During my celebration of Higan here this month, I used Nikkyō Niwano’s definitions of the Six Pāramitā from his Buddhism for Today. I was very unhappy with his discussion of wisdom.
We cannot save others without having wisdom. Let us suppose that there is an impoverished young man lying by the road. And suppose that we feel pity for him and give him some money without reflecting on the consequences. What if he is mildly addicted to some drug? He will grab the money given to him and use it to buy drugs. In this way he may become seriously, even hopelessly, addicted. If we had handed him over to the police instead of giving him money, he would have been sent to a hospital and could start life over again. This is the kind of error we may commit in performing donation without wisdom.
Perhaps in Japan and perhaps in 1976, when Buddhism for Today was first published in English, but not today, and not here in America.
Caleb Michael Bodine was born in 1992 on the first day of November, the third child of Candi and Chris Bodine. Caleb’s older brother, Colin, and my son, Richard, were friends throughout school. The wife and I met Candi and Chris when our children were in kindergarten and we cheered together from the football field stands as our sons graduated from high school.
All three of the Bodine children grew up in a loving and supportive family, but all the love and attention and support and law enforcement intervention could not prevent Caleb from falling into a downward spiral of drugs and petty crime. He died, homeless, on the streets of San Francisco on Nov. 23, 2021. He was only 29 years old.
Four months later, Candi emerged from her grief to publish this notice on Instagram and Facebook:
March 23, 2022. It’s been four months. Four months from today when our hearts broke. Our son Caleb lost his life to the disease of addiction 22 days after his 29th birthday. I am finally coming out of the fog and felt like it was time to talk about it. It was a long hard struggle for him and I missed him every day. The difference is now I will miss him forever. I hope and pray that he is at peace and now out of the pain that addiction causes. The photo I shared is the last picture I have of him. I’m not exactly sure where it was taken but it’s something he sent me about three years ago. I like to imagine that he is up on top of a mountain -healthy and happy and living his best life. Caleb was so smart and funny and interesting, a great athlete and someone that I called a friend. I hate that drugs took him from us but he will forever hold a place in my heart and now he is home with us albeit not in the way we would have wanted. He was a son and a brother and a nephew and a friend and an uncle to 2 amazing little twin nieces that he never got the opportunity to meet. Rest in peace my little buddy. I love you. Caleb Michael Bodine 11/01/92-11/23/21
While Nikkyō Niwano’s explanation of Wisdom is not helpful, his discussion of Buddha Nature in his book The Lotus Sutra Life and Soul of Buddhism suggests a view we should all approach:
The word, Buddha, originally means the Enlightened One, that is, a man who perfected himself spiritually. Accordingly, to take the case of a man in actuality, the buddha-nature means the possibility which makes a man become a person who perfects himself spiritually and frees himself from the bonds of illusion and suffering, although, in a strict sense, it indicates man’s true nature which is united with the universal life in a body.
Sakyamuni saw through the fact that such a possibility is sure to exist in all men. He pointed out and taught this fact by His strong words. It was indeed something to be thankful for.
But for this teaching in this world, those who regard themselves as worthless and sinful men will be prepossessed by the idea that such worthlessness and sinfulness are their own true nature and they will not be able to get rid of this prepossession.
But for this teaching, for example, when we see the evil of another person, we take him for a bad man and hate him. For example, when we see a spiritless man, we conclusively brand him as a useless dullard and shall take no notice of him.
Toward others as well as ourselves, as long as we have such a way of looking at people and adopt such an attitude, we cannot find salvation in this manner. Others as well as we ourselves are covered by dark shadows of agony, hopelessness, desperation, contempt, faithlessness or hatred. The world always treats us coldly and sharply, and unpleasant disputes do not come to an end here.
At that time, if we can awake to the fact that “we have the buddha-nature and we have the possibility of elevating ourselves infinitely,” we shall have the same feeling as if a window were suddenly broken open in a wall of a dark prison and the bright sunlight streamed through it. As soon as we see that light, how much we shall be encouraged by it! We shall certainly stand up in spite of ourselves and shall begin to endeavor to steal out of our prison.
If we can realize the fact that “all other people also have the buddha-nature and that they, too, have the possibility of becoming perfect men,” we completely change our way of looking at them. If we believe the good of another person as being his true nature, while we also admit his wrongs and his defects as they are, we shall have the feeling of respecting him and receiving him as a man without only hating him, excluding him, forsaking him and disregarding him. Such a feeling is called the spirit of tolerance.
Also see: