JAECHAN ANSELMO PARK. Thomas Merton’s Encounter with Buddhism and Beyond: His Interreligious Dialogue, Inter-Monastic Exchanges, and Their Legacy. Preface by Bonnie Thurston; Foreword by William Skudlarek. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2019. Pp. xxxii + 285. $29.95 pb. ISBN 978-0-8146-8474-0. Reviewed by Patrick F. O’CONNELL, Gannon University, Erie, PA 16541.
Readers interested in finding a comprehensive analysis of Thomas Merton’s writings on Buddhism will need to look elsewhere than in this book. The focus of the author, a Benedictine monk of St. Benedict Waegwan Abbey in South Korea, is quite different. Originally written as a doctoral dissertation at Regis College of the University of Toronto, Thomas Merton’s Encounter with Buddhism and Beyond, while not neglecting concepts and ideas, is primarily concerned with matters of methodology, with Merton’s conviction that the fundamental basis for developing authentic and fruitful interreligious respect and understanding is mutual contemplative experience and that spiritually mature monastics have an essential contribution to make in this process. Fr. Park goes on to consider how monastic interreligious encounters in the half-century since Merton’s death have been deeply influenced by his legacy, which he believes will continue to provide a framework for what he foresees as the next important phase of Christian-Buddhist interaction, creating and implementing programs for fostering deeper relationships between monastics, and their lay associates, of the two traditions in specific cultural settings, with particular attention to his own Korean milieu.
After an introductory overview (xxiii-xxxii) the book is divided into four chapters. The first, “Merton’s Own Inner Experience and Interreligious Dialogue” (1-59), traces key biographical developments and highlights significant events in Merton’s own spiritual growth, with particular attention to the famous “epiphanies” in downtown Louisville in 1958 that marked his decisive recognition of the divine presence in every person and his identification with their problems, struggles and hopes that would mark his “turn to the world” in the final decade of his life; and his vivid illumination that “everything is emptiness and everything is compassion” (xxvii, 43-44) in the presence of the Buddha statues at Polonnaruwa in Ceylon on December 2, 1968, eight days before his sudden death in Thailand. The author then goes on to consider Merton’s central insight that “self-emptying and self-transcendence” (49) is at the heart of all authentic religious experience and is thus the ground for a transformation of consciousness, the realization of the true self as a non-dualistic participation in absolute Reality, making possible both a prophetic engagement with issues of injustice, oppression and violence and an openness and receptivity to discovering analogous contemplative transformations in other religious traditions.
Chapter 2, “Merton’s Pioneering Work with Buddhist-Christian Dialogue” (61-121), first considers the stages of development in Merton’s understanding and appreciation of Buddhism: the evolution from suspicion to sympathy from the time of his conversion in 1938 through his first serious investigation of Zen in the work of D. T. Suzuki in the mid-1950s; his intensive engagement with Buddhist and other Asian religious traditions that resulted in the numerous essays on various aspects of these traditions during the final decade of his life; and the direct encounters with Buddhist contemplative practitioners, particularly Tibetans, including the Dalai Lama, during his two months in South Asia immediately preceding his death. The author emphasizes Merton’s growing appreciation both of the enrichment provided by Zen perspectives for Christian spiritual growth, particularly the corrective to Cartesian dualism of the empirical ego and the non-self to be found in the Zen “ontological awareness of pure being beyond subject and object” (74), and of the possibilities of discovering common ground between the Christian contemplative experience of self-emptying (kenosis) and Buddhist void or emptiness (sunyata) as a basis for mutual appreciation of one another’s traditions. Merton’s recognition of three dimensions of dialogue – theological, experiential and actively oriented – is considered, with the second, “centered on mutual religious experiences and a sharing of spiritual practices” (94), being the most important for Merton and thus for Park as well. This experiential focus serves both to highlight the role of contemplatives, particularly monastics, in Christian-Buddhist dialogue, and also to deflect the occasional negative focus (often tendentious and sometimes based on recent critiques of Merton’s principal dialogue partner, Suzuki) on the limitations of Merton’s knowledge of Buddhism, since his principal concern was with praxis rather than theory, also evident in his fascination with the Tibetan meditative method of dzogchen in his conversations with the Dalai Lama and other Tibetan spiritual masters.
