Theological Encounter Research Articles

A Buddhist Monk's View of Theological Encounter III

When I read Theological Encounter III in Volume 8 of Buddhist-Christian Studies (1988), I found the articles of great interest. This is because these articles touch on many philosophical problems which embrace the fundamental problems of Buddhism. I would like to take this opportunity to express my honest opinion on the ideas presented by the contributors and the similarities and differences with my own thinking. First I would like to give my views on the use of the words Ultimate Reality. On first encountering the phrase, I felt something a little odd. This is because, to me, reality is something which always exists here and now. So I wonder whether it actually makes sense to add the adjective ultimate to the word reality. Reality always exists at this place and at the moment of the present. In this sense we can say that reality is always ultimate and, at the same time, instantaneous. This is at the root of my reservations over using the adjective ultimate when describing reality.

The Fifth International Buddhist-Christian Theological Encounter

The fifth session of the International Buddhist-Christian Theological Encounter took place March 16-20, 1989, at Hsi Lai Temple, Hacienda Heights, California. The group was formerly named the North American Buddhist-Christian Theological Encounter Group, or simply the Abe-Cobb Group after its founders, Professor Masao Abe and Professor John Cobb, Jr. This session was hosted by a Buddhist community in North America for the first time in the magnificent new Hsi Lai Temple. The beauty and serenity of the temple and the graciousness of the Venerable Hsing-yiin, the master of the temple, as well as that of the monks and nuns, added to the spirit of our conversations. At this session, the group was made up of twenty-five participants from Thailand, Japan, Germany, Canada and the United States. The work of the group has been generously supported by various Buddhist and Christian foundations, churches, and organizations for the past five years. Special note should also be made of the support given the meeting by the Claremont Graduate School, represented by ProfessorJohn Hick and Dr. Edward Hughes. At the end of each session, the group has always decided what the topic will be for the next meeting. For the fifth meeting, the topic was Buddha and Christ. It was felt that this topic would allow for an exploration of the central role of these two foundational figures in each tradition. The topic could be and was approached from perspectives and methodologies ranging from the theological, sociological, and historical. The conference followed the format that worked so well for the first four meetings of the group. Four papers, two Buddhist and two Christian, were prepared and circulated prior to the conference to all participants. At the conference there were two formal responses to each paper, each presented in a different session. None of the papers were actually read at the meeting, but each presenter was given about ten minutes at the beginning of the session to explain how she or he had come to write the paper. Then the respondent took about twenty minutes to offer her or his critique. This was then followed by

The Third Conference of the Tozai Shukyo Koryu Gakkai

The following report is offered as an overview of the Third Conference of the TSzai Shukyo Koryu Gakkai, the Japan Chapter of the East-West Religions Project, held inJuly of 1984 at the Kansai Seminar House in Kyoto. OnJuly 23 Gishin Tokiwa reported on progress in the Theological Encounter on Suffering initiated at the Hawaii Conference on East-West Religions in Encounter held in Hawaii earlier that year. That same day and the following, Seiichi Yagi addressed the assembly on the theme and drawing from his recent book, Paul and Shinran, Jesus and Zen (Kyoto: Hojokan, 1983). The ensuing discussions were carried over to the third day. The fuller report on which these pages are based appeared in the April-May issue of Daijozen whose editor, Ryomin Akizuki, is a member of the Japan Chapter. The translation was made from Professor Masaaki Honda's abridgement of the complete text. The participants cited are: Akizuki, Ry6min Rinzai Zen, Professor Emeritus of Saitama Medical University Augustine, Morris Catholic, Professor of Kansai University Bando, Shojun Jodo Shinshu, formerly Professor of Otani University Doi, Masatoshi Protestant, Professor Emeritus of Doshisha University President ofJapan Chapter of E.W.R.P. Honda, Masaaki Catholic, Professor of University of Occupational and Environmental Health

Responses to Gishin Tokiwa

OGDEN: I welcome Professor Tokiwa's paper for the challenge that it has provided to me personally to move toward what I believe is a deeper understanding of Buddhism as well as of my own Christian faith. To explain why I say this, I would first like to clarify in a very schematic and general way how I myself approach our theological encounter together. So far as I am able to see, Buddhism and Christianity both present themselves as answers to what I call the existential question of human beings simply as such. By this I mean the question that we human beings inevitably ask and find ourselves having to ask about the meaning of ultimate reality, with which we all inescapably have to do for our own understanding of ourselves in the world in relation to others and ourselves. Now I take this term ultimate reality to be as nonprejudicial a term as I could find to talk about these things. It's like John Hick's term transcendent, but I'm trying to use it in a very neutral sense, recalling only William James' definition of reality, that reality is what we all have to come to terms with in some way or other. And what I mean by ultimate reality is simply that with which I have to come to terms no matter what else I have to come to terms with. It is strictly ultimate in so far as it is that reality with which anything whatever has to come to terms in order to be or to mean anything at all. Now this existential question about the meaning of ultimate reality of ourselves and the world, is always in my belief a twofold question: it is at once a question about ultimate reality as that which authorizes some understanding of myself

Probabilistic aspects of the human cybernetic machine.

