Jackson selected Calhoun for his Vice President, maybe as a result of the mistaken notion that Calhoun was an ally. Both Jackson and John C. Calhoun, started out as nationalists. John C. Calhoun started out as an ardent Nationalist and a champion of majority rule. He was a graduate of Yale and the Litchfield Law School. In 1812 he was one of the folks who was ardent for the US to enter the War with Britain. In 1817 he was James Madison's secretary of war and a leading proponant of nationalist causes. He was a believer in the sound notion that a lasting peace depends on having a sound Army.2 he favored a national bank because he felt that an unstable national currency would complicate war finance. He favored the construction of roads, the nationalization of the armed forces, and a protective tariff to protect nascent industries. All these positions were guided by general principles. As the author of "Prelude to Civil War" notes;
"the South Carolinians' plea for an active national government was not an unqualified demand for unlimited interference in the economy. It was always restricted by the patriotic and disinterested motives which inspired it. South Carolina planters had little financial interest in the nationalist program. South Carolina's road and canal projects, for example, were intrastate enterprises which required no federal aid. A system of national roads was unlikely to pass through South Carolina; thus federal appropriations would more directly invigorate the economy of other American States."
This meant that the general principles espoused by the Young Calhoun were not backed by self interest. By 1827 his ideas had changed radically.
When Andrew Jackson ran for the Presidency in 1827 he ran as a champion of all the ideas that Calhoun had articulated so well some 10 years earlier with the exception of his ideas on the National Bank. They both were champions of States Rights, but now they no longer agreed on other key issues. When Andrew Jackson was elected in 1828, he thought that John C. Calhoun was at his side, but the John C. Calhoun of 1828 was no longer the same man as the John C. Calhoun of 1818.
Jackson was a frontier General. In the War of 1812 he'd won the only non-naval clear victory of the war, routing an Army sent to New Orleans to spearhead a primary invasion up the Mississippi. In 1818 Jackson had pursued the Seminole Indians into Florida against the express orders of the war department. He never did defeat the Seminoles, who remained in the swamps until they finally signed a treaty some 150 years later, but he did provoke an international incident and a near war with Spain. The invasion also violated Calhoun's war department orders. Jackson claimed he had a letter from Monroe authorizing his action. Monroe remembered no such letter. At the time Calhoun attacked Jackson and demanded an investigation for insubordination. Secretary of State Adams (John Quincy Adams) rejected this plea, and the whole thing turned out amicably when the US purchased Florida from the Spanish and annexed it as a future State. But when Clay and Crawford attacked Calhoun and Jackson for their adventurism, Jackson got the idea that Calhoun had been on his side in the dispute. This turned out to be a mistake. And these old war issues would surface in time to become a symbol of a deeper ideological difference between the two.
By 1827 Calhoun was a champion of nullification, and no longer a believer in majority rule or the wisdom of the people. The depression of 1820 that lasted for a number of years. It also was afflicted by his acquisition of low lying Cotton country tended by slave labor had made him aware of self interest. Jackson still felt that the Tariff that had been imposed on imports in order to protect beginning industries in the US was constitutional and necessary. However, his Vice President was now adamantly against the Tariff. By 1827 Calhoun was about to become the leading proponant of the pernicious doctrine of "nullification" and someone whose behavior and ideas planted some of the dragon seeds which would spring up to fight in the Civil War. Self interest combined with the excesses of John Quincy Adams, who had tried to use Nationalism to quell dissent, had led to a change of views. He wrote to Littleton Walker Tazewell:
"The despotism founded on combined geographical interst, admits of but one effective remedy, a veto on the part of the local interest, or under our system, on the part of the states."3
Before nullification, in 1825, he had argued to one Mclean that "the principle of periodic elections would adequately safeguard the American Experiment in Self-Government. Representatives might be corrupt, but the people were incorruptible. As long as the population retained control over those who governed, democracy would remain the most viable form of Government."3
By 1827 he no longer had faith in the inherent wisdom and virtue of the people. Projecting his own treatment of the negro slave minority on his own people from his own state he said "Man, is so constituted, that his direct or individual feelings are stronger than his sympathetic or social feelings." As a result a group of men with similar interests are always more self-interested than disinterested. Therefore in a Democracy, if one portion of the community contains a numerical majority, it will "pervert its powers to oppress and plunder the other. If no one interest can muster a majority, a "combination will be formed between those whose interests are most alike." The author notes further that "the rule of the majority and the right of suffrage are good things, but they alone are not sufficient to guard liberty, as experience will teach us.4 He felt a system of minority (or state) veto would end the tyranny of numbers. In short he'd come to feel that a system, to be truly fair should rule by absolute consensus. Calhoun wouldn't openly express these feelings until 1831. To Calhoun nullification was the only real way to save the Union, because he felt that sooner or later slavery would be abolished unless the south was granted the right to nullify it's decrees. He hoped to prevent his vision of federal armies marching into South Carolina. His too was an accurate assessment of the situation as he saw it.
