The Other Shore, Thich Nhat Hanh

Thich Nhat Hhan is a Vietnamese Zen master, poet, peace activist, author and founder of the Plum Village Tradition. He coined the term “Engaged Buddhism” in his book ‘Vietnam: Lotus in a Sea of Fire‘. He promotes non-violent solutions to conflict through deep listening and loving speech. During his 1966 stay in the US he had a dialogue with Martin Luther King and urged him to publicly denounce the Vietnamese War. In 1967 King nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize. In his nomination, King said, “I do not personally know of anyone more worthy of [this prize] than this gentle monk from Vietnam. His ideas for peace, if applied, would build a monument to ecumenism, to world brotherhood, to humanity”

‘The Other Shore’ contains a new translation of ‘The Heart Sutra’. Being part of the Prajñāpāramitā series of sutras, the main subject is emptiness (Śūnyatā). Thay’s (the name his students use for him) concern is that people may get the wrong meaning of emptiness. Buddhism is not about nihilism.

The Heart Sutra is well known for its phrase,
“Form is emptiness, emptiness is form.”
It then continues with the lines,
“Therefore in emptiness there is neither form,
nor feelings, nor perceptions,
nor mental formations, nor consciousness.
No eye, or ear, or nose,, or tongue, or body, or mind.”
There seems a contradiction here. First the sutra says that form is emptiness but then says that there is no form. This could be taken to show that nothing really exists and we are left with a view of nihilism. When we encounter opposites, there is a tendency to believe that one is correct and the other is wrong. We may believe that either nothing exists or everything exhists. Buddha actually taught that these extreme views of being and nonbeing should be avoided.

In order to understand this better, Thay gives some examples, including the story of The Novice Monk. A Zen master asks a novice monk to tell him what he understands about the Heart Sutra. The novice replys, “I have understood that all five skandhas are empty. There are no eyes, no ears, no nose, no tongue, no body, and no mind…”
“Do you believe this?”
“Yes I truly believe this.”
The Zen monk asked him to com closer. As he came close the Zen master grabbed him by the nose and twisted it hard.
“Master! You are hurting me!”
The Zen master raised his eyebrows and said, “But you just said that the nose doesn’t exist. So if there is no nose, what is hurting?”

Thay explains that the teachings of Prajñāpāramitā are the teaching of the emptiness of self, and the emptiness of all phenomena, and not the nonbeing of self and phenomena. For better understanding Thay changes the line,
“That is why in emptiness, there is neither form,
nor feelings, nor perceptions,
nor mental formations, nor consciousness,”
into,
“That is why in emptiness, body, feelings,
perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness
are not separate self-entities.”
The point then is that they cannot exist on their own. They have to inter-exist.

Included in the book is Thay’s new translation of the Heart Sutra along with the version previously used at Plum Village. There is also the sanskrit version along with a literal English translation. There are a number of illuminating commentaries on the sutra. All in all a great book to get a deeper understanding of the Heart Sutra.

For More information on the work of Tich Nhat Hanh click on the link below.