Education, discipline, and enlightenment in Platonism and Buddhism
by frankdeluxe
To understand the world, one must go out of the world. This is the premise of the Buddhist faith as well as Template:Wiki philosophy. The world in which we live is illusion, or maia; existence as we know it is suffering. To know these things is the first step in moving beyond them. Coming back into the world to effect these understandings in a purposeful way is to arrive at a virtuous way of life. Both Template:Wiki in his Template:Wiki and Buddhism (spoken for in this essay by the Template:Wiki Template:Wiki tale Template:Wiki) promise this in their accounts of coming to understand. For Template:Wiki it is a method of education; for Buddhism it is a journey to this knowledge in a pilgrimage of the self as it relates to existential1 truth. Both of these paths to enlightenment involve a process of Template:Wiki. The self is to be understood as another illusory product of worldly contingencies; the world is to be negated as a phantasm of appearances. In Template:Wiki, the only reality is that of the Forms: everything in the world is but a copy of these forms. In Buddhism, the only reality is suffering and illusion in the world; it does not deal with Forms that explain metaphysical truths. Instead, there is only a Template:Wiki of existence out of which false categories, Template:Wiki and individuation arise.
In Plato’s famous Template:Wiki example, we see how we are engulfed in a world of Template:Wiki. He goes through a series of Template:Wiki categories which correspond to degrees of entrapment and liberation. These categories are: Illusion, in which the Template:Wiki is imprisoned in the Template:Wiki; Belief, in which the prisoner has been freed from his shackles and is able to examine the Template:Wiki and discover that up until now he has unknowingly been held in a state of appearances; Reason, in which the prisoner can see shadows of objects in the outside world reflected into the Template:Wiki; Intelligence, in which he is able to withstand the dazzling light of the outside world and can apprehend its contents; and finally Understanding or Knowing, in which the Template:Wiki can look at the Template:Wiki directly and know the good directly (Template:Wiki, The Template:Wiki, 259n). As far as the method of arriving at this understanding goes, Template:Wiki prescribes that the Template:Wiki must be trained such that his attention is directed at properly conceived accounts of the good (or God) and the Template:Wiki of reality. The goal is to make the student understand why he is doing what he is doing, and some restriction on worldly influences is necessary to achieve this, in Plato’s estimation. Here I will turn to Wu Ch’êng-ên’s Monkey2, focusing mostly on the main character, to elaborate on the connections between Plato’s account of virtue and education in The Template:Wiki, and similar themes in Buddhism as they are presented in the Template:Wiki.
If, in Wu’s Template:Wiki, we look at Template:Wiki himself, we see an Template:Wiki engaged in just such a struggle to understand the Template:Wiki of the existence and arrive at a virtuous way of life. Indeed, when we first encounter Template:Wiki, he is a creature of ego and appetite who seeks fulfillment in holding dominion over earthly objects and beings. By heroic action, he becomes the Template:Wiki King of a tribe of primates, with the assured reign of a thousand years; however, tension arises in short order:
the Template:Wiki King had enjoyed this artless existence for several hundred years when one day, at a feast in which all the monkeys took part, the king suddenly felt very sad and burst into Template:Wiki. His subjects once ranged themselves in front of him and bowed down, saying ‘Why is your Majesty so sad?’ ‘At Template:Wiki,’ said the king, ‘I have no cause for unhappiness. But I have a misgiving about the Template:Wiki, which troubles me sorely ... to-day I am not answerable to the law of any human king, nor need I Template:Wiki the menace of any beast or Template:Wiki. But the time will come when I shall grow old and weak. Yama, King of Death, is secretly waiting to destroy me. Is there no way by which, instead of Template:Wiki born again on earthI might live forever among the people of the sky? (Wu Ch’êng-ên, Template:Wiki, 14)
Here is a primary problem which begins Template:Wiki on the journey for enlightenment: the anxiety concerning death, and the desire to escape it. Template:Wiki, however, is also concerned with holding onto his self, and this immediately creates a barrier between him and what he seeks. He is attempting to seek immortality, which is a preservation of the earthly Template:Wiki of Template:Wiki. This desire to hold onto one’s Template:Wiki is constitutive of the greatest anxiety of all, that is, the extinction of the self. In The Template:Wiki, Template:Wiki pinpoints this anxiety as a key problem for those in Template:Wiki to be Guardians3. If a warrior is afraid of death for Template:Wiki of losing oneself in annihilation, then he will not march into Template:Wiki so readily or so fervently.
In his account of education (Part 3, Book 2 of The Template:Wiki), Template:Wiki examines the work of poets such as Homer and Hesiod4 searching for the cause of this anxiety and Template:Wiki. He finds that they promote the attachment of the self to worldly objects and ideals instead of virtues such as bravery or honour; in this way, they are unsuitable because they direct the minds of those who read them to corrupted values. Furthermore, the attachment to the world causes them to Template:Wiki death, which is the utter separation of one from the world. “’Must we not,’says Socrates in his Template:Wiki with Adeimantus, ‘extend our range to include something that will give them the least possible Template:Wiki of death?’ ‘Certainly not’ ... ‘It looks then, as if we shall have to control story-tellers on this topic too. We must ask the poets to stop giving their Template:Wiki gloomy account of the after-life, which is both untrue and unsuitable to produce a fighting sprit” (Template:Wiki, The Template:Wiki, 81). Template:Wiki wants the minds of those initiated into his education to be focused on the good, which is the highest virtue and Form.
