RADICAL CONTRADICTION

RADICAL CONTRADICTION

During the Summer of Love, in July 1967, Time Magazine featured a cover story determined to scoop the vitriolic nature of the then booming Hippie subculture:

“…the hippies hope to generate an entirely new society, one rich in spiritual grace that will revive the old virtues of agape and reverence. They reveal, says University of Chicago Theologian Dr. Martin E. Marty, ‘the exhaustion of a tradition: Western, production-directed, problem-solving, goal-oriented and compulsive in its way of thinking.’ Marty refuses to put the hippies down as just another wave of ‘creative misfits,’ sees them rather as spiritually motivated crusaders striking at the values of straight society where it is most vulnerable: its lack of soul. In a sense, hippiedom is a transplanted Lost Horizon, a Shangri-La a go-go blending Asian resignation and American optimism in a world where no one grows old.” [1]

The hippies’ embrace of Eastern thought reflected frustrations with the dominant philosophy in the West, or as this author established, the West’s priority for the individual to be linked to the means-end duality. At the utilitarian extreme of this ideology, humans are described simply as agents for the accomplishment of a particular goal. “Asian resignation”, however strange the phrase sounds today, was a spirit that negated this system, and de-prioritized people as cogs within a progressive machine. The cover story in the July 1967 issue of Time Magazine illustrates that this partial misrepresentation of Eastern thought was one perpetuated through the critics of the Hippies, but I contend that the Counterculture movement itself, through what it symbolized then, radical activism seeking to expand America’s popular culture through the introduction of new belief systems, and what it became—the New Age movement. I believe that while each has its own virtues, generally seen through their attempts to make Chinese religion accessible to more segments of American culture, the spiritual for the Counterculture and the consumer for the New Age [1]. Yet, each has their own corruption of the version of culture they attempted to introduce to America, with the New Age being at greater fault than the Counterculture.

The specific failings of the Counterculture and its legacy are not only entrenched in the sources which are misrepresented, but also in the damage the movement incurred upon mainstream society. When the Counterculture interpreted Buddhism, they extracted the religion’s aesthetic vision, with the unfortunate consequence that the New Agers have built a consumer culture around this aesthetic that contradicts its most integral precepts. When the Counterculture attempted to disseminate Daoism, the movement in its excitement internalized a lackadaisical methodology, and in New Age publishing the practice has damaged even the most lucid renditions of classical sources. Through the Counterculture’s roughshod study of the complex tradition of Confucianism the movement muddled religious lines, forming the religion into a syncretic mess of folk mysticism that New Age quacks attempt to explain with pseudoscience, deluding the American masses from the native and historical forms of Confucian thought. In total, the shape the counterculture has had upon popular culture, through New Age religion and other forms of bastardization, has created a crude caricature of Chinese culture and detracted from the intercultural understanding between the Western and Eastern axis.

The Counterculture frequently took Buddhism as its flagship religion, and in their reverence to the school of thought they created their own art to encapsulate the spirit of the practice; unfortunately, this was the beginning of Buddhism’s encounter with the spirit of Capitalism. Minimalism is the key idea for this form of art, as they attempted to capture the feeling of enlightenment through the stripped-away essence, where one is supposedly part of the larger world by breaking himself down to his key components. Between the stark rock gardens and the sleek lines of IKEA furniture, something went awry in the beautification under these rules, and the modern “Zen home” was created. In this domesticated form of Buddhism, one need not be part of the monastic community, or even know the Four Noble Truths to look the part. Not unlike the consumer products created through the Bauhaus school of design during the 1920’s, what we can see today is a Zen aesthetic that is not only pleasing, but cost effective[2]. Buddhism, the West via the New Agers has discovered, is highly marketable. There is no particular damage to the general notion of introducing religion to popular culture. However, the contradiction between marketing Zen design in cheap furniture and popular music and the transcendental dogma of Buddhism is staggering. The dogma of Buddhism, whether affiliated with the Mahayana or Theravada schools, does not condone strong attachment to material possessions, let alone the use of a mere aesthetic to communicate the simplicity of the monastic lifestyle[3].

