with a period in Indian religiophilosophical thought identified by Johannes Bronkhorst as one in which words were thought to be identical with the things they denote.23

The Value Attributed to Dhāraṇī The Lotus Sūtra mentions dhāraṇī repeatedly. As is typical of Mahāyāna sutras, the text begins with a description of the audience present at the teaching that is being given by Śākyamuni Buddha. In this case, the audience includes eighty thousand bodhisattva mahāsattvas. They are first described as having attained the exalted status of unsurpassed, complete awakening (Skt. anuttara samyaksaṃbodhi) and are then described as “having mastered the dhāraṇīs.”24 Similarly, in chapter 12, Mañjuśrī is asked whether there are any beings who have put the Lotus Sūtra into practice and have thereby rapidly achieved buddhahood. In reply he identifies the eight-year-old daughter of the dragon king Sāgara who, in the space of a single moment (Skt. kṣaṇa), produced bodhicitta and “attained the point of nonbacksliding.” Seemingly of equal importance to bodhicitta, she is described as having “gained dhāraṇī.”25 At the beginning of chapter 17, bodhisattva mahāsattvas, “equal to the number of atoms in one world-sphere,” are described as having gained a dhāraṇī that “can be turned to a hundred thousand myriads of millions of incalculable [uses]”26; in chapter 23 eighty-four thousand bodhisattvas are said to have attained a dhāraṇī “enabling them to understand the speech of all living beings.”27 In chapter 18 the merit of a person who listens to the Lotus Sūtra for even a moment causes him to “be able to be reborn in the same place as dhāraṇī (pratilabdha) bodhisattvas.”28 As a final example of the high value placed on dhāraṇī by the authors of the Lotus Sūtra, a passage in chapter 24 states that when this very same chapter was preached29 “in this Sahā world-sphere incalculable bodhisattvas also attained this samādhi and dhāraṇī” of “manifestation of the body of all forms.”30 In all of these instances, despite the obviously exalted status in which dhāraṇī are held, and in which some specific dhāraṇī are identified by name, no actual dhāraṇī is given or recorded. The actual dhāraṇī as such appear in the text only in the twenty-sixth and twenty-eighth chapters.31 Chapter 26 of the Lotus Sūtra32 is entirely devoted to the transmission of five different dhāraṇī, and chapter 28 gives one additional dhāraṇī. The function ascribed to all six of these dhāraṇī, the only ones that actually appear in the text, is protection for practitioners and upholders of the Lotus Sūtra.

Buddhavacana? Speech and Authority Attention to the dhāraṇī in the Lotus Sūtra introduces an additional issue into the already complex question of the authority of the speech of a buddha (Skt.

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buddhavacana, discussed earlier in Chapter 7). Initially it might appear that the dhāraṇī are not buddhavacana, because they are introduced by a variety of figures— three bodhisattvas, two devarājas, and a group of ten daughters of rākṣasas along with others of their retinue. Three of the five dhāraṇī introduced in the twenty-sixth chapter, however, are said to have been voiced by buddhas other than Śākyamuni. The first, offered by medicine king Bodhisattva, is reported to have been pronounced “by Buddhas equal in number to the sands of sixty-two millions of Ganges rivers.” The second, given by the bodhisattva Brave Donor, was taught “by as many Buddhas as there are sands in the Ganges river.” And the third, introduced by the god king Realm Holder, was given “by forty-two millions of Buddhas.”33 In this sense, the sutra also addresses, if indirectly, the question of the authority of what a buddha speaks.34 The authority of these hyperbolically numerous buddhas validates the latter dhāraṇī, even though they are spoken in the sutra by bodhisattvas and god kings. Here we see that the authority of buddhavacana, as nuanced in Chapter 7 earlier, extends to dhāraṇī. It is not simply the cognitive, doctrinal content of these dhāraṇī that is authorized by the speech of buddhas but also their efficacy—though as discussed earlier in Chapter 6, authorizing the efficacy of a dhāraṇī is to be distinguished from the idea that they are effective through the founding action of a “culturally postulated superhuman agent.” Furthermore, it is important to note that in the course of the sutra, not all dhāraṇī are validated in this way. The god king Vaiśravaṇa commits himself to protecting teachers of the dharma “by means of this supernatural charm.”35 Furthermore, he will personally protect Lotus Sūtra adherents. The dhāraṇī pronounced by the daughters of rākśasas is seemingly expected to work of its own accord, causing the head of any demon, human, or fever(demon?) who has the audacity to attack or torment a teacher of the dharma to split into seven parts.36 Likewise the rākśasa daughters will come personally to protect a Lotus Sūtra pracitioner.37 Similarly, in chapter 28, the bodhisattva Samantabhadra pronounces a dhāraṇī that will protect a teacher of the dharma from attacks by nonhumans or confusion by women (presumably, carnal desire) and commits himself to personally protecting dharma teachers. In these instances, the dhāraṇī do not seem to require any validating reference to having been spoken by buddhas. Instead, it would appear that the authors and compilers of the Lotus Sūtra simply assume that these dhāraṇīs are effective in themselves, that is, spontaneously as with daimoku and nenbutsu as discussed in Chapter 6. Whether these two ways of presenting the dhāraṇī actually represent significantly different understandings is not evident from the text itself. Some light may be shed, however, by noting the similarity to the way that the efficacy of vows (Skt. pranidhana) made by bodhisattvas is conceived. For example, the vows of Dharmākara Bodhisattva are conceived as being continuously effective in and of themselves. This is because the condition for their fulfillment, as identified in the vows themselves, is that Dharmākara becomes Amitābha Buddha, and this condition has already been fulfilled.38 Another revealing similarity is between the workings of dhāraṇī and the efficacy of the Buddha’s prophecies of future awakening, another characteristic motif of the Lotus Sūtra. The question of the status of dhāraṇī as buddhavacana also raises a specifically epistemological issue, returning us to topics discussed in Chapter 7 but focusing here

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specifically on the power of dhāraṇī. While for many Buddhist adherents a buddha is considered to be a reliable source of valid cognition (pramaṇa), the authority of speech (śabdapramāṇa) is not uncontested in Buddhist thought. This is more complicated than simply that “to a non-adherent, the argument from authority is a weak form of pramāṇa.”39 The weakness of the argument from authority is a commonplace in Western logic, but in Indian thought the issue is formulated differently, and speech (śabda) is held by the vast majority of Indic thinkers to be one of the primary pramāṇas, that is, a source of valid cognition that cannot be reduced to a combination of simpler sources. The question is not the strength of the argument per se, but rather who or what is an authoritative source of speech regarding a specific topic. In this way, the question of who spoke a dhāraṇī, or who teaches it, becomes relevant to considering how it is thought to be effective. One of the main forms this view takes seemingly derives from the Mīmāṃsa view of the Vedas as the eternal vibration from which the universe arises. As fragmentary expressions of the eternal Vedas, mantra are inherently absolutely “true,” as an ontic manifestation of a metaphysical reality, and their ritual use makes present the power of that absolute truth. Knowing from speech, śabdapramāṇa, is not simply an instance of the argument from authority, but rather refers to the speech itself as the making manifest of the power and truth of the Vedas, linking back to the power of an act of truth discussed at the opening of this chapter. Later interpretations extended this to include the authoritative speech of an awakened guru. In this way, the issue of knowledge from speech is a complex one for Buddhists. On the one hand, they do not accept the authority of the Vedas, yet on the other, buddhavacana is authoritative. Indeed, a more extreme position is found in the writings of Dignāga and Dharmakīrti, and other of the Buddhist epistemologists for whom only perception and inference are accepted as valid pramāṇa, while speech and other sources accepted by other schools as bases for valid cognition are not. In this conception it is not the authority of the speaker that validates what is spoken, but rather the power inherent in what is spoken that effectively validates the speaker.

Conclusion In the preceding chapters, we have explored several dimensions of the thinking that supports the idea that mantra and dhāraṇī are effective. These theories include the Mīmāṃsā conception of mantric speech as a manifesting of the eternal vibration of the Vedas; phonematic emanation, in which the sequence of the Sanskrit syllabary is identical with the emanation and resorption of being as the process of bondage and liberation; and the sphoṭa theory of Bhartṛhari and Patañjali in which the mantra and the deity are identical, and the consequent conception that focusing one’s attention on the mantra allows one to realize the triune identity of mantra, deity, and self. As noted, this idea is also found in the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa, which contains assertions of the identity of the mantra and the buddhas. As Glenn Wallis writes, “The mantra is an effective instrument by virtue of its being nothing less than a form assumed by the bodhisattva Mañjuśrī.”40

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In large part, however, such theories of extraordinary language do not help us understand the protective function of dhāraṇī as found in the Lotus Sūtra. For example, the dhāraṇī in the Lotus are not for liberation through realizing one’s identity with a deity but for protection of those who affiliate themselves with the sutra itself. It is not the case that an exalted stage of awakening is brought about by the mastery of dhāraṇī, rather, a bodhisattva’s advanced stage of awakening is evidenced by the ability to wield the power of the dhāraṇī. Similarly, a hypothetical Lotus Sūtra practitioner is presumably not expected to contemplate these dhāraṇī, but rather to utter them at times of need. In some instances, where the dhāraṇī is said to have originated from a buddha, the power of the dhāraṇī corresponds to the protective function of paritta, which themselves depend on the cosmo-imperial authority of the Buddha Śākyamuni as world conqueror for their efficacy. In addition, however, the opening story from the Milindapañhā gives an understanding that speech that is in accord with the actual nature of existence has the power to stop the flow of the Ganges River, bring rain, stop fire, and cure poisoning. Considering which expressions are to be considered authoritative, Donald Lopez has noted that some sources add a third criterion to the two of “whether it fits into the Sūtra (sutte oranti) and is in agreement with the vinaya (vinaye sandissanti).”41 That third is that the words not go against the way things are (dharmatām no vilomayati). It is unclear precisely what is added by this third criterion, since it would appear inappropriate for a doctrine to be in accordance with the sūtras and the vinaya, yet contradict the dharmatā.42

Juxtaposing this with the power of an asseveration of truth, we can understand this then to mean that being in accord with the way things are, the actual nature of existence, is what makes verbal expressions both valid and powerful. Furthermore, therefore, when bodhisattva practitioners attain unsurpassed, complete awakening, they are in accord with the actual nature of existence, and their speech is in accord with the actual nature of existence. In the form of dhāraṇī such speech has the power to provide protection, such as that extended to adherents of the Lotus Sūtra.

9

Ajikan: Visualizing the Syllable A

The study of the ajikan practice provides a key example of extraordinary language use in the tantric practices of the Shingon tradition of Japan. This practice exists at the interface of the oral/aural of the Indic background of Buddhist tantra and the graphic/visual of its development in China. Following is a preliminary sketch toward a history of the ajikan. This historical sketch is necessarily preliminary because Euro-American Buddhist studies scholars have only recently begun to think what a history of a ritual would comprise.1 Following this preliminary history are a description and analysis of the practice, translations of selected texts on ajikan from Kakuban and Dōhan, two Kamakura-era figures who promoted the practice of ajikan, and a text by Taisen Miyata, a present-day Shingon priest. An appendix provides a syntactic analysis of ajikan as a ritualized visualization practice. Such analyses allow us to see that a syllable can act as the chief deity of a Shingon ritual, challenging common conceptions of religious agency as discussed earlier in Chapter 6.

History of Ajikan: Continuity from Buddhist India to Kamakura Japan Although the use of mantra may have pre-Vedic origins, mantra as known in tantric Buddhism originate with Vedic ritual.2 The existence of meditation practices utilizing letters or sounds as the object of meditation or visualization in East Asian religious cultures apparently results entirely from the transmission of Buddhism, which carried these practices into East Asia. A survey of some of the English-language literature on Taoist and neo-Confucian styles of meditation and ritual practice revealed nothing that might be considered substantively similar, much less the same as ajikan practice (the Bon use in Tibet is quite evidently a direct borrowing).3 Logically, of course, not having found a practice substantively similar to ajikan does not mean that it is not there, only that it has not been found. However, given the assumptions of Chinese philosophy, there are also logical reasons that such a practice would not be there. The Mīmāṃsā view is that language—Sanskrit—is the manifestation of the absolute—the Vedas—in the realm of human experience, and this influenced tantric Buddhist conceptions of the ritual efficacy of language. In contrast, for Daoism language is a two-edged sword that can either lead the mind further away from the Dao—as language is “the endless division of consciousness by considering and naming things and then going on to consider and name the considering and naming is the active knowledge of the ordinary mind that has led away from the Tao and must be stopped”4—or can at most serve to

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“lead people away from [the] perilous influence” of language itself.5 Given what might be called a “hermeneutics of suspicion” (to borrow from Paul Ricoeur) toward language held by Daoist practitioners, it is not surprising that there would not be any use of linguistic elements—such as the syllable A—as meditative objects in that tradition. In the Daoist tradition a special form of writing was used for the revealed texts. However, Strickmann concludes that “the Taoist theory of celestial writing appears to reflect the role of exotic scripts like Brahmi, Kharoṣṭhī, or Siddham, in Buddhist scriptural usage.”6 A neo-Confucian view, that of Shao Yung, sees language as derivative—“The images and numbers symbolize categories that describe the structure of the universe and that are a means by which the particulars of experience can be ordered systematically. The categories do not, in ontological terms, have an existence prior to experience itself ”7— and as conventional.8 Hence, for neo-Confucians such as Shao Yung, language would not be the key to a higher reality that it is for traditions arising in the Indic context. In addition to the questions concerning the origin and transmission of the ritual practice of visualizing the syllable A, there is the question of the extent to which the interpretation of the ritual practice was also transmitted. Frits Staal has maintained that ritual can develop in a new religious culture—that is, one different from that of its origin “by incorporating arbitrary elements following an ‘outer chance development’.” In contrast, Staal also points out that doctrine “possesses a philosophic dimension that prevents unlimited growth: consistency has to be preserved.”9 There is, therefore, a history of the practice and a history of its interpretation, both of which contribute to the religious culture of Kamakura Japan and both of which are in a sense lateral to other historiographic approaches to the period that have tended to emphasize the discontinuity of the Buddhisms identified as “Kamakura Buddhism” from the preceding history of Buddhism in Japan by deploying a rhetoric of rupture. The syllable A is a bīja mantra, that is, a mantra composed of a single “seed” syllable. Although bīja mantra are almost always described as single syllables, the Agnipurāṇa distinguishes between those mantra having more than twenty syllables, those with ten to nineteen, and those with fewer than ten, the latter being referred to as bīja mantra: “O twice-born one, the ‘garland-mantra-s’ (mālā-mantra) are said to be mantra-s with more than twenty syllables. ‘Mantra-s’ have more than ten syllables. Less than that (tadarvāk), they are called bīja-s.”10 Bīja mantra are continuous in form with mantric practices of Vedic ritual. Staal, for example, suggests that bīja mantra are related to the “meaningless syllables from the Samaveda (which) are called stobha. If Vedic mantras are called bits and pieces, it is the stobhas that are the bits.” Staal sees the connection between the Vedic and the tantric use of single-syllable mantras in terms of its being “a curious fact that monosyllabic mantras of the stobha type reemerged in Tantrism after apparently lying dormant for more than a millennium.” The stobha, however, mainly functioned as structural units within the syntax of Vedic mantra, while bīja mantra function as significant elements in and of themselves.11 A well-known instance is the syllable Oṃ, which some have suggested is the progenitor of the use of a single syllable and which becomes important in the Upaniṣads.12 Benoytosh Bhattacharyya suggests that there was a stepwise historical sequence by which bīja mantra were introduced into Buddhism. In his view, for the sake of “the illiterate masses, who were mostly responsible for the great popularity of the Mahāyāna,” sutras were reduced to dhāraṇī, which in turn were reduced to mantra, which in their turn were reduced

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to bīja mantra.13 We note that this theory is questionable as it relies on a now longoutdated and disparaging conception that the popularity of Mahāyāna arose from the interests of lower classes and illiterates. There is, of course, no singular cause for “the Mahāyāna,” as there is no singular “the Mahāyāna.” As a bīja mantra the syllable A plays an important role in both Buddhist and Hindu tantra. Symbolically the syllable is understood in very similar ways in both traditions. Outside of India, in both Japanese and Tibetan tantric Buddhism, visualization of the syllable A is considered to be one of the fundamental practices.14 The symbolic valence of the syllable A is rooted in Indian understandings of language and the associations that arise in relation to these, which we have discussed earlier, but which here we focus on in relation to the syllable A and its visualization in Shingon practice. There are three relevant aspects of the linguistic understanding of the syllable A. First, it is the initial element of the Sanskrit syllabary. Second, each of the syllables of Sanskrit is considered to have A as its fundamental vowel component. Third, as a prefix A indicates negation. As the first syllable of the Sanskrit syllabary most commonly known, all of the imagery of beginnings comes to be associated with A. This is familiar to us in both Greek and English, when we employ the metaphors of alpha and omega and A to Z as representing “from beginning to end” or “the totality of things.” Similarly, in its Indian associations, A is understood as the first vibration, which gives rise to the universe, to existence. The word for beginning in Sanskrit is “adi,” the first phoneme of which is the syllable A, and some strains of tantric Buddhism speak of the Adi Buddha as the primal Buddha, the basic, fundamental, originary Buddha. In addition to beginnings, A is also associated with the image of the highest, best, most exalted. For example, in Hindu tantra, the syllable A is “the highest level of Siva’s energy.”15 The second important aspect of the syllable A is that in these Sanskrit formularies no consonant can stand alone. Thus, there is no consonant “k,” but rather the syllable KA. Other “k-syllables,” such as “ki” and “ku,” are written as “ka” modified by the presence of an additional vowel marker. There was also an alternative syllabary known as the “A-RA-PA-CA-NA,” which differed from the standard Sanskrit syllabary in several ways, including the omission of all of the vowels other than A. This syllabary is widely found in Mahāyāna and tantric Buddhism, such that it has (mistakenly) been called the “mystical alphabet of the Buddhists.”16 In Japanese tantric Buddhism, for example, “A-RA-PA-CA-NA” is one of the mantra for Mañjuśrī, known in Japanese as the Goji Monju-ju (“five syllable invocation for Mañjuśrī”).17 In the more common syllabary, however, A is present in every syllable as the necessary vowel sound complementing the consonant. This aspect of the role of the syllable A is the basis for the association with the idea of universality. A is the fundamental “vibration” present in all things, the base or foundation of all.18 It is on this basis that in some forms of Hindu Tantra the cosmogonic process is one of “phonematic emanation” and begins with the syllable A. “A is the original phoneme, (ādyavarṇa) which comes before all others, whence they all proceed and where all of them will return.”19 From A, the other vowels, liquids, bindu and visarga, and the consonants are understood to emanate in a progressive fashion. This progression is not a uniform one, however, as the energy of Śīva first manifests forth and then stabilizes. This speculative system integrates not only the indexical associations of the syllable—that is, the association

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between the syllable A and such words as anuttara (the absolute)—but also the written form of the syllable; that is, the shape of the written form of the syllable A is interpreted as resulting from phonematic emanation.20 This kind of speculation is also found in Japanese tantric Buddhist discussions of the syllable A. The third aspect of A is its function as a negative prefix. Again the similarity with Greek and English is evident. Examples such as “atom” (not divisible) and “a-gnostic” (not knowing) make this similarity evident. In a fashion reminiscent of the via negativa, the Sanskrit A comes then to also have associations with the absolute as that which cannot be expressed by any concept, since any concept would limit the absolute—not only negation, but also the inexpressible. The Large Sutra on Perfect Wisdom says, for example, “The syllable A is a door to the insight that all dharmas are unproduced from the very beginning (ādy-anuman-natvād).”21 This body of symbolic associations of the syllable A gave it an important place in tantric Buddhist praxis as well as in Hindu. One example of the importance placed on the syllable A in the Buddhist tradition is the tantric Prajñāpāramitā text that reduces the entirety of the Prajñāpāramitā to the syllable A, “The Blessed Perfection of Wisdom, The Mother of All the Tathāgatas, in One Letter.” According to this sutra, the Buddha “addressed the Venerable Ananda, and said, ‘Ananda, do receive, for the sake of the weal and happiness of all beings, this perfection of wisdom in one letter, i.e. A.’”22 Edward Conze, the translator of this text, briefly explains this teaching in his preface, saying that “the idea behind it is the doctrine of the Mahasaṃghika school who maintained that the Buddha has taught everything by emitting just one single sound. The auditors hear it each one according to their own needs and in this way the one syllable A is transmitted in the minds of people into all the sermons on Prajñāpāramitā.”23 In Lamotte’s discussion of the Mahāsāṃghika, one of “fifteen docetist propositions” attributed to the Mahāsāṃghika is that “all [the Buddha’s] discourses are in keeping with the teaching of the Law which they can explain in a single vocal utterance (ekavāgudāhāra).”24 As Buddhism moved out of the cultural world of the subcontinent, it carried with it these speculations on the syllable A and a set of practices that made use of it. Using the syllable A as an object of visualization and meditation was transmitted to both East and Central Asia and is found, for example, in Tibetan Buddhist praxis. The rNyingma pa rDzogs chen tradition includes several visualization practices that use the syllable A in Tibetan script (the upper case or large A, a chen, rather than the lower case, or small A, known as a chung) as the object visualized. One such practice involves sitting in a darkened room and gazing at the syllable A, which is written in white on a black background, tracing the letter with one’s gaze until the mind becomes still. A second practice involving the syllable A is to concentrate on the letter, visualize it at the point between the eyebrows, and then visualize it moving away from that spot to a distance of several feet, and then bring it back to the forehead. Visualizing this movement is to be repeated several times. In another of these practices the meditator sits out of doors in the open, directs his or her gaze toward an unrestricted view of the sky, and visualizes the syllable A at the tip of the nose. A second A is visualized just beyond the first, then a third just beyond the second, and so on, until the line of A’s stretches out to touch the sky.25

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Such practices may be the basis for descriptions of miraculous appearances of the syllable A found in some Tibetan hagiographies. For example, Vimalamitra is described as having produced “extraordinary understanding” through his practices on the summit of Mt. Bhāskara, at which time “the white syllable A appeared at the tip of his nose, as if on the verge of melting away.”26 Kumārādza is similarly described, while Lhatsūn Namka Jikme is described as being marked with the syllable A not only on the tip of his nose but also on his tongue and between his eyebrows. The sound of the syllable A is said to have issued from the womb of the mother of Guru Chöki Wangcuk, and a prophecy concerning Zhōnu Sangye foretells that he will have seven disciples each marked with “the syllable A on the tips of their noses.”27 Beyond these hagiographic allusions, the same understandings of the syllable were present in Tibet as in India. Herbert Guenther translates the following from the rDorje gsang-ba’i snying-po rtse-ba’i rgyud de-kno-na-nyid nges-pa: This very A auto-presences in various transformations Encompassing (and pervading) all linguistic features [consisting of vowels and consonants]: KA and the rest, totalling forty–two Definitively [constituting the operational domain of] A the king [Buddhahood] making his presence felt.28

This is another instance of the symbolic understanding of A as pervading everything because of its presence in all syllables. Visualization of the syllable A was employed by Bon po practitioners as well. In the Bon po text gZi brjid there is a chapter entitled “A dkar thep pa” or “Vehicle of the White A.” Snellgrove notes that this chapter is “a very good account of the tantric theory of ‘transformation’ through the mantras.”29 Contrary to what we might presume based on the idea of phonematic emanation, the transformation in this case is not the phonetic transformation of the syllable itself, but rather the transformation of the practitioner. In the Bon po work ATri Thun Tsham Cho na Dan Cha-Lak Che, translated by Per Kvaerne under the title “The A Khrid System of Meditation,” are directions for the Bon po version of the ajikan practice. It says there that the mind conforms to the eye. … Therefore one should staringly, unblinkingly, without looking up or down or to the right or to the left directly in front regard the “A” without opening fully nor closing the eyes; without being distracted by thoughts of the past or imaginings regarding the future, by sudden reflections or thought and recollections of good or evil … controlling one’s mind so that it becomes one-pointed. 30

In Tang Yixing (Jpn. Ichigyō; 683–727) became Śubhakarasiṃha’s (Jpn. Zenmui; 637– 735) disciple in 716 and also met Vajrabodhi (Jpn. Kongochi; 671–741) four years later.31 Thus, he trained in both the Vairocanābhisambodhi Sutra (T 848; Jpn. Dainichikyō) and the Vajraśekhara Sutra (T 865; Jpn. Kongochogyō) traditions. Each of these traditions, comprising practices, text, and maṇḍala, was brought to Tang by one of his two teachers.

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These are the two traditions of practice that Kūkai drew upon in his later development of the Shingon tradition. In Yixing’s commentary on the Vairocanābhisambodhi Sutra (T 1796) he explains the threefold significance of the syllable A: it is the beginning of things, the being of things, and the end, that is, the negation of things. While expressed in slightly different terms, these are fundamentally the same as the three discussed earlier: beginning, universal, and inexpressible. According to Shozui Makoto Toganoo, A as the beginning of things is associated by Yixing with ādi, that is, the origin or primordial. As such “it is the essence of conditioned arising (pratītya-samūtpada),” a characteristic that gives it its significance as the being of things. It is also the negative prefix, associated with the term asvabhāva, “not self-existent.” Toganoo seems to indicate that Yixing summarizes these three meanings by association with “anutpāda (non-origination), that is, the middle (madhya) between is-ness and nothingness.”32 From Tang, these speculations and practices spread to Heian Japan. For example, Kūkai details five meanings for five “transformations” of the syllable A in his “Precious Key to the Secret Treasury” (Hizō hōyaku): (1) A stands for the enlightened mind (bodhicitta), (2) Ā for practice to bring out enlightenment, (3) Aṃ for realization of enlightenment, (4) Aḥ for nirvana, and (5) Āḥ for wisdom perfectly provided with skillful means.33 Here we find Kūkai employing a set of five “transformations” of the syllable A, effectively repeating what had occurred in Indian forms of tantra under the influence of what Staal refers to as the “phonological discoveries of the Indian grammarians.”34 Staal cites other instances of similar sets of five, as well as similar uses of phonological transformations of syllables (in some cases with the vowels and in others with the diphthongs) being used as sets of bīja mantra. Kūkai continues his explanation of the significance of the syllable A, saying, Those who understand the meanings of the letter A are to meditate on it resolutely; they should meditate on the perfect, luminous, and Pure Consciousness. Those who have had a glimpse of it are called those who have perceived the absolute truth (paramārtha). Those who perceive it all the time enter the first stage of Bodhisattvahood. If they gradually increase their competence in this meditation, they will finally be able to magnify it [the moon] until its circumference encompasses the entire universe and its magnitude becomes as inclusive as space. Being able freely to magnify or reduce it, they will surely come to be in possession of the all-inclusive wisdom.35

In another work, the Sokushin jōbutsugi, Kūkai discusses the system of six elements (the five familiar from Indic cosmology—earth, water, fire, wind or breath, and empty space—together with consciousness); these elements play an important role in the cosmicization of the practitioner, for the six elements that make up the cosmos are identical with the very body of the practitioner. Each of the six elements is identified with a bīja mantra: earth with A, water with VA, fire with RA, wind or breath with HA, empty space with KHA, and consciousness with HŪṂ. Kūkai explains that “‘A’ indicates [the truth] that all elements are originally non-arising.”36 Alluding to the function of A as a negative prefix, this is in keeping with the kinds of meanings attributed to the syllable, which we have seen as continuous from India.37

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In the medieval period, several Shingon masters promoted the practice of ajikan, including Kakuban (1095–1143) and Dōhan (1179–1252). While ajikan is seen as a fully adequate practice—that is, it is itself capable of bringing the practitioner to awakening—this view of the practice differs from the notion of “exclusive practice” as developed in other sects (such as Hōnen’s teaching of exclusive nenbutsu practice, senju nenbutsu). Exclusive practice is often noted as characteristic of the new Buddhisms of the Kamakura era. Carl Bielefeldt has said of the Kamakura founders that their selection of the one practice was not merely a decision to specialize in a particular religious exercise but a commitment to the highest vehicle alone and a rejection of all other teachings as incompatible with it. Thus, unlike classical Tendai—which sought to justify and embrace all versions of Buddhism as the expedient expressions of the one Buddha vehicle—Shinran, Nichiren, and Dōgen, like the Ch’an reformers of the T’ang before them, tended to see the one vehicle as exclusive: the highest dharma alone was true: all else was false (or at least religiously irrelevant) and was to be abandoned. Indeed it was precisely in the abandonment of the false (or irrelevant) and the single-minded commitment to the true … that the believer’s doubts about the principle of perfection were wiped away, and he found himself actually participating in the sudden practice.38

In contrast to this exclusivism, Shingon, like classical Tendai as mentioned by Bielefeldt, maintained an inclusivist perspective on practice. Taiko Yamasaki says that although ajikan is “the most concise and versatile of Mikkyo’s hundreds of ritual practices, the A syllable visualization nevertheless fulfills the scope of the esoteric teachings.” Thus, ajikan was promoted as a fully sufficient practice, while not discarding the full range of Shingon practices for an exclusive adherence to ajikan alone.39 Belief in the power of the syllable A also was spread more widely as part of the belief system related to the importance of one’s last thought and consequent deathbed practices.40 According to Jacqueline Stone, A-syllable contemplation formed a key part of a discourse of nondualism in which death was seen as natural. This discourse recommended “the esoteric A-syllable contemplation (ajikan) as a deathbed practice that uniquely accords with the nondual reality of birth and death as the inherent workings of the dharma nature.”41

The practice of Ajikan Visualizing the syllable A is a relatively simple practice. In the “Precious Key to the Secret Treasury,” Kūkai gives a brief verse summary of the practice: Visualize: a white lotus flower with eight petals, [above which is a full moon disc] the size of a forearm in diameter, [in which is] a radiant silvery letter A. Unite your dhyāna with prajña in an adamantine binding; Draw the quiescent Prajñā of the Tathāgata in [your mind].42

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Yoshito S. Hakeda, whose translation is quoted here, notes that the instruction to unite dhyāna and prajña can be understood in two ways. First, it can be understood as directing one to “enter into the state of unshakable concentration in the oneness of body (dhyāna) and mind (prajñā).” Second, it can be understood as directing one to form the vajrāṅjali mudrā—“one should unite the right thumb (dhyāna) with the left thumb (prajñā) and form the mudrā called vajrāṅjali.”43 However, another plausible understanding of this instruction is that rather than distinguishing between making the mudrā, and uniting body and mind, the two (physical gesture and mental concentration) are in fact indistinguishably identical. The vajrāṅjali mudrā—the unity of embodied meditation and cognitive wisdom—is used extensively in the practice of visualizing the syllable A. The practice continued to be transmitted and new versions of it created. For example, one manual for the practice, entitled Ajikan Sahō Chūin-ryū, was compiled by the priest Zōei during the early years of the Tokugawa era.44 Written after the Kamakura era, Zōei’s text gives us a relatively full description of the ritual, unlike many ritual manuals that, assuming the reader to be an initiate, express themselves in such abbreviated form as to be incomprehensible to the uninitiated. This manual is still in use, and in it Zōei sets out the ajikan practice in eleven steps: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Prostrations Take One’s Seat The Syllable HŪṂ Sādhanā for the Protection of the Body Five Great Resolutions Five Syllable Garbhadhātu Mantra Visualize the Chief Deity: The Syllable A 7.a. in one’s heart 7.b. in front of one’s eyes and in one’s heart 7.c. expanding to fill the dharmadhātu, contracting and returning to one’s heart 8. Sādhanā for the Protection of the Body 9. Return of the Buddha 10. Stand Up and Three Prostrations 11. Thought of Great Compassion These steps in the visualization can be briefly described as follows: 1. PROSTRATIONS: the practitioner performs three full prostrations, that is, touching the five points—knees, elbows, and forehead—to the floor. With each prostration the practitioner recites the following “Universal Homage” mantra: Skt.: om sarva-tathāgata-pāda-vandanām karomi Jpn.: ON SARABA TATAGYATA HANA MANA NAU KYAROMI 2. TAKE ONE’S SEAT: the practitioner next seats himself or herself in half lotus posture and forms the dharmadhātu samādhi mudrā. The directions that follow this are virtually identical to those given for Zen-style meditation:45 “Line up your ears and your shoulders, and your nose with your navel, and focus both your eyes on the tip