The third chapter, “Merton’s Pioneering Work with Inter-Monastic/Contemplative Dialogue” (123-79), proposes that Merton’s principal contribution in this field was to create “a new paradigm for interreligious dialogue by means of inter-monastic exchange and inter-contemplative dialogue,” a topic that has been recognized by previous commentators but “has not yet been the subject of serious study and analysis” (125). Park notes Merton’s belief that contact with non-Christian monasticism could contribute substantially to Christian monastic renewal in the wake of the Second Vatican Council by encouraging a reappropriation of the original monastic charism of contemplative enlightenment and by reminding monks that personal and communal inner transformation, not institutional or structural reforms, was the essential component of any authentic and lasting revitalization of monastic life. Likewise this shift away from primarily institutional considerations revealed the relevance of this process for a world “facing a crisis of faith and the loss of basic human values” by encouraging “an awakening of ‘inner’ monkhood or the hidden contemplative in everyone” (135). Inter-monastic dialogue could become exemplary for interreligious dialogue more generally, situating the sharing of religious experience and of contemplative practices and spiritual disciplines at the center of encounters among adherents of different traditions. Merton’s famous declaration at the Temple of Understanding Conference in Calcutta in October 1968 that “the deepest level of communication is not communication, but communion” (149, 152, 162, 191) is at the heart of this approach, as well as his assertion that “Final integration is a state of transcultural maturity” and that the “monastic ideal is precisely this sort of freedom in the spirit, this liberation from the limits of all that is merely partial and fragmentary in the given culture” (156, 157). Such an ideal in Merton’s view is not limited to vowed religious but open to spiritually mature persons in all walks of life, but can and should be modeled by monastics as an integral dimension of their charism.
In his final chapter, “Merton’s Legacy: Beyond His Encounter with Buddhism” (181-242), Park reviews the history of monastic interreligious dialogue since 1968 in its relationship to Merton’s life and work, and considers the directions such dialogue should take in the years ahead. He describes the emergence of the commissions “Dialogue Interreligieux Monastique/Monastic Interreligious Dialogue” from the Benedictine organization “Aide à l’Implantation Monastique” that sponsored the 1968 Bangkok conference and the subsequent meeting in Bangalore in 1973; surveys the various monastic exchange programs sponsored by DIM/MID, “indirectly inspired by Thomas Merton” (195), in which Christian and Buddhist monks experienced each other’s way of life through brief or more extended stays at monasteries of the other tradition; describes in detail the series of four “Gethsemani Encounters” between Christian and Buddhist practitioners held between 1996 and 2015, originally at the suggestion of the Dalai Lama, as a more direct response to Merton’s call for contemplative interreligious dialogue; and makes pertinent suggestions for implementing what he sees as the next phase of the ongoing process of realizing Merton’s vision, fostering closer relationships between Christian and Buddhist monastics in specific geographical and cultural settings, drawing on current and planned programs in South Korea, in which he himself is deeply involved, as exemplifying that “the time is ripe for inter/intra-monastic dialogue in lived experience and spiritual depth within Asia and between Asian monastics or contemplatives” (241-42). Thus Park concludes his discussion by considering Merton’s contributions to interreligious dialogue not merely from a historical perspective but in their continuing relevance for the present and future of monastic and spiritual development in a global context.
