Includes bibliographical references (leaves 320-323) Microfiche. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Library, 1994. 6 microfiches: negative; 11 x 15 cm
關鍵詞
LIBERATION; CH'AN BUDDHISM; ZEN; ENLIGHTENMENT
摘要
The development of Ch'an Buddhism, especially in the period from Hui-neng to Lin-chi, can best be understood as an exemplary articulation of what shall be termed Social Buddhism. The crucial features of such a conception of Ch'an are: first, a movement away from situating the paradigmatic locus of enlightenment in private experience to seeing it as the concrete narrativity of lived interpersonality; and, secondly, a shift away from taking enlightenment to be a state--whether of consciousness, superlative moral integrity or individually initiated activity--to seeing it as virtuosically improvised conduct. That is, Ch'an enlightenment is never the attainment of a single individual, but the dramatic transformation of an entire world.
The first half of the dissertation develops the necessary conceptual tools for understanding the above re-orientation. Beginning with a revisioning of suffering and founded on the critical distinction of social and societal orientations of conduct, this section pivots on a re-evaluation of the nature of personhood and the proposal that persons be seen as narration or the dramatically ordered dissolution of both 'self' and 'other.' Following a sketch of the implications for change (i.e., the transition from sentient being to buddhahood) that are implied by the inversion of the typical precedence of being over value required by a practical embrace of the emptiness of all things, Part One culminates with a preliminary laying out of the groundwork for a concursive (as opposed to discursive) theory of communication and meaning--a theory needed in order to fully understand the significance of the claim oft repeated by the Buddha and the patriarchs of Ch'an that they have nothing to either teach or transmit.
Part Two directly addresses the relation of Buddhist practice and Buddhist enlightenment. Far from being held up as exemplary forms of Ch'an practice, both sitting meditation and the infamous "shock tactics" of masters like Ma-tsu and Lin-chi are held to be energy techniques that are a useful but insufficient adjunct to the realization of Ch'an enlightenment. Instead, it is argued that the practice of Ch'an is best seen as a systematic relinquishing of all horizons to readiness, responsibility and relevance. Ch'an Buddhist practice is nothing short of the unprecedented birth of the Pure Land, the incomparable opening up of a dramatically new buddha-realm.