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of your nose. Your tongue should touch the top of your mouth, and your breath will thus naturally become calm. Your hips should not be too far back, nor too far forward. Rather, sit straight up and in this way aid your circulation. When you have done this, then move the body two or three times to the front and back, and to the left and right.”46 The practitioner then takes his or her string of beads (nenju) and rubs it two or three times, reciting the “Universal Homage” mantra one more time. 3. SYLLABLE HŪṂ: the practitioner forms the vajrāṅjali mudrā by bringing the hands together, palm facing palm, cupped so that there is a slight gap between them, with the tips of the fingers interlaced, fingers of the right hand on top. The practitioner then recites the bīja mantra HŪṂ ten times. 4. SĀDHANĀ FOR THE PROTECTION OF THE BODY (this action is also known as “Donning the Armor of the Tathāgatas”):47 the practitioner makes the inner fist three pronged vajra mudrā; this is done by folding the hands together with the tips of the fingers inside, right hand uppermost. The middle fingers are then extended and touch at the tips, while the forefingers extend out around the middle fingers; recite the mantra Skt.: om vajrāgni pradīptāya svāhā Jpn.: ON BAZARA GINI HARACHI HATAYA SOWAKA five times, visualizing the mantra going to the five places on the body: forehead, left and right shoulders, chest, and throat.48 5. FIVE GREAT RESOLUTIONS (with vajrāṅjali mudrā):49 the practitioner recites: Sentient creatures are innumerable; I vow to save them all. Meritorious knowledge is innumerable; I vow to accumulate it all. The teachings of the dharma are innumerable; I vow to master them all. The tathāgatas are countless; I vow to serve them all. Bodhi is unsurpassed; I vow to attain it. May I and others in the dharmadhātu receive equally the ultimate benefit. 6. FIVE SYLLABLE GARBHADHĀTU MANTRA: the practitioner next recites the mantra of Mahāvairocana Tathāgata: Skt.: om a vi ra hūṃ kham Jpn.: ON A BI RA UN KEN one hundred times. 7. VISUALIZE THE CHIEF DEITY: THE SYLLABLE A 7.a. in one’s heart: “First visualize the syllable A, a lotus, and the disk of a full moon within your heart. Imagine that within your heart there is a full moon, bright shining and white in color. In the middle of this full moon there is a white lotus flower. The syllable A is resting on the surface of this open lotus flower.”50 7.b. in front of one’s eyes and in one’s heart: the practitioner alternately visualizes the syllable A in front of himself or herself and in his or her heart. The size of the syllable is to be about one chu, 40 cm. This is to be repeated several times. 7.c. expanding to fill the dharmadhātu, contracting and returning to one’s heart:

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the syllable A is visualized as expanding to fill the entirety of the dharmadhātu. At this point then the syllable contracts to its former size and is then placed within the practitioner’s heart. The practitioner is advised to then “forget the differences between your body and your heart, and abide for a while in the state of nondifference.”51 8. SĀDHANĀ FOR PROTECTION OF THE BODY: the practitioner repeats the actions described in number four above. 9. RETURN OF THE BUDDHA: bringing one’s hands together in front of one’s chest, the practitioner is directed to “imagine that the Buddha that you invited to attend your meditation is now returning to his Pure Lands, and that the Buddha of your own heart is now returning to his palace in your heart.”52 Initially this instruction is confusing as there was no specific invitation of any Buddha enjoined in the first half of the visualization. However, since the “Five Syllable Garbhadhātu Mantra” is the mantra for Mahāvairocana Tathāgata (Dainichi Nyorai), recitation of it may be interpreted as having functioned for Zōei as an invitation to Mahāvairocana Tathāgata to attend the ritual visualization—hence, at this point, the direction to return the Buddha to his Pure Land. 10. STAND UP AND THREE PROSTRATIONS: the three prostrations are accompanied by the same mantra as in the opening of the practice, one recitation per prostration. 11. GREAT COMPASSION: Zōei closes with advice concerning the practitioner’s state of mind outside of the practice session per se: Abide in the thought of great compassion, and perfect this thought in respect to yourself and in respect to all other persons and living beings. In all of your actions, be they walking, standing still, sitting or lying down, try to remember that this syllable A is within your own heart. If you are able to do this, then what knowledge you have and what ignorance you have will altogether be one in their Dharmanature, you will understand that your own heart and the syllable A are identical and during this present lifetime of yours you will soon attain to the unsurpassed state of enlightenment, bodhi.53

Zōei’s version of ajikan practice shows how this visualization type of meditation practice is organized according to ritual structures that are in fact common to a wide variety of Shingon rituals, as will be examined more closely in the appendix. These ritual structures, that is, syntax, are found in Shingon rituals dating from before the Kamakura right up into the present. At the same time this ritual text shows how the symbolic values of the syllable—creation, maintenance, destruction, or beginning, universal, and inexpressible—were put into practical application in Buddhist ritual practice. Two of the most prominent Shingon monks during the Kamakura era, Dōhan and Kakuban, promoted the ajikan practice. Selected translations from their writings on the practice follow.54

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Ajikan texts Dōhan (1178 or 1184 to 1252) was a disciple of the famous Kakukai (1142–1223). Himself a very prolific author,55 Dōhan became one of the leading Shingon figures in the Kamakura era.56 Among other writings on ajikan, Dōhan wrote, “Visualizing the Unity of A and HŪṂ” (A Un Go kan). Linking the bīja mantra A with HŪṂ, this text is typical of Dōhan’s treatment of the syllable visualization and is consistent with Dōhan’s nondual orientation.57

Visualizing the unity of A and HŪṂ The true tone of the heart/mind of all living beings is precisely Mahāvairocana’s non-discriminating wisdom-body. Walking, standing, sitting, lying down, at all times, breathing out is the syllable A, breathing in is the syllable HŪṂ. Naturally spontaneous, the primal mantra, not just (for those who have) realized enlightenment, the two syllables are not separate. Open mouth: syllable A, originary, unarisen; lips closed: syllable HŪṂ, cutting off karma. The syllable A is the womb of all in the circuit of the ten worlds; the syllable HŪṂ is the vajra of immutable wisdom. One for a long time follows with pleasure in their heart either the syllable A or the syllable HŪṂ produced by the out and in breaths. Following the energy (ki) as appropriate then the practitioner with mouth open, or lips closed, the A and HŪṂ of out and in these two syllables follow (one another). These two syllables are nondual principle and wisdom,

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the single reality of the two maṇḍalas is the profound visualization gate.58 Again, these two syllables are each sounded by the inner three: throat, tongue, lips which are the three marks,59 the three bodies, the threefold practice, the full circle of ten thousand virtues. By one thought of these two syllables, in the final moments, at the end of life, clearly perceiving them before one’s eyes one gains certainty of unbroken reincarnations continually in this familiar Triple World with joyous and beneficial feelings always being experienced.

Whereas Dōhan is identified with the “old teachings school” (Jpn. kogiha) of his teacher Kakukai, Kakuban is perhaps best remembered today as the founder of the “new teachings school” (Jpn. shingi-ha). The doctrinal issue that separates Kakuban’s “new teachings school” from the “old teachings school” is the question of which aspect of the dharmakāya (Jpn. hosshin; that is, Dainichi, Mahāvairocana) is the source of the Shingon teachings. The “old teachings school” holds that the “original body” (Jpn. honji-shin) of the dharmakāya is the source, while the “new teachings school” holds that the source is the “empowerment body” (Jpn. kaji-shin) of the dharmakāya.60 Another aspect of Kakuban’s work was integrating aspects of the popular Amitābha cult into Shingon, including identifying Dainichi Nyorai with Amitābha (Jpn. Amida) and propagating recitative chanting of the name of Amitābha (Jpn. shōmyō nenbutsu) as a practice within the Shingon tradition. Jacqueline Stone highlights the theme of the identity of mantra and deity, telling us that “Kakuban identified the inbreath with the seed syllable A and the outbreath with the seed syllable HŪṂ, which together he regarded as the fundamental mantra of Amida. Thus the cycle of breathing in and out becomes both the mantra of Amida and Amida himself.”61 In keeping with Shingon thought generally, however, Kakuban rejected the concept of mappō, the idea that our current age is one that has become so degenerate that the buddhadharma (teachings of the buddha) are no longer effective—an idea central to some forms of Pure Land Buddhist thought as the rationale for exclusive practice of recitative chanting of the name of Amitābha. Kakuban wrote several works on ajikan, two of which follow.62

Kakuban’s Ajikan poem In the center of the heart moon cakra is an eight-petalled lotus. Above the lotus calyx

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is the syllable A. The blossom is colored red, and clear and pure inside and out. The light of the five wisdoms63 shines forth, destroying the darkness of the nine consciousnesses.64 Cutting away any trace of ignorance from mind and body; ending the gloom of confusion for oneself and others. Following the breath in and out, the syllable passes from inside to out. When outside it liberates others, when inside it liberates oneself. A is the mother of all other syllables, able to generate the many syllables. This dharma is the buddha family (Skt. gotra), miraculously producing the various buddhas. All together the bījas fill the whole of the dharmadhātu. All of the buddhas fill empty space equally. The primal vow of these buddhas shines forth, teaching the dharma. At the same time the reflection of their past vows saves sentient beings by extraordinary powers. The three bodies only expound one dharma—the syllable A. All the sutras praise extensively the various virtues of this dharma. Listening to the name, or just hearing it, all evil actions melt away like ice. Reciting verbally or visualizing the syllable, ten thousand virtues gather around one like clouds. With weak visualization and only faith, one immediately [upon death] enjoys the Pure Land. With deep practice and complete wisdom, one realizes the fruit of buddhahood in this world.

Kakuban’s Ajikan Visualizing this syllable is a wondrous practice. Because it gives birth to all of the syllables, the syllable A is the mother of all syllables. The single syllable mantra A gives rise to the syllables of all dhāraṇī. Therefore, the syllable A is considered the parent of all mantras. This dharma is the buddhas, because all dhāraṇīs are

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produced from the syllable A, and all buddhas are produced from the dhāraṇīs. You will be more familiar with the syllable if you memorize the gāthā. This is important. Hindered by one’s suffering when seriously ill, you may not be able to visualize properly. But even if seriously ill, merely inhaling and exhaling is the syllable A. Since the mantra of all the buddhas of the triple world and the ten directions is recited with each sound made, attempting to recite the nenbutsu would be of meager effect. There is no better way of attaining sudden awakening than by holding the pure mind on the inhalation and exhalation of the breath, thinking of it [the breath] as filled by the marvelous mantra, stopping other thoughts, focusing your mind only on this one dharma, the syllable A. The precious name of Amitābha is the most excellent of all the buddhas because the syllable A is in it. For those who especially desire rebirth in the western direction,65 there is no better way than by performing this visualization. This is the most excellent of mantra practices, it is the highest [lit., most secret66] teaching. If you doubt this then you will drop down into Avīci Hell.67 Truly one should have confidence. Someone may wonder: how much merit is there in visualizing inhaling and exhaling? Nothing has more virtue than this because one freely controls one’s spiritual power in accord with the dharma, this breath goes in and out, and comes in from the root of life in the middle of the buddha lands of the ten directions, this breath fills you completely, diminishing but never stopping, even while asleep at night.

Ajikan continued to be promoted by members of the Shingon tradition during the premodern and modern periods. For example, a recent addition to Kongōbu-ji, the main headquarters of the Chūin ryū lineage of Shingon on Mt. Kōya, is an Ajikan dōjo, a practice hall specifically set up with images used for visualization practice.

Concluding comments By focusing on a particular practice, we are able to take a different perspective on the history of Buddhism in the Kamakura era. Given the variety of practices that were promoted during the Kamakura—as exemplified not only by those usually associated with the era (e.g., daimoku, shōmyō nenbutsu, and shikan taza) but also by such practices as the clear light mantra (kōmyō shingon, discussed earlier in Chapter 6) and ajikan—one may ask why some of these practices became well known and popular while others remained marginal. To say that the widely known practices became so because they were promoted by institutions that became widely popular does not in fact address the causal relation. It would be just as true to suggest that the institutions became widely popular because of the success of the practices in appealing to large numbers of people. Since religious phenomena are overdetermined, a large number of factors—institutional, economic, political, interpersonal, and the like—are no doubt involved in this process.

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But looking at this from the perspective of practice, at least three factors seem relevant to the limited popularity of ajikan practice. The first and second will just be mentioned as considerations; the third will be explored more fully as it relates to the issue raised by Staal regarding the transportability of ritual practices and their interpretations. First, ajikan was not promoted as an exclusive practice: the rhetoric surrounding it did not include the denial of value to all other practices. Second, although the practice of ajikan may be a relatively simple ritual, unlike purely recitative practices, for example, recitation of the name of Amitābha Buddha, nenbutsu, most forms of the practice require leisure time and free space, an investment in implements and offerings, and a certain amount of training. It would not, therefore, have been as easily appropriated by peasants in the premodern period. We can see a direct parallel with the way that today mindfulness is promoted among upper-middle-class professionals for its simplicity, absence of belief commitments, and the ease with which it can be fit into a busy schedule. Third, it is a practice that implies literacy—not just the ability to read and write, but an engagement with the culture of literacy, the aesthetics of literacy.68 More specifically, and here we come back to Staal’s point regarding the greater portability of practice in contrast to the portability of doctrine, ajikan practice requires a familiarity with the symbolic associations of the syllable A. As these associations are rooted in the Sanskrit syllabary and grammar, the associations as learned would not connect with the native speech of Japanese practitioners in the same that those associations would have for early medieval Indians immersed in a Sanskritic environment.69 Taking each of the associations discussed earlier in sequence: first, in Japanese “a” does not function as a negative prefix. Second, although the Japanese syllabary was modeled on the Sanskrit syllabary, the vowels function differently, and each vowel is autonomous, rather than being an inflection of A. It is not the case, in other words, that each syllable is formed with A as its vowel component, the other vowel forms of the syllable being seen as modifications of the “a” form. Rather, there are separate, independent syllables with the different vowels. “Ki” is, for example, itself a syllable, rather than being a modification of “ka.” Third, while “a” is the initial syllable in some versions of the Japanese syllabary, no theory of “phonematic emanation” was developed on this basis in Japan, perhaps in part because of the greater value given to Chinese characters and in part because traditionally the “i-ro-ha” form of the syllabary70 was much more common.71 In contrast, other practices such as shōmyō nenbutsu (vocal recitation of the name of Amida Buddha) or daimoku (reciting the title of the Lotus Sūtra) would have been more experientially accessible because they do not depend so completely upon familiarity with Sanskrit. The recitation of nenbutsu would have had experiential connections with the anthropomorphic figure of Buddha Amitābha and his vow assuring rebirth in the Western Pure Land. Similarly, reciting the daimoku would have had experiential connections through such vehicles as the stories concerning the saving power of the Lotus Sūtra.72 Whereas Amitābha Buddha and the Lotus Sūtra are more directly accessible as potent religious symbols, the symbolic import of the syllable A is rooted in rather abstruse Indic speculations about the ontological and cosmological significance of Sanskrit. Therefore, native speakers of Japanese would

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not have experienced the A with any immediacy, but instead only as an intellectual abstraction. We may, therefore, reasonably conclude that the very abstract and unfamiliar symbolic value of ajikan practice was an important contributing factor that kept it from achieving the kind of widespread popularity attained by nenbutsu and daimoku recitations. The history of the ajikan practice demonstrates the high degree of continuity from the Indic origins of tantric Buddhism to the Kamakura era, right into the present. At the same time, interpretations of ajikan were also carried over with a high degree of consistency: the three meanings of the syllable A as beginning, universal, and inexpressible/negation, together with the reliance on the linguistic symbolism from which these three arose, are present in Kamakura era Japan, despite several centuries of transmission across at least two cultural filters—the boundary between the Sanskritic and Sinitic worlds, and then between Sinitic and Japanese. However, as Staal says, doctrinal aspects do not “translate” as easily from one religious culture to another as do practices. While Staal points to philosophic understandings in his analysis, the difficulty of translating a practice seems also to be present where the “doctrine” is a set of symbolic associations.73 Taking these two considerations together, we should note that in fact ideological conceptions of some kind—whether formally religious doctrines or informal popular ideas—always accompany and motivate (or fail to) practices of all kinds. In other words, ideology and practice always constitute a dialectic. Examination of the practice, such as the following syntactic analysis, itself shows that although it does not perfectly replicate the ritual structures familiar from other Shingon practices, the ajikan employs a significant amount of ritual structure for its performance. This points to a difficulty inherent in the English language terminology used to describe such practices. There is as yet no universally accepted set of categories for practices like ajikan. Perhaps there never will be. However, one of the pervasive elements in English-language discourse regarding practice has been to dichotomize ritual and meditation as two mutually exclusive practices, with meditation being described in (purely) mental terms and ritual in (purely) physical terms.74 The ajikan falls into neither category, since it employs both mental activities (visualization of the syllable A) and physical activities (e.g., mudrās and mantra). In order to develop a more accurate understanding of practice, the assumption that ritual and meditation are two mutually exclusive categories must be abandoned and a fuller, more finely nuanced descriptive approach brought into use.75 Until recently, the study of Buddhist ritual has lagged behind the study of other aspects of Buddhism. Practice, however, is central to Buddhism, and the integral relation between ritual and meditation is an essential part of how Buddhist practice has developed over the two and a half millennia of Buddhist history. An understanding of ritual and ritualized meditations such as visualizing the syllable A does, therefore, make an essential contribution to understanding the history of the Buddhist tradition, not only in the tantric Buddhisms of Japan, but throughout its entire course.76

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Appendix: Shingon ajikan: Diagrammatic Analysis of Ritual Syntax The following examines the ritual syntax of ajikan practice, comparing two ritual manuals: one premodern and the other modern. This analysis leads our inquiry into broader questions of the relation between language and practice than those that are the central concern regarding extraordinary language. Although broader in scope, they are not irrelevant to the central thesis regarding the transmission of ritual practices and their conceptualizations from India, through China, to Japan. By analogy with referring to the systematic structures of ritual as ritual syntax, we can refer to the elements of which these structures are composed as ritual semantics. The analysis that follows allows us to examine in close detail how a semantic element, the bīja mantra A, functions as the chief deity (Jpn. honzon) for some rituals in the Shingon ritual corpus. Comparing the ajikan visualization with other Shingon rituals also allows the relation between syntax and semantics in rituals to be examined. In addition to understanding this particular ritual, and the theoretical issues it reveals, the method employed exemplifies a diagrammatic technique that will allow meaningful comparisons of rituals from differing religious traditions. Frits Staal has demonstrated the heuristic value of considering the ways that rituals are organized as analogous to the syntactic structures of language.77 In addition to the theoretical and methodological concerns regarding considering rituals to have a syntactic structure analogous to that of sentences, Staal’s work on ritual has initiated a technique of diagramming the structure of rituals.78 Just as syntactic studies of language have benefited from the development of the now widely used techniques of sentential tree diagrams, so also ritual studies can benefit from a consistently used diagramming technique. In the following, two versions of the Shingon ajikan practice will be analyzed syntactically.79 One of these is from an early Tokugawa era (1603–1867) manual. The other is from a modern manual. The syntax of each will then be diagrammed and the syntactic structures of the ritual discussed. There are two related aspects of ritual syntax that diagramming can assist in analyzing. First, the systematic structures, rules, by which rituals are organized, are themselves ordered. Second, there are meta-rules. Staal has summarized these two factors, saying “‘Meta-rules’ are simply rules about rules. ‘Rule order’ is easiest understood in the ritual context: the rules about lighting the fire have to operate before those that describe how oblations are made into it.”80 Rule ordering and meta-rules are both evident in the work of Vedic ritualists and form part of the analogy Staal makes between ritual and language. In addition, it is clear from my own work on Shingon rituals that ritual structuring employs elements analogous to phrases within larger sentence analogues. One important contribution of ritual phrase structure is that it can contribute to an understanding of cognitive structures in the same way that the analysis of linguistic phrase structures does. According to Steven Pinker, it is the phrase structure with its ability to utilize the same kind of phrase in a variety of locations, which allows for the incredible variety and adaptability of human language: “Once

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a kind of phrase is defined by a rule and given its connector symbol, it never has to be defined again, the phrase can be plugged in anywhere there is a corresponding socket.”81 Pinker goes on to point out the cognitive implications of linguistic phrase structures, maintaining that “restriction in the geometry of phrase structure trees … is a hypothesis about how the rules of language are set up in our brains, governing the way we talk.”82 Analysis of ritual phrase structures should in the same way contribute to an understanding of how the rules of structured activity are “set up in our brains.” Although structured activity includes more than ritual—for example, games and dramatic performances—ritual may be one of the most extensively rule-bound of such behaviors. “Rule-bound” is used here in its technical sense, not the colloquial sense of uncreative or inflexible. For contemporary linguistics, the concept of rule has shifted from a generative notion—that is, people form sentences according to inherent rules—to a descriptive one. A “child acquires a certain linguistic skill, which linguists can describe in the form of a rule.”83 Thus, when it is asserted that ritual is a rule-bound behavior, the assertion is not that the rituals were created in accordance with a set of rules that are necessarily consciously known by their authors. Rather, the rule-bound character of rituals is that there are certain consistent patterns that can be generalized as rules. Based on his anthropological analysis of the strategies of honor in Algerian society, Pierre Bourdieu notes that The science of practice has to construct the principle which makes it possible to account for all the cases observed, and only those, without forgetting that this construction, and the generative operation of which it is the basis, are only the theoretical equivalent of the practical scheme which enables every correctly trained agent to produce all the practices and judgments of honour called for by the challenges of existence.84

However, because the patterns are consistent, the rules as generalizations must exist in some kind of isomorphic relation with cognitive structures. While analysis of rule ordering, meta-rules, and ritual phrase structures can be done narratively, making the structures visible in diagrammatic form can show the results of such analyses much more clearly and also allows for more informative comparisons. The application of a diagramming technique is based on an analogy between language and ritual as both rule-bound or systematically structured behaviors. Other analogies could be made, the exploration of which might prove fruitful. For example, the approach of performance theory draws on the analogy of ritual to theater.85 The analogy with language made here for analytic purposes is also to be distinguished from the question of what activities provide the model for the ritual in its creation. The metaphor of feasting an honored guest provides the basic model for organizing many of the rituals that derive from Vedic origins.86 This alimentary model is important for understanding the logic, or metaphoric entailments,87 of many Shingon rituals. While understanding the founding metaphor is important, it is still a separate issue. The benefit of the heuristic analogy with language is the possibility of appropriating the well-developed analytic tools of linguistics.

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This should not be taken, however, as a suggestion that language holds a position of cognitive primacy. Although an extended discussion of the issues involved goes beyond the scope of the present inquiry, it is my own belief that rule-bound behaviors do form a general category, which includes language, games, theatre, and ritual.88 Determining whether this is the case will require the application of common analytic techniques, such as the inverted tree diagrams of ritual syntax introduced by Staal, which is employed here. The first of the two practices to be analyzed, Zōei’s ajikan visualization ritual, was already introduced earlier in the main body of this chapter. As mentioned earlier, ajikan continues to be an important part of Shingon praxis into the present. For example, in the present era the Shingon priest Miyata Taisen89 has compiled an ajikan manual in English for the instruction of Shingon adherents in the United States.90 Zoei’s manual describes the practice in fifteen steps:91 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

Enter the shrine Prostrations Take one’s seat Purify the three karmic actions Generate the mind of enlightenment Recite the vow mantra Five great vows Recite the five syllable mantra Control the breath Proper visualization End the meditation Recite the Stanza of the Three Powers Make personal aspirations Don the armor Exit the shrine

In summary: (1) Enter the Shrine. The practitioner comes into the hall of practice. (2) Prostrations. The practitioner makes three prostrations facing the portrayal of the syllable A, which is used as the object of meditation while reciting the mantra. Skt.: om sarva tathāgata pāda-vandanām karomi Jpn.: ON SARABA TATAGYATA HANA MANA NAU KYAROMI (3) Take One’s Seat. The practitioner then sits down cross-legged, takes a few deep breaths to relax himself, and allows his attention to settle into the solar plexus. (4) Purify the Three Karmic Actions. The practitioner then purifies the actions of body, speech, and mind by reciting the mantra Skt.: om svabhava suddha sarva-dharma svabhava-suddha ham Jpn: ON SOHA HANBA SYUDA SARABA TARAMA SOHA HANBA SYUDO KAN

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five times, making the lotus bud mudrā and directing the recitations to what are called the five places of the body, that is, the forehead, right and left shoulders, chest, and throat. (5) Generate the Mind of Enlightenment. With the thunderbolt mudrā the practitioner generates the mind of enlightenment, that is, bodhicitta, by reciting the mantra Skt.: om bodhicittam utpadayami Jpn.: ON BOCHI SHITTA BODA HADA YAMI seven times. (6) Recite the vow (samaya) mantra. With the same mudrā, the practitioner recites the vow mantra Skt.: om samayas tvam Jpn.: ON SANMAYA SA TO BAN seven times. (7) Five Great Vows. Continuing to hold the same mudrā, the practitioner recites the five great vows: “Living beings are innumerable; I vow to save them all.” “Merit and knowledge are innumerable; I vow to accumulate them all.” “The teachings of the Dharma are innumerable; I vow to master them all.” “The Tathāgatas are innumerable; I vow to serve them all.” “Enlightenment is unsurpassed; I vow to attain it.”92 (8) Recite the Five Syllable Mantra. Still retaining the thunderbolt mudrā, the practitioner recites the Five Syllable Mantra of Dainichi Nyorai Skt.: om a vi ra hum kham Jpn.: ON A BI RA UN KEN seven times. (9) Control the Breath. Folding his hands into the meditation mudrā, the practitioner closes his eyes, exhales through his mouth twice, and then calmly breathes through his nose for the duration of the meditation. (10) Proper Visualization. The practitioner then slightly opens his eyes, looks at the representation of the syllable A, closes his eyes, and creates a mental image of the syllable resting on its lotus blossom against the ground of a clear, full moon in the space in front of his body. Once he has a clear image of the syllable A visualized, he then visualizes it slowly entering into his body, holding the image in his solar plexus. The image is then returned out of the body to the hanging representation of the syllable. (11) End the Meditation. Keeping the eyes closed, the practitioner then takes two or three deep breaths and lightly rubs the hands over the body, from head to foot. Opening the eyes, the practitioner returns to normal breathing. (12) Recite the Stanza of the Three Powers. Still holding the meditation mudrā, the practitioner recites the Stanza of the Three Powers:

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Through the power of my merit, the power of the Tathāgata’s empowerment, and the power of the Dharmadhātu, I abide in a universal offering.93 (13) Make Personal Aspirations. With the thunderbolt mudrā, the practitioner now expresses any personal aspirations, imagining that they will be (effortlessly) accomplished through the intent of Mahāvairocana Buddha. (14) Don the Armour. The practitioner then makes the inner fist of the three pronged thunderbolt mudrā and consecrates the five places of the body (as above), reciting the mantra Skt.: om vajragni pradiptaya svaha Jpn.: ON BAZARA GINI HARACHI HATAYA SOWAKA five times. (15) Exit the Shrine. The practitioner then bows once while seated, giving rise to the mind of compassion, rises, performs the triple prostration (as above), and leaves the shrine.

Analysis of Zoei’s Ajikan A linear description of a ritual practice, such as in diagram 9.1.a, may be compared with the surface structure of a sentence. Previous research into the syntactic structures of other Shingon ritual practices leads to the expectation of symmetry around the visualization of identity of the practitioner with the deity evoked. Here it is not a deity who is evoked in the course of the practice, but rather identification with the syllable A that forms the central act of the practice. This centrality is the metaphoric centrality of “most important” and also syntactically central to the symmetry of the practice, despite its being number 7 of 10 items. The visualization of identity, item 7, is bracketed by two clusters of actions. Numbers 3, 4, 5, and 6 form the preceding cluster (labeled α in diagram 9.1.b). Numbers 8 and 9 form the subsequent cluster (labeled α′ in diagram 9.1.b). Each of these clusters is itself made up of two elements and displays repetitive symmetry—that is, the symmetrical repetition of the elements in the same order—in contrast to the mirror-image symmetry in which the order is reversed. The five-syllable mantra (item 6, labeled C in both diagrams 9.1.a and 9.1.b) and the return of the Buddha (item 9, labeled C′ in both diagrams 9.1.a and 9.1.b) are functional equivalents. As a result of terminal abbreviation, items appearing in abbreviated form in the second part of the ritual, the syllable HŪṂ, protection of the body, and the five great resolutions (items 3, 4 and 5, labeled B in both diagrams 9.1.a and 9.1.b) are symmetrically represented only by the repetition of protection of the body (item 8, labeled B′ in both diagrams 9.1.a and 9.1.b). The opening actions of prostrations and taking one’s seat (items 1 and 2, labeled A in both diagrams 9.1.a and 9.1.b) are mirror images symmetrical with the two actions that end the ritual practice: standing up and prostrations (items 10a and 10b, labeled A′ in both diagrams 9.1.a and 9.1.b). Figure 9.1 is a way of showing these relations visually.

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Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan Diagram 9.1.a

Sādhana for Protection of the Body 1. Prostrations A 2. Take One ̛s Seat 3. The Syllable HŪṂ B

4. Sādhana for Protection of the Body 5. Five Great Resolutions

C

6. Five Syllable Garbhdhātu Mantra 7. Visualize the Chief Deity: the Syllable A a. In one᾿s heart

D

b. In front of one᾿s eyes and in one᾿s heart c.[aʹ] Expanding to fill the dharmadhātu, contracting and returning to one ̛s heart

Bʹ

8. [4ʹ] Sādhana for Protection of the Body

Cʹ

9. [6ʹ] Return of the Buddha 10. Stand Up and Prostrations a.[2ʹ] Stand Up

Aʹ

b.[1ʹ] Prostrations 11. Thought of Great Compassion Outside the Ritual Visualization Per se

Diagram 9.1.b R

D

7. Visualize the Chief Deity

a A

1. Prostrations

B

2. Take 3. The 4. Sādhana 5. Five for Great One᾿s SyllaSeat ble Protection Resoluof the HŪṂ tions Body

C

6. Five Syllable Garbhadhatu Mantra

Bʹ

7.a In 7.b In 7.c [aʹ ] one᾿s front Expanding heart of one᾿s to fill the eyes and dharmain dhātu one᾿s and heart returning to one᾿s heart

Figure 9.1 Syntactic Structure of Zoei’s Ajikan.

Aʹ

aʹ Cʹ

9 [6ʹ] 8 [4ʹ ] Sādhana Return of the for Protection Buddha of the Body

10. Stand Up and Prostrations 10.a [2ʹ] Stand Up

10.b [1ʹ] Prostratons

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Analysis of Miyata’s Ajikan Miyata’s text (analyzed in Figure 9.2) demonstrates the same symmetry around identification with the syllable A, in this case, number ten of the fifteen items. Clearly items 9 and 11 are symmetrical to the visualization, being the entry to and exit from the visualization. Turning to the outer edge of the ritual, we find that although leaving the shrine is identified as a single item, it in fact involves three actions, in mirror-image symmetry with the first three items: entering the shrine, triple prostrations, and taking one’s seat. This abbreviation is in the writing of the manual and not an abbreviation of the ritual actions per se. Items 4 and 14 symbolically match each other. Item 4, purifying the three karmic actions, prepares the practitioner to enter into the practice freed from any negative karma. Item 14, donning the armor, prepares the practitioner to leave the ritual practice, protected by the mercy and compassion of the tathāgatas.94 Furthermore, in more complex Shingon rituals, such as the votive fire ritual (Skt. homa, Jpn. goma), putting on the armor, is performed both at the beginning and at the end of the ritual.95 It would appear that in the case of this particular version of the ajikan, the first donning of the armor could be deleted because of the symbolic similarity between donning the armor and purifying the three karmic actions, as conditioned by the entry into and the exit from the ritual itself. Likewise, there is a similarity between items 5, 6, and 7—generating the mind of enlightenment, vow mantra, and the five great vows—and item 13, personal aspirations, since both have to do with the expression of the practitioner’s intent. However, this order is the same as that found in more complex rituals. Generating the mind of enlightenment, vow mantra, and the five great vows are found in the first part of the ritual,96 whereas any aspirations specific to the practitioner will be expressed after ritual identification.97 In much the same way, item 8, reciting the five-syllable mantra, and item 12, reciting the stanza of the three powers, are symbolically symmetrical as relating the practitioner to higher powers. The grouping of these elements can be done in two different manners, as shown in diagrams 9.2.b and 9.2.c. In diagram 9.2.b, items 5, 6, and 7 are grouped together (labeled C in diagram 9.2.b) while item 8 is separate (labeled ⿥ in diagram 9.2.b). Items 12 and 13 (labeled C′ and ⿥ in diagram 9.2.b) stand in repetitive symmetry with items 5, 6, 7, and 8. In diagram 9.2.c, items 5, 6, 7, and 8 are grouped together (labeled C in diagram 9.2.c), while items 5, 6, and 7 form a subgrouping of C (labeled α in diagram 9.2.c). Items 12 and 13 display the same grouping and subgrouping (labeled C′ and α′ in diagram 9.2.c). At this time in the development of the syntactic analysis of rituals, there is not enough comparative material on the basis of which a decision between these analyses can be made. Syntactically, then, we have two alternative interpretations. In addition to these syntactic similarities, there are content similarities between this practice and other Shingon ritual practices as well, which are by analogy referred to as semantic similarities. Most important is the central action mentioned previously, that of the identification of the practitioner with the deity invoked. With few exceptions, ritual identification characterizes both Buddhist and Hindu tantra.98

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Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan Diagram 9.2.a Fifteen Steps in the Contemporary Form 1. Enter the shrine 2. Prostrations 3. Take one’s seat 4. Purify the three karmic actions 5. Generate the mind of enlightenment 6. Recite the samaya vow 7. Five great vows 8. Recite the five-syllable mantra 9. Control the breath 10. Proper visualization ritual axis 11. End the meditation 12. Recite the Stanza of the Three Powers 13. Make personal aspirations 14. Don the armor 15. Exit the shrine

A B C

D C B A

Diagram 9.2.b R

A

B

D

C

C

B

A 15. Exit the shrine

2. Prostra tions

[2 ]

1. 4. 2.a 2.b 3. Enter Bow-Three Take Purify the the ing prostra- seat three shrine tons karmic actions

5. 6. 10. 11. 9. 7. 8. Gener- Recite Five Recite Control Proper End ate the the great the the visual- the mind samaya vows five- breath ization mediof tation vow syllable enmantra lightenment

12. Recite the Stanza of the Three Powers

13. Make personal aspirations

14. 15.a 15. b Don [2.a ] [2.b ] the Bow- Three armor ing prostratons

15. c [1 ] Leave the shrine

Diagram 9.2.c R

A

B

D

C

A

B

15. Exit the shrine

2. Prostra tions

1. 2.a 2.b 3. Enter Bow- ThreeTake the ing prostra- seat shrine tons

C

[ ]

[ ] [2 ]

4. Purify the three karmic actions

5. 6. 11. 7. 9. 10. 8. Gener- Recite Five Recite Control Proper End ate the the great the the visual- the mind samaya vows five- breath ization mediof vow tation syllable enmantra lightenment

13. 12. 15.a 14. Recite Make Don [2.a ] the personal the BowStanza aspir- armor ing of the ations Three Powers

15. b 15. c [2.b ] [1 ] Three Leave the prostra- shrine tons

Figure 9.2 Syntactic Structure of Miyata’s Ajikan.

