The Arhat and the Bodhisattva

Maybe it is time for us Zen and Tibetan Buddhists as well as other Mahayana Buddhists to re-look at the Arhat, the Theravada Buddhist ideal archetype who seeks self-realization and complete emancipation.

Let’s begin by acknowledging that there is an Arhat as well as a Bodhisattva within us all. In Theravada Buddhism an Arhat is any person, including the Buddha, who has reached total awakening and attained Nirvana by freeing him- or herself from greed, hatred and ignorance. Mahayana Buddhists maintain a hierarchy of spiritual aspirations in which the Arhat is viewed as respectable and highly accomplished but below the Bodhisattva who vows to postpone his or her enlightenment, liberation and Nirvana for the sake of all sentient beings.

The Arhat’s path, seeking personal liberation from samsāra, is often portrayed as selfish and undesirable. Some Mahāyānists even regard the aspiration to arhatship and personal liberation as outside the Buddhist path. If we compare the heroism of the Bodhisattva and his/her vow to the seemingly egoistic attitude of the Arhat, it is rather easy to see why we may have an aversion to the ideal of the Arhat.

My own Bodhisattva vow to liberate all sentient beings arose naturally and spontaneously with my first awakening back in February 1971. Ever since then, and even before hearing the word Bodhisattva, not to mention the teachings of Buddhism, I have always identified with this vow and the ideal of the Bodhisattva. It was in this very same moment when my Bodhisattva vow arose that I disowned a vast number of aspects or selves within me. It only dawned on me a few weeks ago that maybe I had disowned the Arhat too, judging him (this self within me) as being too self-centered and egoistic for me to identify with.

What would happen if I resurrected him from the life of oblivion down in the basement to which I had consigned him without so much as food or water, no less the finer things of life like fun, freedom and joy? I have been trying for some time now to discover why my personal protector is so disowned, and has been for so long. I suspect that there is a deep connection between the protector and my disowning of the Arhat. I shall do this work for the first time here in this blog.

Let’s begin with the aid of the visual of the triangle. Let’s put the Arhat at the bottom left corner and the Bodhisattva at the bottom right corner. The Apex of the triangle is that which transcends and embodies and is yet detached from each. From the perspective of the Apex we respect and appreciate both sides of our self and their autonomy and gifts.

Roshi: May I please speak to the Arhat that has been disowned and placed in the basement and not appreciated by the self?

Arhat: I am the Arhat that has been disowned and disrespected by him, and for that matter by Mahayanists, for thousands of years. In fact I’ve been put down and spoken very badly of by many great Zen Masters and others. I feel that he sees me as inferior and self-serving and even egoistic compared to how he prefers to see himself. He likes seeing himself as here for the world and wanting to bring all sentient beings to awakening. So he hates and disowns me as less than him.

What he doesn’t see is that my job is to help him seek after his own salvation, freedom, and liberation. Without me serving him in the way I am here to do, he can’t find his own protective self, the one that looks after his well-being. For more than forty years he has been so focused on saving others that he has neglected his own health and well-being as well as his happiness, freedom and peace of mind. His own Zen Master said that one should always put others first, before oneself, and this he extends to all that he sees as “me, my, and mine,” even to his family.

Because he has so completely disowned me he’s been searching in vain for his own voice of protector for years. Being so mistreated by him and Mahayanists I come out in very covert and unhealthy ways. He doesn’t allow me to really continue to seek deeper enlightenment, freedom and peace for himself, so I come out covertly as feelings of superiority and narrow-mindedness. I come out in him and in other Zen as well as Tibetan Buddhists as judgmental and self-righteous, believing they are superior to those Theravada practitioners who are really just out to save their own selves. He makes hierarchies of attainment, with Hinayana the lowest, then Mahayana, then either Buddhayana or Vajrayana. This gives him and them a sense of superiority. The investment in being right is great and it will take lifetimes to see the error of this thinking.

Roshi: What would it look like if you were not disowned?

Arhat: I would be able to serve him so much better, so much more freely. I would offer balance to his Bodhisattva vow and ways of being. I would help him actualize what he has realized over these past forty years. I would allow him to freely seek his own independence, peace and salvation. Maybe he could find and actualize what he has so often experienced in great awakenings.

I can’t help him when my hands and feet are tied and mouth gagged. He certainly has not seen my merit till now. It is like when one side is light the other side is dark. He has been blind to what I could do for him, but after all his mistreatment of me for so many decades, I am not sure I’m ready to just come out and serve him so quickly. The entire Mahayana tradition would have to offer me a great apology for centuries of putting me down as inferior and not as great and altruistic as they believe that they are.

Roshi: May I please speak to you the Arhat fully owned, embodied and empowered?

Arhat: Yes, I am the Arhat fully owned, embodied and empowered. I am here to seek enlightenment, freedom and great peace of mind. I realize that since we are all one and already Buddha, each of us is responsible for his or her own liberation and salvation, and that I cannot do it for any one else. Each of us has his or her own karma and must find this peace and liberation for our self. Each is responsible and accountable to ourselves and for our own happiness and bliss. Ultimately I am the one that must seek his complete freedom from suffering (dukkha), and stuckness.

I am his ultimate self-protector. I believe in the self and see that it suffers because of delusion. I can acknowledge that he is not yet free, happy and at peace, while he deludes himself into thinking and believing he is. He sees that delusion is enlightenment but doesn’t see that delusion is also just delusion. He is also not so clear as to see that enlightenment too is delusion, that he must drop his so-called enlightenment and return to recognizing his delusion. I can now help him find happiness, freedom and great peace of mind.

