THE JOURNAL OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF BUDDHIST STUDIES CO-EDITORS-IN-CHIEF Gregory Schopen Roger Jackson Indiana University Fairfield University Bloomington, Indiana, USA Fairfield, Connecticut, USA EDITORS Peter N . Gregory Ernst Steinkellner University of Illinois University of Vienna Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, USA Wien, Austria Alexander W. Macdonald Jikido Takasaki Universite de Paris X University of Tokyo Nanterre, France Tokyo, Japan Bardxvell Smith Robert Thurman Carleton College Amherst College Northfteld, Minnesota, USA Amherst, Massachusetts, U SA ASSIS TAN T EDITOR Bruce Cameron Hall College of William and Mary Williamsburg, Virginia, USA Volume 9 1986 Number 2
Transcript
8/2/2019 Dogen Steven Heine Genjokoan Thomas Cleary
Shobogenzo: ZenEssays by Dogen, translated by Thomas Cleary.Hon olu lu: U niversity of Hawaii Press, 1986. vii + 123 pp .
This volume presents the translation of thirteen fascicles ofDogen's masterwork with an introductory essay on Dogen's useof language and its relation to meditation in light of traditionalZen practice, as well as prefatory com m ents (and in some cases,annotations) to each fascicle. Cleary is one of the most noted andprolific translators of Zen and Far Eastern Buddhist texts; hisprevious publications include works by Dogen and the Soto sect.In this case, the material presented has become increasinglyfamiliar. All of the fascicles have appeared in English at least
once, some of them two or mo re times, and particularly im portantand famous pieces such as "Genjokoan" and "Uji" are availablein a half-dozen versions. Yet, Dogen's creative but idiosyncraticSino-Japanese writingis generally recognizedas being so complexand multi-dimensional in its interweaving of novel approachesto traditional Bu ddh ist doctrine that there will con tinue to remainroom for some time for new interpretations if they are faithfulto the text and supp ortedby classical and m odern Japan ese scholarship. So, an important question in evaluating this volume is,What does Cleary's approach to translation and broad background in Mahayana and Zen contribute to the subtle and profound philosophical maze of theShobogenzo?
According to the introductory material (in the Foreward,Introduction and jacket notes), there are three main rationalesfor this translation: first, it attempts to preserve "the form aswell as con tent, on th e p remise that both are functional parts ofthe original design, which is arresting and demands close atten
tion" (p. 20); second, its com mentary and notes h elp make "accessible to a wider audience a Zen classic once considered to be theprivate preserve of Soto monks and Bud dhologists . . . includingreaders from various fields in the sciences and humanities" (jacket); and third, it has "selected [fascicles] for their emphasis onperennial issues in Buddhist learning and action." (Foreward)
The last of these points is probably the strongest. Clearyuses his considerable expertise in Chinese Buddhist texts to illuminate the development and forms of expression of DogenZen. His references in the introduction to other Zen writings,such as those by Gyozan and Wanshi, underscore the influenceof Chinese thought on Dogen without losing sight of the uniqueness of Dogen's approach. Cleary convincingly argues that "agreat deal of Dogen's writings for contemplation inShobogenzowould fall into the general category of complexkoan, and can
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be used with great effect in aiding the mind in the practice offluid integration of multiple perspectives" (p. 8). In some cases,the connect ions may be overs tated. For example, the interpreta
t ion of the elusive opening paragraph of "Genjokoan" in termsof the tradit ional Chinese Soto doctrine of "five stages"(goi)could be valid, but it does not account for Dogen's explicit criticism of the goi standpoint in certain sections of theShobogenzo.Yet, Cleary's work may help init iate further research into relat ively unexplored terr i tory and reverse the tendency to interpretDo gen in light of his m en tor, Ju -ch ing , while overlook ing oth ersignificant Chinese influences.
