Part Two
Chapter 19: The Real Meaning of Evil

One of the most celebrated statements attributed to Shinran is this: “If even a good person will attain salvation, all the more so will an evil person.” This doctrine is often summed up in the phrase akunin shoki, meaning “the evil person is the true object of salvation.” Then what is an “evil person”? Many people may envision the inhuman sort of person who kills in cold blood without a flicker of remorse—but is that all Shinran meant by “evil person”? Let us take a look at another statement he made.

REVELATION OF THE TRUE SELF

I am, now, a foolish being imbued with evil and caught in the cycle of birth and death, constantly submerged and constantly wandering for all these countless aeons without ever a chance for liberation: this is clearly revealed to me.

This statement means, “I have come to see my present self clearly as the vilest and most depraved of sinners, suffering throughout eternity with absolutely no possibility of salvation.”

Because this passage is so essential to an understanding of Shinran's thought, at the risk of belaboring it, let us go over it carefully to be sure that we grasp its import. Here “I” does not refer to the self in the past or future. Rather, Shinran is professing that when he was shown clearly the nature of his present self, his past and his future were likewise illuminated. The words “I am, now, a foolish being imbued with evil and caught in the cycle of birth and death” mean that his present self has been revealed to him as such a person. The moment that happens, he sees simultaneously his past (“constantly submerged and constantly wandering for all these countless aeons”) and his future (“without ever a chance for liberation”). “Constantly submerged and constantly wandering for all these countless aeons” means that he has been suffering continually for ages past without beginning, and “without ever a chance for liberation” means that he has absolutely no prospect of salvation, that Hell is his “eternal dwelling-place.”

Some readers may question how it is possible for anyone to know the worlds of the past or future. According to Shinran, since the present embraces both the past from time immemorial and the future without end, to see the present clearly is to know the entire past and future at once. The present is the key that unlocks the past and the future.

The following story clearly shows the interrelatedness of the present and the future.

A learned man of some note came to town to lecture on the evils of drink and preach the wisdom of abstinence. A townsman passionately fond of drinking marched into the lecture hall, indignant that anyone would wish to impugn one of life's great pleasures. But the more he heard the more he learned, and slowly, against his will, he found himself being won over. Suddenly relenting, he resolved to become a teetotaler. When the lecture was over, he went up to the learned man and told him the whole story, finally asking him to write something to commemorate his resolution.

  “What shall I write?”
  “How about, 'No Drinking Till the Day I Die?'”
  “That sounds awfully hard. Why not make it just for today?”

Scarcely able to believe his ears, the man leaned forward to make sure he'd heard right. “Just for today? Is that good enough?”

  “Certainly. Just give up drinking for today. That will do.”

The man took home the paper with the words “No Drinking Just for Today” on it, and stuck it on the wall. Then he took out his watch and waited expectantly for tomorrow. As night came on and the hour of midnight approached, he got out a big jug of wine and pulled it close with anticipation. As the clock struck twelve, he picked up the jug, got ready to take a long drink, and then glanced over at the wall. A wave of disappointment struck him. “Oh no!” he cried out. “'No drinking just for today,' all over again!”

In fact, “just for today” means the same as “till the day I die.” That truth came home to the man, and he never took another drink as long as he lived.

When “this year” is over, it is “this year” again. When “today” ends, it is “today” again. Time stretches on from ages past into the never-ending future, an endless succession of moments in the present: “now,” “now,” “now” ... Because the present moment embraces the eternal past and the eternal future, philosophers through the ages have spoken of it as the “eternal Now.”

DEATH COMES IN AN INSTANT

We have indicated that “the mind of darkness” means “the mind ignorant of the afterlife.” People tend to think of the world after death as something to face thirty or fifty years down the road, but is that true? If we die tonight, it begins tonight. Or it could begin even sooner: an hour from now, or a minute.

In the huge earthquake of 1995 that devastated the city of Kobe, some young people died while studying at their desks. Each day, around the world many people lose their lives in traffic accidents and other unforeseen events. We cannot tell when we may be thrust into the next life.

Sakyamuni Buddha taught, “The outgoing breath awaits not the incoming breath, and so life ends.” Death may be but a single breath away. Fail to take in the next breath, and immediately your afterlife begins. Each breath you exhale and inhale brushes shoulders with death. On December 31, one second after 23:59'59" it is 00:00'00". At the same instant, the thirty-first changes to the first, December gives way to Janunary, and one year yields to the next. In the same way, this life transforms into the next life in the space of an instant. That is why the next life is contained in the “now” of this breath in and this breath out.

Therefore, the mind of darkness concerning the life after death should not be taken as ignorance of an event that is still half a century away. It is rather the mind of ignorance concerning now, this very moment—ignorance concerning the present self. The dark mind is precisely what conceals our present self from us. When the darkness is lifted and we see ourselves as we really are, the past and the future come into sharp focus. Shinran's words on the revelation of his true self at the beginning of this chapter proclaim this fact. This revelation is not a matter of conjecture or imagination. It is a matter of direct experience.