But was it a "principled" assessment?" On the surface it might have sounded principled. But his earlier beliefs had been guided by general principles. But the idea of nullification was not in defense of a noble minority. It was in the defense of an ignoble economic institution that shadowed all the high notions that the country rested on. That ignoble institution was slavery. And the real reason for supporting it was only one thing; self interest. Nullification thus wasn't an effort to guard liberty. It was an effort to safeguard a form of tyranny. Thus supporting nullification was really advancing a kind of lie, that somehow a form of tyranny could be justified because it allowed ordinary people to live as kings. He no longer stood for the things he once had articulated so forcefully. Like Thomas Jefferson he could rationalize his behavior, but only by telling lies. And like all such lies, the effort to tell lies to others requires that one lie to oneself.
There is a cost to such kinds of lies. The cost is in the loss of faith in real, shining, warm and happy visions that can flower in reality. The "belief" fostered in its stead is in effect unbelief. Unbelief is what fanaticism is. And when fanatics fight the "unbelievers" of the world, it is because they cannot see that such belief is itself 'unbelief." Real belief is based on the fact that at the core of every such faith is creation. The creation of a faith that over and across that desert is a "map" that takes one to a real river and a real paradise on the other side. Unbelief however takes one to dark places. It's lies inevitably lead the captain's and sailors both of such vessels to close their eyes to where they are going. Doggedly, determinedly they push on in their 'unbelief' to places that are not how they portray them. The fruit of such unbelief is almost always a hell. The 70 virgins they cry for turn into seventy tormentors carrying whips and goads.
The contortions required to justify slavery were such an unbelief. The only place they could possibly lead would be the graveyards at Gettysburg and Antietam and the graveyards of hundreds of thousands of innocent slaves and not so innocent slave-owners. Thus his support of nullification was actually a loss of faith in himself and a betrayal of the principles that had informed his youth. He, not Daniel Webster of the story, had figuratively sold his soul to the devil for a few thousand barrels of cotton. By 1828, Calhoun was in a sense a traitor to his country. This was long before the Civil war. But civil war had already started in the South. In 1820 Calhoun had been against Charles Pinkney, by 1827 he agreed with him. Pinkney had maintained that "Settling the Missouri dispute"...was "very unimportant" compared with "keeping the hands of the Congress from touching the question of slavery."6
Andrew Jackson sensed this in him very soon after his election. In 1829 he wrote to a supporter that he'd found Martin Van Buren to be "everything that I could desire him to be...not only deserving my confidence but the confidence of the Nation....I wish I could say as much for Calhoun."7 Jackson believed in States rights, but in the framework of a Nation state. For him nullification was the "ultimate heresy"8 "Jackson had spent a lifetime,...protecting American Democracy against Englishmen and Indians, and he could never approve a successor who might tear down Majority rule." He would summarize his disagreements as follows:9
Mr. Calhoun objects to the apportionment of surplus revenue among the several states, after the public debt is paid. He is also silent on the Bank Question, and is believed to have encouraged the introduction and adoption of the Resolutions in the South Carolina Legistlation relative to the Tariff.
The dispute between the two men, was thus not just over Calhoun and the "petticoat Brigade's" snubbing, defamation and criticism of first Jackson's wife and then later of Peggy O'Neal, but on real issues. The author summarizes the points he makes in quotes from a famous toast on "Jefferson day" in 1830. He recounts how several of the toasts from southern representatives seemed to celebrate the doctrine of minority veto. But Jackson toasted;
Our Federal Union -- it must be preserved."
Calhoun could only say:
The Union -- Next to our liberties the most dear."
George McDuffie:
"The memory of Patrick Henry: The first American Statesman who had the soul to feel, and the courage to declare, in the face of armed tyranny, that there is no treason in resisting oppression."
And of course all present had different notions of what those terms meant, but for McDuffie and Calhoun, secession was already in the mind. Their loyalty to the "Union" was second to loyalty to the repressive regime of slavery. And they wanted to use Nullification to protect that institution forever. Else they knew they'd have to leave the Union.10
The constitutional issue was already on it's way to being settled. Webster would debate Hayne the following year. And he would make the point that the constitution was clearly the supreme law of the land. It had been created after a united crusade for indepence, and once ratified, states could only leave by consent of the other states. By consenting to divided sovereignity, as Webster Argued, they no longer had the option of nullifying it or seceding. And Webster sealed his debate with a wonderful piece of oratry:
When my eyes shall be turned to behold, for the last time, the sun in heaven. May I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union...Let their last feeble and lingering glance, behold the gorgeous ensign of the Republic...blazin in all it's ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land....Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseperable.11
As Newt Gingrich notes when talking and writing about Grant in his new book. The only way to settle a conflict where both sides are completely intractable, is by determined use of force of arms. In 1820, slavery might have been ended peacefully [that is another essay]. By 1829 the road to civil war was already full of soldiers in training.
In some ways I really don't like Andrew Jackson as a person. But as a leader he had the best interests of the country in mind. He was a fighter in a time when fighters were needed. His excesses therefore were America's excesses.