Roshi: I would like now to ask the self if I may speak to the Bodhisattva disowned.

Bodhisattva: I am the Bodhisattva and I am about wishing to awaken and liberate all sentient beings before my own complete attainment of enlightenment. I have been a very strong voice in him for some forty years now, since he first found me hidden within him. I feel very owned and appreciated by him, so I am not sure how I am disowned, but it’s possible that I am still disowned to some extent. I guess I could always be more loved and appreciated as well as respected.

Roshi: Since you are still disowned to some extent, in what ways do you come out through him covertly or even in unhealthy and immature ways?

Bodhisattva: First of all I manifest as his guilt about his own selfish desires and wishes and his feeling that he is responsible for the awakening and well being of others first, that sentient beings are numberless and he must liberate every last one of them before he reaches liberation and peace for himself.

I also come out as his sense of self-importance, of being heroic for working tirelessly to awaken others, even at the expense of his own and his family’s needs. When I am disowned he becomes inflated with the idea that his vows and work are so important that he is deserving of adoration, even of being bowed down to by others, as if he is some kind of noble or king. He acts as if everyone should listen and pay attention to him and be his student, as if he has something to teach others and they should be open to him. I cause him to speak to people rather than with them. Instead of being the finger pointing at the moon I make him believe he is the moon itself, and even lead others to believe that he knows something they don’t.

I come out also in unhealthy ways such as his not getting enough rest or proper exercise. I can cause him to drink too much or overeat because he feels so exhausted from trying to do such wonderful and noble work that he needs to relax and is entitled to over indulge or even to just have some fun that may not be appropriate at the time. I can cause him to not appreciate all that he has because he is too busy to stop and smell the roses.

By disowning me he has become quite arrogant and full of himself. He doesn’t make a very good partner because he is so stuck in the impersonal and considers the personal too personal. With his awakenings he has not only transcended the self, he has gone so far as to deny it. He sees the Arhat as egocentric and self-centered and the Theravada as a lesser vehicle than the great Mahayana.

Roshi: What would it look like if you were actually owned and embodied, even empowered?

Bodhisattva: I could see that all are Buddhas and that all I need to do is get out of their way and allow them to be themselves, that they are all perfect just as they are and there is really nothing to do. I could be the finger pointing at the moon rather then thinking that I am the moon. I could truly educate and empower people rather than teach. I could honor their own intrinsic power and capacity rather than think that they are lacking anything. I could just be rather than do. I could actually sit rather than run around.

Roshi: Would you please allow me to speak to the Bodhisattva owned, embodied and empowered?

Bodhisattva: I am the Bodhisattva owned, embodied and empowered. I truly see that until all sentient beings are completely liberated and at peace there is no liberation for any of us. There is nothing to pass through and yet, since we are all connected and one, there is no escape from dissatisfaction and suffering without including the liberation of all beings. I see that I am one and interdependent and interconnected with all things. I realize that there is no self separate from all and yet there are those who do not realize that they are already awakened and need a hand to realize it. My life is dedicated to the awakening and liberation of all sentient beings for all eternity or until every last being is liberated.

Roshi: I would like now to speak to the Apex, that which includes and yet transcends both the Arhat and the Bodhisattva.

Apex: I am that which includes and transcends both the Arhat and the Bodhisattva. Thank you for asking to speak to me finally. You know, with all his work on embracing aspects of himself he and maybe the world has never asked to speak to me until now. It seems incredible that in all history and in all his years he has overlooked me and the Arhat part of myself.

The Buddhist world, though it professes to be non-dualistic, has made the part of myself that is called the Arhat inferior and less worthy than the part of myself called the Bodhisattva. I guess that is my responsibility since I am the Master. I am the one responsible and accountable. Both the Arhat and Bodhisattva are my children and employees. They both work for me, just two different sides of myself. Of course, how could it ever have been any other way? Both are absolutely essential to be complete whole and truly non-dual. I depend on the Arhat to take care of my deepening and clarifying of my own practice as well as salvation and complete liberation, and on the Bodhisattva to look after the awakening and liberation of all sentient beings. I see that the Arhat is a very mature protector here to look after me and my well-being and to see that in this life I do all that I can to realize the Buddha Way and accomplish Anutara Samyak Sambodhi (Supreme Awakening). I see that the mature Bodhisattva serves me by setting aside my personal desire to attain complete liberation and selflessly work towards the awakening of all sentient beings.

Roshi: I would now like to ask if you would be willing and open to detaching and letting go of both the Arhat and the Bodhisattva? This doesn’t mean that you will lose them, but that you will not be run or managed by either. You will be the one at the helm and driving this Vehicle, not either of them. This will again be your Vehicle, your life that you are responsible and accountable for. I will call you “me”.

Me: Yes I am me, the one truly in charge of this life, no longer run by either the Bodhisattva or the Arhat. They are both aspects of Me available to Me and yet not running this ship. They are always present and accessible and yet no longer working without my consent. I am now free to seek further and deeper enlightenment as well as to work for the liberation of all sentient beings without feeling that the Arhat is somehow inferior to the Bodhisattva or that the Bodhisattva is superior to the Arhat. They are both absolutely necessary aspects of this Human/Being.