WHAT IS SHINJIN?

Like countless millions over the past 800 years, I feel that my Life has been enriched and transformed by Shinran 's teachings. It is, as I stated earlier, from the broad perspective of my own experience that I write these chapters, but of necessity a number of technical terms must be dealt with. In several areas, I have thought it essential to trace linguistic trails from Sanskrit to Chinese to Japanese, in order to clarify meanings in English. Too often, a simple translation presents a distorted and misleading view of the original. Such has been the case with Shinjin, the term that expresses the essence of Shin Buddhism. Shinjin has on occasion been translated as "faith" but to use that English word without considerable further explanation is inadequate as well as potentially misleading. I propose that, like nirvana and Nembutsu , Shinjin become one of those Buddhist terms adopted without translation, as is, into the English vocabulary.

Buddhism cannot be grasped by the analytical logic of the west. Therefore, I wish to tackle the essential question-what is Shinjin?-by first explaining what Shinjin is not. Here is where the linguistic trail tracing must begin. In Japanese, there are three expressions which can all be approximately translated by the English word "faith. " These three-Shinrai,Shinko, and Shinjin-share the common root of shin, "to believe. "

Shinrai, the first of the three possible Japanese translations of "faith," means to "depend on", or "to use." It expresses a belief that does not have a religious context but is used rather in the area of secular relationships such as, for example, my assuming something is going to be the way it is even when I don't really know-like my assumption today that I will be alive tomorrow. This kind of belief is based on my condition now, at this moment. Based on my wellness today, there is a high probability that I will continue to live on tomorrow. However, if I am ill, that probability is not so high after all. The "knowing" factor is minimal in this kind of believing. Rather, we believe in terms of what we think we can project. So, in many of our human relationships we experience difficulty in believing that these really are what they seem to be, especially at first encounter. With frequency, and familiarity, some kind of understanding is established and it is then that we believe in terms of what we feel more certain about.

Shinko, the second expression translatable as "faith" is more of a religious term. During Shinran's time, many of his contemporaries-his teacher Honen, Dogen who was the founder of Soto Zen, and Nichiren, another Kamakura religious reformer, all used shinko. However, Shinran himself always used shinjin. In dissecting shinko linguistically to trace its meanings, we find that to the root of shin, "to believe," is added a character "ko" which in this instance is also read as aogu-"to look up to." For example, in Shinto, the god you believe in is looked up to. In Japanese, the words for `god' and `above' are homonyms, expressed in the Chinese character read "kami"-god, but a character that often was read "above"or "on top of", and thus the implication that what is "on top" or "above" is "looked up to." The believer neither knows nor questions whether the god which he "looks up to" exists or not. This is not a belief in which intellectual, rational, or scientific evidence is important. In shinko, it is because we do not know that we believe. When Christianity began to establish itself in Japan one hundred years ago, the word "faith" in the Bible was translated as shinko; This aptly translates the Christian belief that God is in heaven and therefore spatially "above" or "on top of" the believer.

Shinjin is totally different from either shinko or shinrai in that it has no intimation whatsoever of "looking up to" but expresses a condition of trust in Amida Buddha and his Vow to save all beings everywhere at all times. In this entrusting there is no subject, no object, no "I believe in something." It is an entrusting relating to the Sanskrit word prasada, which describes a condition that is very calm, still, pure. Cittaprasada is "the mind and heart which is clear and pure," translated in the Chinese text as joshin, "clear or pure mind."

Shinran chose shinjin as the word more adequately carrying his intended meaning of "the truth of one 's heart and mind in a clear and pure way. " Here "pure" is to be carefully understood not as moral purity in the puritanical sense, but as the purity that is the result of non-calculation and non-ego. It is at the point where the pure, clear mind (cittaprasada) becomes my condition that the shinjin of Shinran's teachings becomes manifest. Thus shinjin is neither "faith" in a secular nor in the commonly held religious sense of the English word.

My interpretations of shinjin as it was used by Shinran is that its meaning has two aspects: that of "realizing" or "knowing" as well as the implicit aspect of truth or reality. It is "to know the heart and mind" as well as "the heart and mind that is true and real." This "knowing" is a special implication, the "knowing" that in Sanskrit is expressed by the word prajna, the Buddhist wisdom that is the dynamic of shinjin. To know one's heart and mind refers to the working of prajna, the wisdom that brings about "the true mind and heart." This is not a dualism but a whole in which prajna and "true mind and heart" (cittaprasada) are descriptions, one of the function and the other of the essence of shinjin.

Cittaprasada was, in the Sanskrit texts, used synonymously with samadhi, the state where the heart and mind being calm, truth or reality, can be penetrated. In other words, cittaprasada refers to the ability to "see the Buddha," to satori-be awakened and to be born in the home of Tathagata, the home of the Buddha.

As we interpret shinjin in this light, we begin to comprehend its breadth and depth. Shinjin embodies the wisdom which cittaprasada expresses: the mind which is clear and pure, the ability to "see the Buddha," and to be born into the home of the Buddha.

At this point, we come to the necessity of understanding the nature of Buddhist wisdom.

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