Buddhism has had its spirit stripped away, as a result of the Counterculture introducing it to the American mainstream and more so due to New Age in exploiting its chic aesthetic. The people responsible for the damage are not those who first interpreted the religion and transmitted it to the West, such as D.T. Suzuki. Instead, it seems to have been when the amateurs who took the religion as an individual experience and plunged the West into a distorted Zen sensibility, to the point where Zen lost its original meaning as a deeply meditative state and become an un-meditative buzzword[4]. This is but a small portion of corruption within a larger bit of good, however. America has lent a particular ideal of engagement in political affairs that was in the past not as explicit in worship in Buddhism. Although this brand of activism tends to transcend cultural lines (both Gary Snyder and Thich Nhat Hanh advocated politically active forms of Buddhism)[5], the lines continue in other forms of practice: Buddhism has become oriented towards attracting non-Asian worshippers, and as a result, export-oriented Buddhism has become estranged from even its core tenets. Our grasp of Buddhism today is far more warped than before we were familiar with the term, and as a result it has hindered the capacity for the average American to study Buddhism. In this sense, the Counterculture and New Age movements have done a great deal of damage to Buddhist spirituality.

If one needs to learn what Daoism is, it only requires one word for description: elusive. The goal of the religion itself evades the learner, and this is explicit in the Daoist texts. On the one hand, Daoism posits that true knowledge is ineffable, and that words only serve to detract from meaning. Yet, Daoist texts are highly poetic, so it is hard to say there is a set way of interpreting any of its texts. Interacting ineffability and poetics leads the Daoists canon to be some of the most difficult texts to read, let alone translate into another language. For instance, the Daodejing and Zhuangzi both rely upon highly allusive language that is difficult to recreate in English. This has given rise to the need for many different scholars to provide translations to the texts, both academics (such as Philip J. Ivanhoe, Arthur Waley, D.C. Lau, and James Legge) and non-academics (such as Ursula Le Guin). There is no guarantee that the non-academics cannot provide an academic insight in their translations, for instance, Le Guin’s version of the Daodejing is reputed to be one of the best poetic translations in existence. A close reading of texts through a cultivated intellect—whether attached to academia or not—leads to an effective translation; when the aloofness of a writer is emphasized over the content of his or her rendition is problematic.

The Counterculture’s promise to Daoism, of broader societal awareness of Daoism, meant open access to translations, but it also gave open access to publishing for the New Agers as well. Non-academic publishing, where academic review is not as consistently available, does not bar these authors from publishing bad or stolen translations. All the while, consumers and devotees place their good faith in these religious books that they have been translated in a dedicated fashion. Unfortunately, open publishing does not have the means to ascertain authors’ credibility as translators. The message of Daoism, whether derived from the Daodejing or the Zhuangzi, is consequentially bastardized through unverified non-academic sources, which are created for or on behalf of the aging former members of the Sixties’ Counterculture who characterize this New Age.

In particular, the bastardization occurs through misinterpretation and intellectual property infringement. The most hazardous way to author a rendition of the Daodejing is one that does not refer to the original text in its original language. Lacking even a basic proficiency of Vernacular Chinese (baihua) let alone with Literary Chinese (wenyan), these authors generally compare translations to make their own editions. The problem is that these versions are not derived from a definite source, but from the author’s own thoughts. As Russell Kirkland suggests, these takes on the Daodejing do not reveal a “true Dao”, rather “[that] modern Westerners to bear in mind that such a conception of the spiritual life does not actually reflect the ideals jofany form of ‘Taoism.’ Rather, it reflects the Protestant Christian ideals of Martin Luther, sanitized, of course, of all the hateful dross of Christianity.”[6] He criticizes Stephen Mitchell’s work first and foremost as a work demonstrating a lack of understanding, even to the point of colonial appropriation, or a sort of deluded Western-Orient fetishism. Even worse, because the Daodejing is so frequently translated and is considered a public work, it is often infringed. A copy of the Daodejing published in 2002 by NuVision Publications LLC is a word-for-word copy of Mitchell’s work, and it continues to be sold to this very day. The New Agers who buy NuVision’s products, which are in the vein of religious and occult good, buy what amounts to damaged goods. [2] These New Agers represent not only the masses confused by popular culture as to what is truly Asian, but also the very people who spread the misinformation.

