‘enlightenment’ when used as a name, and ‘awakened’ in its adjectival and past
participle forms. The name originating from this radical is translated into English as
the word ‘awakening,’ while its past participle, translated as Buddha, is used in its
original form and means, as is well known, ‘awakened.’ Buddha also means Awakened
One. Hence, expressions such as ‘to gain enlightenment’ or ‘to become a Buddha’
carry exactly the same significance, and should be understood as a natural designation
of one and the only fact: the act of awakening.
Taken in its literal sense, ‘awaken’ means to stop sleeping or make somebody stop
sleeping. According to this definition it is not absurd to say that every morning when
one wakes up, he or she becomes a Buddha, that is, an Awakened person. Nevertheless,
in a Buddhist context, this expression acquires a completely different meaning. For
Buddhism considers that what we normally call ‘awake’ is in reality nothing but a
state of (deep) sleep. In our everyday lives we accept without questioning as
self-evident the concept of a world that revolves around us, and leads a completely
antagonistic and independent existence from us. Also, whether conscious or
unconscious—it does not matter—we think of ourselves as something solid and stable
and separate from others, even though we may feel emotionally connected. From this
self-centered point of view, our existence appears to be something that has sprung
from the depths of darkness. Based on this perception, we become extremely attached
to the idea of an immutable and supposedly immortal self. In reality, however, we all
know that we are going to die. Between us and this self that we suppose we are and
to which we ordinarily cling, a gap develops. This gap leads to the so-called existential
sufferings of coming into being, aging, getting sick and finally dying. ‘Why am I going
to die?’ ‘Isn’t this a mistaken idea?’ we ask ourselves. And not being able to come to
terms with reality, we go on asking questions like ‘What happens after death?’ Such
questions turn up new and insoluble torments. In all probability too, such a situation
eventually becomes the target of nihilistic questioning about its own meaning. This
process is referred to in Buddhism by the expression ‘to be asleep,’ which describes
the state from which our sufferings are derived, a state, I think, all of us are familiar with.
If we realize that there is no immutable separate self and that such an ego-centric
point of view is not in any way something absolute, but rather and simply a fictitious
assumption, then there is also the possibility that an entirely new world can unfold
before us. We begin to feel that all things are connected and form a whole and that
they are all intimately related to each other. Then we are able to realize that we are
nothing but a part of the whole, and also that this whole leads its own life as a whole
and realizes itself as the life of each and all of its parts. To experience this is
enlightenment in which the self and the world are perceived as existing in a state of
union; furthermore, each world is seen—for all the intimate and meaningful
connections it contains—as something based on what one could describe by the term
‘correlativity.’ It is like being touched by an extreme feeling of inevitability and
necessity, as if everything that is taking place has always been there from the very
beginning of the universe.
Yet it should be emphasized—due to very frequent misapprehension on this point
—that an experience of enlightenment developing exactly in the specific way
230 HAYA TATSUO