The two most important differences between this practice and other members of the Shingon ritual corpus are: first, the absence of the metaphor of feasting an honored guest, and second, the symbolism of identification through the body. The majority of Shingon rituals employ the metaphor of feasting an honored guest for the purpose of

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structuring the ritual process. This metaphor derives directly from the Vedic ritual system in which the fundamental metaphor for the sacrifice is that of making food offerings to the deities as honored guests. Other kinds of metaphors have been used in different ritual traditions. For example, the Daoist rituals usually employ the metaphor of petitioning a bureaucratic official to structure rituals. The practice of visualizing the syllable A, however, does not employ the metaphor of feasting an honored guest. Despite the syntactic similarities, and the similarity of identification between the practitioner and the chief deity (Jpn. honzon), no offerings are made to the syllable. Indeed, expressing it this way sounds absurd: it hardly makes sense to think of offering music, incense, food, perfumes, and lights to a syllable. There are two possible reasons for the absence of the feasting of an honored guest metaphor. First, the practice is a very short one, requiring such extensive abbreviation that this symbolism has been excised. Second, the use of a syllable as the chief deity imposes a semantic constraint on the ritual. Unlike a buddha, a syllable does not eat food, drink water, appreciate music, or enjoy incense. The semantic shift of the chief deity from an anthropomorphic entity to the syllable A has produced other kinds of semantic changes in the ritual performance. The other noteworthy difference between this visualization of the syllable A and other members of the Shingon ritual corpus is the character of the identification between the practitioner and the chief deity. Many of the Shingon rituals employ visualization of the three mysteries (Jpn. sanmitsu): the mysteries of body, speech, and mind. The practitioner identifies his own body with the body of the Buddha by making the appropriate mudrā, identifies his own speech with the speech of the Buddha by reciting the appropriate mantra, and identifies his own mind with the mind of the Buddha by entering into the appropriate meditative state (Skt. samādhi).99 In the practice of visualizing the syllable A, however, identification is performed by visualizing the syllable A as entering into and residing within one’s own body. I suspect that again it is the semantics, or symbolic association, of the syllable A as the chief deity that produces this difference between ajikan and other ritual practices in the Shingon corpus. Syllables do not have anthropomorphic bodies with which we can identify our own bodies, they do not speak, and they do not have a mind. However, in chanting the syllable A, we can feel the vibrations arising from the solar plexus. In conclusion, we can identify four important theoretical aspects of the analysis in this appendix: first, the importance of syntactic analysis of ritual as providing a baseline for common discourse about ritual; second, the syntactic effects of semantic change; third, the continuity of syntactic and symbolic aspects of ritualized meditative practice; and fourth, the implications for a cognitive theory of ritual practice. First, the study of ritual continues to be hampered by the lack of any agreed-upon analytic technique. A variety of perspectives have been developed, but little interaction is possible between them in the absence of a common analysis as a basis for discussion. The situation is much like that of linguistics prior to Saussure. Saussure insisted upon the synchronic analysis of language as a means of providing a control to the otherwise largely speculative theories concerning language that were being promoted in his day. In the same way, a systematic synchronic analysis such as that provided by a syntactic approach to ritual can provide a common basis for discussion of ritual.

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Second, the syntactic examination of the ajikan shows the effect of semantic change on the syntax. Without returning to a referential understanding of semantic meaning with its implicit neo-Platonism,100 the mutual relation between semantics and syntax does need to inform research on the structures of ritual.101 The development of this approach to the study of ritual will require much additional work, both specifically within the Shingon ritual corpus and also more broadly in other Buddhist and tantric rituals. This work is needed in order to establish the kind of body of information necessary for testing differing analyses.102 Third, Zōei’s and Miyata’s versions of the ajikan show how this visualization kind of meditation practice is organized according to ritual structures, which are in fact common to a wide variety of Shingon rituals: mirror-image symmetry, repetitive symmetry, and terminal abbreviation. These ritual structures are found in Shingon rituals dating from before the Kamakura up to the present. At the same time this ritual text shows how the symbolic values of the syllable A, which originated in India—beginning, universal, and inexpressible—were put into practical application in Buddhist ritual practice. Fourth, the use of ritual as a means of revealing cognitive structures implies a view of cognition, which asserts that there are neither isolated cognitive systems—one for language, one for ritual, one for games, one for music, and so on—nor a single cognitive system at the base of or governing all such capacities. Rather, it seems that there are a variety of systems, overlapping and interconnected, which come into play in differing combinations to produce different kinds of activities. Thus the same structures that allow for the workings of grammar in the production of language can, in combination with other cognitive structures, also be at play in the production of ritual.

10

Concluding Reflections

As recounted at the beginning of this work, it was motivated by the personally jarring disjunction that I found between my own precritical expectations of a Buddhism devoted to transcendent realization through mystical silence and the realities of an incredibly rich ritual culture that valued language positively. Studying Shingon, both conceptually and as a form of Buddhist practice, raised for me three questions. How did the representation of Buddhism as a tradition of mystical silence viewing language negatively come about? What are the ideas that support thinking that such practices as mantra, dhāraṇī, nenbutsu, and daimoku are effective? And what was the history of those ideas? In the course of attempting to answer these questions, four themes directly related to issues of language use in Buddhist praxis have been constellated. In brief, these are: First, that there is no single, unitary, monolithic “Buddhist” attitude toward language. Instead, there are both positive and negative views, and a variety of nuanced arguments regarding how language is to be understood. Second, if we examine tantric Buddhist praxis, we find language being used in a variety of ways. Much of it is quite ordinary, in the sense that it is used to explain and describe such things as ritual actions or visualizations. However, one also finds what we have identified here as extraordinary language use, a form of language use that constitutes a coherent category. Extraordinary language use does not conform to the ordinary conception of language as the communication of information. Third, the conceptions regarding extraordinary language in East Asian tantric praxis evidence continuity from India. Such conceptions are not “cultural baggage,” a conclusion that easily follows from a preconception of religion as private, experiential, and focused on the silence of the absolute. Conceptions of religion that define it in this threefold fashion are both modern and parochial, and the uncritical generalization of those conceptions as true of all religions necessarily distorts our understanding of those traditions that operate outside the presumptions of modern Euro-American religious culture. Instead, the conceptions of language that give extraordinary language a sense of efficacy are central to the Buddhist tradition transmitted from South to East Asia. Fourth, at the same time, specific ideological elements and specific practices did not move in lockstep with one another. It is, therefore, also necessary to understand that the relative trajectories of ideology and practice result from the two being semiautonomous from one another; that is, each has its own integrity but remains in a dialectic interaction with the other.

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Nuancing Buddhist conceptions of language The model of Buddhism as valorizing mystical silence and communion with the Absolute/One as its primary goal is overdetermined in Euro-American scholarship. There are important strains within Buddhist thought that do match that view, such as the representation of Zen made by many within that tradition. Seong-Uk Kim summarizes that representation as “Zen is a special transmission that enables one to see the nature and attain enlightenment not by positing words and letters but by pointing directly to mind.”1 Kim goes on to give a fuller explication of this view as related to Ch’ŏnch’aek’s commentary on Linji, explaining that this is a specific view of language, a view based on the fundamental suspicion of language. According to this view, language does not represent reality as such. It rather conceals or distorts the truth of reality and is therefore incapable of fully manifesting that truth or the experience of it.2

While negative views of language such as this are found throughout Buddhist history, selecting that view to characterize all of Buddhism is overdetermined by its congruence with particular views of language found in Euro-American culture. We should not lose sight of the continuity that runs from the Greco-Roman view of language as an obstacle, as described by de Certeau, through to neo-Platonism, and on to Romanticism and neo-Romanticism, which provides much of contemporary religious studies with its presumptions. The central role of language in Shingon, Pure Land, and Nichiren, as well as other Buddhist traditions, suggests that positive views of the role of language in the process of attaining awakening should not be marginalized. The assertion that language is actively conducive to awakening entails an understanding of ontology and epistemology that differs radically from the familiar dualistic view of Buddhism in the West. Positing that there is a realm of experience unmediated by cognition distinct from the realm of cognitively mediated experience, that view may be called a metaphysics of reality and reflection.3 This is itself an ideological or even theological position, not simply a fact of human existence. Within a dualistic metaphysics such as that of reality and reflection, one logic of awakening conceives it as being attained by transcendence, or elimination of reflective awareness, necessary in order to experience a higher or truer reality. In contrast to this, the notion that the dharmakāya actively preaches the dharma suggests a radically nondual Madhyamakastyle interpretation in which language is conventional and therefore empty—like all existing things—and as with the emptiness of all existing things, this very emptiness of language can serve as a stimulus to awakening.4 For example, contrasting with the negative view of language that is taken to characterize Zen as presented earlier, Kim has also noted that there is a “Zen recognition of the dual nature of language, which conceals and discloses reality simultaneously.”5 Talal Asad discusses the origins of the contemporary Euro-American conception of religion as a distinct category separate from other forms of discourse, particularly those related to any form of social power. According to Asad,

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there cannot be a universal definition of religion, not only because its constituent elements and relationships are historically specific, but because that definition is itself the historical product of discursive processes.6 To presume that the dualistic metaphysics of reality and reflection is either simply true or that it is true of all religious traditions is to promote a universal definition of religion—one that is itself grounded on particular ideological, and indeed theological, pre-commitments.

Extraordinary language In order to provide a greater nuance to discussions of Buddhist understandings of language, we have introduced the concept of extraordinary language use. Ordinarily, language is without hesitation defined by scholars of philosophy and linguistics as the communication of information, and it is this understanding that we are calling ordinary language use.7 Such a definition of language necessitates the transfer of informative content between two parties to the communication as the criterion for ordinary language. On both aspects, informative content and the presence of two parties, the use of mantra, dhāraṇī, nenbutsu, and daimoku do not qualify as ordinary. These uses of language generally do not convey information. In some cases they may appear to be “descriptive,” as in an example given by Francis X. Clooney. He says that mantra are “verses sung or recited in the course of the performance of a sacrifice; usually their utterance inaugurates the particular action itself, or the material used, or the deity who is the recipient of the sacrifice.”8 He gives an example of such a mantra from the Mīmāṃsa author Śabara, which reads, “I am cutting the grass which becomes the seat of the gods.”9 Clooney explains that this “illuminates with meaning the act of cutting grass blades to use at the altar.”10 Although Clooney gives no explanations as to what he means by the opaque phrase “illuminates with meaning,” the expression is clearly not a description of the act of cutting grass for use in the ritual. It is instead an integral part of some ritual action, a compound action we might call “cutting grass blades for the seat of the gods.” Thus, although given in the declarative, this does not have propositional content; it is not true or false. Indeed, most mantra are not declarative in this way, and particularly in the Japanese context, even if some declarative content can be attributed to the mantra by some scholar, that content is not the intent of the practitioner using the mantra in the course of his/her ritual performance. Likewise, mantra and other forms of extraordinary language use are not communications between two parties—these are not conversations but rituals and ritualized acts that are in general not directed to anyone. Not conveying informative content from one party to another, such speech is not ordinary language. Although I have attempted to explain the category of extraordinary language as clearly as possible, this does not mean that it is a clearly demarcated category. It is instead a category with fuzzy boundaries. While a seed syllable mantra such as A can be considered prototypically extraordinary language, a mantra with a declarative form is less clearly so. Under the right conditions it would serve a declarative purpose— imagine if someone asked what you were doing on your hands and knees with a pair of secateurs cutting blades of grass in preparation for a ritual sacrifice. “I am cutting

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blades of grass for the seat of the gods,” would be a perfectly ordinary use of language. In the performance of that ritual, however, it is not an answer to a question and does not literally describe what is being done, but rather serves to complete a symbolic action, making it “ritually real.” That use of “the same” sentence is not informative, it is not conveying information about the action, and it is not a report about the action—it is itself part of the action. An additional consideration is that, although not specified by Clooney, we may presume that Śabara intends that the mantra be recited in Sanskrit. Were it ordinary communicative language, then as part of a ritual performed, for example, in the United States it could be translated into English. To do so, however, would according to Vedic understandings automatically render the expression ritually ineffective. The concept of extraordinary language allows us to see that although these uses have language-like characteristics, they do not function in the same way that ordinary language does. As a category, it gives us an additional nuance in understanding the variety of uses of language in Buddhist praxis.

Not cultural baggage Ideological positions are implicit in ritual practice, as noted by Glenn Wallis in his study of the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa and by Elizabeth English in her examination of the Vajrayoginī cult. Further, the two form a nondual dialectic, each informing and directing the other. A dichotomous opposition between ideology and practice is an artifice. While it may reflect in a correlative fashion some emic categories, this is a case where emic categories—no matter how well they may match existing scholarly preconceptions—should not be uncritically accepted as determinative. The division between doctrine and practice is an analytic artifact and not a natural one. As such it should only be employed heuristically and with reflection on proper context— rather than presuming that the distinction is natural or that doctrine is automatically privileged as determinative of practice. It is the question being asked that makes it worthwhile to draw the specific kind of distinction, whether between unmediated experience and language-informed reflection, between practice and doctrine, or between thought and action. Adequate reflection on the specific question for which the distinction is of value necessitates clear explication of the underlying presumptions, which can range across psychology, epistemology, religion, cosmology, anthropology, and ethics. It is simply not the case that thought and action, or ideology and practice, exist independently of one another and only then establish connections or relations across that divide. The contemporary Euro-American understanding of religion, informed by its own history of rising capitalist imperialism,11 automatically tends to privilege those “religious elements” of Buddhism that most closely correlate to contemporary Western ideas about what constitutes “religion.”12 This creates “Buddhism as object of legitimate study.”13 As a legitimate object of study, Buddhism is reformulated so as to fit into the existing preconceptions regarding religion, themselves for the most part simply sublations of late nineteenth-century liberal Protestantism. In addition to a privatized

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understanding of Buddhism as an individual, heroic quest, this means that doctrinal aspects, including karma, the decline of the dharma, emptiness, and so on, as well as aspects of practice, such as meditation and ritual, are what are considered to be “religious” and therefore legitimate objects of study. Delimiting the religious aspects of the Buddhisms transmitted to Japan in this way leaves everything outside of that etic boundary in the realm of nonreligious dimensions of culture—“cultural baggage” that is carried along with the religious content. Yet as shown earlier by Tanluan’s argument that there are words that are identical with their referents, and by Kūkai’s concern with proper pronunciation replicating Sanskrit, they and others we have mentioned did not consider these aspects of Buddhist thought to be merely peripheral or ancillary to its religious value. Rather, these aspects were understood to be central to the efficacy of Buddhist praxis. In other words, the philosophy of language—whether implicit or explicit—was not simply cultural baggage. To speak of Buddhism as “carrying” Indic culture to China creates an artificial division between Buddhism and Indic culture. In a discussion of the history of science, Robert J. Richards makes a point relevant to religion as well: “The mistake to avoid is the general presumption that scientific and logical factors can always be neatly separated from other cultural notions.”14 To paraphrase Richards for the purposes of the discussion here, we must also avoid the mistaken general presumption that religious factors can always be neatly separated from other cultural factors. Finally, attention to the continuity of conceptions regarding the efficacy of extraordinary language from India to Japanese Esoteric Buddhism helps to correct the unfortunate disconnect between Indian and Japanese Buddhist studies. This disconnect is in part informed by the area studies model, which continues to divide the field of Buddhist studies along artificial geopolitical boundaries.15 In the case of the study of Japanese Buddhism, this has only served to continue notions of Japanese Buddhist exceptionalism, the fetishizing of founders as religious geniuses, and the stylistic orientation of research, for example, literary studies, in the case of postwar Japan, vs. scholastic studies, in the case of medieval Indian Buddhism. These in turn have led to the current impression that what is called Indo-Tibetan Buddhism is scholastic in character and deals primarily with philosophic issues, while Japanese Buddhism is largely literary and aesthetic in character and lacks any significant scholastic concern with philosophic issues. Reflection on the nature of language is one important element of East Asian Buddhist scholasticism.

Relative trajectories of ideology and practice For over a century and a half, the study of religion in the Western academe has been defined by the study of doctrine—natural given the history of the field as an extension of theology, but hardly an adequate basis for an approach to the subject matter that does not bias inquiry by presuming the universality of the idea that doctrine is central. From the last quarter of the twentieth century into the present, however, alternative approaches have increasingly entered into the discourse of religious studies. Most important of these for my own studies has been the study of ritual. When considering

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the movement of religio-cultural traditions across societal boundaries, as we have done in this work, there arises the question of relative trajectories: doctrine and practice do not move with the same ease across such boundaries. In summarizing Frits Staal’s arguments for the meaninglessness of ritual, I once proposed a general principle: “Ritual actions are more stable over time and across cultural boundaries than are their interpretations.”16 One particularly subtle instance of this is Staal’s discussion of the relation between grammar and mantra in which he points out that when mantra that have been “constructed in accordance with the phonological rules of Sanskrit” are “exported from India to other countries, their phonological structure generally adapts itself to their new environment.”17 In this case the “interpretation” is by reference to phonology—the same mantra having different phonological interpretations in different linguistic contexts. What we have explored here, however, is that practice is always supported by some ideology, and ideology is maintained by practices. Practice and ideology do move together, despite the differences between the source and target religio-philosophical cultures. One of the conceptual difficulties to understanding this seems to be the tendency to treat doctrinal systems as philosophically consistent constructs, only concerned with conceptual matters. A second is the tendency in religious studies (and intellectual circles generally) to presume that doctrine (or thought) is determinative of action. Despite these presumptions, each is semiautonomous from the other and progresses in fits and starts along its own trajectory. Ideological or discursive systems, although internally reinforcing, are not closed systems, but rather fuzzy in their boundaries—like the shaded edging created in penumbra. Systems of thought, including ways of thinking about language, are always being made up in the present. Fabio Rambelli has described Esoteric Buddhism as “a discursive formation … an ensemble of knowledge and practices concerned with the interpretation of reality as well as the production, selection, conservation, and transmission of knowledge.”18 Such systems of praxis are in other words assemblages and are ongoing works in progress—not simply bricolage, but a continual process of renovation without beginning or end, always in media res. Diachronically such a system does not exist except in the abstract, and it is neither known nor possessed by anyone. In contrast, any synchronic “snap shot” shows such a system as a static one, at a specific time, but in doing so conceals the constant ongoing change of the system as a process. While the entire system is not in the possession of any one practitioner, practices and understandings of those practices are always conjoined dialectically. That dialectic relation is itself one in which the two are not always in close coordination.

In closing: The plurivalence of language Throughout this work, we have been suggesting that Buddhist attitudes toward language are complex and require a nuanced understanding. The category of extraordinary language has been proposed as one way of adding nuance to the received, and now outdated, view that Buddhism in its entirety holds a negative view toward language. Ryūichi Abé describes the moments following the Buddha Śākyamuni’s

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awakening when Brahmā appealed to Śākyamuni to teach the dharma despite the fact that it is “profound, difficult to understand, hard to realize, serene, sublime, beyond discrimination, and subtle.”19 Abé too suggests that there are two ways that this story can be read. The story might suggest that the truth can only be grasped by direct experience, and that language is neither essential for nor conducive to the achievement of enlightenment. This line of reading the episode is consistent with a view on the Buddhist attitude toward language held by many modern scholars: that Buddhism is generally skeptical about language because it considers that language obscures, rather than stimulates the awakening experience; and therefore that the ultimate truth rests in the silence of meditative experience and remains beyond the reach of words, concepts, and logic.20

Abé offers a second interpretation, drawing on the distinction between pratyekabuddhas, those awakened ones who either choose not to or lack the capacity to express their understanding to others, and saṃyak-saṃbuddhas, the perfectly awakened ones who are endowed with the eloquence to skillfully preach the dharma. They are also called tathāgata, or ju-lai in Chinese, those enlightened ones who have returned from thusness—that is, returned to our realm to guide beings here and lead them to the truth.21

Abé further points out that the Pāli vinaya records a set of verses (Skt./P. udāna) that the Buddha Śākyamuni is said to have spoken over the course of the night of his awakening. As a monologue, “the verse was uttered by the Buddha not to relate his experience to others but for himself. But for what purpose? Did these words assist Śākyamuni in ascertaining his progress toward perfect enlightenment? If they did, why do we talk about enlightenment and language as if they were two opposing poles?”22 Buddhist thought participates in the kind of oscillation between two attitudes toward language found in the image presented by de Certeau and which we have employed in this work. However, with Abé’s rhetorical question here at the end, we come to an understanding that awakening and language can be conceptualized as nondual. Each has its own unique character, the one cannot be reduced to the other, but both necessarily exist in relation to one another.

Character Glossary ajari, Ѫᮨཨ, Skt. ācārya, master ajikan,Ѫ࣊؏, visualizing the syllable A akusetsura rin,ዳႤདྡྷ, Skt. akṣaracakra, wheel of syllables Chūin-ryū, ஦Ӆླྀ, the largest lineage of Shingon Buddhism in present-day Japan daimoku, ୌ໪, lit. title, title of the Lotus Sūtra Dainichi Nyorai, ୉ೖ೙པ, Mahāvairocana Tathāgata, central buddha of the Shingon tradition dhāraṇī, ଭད೎ Fudō Myōō, ෈ಊ໎Ԩ, Skt. Acalanātha Vidyārāja, the “immovable lord of wisdom” Fudō myōō sokusai goma, ෈ಊ໎Ԩଋࡄ‫ޤ‬ຐ, protective fire offering with Fudō Myōō as chief deity gachirinkan, ݆ྡྷ؏, visualizing the moon cakra ganriki jinen, ‫ࣙྙب‬ષ, the spontaneous working of Amitābha’s vow regarding rebirth in Sukhāvatī Gokuraku, ‫ ֺۅ‬Skt. Sukhāvatī, land of bliss, Amitābha’s pure land goma, ‫ޤ‬ຐ, Skt. homa, ritual of votive fire offerings gorin sotoba, ‫౐ིྡྷޔ‬ᣵ, five-element stūpa hō, ๑, Skt. dharma honzon, ຌଜ, chief deity of a ritual; in tantric rituals, the deity is evoked into the mandala that is the altar hosshin seppō, ๑ਐઈ๑, preaching/teaching activity of the dharmakāya buddha Mahāvairocana jinen hōni, ࣙષ๑࣒, the natural and spontaneous working of things according to karma jingtu, ৞ౖ, jōdo, “purified ground” or “ground that purifies,” Chinese term referring to the character of a “pure land” such as Amitābha’s Sukhāvatī, possibly cognate with the Sanskrit pariśuddhabuddhakṣetra, “purified buddha-field” jirinkan,࣊ྡྷ᧼, wheel of syllables visualization juhachidō, ॉൂౕ, eighteen stages training, first of the four rituals in which a Shingon priest trains Katen, Ւళ, Agni kegare, ᜧ, pollution kōmyō shingon, ޭ໎ᚺ‫ݶ‬, “clear light” mantra Kongōbu-ji, ۜ߸้࣋, main temple complex of the Chūin-ryū lineage of Shingon Buddhism kongōkai, ۜ߸ֆ, Skt. vajradhātu, vajra realm, realm of discriminating wisdom Kōyasan, ߶໼ࢃ, Mt. Kōya, location of the main temple complex of the Chūin-ryū lineage of Shingon Buddhism

Character Glossary

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Kūkai, ‫ۯ‬ք(774–835), founder of Shingon mappō, ຦๑ final age of the dharma, period of final decline of the Buddha Śākyamuni’s teachings mikkyō, ື‫گ‬, Ch. mi chiao, esoteric myō, ຽ, Skt. vidyā, grammatically feminine mantra myōhi, ໎൴, Skt. vidyā-rājñṛ, the Queen of Wisdom/Light nenbutsu, ೨ဢ, Ch. nianfo, Skt. buddhānusmṛti, recollection of a buddha; conventionally, reciting the name of Amitābha nenju, ೨ᨛ, the string of beads used for recitation, usually comprising 108 beads Nichiren, ೖ࿉ (1222–1282), founder of Nichiren sects taking Lotus Sūtra as highest Buddhist teaching nyūga ganyū, ೘ըը೘, Skt. ahaṁkara, mutual interpenetration of practitioner and deity, central ritual action Okunoin, ԠӅ, lit. inner hall, mausoleum of Kūkai ryōiki or reiki, ᯨҡ‫ى‬, abbr. title of the Nihon ryōiki, collection of miraculous stories, tales of karmic retribution sanmitsu, ࢀື the three mysteries senju nenbutsu, ઒र೨ဢ, exclusive practice of nenbutsu, a teaching of Hōnen’s shidokegyō, ౕ࢝Յߨ, the four stages of a Shingon priest’s training, prayoga shikan taza, ᷭ؇଩࠳, just sitting, a style of Zen meditation taught in the Sōtō school shingon, ᚺ‫ݶ‬, Skt. mantra, lit. “true word”; also name of Esoteric Buddhist sect in Japan shōmyō nenbutsu, ᜟ໌೨ဢ, vocal recollection of a buddha, esp. the Buddha Amitābha, recitation of the nenbutsu shōnenju, ਜ਼೨ᨛ, right mindfulness, seventh of the eight stages of the path taizōkai, ଽ଄ֆ Skt. garbhadhātu, womb realm, realm of undifferentiated equality of all dharmas; conventionally, compassionate action Tanluan, ಸ᳷ (476–542), Jpn. Donran, Chinese priest, considered third of the seven patriarchs of the Shin Buddhism Tendai, ళୈ, Ch. Tiantai, school of Buddhism in sixth-century China, acquired esoteric dimension in Japan

Notes Introduction 1

The phrase “extraordinary language use” is employed to identify the category as a way of using language, rather than a particular kind of language per se. There are times in the following when, as a matter of stylistic convenience, the phrase “extraordinary language” is employed, but the reader will hopefully keep in mind that what we are describing is a way that language is used. 2 Robert A. Yelle, Language of Disenchantment: Protestant Liberalism and Colonial Discourse in British Asia (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2013). 3 Although I have frequently used the term “Euro-American” in an attempt to be more specific, it is not always the best term—more inclusive than Anglo-American, it may be in a sense too inclusive. “Western” is used here in reference to what is commonly referred to as modern philosophy, the intellectual project that is usually considered to be initiated by Descartes. 4 Recent works by several scholars, including Jay L. Garfield, William Edelglass, Tom J.F. Tillemans, Jan Westerhoff, and others working in those circles, have done much to critically move discussions beyond the limitations imposed by treating Western philosophy as unproblematically universal. 5 Mark Siderits, Indian Philosophy of Language: Studies in Selected Issues, Studies in Linguistics and Philosophy, no. 46 (Dordrecht, Boston, and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1991), 3. 6 Eivind Kahrs, Indian Semantic Analysis: The “nirvacana” Tradition, University of Cambridge Oriental Publications, no. 55 (Cambridge: University of Cambridge Press, 1998), 8. 7 Kahrs, Indian Semantic Analysis, 8. 8 Some critics of earlier versions of this work have suggested that in fact there are a wider range of ways that language is now theorized than as the communication of propositional information. While this is true, these all presume a common core of propositional form and then seek to add nuance to it. This critique will be discussed more fully in Chapter 1, “Extraordinary Language Use.” 9 Frits Staal, “The Concept of Metalanguage and Its Indian Background,” Journal of Indian Philosophy 3.3/4 (September 1975): 334. 10 Judith Simmer-Brown, Dakini’s Warm Breath: The Feminine Principle in Tibetan Buddhism (Boston, MA: Shambhala, 2002), 169. 11 Among many others, see Alex Wayman, The Buddhist Tantras: Light on Indo-Tibetan Esotericism (1973. Reprint. London and New York: Routledge, 2008), Chapter 11: “Twilight Language and a Tantric Song,” 128–135; and George Elder, “Problems of Language in Buddhist Tantra,” History of Religions 15.3 (February 1976): 231–250. An important collection in this regard is Bernhard Scheid and Mark Teeuwen, eds., The Culture of Secrecy in Japanese Religion (London and New York: Routledge, 2006), particularly the essay by Ronald Davidson.

Notes

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12 James Robson, “Signs of Power: Talismanic Writing in Chinese Buddhism,” History of Religions 48.2 (November 2008): 130–169. Idem., “Talismans in Chinese Esoteric Buddhism,” in Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Richard K. Payne (Leiden and Boston, MA: Brill, 2011), 225–229. 13 Paul Copp, The Body Incantatory: Spells and the Ritual Imagination in Medieval Chinese Buddhism (New York: Columbia University Press, 2014). 14 Saroj Kumar Chaudhuri, Siddham in China and Japan (Philadelphia: Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, 1998). 15 Christine Mollier. Buddhism and Taoism, Face to Face: Scripture, Ritual, and Iconographic Exchange in Medieval China (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2008). 16 Michel Strickmann, Chinese Poetry and Prophecy: The Written Oracle in East Asia, ed. Bernard Faure (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005).

Chapter 1 1

2 3

4

5

6

7

8 9

For detailed information on the establishment of the Shingon sect in Japan, see David Lion Gardiner, “Kūkai and the Beginnings of Shingon Buddhism in Japan,” dissertation, Stanford University, 1995. A subset of mantra and therefore not discussed separately here. See Chapter 5 for further on this category. The focus of this work being Japan and East Asia, consideration of the yogāvacara, and the similarities of its practices to those examined here is beyond the scope of this work. The interested reader should consult particularly Kate Crosby, “Tantric Theravāda: A Bibliographic Essay on the Writings of François Bizot and others on the Yogāvacara Tradition,” Contemporary Buddhism 1.2 (2000): 141–198. Michael Jerryson, “Introduction: The Buddhist System in Transition,” in The Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Buddhism, ed. Michael Jerryson (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2017; online DOI: 10.1093/ oxfordhb/9780199362387.013.22), 1. I employed the term “discourse” in this phrase in the broad sense of informing and convincing. As these uses are not informative, they might also be called “nonpropositional.” The use of “discourse” here is intended to be more technically specific than some of the postmodern uses in which discourse is seen to be the sole form of constructing worlds of experience (lebenswelt). John L. Locke, “Social Sound-Making as Precursor to Spoken Language,” in Approaches to the Evolution of Language, ed. James R. Hurford, Michael Studdert-Kennedy, and Chris Knight (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 192. The communication of information is not the same as a referential theory of meaning, a basic distinction not understood by the respondent to a related work “On Not Understanding Extraordinary Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan,” forthcoming in Religion, when it was presented at the American Academy of Religions conference in San Antonio, 2016. These correspond to the six functions of language identified by Roman Jakobson. Frits Staal, Ritual and Mantras: Rules without Meaning (New York: Peter Lang, 1990), 293.