In Buddhism, the highest virtue is the escape from suffering ; when one has come back into the world from his journey into enlightenment, the highest virtue to which he can attain is the alleviation of the suffering of others either by right action or through teaching the way of Buddhism. In Template:Wiki, the character Tripitaka5 plays this role as he makes his way to the Template:Wiki (as well as enlightenment itself) to collect the Buddhist scriptures. His character is similar to that of the prisoner who has escaped from the Template:Wiki to stand in the light and look at the Template:Wiki. For Template:Wiki, the philosopher is one who comes back down into the Template:Wiki to help free the rest of the prisoners by making them Template:Wiki of their entrapment in the world of appearances.
Returning to the character of Template:Wiki, another important element to which he corresponds in The Template:Wiki, is that of the bad or corrupted Template:Wiki. Essentially, the bad Template:Wiki is one who is out of control; he has no discipline, and has sunk into concerning himself with power in the Template:Wiki world (just as Template:Wiki does when he uses his skills acquired from various spiritual masters to launch an assault on Heaven). This arises from desiring earthly ends such as wealth and power. Just as the Template:Wiki are trained in the State, so Template:Wiki is trained by by various spiritual masters; however, he is overly ambitious and lets his appetite for power run wild. He subverts the order of Heaven, dubbing himself “Great Sage, Template:Wiki to Heaven”, and attacks it. This is an interesting piece of symbolism in that he is attempting to undermine a system from which he cannot escape6 ; Later, during his encounter with the Buddha, Template:Wiki is faced with this same reality. He wagers with the Buddha that he can successfully jump off of the Buddha’s right hand, but is unpleasantly surprised when he attempts to do so: he finds that five pink pillars he arrived at at the end of his leap turn out to be the Buddha’s fingers, and that, in fact, he never managed to escape from the Buddha’s presence. This is a major turning point for Monkey7 , because he realizes that he cannot exist outside the order of things, and after his imprisonment (as per the terms of the wager in the event that he loses), Template:Wiki becomes the servant of Tripitaka, and embarks upon his journey to enlightenment.
The magic pain cap which Tripitaka tricks Template:Wiki into wearing is perhaps the most important piece of symbolism. At first, it causes Template:Wiki to feel pain when he misbehaves; it thereby limits his range of activities and forces him to turn his mind to more virtuous things. In Plato’s Template:Wiki, we see similar limitations when Template:Wiki restricts what trainees can and cannot expose themselves to, and where they can and cannot flex their will to act.
We shall ... prevent our Template:Wiki Template:Wiki brought up among Template:Wiki of what is evil, and so day by day and little by little, by grazing widely as it were in an unhealthy pasture, insensibly doing themselves a cumulative psychological damage that is very serious. We must look for Template:Wiki and craftsmen capable of perceiving the Template:Wiki Template:Wiki of what is beautiful, and then our young men, living as it were in a healthy climate, will Template:Wiki because all the works of art they see and hear influences them for good, like the breezes from some healthy country, insensibly leading them from earliest childhood into close sympathy with beauty and reason (Template:Wiki, 103-4)
So, for Template:Wiki, those Template:Wiki educated are to be restricted from wrong thought and action, until such time as they are able to understand why it is favourable to be in harmony with the good. At that time, they will be able to understand why corruption is an evil. Similarly, Template:Wiki has restriction forced upon him in the form of the pain cap. At the end of the story, once he has made his way to enlightenment and acts rightly for the sake of right action, he finds that the cap has disappeared. The importance of this is that as Template:Wiki has approached enlightenment, he has begun to act properly of his own accord. Thus, when he becomes enlightened, he has no need for further Template:Wiki, because to act in any other way has become absurd for him.
Both The Template:Wiki and Template:Wiki show that enlightenment or understanding require Template:Wiki and discipline. More importantly, the enlightened one must come back into the world to give content to his understanding and effectuate good in the world, rather than remaining a Template:Wiki subject. As for the question as to whether or not wisdom obviates the need for Template:Wiki, it is clear that this is so. Wisdom provides a rational basis for never acting wrongly, and when one has attained this level of understanding, he will always follow the right path, and therefore not engage in actions which will require Template:Wiki to correct his deviations.
1Here I use the term ‘existential’ to mean ‘pertaining to existence’ - no Sartreanesque arguments will ensue.
2 Which is, of course, a Template:Wiki of the Template:Wiki tales themselves, rather than an original work bestowed upon China with the express intent of it standing as “the Template:Wiki Template:Wiki of China”.
3 Those Template:Wiki trained and designated to Template:Wiki the Template:Wiki and its people. Template:Wiki requires that the Template:Wiki embody such virtues as discipline, courage, and so on.
4 The Template:Wiki did not have Template:Wiki scriptures based on some sort of divine revelation in the same manner as the Template:Wiki or Eastern faiths such as Hinduism. Instead, their collected myths and Template:Wiki poetry served as a Template:Wiki and ethical foundation.
5 Drawn from the historical figure Hsuan Tsang, who journeyed to India to collect Buddhist scripture and bring them back to China in a clarified form. ‘Tripitaka’ means ‘Three Baskets’, which refers to three forms of Buddhist teachings. Interestingly, the third basket, Abhidharma, is the “systematized presentations of the teachings” (Thich Nhat Hanh, The Heart of the Buddha’s Teaching, 226n). This seems to be in concert with Plato’s belief that teachings about the Template:Wiki of God should be systematized and structured in a formal, consistent manner.
6 A good parallel here is that of St. Augustine and his “stealing of the pears” episode in The Confessions, in which he engages in thievery only to throw his ill gotten gains away. Augustine admits that he did this for no other reason than to oppose himself to God’s law and assert his freedom from that order. He writes, though, that he later realized the lunacy of this idea and eventually turned toward enlightenment.
7 As well as for Template:Wiki: while Template:Wiki has managed to disrupt the Confucian/Taoist system in Heaven, this episode points to the fact that Buddhism is Template:Wiki, and is in fact the true Way to enlightenment.