Soga Ryojin was a 20th century Shin Buddhist philosopher, who worked together with Kiyozawa Manshi to reformulate Shin Buddhism in a modern context. He achieved this through the incorporation of Western philosophical ideas which advocated the rejection of the state and organised structures. Soga and other Shin modernists sought disassociation with structure, instead projecting their image of the Pure Land into the abstract. Initially, therefore, it is apparent that Pure Land intellectualism became personal and internalised. However, conversely, with engagement in philosophical discussion of the Pure Land, Soga contributed to a formalisation of Shin intellectualism and the abstract.
Soga Ryojin’s discussion of the abstract self is primarily focused on the Dharmakara Boddhisattva narrative, found in the Three Pure Land Sutras.[1] They describe the transformation of the Boddhisattva into Amida Buddha, and subsequent alteration of the world of suffering into an enlightened Pure Land. This realisation is read as an expression of ‘cosmic oneness’.[2] Soga’s work, “A Saviour on Earth: The Meaning of the Dharmakara Bodhisattva’s Advent” sought to re-examine this narrative through two abstracted concepts. The first, that the Bodhisattva is the ‘storehouse consciousness’ and the second, that the Bodhisattva consequently ‘becomes me’. The storehouse consciousness is the deepest layer of the mind which contains seeds of thought. Liberation occurs when these thoughts are set free without entrapment in other parts of the mind and the storehouse consciousness becomes entirely empty. This is the revelation of one’s true inner self, and therefore the discovery of an internalised Pure Land. The ‘Boddhisattva becomes me’ through the manifestation of the personal ‘I’ within the life of the Shin practitioner.[3]
With this, Soga aimed to reformulate the Shin Buddhist path through the centrality of the self to understanding the Pure Land. This philosophy implies that Soga sought an independent intellectual existence for modern Shin practitioners. His vision of the Pure Land was entirely dependent on the internal relationships of the mind and its interdependence with fleeting thought patterns. It implies a disassociation with concrete reality and creates a sphere which Shin teachers, Buddhist monastic institutions and the state had no access to. Through understanding Pure Land through the abstract conceptualisation of thought, the mind-body realisation is totally and exclusively embodied within the practitioner. We are placed interior to our own subjectivity, and therefore the Pure Land remains something remote, exclusive, and untouched. Thus, Soga’s Pure Land appears to be separated by its existence in the abstract realm of the mind as he rejects traditional structures of Shin practice reformulates the Dharamkara Bodhisattva as something manifested within.
Despite Soga’s apparent rejection of structure and focus on the abstract, modern Shin Buddhism can still be described as systematised. Soga’s shift away from discourse of concrete practice and manifestation of the Pure Land does entail an intangible abstraction. However, to replace the concrete narratives of previous Shin philosophers, Soga unconsciously systematises the metaphysics of the abstract Pure Land. The concept of alaya-vijnana or the infinite mind-store exemplifies Soga’s formalisation of the abstract.[4] With its creation, Soga identifies, locates and unpacks the inner consciousness in a disciplined way which amounts to an organisation of the abstract realm. He attempts to order the discussion to make it accessible, and in doing so, imposes structural perimeters.
In a later lecture, Soga discusses the ‘True History of Buddhism’.[5] He attempts to define the history of Buddhism from the standpoint of materialism. Soga claims that this materialism negates any concept of a unified body of Buddhist truth and criticises previous scholars who have focused solely on doctrine instead of the practice of the mind.[6] Here, he in fact argues for the concrete nature of Buddhist history and projection of this past into the present, in order to reveal the path toward our own personal Buddhahood. Consequently, Soga advocates for a non-subjective history of Buddhism which can guide us into the present. Whilst the image of the Pure Land may appear abstract, Soga reinforces it with a concrete timeline of Buddhist faith, locating it firmly within the present. In his lectures, Soga sees the larger Sutras as the unifying thread of Buddhism.[7] In his abstraction of the Pure Land, he still provides an attachment to reality which systematises abstract thought. Consequently, within his writing, we can see they very organisation of thought which Soga’s ideas initially appear to reject. His personal structural understanding of the storehouse consciousness is imposed on the practitioner. This creates an entanglement of thought within the storehouse which Soga aimed to avoid. Whilst initially, it is apparent that Soga rejects all structures, he does, in fact, reinforce these very structures he seeks to avoid- those imposed on the inner mind.
Soga Ryojin’s modernist vision of the Pure Land appears entirely abstracted from the concrete practice of the monastic institution and traditional vision of the Bodhisattva. He advocates internal, mindful reform, where progression is dependent on the interrelation of subjective thought processes within the practitioner’s mind. However, this abstraction of Buddhist practice is not wholly subjective, and the formalisation of intellectual thought can still be seen. Through the discussion of concepts such as the ‘mind-store’ and the unifying timeline of Buddhist history, Soga physically and mentally locates the abstraction of the Pure Land within the worldly sphere of space and time. As such, Soga is still able to systematise the metaphysical elements of his Pure Land discussion through terminology and practical discussion.
Bibliography
Bragt, Jan (Trans.) Soga Riyojin: Shinran’s View of Buddhist History, (1999).
Unno, Mark, “Modern Pure Land Thinkers: Kiyozawa Manshi and Soga Riyojin” in Davis (Ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Japanese Philosophy, (2017).
[1] Unno, Mark, “Modern Pure Land Thinkers: Kiyozawa Manshi and Soga Riyojin” in Davis (Ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Japanese Philosophy, (2017), p.184.
[2] Ibid, p.184.
[3] Ibid, p.197.
[4] Ibid, p.197.
[5] Bragt, Jan (Trans.) Soga Riyojin: Shinran’s View of Buddhist History, (1999), p.111.
[6] Ibid, p.112.
[7] Ibid, p.118.