Compared to Daoism and Buddhism, the American understanding of Confucianism is comparably small and obscured. Generally, we tend to envision Confucianism as a religion through a mish-mash of Chinese folk practices, running the gamut from Tai Chi to Feng Shui and ancestral veneration. It is a contentious debate whether Confucianism can even be called a religion. Despite this controversy, forms of Confucianism have been integrated into American culture as an amalgamation of these tenets, deemed as either Chinese thought or more generally under the umbrella of “Eastern thought”. The identity of Confucianism is obscured, rather than clarified, when elements which are uncharacteristic of the original spirit and historical utility of the orthodox texts are forcibly merged with Chinese folk practices. Confucianism is not so much a strict school of completely uniform beliefs as it is a series of individual thinkers with a few similarities, or as P.J. Ivanhoe puts it, “we all are still under the spell of the myth of ‘timeless Confucianism’ [where] we either fail to see the differences between [individual thinkers] or see them yet find them so surprising”[7]. Although this can be said about quite a few religions, the divergent beliefs between classical Confucianism and imperial Confucianism (today deemed “Neo-Confucianism”) are so difficult to document due to language barriers and textual hazards.

This problem seems to occur as a common problem among not only Western masses, but Chinese scholars as well. The classical education in historical China was reinforced by the civil service examination, which in turn was subject to political machinations. During the Song Dynasty in the 11th and 12th centuries, an influential scholar, Zhu Xi, wrote commentaries for the Chinese classics (e.g. the Analects of Confucius, the Mengzi, and the Book of Odes). In the centuries after Zhu Xi’s death, the civil examination system integrated Zhu Xi’s version of the classics. As per this form of Confucianism, Neo-Confucianism, these classics push a highly metaphysical interpretation of texts that were originally completely secular in their ethical orientation, demonstrated through Confucius, “If you cannot serve man, how can you serve the spirits?”[8] A methodical pace is demanded by many Sinologist experts in religion, with attention upon each transformative event in the philosophy. Method was an element completely devoid in the Counterculture, which tended to cobble everything together without any regard to capturing its true spirit in its haste to introduce unfamiliar elements into the American mainstream. Although we can hardly blame them for these problems, for even academics have problems extracting Confucian ideology from centuries of Neo-Confucian, it is reproachable that the misappropriation of Chinese culture continues to this day through the New Ager’s grasp on consumer spirituality. Similar to the state of open publications, New Agers, purported to be experts in the field, exploit people’s lack of information regarding Feng Shui to make a quick buck[9]. They apply Feng Shui to the office, when it was originally applied to marriage dates and grave sites. Geomancy is employed in a novel way; adapting an old concept for new affairs in itself is not a bad thing. Alas it too is a complete charade, for these con-artists deem Feng Shui to be scientifically proven to aid people’s affairs, yet the experts themselves lack credentials of scientific or even Chinese philosophical merit, a diluted form of Feng Shui derisively termed “McFeng Shui”[10]. Ultimately, their chicanery gives all elements of Chinese thought a bad name, despite the fact they have a tenuous connection at best.

Western interpretation of religion has its good traits. Buddhist thought boomed in the West and created a new generation of devotees. Daoism, when given mainstream popularity, has texts that have translated in the West more than any other non-Western religion. Confucian texts have introduced many people to the basic ideals of Confucian thought. However, the Counterculture’s involvement has led to bad developments as well, ones that I trace to the crass entrepreneurial practices of the New Age. Buddhism’s boom pushed the religion into art, which transpired into a contradictory and soulless version of the religion. Daoist thought has been corrupted in translation, through shoddy rendition and downright theft. Confucianism has been subject to misappropriation by shysters who make fraudulent claims of Confucian mysticism, and as a result the religion has been shunned more than accepted. The Counterculture, representing the first attempts to open America to external forms of religion, features good qualities of openness in religious materials in regards to Eastern thought. As informed consumers and students, we must recognize that this good comes with certain bad, and we should at least attempt to establish a custom of seeking credibility of our teachers before we accept their teachings. For the sake of better encapsulating the authenticity of these religions, it would be best to recast their role in American culture, one detached from the Counterculture’s lack of method, and shunning the New Age’s no-holds-barred consumerism.

