What's Wrong With Mindfulness- Zen Perspectives, page 19
18.Interestingly, some recent findings in cognitive neuroscience resonate with classical Buddhist “intentional” models; see F. J. Varela, E. Thompson, and E. Rosch, The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1991).
19.The only candidate in early Buddhist psychology for a “raw feel” might be sparśa or “contact” (Pali: phassa), but properly speaking sparśa per se is not a conscious event so much as an essential but subliminal constituent involved in the arising of cognition.
20.P. J. Griffiths, On Being Mindless: Buddhist Meditation and the Mind-Body Problem (La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1986); P. J. Griffiths, “Pure Consciousness and Indian Buddhism,” in The Problem of Pure Consciousness: Mysticism and Philosophy, ed. R. K. C. Forman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), 71–97; Sharf, “Is Nirvāna the Same as Insentience?”
21.R. H. Sharf, “Experience” in Critical Terms for Religious Studies, ed. M. C. Taylor (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), 94–116.
22.For traditionalist critiques see the overview and bibliography in Sharf, Buddhist Modernism and the Rhetoric of Meditative Experience, 262–65. The appropriateness of “bare attention” as a way to understand sati is the subject of a dialogue between Alan Wallace and Bhikkhu Bodhi, The Nature of Mindfulness and Its Role in Buddhist Meditation: A Correspondence Between B. Alan Wallace and the Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi (Unpublished manuscript, Santa Barbara Institute for Consciousness Studies, Santa Barbara, CA, 2006), and is explored at length in several of the contributions to the 2011 issue of Contemporary Buddhism (see note 11 above).
23.R. H. Sharf, “Mindfulness and Mindlessness in Early Chan,” Philosophy East & West: A Quarterly of Comparative Philosophy 64, no. 4 (2014): 933–64.
24.On Layman Fu, or Fu Xi (a.k.a. Fu Dashi, 497–569), see B. H. Hsiao, Two Images of Maitreya: Fu Hsi and Pu-tai Ho-shang (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, SOAS, University of London, 1995), 50–224; S. Yanagida, Shoki no zenshi I (Kyoto, Japan: Chikuma shobō, 1971), 236; and Y. Zhang, Fu dashi yanjiu (Chengdu, PRC: Bashu shushe, 2000). A text attributed to him, the Shanhui Daishi lu (Zokuzōkyō 69, no. 1335) contains little with regard to actual meditation technique.
25.The Dzogchen analogue to bare awareness is known variously as “awareness” (rig pa, sometimes translated “open awareness”), “gnosis” (ye shes), “the mind of awakening” (byang chub kyi sems), “luminosity” (’od gsal, sometimes translated “clear light”), and so on; see S. G. Karmay, The Great Perfection (rDzogs Chen): A Philosophical and Meditative Teaching of Tibetan Buddhism (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2007); Klein and Wangyal, Unbounded Wholeness: Dzogchen, Bon, and the Logic of the Nonconceptual; and S. van Schaik, Approaching the Great Perfection: Simultaneous and Gradual Approaches to Dzogchen Practice in Jigme Lingpa’s Longchen Nyingtig (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003).
26.Elsewhere I have argued that to do so would be to misconstrue the logic of the rhetoric of “subjective experience” (Sharf, “Experience”).
27.For Zongmi’s critique of Mazu and the Hongzhou school see J. L. Broughton, Zongmi on Chan (New York: Columbia University Press, 2009), 84–86, and passim.
