Beyond Zen: D. T. Suzuki and the Modern Transformation of Buddhism

324 Pages·2022·2.681 MB·English

by  John Breen (editor), Fumihiko Sueki (editor), Shōji Yamada (editor)

BEYOND ZEN

BEYOND ZEN
D. T. Suzuki and the Modern
Transformation of Buddhism
Edited by John Breen,
Sueki Fumihiko, and Yamada Shōji
University of Hawai‘i Press
Honolulu
© 2022 University of Hawai‘i Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
First printing, 2022
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Breen, John, editor. | Sueki, Fumihiko, editor. | Yamada,
Shōji, editor.
Title: Beyond Zen : D. T. Suzuki and the modern transformation of Buddhism /
edited by John Breen, Sueki Fumihiko, and Yamada Shōji.
Description: Honolulu : University of Hawai‘i Press, 2022. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022034984 | ISBN 9780824890117 (hardback) | ISBN
9780824892210 (pdf) | ISBN 9780824892227 (epub) | ISBN 9780824893736
(kindle edition)
Subjects: LCSH: Suzuki, Daisetz Teitaro, 1870–1966—Influence. | Buddhist
Scholars—Japan. | Buddhism—Japan.
Classification: LCC BQ988.U887 B49 2022 | DDC 294.30952—dc23/eng/20220808
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022034984
Cover art: Koka Kola, 2019. Japanese cypress, gold leaf, ceramic. H560 × W310 × D200 mm.
©Kanji Hasegawa, courtesy KANA KAWANISHI GALLERY
Cover design: Melissa Rose Wong
University of Hawai‘i Press books are printed on
acid-free paper and meet the guidelines for permanence
and durability of the Council on Library Resources.
Contents
Preface vii
Abbreviations ix
Introduction 1
I. D. T. Suzuki at the Turn of the Century (c. 1890–c. 1920)
1. F rom Postpantheism to Transmaterialism: D. T. Suzuki and
New Buddhism 15
James Mark Shields
2. S uzuki Daisetz Attempts a Mahāyāna Protestant Buddhism: Outlines
of Mahayana Buddhism as True Religion 33
Mark L. Blum
II. D. T. Suzuki in the Interwar Years (c. 1920–c. 1941)
3. Th e Suzuki Contribution to the
Anglophone Press of Interwar Japan 59
Judith Snodgrass
4. W as D. T. Suzuki a Nazi Sympathizer? 84
Brian A. Victoria
5. D . T. Suzuki and the Welfare of Animals 108
James C. Dobbins
III. D. T. Suzuki during and after the War (c. 1941–c. 1946)
6. D . T. Suzuki and the Two Cranes: American Philanthropy
and Suzuki’s Global Agenda 133
Richard M. Jaffe
7. T ransnationalizing Spirituality: D. T. Suzuki’s Zen Textuality 156
Roman Rosenbaum
8. How to Read D. T. Suzuki?: The Notion of “Person” 177
Sueki Fumihiko
v
vi Contents
COLUMN 1. S uzuki Daisetsu, Spirituality, and the Problem of Shinto 192
John Breen
IV. Postwar D. T. Suzuki (c. 1946–c. 2000)
9. Suzuki Daisetz’ “Spiritual Japan” and Buddhist War Responsibility:
An Alternative History of the Allied Occupation of Japan,
1945–1952 199
Alice Freeman
10. D. T. Suzuki’s Theory of Inspiration and the Challenges
of Cross-Cultural Transmission 225
Roy Starrs
11. D. T. Suzuki’s Literary Influence: Utopian Narrative in American
and European Memoirs of Zen Life 247
Ben Van Overmeire
COLUMN 2. D. T. Suzuki and American Popular Culture 268
Yamada Shōji
Bibliography 273
Contributors 297
Index 303
Preface
John Breen
By pretty much any measure, D. T. Suzuki (1870–1966) was a great man. He had
an abundance of charisma, and charmed audiences in Japan and the West
throughout his long and eventful life. He was a prolific writer, speaker, and
translator, and his books, essays, and lectures have exerted a profound and
enduring impact on the way Westerners, especially, came to view not only Zen
and Mahāyāna Buddhism but Japanese culture also. Suzuki’s output was at times
difficult. This was a consequence of his positioning himself on the borders
between Zen and Pure Land Buddhism, priest and layperson, scholar and popu-
larizer, Japan and America, and, of course, the Japanese and English languages.
His work was controversial, too. Scholars of the late twentieth and early twenty-
first centuries have raised awkward questions about the political sympathies of
this man of peace.
Suzuki died in 1966 at the age of ninety-five, having lived in Japan and the
United States through one of the most tumultuous periods in world history.
Academic and more popular interest in his work continues unabated to this day.
What has been missing till now, however, is a comprehensive assessment and con-
textualization of his life and legacy. Now seems the perfect moment for reflection
and taking stock. The fiftieth anniversary of his death has just passed; the copy-
right on his literary output has now expired; and his selected works have recently
been published by a major American university press. We are in a position to
