Buddhist Sangha Article

Perfect Life
In The Sangha

By Toshu J. Neatrour

Toshu J. Neatrour was ordained a Soto Zen Priest by Zen Master Tozen Akiyama of the Milwaukee Zen Center on August 6, 1995.

In becoming a Buddhist one takes refuge in the Sangha, the community of practice, as the perfect life. This life has many aspects: how it practices, how it supports individual practice, how it gets through a day, and how it resolves difficulties. We are fortunate that this “perfect” life is not without struggles and conflicts. These are essential to a “perfecting” life, a life that embraces change and accepts everything as it is.

There is a stereotype in discussions of Zen Sanghas. Japanese Sanghas are supposed to be “silent” while American Sanghas are “vocal”. This may mean that problems are in one case avoided or dealt with privately. The opposite option is to discuss them publicly. This raises a question: “Since Buddhism is the Middle Way that rejects extremes, how can being either “silent” or “vocal” all the time be appropriate?”

Recently I began to study Dogen's Eihei Shingi, translated as Pure Standards of the Zen Community by Taigen Dan Leighton and Shohaku Okumura. It may be interesting to compare Dogen's views of how Sanghas deal with problems. What I discovered did not fit the stereotype of “silence” and I began to see something different from the stereotypes. It was something I did not expect. It was a way of approaching Sangha problems that emphasized silence and an interesting manner of speaking. The text reveals a community in which physical privacy is almost completely absent but in which internal or emotional privacy is highly valued.

Dogen recommends in the regulations for the study hall that we should value our affinity with the Dharma which permits us to associate with other members of the Sangha and not judge other members. We should avoid judging them as ordinary or sagely, humble or high ranking. Those of long experience should be polite to newcomers. Each should take care of the other with mutual sympathy.

However when something improper occurs, something against decorum, it should be reported to an appropriate person so that a correction can be made. This correction is made with sensitivity and respect. When something is missing, simply post a sign, don't make an arbitrary assumption that a theft has occurred.

I recommend reading over this small chapter of the Eihei Shingi. Although not as long or as extensive as other chapters, it gives a vivid view of an atmosphere of practice in which each member is called upon to see that the harmony of the Sangha is preserved. Also it makes clear that the evaluation of each others practice is improper. It may seem that these points are obvious. But how many times each day to we “evaluate” others in order to dismiss or diminish our relationship to them? How many times do we pass responsibility to someone else?

These admonitions seem to me to be difficult to accept as is. Yet Dogen is powerfully persuasive that they must be accepted. It is very tempting to wish to assign responsibility for the Sangha to “someone in charge”. It may be even more tempting to want to engage in the entertainment of evaluating our fellow practitioners. Fundamentally, if we have faith in the practice, neither is necessary. If we really believe in zazen as the direct manifestation of awakening, we cannot ignore a wrong let alone knowingly contribute to one, regardless of our position in the community. If we truly believe that a moment of sitting in zazen is a moment of living as Buddha we can put aside evaluating our fellow practitioners as wise or stupid, healthy or ill, humble or important. The habit of giving others the unrequested benefit of our superior insight or wisdom into how they could improve their lives becomes empty and unnecessary if we have faith in practice. Equally, giving our own personal difficulty to the community to solve is questionable.

After reading this chapter one thing became quite clear. The silence of Dogen's community respects the practice and the individual much more perfectly than the habit of having to talk it all out.

Consider for a moment the Indian Buddhist custom of dealing with problems. The Sangha came together fortnightly for a repentance ceremony. These were observed at evening on full and new moon days. The assembled practitioners, the Sangha, would gather and recite the precepts that the community followed. Infractions were discussed and problems were resolved in public. Later, the public working out of difficulties was eliminated in favor of privately resolving problems before the ceremony. These discussions involved only those directly concerned. At the ceremony the participants were simply declared to be free of violations and obstructions in practice. The 'purity' of the Sangha had been restored.

It is interesting that in India the practice of the repentance ceremony was initially more “vocal” and later more “silent”. Why the change? Could it be that the thrashing out of problems in public was found to be destructive of the practice of the Sangha? Did it burden everyone with problems that were not their business? Public talk may unnecessarily injure and humiliate those who have made mistakes, those injured, and also those who may have been largely untouched by the act itself. Making the discussion of problems private, involving only those with a stake in the matter, may have relieved the rest of the community of an unnecessary burden.

It is unlikely that this will be a very popular view today. When many in our culture are obsessed with talk to the point of self injury, silence will not be popular. We are ready to examine the next person most minutely and offer our analysis as help even when not requested. Yet one need only take the briefest glance at a television talk show to see examples of how the injurer, injured, and bystander may be additionally hurt by too much information. Another example seems to be the immense interest which we have for the private failings and intimate lives of dead presidents. Even when there are no historic consequences and they are unable to answer we insist on trying to pry into their inmost workings. Perhaps our culture has lost its ability to teach its members how to be private and respect the privacy of others? Perhaps digging into someone else's psyche is a sufficient distraction that we don't have to face our Self? It may provide something easier to do than actually practice zazen. This paragraph is subject to exactly the same criticism.

Although in Zen the Sangha is important, the Sangha cannot do our practice for us. If we have a difficulty to resolve, we must individually face and resolve it no matter who else is involved. We are all responsible for maintaining the integrity of the practice of the Sangha. A view that certain people are completely responsible for the Sangha runs counter to the individual practice and individual responsibility that is just as important in Zen practice as the function of the community. Similarly a view that denies that some Sangha members have assumed more responsibility by virtue of their function also seems inadequate.

We know that we have a long tradition in the West of grasping tightly the thoughts that arise from analysis. We try to be certain that progress can be managed and controlled. But in Dogen's community, there is little place for this. As I read the Eihei Shingi it is apparent that releasing our grasp on thoughts is just as important in a functioning community as it is in the individual's practice of zazen. Dogen provides quite a criticism of some of my own shortcomings. Yet I am delighted that he has a view of practice that does not depend on culture so much as upon the stuff of life anywhere. When we value what we share in the practice and let go of what is not necessary, how can the life of the Sangha not be perfect just as it is? Is it not perfect even with all its faults and contradictions?

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Perfect Life In The Sangha

Perfect Life
In The Sangha