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10 Frits Staal, “Vedic Mantras,” in Mantra, ed. Harvey P. Alper (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), 72–73. 11 Derek Bickerton, Language and Species (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1990). 12 Michael Tomasello, Origins of Human Communication (Cambridge and London: The MIT Press, 2008). For an approach that takes into account language as a means of deception, see Chris Knight, “Ritual/Speech Coevolution: A Solution to the Problem of Deception” in Approaches to the Evolution of Language: Social and Cognitive Bases (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 68–91. 13 Robbins Burling, The Talking Ape: How Language Evolved (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2005). 14 Donald S. Lopez, Jr., Elaborations on Emptiness: Uses of the Heart Sūtra (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), 165. 15 Copp, The Body Incantatory, xvi. 16 The phrase “conducive to awakening” was coined in order to avoid the term “soteriology” and its connotations, which are not simply inappropriate for discussing Buddhism but are actively misleading by automatically structuring discourse in a particular way. 17 Robert A. Yelle, Explaining Mantras: Ritual, Rhetoric, and the Dream of a Natural Language in Hindu Tantra, Religion in History, Society and Culture, no. 3 (New York and London: Routledge, 2003), 4. 18 Umberto Eco, The Search for the Perfect Language, trans. James Fentress (Oxford, UK, and Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1995). Yelle’s additional goal is to demonstrate that such a conception of a particular kind of efficacious language is not limited to the tantric traditions, and for this purpose employing the terminology of mantra as perfect language would more effectively link his work to Eco’s study of this phenomenon. 19 Yelle, Explaining Mantras, 62. 20 Steve Farmer, “Neurobiology, Stratified Texts, and the Evolution of Thought: From Myths to Religions and Philosophies,” 6, http://www.safarmer.com, accessed June 12, 2007. Farmer’s use of the concept is placed within a broadly comparative context. 21 The valences of meditation as positive and ritual as negative are socially determined, bound into the English-language discourse about religion, and rooted in the theological debates of the Reformation era. 22 Stanley Tambiah, Culture, Thought, and Social Action: An Anthropological Perspective (Cambridge, MA, and London: Harvard University Press, 1985), 60–61; see also ch. 4, “A Performative Approach to Ritual.” For additional examples, see Ellison Banks Findly, “Mántra kaviśastá: Speech as Performative in the Ṛgveda,” in Understanding Mantras, ed. Harvey P. Alpert (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), 15–47; Wade T. Wheelock, “The Mantra in Vedic and Tantric Ritual,” in Understanding Mantras, ed. Harvey P. Alper (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), 96–122; John Taber, “Are Mantras Speech Acts? The Mīmāṃsā Point of View,” in Understanding Mantras, ed. Harvey P. Alper (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), 144–164; and Harvey P. Alper, “The Cosmos as Śiva’s Language–Game: ‘Mantra’ According to Kṣemarāja’s Śivasūtravimarśinī,” in Mantra, ed. Harvey P. Alper (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), 249–294. 23 José Ignacio Cabezón, Buddhism and Language: A Study of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1994), 3.

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24 Paul O. Ingram, “The Power of Truth Words: Kūkai’s Philosophy of Language and Hermeneutical Theory,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, n.s. 7 (1991): 19–20. 25 Richard D. McBride, II, “The Mysteries of Body, Speech, and Mind: The Three Esoterica (Sanmi) in Medieval Sinitic Buddhism,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 29.2 (2006): 305–355. McBride has pointed out in two additional essays that the usage of the terminology of secrecy in East Asian Buddhism has to do with establishing the unique character of a teaching as special and out of the ordinary, rather than technically tantric. See his “Enchanting Monks and Efficacious Spells: Rhetoric and the Role of Dhāraṇī in Medieval Chinese Buddhism,” Bul gyo hak bo 72 (2015): 167–200, and “Is there really ‘Esoteric’ Buddhism?” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 27. 2 (2004): 329–356. 26 Thomas P. Kasulis, “Truth Words: The Basis of Kūkai’s Theory of Interpretation,” in Buddhist Hermeneutics, ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr. (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1992), 262. 27 This is not intended as a definition of “ritualization” but simply as a pointer to the contexts within which extraordinary language is employed. 28 Jan Gonda, “The Indian Mantra,” Oriens 16 (December 31, 1963), 254. 29 Gonda, “The Indian Mantra,” 245. 30 Sir John Woodroffe (1865–1936), under his nom de plume Arthur Avalon, The Tantra of Great Liberation (Mahānirvāna Tantra) (New York: Dover Publications, 1972, reprint), lxxxvi. 31 Gonda, “The Indian Mantra,” 248. 32 Gonda, “The Indian Mantra,” 248. 33 Gonda, “The Indian Mantra,” 248. 34 Gonda, “The Indian Mantra,” 255. 35 See André Padoux, Vāc: The Concept of the Word in Selected Hindu Tantras, trans. Jacques Gontier (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1990). 36 Francis X. Clooney, “Why the Veda Has No Author: Language as Ritual in Early Mīmāṃsā and Post-Modern Theology,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 55.4 (Winter 1987): 671. 37 Wheelock, “The Mantra in Vedic and Tantric Ritual.” 38 Gavin Flood, Body and Cosmology in Kashmir Śaivism (San Francisco: Mellen Research University Press, 1993), 41. 39 Cullavagga, 5.6. See “A Wish of Loving Kindness” (Cv 5.6), trans. by Andrew Olendzki. Access to Insight (BCBS Edition), November 2, 2013, http://www. accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/vin/cv/cv.05.06.01x.olen.html. For another instance, see Ernst Waldschmidt’s 1959 essay, “The Upasenasūtra: A Charm against Snake-Bites from the Saṃyukāgama,” in Ausgewählte Kleine Schriften, ed. Heinz Bechert and Petra Kieffer-Pülz (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1989, reprint), 180–200. 40 Yoshito S. Hakeda, Kūkai: Major Works (New York: Columbia University Press, 1972), 144. 41 Richard K. Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan: Feeding the Gods, The Shingon Fire Ritual (Delhi: International Academy of Indian Culture and Aditya Prakashan, 1991), 98. 42 Yelle, Explaining Mantras, 11. 43 Koichi Shinohara, “Removal of Sins in Esoteric Buddhist Ritual: A Study of the Dafangdeng Dhāraṇī Scripture,” in Sins and Sinners: Perspectives from Asian Religions, ed. Phyllis Granoff and Koichi Shinohara (Leiden: Brill Academic Publishing, 2012), 244. 44 Shinohara, “Removal of Sins in Esoteric Buddhist Ritual,” 244.

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45 Chi Chen Ho, “The Śūraṃgama Dhāraṇī in Sintic Buddhist Context: From the Tang Dynasty through the Contemporary Period,” dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles, 2010, 3–4. 46 Paul Copp, “Dhāraṇī Scriptures,” in Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia, ed. Charles D. Orzech, Henrik Sørensen and Richard K. Payne (Leiden and Boston, MA: Brill, 2011), 176. 47 Jens Braarvig, “Dhāraṇī and Pratibhāna: Memory and Eloquence of the Bodhisattvas,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 8.1 (1985): 17–29. 48 McBride, II, “Enchanting Monks and Efficacious Spells,” 170. 49 Ronald M. Davidson, “Studies in Dhāraṇī Literature I: Revisiting the Meaning of the Term Dhāraṇī,” Journal of Indian Philosophy 37.2 (2009): 107, 97–147. 50 Arlo Griffiths, “The ‘Greatly Ferocious’ Spell (Mahāraudra-nāma-hṛdaya): A dhāraṇī Inscribed on a Lead-Bronze Foil Unearthed near Borobudur,” in Epigraphic Evidence in the Pre-Modern Buddhist World, ed. Kurt Tropper (Vienna: Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien, Universität Wien, 2014), 1–36. Gregory Schopen, “The Text on the ‘Dhāraṇī Stones from Abhayagiriya’: A Minor Contribution to the Study of Mahāyāna Literature in Ceylon,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 5.1 (1982): 99–108. Thomas Cruijsen, Arlo Griffiths, and Marijke J. Klokke, “The cult of the Buddhist dhāraṇī deity Mahāpratisarā along the Maritime Silk Route: New epigraphical and iconographic evidence from the Indonesian Archipelago,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 35.1–2 (2012): 71–157. 51 Jacob P. Dalton, “How Dhāraṇīs WERE Proto-Tantric: Liturgies, Ritual Manuals and the Origins of the Tantras,” in Tantric Traditions in Transmission and Translation (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 199. 52 Dalton, “How Dhāraṇīs WERE Proto-Tantric,” 200. 53 Dalton, “How Dhāranīs WERE Proto-Tantric,” 200. From my own perspective it is doubtful that dhāraṇīs have any intrinsic deep philosophical insight, but rather that as the object of interpretation, a “reading” might creatively attribute such insights to them. 54 Dalton, “How Dhāraṇīs WERE Proto-Tantric,” 204. Dalton calls attention to the similar structure found in paritta texts as described by Peter Skilling, “The Rakṣā Literature of the Śrāvakayāna,” Journal of the Pali Text Society 16 (1992): 109–182. 55 See Chapter 8. This count is based on Leon Hurvitz’ translation of Kumārajīva’s Chinese translation; Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma: The Lotus Sūtra (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976). 56 Young-ho Kim, Tao-sheng’s Commentary on the Lotus Sūtra: A Study and Translation (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1990), 332. 57 Hurvitz, Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 321. 58 On the “language-positive” stance of the Lotus Sūtra tradition, see Jacqueline Stone, “‘Not Mere Written Words’: Perspectives on the Language of the Lotus Sūtra in Medieval Japan,” in Discourse and Ideology in Medieval Japanese Buddhism, ed. Richard K. Payne and Taigen Dan Leighton (London and New York: Routledge, 2006), 160–194. 59 One example is the Jishū sect, which retains a few temples in present-day Japan, including one as part of the Shikoku pilgrimage route. See Caitilin J. Griffiths, Tracing the Itinerant Path: Jishū Nuns of Medieval Japan (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2016). 60 Jacqueline I. Stone, Original Enlightenment and the Transformation of Medieval Japanese Buddhism (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1999), 241–242.

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61 Made most widely known in the present, probably by the rise of Sōka Gakkai from the middle of the twentieth century both in Japan and internationally. A very sensitive treatment of the internationalization of Sōka Gakkai is Richard Hughes Seager, Encountering the Dharma: Daisaku Ikeda, Soka Gakkai, and the Globalization of Buddhist Humanism (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2006). 62 Yoshiko K. Dykstra, trans., Miraculous Tales of the Lotus Sutra from Ancient Japan: The Dainihonkoku hokekyōkenki by Priest Chingen (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1987). 63 Tale no. 18 in Kyoko Motomochi Nakamura, trans., Miraculous Stories from the Japanese Buddhist Tradition: The Nihon ryōiki of the Monk Kyōkai, 2 vols. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1973), I: 129–130. 64 Tale no. 19 in Nakamura, Miraculous Stories from the Japanese Buddhist Tradition, I: 130–131. 65 Kate Bowler, Blessed: A History of the American Prosperity Gospel (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2013). 66 Glenn Wallis notes a similar set of qualifications in relation to mantra (discussed in the next chapter) but sees these as consistent with ordinary language use as well. These kinds of qualifications do make recitation of the daimoku similar to Austin’s understanding of performative speech, a technical issue discussed in Payne, “On Not Understanding Extraordinary Language in the Buddhist Tantra of Japan,” Religions 8.10 (2017): 223., as well as in the next chapter. 67 This is to oversimplify the nature of Pure Land Buddhism, which is, in fact, quite messy unless defined into submission by stipulation. 68 A third name Aparimitāyus, which has much the same meaning as Amitāyus, is also rendered into Chinese by the same characters. See Richard K. Payne, “Aparimitāyus: ‘Tantra’ and ‘Pure Land’ in Medieval Indian Buddhism?” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 9 (2007): 273–308. 69 Jan Nattier, Once upon a Future Time: Studies in a Buddhist Prophecy of Decline (Berkeley : Asian Humanities Press, 1991). 70 The exact number is a matter of debate among Pure Land writers, depending on a variety of different interpretations of different texts. The number 10 is found frequently and will serve my purposes here. 71 Today the two largest Pure Land sects are Jodō and Jodō Shinshū, but there are other smaller Pure Land traditions as well. 72 This term seems to function suspiciously like a catchall for usages that cannot be otherwise categorized as communicative. 73 As will be discussed more fully in the next chapter, the recitation of a mantra or dhāraṇī does not communicate either propositional content or any of its variants from one person to another. For example, though a mantra may be associated with a specific action in a ritual, its function is very different from asking someone to “please pass the salt.” 74 André Padoux, “Mantras—What Are They?” in Understanding Mantras, ed. Henry P. Alpert (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), 302. 75 Glenn Wallis, Mediating the Power of the Buddhas (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002) 58. 76 Talal Asad, Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), 36. See also William S. Sax, Mountain Goddess: Gender and Politics in a Himalayan Pilgrimage (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), 10, commenting on the examination of worldviews:

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Notes As I see it, formal statements about the world and humanity’s place in it are based upon certain ‘commonsense’ assumptions and categories that, like the categories of grammar and syntax, are neither criticized, nor reflected upon, nor explicitly formulated (at least not very often). Because people rarely feel the need to formalize such categories, they generally remain implicit and must therefore be inferred from the languages in which they are encoded, the institutions in which they are embedded, and the thoughts and actions that they have influenced.

Chapter 2 1 2

Ingram, “The Power of Truth Words,” 15. This particular formulation also smuggles in the notion of the primacy of experience, itself part of the discursive presumptions about the nature of language and the nature of awakening. In contrast, Steven Heine has indicated that Dōgen’s use of kōans is not based on a dichotomy between “language used in kōan cases and the silence of enlightenment” (“Kōans in the Dōgen Tradition: How and Why Dōgen Does What He Does with Kōans,” Philosophy East and West 54.1 (2004): 2). 3 For just one example, see Ninian Smart, “Mysticism and Scripture in Theravāda Buddhism,” in Mysticism and Sacred Scripture, ed. Steven T. Katz (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 232–241. 4 This debate is recorded in several volumes edited by Steven T. Katz, including Mysticism and Philosophical Analysis (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), Mysticism and Religious Traditions (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1983), and Mysticism and Sacred Scripture (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000). 5 On the grounding of popular Buddhist praxis in Romanticism, see Laurence Cox, “European Buddhist Traditions,” in The Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Buddhism, ed. Michael Jerryson (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 339. Also, Martin Baumann, “Modernist Interpretations of Buddhism in Europe,” in Buddhism in the Modern World, ed. David L. McMahan (New York: Routledge, 2012), 127–129. 6 This distinguishes between the modern representation of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, which has developed from the 1960s onward, and the older representation of Tibetan Buddhism, which developed in light of the projection of Orientalist fantasies such as those of the nineteenth-century Theosophical Society. 7 John Drew, India and the Romantic Imagination (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1998), and Mark S. Lussier, Romantic Dharma: The Emergence of Buddhism into Nineteenth-Century Europe (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011). 8 Anthony Pagden, The Enlightenment: And Why It Still Matters (New York: Random House, 2013), 330. 9 Schematically, the historical trajectory has been from the theological claims of Schleiermacher, to the philosophy of religion of Otto, to preconceptions about the nature of religion in contemporary religious studies. 10 For a presentation of what he calls the “canonical position,” see Steven T. Katz, “Mystical Speech and Mystical Meaning,” in Mysticism and Language, ed. Steven T. Katz (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 3–4.

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11 This epistemology would seem to actually be rooted in the epistemological psychology of the English Empiricists John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume, which is almost entirely unchanged since their time and now taken as simply given. 12 See Shinobu Kitayama and Hazel Rose Markus, eds., Emotion and Culture: Empirical Studies of Mutual Influence (Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 1994); Zoltán Kövecses, Metaphor and Emotion: Language, Culture, and Body in Human Feeling (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000); Paul E. Griffiths, What Emotions Really Are: The Problem of Psychological Categories (Chicago, IL and London: Chicago University Press, 1997). 13 Within this metanarrative, mystical experience is frequently understood as having a singular object—all mystical experiences are of the same transcendent object called variously God, the One, the Absolute, and so on. The philosophic difficulties of fitting a tradition that is at least nontheistic, if not actively atheistic, and that posits an ontology of constant interdependent change, into such a view of religion, are usually simply elided. 14 The Romantic movement is itself a complex one and has been the object of a great deal of study. We can only give broad indications here of its relation to religious studies, Buddhist studies, and the understandings of language relevant to our study. In significant ways, the Romantics are more complicated in these matters than neoRomantic preconceptions in which they were still struggling with issues. In contrast to the sometimes greater nuance of Romantics themselves, neo-Romanticism has been largely reduced to an almost formulaic set of unexamined preconceptions, displaying much less nuance. 15 For an example of neo-Romantic theory of language in relation to the topic of this chapter, see Randall R. Scott, “The Music of the Mantra: Aural Efficacy and Aesthetics in Buddhist Esotericism,” Arc: The Journal of the Faculty of Religious Studies, McGill 27 (1999): 79–96. 16 Paul Heelas and Rachel Kohn, “Psychotherapy and Techniques of Transformation,” in Beyond Therapy: The Impact of Eastern Religions on Psychological Theory and Practice, ed. Guy Claxton (London: Wisdom Publications, 1986), 293–309, 293–294. 17 See Robert Sharf, “Buddhist Modernism and the Rhetoric of Meditative Experience,” Numen 42.3 (October 1995): 247. 18 Or as an instance of the “pizza effect.” 19 John R. McRae, “Oriental Verities on the American Frontier: The 1893 World’s Parliament of Religions and the Thought of Masao Abe,” Buddhist–Christian Studies 11 (1991): 7–36. 20 In a gesture of self-disclosure, I will claim that having come of age in the 1960s and 1970s in the Greater San Francisco Bay Area, I drank deeply of the waters of neoRomantic rhetoric that informed so much of the counterculture. While skeptics might see this as reason for rejecting my critiques as simply themselves reactionary (“killing the father” perhaps?), it indicates a deep familiarity with that rhetoric. 21 Thomas A. Tweed, “American Occultism and Japanese Buddhism: Albert J. Edmunds, D.T. Suzuki, and Translocative History,” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 32.2 (2005): 249–281. 22 Michael Stoeber, “The Comparative Study of Mysticism,” in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Religion (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 2–3. 23 For a more balanced presentation of the full range of the practices involved in Buddhist monastic training, see George B. J. Dreyfus, The Sound of Two Hands Clapping: The Education of a Buddhist Monk (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press, 2003).

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24 Huston Smith, The World’s Religions: Our Great Wisdom Traditions (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1991, rev. ed., a slight reworking of his original 1958 work, The Religions of Man): 88. Smith goes so far as to render muni as “silent sage,” a definition he fails to make clear as his own interpretation. This rendering is unsupported by Monier Monier-Williams’ A Sanskrit-English Dictionary (Tokyo: Oxford University Press, 1982, reprint). There are many other problems with Smith’s representation of Buddhism that can be traced to his theological commitment to the belief system of perennialism and traditionalism. 25 Raymond W. Gibbs, Jr., Embodiment and Cognitive Science (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 4. 26 Carl Andrew Seaquist, “Ritual Syntax,” dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 2004, 24. 27 Catherine Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 19–20. 28 Some theorists equate a speaker’s or actor’s intention with the meaning of the speech or action. The question of whether authorial intent is ultimate, however, mitigates against such a simple equation. 29 There have been very important advances in self-reflective scholarship on the cultural locatedness of philosophy. Notably, William Edelglass and Jay L. Garfield, eds., The Oxford Handbook of World Philosophy (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2011). It is worth noting, however, that the editors feel it necessary to begin by explicitly “rejecting the widespread belief that one’s own culture is the only one in which philosophical thought has or even could emerge.” A much stronger statement regarding the parochial character of contemporary US philosophy is found in Jay L. Garfield and Bryan W. Van Norden, “If Philosophy Won’t Diversify, Let’s Call It What It Really Is,” New York Times, May 11, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/11/ opinion/if-philosophy-wont-diversify-lets-call-it-what-it-really-is.html, accessed Sunday, July 9, 2017. 30 Most treatments of the philosophy of language are strikingly parochial, giving attention only to what may be called the Anglo-American stream of thought. For example, an examination of A. P. Martinich and David Sosa, eds., The Philosophy of Language (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001, fourth edn.), might lead one to conclude that modern Continental philosophers had never thought philosophically about language. Such a narrow scope perhaps also explains why the Indic philosophy of language remains marginal as well. 31 James R. Hurford, The Origins of Meaning: Language in the Light of Evolution (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2007). 32 Burling, The Talking Ape, 67–68. The importance of making this point regarding the foundational character of referential thought and the role of reference as basic to modern theories of language was driven home to me by Christian Wedemeyer’s response to a presentation of this material at the American Academy of Religion, 2016. Wedemeyer dismissed my critique of philosophy of language by saying that “since de Saussure [sic] (himself over a century ago) semiology (the study of the use of signs in society) has suggested that the relationship between signifier and signified understood as direct denotation is arguably the least significant aspect of linguistic reference” (emphasis in original, personal communication, January 17, 2017). Despite this, the relation between word and object continues to play a central theoretical role, corresponding to the importance given to it by Hurford and Burling. My point is neither to assert nor to dispute the importance of referential thought but rather to point out the

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limitations imposed by its presumption in philosophy of language and linguistics when those approaches are turned to for explanations for extraordinary language. Eve E. Sweetser, From Etymology to Pragmatics: Metaphorical and Cultural Aspects of Semantic Structure (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 1. David Woodruff Smith, “The Role of Phenomenology in Analytical Philosophy,” in The Oxford Handbook of the History of Analytical Philosophy, ed. Michael Beaney (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 1118. Jacques Derrida, “Form and Meaning: A Note on the Phenomenology of Language,” in Margins of Philosophy, ed. Jacques Derrida, trans. Alan Bass (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 159. Sweetser, From Etymology to Pragmatics, 6. Anna Wierzbicka, Imprisoned in English: The Hazards of English as a Default Language (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2014). Zoltán Kövecses, Language, Mind, and Culture: A Practical Introduction (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2006). Sweetser, From Etymology to Pragmatics, 8. Paul Ricoeur, The Rule of Metaphor, trans. Robert Czerny (1977. Reprint. London: Routledge, 2003). Mark Johnson, The Mind in the Body: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination, and Reason (Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press, 1987), xxx. See, for example, Benveniste’s critique of Saussure for covertly introducing the referent (object) into an otherwise two-part theory of signifier (sound symbol) and signified (concept). Emile Benveniste, “The Nature of the Linguistic Sign,” in Problems in General Linguistics, trans. Mary Elizabeth Meek (Coral Gables, Fl.: University of Miami Press, 1971), 43–48. Cf. Ruth M. Kempson, Semantic Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), 28–33. Kempson has argued that there is no nonarbitrary difference between a semantics based on the idea of meaning as truth conditions and a semantics based on the idea of meaning as the logical entailments. Kempson, Semantic Theory, 76. We note that like other works in this field, this assertion of identity is atemporal; that is, it ignores that truth conditions may in some sense be said to preexist a statement, while entailments follow it. I simply note this here without attempting to argue that the difference is significant for our discussion. John R. Searle, Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969), 29. Searle, Speech Acts, 40. From entirely different directions, see A. L. Becker, Beyond Translation: Essays Toward a Modern Philology (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1995); Xinli Wang, Incommensurability and Cross-Language Communication (Hants, England, and Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007). The “principle of compositionality” is today expressed as “The meaning of a compound expression is a function of the meanings of its parts and of the way they are syntactically combined” (Theo Janssen, “Compositionality: Its Historic Context,” in The Oxford Handbook of Compositionality, ed. Wolfram Hinzen, Edouard Machery, and Markus Werning (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 19, online, DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199541072.013.0001). On the difficulties entailed by such an approach, see Staal, “Vedic Mantras,” 48–95. Staal, “Vedic Mantras,” 74.

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Notes Locke, “Social Sound-Making as Precursor to Spoken Language,” 192. John Lyons, Semantics, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), I: 244. Though unfortunately I no longer have the work available, I do recall seeing basically this same model employed to explain memory. Regarding the invisibility of “dead” metaphors, see Paul Ricoeur, The Rule of Metaphor: Multidisciplinary Studies of the Creation of Meaning and Language, trans. Robert Czerny, with Kathleen McLaughlin and John Costello (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1977). Julia Kristeva, Language the Unknown: An Initiation into Linguistics, trans. Anne M. Menke (New York: Columbia University Press, 1989), 10. Alan Cruse, Meaning in Language: An Introduction to Semantics and Pragmatics, third edn. (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 5. Wolfgang Carl, Frege’s Theory of Sense and Reference: Its Origins and Scope (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 121. Daniel C. Dennett, Consciousness Explained (Boston, MA: Back Bay Books, 1992), 101–138. See Terrence W. Deacon, Incomplete Nature: How Mind Emerged from Matter (New York and London: W.W. Norton, 2012), 69–72. Luca Gasparri and Diego Marconi, “Word Meaning,” in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy 2016 (http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2016/entries/word-meaning/, accessed Friday, July 7, 2017), 4. Ricoeur, The Rule of Metaphor, 101–104. Sweetser, From Etymology to Pragmatics, 59. J.L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words: The William James Lectures Delivered at Harvard University in 1955, second edn., ed. J. O. Urmson and Marina Sbisà (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975). The performative theory of language, used in a narrow sense here, must be distinguished from Searle’s extension of it in his own idea of speech acts. Rather than a theory of actions performed through speech, as in Austin’s case, Searle’s ideas form a more general theory about the variety of functions to which language may be put. Stanley Tambiah, “A Performative Theory of Ritual,” Proceedings of the British Academy 65 (1979): 113–169. Reprinted in Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah, Culture, Thought, and Social Action: An Anthropological Perspective (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985), 123–166. Cf. Jonathan Z. Smith, “Trading Places,” in Ancient Magic and Ritual Power, ed. Marvin Meyer and Paul Mirecki (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1995), 15. Although Padoux does not use the terminology of performative language, this seems to be his conclusion reached when he writes that the function of mantras “is a direct action, generally a ritual one, or a psychological or mystical one”; “Mantras—What Are They?,” 302. Yan Huang, “Introduction: What Is Pragmatics?” in The Oxford Handbook of Pragmatics (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2017; online DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199697960.013.33), 2. The term “beyond” is purposely ambiguous here. Yan Huang has noted that there are two understandings regarding the relation between pragmatics and other elements of language as identified by philosophy of language and linguistics. One, which he calls the “component view,” sees pragmatics as one of several such elements, while the other, which he calls the “perspective view,” sees pragmatics as a perspective from which to view all other elements. Huang, “Introduction: What Is Pragmatics?” 1.

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This is a shift from the long-standing attempt to define language as an abstraction, going back at least to Frege’s insistence on sense (Sinn) being objective. This in turn goes back to Saussure’s distinction between langue and parole and has been carried forward very strongly into contemporary linguistics by Chomsky’s rejection of an empirical approach to the study of language. On Chomsky as a rationalist, see Randy Allen Harris, The Linguistics Wars (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 65–68. Charles Goodwin and Alessandro Duranti, “Rethinking Context: An Introduction,” in Rethinking Context: Language as an Interactive Phenomenon, ed. Alessandro Duranti and Charles Goodwin (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 3. In the same volume, see also the essay by John J. Gumperz, “Contextualization and Understanding,”in Rethinking Context: Language as an Interactive Phenomenon, ed. Alessandro Duranti and Charles Goodwin (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 229–252. Austin, How to Do Things with Words, 14–15. Glenn Wallis, “The Buddha’s Remains: Mantra in the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 24.1 (2001): 91–92; also Glenn Wallis, Mediating the Power of the Buddhas: Ritual in the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002), 30. Yelle indicates that “Our intuition that such formulas become more powerful through repetition is shared by the Tantric tradition” (Explaining Mantras, 12). In a pure structuralism, meaning is entirely explained solely by intralinguistic contrasts. Such an approach would itself presume an abstraction of language, rather than a phenomenology of language. A phenomenological approach would necessitate extralinguistic contrasts as well. Patrizia Violi writes in Meaning and Experience, trans. Jeremy Carden (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2001), 48: “All vocabulary that refers to a corporeal and perceptual phenomenology requires semiotic translation into an interpretant which cannot be exclusively linguistic. Neither can purely intralinguistic differential relations resolve the problem, because the meaning of sour is something more than ‘not sweet’ or ‘not salty’.” Daniel Chandler, Semiotics: The Basics (London: Routledge, 2002), 13, 44. See Lyons, Semantics, I: 240–241. For a discussion of the relative value of etymological treatments in relation to socially attributed meanings, see Donald S. Lopez, Jr., “The Spell,” in Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West (Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press, 1998), 114–134. Christoph Lindtner, trans., Master of Wisdom: Writings of the Buddhist Master Nāgārjuna (Emeryville, CA: Dharma Publishing, 1997, rev. edn.), 121. Kathryn A. Woolard, “Language Ideology as a Field of Inquiry,” in Language Ideologies: Practice and Theory, ed. Bambi B. Schieffelin, Kathryn A. Woolard, and Paul V. Kroskirity (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 3. Michel De Certeau, The Mystic Fable, Volume One: The Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, trans. Michael B. Smith (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press, 1992), 115. de Certeau, The Mystic Fable, Volume One, 114. Fabio Rambelli, “Sémiotique Bouddhiste: Perspectives et Questions Ouvertes,” Protée 39 2 (Fall 2011): 12. Stone, “‘Not Mere Written Words’: Perspectives on the Language of the Lotus Sūtra in Medieval Japan,” in Discourse and Ideology in Medieval Japanese Buddhism, ed. Richard K. Payne and Taigen Dan Leighton (London and New York: Routledge 2006), 162. Stone, “Not Mere Written Words,” 162–163.

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Chapter 3 1

2

3

4 5

6 7

8 9 10

11 12 13

The “Rebirth Treatise” (T. 1524, Jing tu lun) is attributed to Vasubandhu: Wuliangshou jing youbotishe yuansheng jing (Treatise on the sutra of the [Buddha] of Immeasurable Life and the Verses on the Aspiration for Rebirth); see Richard K. Payne, “The Five Contemplative Gates of Vasubandhu’s Rebirth Treatise as a Ritualized Visualization Practice,” in The Pure Land Tradition: History and Development, ed. James Foard, Michael Solomon, and Richard K. Payne (Berkeley : Center for South and Southeast Asian Studies, University of California at Berkeley, 1996). Reprinted in Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 17 (2015). Richard K. Payne, “Dhāraṇī in the Lotus Sūtra: Indic Context for the Power of Words,” paper presented at the Fifth Biennial Lotus Sūtra Conference, Marburg University, Marburg, Germany, May 4–7, 2002. See Chapter 8. This emphasis on logic is basic to Gottlob Frege’s founding of modern philosophy of language, evident in his rejection of psychologism. Michael Morris, An Introduction to the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 22–28. Also, Peter Hylton, “Ideas of a Logically Perfect Language in Analytic Philosophy,” in The Oxford Handbook of Analytic Philosophy, ed. Michael Beaney (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 906–925, online DOI: 10.1093/ oxfordhb/9780199238842.013.0013. Kenneth Taylor, Truth and Meaning: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Language (Oxford: Blackwell, 1998), 39. On the cosmogonic role of speech, Vāc, see W. Norman Brown, “Agni, Sun, Sacrifice, and Vāc: A Sacerdotal Ode by Dīrghatamas (Rig Ved 1.164),” Journal of the American Oriental Society 88.2 (April–June 1968): 199–218. Brown says that in this hymn, “Behind and over the cosmos and the Sacrifice is Vāc. She is the One Real (neut.). From her emanated the unorganized material of the universe and the sacrificial ritual needed to organize it, which Agni learned” (p. 199). Frits Staal, “Oriental Ideas on the Origin of Language,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, 99.1 (January–March 1979): 1–14, 10. Elisa Freschi, “A Study of Indian Linguistics: Prescriptive Function of Language in the Nyāyamañjarī and in the Speech Act Theory,” 2013, 3, online: https://www.academia. edu/35308844/The_Study_of_Indian_Linguistics._Prescriptive_Function_of_Language_ in_the_Ny%C4%81yama%C3%B1jar%C4%AB_and_in_the_Speech_Act_Theory. Theo Janssen, “Compositionality: Its Historic Context,” in The Oxford Handbook of Compositionality (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2012). Mark Siderits, Indian Philosophy of Language: Studies in Selected Issues (Dordrecht, Boston, and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1991), 4. Also known, more fully, as the Humboldt-Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, “according to which conceptual structures are seen as the products of a linguistically determined ‘construction’ of social ‘reality,’” a designation Sapir himself may not have supported; Pieter A. M. Seuren, Western Linguistics: An Historical Introduction (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 1998), 188. On the use of mantra in Vedic ritual, see Wade T. Wheelock, “Patterns of Mantra Use in a Vedic Ritual,” Numen, 32.2 (1985): 169–193. Staal, “Vedic Mantras,” 48. Sheldon Pollock, The Language of the Gods in the World of Men: Sanskrit, Culture, and Power in Premodern India (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press, 2006), 106.