Jackson was elected in 1828, during a time when the South and the West felt they needed to team up to defeat New England domination over them and to make the new Republic more fully Republican and Democratic. It is the reasons behind Jackson's attitudes that I find are still worth studying. He opposed what he opposed for the right reasons.
When he was elected he was adamantly against the National Bank, and mildly approved of a tariff which was despised by the South. His vice President was John C. Calhoun who cared very little about the National Bank, but was opposed to the Tariff in a major way. These two disagreed on fundamental philosophy. And their disagreement echos to this very day. First let's talk about the National Bank.
Jackson opposed a National Bank. The US already had one, but he opposed to it on principle. William Freeling tells us that 1 He "was distressed about the Capitalists and stock jobbers who supposedly made profits by spewing forth paper money instead of producing a material product. The President was determined to stop rich, moneyed interests from using government funds to secure paper profits at the expense of the people." The author goes on to say that Jackson could "tolerate the tariff, one suspects, because industrial capitalists made a finished product instead of "gambling" with paper money and because manufacturers did not employ funds from the public treasury. A National bank, on the other hand, gave paper profits to "a few Moneyed Capitalists", who are trading upon our revenue, and enjoy the benefit of it, to the exclusion of the many." A National debt, Jackson believed, was "a curse to a republic" because "it is calculated to raise around the administration a moneyed aristocracy."
Now, all that was prescient. Indeed that state seems to be coming to pass at the present time. As a result, Jackson was so determined to destroy the bank that he succeeded. Still, though he was absolutely right in his reasons, in his analysis, and in his prognostation -- getting rid of the Bank didn't really solve anything but only made the US economy all the more chaotic. A banking system was necessary to the evolution of Capitalism. If one wasn't created by fiat, it was going to evolve by trial and error. His destruction of the bank thus didn't prevent the rise of a moneyed class because, people with money created banks by getting the states to charter them, once created these privately chartered banks stepped into the vacume created by the destruction of the National Bank and began making loans, and some of them to print money. The Federal Government still found ways to borrow money and still found ways to spend beyond their means. The state banks did so as well. And the lack of a central bank meant that periodically the populace would have to pay for the malfeasance or bad gambles of those assorted "gamblers" and their bad bets. The US would have periodic runs on it's banks and depressions that would last for years at a time, largely because there was no central authority to regulate the banks. So his remedy was worse than the illness.
To be continued.
My thoughts for today are on the subject of lies and lying. And why the tendancy to lie in print, in the media, to others and to ourselves is so dangerous. To me lies are even more dangerous to ourselves and to others than violence. Because violence generates it's own punishment. But lies can poison entire fields of relations. And most importantly, the lies we tell ourselves hold us back from becoming the wonderful beings we can be, or even make us ugly beings toiling in stables.
The Jewish new year just passed and the most important holiday of Yom Kippur. I like this new year, because a day of atonement is a good thing. We need "teshuvah" or "apology." We need to own up to our own foibles, mistakes, errors, and most importantly our own lies and self-deceptions. Owning up to lies is a necessary part of correcting our lives and correcting our perception of reality. It is a part of reaching enlightenment. If you look carefully at what is being taught, ending self-deception is the ultimate goal of people East and West.
To reach enlightenment is part of repairing our world and making our own part in it a better place to "be". But to do so we have to atone for and redeem those things that are bent, torn, and acknowledge how we helped bend and tear them. That is atonement. We have to "ransom" our lives back from the blind causes we've made individually and collectively. Because we have to pay a toll in "Karma" or consequences for each thing that we do unless somehow it is "forgiven" or set aside by the world around us and the beings in it.
However, this is not just a matter of confessing sins or bad causes. That is but the first step. It is a matter of straitening out our lives. The reason that the buddha taught "dharma" and Jews teach Halakha[Law], is that good intentions are important, but until we have better habits they are not enough. Laws are aimed at reforming our habits, getting us in the habit of thinking "straiter", acting less perverse, doing the things our noble principles profess.
Simple laws like chanting the daimoku, and general principles, are for waking up our minds, but unless we act out those laws and principles; discipline ourselves, this is just a beginning that can prove insufficient to make our world a better place and our own lives happier.
Following rules and discipline is important. But it too is just a first step. We then have to struggle with and awaken to the reasons for those rules and disciplines. Sometimes that involves breaking them and seeing the consequences. Once we learn the general principle behind a set of rules, we no longer have to live in fear of the rules. But rather of the kinds of causalities that necessitate them. Just as a child obeys his parents at first out of fear of a spanking, and only later because he/she appreciates the value of not crossing the street outside the cross walk.
Atonement and reflection therefore are "First steps." There is a story of a man who awakened to his failures, and had to toil in his own fathers stables until his father was able to raise him to appreciate that he was his son and deserved to entire the entire estate. We are like that son sometimes. Sometimes we are atoning for the fact that we are not fully aware that we don't have to atone for what we haven't, or won't ever do again. Salvation isn't a one time thing, but an ongoing process of reforming and redeeming our lives from the things that bind us, enslave us, or make us miserable. We cannot succeed in fully removing the "shackles of our arms" unless we remove the shackles on our brains.