PROBABILISTIC ASPECTS OF THE HUMAN CYBERNETIC MACHINE* VAN RENSSELAER POTTERf Men who know they are machines should be able to bring a higher degree of objectivity to bear on their problems than machines that think they are men.—D. E. Wooldridge [Mechanical Man, p. 204] I have been working in the field of cancer research for over 30 years, and it has become increasingly apparent to me that the biological world has many probabilistic aspects. This view is a direct result of my experience in the cancer field, in which one of the chief products of my own research has been the demonstration of the diversity of chemical patterns that are compatible with malignancy. I should make clear what I mean by "probabilistic aspects" of cancer, or of life, or of the world. I will define "probabilistic" to mean "uncertain as to time of occurrence." This definition is my own and differs from any previous definitions by introducing time into the discussion. I will try to develop the significance of this new definition as I go along. First, I would remind you of the accepted definitions, which are permissive for my own. Probabilutic is given as (1) of or relating to probabilism and (2) of, relating to, or based on probability. Probabilism: a theory that certainty is impossible, especially in the sciences, and that probability suffices to govern belief and action. Probability: a mathematical basis for prediction that, for an exhaustive set of outcomes, is the ratio of outcomes that would produce a given event to the total number of possible outcomes. In plain words, this means that the probability of drawing an ace of spades from a standard deck of cards is one in 52. In this simple example, time is not mentioned because the action and result are immediate and there is no obvious intervention by modulating influences if an honest deck is used. However, it will be my purpose ?Paper presented at the Institute for Theological Encounter with Science and Technology, Saint Louis, April 1973. Cybernetics is the science of communication and control within organized systems. tMcArdle Laboratory, Medical School, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin 53706. 164 I Van Rensselaer Potter » Human Cybernetic Machine to argue that in most real-life situations, we will find probabilistic aspects involving time as one ofthe variables. When time enters into probability, there is an opportunity for factors other than a "first cause" to moderate the outcome. These factors may involve feedback from the system itself, or they may be external. A classic example ofan event that is apparently probabilistic in the sense of having a most probable but uncertain "time of occurrence" is the decay of a radioactive element. In this case there is a "most probable time" for decay precisely because the event is not modulated by any external influence as far as is known. In speaking of probabilistic aspects of life, I did not, you will note, prejudice my case by speaking about the probabilutic nature of life, because I will emphasize that life is highly organized but that it has probabilistic aspects. On the other hand, I might with some justification talk about the probabilistic nature of cancer, which is very disorganized, although organized enough to proliferate. Thus, I might say that among the probabilistic aspects of life is the phenomenon ofcancer. The cancer problem may be dominated by the probabilistic nature of cancer causation , cancer progression, and cancer therapy, but life is not. Life is characterized by the exquisite organization of living organisms, whether they are single cells or human beings consisting of millions upon millions ofindividual cells combined into a fabulous cybernetic system. Organization includes organization in space, which is structure, and organization in time and space, which isfunction. A computer is also organized in time and space. An automated machine can be built around a computer to produce a cybernetic machine that will carry out certain functions according to a desired program in an environment with specified raw materials, but it is not comparable to a living organism, which can operate adaptively over a wider range of unexpected events. Perhaps such a combination of devices should not be called a cybernetic machine but, rather...

Some Reflections on the Jewish-Christian Dialogue in the Light of the Six-Day War

In the domain of dialogue, an authentic crisis consists of one situation only—that in which one party with draws from confronting an issue raised by the other party. Only such a discrepancy—when one party falls silent and fails to respond to an issue which deeply involves the other party— can be considered to precipitate an authentic crisis. Such a crisis was precipitated in the Jewish-Christian dialogue when the Christian partner fell silent during the period aptly de scribed as the "Munich period." Inasmuch as the state of Israel was, for him, a purely political entity, it could not come within the purview of his dialogue with Judaism, because that religion was, to him, like Christianity, a purely religious entity. The reality of Judaism qua religion, however, does not allow this neat division between faith and politics, for Judaism is, in its very essence, inextricably tied to an ethnic dimension, that is, to Jewish nationhood, and, as such, to all its "secular" aspects, including the political. But this bond, which is dis tinctive and peculiar to Judaism, is not easily appreciated. It calls for a sustained, elaborate theological exposition. This the Jewish partner failed to offer, and the Christian partner cannot be blamed for having molded Judaism's theo logical image after that of his own religion. Still, the crisis which inevitably ensued may yet prove a blessing in disguise, in having so poignantly shown the bankruptcy of the dialogue when pursued as a mere humanitarian encounter and, as a result, leading to the reconstitution of the dialogue as an authentic theological encounter.