The Medieval Transition
I. Religious Developments during this period (11-13th centuries)
A. Growth in popular (evangelical) forms of Buddhism
1. Pure Land (Amidism): Faith in Amida Buddha and his Pure Land ("Namu Amida Butsu")
2. Nichiren Buddhism: Chanting the Lotus Sutra (or even just the title, "Myôhô renge kyô)
3. Zen Buddhism: return to the idea that you can achieve enlightenment through your own efforts
B. Increasing emphasis on Buddhist deities who save us (Jizô, Amida, Kannon)
1. Review of important (relatively new) concept: The Age of the Degenerate Dharma
(Mappô)
a. 1000 years after Buddha people can understand and practice Buddha's teachings (the Dharma)
b. next 1000 years people can understand but not practice
c. now (1052 CE) people can neither understand nor practice and must therefore depend on deities for salvation
2. Question of TARIKI ("other power") versus JIRIKI ("self power")
a. Comparison: Christianity's problem of which is more efficacious, faith or good works
b. cat salvation versus monkey salvation
II. Review of the development of cosmological models
A. "Two world" view of Shamanism
1. Material world
2. Spiritual world
B. Mahayana world view: based in reincarnation and karma
1. Material reality (this world)
2. Spiritual reality (heavens and hells)
3. Absolute Reality (also called "Ultimate Reality" and "True Thusness")
a. Concept of non-dualism: no ultimate difference between existence (material and spiritual reality) and non-existence (absolute reality)
C. What is the contradiction between the concept of reincarnation and ancestor deities (ujigami ) or ghosts?
1. How does Buddhism deal with this problem?
D. Six “worlds” or “paths” of reincarnation (called the ROKUDO in Japanese)
1. Heaven (several levels)
2. Human
3. Animals
4. Mayhem/Ashura (sometimes above humans, sometimes below animals)
5. Hungry Ghosts/Gaki
6. Hell (Naraka, multiple levels)
III. Hell (images)
A. Comparison with early Buddhism
1. Early Buddhist idea of karma and reincarnation: mechanical process (no deities involved)
2. Development of personalized judgment by King Enma/Emma (Skt. Yama, image) , Ten Judges, or Bodhisattva Jizô
a. Concept of Judgement in Hell as Court of Law comes from China
1) Ten judgements (one a week); 5th one at 35th day decides which path you take next reincarnation
3. Setsuwa stories in which Jizô or other deity intercedes in hell (defends you if you or your familyhas expressed faith in him)
a. #104 "The Catch": Poor man saves a turtle, who turns out to have been Jizô. Saves both himself and another young woman.
b. #180 "The Reprieve": The priest Zôman is brought back from hell by Jizô.
c. #215 "Be Good to Your Father and Mother": Kamo no Yukimitsu is given a tour of hell by the Kasuga deity
4. Setsuwa Tours of Hell
a. #101 "The God of Fire and Thunder": Nichizô tours hell guided by Zao Gongen and meets Michizane.
b. #46 "The Weight of Tradition": Haruto, a dancer, comes back to life to teach an important dance.
C. Why might the concept of hell have developed? (Discussion Forum Question)
1.
2.
3.
4.
a. Comparison
5.
b. Medieval Catholic Christianity comparison (limbo, purgatory, indulgences)
D. Example: Blood Pool Hell (image)
Concept of the Blood Pool Hell first enters Japan develops in later medieval period, and really becomes popular in the Edo period (1603-1868)
Descriptions:
The Blood Pool Sutra is a savior of women, and reveals that, if at the time of her menstrual period a woman spills blood on the ground, the deity of the earth will morn. Or, if she releases blood in a river, the deity of water will suffer. As women’s menses and parturition blood accumulate, they become the Blood Pool Hell, 80,000 yojanas deep and wide. Upon falling into the boiling lake of blood, women are tortured by demons who shout, 'It’s blood from your own bodies, so drink it all up!' Though a woman may feel remorse, it will have no effect, and though she may have children, they will do her little good. [Isozaki, a late-Muromachi otogizoshi (medieval tale). Keller Kimbrough, Preachers, Poets, Women and the Way, University of Michigan, 2008, pp. 230-31]
Another description from the otogizoshi, Tengu no dairi (The Palace of the Tengu) in which Minamoto no Yoshitsune is taken on a tour of the underworld by a tengu goblin guide:
There is an iron cable over the lake of blood. Five demons appear in five different colors, and they goad women out over the lake. “Cross the cable!” they shout. But the women lose their footing before they even reach the center, and they fall in with a splash. Their bodies sink below, while their long hair floats on the surface like duckweed. When they try to rise, the demons push them back down with iron rods. The women’s anguished cries are thinner than a spider’s thread. “It’s your punishment for the crimes you committed in the human realm!” the demons shout, their voices echoing all around, “so don’t blame us!” [Kimbrough, pp. 231-32)
1. Who ends up in this hell initially?
2. Late medieval period: in Japan belief in the Blood Bowl Sutra is spread by Kumano Nuns
image (Note: this is Chinese version, so male Buddhist priests are distributing sutras)
3. Who ends up in this hell by the 16th century? Why?
a. How do they get out?
4. Although specifically about women, how is this an example of the logic of hells generally?
5. Why do you suppose a hell that seems so misogynistic (antagonistic to women) is embraced by women and spread primarily by women to other women?
a.
b. Do you think medieval and early modern women really believed in it?