When Christians are "saved" more power to them. Finding a teacher and accepting that salvation is there for the taking, is but a first step. After one awakens to the monstrous insufficiency of an unenlightened life, one needs to start mastering the meaning of causality. Life is creative, and we participate in that creation. People who see God/Buddha as a higher power speak of the "book of life" as being written right now. Right now is creation. If there is an ineffable and great God, then he is creating this moment and all moments before them. Thus this moment is, at least potentially, an act of creation. If we are conscious we are part of that creation. It is up to us to take the next step and actively write in that book. To write better stories as we become more aware of our role in life.
Thus being "born again" is but a first step. Christians should not hold there in an endless repetition of that event but try to grasp it's deeper significance. They have to move on and start to act out the spirit and purpose of their teacher. They need to actively work to save the world and bring about the "redemption" or repurchase of all the things that have been mispent and put into hock to bad causes and bad thoughts. Rosh Hashana, the day of redemption, is the time for that moment for reflection of Jews. Moslems do this in their month of Ramadan. Buddhists do this in their meditations. Higher consciousness is important not as an end, but as a first step.
Higher consciousness is but a first step. Once you awaken you have to take action.
And the enemy of higher consciousness is lies. False beliefs. Anti-salvation. Kings who are selfish and don't save anyone, not even themselves. Belief in lies is "unbelief." Unbelief is the source of evil. That is the meaning of "anti-Christ" of "false-profits." The Kaffirs in this world, the "unbelievers" are often those people who claim to be most certain that they have all the answers. Indeed I'd say that before a Moslem should ever touch one hair of a Christian, Jew or Buddhist -- or vice versa -- one should first look long and hard in the mirror at ones own beliefs. Are they really the seal of the divine, or a stamp of oppression? I speak from bitter realization.
The divine, the enlightenment, is inherent in all of us. Truth speaks to all of us. But truth is often painful. It seems to be "from the devil" because it sometimes makes us miserable. Change is painful. Acknowledging error is painful. Taking the step of remedying situations is even more painful. People become stuck in the stage of apology. Apologizing endlessly for the wrong things. People become stuck in the stage of repentance. Repenting endlessly for the wrong things. AA people get stuck longing for alcohol and returning to meeting day after day. If we get stuck, we lie to ourselves.
We have to move on. And that means eschewing all forms of lies. And recognizing that fiction is a big part of our lives, and that therefore lies are probably inexcapable, and thus we have to remember to tell the difference between figurative and literal. As we awaken, our inward lives as "knights" or "golden ones" and our outward appearance as beings with feet of clay, becomes more important to us inwardly, and less important to be displayed outwardly. We have to learn to distinguish Fact and fiction, the message from it's vehicles, the truth in prophesy or ravings, from the vehicles. Our dreams and the means we use to make them come true are themselves acts of faith and divine things. Valuation is an act of volition. Faith an act of realization that reality is what we make it, not belief in unreal things. Belief in unreal things is unbelief. WE become aware enough when we recognize the value of a story lies not in whether it actually happened but in the model it provides for us to take action with. We come to see stories differently. A child believes in Santa Claus. An adult believes in the principle behind Santa Claus. Knowing that something is clay, doesn't make it any less valuable to turn it into a porcelan work of art. Life is our clay, if we are to be "Buddha's" or "Bodhisattvas," "Awakened ones", "apostles," we have to treat our lives as clay and fashion something noble and beautiful out of them. That is a struggle. It is a struggle with the notion that they are "only" clay. If we do so then we can make fine pottery, beautiful images, and worship the divine that gave us the ability to do this.
The Voice
I hear a voice inside.
Is it my own?
I hear a voice inside.
I cannot, must not, imagine it.
I hear a voice inside.
I cannot must not, imagine it
The moment of universality, the moment of one,
this thing some might call samadhi;
it soon passes, but this voice lasts.
I hear a voice inside.
I name that voice God.
And it names my Voice "Me."
I name that voice Buddha,
and my friends, those teachers,
talk to me.
And that voice, from inside me,
is one of them.
So that is why they call it the "Bliss body."
It's awakening is a moment of Bliss and terror.
And it is only a beginning.
That voice...
it is a still voice, a quiet voice,
Not all the earthquake and thunder,
it is the sound that makes sense of it all,
or simply takes it in.
That voice...
It is not the whole Host of Heaven,
Not the sun, not the moon, and yet in them.
Not the world, nor "Gaia,"
yet sometimes it speaks with that voice too.
It is salvation,
but not from any mans hand,
but from a word that awakens and is shared.
That awakening.
It is not a final moment.
The "Kingdom" is neither here nor there,
neither of this world nor some other,
but a realm of awakening,
that takes it all in,
and starts to make sense of things.
I hear a voice inside.
I cannot, must not imagine it.
I hear a voice inside,
I cannot, must not try to limit it or to rule.
I hear a voice inside,
I cannot, I must not, imagine it.
But listen to it;
that is what I must do.
Chris
Boots...