28.This language of inner stillness and falling into emptiness is found, among other places, in the records of another Hongzhou school critic Fayan Wenyi (885–958) and his dharma brother Xiufu (d. 951?). Wenyi’s Fayan lineage stressed the study of doctrine and texts as a corrective; see his biography in fascicle 24 of the Jingde chuangdeng lu (Taishō shinshū daizōkyō no. 2076, vol. 51, 400b1–3), and the discussion in A. Welter, The Linji Lu and the Creation of Chan Orthodoxy: The Development of Chan’s Records of Sayings Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), 32–33; and B. Brose, Buddhist Empires: Patronage, Lineage, and the Rise of Chan in China (Unpublished manuscript, 2013), 116. Guishan Lingyou (771–853), a third-generation teacher in the Hongzhou line, was another critic of a perceived tendency toward moral turpitude in the growing Zen movement; see T. Kirchner, “The Admonitions of Zen Master Guishan Dayuan,” Hanazono daigaku kokusai zengaku kenkyūjo ronshū 1 (2006): 1–18; and M. Poceski, “Guishan jingce (Guishan’s Admonitions) and the Ethical Foundations of Chan Practice,” in Zen Classics: Formative Texts in the History of Zen Buddhism, eds. S. Heine and D. S. Wright (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 15–42. On meditation illness see J. Ahn, Malady of Meditation: A Prolegomenon to the Study of Illness and Zen (Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Berkeley: University of California, 2007).
29.P. N. Gregory, “Sudden Enlightenment Followed by Gradual Cultivation,” in Sudden and Gradual: Approaches to Enlightenment in Chinese Thought, ed. P. N. Gregory (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1987), 286. Similar critiques can be found in the writings of many major medieval Zen figures, from Heze Shenhui (670–762?), who played a role in the composition of the Platform Scripture, to Yongming Yanshou (904–975), a prolific and influential master of the tenth century.
30.See http://www.ted.com/talks/jill_bolte_taylor_s_powerful_stroke_of_insight.html.
31.J. B. Taylor, My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey (New York: Viking, 2008), 41.
32.Ibid., 116.
33.The literature on perennialism is vast; for overviews, see especially S. T. Katz, ed., Mysticism and Philosophical Analysis (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978); S. T. Katz, ed., Mysticism and Religious Traditions (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983); S. T. Katz, ed., Mysticism and Language (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992); R. K. C. Forman, ed., The Problem of Pure Consciousness: Mysticism and Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990); W. Proudfoot, Religious Experience (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985); and Sharf, “Experience.”
34.Sharf, “Is Nirvāna the Same as Insentience?”
35.R. H. Sharf, “Whose Zen? Zen Nationalism Revisited,” in Rude Awakenings: Zen, the Kyoto School, and the Question of Nationalism, eds. J. W. Heisig and J. Maraldo (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1995), 50–51.
36.J. Hubbard and P. L. Swanson, eds., Pruning the Bodhi Tree: The Storm Over Critical Buddhism (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1997).
37.On Critical Buddhism, see especially the collection of papers in Hubbard and Swanson, Pruning the Bodhi Tree.
38.Ahn, Malady of Meditation.
39.This paper was originally prepared for the Advanced Study Institute “Mindfulness in Cultural Context,” organized by the Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, McGill University, June 3–5, 2013. A revised version was presented at Smith College on April 4, 2014. My thanks to the audiences at both venues for their comments and critiques. Thanks also to the anonymous reviewers of this paper, whose suggestions, as they will surely note, I did not always follow. And thanks finally to Elizabeth Horton Sharf for her invaluable editorial assistance. Parts of this paper, notably the discussion of the term smr.ti, borrow directly from my article “Mindfulness and Mindlessness in Early Chan,” in Philosophy East & West.
INDEX
Page numbers followed by “(2)” indicate two discussions. Page numbers followed by “q” or “+q” indicate quotations or discussions plus quotations.
