Hongaku
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hongaku (本覺) a Japanese term commonly translated as "original enlightenment". It refers to the concept in East Asian Buddhism that enlightenment is a quality inherent in the nature of all sentient beings.[1]
This concept initially developed in China, where it is known by the Chinese term benjue. The Dasheng qixin lun was influential in promoting this concept in China.[1]
The Princeton Dictionary states:
- The Dasheng qixin lun posited a distinction between the potentiality to become a buddha that was inherent in the minds of every sentient being, as expressed by the term “original enlightenment” (C. benjue; pronounced hongaku in Japanese); and the soteriological process through which that potential for enlightenment had to be put into practice, which it called “actualized enlightenment” (C. shijue; J. shikaku). This distinction is akin to the notion that a person may in reality be enlightened (original enlightenment), but still needs to learn through a course of religious training how to act on that enlightenment (actualized enlightenment).[1]
This scheme was further developed in numerous commentaries written by Chinese scholars in the Di lun zong, Huayan zong, and Tiantai zong.[1]
The Princeton Dictionary states:
- In medieval Japan, this imported soteriological interpretation of “original enlightenment” was reinterpreted into an ontological affirmation of things just as they are. Enlightenment was thence viewed not as a soteriological experience, but instead as something made manifest in the lived reality of everyday life. Hongaku thought also had wider cultural influences, and was used, for example, to justify conceptually incipient doctrines of the identity between the buddhas and bodhisattvas of Buddhism and the indigenous deities (kami) of Japan... Distinctively Japanese treatments of original enlightenment thought begin in the mid-eleventh century, especially through oral transmissions (kuden) within the medieval Tendaishū tradition. These interpretations were subsequently written down on short slips of paper (kirigami) that were gradually assembled into more extensive treatments.[1]
Notes
Sources
Buswell, Robert E.; Lopez, Donald S. (2014), The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, Princeton University
Further reading
Original enlightenment, Wikipedia