know and to understand more than ever about Suzuki’s intellectual and practical
engagement with religion, philosophy, and culture. This volume’s editors took an
important first step by hosting an international conference on Suzuki at the
International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Nichibunken) in 2016.
“Reflections on D. T. Suzuki: Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of His
Death” was the first time the leading Suzuki scholars had gathered in one place to
reflect critically on the man and his legacy. Scholars, both seasoned and young,
Anglophone and Japanese, came to Nichibunken from America, Australasia, and
Europe, as well as from across Japan to engage in a two-day exchange of scholarly
views. The present volume had its beginnings in that event.1
vii
viii Preface
Unfortunately, it did not in the end prove possible to represent here all those
Suzuki experts who presented papers at the 2016 conference. The editors would
like to take this opportunity to thank the following for their contributions: pro-
fessors Stefan Grace (Taishō University), who expertly summed up the achieve-
ments of the two-day conference; Iwamoto Akemi (D. T. Suzuki Museum), who
spoke on “Daisetsu’s Zen, Mahāyāna Buddhist Thought, and the Doctrine of
Early Indian Yogācāra”; Moriya Tomoe (Hannan University), who offered “An
Analysis of D. T. Suzuki’s ‘Subjective’ Discourses on Religion and Their Relation
to Social Criticism”; and Wayne Yokoyama (Hanazono University), who
addressed the topic of “Suzuki’s Work on Saichi’s Poems: Another Lifework left
Incomplete.”
Sueki Fumihiko wrote the bulk of the introduction to this volume, which
develops reflections on Suzuki, his life, and his work that Sueki shared at the
conference and published subsequently in the journal the Eastern Buddhist.2
Sueki’s chapter, “How to Read D. T. Suzuki? The Notion of ‘Person,’ ” is a rework-
ing of parts 4 and 5 of that essay. It is reproduced here with permission from the
editor of the Eastern Buddhist. Note that the essays by John Breen and Yamada
Shōji are not full-length chapters but brief “columns” of the sort that are increas-
ingly fashionable in Japanese publications. Finally, as is well known, Suzuki
styled himself in multiple ways: D. T. Suzuki, Suzuki Daisetsu (Daisetz), Suzuki
Daisetsu (Daisetz) Teitarō, and Suzuki Teitarō Daisetsu (Daisetz). We have not
sought to impose uniformity here, and so Suzuki appears in this book under a
wide variety of names.
This book adheres to established convention in using the modified Hepburn
system of romanization for Japanese, and Pinyin for Chinese. Japanese and
Chinese personal names are presented in the customary fashion, so that family
name is followed by given name. Macrons indicating long vowels have been
employed throughout, except in the case of well-known place names such as
Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka. Finally, the editors would like to thank Kurita
Hidehiko for his help with the footnotes, references, and index.
Notes
1. For details of the event, see John Breen, “Reflections on D. T. Suzuki,” Eastern Buddhist
(New Series) 47, no. 2 (2016): 101–106.
2. See Sueki Fumihiko, “Reading D. T. Suzuki with a Focus on His Notion of ‘Person,’ ”
Eastern Buddhist (New Series) 47, no. 2 (2016): 1–26. The editors of this volume would like to
thank the editor of Eastern Buddhist for permission to reproduce material here.
Abbreviations
BA: Bakhmeteff Archive
MBA: Matsugaoka Bunko Archive
MBKN: Matsugaoka Bunko kenkyū nenpō
MECW: Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Marx-Engels Collected Works, 50 vols.
(New York: International Publishers, 1975)
OMB: Suzuki Daisetz Teitaro, Outlines of Mahāyāna Buddhism (London:
Luzac, 1907)
RAC: Rockefeller Archive Center
SB: Akamatsu Tesshin and Fukushima Hirotaka, eds., Shin bukkyō, 4 vols.
(Kyoto: Nagata Bunshōdō, 1982)
SDS: S uzuki Daisetsu, Suzuki Daisetsu senshū 鈴木大拙選集, 26 vols.
(13 + 8 [zoku] + 5 [tuikan]). Tokyo: Shunjūsha, 1952–1958.
SDZa: Suzuki Daisetsu, Suzuki Daisetsu zenshū, 32 vols. (Tokyo: Iwanami
Shoten, 1968–1971; 1980–1983)
SDZb: S uzuki Daisetsu, Suzuki Daisetsu zenshū: Zōho shinban, 40 vols., edited
by Hisamatsu Shin’ichi, Yamaguchi Susumu, and Furuta Shōkin
(Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1999–2003)
SMC: Sano Manabu, Sano Manabu chosakushū, 5 vols. (Tokyo: Sano Manabu
Chosakushū Kankōkai, 1958)
SSR: D . T. Suzuki, “Selections from Shin shūkyō ron,” in Selected Works of
D. T. Suzuki, vol. 3, Comparative Religion, edited by Jeff Wilson and
Tomoe Moriya, 3–28 (Oakland: University of California Press, 2016)
T: Taishō Shinshū Daizōkyō
ZSS: Zen Studies Society Archive
ix