Numbers
9/11 trauma, 125
A
Abels, Janet Jiryu, 8
on plastic bags, Zen, and mindfulness/eco-practice, 119–23
abhidharma (Theravada): on consciousness, 145
absorption. See jhanas
acceptance of conditions as they are and mindful response to, 127
acceptance of suffering and finding freedom in, 130–31
Advaita, 107
Aitken, Robert: The Mind of Clover, 53
America. See Buddhism/Zen in America/the West
American Zen Teachers Association (AZTA), 49
anger: Beck on, 46
anxiety: Beck on, 46
appreciation of emptiness, 25
Arendt, Hannah, 150
Aristotle: on happiness, 22
Armstrong, Guy, 105+q
the arts: mindfulness in, 109–17
Arts Week at Omega, 81–90
gospel concert, 89–90
noise and busyness, 84
people: diversity and similarity, 85–86
See also workshops at Omega
attainment fantasy, 67
attention:
bare. See bare attention
“evenly hovering attention,” 113–14
Mirsky model, 164n23
See also paying attention; and also awareness; mindfulness; sati
“Attention means attention,” 93
aversion. See greed and aversion
avocado sandwich: making and eating, 135–37
awakening, 121
Dogen on, 71
and the notion of self, 41
as sudden and transformation as gradual, 147
See also enlightenment; liberation; realization
awareness:
mindfulness as, 70–71, 94, 96–97, 99–100. See also sati
not-thinking and, 25
present-centered. See bare attention
See also mindfulness
AZTA (American Zen Teachers Association), 49
B
bare attention, 141–44
Nyanaponika on, 142, 168n9
objections to construing as bare, 144–47
as pure impression/nonconceptual cognition/direct perception, 144–45, 146, 170n17
See also sati
Batchelor, Stephen, 79q
Bayda, Ezra: Beyond Happiness, 22
Beck, Charlotte Joko:
on labeling thoughts, 45
on practice and meditation, 125, 127
psychological direction, 46
behavior, 66
social cues and, 65
being here now/in the present moment, 34–35, 120–21, 143, 145–47, 148
beliefs:
letting go, 55
truth and (Mara), 54–55
Benson Relaxation Response, 59–60
Berssenbrugge, Mei-mei: Hello, the Roses, 112–13
Beyond Happiness (Bayda), 22
“Beyond McMindfulness” (Loy and Purser), 74–75
bias (cognitive bias): and mindfulness practice, 65
blissful experiences in meditation, 101–2, 102–3
Blue Cliff Record, 29q
Bodhi, Bhikkhu, 14, 75q
Bodhidharma:
and Dazu Huike, 32
and his successors, 58
bodhisattva ideal, 72
body and mind, 58–59
dropping, 35, 36, 44
studying the way in, 37–38
Book of Serenity, 10q
Brain Activity Map Project, 57–58
brain research, 23, 55–59
brain scans, 55–56
Britton sleep problems study, 60–61
Brown and Harris: on depression in women, 139
Buddha:
Dharma transmission to Mahakashyapa, 4, 36
in meditation, 95–96
“What is buddha?,” 31
buddha-nature theory and the ethical failings of Buddhism in Japan leading up to WW II, 150
Buddhaghosa: Path of Purification (Visuddhimagga), 140, 142
Buddhahood. See enlightenment
buddhas, 117
See also Buddha
Buddhism in Japan:
Critical Buddhism, 150
ethical failings leading up to WW II, 150
Imperial Way Zen (WW II), 77–78
temple priests, 48–49, 49–50
See also monasteries in Japan
Buddhism in Southeast Asia, 48, 73
Buddhism/Zen in America/the West, 1, 2, 95
deracination of, 3–4, 7, 39, 47–50. See also secularization of, below
destabilizing trends/three shaky pillars, 3–4, 7, 39–44. See also deracination of, above; instrumentalization of, below; secularization of, below
engagement with doctrines/forms, 147
feminization of, 47, 48, 132
impermanence, 153
instrumentalization of, 3–4, 7, 24, 26, 40, 52, 141, 154; laicization of Zen practice as, 43–44, 46–47. See also commodification of mindfulness/meditation; instrumentalized Buddhist practice
laicization of, 47, 49; Zen practice, 40–44, 44–47, 48–49, 49–50
the Middle Way, 52
modernism/Protestant Buddhism, 141–44
opportunity for, 79
pathways ahead, 9–10
scandals in, 52
as a science of happiness, 141
secularization of, 3–4, 5, 6–7, 7–8, 39–40, 41, 49. See also instrumentalization of, above; laicization of, above
synthetic practices, 48