Boots in the Air,
Boots on the Ground,
Boots down the alleyway,
seeking out an enemy.
They say we own the night,
so in the night we fight,
My men and I creep towards the target,
Pant Pant, shuffle shuffle,
we move as fast as we can,
Until we have them in our site.
...
We have them in our site,
We let loose our bullets and grenades,
Another night has come,
"It's either them or us to die."
As the bullets fly.
I say, "wait! don't step there!"
But it's now too late to care;
Boots in the air,
He's on the ground,
Blood thick and wet and pumping,
His feet are still inside his boots.
Chris
Today is "Rosh Hashanah" -- the Jewish New year. It actually started last night, like all dates Jewish, at sundown. According to tradition The Ultimate recreated the world in 5765. All the time before that is 'before' and all the time after that is after. It helps to recognize that the source of Buddhahood, enlightenment, etcetera is not any particular man, but inherent in "life" itself. Time itself is an illusion of our limited perception. Anyway happy new year. And I'll celebrate the new year again in January, and observe the Chinese New year in the spring. That is how we should live our lives. No need to fight. Just notice the distinctions appreciate the wisdoms, and try to avoid stepping in the other stuff.
The Kerry campaign is facing formidible opposition. Some of it self created. The "Swift boats for Truth" are made up of people who have hated and despised him since the early 70's when he led the "Vietnam Vet's against the war" and testified before congress on attrocities. He has tried to finesse or avoid dealing with the big issues of the War in Iraq and as a result found himself reacting to the Republicans instead of driving home his arguments and message. And the consequence of this is the "dumbing down" of the debate. People calling one another names, and getting highly emotional. And those in the middle finding that they "feel" Kerry is a phoney rather than sincere. The tactic is the Al Gore Tactic, the "Dukakis strategy." It is Karl Rove at his worst best (see bush's Brain) As long as Kerry lets the Republicans define his game he's going to twist and turn and find knives in every direction. "Waffler" if he expresses a change. Liar if he expresses disagreement. Panderer if he expresses agreement.
If he wants to win, win or lose in the numbers, he's got to "never mind" that stuff, and follow the ex-presidents advice; find his message, express a real vision and make the distinctions clear between what he offers and what the present administration is peddling. Most of all he should listen to the advice of those who know how to win. Not just Clinton, but even Edward Kennedy. And certainly the sagacious Richard Cohen:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A19108-2004Sep13.html
As Richard Quotes from Kennedy:
On Friday Kennedy delivered a Senate speech that's worth a gaggle of campaign consultants of the sort Kerry has been hiring in lieu of plumbing his own gut. Kennedy accused the Bush administration of "arrogant ideological incompetence."
And I agree with Richard. I'm proud of some Republicans who have broken ranks with their colleagues. The Virginian Senator Warner is making me proud of Virginians for the first time in many years, by refusing to white-wash the hijinks in Iraq. As Richard goes on to say:
"It's hard to be either more succinct or more on target. The little phrase sums up all that ails both Bush and his administration -- everything from a misguided crusade to liberate Iraq (and the Middle East) from despotism to the strut of the president himself. It fingers the reason why Bush and his boys went to war in Iraq, expecting what Kennedy called "a cakewalk." This was the triumph of ideology over common sense, a belief propounded by neoconservatives within and without the administration that beneath every Iraqi lurked the Music Man, and U.S. troops would be greeted by, at a minimum, 76 trombones. A predisposition to believe your own fantasies makes a very sweet sound indeed."
"In his speech, Kennedy several times mentioned Bush's "mission accomplished" mentality, which "left our armed forces in Iraq underprepared, understaffed and underled for the mission that was only just beginning." Kennedy quotes Don Rumsfeld, who, with his characteristic bluntness, refused to say precisely how long the war might last. But it would not, he assured us, be more than "six months." As for Vice President Cheney, Kennedy has him on the record, too. American troops would "be greeted as liberators," Cheney said. This is the man Bush took on his ticket for his wisdom. "
"The virtue of Kennedy's speech is that it makes clear that all the missteps leading up to the war and all the blunders afterward were not mere mistakes but the product of an ideology that had seized the administration and rendered it inept. The Bushies operated on an expectation of how things should be and not, as governments should, on empirical knowledge seasoned by strong cynicism. They so much believed that things would be as they wanted them to be that they embarked on a latter-day Children's Crusade. Where, oh where, were the adults? "
Sometimes people surprise us. He mentions some I feel the same way about later in his column:
"Once I wrote a column disparaging Sen. Chuck Robb. Later he stood in the Senate and delivered a gutsy speech against gay-bashing and I gladly had to eat my words. Years later, I ridiculed Sen. Bob Graham for the diaries he kept. Now he has written a worthy book damning the Bush administration for its many intelligence blunders, and again I bow in regret."
Others wrote essays today, but none as as succinct and on target. Elie Wiesal wrote one worth reading, but otherwise forgetable. He talks of symptoms but doesn't address causes. David Ignatious wrote a good historical article on Saddam Hussein. And there were other good articles, but once again I have to go with the Cohain of DC whose wisdom is always worth paying attention to.