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14 Patton E. Burchett, “The ‘Magical’ Language of Mantra,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76.4 (December 2008): 820. 15 Sukumar Sen, “On Dhāraṇī and Pratisarā,” in Studies of Esoteric Buddhism and Tantrism: In Commemoration of the 1,150th Anniversary of the Founding of Koyasan (Koyasan: Koyasan University, 1965), 67. 16 Arion Rosu, “Mantra et Yantra dans la Médecine et l’Alchimie Indiennes,” Journal Asiatique (1986): 205. 17 Johannes Bronkhorst, Langage et Réalité: sur un épisode de la pensée indienne (Turnhout: Brepols, 1999), 9: “les mots et les choses dénotées constituaient une seule unité, et les mots n’étaient pas distincts de leurs objets.” 18 Bronkhorst, Langage et Réalité, 11. 19 Bronkhorst, Langage et Réalité, 12–17. 20 Bronkhorst, Langage et Réalité, 17: “la parole couvre, pour ainsi dire, la réalité qui se cache derrière elle.” 21 Bronkhorst, Langage et Réalité, 17: “cette conception s’exprime dans l’emploi fréquent de mantras, que ce soient des mantras védiques ou des mantras non védiques; les mantras étaient censés influencer la réalité objective, non linguistic, et ce en raison du lien rattachant les mots, et parfois aussi les sons, aux choses.” 22 Śabda is “sound,” and although it can be distinguished from language and word, which are vāk, pada, and vacana, the terms are often used interchangeably. Motegi Shujun, “Śabda in the Yuktidıpikā,” Acta Asiatica: Bulletin of the Institute of Eastern Culture 90 (February 2006): 39–40. 23 As discussed elsewhere in this volume, these ideas provided a basis for the later tantric development of an emanationist metaphysics. This cosmogony is strikingly similar to a neo-Platonic one; both view the process of emanation as one of degradation. There is, however, a key distinction: while Plotinus conceived of the emanation of being, in Hindu tantra the emanation is of sound structured according to the sequence of the Sanskrit syllabary. 24 Padoux, Vāc, 224. 25 Padoux, Vāc, 51. 26 Padoux, Vāc, 83–84. 27 Padoux, Vāc, 83. 28 Padoux, Vāc, 84. 29 Padoux, Vāc, 84. 30 Paul Müller-Ortega, “Sequence and Sequencelessness in the Indescribable Vortex Wheel of Power: The Kālī-Krama as Śakti-Cakra in the Tantric Discourse of Power in Medieval Kashmir,” 12. Paper presented at the Society for Tantric Studies conference, Flagstaff, 2002. Cited with permission of the author. 31 Müller-Ortega, “Sequence and Sequencelessness in the Indescribable Vortex Wheel of Power,” 7. 32 Müller-Ortega, “Sequence and Sequencelessness in the Indescribable Vortex Wheel of Power,” 7. 33 Müller-Ortega, “Sequence and Sequencelessness in the Indescribable Vortex Wheel of Power,” 23. His complete list includes a total of eleven such sequences. 34 Harold Coward, “Meaning and Power of Mantras in Bhartṛhari’s Vākyapadīya,” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 11.4 (1982): 374. 35 David Carpenter, “Bhartṛhari and the Veda,” in Texts in Context: Traditional Hermeneutics in South Asia, ed. Jeffrey R. Timm (Albany : State University of New York Press, 1992), 19.

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36 Bhartṛhari’s proposal that meaning is a one-term system in which the singularity of meaning has two aspects that are inseparable contrasts with the abhidharmika distinction of name and sound into a two-term nominalist system of meaning, as is discussed later in this chapter. 37 Coward, “Meaning and Power of Mantras in Bhartṛhari’s Vākyapadīya,” 371. 38 Coward, “Meaning and Power of Mantras in Bhartṛhari’s Vākyapadīya,” 371, citing Vākyapadīya 1:23–26, 122–123. 39 Coward, “Meaning and Power of Mantras in Bhartṛhari’s Vākyapadīya,” 373. 40 Wheelock, “The Mantra in Vedic and Tantric Ritual.” 41 Hakeda, Kūkai, 144. 42 Bimal Krishna Matilal, The Word and the World: India’s Contribution to the Study of Language (Delhi, Oxford, and New York: Oxford University Press, 1990), 77. 43 See Radhika Herzberger, Bhartṛhari and the Buddhists: An Essay in the Development of Fifth and Sixth Century Indian Thought (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1986). 44 Bhartṛhari’s views on language and meaning are difficult to summarize because of their complex and nuanced character. Different interpretations seem to depend as much on the concepts in terms of which the interpreter understands Bhartṛhari. See, for example, Ashok Aklujkar, “The Word Is the World: Nondualism in Indian Philosophy of Language,” Philosophy East & West 51.4 (2007): 452–473. 45 Elizabeth English, Vajrayoginī: Her Visualizations, Rituals, and Forms. A Study of the Vajrayoginī Cult in India (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2002), 164. 46 Gérard Genette, Mimologics, trans. Thäis E. Morgan (Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 1995), 7. 47 For a general overview, see Gavin Flood, “The Śaiva Traditions,” in The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism, ed. Gavin Flood (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2003). 48 Richard H. Davis, Ritual in an Oscillating Universe: Worshipping Śiva in Medieval India (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991), 135. 49 Davis, Ritual in an Oscillating Universe, 133. 50 Davis, Ritual in an Oscillating Universe, 126. 51 June McDaniel, The Madness of the Saints: Ecstatic Religion in Bengal (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1989), 228. 52 Teun Goudriaan, “Kubjikā’s Samayamantra and Its Manipulation in the Kubjikāmata,” in Mantras and Diagrammes Rituels dans l’Hindouisme, ed. André Padoux (Paris: Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1986), 142. 53 Goudriaan, “Kubjikā’s Samayamantra,” 141–142. 54 Goudriann, “Kubjikā’s Samayamantra,” 143. 55 Goudriann, “Kubjikā’s Samayamantra,” 144. 56 This might instead reflect the idea that it is worship that keeps the gods alive. In his De Oraculorum Defecto, Plutarch recounts a story about the death of Pan that when his last worshipper dies, the cry “Great Pan is dead” is heard from an island by those on a passing ship. In the modern era, this idea was popularized by Milton, E. B. Browning, and Oscar Wilde. 57 Alexis Sanderson, comments in Padoux, ed., Mantras and Diagrammes Rituels dans l’Hindouisme, 162; see also, Alexis Sanderson, “Remarks on the Text of the Kubjikāmatatantra,” Indo-Iranian Journal, 45 (2002): 1–24. 58 Mark S. G. Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of Vibration: An Analysis of the Doctrines and Practices of Kashmir Shaivism (Albany : State University of New York Press, 1987), 21. 59 Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of Vibration, 21. 60 Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of Vibration, 3.

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61 Effectively the same claim is made in the context of Tibetan Buddhist thought by Rdo Grub-chen. See Janet Gyatso, “Letter Magic: A Peircean Perspective on the Semiotics of Rdo Grub-chen’s Dhāraṇī Memory,” in In the Mirror of Memory: Reflections on Mindfulness and Remembrance in Indian and Tibetan Buddhism, ed. Janet Gyatso (Albany : State University of New York Press, 1992), 173–214. 62 Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of Vibration, 198. 63 Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of Vibration, 198. 64 Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of Vibration, 200. 65 The role of epistemology in Buddhist thought runs counter to two sets of preconceptions about the place of knowledge in relation to religious concerns. First is the fundamental division in Western thought between philosophy and religion, specifically epistemology as a philosophic issue and soteriology as a religious issue. Second is the neo-Romantic assumption that the concerns of epistemology necessarily interfere with attaining direct, unmediated experience of the truth, God, or some other version of a hypostatized higher reality. The Buddhist tradition is certainly complex enough to include many strains that seem to emphasize direct, unmediated experience as the goal; however, there are also significant other strains that should not be “placed under erasure.” For the latter, epistemological concerns with valid knowledge are central to discovering what is conducive to awakening. See Leonard W. J. Van Der Kuijp, “An Early Tibetan View of the Soteriology of Buddhist Epistemology: The Case of ‘Bri-gung ’Jig-rten Mgon-Po,” Journal of Indian Philosophy 15 (1987): 57–70. 66 Satischandra Chatterjee, The Nyāya Theory of Knowledge: A Critical Study of Some Problems of Logic and Metaphysics (Calcutta: University of Calcutta, 1965), 317–319. 67 Bimal Krishna Matilal, “Śābdabbodha and the Problem of Knowledge-Representation in Sanskrit,” Journal of Indian Philosophy 16 (1988): 107. 68 Jonardon Ganeri, Semantic Powers: Meaning and the Means of Knowing in Classical Indian Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 72. On p. 73, Ganeri goes on to identify five conditions, four of which have to do with the utterance itself, and the fifth being that the person uttering the statement is a “credible witness” (Skt. āpta). 69 See, for example, Bimal Krishna Matilal and Arindam Chakrabarti, eds., Knowing from Words (Dordrecht, Boston, and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1994). 70 See Chapter 7. 71 See also Natalie D. Gummer, “Listening to the Dharmabhāṇaka: The Buddhist Preacher in and of the Sūtra of Utmost Golden Radiance,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 80.1 (March 2012): 137–160. 72 J. N. Mohanty, “Is There an Irreducible Mode of Word-Generated Knowledge?” in Knowing from Words, ed. Bimal Krishna Matilal and Arindam Chakrabarti (Dordrecht, Boston, and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1994), 29. 73 Dōgen, Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-Eye Treasury, trans. Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross, 4 vols. (Berkeley, CA: Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research, 2008), II.57. For a commentary on this section, see Taigen Dan Leighton, Zen Questions: Zazen, Dōgen, and the Spirit of Creative Inquiry (Boston, MA: Wisdom Publications, 2011), 43. 74 Krishna Sivaraman, “The Word as a Category of Revelation,” in Revelation in Indian Thought: A Festschrift in Honour of Professor T. R. V. Murti, ed. Harold Coward and Krishna Sivaraman (Emeryville, CA: Dharma Publishing, 1977), 46. 75 Sivaraman, “The Word as a Category of Revelation,” 47.

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Notes Collett Cox, Disputed Dharmas: Early Buddhist Theories on Existence (Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1995), 160. Phyllis Granoff, “Buddhaghosa’s Penance and Siddhasena’s Crime: Remarks on Some Buddhist and Jain Attitudes towards the Language of Religious Texts,” in From Benares to Beijing: Essays on Buddhism and Chinese Religion, ed. Koichi Shinohara and Gregory Schopen (Oakville, New York and London: Mosaic Press, 1991), 19. Granoff, “Buddhaghosa’s Penance and Siddhasena’s Crime,” 19. Granoff, “Buddhaghosa’s Penance and Siddhasena’s Crime,” 25. Anne Blackburn, “‘Magic in the Monastery’: Textual Practice and Monastic Identity in Sri Lanka,” History of Religions 38.4 (May 1999): 354. Judith Snodgrass, Presenting Japanese Buddhism to the West: Orientalism, Occidentalism, and the Columbian Exposition (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 2003), 114. David McMahan, The Making of Buddhist Modernism (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). Skilling, “The Rakṣā Literature of the Śrāvakayāna,” 110. Jeffrey Samuels, “Texts Memorized, Texts Performed: A Reconsideration of the Role of Paritta in Sri Lankan Monastic Education,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 28.2 (2005): 339–367. Emphasis in original. Anne M. Blackburn, “Looking for the Vinaya: Monastic Discipline in the Practical Canons of the Theravāda,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 22.2 (1999): 284. A. Syrkin, “Notes on the Buddha’s Threats in the Dīgha Nikāya,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 7.1 (1984): 147–158. More broadly, see Michael Witzel, “The Case of the Shattered Head,” Studien zur Indologie und Iranistik, 13–14 (1987): 363–415. Thanissaro Bhikkhu, trans., Ahina Sutta, “By a Snake,” Anguttara Nikāya IV.67, 2002, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/canon/anguttara/an04-067.html, accessed Monday, July 10, 2017. This suggests a rather different significance for the expression “May all beings be safe from harm,” which in one or more of its variant readings has become a commonplace among Western Buddhists. Although used today as a rather general expression of compassion, it may well apparently have originated as more of a propitiatory quid pro quo. Cf. Matthew Kapstein’s comments on the question of the propriety of applying “categories like magic and religion”; “Scholastic Buddhism and the Mantrayāna,” in Reason’s Traces: Identity and Interpretation in Indian and Tibetan Buddhist Thought, ed. Matthew T. Kapstein (Boston, MA: Wisdom Publications, 2001), 233. Beyond pointing out the categories themselves (which, we might note, were themselves created for apologetic purposes), and the differences between the conceptual landscapes of the West and India, he goes on to problematize the issue by noting that there are structurally similar distinctions and the difficulty of relating them to those arising within the Western intellectual tradition. Burchett, “The ‘Magical’ Language of Mantra,” 807–808. The translator ignores the equally common distinction between magic and religion based on goals. In this distinction, such a “worldly” goal as protection from snakebite would be magic, as it is not a “spiritual” goal. Again, we must keep in mind the polemical origins of this rhetoric.

Notes 92 93

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This is certainly an instance of what psychologists would consider “magical thinking,” the idea that “thinking something makes it so.” Anne Blackburn, Buddhist Learning and Textual Practice in Eighteenth–Century Lankan Monastic Culture (Princeton, NJ and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2001), 136–137. Piyadassi Thera, trans., The Book of Protection: Paritta (Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society, 1999), http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/bps/misc/protection. html, accessed Monday, July 10, 2017. Peter Harvey, “The Dynamics of Paritta Chanting in Southern Buddhism,” in Love Divine: Studies in Bhakti and Devotional Mysticism, ed. Karel Werner (Richmond, Surrey, UK: Curzon Press, 1993), 54. Harvey, “The Dynamics of Paritta,” 58. Harvey, “The Dynamics of Paritta,” 67. See also, David V. Fiordalis, “Miracles and Superhuman Powers in South Asian Buddhist Literature,” Ph.D. dissertation, The University of Michigan, 2008, 101–108. Harvey, “The Dynamics of Paritta,” 73. Kapstein, “Scholastic Buddhism and the Mantrayāna,” 237. Kapstein, “Scholastic Buddhism and the Mantrayāna,” 238. Kapstein, “Scholastic Buddhism and the Mantrayāna,” 238. Kapstein, “Scholastic Buddhism and the Mantrayāna,” 240–241. Kapstein, “Scholastic Buddhism and the Mantrayāna,” 242. Richard Salomon, “New Evidence for a Gāndhārī Origin of the Arapacana Syllabary,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 110.2 (April–June 1990): 255–273. See Ryan Richard Overbey, “Memory, Rhetoric, and Education in the Great Lamp of the Dharma Dhāraṇī Scripture,” Dissertation, Harvard University, 2010, 151–161, for an extensive discussion of this topic. English, Vajrayoginī, 115. Yūkei Matsunaga, “On the Date of the Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa,” in Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R. A. Stein, vol. 3, Mélanges chinois et bouddhiques 22, ed. Michel Strickmann (Brussels: Institut Belge des Hautes Études Chinoises, 1985), 882, 893. Wallis, “The Buddha’s Remains,” 91. Wallis, “The Buddha’s Remains,” 96–97. English, Vajrayoginī, 38–40. English, Vajraysoginī, 164. English, Vajrayoginī, 1. See Overbey, “Memory, Rhetoric, and Education in the Great Lamp of the Dharma Dhāraṇī Scripture,” 187.

Chapter 4 1

Chad Hansen, “Philosophy of Language in Classical China,” 1, http://www.hku.hk/ philoedc/ch/lang.htm, accessed Saturday, July 29, 2017. See also Hansen’s discussion of the relation between Buddhist and neo-Confucian thought in his A Daoist Theory of Chinese Thought: A Philosophical Interpretation (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 15–18. Examines the consequences of a retrospectivist historiography that reads neo-Confucian concepts influenced by Buddhist ones back onto classical Chinese thought.

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Notes Lindsay Jones, Encyclopedia of Religion, second edn. (New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2004), sv. “Buddhism.” Arthur McCalla, “Romanticism,” in Guide to the Study of Religion, ed. Willi Braun and Russell T. McCutcheon (London: Cassell, 2000), 365–379. Although, as discussed earlier, nenbutsu is largely today associated with recitation of the name of Amida, that is one specific form of a much wider conception of meditating on the name of a buddha through recitation. For a discussion of Chan/Zen rhetorical practice, see Bernard Faure, The Rhetoric of Immediacy: A Cultural Critique of Chan/Zen Buddhism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991). This is in fact an objection to the methodology of “ideal types,” which I see as simply just impressionistics dressed for academic meetings. Hansen, “Philosophy of Language in Classical China,” 1. Jane Geaney, On the Epistemology of the Senses in Early Chinese Thought (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2002). Kristeva, Language the Unknown, 74. Emphases in original. Kristeva, Language the Unknown, 78. Emphases in original. For a discussion of the later development of these ideas in the West, see Eco, The Search for the Perfect Language. Roy Harris, Language, Saussure and Wittgenstein: How to Play Games with Words (London and New York: Routledge, 1988), 7–11. John Makeham, Name and Actuality in Early Chinese Thought (Albany : State University of New York Press, 1994), 9. In addition to “nomenclaturist,” “surrogational” is another term for this view that has been employed by Harris. “Surrogationalism accepts as axiomatic the principle that words have meaning for us because words ‘stand for’—are surrogates for—something else” (Harris, Language, Saussure and Wittgenstein, 10). Xing Lu, Rhetoric in Ancient China, Fifth to Third Century B.C.E.: A Comparison with Classical Greek Rhetoric (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1998), 82. Mark Edward Lewis, Writing and Authority in Early China (Albany : State University of New York Press, 1999), 32. Hansen, “Philosophy of Language in Classical China,” 2. A. C. Graham, Disputers of the Tao: Philosophical Argument in Ancient China (La Salle, IL: Open Court Press, 1989), 141. Hansen, “Philosophy of Language in Classical China,” 2. Lu, Rhetoric in Ancient China, 83. Hansen, “Philosophy of Language in Classical China,” 2. Hansen, “Philosophy of Language in Classical China,” 2. Intensional is to be distinguished from “intentional”—the latter is used, for example, to identify some action done with intent. Hansen, “Philosophy of Language in Classical China,” 1. Paul Harrison and W. South Coblin, “The Oldest Buddhist Incantation in Chinese?: A Preliminary Study of the Chinese Transcription of the Mantra in the Druma-kinnararāja-paripṛcchā-sūtra,” in Buddhism across Boundaries, ed. John R. McRae and Jan Nattier (Philadelphia: Sino-Platonic Papers, no. 222, March 2012), 68. Skilling, “The Rakṣā Literature of the Śrāvakayāna,” 109–182. Harrison and Coblin, “The Oldest Buddhist Incantation in Chinese?” 68. McBride, “Enchanting Monks and Efficacious Spells,” 169. This essay overlaps in content with Richard D. McBride, II, “Dhāraṇī and Spells in Medieval Sinitic

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Buddhism,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 28.1 (2005): 85–114, which may be more easily accessible to readers. Henrik H. Sørensen, “The Spell of the Great, Golden Peacock Queen: The Origin, Practices, and Lore of an Early Esoteric Buddhist Tradition in China,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 8 (Fall 2006): 89–123. Ryan Richard Overbey, “Vicissitudes of Text and Rite in the Great Peahen Queen of Spells,” in Tantric Traditions in Transmission and Translation, ed. David B. Gray and Ryan Richard Overbey (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2016), 272. T. 1509. Translated by Étienne Lamotte, Le traité de la grand vertu de sagesse de Nāgārjuna. Paul Copp, “Notes on the term ‘Dhāraṇī’ in medieval Chinese Buddhist Thought,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 71.3 (2008): 501. McBride, “Enchanting Monks and Efficacious Spells,” 176. Gelongma Karma Migme Chodron, trans., The Treatise on the Great Virtue of Wisdom of Nāgārjuna (Mahāprajñāpāramiāśāstra), from Lamotte’s French Translation, privately published, 260. Chodron, The Treatise on the Great Virtue of Wisdom, I:261. Michelle Wang, “Changing Conceptions of ‘Maṇḍala’ in Tang China: Ritual and the Role of Images,” Material Religion 9.2 (2013): 189. This same information appears in Michelle Wang, Maṇḍalas in the Making: The Visual Culture of Esoteric Buddhism at Dunhuang (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2018), 23–50. Wang, “Changing Conceptions of ‘Maṇḍala’ in Tang China,” 190. Wang, “Changing Conceptions of ‘Maṇḍala’ in Tang China,” 190. Wang, “Changing Conceptions of ‘Maṇḍala’ in Tang China,” 191. Wang, “Changing Conceptions of ‘Maṇḍala’ in Tang China,” 193. Wang, “Changing Conceptions of ‘Maṇḍala’ in Tang China,” 208. Bernard Faure, The Will to Orthodoxy: A Critical Genealogy of Northern Chan Buddhism (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1997), 126. Use of the dhāraṇī is based on the apocryphal *Śūraṃgama sūtra. See Robert E. Buswell, Jr., and Donald S. Lopez, Jr., eds., The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014), 873–874. Ho, “The Śūraṃgama Dhāraṇī in Sintic Buddhist Context,” 2. Ho, “The Śūraṃgama Dhāraṇī in Sintic Buddhist Context,” 6–9. Copp, “Notes on the term ‘Dhāraṇī’ in medieval Chinese Buddhist Thought,” 494. Copp, The Body Incantatory, 12. Copp, “Notes on the term ‘Dhāraṇī’ in medieval Chinese Buddhist Thought,” 501. Copp, “Notes on the term ‘Dhāraṇī’ in medieval Chinese Buddhist Thought,” 506. Davidson, “Studies in Dhāraṇī Literature I,” 98. Davidson, “Studies in Dhāraṇī Literature I,” 172. Vincent Eltschinger, “Dharmakīrti on Mantras and Their Efficiency,” in Esoteric Buddhist Studies: Identity in Diversity, ed. Executive Committee ICEBS (Koyasan, Japan: Koyasan University, 2008), 275, 273–289. Eltschinger, “Dharmakīrti on Mantras and Their Efficiency,” 275. Tanluan, “A Commentary on The Upadeśa on the Sutras of Limitless Life with Gāthās on the Resolution to Be Born Composed by the Bodhisattva Vasubandhu: Expository Commentary by the Monk Tanluan,” trans. Roger Corless, rev. Takahiko Kameyama and ed. Richard K. Payne, Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 17 (2015): 69–233.

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55 Roger Corless, “The Enduring Significance of T’an-luan,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 17 (2015): 7–22. 56 David Matsumoto, “Jōdoron ৞ౖ࿨: Discourse on the Pure Land,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 17 (2015): 23–42. 57 See Richard K. Payne, “The Five Contemplative Gates of Vasubandhu’s Rebirth Treatise,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 17 (2015): 233. 58 This passage seems rather obscure and it is interpreted differently in three translations: the Corless/Kameyama translation: Tanluan, “A Commentary on The Upadeśa on the Sutras of Limitless Life”; Hisao Inagaki, T’an-luan’s Commentary on Vasubandhu’s Discourse on the Pure Land: A Study and Translation (Kyoto: Nagata Bunshodo, 1998); and Minoru Kiyota, “Buddhist Devotional Meditation: A Study of the Sukhāvatīvyūhopadeśa,” in Mahāyāna Buddhist Meditation: Theory and Practice, ed. Minoru Kiyota (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1978), 249–296. The summary here explicates the concept underlying the passage through the lens of these three translations, rather than quoting any one interpretation. What seems implicit in the two pairs “light/wisdom” and “name/essence” is that the first is the manifest form of the second in each pair. 59 Tanluan, “A Commentary on The Upadeśa on the Sutras of Limitless Life,” 161–162. For another translation, see Inagaki, T’an-luan’s Commentary on Vasubandhu’s Discourse on the Pure Land, 210. 60 Tanluan’s examples include Daoist instances of spells (Tanluan, “A Commentary on The Upadeśa on the Sutras of Limitless Life,” 161–162), and the same is true of Daoshi, who “makes no distinction between Buddhist and non-Buddhist spells, which suggests that the Chinese (at least Daoshi) did not perceive of dhāraṇī as a completely foreign commodity” (McBride, “Dhāraṇī and Spells in Medieval Sinitic Buddhism,” 105). 61 Inagaki points to the Dazhidu lun (T.246b), a commentary on the Large Perfection of Wisdom Sūtra attributed to Nāgārjuna; see Étienne Lamotte, Le Traité de la Grande Vertu de Sagesse de Nāgārjuna (Mahāprajñāpāramitāśāstra) (Louvain-la Neuve: Institute Orientaliste, 1970), vol. 3, 1617–1618. Inagaki mentions the Dazhidu lun in relation to Tanluan’s assertion that there are two kinds of names, those that are identical with the thing named and those that are separate. It is perhaps in keeping with the style of Madhyamaka argumentation that this section discusses these two options, rejecting both: Question.—La chose (artha) est-elle unie au nom (nāman) ou séparée du nom? Si elle était unie au nom, on se brûlerit la bouche en disant «feu». Si elle était séparée du nom, on aurait de l’eau en disant «feu». Réponse.—La chose n’est ni unie au nome ni séparée du nom. Les anciens, par convention (saṃvṛti), one fixé les nomes pour désigner les choses, et leurs descendants, grâce à ces noms, connaisssent les choses. Ainsi pour chaque chose il y a un nom appelé [ici] dharma. (Question.—Is a thing (artha) unitary with its name (nāman) or separate from its name? If it were unitary with its name, we would burn our mouths by saying “fire.” If it were separated from the name, we would get water when saying “fire.” Answer.—The thing is neither unitary with its name nor separate from its name. The ancients, by convention (saṃvṛti), fixed the names to designate things, and their descendants, thanks to these names, know things. So for every thing there is a name called [here] dharma.)

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62 Shinkō Mochizuki, Pure Land Buddhism in China: A Doctrinal History, 2 vols., trans. Leo Pruden, Richard K. Payne and ed. Natalie E. F. Quli (Berkeley, CA: Institute of Buddhist Studies and BDK America, 2016), I, 27–43. 63 McBride, “Enchanting Monks and Efficacious Spells,” 178. 64 McBride, “Enchanting Monks and Efficacious Spells,” 178. 65 Robert H. Sharf, “On Pure Land Buddhism and Ch’an/Pure Land Syncretism in Medieval China,” T’oung Pao 88 (2002): 302. 66 Sharf, “On Pure Land Buddhism and Ch’an/Pure Land Syncretism in Medieval China,” 304. 67 Charles Jones, “Treatise Resolving Doubts about the Pure Land (Jingtu jueyi lun 䫪 ౖ݀ٛ࿨) By Master Yinguangһޭ(1861–1947),” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 14 (Fall 2012): 27–28. 68 Jones, “Treatise Resolving Doubts about the Pure Land,” 45.

Chapter 5 1

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Michaela Mross, “Vocalizing the Remembrance of Dōgen,” in Dōgen and Sōtō Zen, ed. Steven Heine (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 210–233. Online DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199324859.001.0001. Sango, Asuka. “Buddhist Debate and the Production and Transmission of Shōgyō in Medieval Japan,” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 39.2 (2012): 241–273. Groner, Paul. “Training through Debates in Medieval Tendai and Seizan-ha Temples,” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 38.2 (2011): 233–261. Minowa Kenryō. “The Tendai Debates of 1131 at Hosshōji,” Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 41.1 (2014): 133–151. Richard K. Payne, “Homa: Tantric Fire Ritual,” in Oxford Encyclopedia of Religion (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. DOI: 10.1093/ acrefore/9780199340378.013.82), and Payne, Richard K. and Michael Witzel, eds., Homa Variations: Ritual Change over the Longue Durée (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2016). Richard K. Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan. Feeding the Gods: The Shingon Fire Ritual (New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan, 1991), 105. Mark Unno, Shingon Refractions: Myōe and the Mantra of Light (Boston, MA: Wisdom Publications, 2004). David Gardiner, “Kūkai’s View of Exoteric Buddhism in Benkenmitsu nikyōron,” in Bulletin of the Institute of Esoteric Buddhist Culture (Kōyasan, Japan: Kōyasan University, 1992), 201 (reverse numbering). This leads to an understanding of the relation between language and awakening that not only differs from concepts found in Heian Buddhism in Japan but also from those found in Tibetan Buddhism. In the Tibetan traditions the Gelugspa has long recognized the role of language in facilitating one’s progress on the path to awakening. While it does not make as radical a claim as Kūkai, they do assign positive valence to the role of discursive language and reason in leading one to recognize the truth of impermanence and emptiness. José Ignacio Cabezón, Buddhism and Language: A Study of Indo-Tibetan Scholasticism (Albany : State University of New York Press, 1994). Ryūichi Abé, The Weaving of Mantra: Kūkai and the Construction of Esoteric Buddhist Discourses (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), 196. Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 194.

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9 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra Ibid., 195. 10 Ryūichi Abé, “Mantra, Hinin, and the Feminine: On the Salvational Strategies of Myōe and Eizon,” Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie 13 (2002): 115. 11 Gardiner, “Kūkai’s View of Exoteric Buddhism,” 201–200. 12 Gardiner, “Kūkai’s View of Exoteric Buddhism,” 201–200. 13 Wallis, “The Buddha’s Remains,” 90. 14 Chikyo Yamamoto, trans., Mahāvairocana-Sūtra (New Delhi: International Academy of Indian Culture, and Aditya Prakashan, 1990), 1; Rolf W. Giebel, trans., The Adamantine Pinnacle Sutra (Berkeley, CA: Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research, 2001), 19; Ian Astley-Kristensen, trans., The Rishukyō: The SinoJapanese Tantric Prajñāpāramitā in 150 Verses (Amoghavajra’s Version) (Tring, UK: The Institute of Buddhist Studies, 1991), 39. 15 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 10. 16 Hajime Nakamura, Indian Buddhism: A Survey with Bibliographical Notes, Buddhist Traditions, vol. 1 (1980) (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1980, reprint), 319. 17 Hajime Nakamura, Indian Buddhism: A Survey with Biographical Notes (Osaka: Kansai Gaikokugo Daigaku, 1980), 325. 18 Astley-Kristensen, The Rishukyō, 11. As for Candrakīrti’s dates, Nakamura simply gives “c. 650”; Indian Buddhism, 286. David Seyfort Ruegg basically agrees, giving “c. 600–650,” while noting his own disagreement with Christian Lindtner’s suggestion of 530–600; The Literature of the Madhyamaka School of Philosophy in India, A History of Indian Literature, vol. VII, fasc. 1 (Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz, 1981), 71. 19 Astley-Kristensen, The Rishukyō, 14. 20 Rolf W. Giebel, trans., The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra (Berkeley, CA: Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research, 2005), 9. Note that Giebel identifies twenty-nine erroneous views (279, n. 3). 21 Stephen Hodge, trans., The Mahā-Vairocana-Abhisaṃbodhi Tantra with Buddhaguhya’s Commentary (London and New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2003), 61. Unfortunately, Buddhaguhya’s Commentary does not give any specific explanation of this point. 22 Wilhelm Kuno Müller, trans., “Shingon-Mysticism: Śubhākarasiṁha and I-hsing’s Commentary to the Mahāvairocana–sūtra, Chapter One, an Annotated Translation,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Los Angeles, 1976, 145. 23 Ryūjun Tajima, trans., Étude sur le Mahāvairocana-Sūtra (Dainichikyō), avec la traduction Commentée du Premier Chapitre (Paris: Libraire d’Amérique et d’Orient, 1936), 67. 24 English translation of Ryūjun Tajima’s French rendering in Étude sur le Mahāvairocana-Sūtra, in The Enlightenment of Vairocana ed. and trans. Alex Wayman (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 1992), 259. 25 Minoru Kiyota, Tantric Concept of Bodhicitta: A Buddhist Experiential Philosophy (Madison: South Asian Area Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1982), 65. Cf. Yamamoto, Mahāvairocana-Sūtra, 5. 26 Kiyota, Tantric Concept of Bodhicitta, 65. 27 Kiyota, Tantric Concept of Bodhicitta, 65. 28 Tajima, cited in Wayman, The Enlightenment of Vairocana, 279, nn. 203, 204. 29 Müller, “Shingon-Mysticism,” 145–146. 30 Robert Sharf, “Thinking through Shingon Ritual,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 26.1 (2003): 60. 31 Sharf, Coming to Terms with Chinese Buddhism, 277.