The rat ionale concerning form in addi t ion to the contentof the original material , howeve r, is som ew hat p roblem at ic . Sinceth e Shobogenzois wri t ten in a conv ent ional p rose form — and notin an unusual or unexpected poetic or call igraphic form (although i t contains references to Zen poems as well as a poeticqual ity in i ts com posi t ion)— the quest ion of ca ptu ring "form "would not seem to present an issue for the translator. WhatCleary basically means by form is that "passages and phraseswhich the original text keeps in Chinese, as well as certain tech
nical terms which seem to s tand out for emphasis , have beenital icized in the English." (p. 20) The practice of highlighting theChinese references is valuable, s ince Dogen's wri t ing frequent lyconsis ts of reinterpretat ions or rewri t ings of early Chinesesources. But most translat ions, at least the careful ones, do setthe references off by quo tat ion m arks or inde ntat io n. Pe rha psCleary is m or e th or ou gh than som e because he i talicizes eachword from a source passage that is m en t ion ed in Dogen 's commentary. The real difficulty in this issue arises from the fact thatboth the Chinese references and the technical terms are highlighted in exactly the same way. In the original text , these so-cal led technical terms are never ident i f ied as such. Thus, doingso he re ent i rely ref lects the t ran slator 's own ju dg m en ts , w hichare not explained and are also not a mat ter of the text ' s form.In addition, this practice is not always followed consistently. Manyof the important doctr ines , such asshinjin-datsuraku (casting offor shedding body-mind) and kikan (pivotal working), are not
i tal icized; some that are, includingkyoryaku (passage), are notexpla ined in the com m entary . Perh aps a com prehe ns ive g lossarywould have been a more effective means of indicating the specialconcepts in Dogen ' s thought .
T h u s , the key quest ion remains , How does the t ranslat ionfare in terms of content? This is general ly a thorough and accu-
8/2/2019 Dogen Steven Heine Genjokoan Thomas Cleary
rat e jo b , which is often qu ite successful in conve ying t he fullimplications of Dogen's highly suggestive writ ing. Several of thetranslations, such as "Sansuikyo" and "Kuge," are particularlynoteworthy for captur ing the tone and essence of Dogen 'sthought. In other cases, however, the translation is not as meticulous or as certain as one might hope. An examination of thecrucial "Genjokoan" fasicle (pp. 32-35), which appears first inmost Jap an ese edi t ions , reveals a nu m be r of proble ms . F irs t, thetranslation seems too l i teral in the phrase, "enlightenment ontop of en l igh tenm ent , " by which Dogen m eans "en l igh ten me ntbeyond enl ightenment" or "se lf -surpassing enl ightenment ." Ina related context, Cleary translates the term(Jo orue) as "progress
(or t ranscendence)" (p . 30) . On the other hand, the render ingof the central doctr ine ofju-hdi as "normative state" (which isnot i ta licized) appears to take too much liberty. Dogen's term,which is usually translated more l i terally as "abiding dharma-pos-it ion" (Cleary's re nd er in g in "Uji") refers to the conc rete man ifestation of the interpenetrating currents of l ife and death, akin toNishida's logic of place{basho) of absolute nothingne ss. "N ormativestate" not only loses the temporal significance underlying the spatialmetaphor, but seems to overlook the point that the type of
philosop hical persp ective articula ted by D oge n is descriptive of theontological condition of reality as it is, rather than offering anaxiological recommendation for how things should be.
While the problem in the above points may be a lack offamil ia ri ty with the s tan dard Ja pa ne se com m entar ies , an oth erdifficulty is the awkw ard re nd er in g of Do gen's philosop hical writing. For example, the f inal sentence in the well-known passagein "G enjok oan" con cer nin g the relation betw een self-forgetful-ness and the casting off of body-mind is translated as: "There isceasing the traces of enlightenment, which causes one to foreverleave the traces of en lig ht en m en t w hich is cessation." (p. 32) Th isversion seems to carry a threefold redundancy: ceasing the tracescauses one to leave the traces which is an act of ceasing. InDogen's writ ing, however, the two clauses build upon and enhance one anothe r a s we l l a s the me taphor of shedding . Thus ,an alternative version would be: It [casting off body-mind] is thecessation of the traces of enlightenment, and this traceless en
l ighte nm ent is perpetual ly rene we d."Another example of awkward or misleading t ransla t ion isin the title of several fascicles. For instance, "Genjokoan" is rendered as "Issue at Hand," which may be an interesting but controvers ia l a t tempt to capture in contemporary idiom Dogen 's
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