Chris Holte
Letter from Teradomari -- Discussion
www.sgi- usa.org/buddhism/library/Nichiren/Gosho/LetterTeradomari.htm
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/irgosho/message/11151
> I have received the string of coins that you sent. Those resolved
> to seek the Way should all gather and listen to the contents of
> this letter.
This letter (among many others) counters the premise that the Gosho
were not intended to be studied by us followers of Nichiren. He wrote
the Gosho, usually as part of "thank you" letters to his disciples.
His disciples would give him sustenance, and he'd give them "dharma"
or Buddhist teachings in return. His Gosho were not all 'shastras'
many of them were very personal letters. And in this sense they were
a somewhat new thing in Buddhism. You don't see any letters from
Shakyamuni. In religious writings they are closer to the letters of
the "New Testament" of Christianity than to nearly any other
religious work. We can appreciate them all the more because they take
the general theories of Buddhism and apply them to specific realities
and to generating useful "protocols" or "guidelines" for our own use.
This is what makes them invaluable. You can read Dengyo or Tendai
commentaries and learn a lot of theory. But how to practice and
acheive enlightenment in a confused and real world? No way.
Nichiren starts by recounting his trip to Sado:
> This month (the tenth month), on the tenth day, we left the village
> of Echi in Aiko District of the province of Sagami.
> Along the way we
> stopped at Kumegawa in the province of Musashi and, after traveling
> for twelve days, arrived here at the harbor of Teradomari in the
> province of Echigo. From here we are going to cross the sea to the
> island province of Sado, but at the moment the winds are not
> favorable, so I do not know when we will depart.
In later written "Gosho" of a more hagiographic format, Nichiren's
disciples add in miraculous and fantastic events to the account of
his journey's from Matsubagayatsu to Sado. This journey was not a
pleasant trip. You can imagine that Nichiren wasn't dressed for
winter, and winter was coming. That he was cold, hungry, in danger of
death. Perhaps in shackles. He was a prisoner. He had some of his
acolytes with him, but his main companions were troops.
So he wasn't exaggerating:
> The hardships along the way were worse than I could have imagined,
> and indeed more than I can put down in writing. I will leave you to
> surmise what I endured. But I have been prepared for such
> difficulties from the outset, so there is no point in starting to
> complain about them now. I shall accordingly say no more of the
> matter.
This is the key point of this letter. "I have prepared for such
difficulties from the outset." Nichiren knew what his words would do,
and how his provocative essays would be taken. In the Kaimoku Sho
(written after this document) he tells us:
"I, Nichiren, am the only person in all Japan who understands this. But if I utter so much as a word concerning it, then parents, brothers and teachers will surely censure me and the ruler of the nation will take steps against me. On the other hand, I am fully aware that if I do not speak out, I will be lacking in compassion. I have considered which course to take in the light of the teachings of the Lotus and Nirvana sutras. If I remain silent, I may escape persecutions in this lifetime, but in my next life I will most certainly fall into the hell of incessant suffering. If I speak out, I am fully aware that I will have to contend with the three obstacles and four devils. But of these two courses, surely the latter is the one to choose."
We have a duty to uphold the truth and teach this teaching. Even if
it costs us the approval of friends and loved ones or even gets us in
trouble:
> The fourth volume of the Lotus Sutra states: "Since hatred and
> jealously toward this sutra abound even during the lifetime of the
> Buddha, how much worse will it be in the world after his passing?"
> The fifth volume says: "The people will be full of hostility, and
> it will be extremely difficult to believe." And the thirty-eighth
> volume of the Nirvana Sutra states: "At that time all the Brahmans
> spoke to [King Ajatashatru], saying, 'O Great King, at present
> there is a man of incomparable wickedness, a monk called Gautama.
> All sorts of evil persons, hoping to gain profit and alms, have
> flocked to him and become his followers. They do not practice
> goodness, but instead use the power of spells and magic to win
> over men like Mahakashyapa, Shariputra and Maudgalyayana.'"
Like Shakyamuni, Buddhists throughout time have been accused of "not
practicing goodness," because rather than focusing on ethical
precepts or good deeds, we've tried to focus on distinguishing what
is actually true so that we could more clearly judge what "goodness"
and "evil" are about. Accordingly our opponants, who are often the
ones really seeking "magic spells", jealously defame us to others.
Because they themselves are not aware of the distinction between
appearing to practice Goodness and actually making the cause for
enlightenment or a real change in self and environment. Consequently,
when all their pretensions are exposed by comparison to the real
thing, they get angry.
As Nichiren says:
> This passage from the Nirvana Sutra recounts the evil words
> which the various Brahman believers spoke against Shakyamuni
> Buddha because he refuted the scriptures preached by their
> original teachers, the two deities and the three ascetics.