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32 The esoteric portion of the training for Tendai priests uses the same sequence of rituals, but with the taizōkai and kongōkai reversed. Also, while the Shingon rite is performed over a hundred-day period, the Tendai esoteric training is done in sixty days. 33 The name commonly used in Japanese; however, this is the translation of Vajraśekhara, a collection of eighteen texts that includes the Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha. 34 Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan, 253–254. 35 Personal communication, Gil Fronsdal, July 20, 2016. A similar link between performative arts, such as ritual and dance, and literary and rhetorical uses of chiasmus is found in Homeric art. See A. P. David, The Dance of the Muses: Choral Theory and Ancient Greek Poetics (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2006). 36 The emphasis on emptiness here is consistent with that of the Great Lamp of the Dharma Dhāraṇī Scripture. As Ryan Overbey explains, the thing transmitted by the Great Lamp is not just the text itself—it is a spell composed of letters which both reveal and embody the homogenous emptiness underlying all phenomena. The Great Lamp’s dhāraṇī can thus serve as an explicitly meaningless token, but possession of this token can authenticate its holder as a true heir to the Buddha’s omniscience and eloquence. (Overbey, “Memory, Rhetoric, and Education in the Great Lamp of the Dharma Dhāraṇī Scripture,” 187) 37 See Chapter 3, which draws on Padoux, Vāc, esp. Chapter 5: The Phonematic Emanation. 38 Adrian Snodgrass, The Matrix and Diamond World Mandalas in Shingon Buddhism, 2 vols. (New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan, 1988), I:213. 39 The use of Dainichi kyō as the common name for the sutra in Japan has led many scholars (myself included) to “back translate” the title as Mahāvairocana-sūtra. As a consequence, the latter title is also found in the Western language literature on East Asian Buddhism. 40 Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan, 280. 41 Yamamoto, Mahāvairocana-Sūtra, 121–125; Giebel, The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra, 139–141. This chapter appears differently in the Tibetan; see Hodge, The MahāVairocana-Abhisaṃbodhi Tantra with Buddhaguhya’s Commentary, 216–231. 42 Here the concept of the wheel of syllables seems almost to function as a mnemonic device for the study of Sanskrit. 43 Giebel notes that “The Tibetan translation has ‘ineffability,’ which better fits the standard association of the letter Va with vāc (‘speech’)”; The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra, 287, n. 122. 44 Giebel, The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra, 202–203. 45 Giebel indicates uncertainty about this association; The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra, 203. 46 Giebel, The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra, 204. 47 Shingen Takagi and Thomas Eijō Dreitlein, Kūkai on the Philosophy of Language (Tokyo: Keio University Press, 2010), 2. 48 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 74. 49 Takagi and Dreitlein, Kūkai on the Philosophy of Language, 5.

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50 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 109. 51 Takagi and Dreitlein, Kūkai on the Philosophy of Language, 5; citing Ryūichi Abé, “Shingon, keikoku, hōkaigū: aruwa Kūkai Mikkyō no shoteki kōchiku,” in Kōbō Daishi bokuseki shūjū, ronbun hen (Kyoto: Kōbō Daishi Bukuseki Shūjū Kankōkai, 1999), 91. 52 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 15. 53 Takagi and Dreitlein, Kūkai on the Philosophy of Language, 6. 54 In this interpretation, I take the concepts of conventional, or consensual existence, construction, dependent co-origination—pratityasamutpada, and emptiness— sunyatā, as fundamentally synonymous. 55 Giebel, The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi sūtra, 17. 56 David Ross Komito, Nagarjuna’s Seventy Stanzas: A Buddhist Psychology (Ithaca, NY: Snow Leopard, 1987), 94. The overlap between the two sets of metaphors indicates that these were probably in common circulation as explanations of emptiness. 57 Giebel, The Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi Sutra, 205–206 (online, 183); see also Yamamoto, Mahāvairocana-Sūtra, 162. 58 See Richard K. Payne, “The Shingon Ajikan: Diagrammatic Analysis of Ritual Syntax,” Religion 29.3 (1999): 215–299; see also Chapter 9 in this volume. 59 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 291. 60 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 291. 61 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 292. 62 Collett Cox, Disputed Dharmas: Early Buddhist Theories on Existence, An Annotated Translation of the Section on Factors Dissociated from Thought from Saṅghabhadra’s Nyāyānusāra (Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1995), 166. 63 Cox, Disputed Dharmas, 166. 64 Kiyota, Tantric Concept of Bodhicitta, 65. 65 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 290.

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At the same time, we should note that the Buddhist modernist representation of what Buddhism “really” is as fundamentally rationalistic is itself an historical construct. This is not simply a question of whether such concepts are socially and historically located but whether religious conceptions are, like literature or mathematics, constructed by human activity or discovered by human inquiry. This polarity is the commonly accepted understanding of these two different kinds of human projects as distinct from one another. However, by employing the commonplace conception here, I do not wish to be misunderstood as supporting the notion that there is some kind of Platonic metaphysical reality. E. Thomas Lawson and Robert N. McCauley, Rethinking Religion: Connecting Cognition and Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 125. I use the term “agency” here in a very general sense as a means of avoiding the problems of an implicit dualism, as suggested by Paul Copp’s discussion of the artificial separation of “word” from “power” in his paper “Dust, Shadow, and the Written Stuff of Spells,” presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion (AAR), San Antonio, TX, November 21, 2004, 10. See Barbara Rogoff, The Cultural Nature of Human Development (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003).

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See, for example, Michael Horace Barnes, Stages of Thought: The Co-Evolution of Religious Thought and Science (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). Barnes’ idea appears problematic because of its superficial similarity to late nineteenth-century colonialist theories of the evolutionary progress of societies, which were employed to justify imperialism. His actual argument, however, is more nuanced, despite its being quite out of fashion with much of contemporary thought. Michael Tomasello, The Cultural Origins of Human Cognition (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 1999), 73. Tomasello, The Cultural Origins of Human Cognition, 74. Tomasello, The Cultural Origins of Human Cognition, 75. Lawson and McCauley, Rethinking Religion, 124. We note that in later works they have revised this terminology for greater clarity but without significant modifications to their basic theory. Jacob Dalton, “Observations on Dhāraṇī Ritual Practice in the Tibetan Dunhuang Manuscripts,” paper presented to the annual meeting of AAR, San Antonio, TX, November 21, 2004, 3–4. Wallis, Mediating the Power of the Buddhas, 37. Wallis, Mediating the Power of the Buddhas, 37. Ronald M. Davidson, Indian Esoteric Buddhism: A Social History of the Tantric Movement (New York: Columbia University Press, 2002), 118–131. Lawson and McCauley’s theory seems to involve a certain amount of circular argumentation to the extent that they draw a sharp distinction between what is religious and what is not: religion involves culturally postulated superhuman agents, and if culturally postulated superhuman agents are absent then and there is no religion. They cite the (now historical) example of Lenin and his tomb for the Soviet Union as having various characteristics that make it appear to be religious, but then conclude that because Lenin is not treated as a culturally postulated superhuman agent, it is not religion (Lawson and McCauley, Rethinking Religion, 124). Their general argument seems to me to have a crypto-theological presumption—religion is based in the actions of God. Rather than being expressed as an explicit assumption about religion, it is “crypto–” because it is claimed to have empirical status. Vincent Eltschinger, “Dharmakīrti on Mantras and Their Efficiency,” in Esoteric Buddhist Studies: Identity in Diversity, ed. Executive Committee ICEBS (Koyasan, Japan: Koyasan University, 2008), 273–289. Vincent Eltschinger, Dharmakīrti sur les Mantra et la Perception du Supra-Sensible (Vienna: Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien Universtität Wien, 2001), 13–14. Eltschinger, “Dharmakīrti on Mantras and Their Efficiency,” 276. Eltschinger, “Dharmakīrti on Mantras and Their Efficiency,” 276. Eltschinger, “Dharmakīrti on Mantras and Their Efficiency,” 278. Lawson and McCauley might argue in reply that this simply demonstrates that mantra are thought of as comparable to technical skills and therefore are not religious. I think that the circularity of this hypothetical response demonstrates the fundamentally arbitrary character of their sharply delineated definition of religion as necessarily involving a culturally postulated superhuman agent. Daniel Boucher, “The Pratītyasamutpādagāthā and Its Role in the Medieval Cult of the Relics,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 14.1 (1991): 1–27.

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24 T. Griffith Foulk and Robert H. Sharf, “On the Ritual Use of Ch’an Portraiture in Medieval China,” Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie 7 (1993): 149–219. Also, Glen Dudbridge, “Buddhist Images in Action: Five Stories from the Tang,” Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie 10 (1998): 377–391. 25 Robson, “Signs of Power,” 130–169. Michel Strickmann, Chinese Magical Medicine, ed. Bernard Faure (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2002), esp. Chapter 4, “Ensigillation: A Buddho-Taoist Technique of Exorcism.” 26 Copp, The Body Incantatory. 27 This is key to a critique of Lawson and McCauley’s theory. If that theory is to be cognitive, it should represent the way that any adherent engages with the tradition, rather than only the theological elite. The tendency of their theorizing seems to suggest that there are hidden theological commitments grounding their formulations. 28 My thanks to Jacqueline Stone for pointing out this similarity. Jacqueline Stone, personal communication, April 29, 2017. See also Stone, Original Enlightenment and the Transformation of Medieval Japanese Buddhism, 267–270. 29 Brian Ruppert, Jewel in the Ashes: Buddha Relics and Power in Early Medieval Japan, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000; Brian Ruppert, “Beyond Death and the Afterlife: Considering Relic Veneration in Medieval Japan,” in Death and the Afterlife in Japanese Buddhism, ed. Jacqueline I. Stone and Mariko Namba Walter (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2009), 102–136. 30 One is reminded in this regard of the story that Shinran’s ashes were added to the lacquer of a statue of him. In general, however, Shin has historically been very “modern” in its rejection of belief in the power of relics, as well as of amulets. In present-day Japan, unlike the vast majority of Buddhist and Shintō temples and shrines, Shin temples do not sell protective amulets of any kind. 31 Indeed, the idea that Śākyamuni is to Buddhists as Jesus is to Christians is perhaps one of the most common misconceptions of Buddhism held by Westerners. 32 Ronald Davidson, “Reflections on the Maheśvara Subjugation Myth: Indic Materials, Sa-skya-pa Apologetics, and the Birth of Heruka,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 14.2 (1991): 199–200. An analogous text is found in full translation in Jacob P. Dalton, The Taming of the Demons: Violence and Liberation in Tibetan Buddhism (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2011), 159–206. 33 Unno, Shingon Refractions, 22. 34 Unno, Shingon Refractions, 25. 35 Copp, “Dust, Shadow, and the Written Stuff of Spells,” 4; Richard McBride, “Were Dhāraṇī and Spells ‘Proto-Tantric’ in Medieval Sinitic Buddhism?,” paper presented at the annual meeting of AAR, San Antonio, TX, November 21, 2004, 23–24. Published as “Dhāraṇī and Spells in Medieval Sinitic Buddhism.” 36 Abé, “Mantra, Hinin, and the Feminine,” 106–107. 37 Unno, Shingon Refractions, 1. 38 Dalton, “Observations on Dhāraṇī Ritual Practice,” 6–7. 39 Line numbers added. Kaiō Tanaka, Kōmyō Shingon shūsei (Kisarazu, Japan: Tokuzōji Shuppanbu, 1968), 132–133. 40 A stūpa of five cakras or wheels representing earth, water, fire, wind, and empty space. These are the five constituents of all existing entities according to Indian cosmology and were adopted into Buddhism. These are also the constituents of human beings and therefore express the identity of a human being and the cosmos as a whole.

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Chapter 7 1 2 3

4 5

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N. S. Junankar, Gautama: The Nyāya Philosophy (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1978), 146. Jonardon Ganeri, Semantic Powers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 15. Satischandra Chatterjee and Dhirendramohan Datta, An Introduction to Indian Philosophy (Calcutta: University of Calcutta, 1960), 45–47. The authors note that while the school of Mīmāṃsa established by Kumārıla Bhaṭṭa accepted these six, there was another Mīmāṃsa school established by Prabhākara that accepted only the first five, excluding noncognition (anupalabdhi). See also Francis Clooney’s review of Purusottama Bilimoria’s “Śabdapramāṇa: Word and Knowledge,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 60.1 (Spring 1992): 143–145. Chatterjee and Datta, An Introduction to Indian Philosophy, 33. N.b. the idea that there is a “real connection” (sambhanda) between words and their referents is not universally shared by the orthodox philosophies. The position of Gautama, a key thinker for the Nyāya tradition, is, like the Buddhist one, a conventionalist understanding: “right cognition of objects denoted by words is based upon convention (samaya)”; Junankar, Gautama, 148. Regarding the characteristics of the Nyāya “theory of the meaning of a verbal awareness,” see Karl H. Potter, “A Speech-Act Model for Understanding Navya-Nyāya Epistemology,” in Analytical Philosophy in Comparative Perspective, ed. Bimal Krishna Matilal and Jaysankar Lal Shaw (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1984), 217–218. Shujun, “Śabda in the Yuktidıpikā,” 47. Kisor Kumar Chakrabarti, Classical Indian Philosophy of Mind: The Nyāya Dualist Tradition (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1999), 12. On Buddhist philosophy of language as nominalist, see Mark Siderits, “Apohavāda, Nominalism and Resemblance Theories,” in Dharmakīrti’s Thought and Its Impact on Indian and Tibetan Philosophy, ed. Shoryu Katsura (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1999), 341–348. Siderits describes nominalism in this way: the only thing that all cows share is the label “cow.” See also Cox, Disputed Dharmas, 159–171; Roger Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? Dharmakīrti and rGyal tshab rje on Knowledge, Rebirth, No-Self and Liberation (Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publications, 1993), 125; Anne Klein, Knowledge and Liberation: Tibetan Buddhist Epistemology in Support of Transformative Religious Experience (Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publications, 1986), 206–214. It is important to note that conventional does not mean arbitrary. While there may be no given or natural relation between words and meanings, such relations are established by social use. Such bibliophilia (based on ascriptions of ultimate authority to the Bible, i.e., Bibliophilia) reflects not only the attitudes and presumptions of contemporary Western Buddhist thinkers but also those of nineteenth-century Western proponents of Buddhism. Under the influence of Protestant conceptions of scripture, they sought to establish the authority of the Buddha’s words just as their contemporaries sought the authoritative word of Jesus, which initiated the “quest for the historical Jesus” and the earliest Gospel source. Buddhist studies have also seen a similar quest for the historical Buddha, although without also appropriating the mistaken notion that demonstrating the truth of historical claims regarding the existence of Jesus must also demonstrate the truth of religious claims regarding his divinity.

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10 Thanissaro Bhikkhu, trans., “Kalama Sutta: To the Kalamas,” AN 3.65; Access to Insight, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an03/an03.065.than.html, accessed October 22, 2006. 11 Bhikkhu, “Kalama Sutta: To the Kalamas,” Translator’s Note. 12 Elizabeth Valentine, “The Validation of Knowledge: Private and Public,” in The Authority of Experience: Essays on Buddhism and Psychology, ed. John Pickering (Richmond, Surrey : Curzon Press, 1997), 208. 13 In fact, only one of Valentine’s sources are Buddhist and it is problematic: Jeremy W. Hayward, who was a disciple of Chögyam Trungpa and therefore inherited an explicitly modernizing version of Buddhism, and is a teacher of the Shambhala Training, which is presented as something other than Buddhism. This is, of course, another one of Buddhist modernism’s strategies. By focusing on meditation it is possible to assert that Buddhism is not a religion (which protects it from being in competition with Christianity), but simply a philosophy, a way of life, or some other formulation that attempts to conceal the role of ideology, asserting instead that Buddhist meditation (or, in this case, Shambhala Training) does not depend on any specific belief system. See, for example, http://sti.shambhala.org/, accessed November 26, 2006. 14 Valentine, “The Validation of Knowledge: Private and Public,” 209. The slippage from being based on sensation to being “essentially mental” ignores the philosophic problems involved in psychologizing epistemology. Consider, for example, Edmund Husserl’s retreat from his early psychologizing of mathematics in light of these kinds of problems as had been pointed out to him by Frege. 15 Valentine, “The Validation of Knowledge: Private and Public,” 209. 16 Valentine, “The Validation of Knowledge: Private and Public,” 211. 17 This formula—permanent, eternal, absolute, unchanging—is of my own making and attempts to indicate impressionistically the quality or characters being rejected. It is not canonic and is not intended as a specific or comprehensive list—the absence of a conjunction is intended to indicate this impressionistic status. 18 For a discussion of this metaphoric conception of the mind in Western philosophy, see Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981). 19 Although found elsewhere in Buddhist literature, one source of reflection on this metaphor is the Zen tradition. There is, for example, an extended discussion in Dōgen’s Shōbōgenzō, chapter 20, “Kokyō.” See, Shōbōgenzō: The True Dharma-Eye Treasury, trans. Gudo Wafu Nishijima and Chodo Cross, 4 vols. (Berkeley : Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research, 2007); http://www.bdkamerica.org/ bdk-tripitaka-digital-downloads), I, 313–330. It also forms a central theme in the origin legend of the Sōtō school of Zen, the Platform Sūtra. See The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch, trans. John R. McRae (Berkeley : Numata Center for Buddhist Translation and Research, 2000; http://www.bdkamerica.org/bdk-tripitaka-digitaldownloads), 20–22. 20 Matthieu Ricard, “On the Relevance of a Contemplative Science,” in Buddhism and Science: Breaking New Ground, ed. B. Alan Wallace (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), 272. 21 Daniel Perdue, The Course in Buddhist Reasoning and Debate: An Asian Approach to Analytical Thinking Drawn from Indian and Tibetan Sources (Boston and London: Snow Lion, 2014), 237. See also Daniel Perdue, Debate in Tibetan Buddhism (Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion, 1992), 295–297.

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22 George B.J. Dreyfus, The Sound of Two Hands Clapping (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press, 2003), 234. 23 Yūichi Kajiyama, An Introduction to Buddhist Philosophy: An Annotated Translation of the Tarkabhāṣā of Mokṣākaragupta (Vienna: Arbeitskreis für Tibetische und Buddhistische Studien, Universität Wien, 1998, reprint), 2. For philological discussions of pratyakṣa and anumāna, see pp. 29 and 30, respectively. In this essay, pratyakṣa is rendered by the more common “perception,” and anumāna by “inference.” 24 For a response to Mokṣakaragupta’s argument, see Rohit Dalvi, “The Man from Nicobar: The Bauddhatarkabhasa on Sabdapramana [sic],” http://www. infinityfoundation.com/mandala/i_es/i_es_dalvi_nicobar.htm, accessed November 2, 2006. Dalvi’s response is based on the notion that there are certain “basic conditions under which knowledge through sabda becomes possible… [including,] among other things, the hearer to understand the language of the speaker” (6–7). This addition of “basic conditions” to the fundamental notion of word-object identity seems to me weaken the notion of a real relation between word and referent to the point that it becomes effectively meaningless, or it is simply an implicit admission that the connection is conventional, in this case, based on sharing a common language rather than being located somewhere external to the subjects in communication with one another. 25 See Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 103–104. Jackson employs another rendering for vyapti, “invariable concomitance,” which is also found in the literature. 26 Kajiyama, An Introduction to Buddhist Philosophy, 32. Note: material in brackets is the translator’s interpolation, within which I have added glosses in parentheses. 27 Vesna Wallace, The Inner Kalacakratantra: A Buddhist Tantric View of the Individual (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2001), 13. 28 Wallace, The Inner Kalacakratantra, 13. 29 Kajiyama, An Introduction to Buddhist Philosophy, 34–35. 30 Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 127. 31 Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 127. 32 Jackson glosses this last as “savior.” 33 Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 129. Jackson’s discussion seems to reflect the terse character of the Sanskrit original; he simply speaks of “authority.” This presentation employs various adjectival uses of the term “authority,” with the recognition that these are not substantive distinctions but rather simply ones imposed by ordinary English grammar. We should assume that the fact that the Buddha is an authority is identical with his possession of authoritative knowledge, without reifying these as two separate things. 34 Jackson uses “new.” This might, however, implicate a temporal qualification that could prove problematic. 35 Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 176. 36 Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 177, n. 2. 37 This seems to fit well with contemporary arguments regarding the authority of firstperson, subjective experience. 38 Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 176. Jackson uses “efficiency” where “efficacy” would more accurately convey the meaning of the argument. Jackson interprets this point to be one in regard to “potential confirmatory” action—this being his addition of rGyal tshab rje’s text. This interpretation, however, places the confirmation of a cognition—what makes it authoritative according to the argument here—in the

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Notes future. It would be simpler, epistemologically, to place the confirming actions in the past, with the idea that if the cognition is indeed authoritative it will not be contradicted in the future. For example, if someone holds a match to a sheet of paper and it does not burn, we would not question the causal efficacy of our ideas regarding burning but would instead wonder something like, “What’s with this paper?” Richard P. Hayes, Dignaga on the Interpretation of Signs (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1988), 203. Hayes, Dignaga on the Interpretation of Signs, 178, n. 6. This is based on a philological understanding of the term pramāṇa, specifically regarding the prefix pra-. Dharmakīrti and others following his interpretation understood this to mean “new.” Another school, the Prāsaṇgikas, understood it as “foremost,” that is, best. See Daniel Cozort and Craig Preston, Buddhist Philosophy: Losang Gönchok’s Short Commentary to Jamyang Shayba’s Root Text on Tenets (Ithaca, NY and Boulder, CO: Snow Lion Publications, 2003), 73. Jackson uses “conventional.” Perhaps “construction,” rather than “convention,” might be a better rendering in this case? In any event, the significance of the argument is that such cognitions are derivative, so that is the term I employ here. For a general discussion of memory in Western epistemology, see Robert Audi, Epistemology: A Contemporary Introduction to the Theory of Knowledge (New York and London: Routledge, 2003, second edn.), 56–74. Does this actually complicate the case for causal efficacy given earlier? Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 179. Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 188. Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 194. Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 216. Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 218. Sarvajña is an epithet of the Buddha that has frequently and seemingly uncritically been rendered as “omniscience.” Despite (or perhaps because of) the connotations of the term in Christian theology this seems to appeal to some translators as the easiest, most literal translation: “all” (sarva-) “knowing” (jña). In light of Dharmakīrti’s comments, perhaps sarvajña might be better rendered as “knowing thoroughly, knowing completely, knowing accurately.” Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 217. Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 218. Jackson, Is Enlightenment Possible? 218. These glosses of the two Sanskrit terms are my own. This reflects the ground of perennialism as the conceptual substratum of Buddhist modernism and is evidenced by the widespread use of stories from other traditions in Buddhist modernist dharma talks. This is characteristic of much of religion outside the American mainstream and has been traced by Cathy Gutierrez to the midnineteenth-century craze for Plato. Cathy Gutierrez, Plato’s Ghost: Spiritualism in the American Renaissance (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 8–9. Indicative of how malleable these concepts are, later Pure Land teachers in Japan will identify Amitābha as the dharmakāya. We note that there are indeed some contemporary Buddhists whose attitude toward the Buddhist canon, or some selections thereof, is textually fundamentalist in ways that are similar to the attitudes of some Christians. Karen Lang, Four Illusions: Candrakīrti’s Advice to Travelers on the Bodhisattva Path (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 15.

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59 Some authors capitalize “Dharma” in the sense of the teachings, while using lower case “dharma” for actually existing things. This, however, presumes that the structures of Western religion are universal and adds a distinction that entails unwarranted connotations—as if the teachings are something different from the way things are. As Steven Collins has noted, “capital letters seem often to be imbued with profound and mysterious significance. Neither Sanskrit nor Pali script uses them, nor any equivalent, and so they are useless as an instrument for our interpretative understanding.” Selfless Persons, p. 8. We add that this is equally true for Chinese, Japanese, and Tibetan, which do not use capitals. 60 Donald S. Lopez, Jr., “Authority and Orality in the Mahāyāna,” Numen: International Review for the History of Religions 42.1 (January 1995): 27. 61 Ronald M. Davidson, “An Introduction to the Standards of Scriptural Authenticity in Indian Buddhism,” in Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha, ed. Robert Buswell (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1990), 291. 62 Tom J. F. Tillemans, “How Much of a Proof Is Scripturally Based Inference (Āgamāśritānumāna)?,” in Dharmakīrti’s Thought and Its Impact on Indian and Tibetan Philosophy, ed. Shoryu Katsura (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1999), 395. See also Tom J. F. Tillemans, “Dharmakīrti, Āryadeva and Dharmapāla on Scriptural Authority,” and “How Much of a Proof Is Scripturally Based Inference?” in Scripture, Logic, Language: Essays on Dharmakīrti and His Tibetan Successors (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1999), 27–36, and 37–51, respectively. 63 Tillemans, “How Much of a Proof Is Scripturally Based Inference (Āgamāśritānumāna)?” 395. The term “objective reasoning” is Tilleman’s more euphonic rendering of what would more literally be “inference functioning by the force of real entities” (vastubalapravṛttanumāna). 64 Tillemans, “How Much of a Proof Is Scripturally Based Inference (Āgamāśritānumāna)?” 395. 65 Tillemans, “How Much of a Proof Is Scripturally Based Inference (Āgamāśritānumāna)?” 395–396. 66 Jürgen Habermas, Knowledge and Human Interests, trans. Jeremy J. Shapiro (Boston: Beacon Press, 1971), 3. 67 Jeffrey Hopkins, The Tantric Distinction: An Introduction to Tibetan Buddhism, ed. Anne C. Klein (London: Wisdom Publications, 1984), 15. 68 But not Gnosticism, that is, not involving the dualistic metaphysics often associated with religious Gnosticism as a heresy in the history of Christianity. It is perhaps indicative of this idea that Edward Conze, who is perhaps most responsible for the common use of the phrase “perfection of wisdom” to refer to the Prajñāpāramitā literature, titled his autobiography The Memoirs of a Modern Gnostic (Sherborne: Samizdat Publishing Co., 1979). 69 The implications of this, even for understanding what a buddha is, are very important. In light of this, it is a mistake in a comparativist context to equate the epithet sarvajñā (“all-knowing”) with the omniscience of the Christian deity. See n. 51 given earlier. 70 It is important to note, however, that the dichotomy between yogic practice and epistemology is not unique to Buddhist modernism. According to Tom Tillemans, for example, it is a long-standing issue in Tibetan Buddhism: “Many Tibetans… maintain a strong separation between the meditational-yogic aspects of Buddhism—which they take as being quintessential—and its logico-philosophical speculations, which they take as being by and large of little or no religious value”; Persons of Authority:

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Notes The sTon pa tshad ma’i skyes bur sgrub pa’i gtam of Alag sha Ngag dbang bstan dar, A Tibetan Work on the Central Religious Questions in Buddhist Epistemology (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1993), 2. The treatment of epistemology as “being without much soteriological import,” however, was not the only view; many also held that epistemology is directly conducive to awakening. For a discussion of the ris med movement, including Mipham’s role in it, see Ringu Tulku, The Ri-Me Philosophy of Jamgön Kongtrul the Great: A Study of the Buddhist Lineages of Tibet (Boston and London: Shambhala Publications, 2006). Quoted from Kennard Lipman, “What Is Buddhist Logic? Some Tibetan Developments of Pramāṇa Theory,” in Tibetan Buddhism: Reason and Revelation, ed. Steven D. Goodman and Ronald M. Davidson (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1992), 32. C. A. J. Coady, Testimony: A Philosophical Study (Oxford: Clarendon Press, Oxford University Press, 1992), 50. Coady, Testimony, 51, referring to H. H. Price. We might summarize these Indic conceptions by saying that the power of speech is located in what might be called the “speech event” to distinguish it from a “speech act.” This distinction between “speech event” and “speech act” is that the former is not a locutionary speech act. The locution of a speech act binds the locution to the speaker, to the speech act as an oral event (speaking). In contrast the speech event is an aural event (hearing; “what is heard”), akin to but not identical with Searle’s perlocution.

Chapter 8 1

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3

4

5 6

Matthew Kapstein, “Schopenhauer’s Śakti,” in Reason’s Traces: Identity and Interpretation in Indian and Tibetan Buddhist Thought, ed. Matthew Kapstein (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2001), 281. Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India, ed. Joseph Campbell (New York: Pantheon Books, 1951), 161–162. Zimmer quotes Eugene Watson Burlingame, “The Act of Truth (Saccakiriya): A Hindu Spell and Its Employment as a Psychic Motif in Hindu Fiction,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (1917): 439–441. There seems to be a fair amount of ambiguity here, and Zimmer’s interpretation poses some potentially important questions about his sociopolitical attitudes. The story is from the Buddhist text, the Milindahañhā (Milinda’s Questions). It is possible to interpret the story as consistent with a Buddhist opposition to caste, or as a mercantilist tale about the leveling power of money, yet Zimmer interprets it in terms of the necessity of adhering to one’s assigned caste role. At the very least, he leaves little room for Indian philosophy as a site of contestation, creating instead an image of uniformity. Burlingame, “The Act of Truth (Saccakiriya),” quoted by Zimmer (see n. 2); T. W. Rhys Davids, The Questions of King Milinda (New York: Dover Publications, 1963), I: 183. Both translators use the seemingly more literal phrase “act of truth.” I. B. Horner, trans., Milinda’s Questions (London: Luzac, 1969), 1: 168. Yusho Wakahara, “The Truth-Utterance (satyavacana) in Mahāyāna Buddhism,” Studies in Buddhism/Bukkyogaku-Kenkyu 56 (March 2002): 58.

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Horner, Milinda’s Questions, 1: 168; emphasis added. I have replaced the word “magicians” with the less connotatively loaded original, “siddhas,” which she gives in a footnote. Richard D. McBride, II, “Practical Buddhist Thaumaturgy: The Great Dhāraṇī on Immaculately Pure Light in Medieval Sinitic Buddhism,” Journal of Korean Religions 2.1 (March 2011): 36. More generally on the role of Japanese sectarian scholarship, see Sharf, Coming to Terms with Chinese Buddhism, 264–265. Daniel Chandler, Semiotics: The Basics (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), 110. Chandler, Semiotics, 110. Frits Staal, “Ṛgveda 10.71 on the Origin of Language,” in Revelation in Indian Thought: A Festschrift in Honour of Professor T. R. V. Murti, ed. Harold Coward and Krishna Sivaraman (Emeryville, CA: Dharma Publishing, 1977), 4. Indeed, one of the originating motivations of philosophy of language per se was the desire to create an artificial language with no ambiguity, which gives the entire field an orientation at odds with the goals of the Lotus Sūtra compilers; Fabio Rambelli, personal communication, September 16, 2001. Also, Hylton, “Ideas of a Logically Perfect Language in Analytic Philosophy,” 906–925, and Eco, The Search for the Perfect Language. For example, Coward, “Meaning and Power of Mantras in Bhartṛhari’s Vākyapadīya,” 365–375, reprinted (without citation to the previous publication) in Understanding Mantras, ed. Harvey P. Alpert (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989), 165–176. Frits Staal, Rules without Meaning: Ritual, Mantras, and the Human Sciences (New York: Peter Lang, 1989), 112. Gyatso, “Letter Magic: A Peircean Perspective on the Semiotics of Rdo Grub-chen’s Dhāraṇī Memory,” 189. Coward, “Meaning and Power of Mantras in Bhartṛhari’s Vākyapadīya,” 373. Wheelock, “The Mantra in Vedic and Tantric Ritual,” 96–122. Takagi and Dreitlein, Kūkai on the Philosophy of Language, 290. Andrew Rawlinson, “Studies in the Lotus Sūtra (Saddharmapuṇḍarīka),” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Lancaster, 1972, xvii. Rawlinson, “Studies in the Lotus Sūtra,” 21. Rawlinson, “Studies in the Lotus Sūtra,” 17. Rawlinson, “Studies in the Lotus Sūtra,” 25. Bronkhorst, Langage et Réalité, 8. Leon Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma (Lotus Sūtra) (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 1; for a similar attribution of “having gained dhāraṇīs” as an indication of an exalted status, see also 204, 223, 247. Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 199. Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 245. Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 301. Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 260. This self-referential character is one of the more striking aspects of the Lotus Sūtra. For a recent study of this and its effect on Dōgen’s writing style, see Taigen Dan Leighton, “Dōgen’s Dream Parables: Lotus Sūtra Influence on Dōgen’s Discourse,” paper presented at the Language and Discourse in the Transformation of Medieval Japanese Buddhism conference, held at Green Gulch Zen Center, September 14–16, 2001. Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 309.

