[lit-ideas] Re: "Grace" taught in all religions?
- From: "Peter D. Junger" <junger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 11 Mar 2006 20:04:57 -0500
"Lawrence Helm" writes:
: All religions teach grace? Hmmmm. Grace is a characteristic of
: Christianity, but what other religions emphasize Grace? In Judaism and
: Islam you get to heaven by means of what you do, don't you? If you do good
: works, you make it. If you don't, you don't. Conservative Catholic and
: Protestant Christianity teach that you don't get to heaven by means of what
: you do but by trusting in Christ for you salvation. You are saved by the
: grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ.
:
:
:
: Hmmm . . . I recall a form of Buddhism that would involve what we could
: call Grace, Amitabah Buddhism. If memory serves me, one is able to get to
: paradise by calling on the name of Amitabah before one dies -- which strikes
: me as a form of grace. I'd be interested in hearing from Peter Junger on
: this.
That is Pure Land Buddhism in which it is told that a Buddha,
named Amitabha---the Buddha of infinite Wisdom and
Compassion---, before he became a Buddha declared that he would
not become a Buddha unless anyone who called upon his name a few
times would go to his Pure Land---the Western paradise---he would
not become a Buddha. In the Pure Land the conditions are such
that anyone who is reborn there will in short order become a
Buddha.
In many of its manifestations Pure Land Buddhism, which is practided
in East Asia and Vietnam, is pretty unsophisticated, but in
Japan, particularly in the so-called True Pure Land school---Jodo
Shinshu or just Shin---it has a very complex set of teachings
which I find quite hard to follow, since they can be described as
the practice of no practice and that is pretty hard to do.
Shin Buddhism is the largest school of Buddhism in Japan and
was also the largest Buddhist school in the U.S. until the 1960's
or so.
I have heard that the Jesuit monks when they first went to Japan
thought when they came across Shin teachings that the Lutherans
must have gotten there before them.
The core of the Shin teachings is that beings like me---and Shinran,
the founder of the Shin school---are such ignorant, lust-filled
creatures that we have no hope of reaching Nirvana---the state
where the causes of suffering are extinguished---under our own
power, so that we have to entrust ourselves to the other power
of the infinite wisdom and compassion that sourrounds us.
From the outside this seems to look pretty much like the working of
grace; from the inside it seems---at least to me---to be quite
different.
Tai Unno, Professor Emeritus of Religion at Smith College, has
written a wonderful book about the Shin teachings called:
River of Fire, River of Water. I don't recall that he ever
mentions "grace," although it is possible that he does.
--
Peter D. Junger--Case Western Reserve University Law School--Cleveland, OH
EMAIL: junger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx URL: http://samsara.law.cwru.edu
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