People confuse "dogmas" or scriptures with reality, not recognizing
that all scriptures are "empty" until someone reads them, interpret's
their meaning and applies them to reality. Consequently it seems
sacriligious when someone is "free" with religious teachings enough
to actually analyze them and make distinctions between what is true
and what is untrue. And for a teaching such as the Lotus Sutra to
explain that these teachings are "upaya" meant to help people awaken,
and not an end in and of themselves, is more than they can handle --
since they are all the more attached to their teachings for seeking
to emancipate themselves from the Saha world.
As Nichiren says:
> In the above passages from the Lotus Sutra, however, it is not the
> Buddha himself who is being looked upon as an enemy. Rather, as
> T'ien-t'ai explains, it is [the Lotus Sutra which is being
> opposed by] "the various shravakas and pratyekabuddhas and the
> bodhisattvas who seek only the Buddha of recent enlightenment."
People get caught up in following their own teachers, or the reified
image they have in their head of Shakyamuni. The idea that Buddhism
is a universal well of truth shocks and dismays them. Disciples and
self-enlightened ones are in love with ideas. The idea that those
ideas are not the end of their questing is something hard to accept.
> In other words, persons who show no desire to hear or believe in
> the Lotus Sutra or who say that it does not match their capacity,
> though they may not actually slander the Law in so many words,
> are all to be regarded as envious and hostile enemies.
Now Nichiren used "martial" language to refer to the monks and
teachers of his time, but if you watch the behavior of people over
time. You will see that those who are attached to a particular person
or institution actually do act enviously and hostile towards those
who -- in actual fact -- devote themselves to Nam Myoho Renge Kyo and
the Lotus Sutra.
> Observing the situation when the Buddha was in the world and
> comparing it with the situation since his passing, we may say that
> the scholars of the various sects in the world today are like the
> Brahmans of the Buddha's time. They too speak of "a man of
> incomparable wickedness," by which they mean me, Nichiren.
And Nichiren could note the comparisons between the complaints. There
are still stories about Nichiren that describe him as a sorcerer.
> They speak of "all sorts of evil persons who have flocked to him,"
> by which they mean my disciples and followers. The Brahman
> believers, having incorrectly received and transmitted the
> teachings of the earlier Buddhas, displayed hostility toward
> the later Buddha, Shakyamuni. The scholars of the various sects
> today are doing the same sort of thing.
Nichiren by being the "Votary of the Lotus Sutra" was transmitting
the "true teachings." Shakabuku is described as a kind of "breaking
and untwisting" of distorted things. Buddhism tends to get distorted
in the hands of people who are entranced or bedazzled by either part
of it's theories, or who want to limit their understanding in some
way. These people can't handle the Lotus Sutra. And in Nichiren's
day they couldn't handle Nichiren's criticisms.
> In effect, they have let their own way of understanding the
> Buddha's teachings lead them into heretical views. They are
> like persons who, dizzy from drink, think that the huge mountain
> in front of them is spinning round and round.
This analogy is important to help us understand whether or not we
understand the Buddha's teachings. If the world seems to be spinning,
it may be we who are "spinning the world." The various schools of
Buddhism involve a dizzying confusion of ideas. Yet, a truly awake
person doesn't see mountains spinning around, but sees things for
what they are. Nichiren's Buddhism is about planting our feet on the
ground and getting sober. Not getting drunk on fantastic sounding
theories, hiding on a mountain, or learning spells and positions.
Not:
> And so we now have these eight sects or ten
> sects all disputing with one another over their various doctrines.
Now I have a question. What are the four teachings of the Nirvana
Sutra that Nichiren refers to next?
> Major Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, Vol. 4, page 97.
In an earlier essay I titled "dealing with Islamicists" I talked about the power of "hadith" and tried to talk about the role of interpretation in dealing with people who are muslims. But this is easier said than done. Islam, like Christianity and Judaism is a "revealed religion." The benefit of the "God-Concept" is that it gives us an absolute authority beyond human control. The drawback of the God concept of the ultimate is that religions tend to try to tell us that their teacher or prophet is beyond question. In the case of Mohammed, Mohammed is portrayed as the "seal of the prophets." To even question his teachings is punishable by death according to their orthodoxy.
This is why Wahabiism and Bin Laden are so tied together. The fundamentalist teachings that were developed first in Cairo and later put to practice in Saudi Arabia during the first stages of it's revolt against the Turks, have associated with them some particularly self-serving notions. We are seeing this in the glorification of violence among the fanatics. Those people are not orthodox. A good exegite among Moslems could refute most of their notions and show that they are violating Islamic restrictions by attacking innocent women and children.
Nevertheless, it is going to be a long and hard road. The Saudi's by teaching Wahabiism, with it's fundamentalism and authoritarianism, have set in motion a movement of people who are monsters. These are people who see human beings as targets and not as human beings at all. They do it for hate. They do it for revenge. And they do it because they confuse revenge with Justice. This is a human failing not a particularly Moslem one. Timothy McVeigh had the same monstrous disregard for consequences and humanity that we saw in the organized attack this weekend outside of Chechnya.
Nichiren is worth studying for a lot of reasons.