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31 The exception is in chapter 28; see Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 334. 32 The chapter numbering employed here follows Hurvitz’ translation, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, which is a translation of Kumārajīva’s Chinese. 33 Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 321, 322. 34 For a discussion of the issue of the authority of the speech of the Buddha, see Lopez, “Authority and Orality in the Mahāyāna,” 21–47. 35 Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 321. 36 While this reference to seven parts initially struck me as odd, why seven? Jacqueline Stone (personal communication, September 2001) suggests that it had to do with the bones of the skull. Skull anatomy includes seven bones which, taken together, enclose the brain—the frontal, two parietal, occipital, two temporal, and sphenoid. Confirmation that this is the significance of the reference to seven parts would depend on examining Indic conceptions of anatomy. 37 Hurvitz, The Scripture of the Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, 323. 38 This is an instance of the self-referential character of several of the Mahāyāna sutras, a characteristic noted by several scholars. See, for example, Gummer, “Listening to the Dharmabhāṇaka.” 39 Wallis, “The Buddha’s Remains,” 95. 40 Wallis, “The Buddha’s Remains,” 97. 41 Lopez, “Authority and Orality in the Mahāyāna,” 26. 42 Lopez, “Authority and Orality in the Mahāyāna,” 27.

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See Richard K. Payne, “Alternative Configurations: Toward a Historiography of Practice,” in Scripture:Canon::Text:Context:Essays Honoring Lewis R. Lancaster, ed. Richard K. Payne (Berkeley : Institute of Buddhist Studies and BDK America, 2014). A comment by Bruce Lincoln concerning a Zoroastrian “mantra” indicates a common basis in at least Indo-Iranian religious culture, if not also in Indo-European religious culture. Myth, Cosmos, and Society: Indo-European Themes of Creation and Destruction (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1986), 91. On the topic of Vedic mantra, see the many works of Frits Staal, especially the essays collected in revised form in part 3 of Rules without Meaning. Henri Maspero, Taoism and Chinese Religions, trans. Frank A. Kierman, Jr. (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1981); Mary Evelyn Tucker, Moral and Spiritual Cultivation in Japanese NeoConfucianism: The Life and Thought of Kaibara Ekken (1630–1714) (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1989); Livia Kohn, Taoist Mystical Philosophy: The Scripture of Western Ascension (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1991); Livia Kohn, Early Chinese Mysticism: Philosophy and Soteriology in the Taoist Tradition (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992); Livia Kohn, ed., Taoist Meditation and Longevity Techniques (Ann Arbor: Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1989); Isabell Robinet, Méditation Taoïste (Paris: Dervy Livres, 1979); John Lagerwey, Taoist Ritual in Chinese Society and History (New York, Macmillan, and London: Collier Macmillan, 1987); Howard J. Wechsler, Offerings of Jade and Silk: Ritual and Symbol in the Legitimation of the T’ang Dynasty (New Haven, CO: Yale University Press, 1985). Kohn, Taoist Mystical Philosophy, 124.

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Kohn, Taoist Mystical Philosophy, 126. Strickmann, “Mantras and Mandarins,” Seminars at the École Pratique des Hautes Études, Paris, May and June, 1987; xerographic copy, 27. Published version in Michel Strickmann, Mantras et mandarins: Le bouddhisme tantrique en Chine (Paris: Éditions Gallimard, 1996), 120. Anne D. Birdwhistell, Transition to Neo-Confucianism: Shao Yung on Knowledge and Symbols of Reality (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1989), 66. Birdwhistell, Transition to Neo-Confucianism, 192. Staal, Rules without Meaning, 390; emphasis in original. Alex Wayman, “The Significance of Mantra-s, from the Veda Down to Buddhist Tantric Practice,” Adyar Library Bulletin 39 (1975): 65–89; quotation, 71–72. Staal, Rules without Meaning, 208, 236. For the functioning of the stobha, see Wayne Howard, Sāmavedic Chant (New Haven, CO: Yale University Press, 1977). Mircea Eliade, ed., Encyclopedia of Religion (New York: Simon and Schuster Macmillan, 1995) s.v., “Oṃ.” For three speculations on the origins of bīja mantra, see Agehananda Bharati, The Tantric Tradition (London: Rider, 1965), 115–118. Benoytosh Bhattacharyya, An Introduction to Buddhist Esoterism, second edn. (Varanasi: Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series Office, 1964). See also Shashi Bhushan Dasgupta, An Introduction to Tantric Buddhism (Calcutta: University of Calcutta, 1958), 56–57. Furthermore, Jan Gonda in his foundational article “The Indian Mantra” (Oriens, 16: 244–297) first mentions bīja mantra during his discussion of tantra (280), apparently overlooking the role of single syllables in Vedic chant. For a discussion of the significance of the syllable A in the work of Abhinavagupta, see Andre Padoux, Vac: The Concept of the Word in Selected Hindu Tantras, trans. Jacques Gontier (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1990), 235–243. For a discussion of the place of the syllable A in a meditation practice from Abhinavagupta, see Paul Muller-Ortega, “Tantric Meditation: Vocalic Beginnings,” in Ritual and Speculation in Early Tantrism: Studies in Honor of Andre Padoux, ed. Teun Goudriaan (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1992), 227–245. See also Dyczkowski, The Doctrine of Vibration, 186, for a brief mention of the meaning of the syllable A in the Spanda tradition. On the use of bīja mantra in South Indian Śrīvidyā Śakta Tantra, see Douglas Renfrew Brooks, Auspicious Wisdom: The Texts and Traditions of Śrīvidyā Śākta Tantrism in South India (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1992), esp. Chapter 5. Padoux, Vac, 127. Salomon, “New Evidence for a Gāndhārī Origin of the Arapacana Syllabary,” 255. Inagaki Hisao, A Dictionary of Japanese Buddhist Terms (Kyoto: Nagata Bunshodo, 1984), s.v. “Goji Monjuju.” For additional information, see Hatta Yukio, Shingonjiten (Tokyo: Heika Shuppansha, 1985), 14 (no. 58). See also Edward Conze, trans., The Large Sutra on Perfect Wisdom, with the Divisions of the Abhisamayālaṃkara (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1975), 21. Additional citations to the canonic literature are given by Salomon, “New Evidence for a Gāndhārī Origin of the Arapacana Syllabary,” 255. The connection between tantric speculations and Mīmāṃsā thought seems obvious. The Mīmāṃsā concern was “in interpreting rituals and sacrificial acts from the vast body of Vedic literature and evaluating their efficacy in terms of the ‘efficiency’ or ‘potency’ they could generate towards accomplishing a particular goal or purpose.” Puruottama Bilimoria, Śabdapramāṇa: Word and Knowledge (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1988), 133. One of the objectives of Mīmāṃsā analysis was “the need to detect and preserve the order of recitation of the mantras upon which the efficacy of the

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Notes rituals were believed to be dependent” (ibid.). However, I am at this point unaware of any historical treatment of the connection. A philosophic examination of Mīmāṃsa thought regarding the efficacy of mantra, one that might reflect on tantric considerations of mantric efficacy, is to be found in Taber, “Are Mantras Speech Acts? The Mīmāṃsā Point of View,” in Understanding Mantras, Harvey P. Alpert, ed. (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989). Padoux, Vac, 235. Padoux, Vac, 235, 241–243, 256. Conze, The Large Sutra, 160. Edward Conze, The Short Prajñāpāramitā Texts (London: Luzac, 1973), 201. Conze, The Short Prajñāpāramitā Texts, vii. Etienne Lamotte, History of Indian Buddhism, trans. Sara Webb-Boin, (Louvain-laNeuve: Institut Orientaliste, Universite Catholique de Louvain, 1988; distributed by Peeters Press), 625 (692 of the French edition). This view would seem to be connected to another Mahāsāṃghika view that the “Buddha knows everything in a single thought-instant,” which forms part of the Indian Buddhist background to the sudden–gradual debate. See Luis O. Gomez, “Purifying Gold: The Metaphor of Effort and Intuition in Buddhist Thought and Practice” in Sudden and Gradual: Approaches to Enlightenment in Chinese Thought, ed. Peter N. Gregory (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1987), 69. The author was trained in these practices by the Lama Tarthang Tulku, Rinpoche, as part of the “Human Development Training Program” at the Nyingma Institute, Berkeley, California, during the summer of 1973. Katsumi Mimaki has pointed out that the term “a chung” is something of a misnomer when used for all occurrences of the “small a.” The term “a chung” is appropriate only for those uses in which it indicates a “long a” as in the transcription of Sanskrit terms into Tibetan. According to Mimaki sensei, occurrences should be specified either as “a sngon ’jug” for a as a prefix or as “a rjes 'jug” for a as a suffix. Seminar discussion, September 21, 1993. Jikrel Yeshe Dorje Dudjom Rinpoche, The Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism: Its Fundamentals and History, trans. Gyurme Dorje, with Matthew Kapstein (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1991), 501. Dudjom Rinpoche, The Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism, 572, 588, 761, 818. Author unknown. rNying-ma’i rgyud-’bum (Thimbu, 1973, vol. 16, 1–137), fol. 8b–9a. Insertions in Guenther’s translation. Matrix of Mystery: Scientific and Humanistic Aspects of rDzog-chen Thought (Boulder, CO, and London: Shambhala Publications, 1984), 70. David L. Snellgrove, trans., The Nine Ways of Bon, London Oriental Series, no. 18 (London: Oxford University Press, 1967), 11. Note that this translation is of selections from the gZi brjid. Snellgrove renders “A dkar thep pa” as “The Way of Pure Sound.” Per Kvaerne, “Bonpo Studies: The A Khrid System of Meditation,” Kailash: A Journal of Himalayan Studies 1.1 and 4 (1973): 19–50, 247–332; quotations, 255–257. (My thanks to Kenneth Eastman for lending me his copy of this rare journal.) Note that Kvaerne opens his essay with the statement that this is a system of meditation and spiritual realization peculiar to the Bon po Lamaist tradition, called A khrid, that is, “The teachings (khrid) concerning the Unconditioned (a)” (19). Note first the continuity of interpretation of the syllable A as referring to the “unconditioned.” When Kvaerne says that the a khrid system is “peculiar to the Bonpo” this may be taken to refer narrowly to that system that goes by the name a khrid. However, if Kvaerne means more broadly that use of the syllable A as a meditative support is unique to the Bon

Notes

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32 33 34

35 36

37

38 39

40

41 42 43 44

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po, then his introductory comments are mistaken. Speculatively, this is the kind of claim that one might expect him to have heard from a Bon po sectarian. Taiko Yamasaki, Shingon: Japanese Esoteric Buddhism, trans. Richard Peterson and Cynthia Peterson, ed. Morimoto Yasuyoshi and David Kidd (Boston and London: Shambhala Publications, 1988), 18–19. Shozui Makoto Toganoo, “The Symbol-System of Shingon Buddhism (2),” Mikkyō Bunka 97 (1971): 60–61. Hakeda, Kūkai, 219–220. Staal, Rules without Meaning, 228. See also Frits Staal, “The Sound Pattern of Sanskrit in Asia: An Unheralded Contribution by Indian Brahmans and Buddhist Monks,” Journal of the Sanskrti Studies Center 2 (2005): 193–207. Hakeda, Kūkai, 220. Kiyota, Tantric Concept of Bodhicitta, 97. In the same work, citing the Mahāvairocana Sūtra, Kūkai gives a variant interpretation of the syllable A, saying that it “represents the essence of life,” while repeating the associations to the elements for the other bīja mantra (98). See also Kūkai’s “The Meanings of the Word HŪṀ (Unji gi)” for another discussion of the meaning of A that reiterates the same understanding. Hakeda, Kūkai, 246–262. Similarly, although Tanabe makes no mention of it, Myoe’s explanation of the efficacy of mantra seems to be, probably indirectly, influenced by Indic (Mīmāṃsā?) understandings of language: “Tied into the correspondence between the dharma and things is the relationship between words and nature. Sanskrit, according to Myoe, is the language of nature since it has existed, unlike other languages, since the beginningless beginning when Brahma and the Buddha spoke it.” George J. Tanabe, Jr., Myoe the Dreamkeeper: Fantasy and Knowledge in Early Kamakura Buddhism (Cambridge, MA: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1992), 138. Carl Bielefeldt, Dōgen’s Manuals of Zen Meditation (Berkeley : University of California Press, 1988), 166. Yamasaki, Shingon, 191. Another important Kamakura monk who shared this inclusivist attitude toward practice is Myōe. Frederic Girard, Un Moine de la Secte Kegon a l’Époque de Kamakura, Myōe (1173–1232) et le “Journal de ses Rives” (Paris: École Française d’Extrême-Orient, 1990), 89. (See Unno’s essay in Re-Visioning “Kamakura” Buddhism for Myoe’s inclusivist attitude toward the kōmyō shingon.) The concept of exclusive practice is often linked with belief that the Kamakura era marked entry into mappō—the era of the decline of the Buddhist teachings. However, as with exclusive practice, the concept of mappō was not nearly as universally accepted by leading Buddhist figures in the late Heian and Kamakura eras as is sometimes portrayed. Dōgen is one well-known instance (Bielefeldt, Dōgen’s Manuals, 167), while Kakuban also explicitly rejected the idea that the world had entered the era of mappō. Jacqueline I. Stone, “Just Open Your Mouth and Say ‘A’: A-Syllable Practice for the Time of Death in Early Medieval Japan,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 8 (Fall 2006): 167–189. Jacqueline I. Stone, Right Thoughts at the Last Moment: Buddhism and Deathbed Practices in Early Medieval Japan (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2016), 346. Hakeda, Kūkai, 220. Hakeda, Kūkai, 220, n. 230. Zōei: Ajikan Sahō Chūin–ryū. Reprinted, together with commentary by Suda Dōei, by Matsuda Dōei (Kyoto: Rokudai Shinpo Press, 1934). Taisen Miyata, ed., and Leo

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Pruden, trans., Ajikan: A Manual for the Esoteric Meditation (Sacramento: Northern California Koyasan Church, 1979). Zōei is also known as Kūkan and as Rikan; 1635 to 1693. 45 This comparison is based on instruction I received at Tassajara Zen Center in 1969. 46 Miyata, Ajikan, 3. Concerning the similarity between Zen and Shingon instructions regarding meditation, consider Dōgen’s directions to the practitioner to: sit upright, with the back of your head straight above your spine, not leaning to the left or right, or to the front or back. Your ears should be in line with your shoulders and your nose in a line with your navel. Place your tongue against the roof of your mouth with teeth and lips closed. Keep your eyes open, not too wide or too narrow, without eyelids covering the pupils. Your neck should not bend forward from your back. Just breathe naturally through your nose, not loudly panting, neither [trying to breathe] long nor short, slow nor sharp. Arrange both body and mind, taking several deep breaths with your whole body so that you are relaxed inside and out, and sway left and right seven or eight times.

47

48

49

50 51 52 53 54 55 56

57

58

Taigen Daniel Leighton and Shohaku Okumura, trans., Dōgen’s Pure Standards for the Zen Community: A Translation of Eihei Shingi (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1996), 72. Although usually Zōei gives full explanations, in this instance he only gives the name of the ritual action to be taken, apparently assuming that the practitioner already knows what is intended from his or her prior training; the expansion given here is based on the action as it is known in other Shingon rituals, such as the sequence of four rituals that constitute the training of a Shingon priest. Payne, Tantric Ritual of Japan, 146. Although the association is not made explicitly in the text, we can call attention to the structural similarity between the five places of the body and the arrangement of the five buddhas (Skt. pañcatathāgata)—one in the central, and four surrounding, one each of the four at cardinal points. The association between members of such sets, in this case sets of five, is a commonplace of tantric Buddhist praxis. Again, the manual only gives the names of this action and the accompanying mudrā. For the mudrā, see Payne, Tantric Ritual of Japan, 144; English translation of the Five Great Resolutions given here is from 152. Miyata, Ajikan, 3. Miyata, Ajikan, 4. Miyata, Ajikan, 4. Miyata, Ajikan, 4. I wish to thank Mark Unno and Eisho Nasu for their assistance with these translations. The Mikkyō jiten lists thirty-two titles, most of them in several chūan. Three are to be found in the Taishō Daizōkyō. Aaron Proffitt, “Mysteries of Speech and Breath: Dōhan’s (1179–1252) Himitsu nenbutsu shō, and Esoteric Pure Land Buddhism,” dissertation, University of Michigan, 2015. Yamamoto Chikyo, History of Mantrayana in Japan (New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan, 1987), 146. The translation that follows is from “A Un Gō Kan,” in Ajikan Hiketsu-shū, ed. Raimitsuun (Kyoto: Rokudaishindo, 1913), 19–20. Cf. the partial translation in Yamasaki, Shingon, 204.

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59 That is, the three virtues that mark the dharmakāya. See Hajime Nakamura, ed., Bukkyō-go Daijiten (Tokyo: Tokyo Shoseki, 1975), s.v. “santen,” 483. 60 Yamasaki, Shingon, 39. These different bodies represent further refinements in the three-body theory discussed previously. 61 Stone, “Just Open Your Mouth and Say ‘A’,” 175. 62 The poem is from “Ajikan,” in Ajikan Hiketsu-shū, ed. Raimitsuun 18; the essay is from “Ajikan,” in Shingon-shū Seiten, ed. Nagamatsu Shunkyo (Kyoto: Heirakuji Shoten, 1915), 1508–1511. 63 According to Adrian Snodgrass, “The five Buddhas in the Perfected Body Assembly of the Diamond World Maṇḍala… represent the five knowledges (pañca-jñānani, gochi), which are five aspects of the Tathāgata’s all-inclusive Knowledge.” The Bodaishinron says, In (the Assembly of) the thirty seven World-honoured Ones (bhagavat) each of the Buddha stations in the five directions symbolizes a Knowledge. Akṣobhya Buddha in the east is the perfection of the Great Round Mirror Knowledge (ādarśa-jñāna, daienkyōchi) also called the Diamond Knowledge (kongō-chi); Ratnasambhava Buddha in the south is the perfection of the Knowledge of Identity (samatā-jñāna, byōdō-shōchi), also called the Initiation Knowledge (kanjō-chi); Amitābha Buddha in the west is the perfection of the Knowledge of Wondrous Perception (pratyavekṣana-jñāna, myōkan-zatchi), also called the Lotus Knowledge (renge-chi); Amoghasiddhi in the north is the perfection of the Knowledge of the Perfection of Action (kṛityanuṣṭhāna-jñāna, jōshōsachi); and Vairocana Buddha at the centre is the perfection of the Dharma World Knowledge (dharmadhātu-jñāna, hokkai-chi), which is the Fundamental Knowledge (kompon-chi). Snodgrass, The Matrix and Diamond World Mandalas in Shingon Buddhism, 2:590. 64 The eight consciousnesses familiar from early Yogācāra together with the amalavijñāna, the pure or immaculate consciousness, as found, for example, in Paramārtha’s version of Yogācāra. Paramārtha (499–569) was influential in the development of Yogācāra thought in East Asia, and the allusion here to nine consciousnesses indicates the interaction with tantric praxis. 65 That is, in Sukhāvatī, the Pure Land of the Buddha Amitābha. 66 See McBride, II, “Is There Really ‘Esoteric’ Buddhism?” 67 The lowest of the hells in Buddhist cosmology, reserved for those who have committed the gravest karmic offenses. 68 See Brian Stock, The Implications of Literacy: Written Language and Models of Interpretation in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983); Jack Goody, The Interface between the Written and the Oral (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987); and William A. Graham, Beyond the Written Word: Oral Aspects of Scripture in the History of Religion (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987). 69 H. H. Ingalls notes that despite Sanskrit being an “artificial” language, it was not a dead language but was widely used as a means of communication in both spoken and written forms. H. H. Ingalls, “General Introduction,” in Sanskrit Poetry from Vidyākara’s “Treasury,” trans. H. H. Ingalls (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1965), 5. 70 Abé, The Weaving of Mantra, 3.

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71 Applying Saussure’s analysis of the limits of arbitrariness, one might identify the situation of a practitioner experientially familiar with Sanskrit (or any of the Prakrit dialects of Sanskrit) as one in which the significance of the syllable A is “relatively arbitrary,” while for a practitioner lacking such experiential familiarity, the significance would be “absolutely arbitrary.” See Ferdinand De Saussure, General Course in Linguistics, trans. Roy Harris (LaSalle, IL: Open Court, 1983), 130–131 (180–181 of the French edition). 72 See, for example, Yoshiko K. Dykstra, trans., Miraculous Tales of the Lotus Sutra from Ancient Japan: The Dainihonkoku Hokekyōkenki of Priest Chingen (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1984). 73 However, the high degree of continuity of interpretation of ajikan practice shown by the Shingon tradition requires Staal’s more general claim that “rituals are transmitted without interpretation or with constantly changing interpretations” (Rules without Meaning, 400) be qualified and evaluated on a case-by-case basis. Rather than interpretations not being transmitted as, for example, with ajikan, it may be that the practice and its interpretation are “fossilized” together with one another as a result of failing to connect with experience, becoming one might say an “antiquarian” form of Buddhist practice. 74 This, obviously, results from the continuing legacy of Cartesian dualism. 75 While this is not the place for an extended examination of this assumption that ritual and meditation are mutually exclusive from the perspective of the sociology of knowledge, it would seem to be relatively safe to see it based in the Protestant Reformation. It is interesting to note in this connection that French scholars, whose mental culture would be more influenced by Catholicism, tended to take the lead in the study of ritual—in advance of Anglo-American scholars, whose own mental culture would be more influenced by Protestantism. For a discussion of the furor over ritual during the Reformation, see Euan Cameron, The European Reformation (Oxford: Clarendon Press, Oxford University Press, 1991), esp. chapter 11; Carlos M. N. Eire, War against the Idols: The Reformation of Worship from Erasmus to Calvin (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986); and Eamon Duffy, The Stripping of the Altars: Transitional Religion in England, c. 1400-c. 1580 (New Haven, CO: Yale University Press, 1992), esp. part 2. Certain strains of psychology have introduced concepts that may contribute to the development of such a typology (e.g., guided visualization and active imagination). For example, see Barbara Hannah, Encounters with the Soul: Active Imagination as Developed by C. G. Jung (Santa Monica, CA: Sigo Press, 1981), and Janet Dallett, “Active Imagination in Practice,” in Jungian Analysis, ed. Murray Stein (Boulder, CO and London: Shambhala Publications, 1984). 76 An issue not mentioned in this chapter is the very important one of ritual efficacy. There appear to be at least two ways in which rituals may be efficacious: socially and psychologically. The performative theory of ritual efficacy seems to me to be the best handling of the social form of efficacy (see, for example, Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah, “A Performative Approach to Ritual,” Proceedings of the British Academy 65 (1979). Reprinted in Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah, Culture Thought, and Social Action: An Anthropological Perspective [Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985], 123–166). A mimetic theory of ritual efficacy seems on the other hand to be the most effective way of dealing with psychological efficacy (see Richard K. Payne, “Realizing Inherent Enlightenment: Ritual and Self-Transformation in Shingon Buddhism,” in Religious and Social Ritual: Interdisciplinary Explorations, ed. Michael B. Aune and Valerie De Marinis [Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1996]).

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77 Frits Staal, “The Meaninglessness of Ritual” Numen 26.1 (Jun 1979), partially reprinted as chapter 13 of Rules without Meaning: Ritual, Mantras and the Human Sciences, Toronto Studies in Religion, vol. IV (New York, Peter Lang, 1989). An argument may be made that the relation between the syntax of language and “ritual syntax” is more than simply heuristically useful. One form that this argument may take is that both are products of the same organizing principles of human consciousness or that they represent examples of the same tendency to create rule-bound systems of behavior. This is not, however, the place to develop these arguments. 78 “Ritual Syntax,” in Sanskrit and Indian Studies: Essays in Honour of H. H. Ingalls, eds. M. Nagatomi et al. Studies of Classical India, vol. II (Dordrecht, Reidel 1980); revised version reprinted as chapter 12 of Rules without Meaning. 79 As per the recommendation of Frits Staal to “never study one ritual in isolation” (personal communication, 16 October 1992). 80 Frits Staal, Concepts of Science in Europe and Asia (Leiden: International Institute for Asian Studies, 1993), 23. 81 Steven Pinker, The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language (New York: Harper Perennial, 1995), 99–100. 82 Pinker, The Language Instinct, 108. 83 Keith Devlin, Goodbye, Descartes: The End of Logic and the Search for a New Cosmology of the Mind (New York: J. Wiley, 1997), 131. 84 Pierre Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, trans. Richard Nice, Cambridge Studies in Social Anthropology, no. 16 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1977), 11. Bourdieu adds the qualification “and only those” to his description of the principle constructed by the science of practice. In linguistics, one of the tests for the descriptive adequacy of the proposed rules is whether the application of them creates a sentence that a native speaker judges to be “ungrammatical.” To the best of my knowledge there have been no tests for the limits of acceptable ritual, although an interesting test case is provided by a ritual created by C. M. Chen, a Taiwanese tantric Buddhist master. This ritual is a votive fire offering (Skt. homa, Jpn. goma) devoted to Jesus and other Christian figures. (Lin, Yutang, ed., A Systematised Collection of Chenian Booklets, Nos. 101–49, vol. III, nos. 115–125 [El Cerrito, CA: Yutang Lin, 1993], includes “A Ritual of Fire Sacrifice to the Five Saints of Christianity” No. 122, 421–444.) While the rituals appear to be “well-formed” in the sense that the structures employed are those of other tantric Buddhist homas, the choice of chief deities (Jpn. honzon) makes them marginal. It is like a sentence in which the subject, adverb, and direct object are all from another language. Or, as with Jabberwocky, one can determine from the context which part is which, and there is a familiar, recognizable order, but one is not sure whether it is something one would oneself want to say. For a more detailed study of this homa ritual, see Richard K. Payne, “Jesus Christ, Tantric Deity: Syntax and Semantics in Ritual Change,” in On Meaning and Mantras: Essays in Honor of Frits Staal, ed. George Thompson and Richard K. Payne (Berkeley : Institute of Buddhist Studies and BDK America, 2016), 455–476. 85 See, for example, By Means of Performance: Intercultural Studies of Theatre and Ritual, ed. Richard Schechner and Willa Appel (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990). 86 For a discussion of the alimentary metaphor in the Indic context, see Charles Malamoud, “Cooking the World,” in his Cooking the World: Ritual and Thought in Ancient India, trans. David White (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1996). Also, Carlos

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89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98

99

100 101

102

Notes Lopez, “Food and Immortality in the Veda: A Gastronomic Theology?” Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies (EJVS) 3.3 (1997): 11–19. See George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1980), and George Lakoff, Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1987). For a preliminary study toward such comparisons, Richard K. Payne, “Buddhist Ritual from Syntax to Cognition: Insight Meditation and Homa,” Religions 7.8 (2016). DOI: 10.3390/rel7080104. Formerly, Bishop of the Kōyasan Buddhist Temple in Los Angeles. Miyata, Ajikan. The divisions of the practice as enumerated are those of the ritual manual itself. Miyata, Ajikan, 2–3. Miyata, Ajikan, 4. See Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan, 146. Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan, 285, 321. Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan, 287. Payne, The Tantric Ritual of Japan, 181. The exception seems to be linked with a strongly dualist ontology, for example, that of the Śaiva Siddhānta tradition. This exception is qualified, however, in that while identification does not form part of such rituals in Śaiva Siddhānta, there are aspects of the tradition wherein an identity is established between the initiate and Śīva. See Richard K. Payne, “Ritual Studies in the Longue Durée: Comparing Shingon and Śaiva Siddhānta Homas,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 13 (Fall 2011): 236–238. Minoru, Kiyota. Shingon Buddhism: Theory and Practice (Los Angeles and Tokyo: Buddhist Books International, 1978), 69–71. In that same volume, see also his “Glossary of Technical Terms,” s.v. “tri-guhya.” See Staal’s “The Meaninglessness of Ritual” for the failure of the referential theory of meaning as applied to ritual practice. While it is not being claimed that ritual is language, the application of linguistic models to the study of ritual has begun to provide a means of performing significant comparative studies of ritual. The efficacy of applying linguistic analyses to ritual may be grounded in the fact that both language and ritual are the cultural products of human beings with a fundamentally similar mental capacity for structuring experience and action. Future applications of linguistic analyses to ritual may borrow from such recent developments in linguistics as “cognitive grammar,” which “claims the inseparability of syntax and semantics.” Ronald W. Langacker, Foundations of Cognitive Grammar, 2 vols. (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1987), I: 1. For a corollary, see David M. Perlmutter and Scott Soames, Syntactic Argumentation and the Structure of English (Berkeley : University of California Press, 1979).

Chapter 10 1

2

Seong-Uk Kim, “The Zen Theory of Language: Linji Yixuan’s Teaching of ‘Three Statements, Three Mysteries, and Three Essentials’,” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 36.37 (2013/2014): 69. Kim, “The Zen Theory of Language,” 83.

Notes 3

4 5 6 7

8 9 10 11 12

13

14 15 16 17 18 19

20 21 22

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We note, however, that the metaphysics of Romanticism is itself not something that can be reduced to a simple formula. See Dalia Nassar, The Romantic Absolute: Being and Knowing in Early German Romantic Philosophy, 1795–1804 (Chicago, IL and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2014). See Gyatso, “Letter Magic: A Peircean Perspective on the Semiotics of Rdo Grubchen’s Dhāraṇī Memory.” Kim, “The Zen Theory of Language,” 75. Asad, Genealogies of Religion, 29. There are many additional aspects of language use under consideration in contemporary linguistics, such as pragmatics, relevance theory, cognitive linguistics, and so on. These do, however, in general take the communicative function of language as fundamental and definitive. Clooney, “Why the Veda Has No Author,” 671. Clooney, “Why the Veda Has No Author,” 671. Clooney, “Why the Veda Has No Author,” 671. Timothy Fitzgerald, The Ideology of Religious Studies (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000). Tomoko Masuzawa, The Invention of World Religions: Or, How European Universalism Was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism (Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press, 2005). Such legitimation seems to inform much of the use of the idea that there is a “Buddhist theology.” Richard K. Payne, “Why ‘Buddhist Theology’ is Not a Good Idea,” The Pure Land, n.s., no. 27 (2012–2013): 37–71. Robert J. Richards, Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior (Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press, 1987), 13. Richard K. Payne, “Buddhist Studies beyond the Nation-State,” in Oxford Handbooks Online (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2016). Richard K. Payne, “Ritual Syntax and Cognitive Theory,” Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, third series, no. 6 (2004): 196. Staal, Rules without Meaning, 254. Fabio Rambelli, A Buddhist Theory of Semiotics (London and New York: Bloomsbury, 2013), 2. Ryūichi Abé, “Word,” in Critical Terms for the Study of Buddhism, ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr. (Chicago, IL and London: University of Chicago Press, 2005), 291–310 : 293. Abé, “Word,” 294. Abé, “Word,” 294. Abé, “Word,” 295.

