ESSAY BY JERRY BOLICK

"To those unfamiliar with the Buddhist teaching of Nembutsu"

February 2005

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Life comes to us as a great, eternal calling, reaching out to us, unfolding around and inside of us, while at the same time holding us, in our entirety, from the unnamable past to the unknowable future. Life's eternal truth is our truth, just as surely as our temporal clinging and attachment to the dance of self and ego is our truth. The Buddha's teaching emanates from deep insight into the unending mix of pain and promise that is human life. Buddha sees what we cannot see, sees that we cannot see, and out of unfathomable concern for our well being, calls out to all humankind with the equally unfathomable message of our liberation from self-imposed restrictions, anxieties and turmoil. The Nembutsu tradition, more broadly known as Pure Land Buddhism, understands the whole of the Buddhist teaching and its history as Buddha's entreaty, Buddha's call to us to awaken to this eternal promise, a call carried by the compassionate movement that is life itself.

Diamond-like, unrelenting clarity of insight into the eternal truths of life, and the corresponding spontaneous movement toward all beings: Absolute Wisdom and Compassion. These two comprise the content of Buddhist Enlightenment and the essence of the Bodhisattva spirit: that mind so singularly committed to the liberation of all beings that personal liberation is set aside until last. It is from this perspective, the perspective of the Enlightened Mind, that Pure Land traditions explore the deeper dynamics of human liberation implied here, primarily through the Buddha's story of the mythic Bodhisattva Dharmarkara and his attainment of Buddhahood, as Amida Buddha.

Neither a person, nor a name in the ordinary sense, Amida means Infinite Light and Life, referring to unrestricted, absolute Wisdom and Compassion at work throughout the universe. Amida signifies the incomprehensible ideal to which all Bodhisattvas aspire, and at the same time name the dynamic principle all Buddhas embody. Amida's story is the historical Buddha's teaching of the eternal truth of universal liberation, a story of cosmic reality unfolding across time through our individual lives. Buddha teaches Amida's story so that we ordinary, unenlightened beings might hear the entire truth of our own life's story, as the Buddha sees it.

Limited as we are by our reliance on intellect, Buddha does not insist that we understand that which is beyond the reach of the human mind; rather, Buddha reaches out to us with what we can recognize, language, in the form of Amida's story. Deeply and thoroughly aware of human suffering and human nature, Amida's vows and aspirations focus on developing the most universal, most inclusive way of liberation for all beings; should he fail to bring every being across, he willingly forfeits his own Enlightenment. But the Buddha reveals to us Amida's success and with that the certainty of our liberation. And all of this, Amida's vows, aspirations and effort, the generation of merit, the power to inspire and bring to fulfillment universal liberation, all of this is gathered, concisely and easy to hold, into Amida's Name, which we are asked only to hear, trust and recite.

Recitation is formulated in Japanese as Namuamidabutsu, or I take refuge in Amida Buddha. All Pure Land schools are characterized by this dynamic call and response relationship, but Shinran, founder of Japan's Shin Buddhism, pushes this dynamic to its utmost limits. Radically challenging the notion that our deluded, ego-ridden self is capable of liberating itself, or even capable of trust, Shinran emphasizes that it is not our calling and Buddha's response, but our hearing of Buddha's call that is critical. For it is Buddha's Compassion, as carried by the Name, that pierces the ego's shell, illuminates its untrustworthy nature and undermines its grip. The real work of liberation and Enlightenment comes completely from the Buddha's side. And that work is already done.

To truly hear is to be awakened to the enduring presence of Wisdom and Compassion, to be awakened to the bigger story that eternally embraces and gives meaning to our lives. The authentic life of Nembutsu emerges only after I truly hear that Buddha's compassionate entreaty is meant, not just for others, but for me. First we hear, then we speak. The door to awareness is opened inward, to the truth that all and everything is a gift. From here, the moment of true entrusting, or shinjin, spontaneous bows and songs arise, expressions of gratitude that come to define the foundation of our living, in Nembutsu.

Although replete with rich literary tradition and doctrinal complexity, one will come to sense the beauty and meaning of Nembutsu only when enabled to catch both the light and the illumined shadows, just so. All conceivable paths swept clean by the voice of silence that speaks, we are carried by genuine engagement with the teaching as handed down through the generations and by reflective attention to the movement of our daily lives. Without the living touch of our fellow travelers, the depth, richness and promise of our lives remain hidden. As Professor Alfred Bloom writes, at the close of 2004, "It is our confidence that the Nembutsu reaffirms our basic humanity, that the essence of life is compassion and love, even though the evidence swirling around us denies our trust."

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