teaching of. See instruction in Buddhist practice
text additions, 48
Buddhist community practice (traditional), 4, 149
Buddhist doctrine/forms: transformation as engagement with, 147
Buddhist practice/training:
commitment to, 19, 20, 49, 51
commodification of. See commodification of mindfulness/meditation
in community (traditional), 4, 149
as deconditioning vs. reconditioning, 148
discovery of the profundities of, 15
eco-practice as, 119–20, 122–23
essential elements, 14
in everyday life, 8–9, 106–7
and happiness, 22
instruction in. See instruction in Buddhist practice
instrumentalization of. See under Buddhism/Zen in America/the West
instrumentalized, 40, 41, 46–47. See also commodified mindfulness/meditation
motivation for, 42
as obscured by the commodification of mindfulness/meditation, 14
solitary practice, 68
sustained practice, 19, 21
validation of Dharma practice, 58
See also bare attention; meditation; mindfulness; sati; zazen; Zen practice/training
Buddhist teachers. See teachers of Buddhism
Buddhist teachings:
eight stages of insight, 140
of equality, 131
knowledge of appearance as terror, 140–41
no-mind teaching, 35
on suffering, 140
transmission of, 4, 36, 132–33
See also sutras (suttas)
Burmese Buddhist origins of the mindfulness movement, 73, 142, 150
business:
corporate context for teaching mindfulness, 16–17, 17, 75, 76, 78
five types not to be engaged in, 75–76
C
canonical perspective on mindfulness, 14
capitalism: commodified mindfulness and, 75, 79
Center for Mindfulness, 4, 21
cessation, 36
Church, George: Brain Activity Map Project, 57–58
clear comprehension. See awareness
client factors in mindfulness practice, 64–65
clinical trial measures in mindfulness studies, 59–63
co-optations by commodified mindfulness/meditation, 79
cognitive bias: and mindfulness practice, 65
commitment, professional. See professional commitment
commitment to spiritual/religious practice, 51, 83, 87
to Buddhist/Zen practice, 19, 20, 49, 51
commodification of mindfulness/meditation, 7, 13–24, 141
Buddhist practice as obscured by, 14
stimulation of greed and aversion, 26
See also commodified mindfulness/meditation
commodified mindfulness/meditation:
approach. See for-gain… approach to mindfulness/meditation
and capitalism, 75, 79
co-optations, 79
danger of. See danger of commodified mindfulness/meditation
vs. exploration of unsatisfactoriness, 16–17(2), 19
and the pursuit of happiness, 22
research on. See scientific research on mindfulness/meditation
scalability, 51–52
as self-involvement, 4, 6–7
studying of, 18–22
teachers of, 15, 16–17
teaching of, 15–18, 73–74, 75, 76–78
See also instrumentalized Buddhist practice
community practice, 51, 67–68
traditional Buddhist community practice, 4, 149
conditions as they are:
acceptance of and mindful response to, 127
mindfulness as engagement with, 73, 127, 132–33, 154
consciousness:
categories expounded by Buddhism, 164n25
Theravada abhidharma on, 145
continuation bias, 65
contributors to this book, 3, 7–10
corporate context for teaching mindfulness, 16–17, 17, 75, 76, 78
craving. See desire
Critical Buddhism, 150
cummings, e. e., 47
curative fantasies, 42
D
daily life. See everyday life
Damei Fachang: and Mazu Daoyi, 31
danger of commodified mindfulness/meditation, 2–3, 6–7, 16, 74–75, 79
ego strength/pride, 30–31, 32
grasping at mind, 32–33
danger of instrumentalized Buddhist practice, 40, 41, 46–47
See also danger of commodified mindfulness/meditation
Daoxin, 146
Dazu Huike: and Bodhidharma, 32
deconditioning vs. reconditioning, Buddhist practice as, 148
deep relaxation, 59–60
depression: hopelessness vs., 139–40, 141
deracination of Buddhism/Zen in America/the West, 3–4, 7, 39, 47–50
See also secularization of Buddhism/Zen…
Deshan: and the old woman, 34
desire (craving), 6, 25–26
See also greed…
destabilizing trends in Buddhism/Zen in America/the West (three shaky pillars), 3–4, 7, 39–44