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Index Note: Locators with letter ‘n’ refer to notes. Abe, Masao 25 Abé, Ryūichi 78–9, 80, 85, 86–7, 88–9, 156–7 abhidharma 2, 7, 44, 55–6, 89–90, 94, 103, 104, 107 Abhisamayamñajarī (Śākyarakśita) 51, 62 absorption 60 Adi Buddha 127 agency, religious cognitive approach 93–4 conceptions 92–4, 96, 98–9 developmental approach 92–3 of mantra 94–5 Agni (fire deity; Jpn. Katen) 97, 107 Ahina Sutta(Anguttara Nikāya) 58 Ahura Mazdāh, Lord 13 ajari (Shingon priest) 2, 3, 82, 83 ajikan 125–50 Dōhan’s version 135–6 Indic origins/aspects of syllable A 125–31 Kakuban’s version 136–8 Miyata’s version 147–50 popularity of 138–40 practice of 131–4 syntactic analysis of (ritual structures, diagramming technique) 141–50 texts 135 Zōei’s version 132–4, 143–6 Ajikan Sahō Chūin-ryū (Zōei) 132 Akṣayamatinirdeśa 16 akusetsura rin (wheel of syllables; Skt. akṣaracakra) 82–5 altar 71, 153–4 Amitābha Buddha (Buddha of Unlimited Light) 2, 13, 20, 73–6, 78, 95–6, 97–8, 111, 122, 136, 138, 139 Amitāyus Buddha (Buddha of Unlimited Life) 20, 73, 84

Amoghavajra 71 amulets 5, 95, 96 animate agency 93 anomalous language 8, 101 anti-language 23, 65 Art of Indian Asia (Zimmer) 117 Asad, Talal 21, 152–3 astrology 58–9 Atharvaveda 45 Austin, John L. 35, 36, 37 authority of Buddha’s speech 101–8 in dhāraṇī in the Lotus Sūtra 121–2 Dharmakīrti’s argument 108–11 scriptural 111–13 Avestan literature 13 awakening (bodhi) 10, 18, 19, 20, 23, 41, 60, 71, 76, 78–9, 82–3, 85, 88, 92, 101, 105, 108, 110, 111, 113, 114, 121, 122, 123, 124, 131, 138, 152, 157 Āyurveda 45 Benkenmitsu nikyōron, (Kūkai) 79 Berkeley, George 167 n.11 Bhartṛhari 50–1, 62, 63, 74, 120, 123 Bhattacharyya, Benoytosh 126 Bhāvaviveka 60–1 Bhoja 45 Bible 57, 67, 111, 187 n.9 Bickerton, Derek 9 Bielefeldt, Carl 131 bīja mantra 2, 39, 62, 83, 98, 126–7, 130, 133, 135, 137, 141, 197 n.36 Blackburn, Anne 56–7, 58 black magic 29 bodhi. See awakening bodhisattva 12, 16, 36, 60–2, 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79, 91, 98, 99, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 130

Index Bodhisattvabhūmi 44, 60–1 Bolzano, Bernard 28 bonsai 26 Bon (Tibetan religion) 125, 129, 196–7 n.30 Braarvig, Jens 16 Brahmā 157, 197 n.37 brāhman 50, 117 Brahmi script 126 breath/breathing exercises 47, 54, 78–9, 133, 135, 136, 137, 138, 143, 144, 148 Bronkhorst, Johannes 46, 121 buddha authority of 103–15, 121–3 essence of 74 identity of 18 life-breath 79 limitlessness of 58, 59 name identical with 74, 76 recollection of 61 relics of 96 speech of (buddhavacana) 2, 54, 55, 56–60, 101–15, 121–3 teaching proficiency 14 Trikaya doctrine (three bodies) 78–9, 111 wheel of five syllables and 83–4 Buddhabhadra 53 buddhadharma (buddha’s teachings) 93, 136 Buddhaghoṣa 56 buddhahood 18, 121, 129, 137 Buddhapālita 71 “buddha-recollection” practice 20, 61, 65, 129 buddhavacana. See buddha, speech of Buddhist modernism 57, 58, 111, 114 Burchett, Patton E. 45 Burling, Robbins 9, 28 Burma 60 Cabezón, José 11 cakra (wheel/cycle) 48–9, 82, 84, 98, 136 calligraphy 26, 87 Canda Paritta(Moon Deity’s Prayer for Protection) 59 Candrakīrti 80, 111–12 Carl, Wolfgang 34 Carpenter, David 50

229

Cartesian dualism 4, 77, 200 n.74 category mistakes 28, 29 Chan Buddhism 24, 65, 71, 75–6 Chandler, Daniel 119 Chāndogya Upaniṣad 46 Ch’an reformers 131 chanting 18, 45, 57, 75, 77, 136, 149 charms 14, 16, 58, 122 Chaudhuri, Saroj Kumar 5 chiasmus 83, 183 n.35 Chi Chen Ho 71 Chinese Buddhism 43, 65–76 conceptions of language 66–9 devotion to Amitābha (Pure Land) 73–4 ideas of emanation 69 mantra and dhāraṇī 70–3 ming concept 66–9 recitation and meditation 75–6 tantric thought 69 Chomsky, Noam 31, 171 n.70 Ch’ŏnch’aek 152 Christianity believers 66 conceptions of agency 93, 94 marriage ceremony 93 Protestant rhetoric of cleansing 57 revelation in language 40 Chūin ryū 83, 138 circumambulation 77 clear light mantra (kōmyō shingon) 2, 38, 77–8, 96–9, 138 Clooney, Francis X. 153, 154 Coblin, W. South 70 code-breakers 32, 34 “Commentary on the ‘Rebirth Treatise” (Tanluan) 43 communications theory 33 comparison (Skt. upamāna) 102, 112 compassion 59, 132, 134, 145, 146, 147, 176 n.88 compositionality 30, 34, 44, 169 n.48 computers 33 concept theory 70 Confucianism 2, 24, 43, 51, 66–9, 86 consciousness 23, 29, 48, 49, 50, 53, 54, 105, 106, 125, 130, 137 contemporary philosophy of language 1, 29, 34, 102 Conze, Edward 128, 191 n.68

230 Copp, Paul 5, 9, 15, 71–2, 96 correlative theory 67 cosmogony 44, 48–9, 87, 90, 127, 173 n.23 cosmology 44, 130, 139–40, 154, 186 n.40 Coward, Harold 50, 120 Cox, Collett 55–6, 89 Cratylus 10, 51, 67 creative spontaneity 27 Cruse, Alan 33 cultural baggage 151, 154–5 cybernetics 33 daimoku 1, 7, 10, 13, 18–19, 21, 23, 30, 31, 34, 36, 37, 38, 40, 122, 138, 139, 140, 151, 153 Dainichi kyō 79, 80, 84, 129 Dainichi Nyorai 98, 134, 136, 144 Dalton, Jacob 16–17, 93, 97 Daosheng 17 Daoxin, Dayi 75 Davidson, Ronald 16, 72, 94, 96, 112 Davis, Richard 51 dead metaphor 29, 32 de Certeau, Michel 40, 46, 58, 152, 157 deluded self 105 demons (yakṣas) 17, 59, 93, 122 Derrida, Jacques 28 Descartes, René 27, 114, 160 n.3 determinate knowledge 106–7 dhāraṇī categories 60–1, 75 in Chinese Buddhism 70–3 etymology 15, 70 functions and activities 70–3 history and conceptions 15–18 in the Lotus Sūtra 117–24 and mantra, distinctions between 16, 17–18, 45, 70–3, 118–20 and tantric Buddhism 61, 120 types of 70–1 value of 121 dharma 17, 18, 20, 52, 55, 58, 60, 75, 78, 83, 88, 95, 112, 122, 131, 133, 137–8, 143, 144, 152, 155, 157 dharmadhātu samādhi mudrā 98, 132 Dharmakīrti 55, 56, 72, 123 view of mantra 94–5, 96, 99

Index view of scriptural authority 111–13 views Buddha’s authority 101, 106, 108–11 Dignāga 55, 106, 107, 108–9, 123 Discernment of the State of Enlightenment 78 Dōgen 55, 131, 166 n.2, 198 n.46 Dōhan 125, 131, 134, 135–6 dreams 19, 87–8 Dreitlein, Thomas 86 duality 4, 24, 27, 47, 50, 75, 77, 78, 152, 153, 184 n.4, 191 n.68, 202 n.98 Dunhuang 93 Dyczkowski, Mark S. G. 53 earth-touching mudrā 71 Eastern religions 25 Eco, Umberto 10, 162 n.18 efficacious language 8, 11, 21, 162 n.18 elements of life 130 Eltschinger, Vincent 72–3, 95 e-mail 33 emanation theory. See phonematic emanation emancipation 108 emptiness 41, 55, 63, 69, 75, 77–90, 111, 114, 152, 155, 183 n.36, 184 n.54 empty ritual 27 empty subject terms 44 encryption (encoding–decoding) model 2, 32–4, 39 Encyclopedia of Religion 65, 91 English, Elizabeth 62, 154 English language 32, 34, 66, 71–2, 97, 115, 125, 127, 128, 140, 143, 154, 162 n.21, 189 n.33 enlightenment 15, 23 24, 26, 61, 78, 79, 80, 84, 104, 130, 134, 135, 143, 144, 147, 148, 152, 157, 166 n.2 and religion 23 Enryakuji monastery 18 eons 18, 80 Esoteric Buddhism 5, 7, 12, 18, 79, 80, 87, 131, 155, 156, 183 n.32 Exoteric Buddhism 80 exotic other 24, 25 expressive vs. performative language 35–6 extraordinary language use four instances of 12–20

Index historical/philosophical approaches 11–12 and meaning 30–1 vs. ordinary forms 1, 8–9, 27–8, 30–1, 153–4 other terms and phrases 9–11 terminology 8–9 faith 17, 18, 19, 60, 72, 112–13, 137 Farmer, Steve 10 Faure, Bernard 71, 75 fire ritual (Skt. homa, Jpn. goma) 2, 15, 36, 77, 82, 97–9, 147 Flood, Gavin 14 flower arrangement 26 Fotudeng 70 Frege, Gottlob 28, 29–31, 34, 44 Freschi, Elisa 44 Fudō Myōō (Great Immovable Lord) 15, 77 Fudō myōō sokusai goma 77 gachirinkan 82 Ganeri, Jonardon 54, 102, 175 n.68 Ganges River 117, 122, 124 ganriki jinen 96 Gardiner, David 78, 79 Geaney, Jane 66–7 German Idealism 25 gnosticism 92, 114, 128, 191 n.68 Gokuraku 20 goma. See fire ritual Gonda, Jan 13–14, 15 Gongyuang zhuan 68 gorin sotoba (five-element stūpa) 98 gospel of prosperity 19 Goudriaan, Teun 52, 53 Graham, A. C. 68 Granoff, Phyllis 56 Guenther, Herbert 129 Gyatso, Janet 120 Habermas, Jürgen 113 haiku poetry 26 Hajime, Nakamura 80 Hakeda, Yoshito S. 132 Hansen, Chad 65, 66, 68–9, 70 Harris, Roy 67 Harrison, Paul 70

231

Harvey, Peter 60 Hayes, Richard 109 Heart Sūtra 7, 9, 16 Heian era 18, 78, 130, 181 n.6, 197 n.39 hermeneutics 5, 55, 79, 126 heuristics 72, 112, 141, 142, 154, 201 n.77 Hevajra tantra 5 Higher Criticism 57 Hinduism 13, 14, 44, 46, 49, 52, 53, 56, 62, 69, 83, 91, 98, 111, 127, 128, 147, 173 n.23 hō (dharma) 20 Hōkke-shū 18 homa. See fire ritual Hōnen 131 honzon (chief deity) 77, 82, 97, 98, 141, 149 Hopkins, Jeffrey 113 Horner, Isaline B. 118 hosshin seppō 78 How to Do Things with Words (Austin) 35 Huiyuan, Jingying 75 human existence 101, 105, 108, 152 Hume, David 167 n.11 Huns 70 Hurford, James R. 28, 168 n.32 Husserl, Edmund 28 ideology language 39, 47 and practice 103, 140, 151, 154, 155–6 ignorance (Skt. avidya) 57, 74, 92, 101, 108, 113, 114, 134, 137 images, role of 48, 49, 61, 71, 94, 95, 126, 138 immorality 16 impermanence 55, 56, 63, 69, 78, 94, 99, 181 n.6 “implicit doctrine” 21 indeterminate knowledge 106–7 Indian Buddhism, conceptions of language 43–63 emanation theory 46–9 and Euro-American philosophy, comparison 43–4 Kubjikā tradition 52–3 Lotus Sūtra 117–24 Mahāvairocana-sūtra 80–5 paritta, protective texts 56–60

232 power of truth 117–18 role of testimony 54–5, 101–3 Śaiva Siddhānta 51–2 sphoṭa concept 44, 50–1 testimony/śabdapramāna, Nyāya theory 54–5 transmission of 125–31, 150, 151, 156 Vajrayoginīcult 62 Vedic rituals and mantra 13–15, 44–6 Indo-Tibetan Buddhism 25, 155 industrialization 24 inference (Skt. anumāna) 54, 55, 102, 104, 105, 106–7, 109, 112–13, 123, 189 n.23 Ingram, Paul 12 initiation 19, 48–9, 52 intentional agency 93 Islam 91 Īśvara 50 Jackson, Roger 109 Jainism 91 Jakobson, Roman 33, 119 James, William 25 Janowitz, Naomi 8 Japanese Buddhism. See Shingon Buddhism Jesus 57, 93, 94, 186 n.31, 187 n.9, 201 n.84 jinen hōni 96 jingtu (purified ground) 73 jirinkan (wheel of syllables) 82–5 Johnson, Mark 29, 35 juhachidō (eighteen stages) 82 Kahrs, Eivind 4 Kakuban 125, 131, 134, 136–8, 197 n.39 Kakukai 135, 136 Kalacakra tantra 107 Kālāmas 103–4, 108 Kamakura era 18, 20, 125–32, 134, 135, 138, 140, 150 Kapstein, Matthew 60–1, 117, 176 n.89 kārikās 38 karma 17, 71, 76, 83, 135, 147, 155 Kashmir Shaivism 14, 48, 49, 53–4 Kasulis, Thomas 12 Katen. See Agni Kautsa 120 kegare 97

Index Khandha Paritta(Protection of the Aggregates) 59 Kharoṣṭhī script 126 Kim, Seong-Uk 152 King and the Corpse (Zimmer) 117 Kiyota, Minoru 81 kōans 5, 166 n.2 kōmyō shingon. See clear light mantra Kongōbu-ji 138 Kongōchō gyō 79, 80, 83, 129 kongōkai (Vajradhātu) 82, 83–4, 90 Kövecses, Zoltán 29 Kōyasan 7 krama 49, 53 Kristeva, Julia 33, 66–7 Kubjikā (Crooked Goddess) 52 Kubjikā school of Kaula tantra 52–3 Kūkai 7, 12, 14, 37, 38, 51, 78, 79, 80, 86–7, 88–9, 120, 130, 131–2, 155 Kumārādza 129 Kumārajiva 53, 70 kuṇḍalinī 47 Kvaerne, Per 129, 196 n.30 Kyoto school 18, 25 Lakoff, George 28, 35 Lamotte, Étienne 71–2, 128 landscape gardens 26 Lang, Karen 111 language “authentic” 41 and awakening 79, 156–7 Buddhist conceptions 152–3, 156–7 and cognition 29, 41 cognition and 29 as communication 9, 21, 39–40 Confucianist and Daoist conceptions 66–9, 125–6 as constitutive of cosmos 44 and culture 29 and emotions 54 encryption (encoding–decoding) model 2, 32–4, 39 and experience 12, 65, 154 function of 9 Indic conceptions 43–63, 117–24 logic as fundamental 44 and meaning 4, 20–1, 27–40, 32, 34, 51 Mīmāṃsā view 125 as mystical or apophatic 23–6, 41

Index neo-Romantic views 23–7 origins of 9, 31 performative function 35–6 power of 54 pragmatics and context 36–7 and reason 4, 24–5, 41 Romantic conception 10, 23, 24 vs. silence 23, 26, 27 theories of 23–41 language conducive to awakening 8, 10 language ideologies 39 Language the Unknown (Kristeva) 33 Laozi 68 Lawson, E. Thomas 92, 93, 95, 96, 98 Lewis, Mark Edward 68 Lhatsūn Namka Jikme 129 liberation 14, 47, 48, 49, 54, 63, 69, 82, 88, 90, 105, 109, 111, 123, 124, 137 limitlessness 58, 59 Lincoln, Bruce 194 n.2 liṅga 52, 109 linguistic realism 10 Linji Yixuan 152 Locke, John L. 8, 31, 167 n.11 logic 29–30, 44, 54, 71, 102, 103, 123, 142, 152, 157 Logical Investigations (Husserl) 28 Lokaṣema 70 Lopez, Donald S., Jr. 9, 112, 124 lotus bud mudrā 144, 145 Lotus Sūtra daimoku recitation 18–19, 139 dhāraṇī 16, 17, 117–24 emergence of 2–3, 120–1 installation of maṇḍala 19 loving-kindness 14, 60 Madhyamaka school 2, 38, 107, 111, 152, 180 n.61 Māgadhī 56 magic 9, 10, 16, 19, 29, 41, 57, 58, 60, 67, 176 n.91 Mahasaṃghika school 128, 196 n.24 Mahāvairocana 52, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 84, 85, 98, 133, 134, 135, 136, 145 Mahāvamsa 60 Mahāyāna Buddhism 2, 7, 12, 13, 16–18, 39, 55, 57, 58, 60–2, 78, 87, 94, 96, 111, 121, 126, 127 Mahāyāna Compendium 75

233

Maheśvara 96, 99 Maitreya 7, 112 Makeham, John 67 maṇḍala 19, 71, 83, 98, 129, 136 Mañjuśrī 47, 61–2, 77, 121, 123, 127 Mañjuśrīmūlakalpa 21, 51, 61–2, 79, 94, 123, 154 mantra. See also specific mantras agency of 94–5 as meaningless object of meditation 10 creation 72–3 and dhāraṇī, distinctions between 16, 17–18, 50, 57, 58, 97 efficacy of 10, 14, 44–6, 50–1, 58–9, 61–2, 96, 99, 102, 120, 196 n.18, 197 n.37 embodiment of 51–2 etymology 14, 15 grammar and 156 history and conceptions 13–15, 21 and meaning 31 and rituals 44–5 in Shingon tradition 12, 52, 62, 96–9 structuralist approach 38–9 syntagmatic/paradigmatic relations 38 in Vedic rituals 44–6, 51–2, 60–2, 69 mantrahetu 72–3 mantra samādhi 50–1, 63 mappō (age of degeneration) 20, 136 martial arts 26 Matilal, Bimal Krishna 54 McBride, Richard 16, 70, 72, 75, 96, 118 McCauley, Robert N. 92, 93, 95, 96, 98–9, 185 n.16, 185 n.22 meaning and expression 28 Frege’s threefold theory 28, 29–31, 34, 44 metaphor theory 34–5 nomenclaturist theory 67 referential theory 28–9, 67–8, 74, 161 n.7, 202 n.100 sphoṭa theory 44, 50–1 structural 119 meditation and recitation 75–6 and ritual 15, 77, 125, 140, 155, 200 n.75 yogic 87 meditation mudrā 98, 144

234 memorial rituals 77 metanarrative 25, 167 n.13 metaphor 16, 28–9, 32–4, 40, 48–9, 87–8, 93–4, 105, 108, 127, 142, 145, 148–9, 184 n.56, 188 n.19 metaphor theory 34–5 metaphysics 14, 28, 44, 49, 51, 56, 66, 90, 120, 123, 152, 153, 173 n.23, 191 n.68, 203 n.3 meta-rules 141, 142 metta. See loving-kindness mikkyō 131 Milindapañhā 118, 124 Mīmāṃsā 2, 14, 44, 46, 62, 81, 89, 91, 94, 95, 99, 102, 123, 125, 153, 187 n.3, 195–6 n.18, 197 n.37 mindless ritual 10 ming (names), concept of 66–9 Mipham, Lama 114, 192 n.71 Miraculous Stories from the Japanese Buddhist Tradition 19 Miraculous Tales of the Lotus Sutra 19 mirror (analogy) 105 mirror-image symmetry 83, 145, 147, 150 mnemonics 7, 16, 17, 85, 183 n.42 modernization 19, 24, 25, 188 n.13 Mohanty, J. N. 55 Mokṣākaragupta 103, 106–8 Mollier, Christine 5 monotheism 91, 101 moon cakra 82, 84, 136 moral failings 60 Mora Paritta(Peacock’s Prayer for Protection) 59 Mount Kōya 7 Mount Hiei 18 Mozi 68 mudrā (hand gesture) 15, 36, 48, 62, 71, 87, 97, 98, 132, 133, 140, 144–5 Müller-Ortega, Paul 48–9 myō. See vidyā Myōe Koben 96–7 myōhi (Queen of Wisdom/Light) 79 mysticism 40, 65 Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization (Zimmer) 117 Nāgārjuna 38, 39, 70, 88, 111 names

Index Confucianist and Daoist conceptions (ming) 66–9 Tanluan’s theory 43, 74, 180 n.61 Nara Buddhism 80, 86 natural language 10, 30, 32, 34, 51, 67 Navajo language 32, 34 negative existentials 44 nenbutsu 1, 7, 10, 13, 20, 21, 23, 30, 31, 34, 35–7, 38, 40, 43, 65, 73, 96, 122, 131, 136, 138, 139–40, 151, 153 nenju (string of beads) 133 neo-Confucianism 65, 125, 126, 177 n.1 neo-Platonism 150, 152, 173 n.23 neo-Romanticism 12, 23–7, 65, 68, 152, 167 n.20, 167 nn.14–15, 175 n.65 Nichiren Buddhism 13, 18–19, 37, 41, 79, 95, 131, 152 Nichiren-shū 38, 39 nirvana 75, 76, 112, 113, 130 nomenclaturism 62, 67 nonapprehension (Skt. anupalabdhi) 102 nondeceptive cognition 109 non-discursive language 8 nondualism 14, 24, 51, 53, 62, 87, 131, 135, 152, 154, 157 nonlinear model 18 Nyāya school 46, 54, 95, 102–3 nyūga ganyū (self and deity) 82 objective meanings 28, 29 objectivist semantic theory 28 Okunoin 7 Oṃ mantra 50, 126 omnipresence 78, 82 oracles 5 orthopraxy 59 oscillation (metaphor) 40 Overbey, Ryan 70 Pacific War 25 Padoux, André 21, 47–8 Pāli canon 14, 57–8, 83, 94, 103, 118, 157, 191 n.59 Pāli Text Society 57 Pāṇini 46 paradigmatic analysis 24, 26, 27, 38, 65, 119 Paramaśiva 49 Parā Vāc (supreme Word) 49

Index paritta(Book of Protection) 2, 44, 56–60, 70, 94, 118, 124 Patañjali 50, 123 peacocks 59, 70 Pearson, Karl 104 perception (Skt. pratyakṣa) 54, 55, 73, 102, 104, 105, 106–7, 109, 110, 112, 123, 189 n.23 Perdue, Daniel 106 perfect language 10 performative function of language 35–6 performative speech 11, 36, 165 n.66 “Performative Theory of Ritual, A” (Tambiah) 35 pervasion (vyapti) 107 philosophical anthropology 27 Philosophies of India (Zimmer) 117 philosophy of language and linguistics vs. Indian philosophic tradition 3–4, 21 limitations 27–40 phonematic emanation 44, 46–9, 54, 61, 63, 85, 87, 88, 90, 123, 127–8, 129, 139 Piaget, Jean 92 Pinker, Steven 141–2 polysemy 72 popular culture 13, 114 practical canon 58 pragmatics and context 36–7 Prajñāpāramitā sūtra 74, 80, 85, 128 Pramāṇasamuccaya (Dignāga) 106, 108–9 Pramāṇavārttika (Dharmakīrti) 106, 108–9 Prasannapadā (Candrakīrti) 80, 111 pratyekabuddhas 16, 157 prejudicial theology 27 presumption (postulation, Skt. arthāpatti) 102 private mind idealism 70 prosperity gospel 19 protection rituals 2, 15, 17, 19, 45, 57–60, 70, 71, 72, 74, 77, 94, 98, 119, 121, 122, 124, 132, 133, 134, 145, 146, 147 Protestantism 1, 57, 154, 187 n.9, 200 n.75 psychotherapy 25 purāṇa literature 61, 126 Pure Land 2, 12, 13, 18, 20, 38, 41, 55, 65, 73–6, 78, 79, 96, 134, 136–7, 139, 152

235

Rahu (asura lord) 59 rākṣasa daughters 122 Rambelli, Fabio 40, 156 Rawlinson, Andrew 120–1 Rdo Grub-chen 120 realization 12, 48, 63, 74, 82, 86, 114, 120, 130, 151, 196 n.30 Rebirth Treatise (Vasubandhu) 73 redemption 92 referential theory 28–9, 67–8, 74, 161 n.7, 202 n.100 Reformation 27, 162 n.21, 200 n.75 relics 95, 96 religious culture 10, 12, 14, 25, 26, 27, 38, 44, 46, 53, 57, 62, 63, 65, 90, 118, 125, 126, 140, 151, 194 n.2 repentance 71, 77 resorption 47, 48, 49, 87, 90, 123 Ricard, Matthieu 105–6 Richards, Robert J. 155 Ricoeur, Paul 29, 34, 126 Rishu kyō 79, 80 ritual(s) cognitive nature of 93–4 rule-bound 141–2 structures (diagramming technique) 141–50 Vedic 44–5, 50, 154 ritual language 8, 9, 13 rNyingma pa rDzogs chen tradition 128 Robson, James 5 Romanticism 10, 23–4, 25, 26, 40, 68, 152, 167 n.14, 203 n.3 Rosu, Arian 45 rule order 141, 142 Śabara 153, 154 saccakiriyā (asseveration of truth) 60, 117, 118 saccavacana (truth utterance) 60 Sadāśiva 51–2 Saichō 18 Sakai, Shinten 80 śakti (power) 47, 49, 52–3, 73 śakticakra (wheel of power) 48–9 Śākyamuni Buddha 26, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 71, 78, 80, 95, 96, 103, 108, 111, 113, 121, 122, 124, 156–7, 186 n.31 salvation 41, 91, 92

236

Index

samādhi (meditative concentration) 50, 63, 71, 85, 88, 93, 121, 149 samayamantra 52, 53 saṃbhogakāya (enjoyment body) 78, 111 samyaksaṃbuddhas 85, 114, 121, 157 Sanderson, Alexis 53, 62 sangha (triple gem) 55, 58, 59, 108 sanmitsu. See three mysteries Sapir-Whorf hypothesis 29, 44, 172 n.10 Saraṇaṃkara 58–9 Sarvatathāgatatattvasaṃgraha sutra 80, 83, 96, 183 n.33 Saussure, Ferdinand de 37–8, 67, 119, 149, 168 n.32, 169 n.42, 171 n.70, 200 n.71 Schrödinger, Erwin 104 Schwartz, Martin 8 Seaquist, Carl 27 Searle, John R. 30 seed mantra. See bīja mantra semantic theory 34, 35, 93 semiotic contrasts 119 Sen, Sukumar 45 senju nenbutsu (exclusive practice) 131 sense vs. reference 44 sentences/sentential unity 8, 30, 31, 32, 34, 44, 51, 55, 66, 120, 141, 142, 145, 154, 201 n.84 Sharf, Robert 75, 82 shidokegyō 82 shikan taza 138 Shingon Buddhism and agency 92–9 cosmogonic speculation 86–7 Dharmakāya’s discourse 78–9 emanation and resorption 87–90 and emptiness 87–90 extraordinary language use 77 founding of 7, 14, 78 Indic sources 79–80 key concepts 12 Kongōkai (Vajradhātu) ritual 83–4 mantra and dhāraṇī 77–8 primary sutra sources 80–2 taizōkai ritual 84–5 terminology 12 “three mysteries” (Jpn. sanmitsu) 12 wheel of syllables (Jpn. Jirinkan)/ritual practices 82–5

Shinohara, Koichi 15 shōmyō nenbutsu 20, 136, 138, 139 shōnenju 82 Siddham script 83, 84, 126 Siddhimātā 52 Siderits, Mark 3 sign, sense, and reference, Frege’s threefold theory 29–31 silent contemplation 7, 17, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 40, 46, 49, 65, 77, 81, 151–2, 157 Simmer-Brown, Judith 5 sin 91, 92, 101, 113 sitting meditation (zazen) 24, 26–7, 65, 75, 77, 98, 128, 134, 135, 145 Śiva (Bhairava) 47, 48, 51, 52, 54, 127 Sivaraman, Krishna 55 Skilling, Peter 57–8, 70 snakebite 58, 59, 70, 176 n.91 Snodgrass, Adrian 83 social bonding 9 Sōka Gakkai 19, 165 n.61 Sokushin jōbutsugi (Kūkai) 130 solipsism 105–6 solitary meditation 24, 26 Song dynasty 76 Sørensen, Henrik 70 soteriology 91, 162 n.16, 175 n.65, 192 n.70 Spanda school 53–4 Speech Acts (Searle) 30 speech vs. silence 40–1 spells 5, 9–10, 16, 70, 72, 74, 75 sphoṭa theory 44, 50–1, 56, 62, 63, 74, 123 Spiro, Melford 60 śrāvakas (listeners) 16, 55 Sri Lanka 57, 60 Śrimitra 70 Staal, Frits 9, 30–1, 44–5, 119, 126, 130, 139, 140, 141, 143, 156 statues 95, 96, 186 n.30 stobhas 126 Stone, Jacqueline 41, 131, 136 stories/story collections 19 Strickmann, Michel 5, 126 structuralist theory 37–40, 119 Śubhakarasiṃha 71, 129 subjugation 93–4, 96, 99 suffering (saṃsara) 71, 97, 104, 105, 110, 138

Index Sukhāvatī (Land of Bliss) 20, 73, 78, 96, 98 superstition 10, 16, 57, 101 Śūramgama dhāraṇī71 Suriya Paritta(Sun Deity’s Prayer for Protection) 59 sutras. See specific sutras Suzuki, D.T. 26, 65 Sweetser, Eve 28, 29, 35 syntagmatic analysis 38 Taisen Miyata 125, 143 taizōkai 82, 83, 84–5 Tajima, Ryūjun 81 Takagi, Shingen 86 talismans 5, 45, 67 talk vs. speech 31 Tambiah, Stanley 35, 60 Tang dynasty 71, 75–6, 86, 131 Tanluan 2, 12, 43, 73–6, 87, 155 Tarkabhāṣā (Mokṣākaragupta) 103, 106 Tarkajvāla (Bhāvaviveka) 61 tathāgata 59, 112, 133, 144, 145, 147, 157 tea ceremony 26 Tendai 18, 41, 131 testimony in Buddhist tradition 105–8, 110 in Indian religious traditions 101–3, 115 in Western epistemology 115 Thailand 60 theology 1, 49, 51, 110, 152, 153, 155 Theravāda Buddhism 8, 56–7, 58 thread, use of for protection 59–60 three marks of existence 114, 136 three mysteries (Jpn. sanmitsu) 12, 82, 149 thunderbolt mudrā. See vajra mudrā Tiantai school. See Tendai Tibetan Buddhism 5, 10, 24, 25–6, 53, 106, 109, 114, 120, 125, 127, 128–9, 155, 166 n.6 Tillemans, Tom 113, 160 n.4, 191 n.70 tipitaka tradition 58 Toganoo, Shozui Makoto 130 Tokugawa era 132, 141 Tomasello, Michael 92–3 Transcendental Meditation 62 Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom(Dazhidu lun) 70–1 trikāya (three bodies) 78, 111, 136, 137

237

true Buddhism 57 Trungpa, Chögyam 10, 15, 188 n.13 trustworthiness 107, 108 truth absolute 123, 130 act of 117, 118, 123 asseveration of 60, 118, 124 conditions 29–30, 66, 169 n.44 correspondence theory 68 of emptiness 55, 86, 181 n.6 and meaning 44 power of 117–18, 123 and reality 152 spoken 52, 55, 60, 117, 118 and syllable A 130 ultimate 41, 79, 120, 157 twilight language 5 two-stratum theory of language 28 unfolding 47, 48 universal homage 15, 132 Unno, Mark 96 Upaniṣads 46, 62, 87, 126 urbanization 24 Uśṇīsavijāya dhāraṇī 97 Vac (speech) 46, 47, 49, 81, 88 Vairocana 96, 99, 199 n.63 Vairocanābhisaṃbodhi 49, 80, 84–5, 86, 87, 88, 89–90, 96, 129–30 Vaiśravaṇa 122 Vajrabodhi 129 vajra mudrā (thunderbolt mudrā) 133, 144, 145 vajrāṅjali mudrā 15, 132, 133 Vajrapāṇi 94, 96, 99 Vajraśekhara Sūtra 78, 80, 129–30, 183 n.33 Vajrayoginī cult 61, 62, 154 Valentine, Elizabeth 104, 105 valid knowledge (Skt. pramāṇa) experience as 104–5 testimony as 101–3, 105 Veda, Visnuism view of 107 Vedic ritual 14, 31, 43–63, 69, 125, 126, 141, 149 Vepacitta (asura lord) 59 verbal testimony 44, 63, 102 vidyā (wisdom) 7, 78–9, 118

238

Index

Vimalamitra 129 virtue 60, 62, 123, 136, 137, 138 Viṣṇu 60 Visnuism 107 visualization practices. See ajikan “Visualizing the Unity of A and HŪṂ” (Dōhan) 135–6 Vyākyapadīya (Bhartṛhari) 50 Vyavahārasiddhi 38 Wakahara, Yusho 118 Wallace, Vesna 107 Wallis, Glenn 21, 37, 61, 79, 80, 94, 123, 154, 165 n.66 Wang, Michelle 71 Warring States era 66 water 59–60, 77, 130, 186 n.40 Western philosophy of language. See philosophy of language wheel of syllables 2, 49, 69, 82–5, 86, 87, 90 white magic 29 Wiener, Norbert 33 Wierzbicka, Anna 29 Windtalkers (movie) 32

Wittgenstein, Ludwig 67 Woodroffe, Sir John 13, 14 worldly gains 19 written mantra 45, 86 Xing Lu 68 Xuanzang 80–1 Xunzi 68 Yama (Lord of the Dead) 71 Yamasaki, Taiko 131 Yelle, Robert A. 10, 15 Yinguang 76 Yixing, Tang 81, 129–30 yogāvacara tradition 8, 161 n.3 Yukei, Matsunaga 80–1 Yung, Shao 126 Zen 18, 24, 25, 26–7, 65, 75, 132, 152 Zhiyi 18 Zhōnu Sangye 129 Zimmer, Heinrich 117, 118, 192 n.3 Zōei 132–4, 143, 145–6 Zoroastrianism 194 n.2