1) Pascal's Wager
IV. Comparison of Buddhist hell to Christianity and Islam
A. "In Christianity you are punished FOR your sins; in Buddhism you are punished BY your sins"
B. Christian theologian, Origen (c. 185-284 CE)
1. Argued for Universal Salvation because believed that an all-good, compassionate God would not let souls burn in hell for eternity.
2. Origin declared heretical posthumously by council of Alexandria (400). Consequence?
C. Buddhist hell as purgatory
1. Work off your bad karma, but eventually you will be saved, either by intercession or reincarnation.
V. Hungry Ghosts (images)
Kyoto National Museum Scroll of the Hungry Ghosts
A. Special path of reincarnation: Why might you be reincarnated as a hungry ghost?
1. Relation to paths of material world and hell? (image)
B. Visual representation of hungry ghosts
1. What are their physical characteristics and abilities?
a.
b.
c.
d.
2. Is this path a kind of hell? How is it different?
C. How does the representation of hungry ghosts relate to the situation in the late 12th century?
1. What was happening?
a. 1181-1185 civil war between Genji and Heike warrior familiescaused widespread famine (thousands and thousands of people died in the capital)
b. What do starving people look like?
D. Rationality of Supernatural Belief: How hungry ghost belief helps explain certain natural phenomena
1. Disintegration of matter (image)
2. Evaporation of fluids
3. Fire (image)
E. How are hungry ghosts saved? (images)
1. Story
2. Food and water
3. Intercession
4. Model medieval ghost story
F. Why can only Buddhist priests or deities see hungry ghosts?
1. Emphasizes
2. Emphasizes
3. Encourages
4. Didactic warning
VI. Demons (image): How do you become one? How are they different from angry ghosts, hungry ghosts, and kami?
A. Three Theories (inconsistent and overlapping):
1. Ferocious, blood-thirsty pre-Buddhist Hindu or Chinese deities and Japanese kami who have converted to Buddhism.
2. A kind of species that reproduces (i.e. has baby demons):
a. Anti-Buddhist type (never converts)
b. Converted to Buddhism (image); serve as servants and workers, especially in Hell
1) eg. #98 "The River of Snakes": The demon Kuhanda ("naked but for a loin cloth, the creature was ten feet tall. Its black skin glistened like lacquer and its red hair bristled straight up") saves ascetic from snake at the bidding of Thousand-Armed Kannon.
2) eg. #172 "The Bottomless Sack": The demon Kuhanda ("a demon with a single horn in the middle of its forehead and a single eye, wearing a red loincloth"), servant to the deity Kichijoten, gives an official a bottomless sack of rice.
3. Demons who used to be human beings
a. Sometimes transform on purpose
1) eg. #125 "A Memorable Empress": monk falls in love with Empress and vows to become demon after death
b. Category is easily confused with angry ghosts, disease deities, hungry ghosts
c. Medieval tales about female demons
eg. # 14 "The Bridge"
19th c. woodblock print by Chikanobu of female demon dressed like Noh demon
B. The Hundred Demon Night Parade (Hyakki yakkô or Hyakki yagyô)
British Museum Scroll of the Hundred Demon Night Parade
1. #168 "No Night to be Out Courting"
2. #169 "Lump on, Lump off"
3. #170 "Take a Good Look"
4. #74 "Invisible Man"
VII. Why were the Hell and Hungry Ghost Scrolls commissioned?
A. Critical analysis questions
1. Author/patron:
2. Audience:
3. Goals:
a.
b.
c.
d.
4. What is the belief system framing it?
a.
b.
5. Economic/political:
B. Two views of the Rokudô (six paths)
1. Common people:
a. hell is a real place (sulphor or iron ore hot springs, you end up at crossroads of six paths after death)
Images of Tateyama and Jigoku Dani (Valley of Hell), images of Blood Pool Hell in Beppu
1) Do common people really believe in hell?
a) Yes:
b) No:
2) Points to keep in mind:
a) Pascal's Wager also applies here
b) Who were the patrons for the scrolls? What was their goal?
2. Enlightened (elite) view:
a. allegorization/attenuation of hell
b. hierarchy is just apparent, not real (Buddhist non-dualism)
c. All levels are really this world
d. eg. Sword Forest Hell
e. Possible discussion question about contemporary Buddhist understanding of what concept of Hungry Ghosts might mean today:
QUOTE: "Our conditioning does not emphasize generosity or relinquishing.
Wanting, getting, and hoarding are dominant emphases in our culture...In
the Buddhist cosmology one of the realms of being is that of 'hungry ghosts.'
When asked what life is like in that realm, teacher Thich Nhat Hanh answered
with one word: 'America'.." (Sharon Salzberg, "Lovingkindness")
VIII. How do ghosts and ancestor deities fit into this Buddhist model?
A. Ghosts
1. muenbotoke (ghosts with no connection to the living)
2. angry ghosts of warriors
B. Ancestor deities (ujigami ):
2. Lower-level heaven?
C. Problems?
1. Does reincarnation include a memory of past lives?
a. Original Buddhist ideas of Mayhem/Ashura and Hungry Ghosts realms
1) Violent people
2) Self-indulgent people
3) Lose personality
4) Is this true of Michizane?
2. Living spirits (ikiryô)?
a. living spirits that possess other people
1) Rokujô
b. No real Buddhist explanation for this except the idea of obsessive attachment
c. Such contradictions and paradoxes emerge frequently