The first reason is that he is an avatar of the Lotus Sutra. Indeed he is the formost avatar of the Lotus Sutra in this age. It is for that reason his chant of Nam myoho renge kyo is worth practicing and his teachings are worth taking into consideration. The chant of Nam Myoho Renge Kyo is the "excellent medicine" of this age.
The second reason is that he is pretty much the only real Buddhist Prophet there ever has been. He told truth to power. He wasn't persecuted for lies or misrepresentations, but for speaking that truth.
The third reason is the reason of what makes that truth truth. The groundwork is understanding Upaya. But then once you understand Upaya you can soar into the great Universal Pure land that opens up in the Saha world. Just as the "70 elders" of the Mosaic vision were treated to the very briefest glimpse of the sacred mountain and the world transformed into Lapiz Lazuli, so that vision of a "transformed" world transforms our appreciation of reality. Make no mistake, this is not a matter of fantasy religion. Reality stays the same. However, when you start to realize that clay and hay make bricks, and that the transformative power of Upaya is aimed transforming the "saha world" into the pure land -- in real time -- you start to recognize that the pure land is here all along. As are hell and heaven. And it is our lives that decide together which world it is.
The Juryo chapter tells us -- among other things -- that the purpose of Upaya is not to build fantasy cities, "magic cities" but to make a journey of discovery.
And there are many other things and many other reasons.
I draw my energy from the lotus sutra. When my mind gets caught up in other things I start to lose energy. The evil of people who ignore reality and paint lies instead is something we do have to fight as well. This is the example Nichiren set. But we must also always be awakening to the warmth of the Pure Land within our minds and lives that rises when we let go of stupidities (attachments). The liars and betrayers who are out there cannot harm us half as much as our own vacilating minds.
Out of the center explodes all things.
Out of this center streams all time.
Streaming, screaming, this moment is born in a flash,
and begins to differentiate anew.
This moment is a moment of creation,
of recreation.
It comes out, defines itself, makes it's statement,
is heard, and then dies into itself;
Giving birth to the next moment.
It is said that the role of "prophets" is telling truth to power. I think that is why Nichiren of all the Buddhist teachers is the one who attracted me. Of all those people he was the nearest to a prophet. His remonstrations were both "prophesy" and warning to the society of his day, and to our day as well. They stand equal with any prophesy of any other teacher/prophet in history.
In our own times, we have a world of people who make their points, argue their ideas, fight their little wars. But telling truth to power? That is rarer than Gold coin, and more expensive than platinum bars. Even McCain, the closest the Senate has to a truth teller, is not willing to tell the unvarnished truth. In his endorcements of Bush he talked up the good, and mostly left out the bad. He hinted at the mistakes, and tried to smile and ingratiate his way into the hearts of Democrats and Republicans alike.
And he called Kerry a friend, while siding with a man who has been his enemy, and has been McCain's enemy as well. He said that he felt that Bush had learned from his mistakes and demonstrated leadership. While he basically disparaged Kerry as not doing so. So much for friendship.
But here is the rub. If John Kerry wants to win in November he needs to be more than a man kissing babies and proposing an alternative to Bush. If he really wants to win he has to be a "truth teller." As Richard Cohen says in his collumn, this would be refreshing. American's don't always want to hear the truth. They reacted to Jimmy Carter's "truth" about a "malaise" with electing Reagan. They preferred Reagan's fable visions to negative truths. But truth isn't always about what is, but about what can be.
The great prophets predicted two things simultaneously. Wrack and Ruin, and transcendence and redemption. People responded to Reagan because he spoke his inner truths. Telling truth to power is saying. "Look this is an iron prison, but it could be a palace; let us build a pallace!" Kerry can do this I would think. If he did, a spark would ignite that would change things for him. With a transcendent vision, even if he lost the election he would win. With no vision, people are going to stick with the known devil over the devil they don't know.
So Kerry! One of your leutenants? Read Richard Cohen's essay in today Post. Please? The spark comes from within. All the advisors and handlers can only steer you wrong if they keep you from listening to your inner voice. You do have one?
Mike gave me this link: http://www.inequality.org
Dick Cheney and others in this administration have been going at Kerry. The trouble is that his attacks are distorted ones. He doesn't attack the "real" positions of his opponant but makes things up on the sly:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A56564-2004Sep2.html
"He talks about leading a more sensitive war on terror, as though al Qaeda will be impressed with our softer side," Cheney jeered, to laughter and boos in the convention hall. "
Of course the one with the "kinder gentler" was his former Boss. But this mischaracterizes both Kerry's stance and the reasoning behind it. Cheney would seem to want to make war on the Germans, French and 1.5 billion Moslems as an alternative to seeking world cooperation. He and his followers don't seem to have any humility and seem to think that God is on the side of the person who shouts his name loudest.
Along with them are the pundits, making comments like how the Democrats are seeking therapy. Richard Cohen is telling us that Kerry needs to be more agressive in spelling out his differences.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54698-2004Sep1.html
But I'm philosophical. The essential thing is to do ones best to articulate the truth. And the other thing is to differentiate between fantasy statements and truth, between authentic visions and hubris and triumphalism.