[1] I define the Counterculture as a lineage of transmission. It runs from practices to the 1950’s (via the Beats and D.T. Suzuki in particular, to a broader platform. Although they attempted to grasp at whatever alternative thinking that went beyond the mainstream, I believe China and its philosophical mission at times ran so strong (Ames and Hall, Anticipating China) that it was especially attractive.. The New Age movement, in contrast, is specifically referring to a mainstream adoption of the Counterculture that occurred in the decades after, which I find to be most virulent in terms of consumer culture, vis-à-vis LOHAS (through Ray and Anderson’s The Cultural Creatives) which is a lifestyle which is one part spirituality mixed with four parts spending habits. The greater part of the lifestyle is consumer culture, as seen how the term “LOHAS” is most used to character the socially aware sovereign consumer. My argument will say that while both movements tend to misinterpret Chinese spirituality, it is the New Age movement’s consumer culture that contradicts the very spirit they attempt to channel.

[2] Prof. Robert Felsing originally warned me about the dangers of plagiarism for this case, with each document available online: (http://libweb.uoregon.edu/tools/wikis/chinwiki/index.php/Goals_of_the_course_%28course_syllabus%29.) My assertion that NuVision primarily caters to New Age is through the assortment of books they publish, which include popular books that have lapsed into the public domain (e.g. Voltaire’s Candide), but also a wide selections of books on spiritual and occult subjects (e.g. Duncan’s Ritual and Monitor of Freemasonry).

WORKS CITED (Partial)

Chan, Edmund. “Four Noble Truths.” The Buddhist Encyclopedia. May 2008. 19 May 2008 <http://buddhism.2be.net/Four_Noble_Truths>.

Denzer, Anthony S. Masters of Modernism. 2004. 23 May 2008 <http://www.mastersofmodernism.com/?page=Modernism>.

Hall, David L., and Roger T. Ames. Anticipating China. Albany: SUNY P, 1995.

Ivanhoe, Philip J. Ethics in the Confucian Tradition. 2nd ed. Indianapolis: Hackett Company Inc., 2002.

Kirkland, Russell. “THE TAOISM OF THE WESTERN IMAGINATION.” Center for Daoist Studies. 20 Oct. 1997. 1 May 2008 <http://www.daoistcenter.org/Articles/Articles_pdf/Kirkland.pdf>.

Lau, D.C. The Analects. New York: Penguin Group, 1979.

“The Hippies.” Time Magazine 7 July 1967. 20 May 2008

<http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,899555,00.html>.

Thich Nhat Hanh. Being Peace. Berkeley: Parallax P, 1996.

[1] http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,899555,00.html (boldface at my own inclusion)

[2] http://www.mastersofmodernism.com/?page=Modernism, also http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/audiointerviews/profilepages/gropiusw2.shtml

[3] http://buddhism.2be.net/Four_Noble_Truths tanha is the term I am talking about, desires. It starts with material possessions, exemplary through the monk’s lifestyle, and moves beyond to attack egoism.

[4] The original word for Zen in Chinese (禪) refers to meditation, for instance “just sitting” (坐禪). The buzzword usage can be found through a quick search online. Zen has become applicable for anything simple in terms of the LOHAS lifestyle, e.g. http://zenhabits.net/.

[5] See Being Peace, as well as Nhat Hanh’s biography http://www.plumvillage.org/HTML/ourteacher.html

[6] Kirkland 15

[7] Ivanhoe 137

[8] Analects IX: 12

[9] E.g. the Black Sect Tantrism http://www.yunlintemple.org/temple.htm, which supposedly practices syncretism between Tibetan Buddhism and Feng Shui, and in academic circles is suspected of the type of quackery I mention. However, there is no proof that one way is more spiritually sound than the other, merely that one is more historically accurate that nother.

[10] http://qi-whiz.com/node/1569

~ by thedefinitearticle on May 28, 2008.