While an impressive achievement in the main, certain aspects of the presentation could have used further clarification or explication. Park’s terminology, which generally is not that of Merton himself, is occasionally somewhat imprecise. The rather casual use of the term “mystical experience,” or “inner-mystical experience” (the exact meaning of the hyphenated modifier is never explained), to describe virtually every occasion of religious significance in Merton’s life, even before his conversion, certainly does not reflect language Merton himself would use for many (any?) of these events. The distinction between “existential dialogue” and “experiential dialogue” (137-38) in chapter 3 remains rather hazy, and in fact Park goes on to combine them in most subsequent references. The term “intra-religious dialogue,” coined by Raimon Pannikar to refer to “an inner dialogue within one’s self and an encounter with another religious experience on an intimate level” (182), is subsequent adopted to describe “dialogue between different cultural and religious traditions . . . at the local level” (222-23), a quite different usage altogether. It is surprising that Park does not follow Merton’s own preference for wisdom-related terminology, his customary references to the “sapiential” and “sophianic” to describe experiential, participatory, transformative ways of knowing, particularly as such language would correlate well with the Buddhist term for wisdom, prajna, found in a number of passages quoted from Merton (see 72, 75, 81-82, 86).
Another relevant dimension of Merton’s teaching that is virtually absent from Park’s discussion is the centrality of the paschal mystery. For Merton liberation from the false self and the discovery of one’s true identity is rooted in the experience of dying and rising with Christ. The death and resurrection of Christ is the supreme expression of compassion – karuna, the central virtue of the bodhisattva ideal of Mahayana Buddhism. By “suffering with” humanity, sharing completely in all the limitations of the human condition including death itself, Christ invites every human person to participate in the passage through death to new, complete life. This is the heart of Merton’s own understanding, and expression, of self-loss and self-discovery, and is certainly part of what he brings to contemplative dialogue with Buddhism, as he himself notes in his essay “A Christian Looks at Zen,” in one of the most fully developed statements concerning the paschal character of the Christian life he ever made:
It is essential to remember that for a Christian “the word of the Cross” is nothing theoretical, but a stark and existential experience of union with Christ in His death in order to share in His resurrection. To fully “hear” add “receive” the word of the Cross means much more than simple assent to the dogmatic proposition Christ died for our sins. It means to be “nailed to the Cross with Christ,” so that the ego-self is no longer the principle of our deepest actions, which now proceed from Christ living in us. “I live, now not I, but Christ lives in me!” (Gal.2:19-20; see also Romans 8:5-17) To receive the word of the Cross means the acceptance of a complete self-emptying, a Kenosis, in union with the self-emptying of Christ “obedient unto death!” (Phil. 2:5-11) It is essential to true Christianity this experience of the Cross and of self-emptying be central in the life of the Christian so that he may fully receive the Holy Spirit and know (again by experience) all the riches of God in and through Christ. (Zen and the Birds of Appetite 55-56)
Aside from a brief reference to the same essay in his final chapter (223), this paschal perspective is largely absent from Park’s discussion. Even when he quotes Merton’s favorite verse from Galatians 2, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (78), it is not considered in the context of the previous verse, “I have been crucified with Christ.”
One final problematic element, as Park himself notes (see 168, 247), is the fact that Merton’s actual experience of inter-monastic contemplative encounters was in fact quite limited, particularly as compared to the decades-long immersion of the Christian monastics Bede Griffiths and Henri Le Saux (Abhishiktananda) in the Indian Hindu milieu (mentioned in passing by Park [145]) or of the Sophia University Jesuits Heinrich Dumoulin, Hugo Enomiya-Lassalle and William Johnston (not monastics of course but certainly contemplatives) in Japanese Zen dialogue and practice. Merton’s interactions with the Dalai Lama and with other Tibetan spiritual masters were certainly of profound significance for him, but were short-term encounters that may or may not have led to a more extended experience of Tibetan practice had Merton lived; and aside from his largely epistolary relationship with Suzuki, and his brief meeting with the Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, there were no comparable direct contacts with Zen figures (though Merton had planned to spend an extended period in Japan with the Sophia Jesuits early in 1969) – which makes his statement to John Moffitt that “Zen and Christianity are the future” a somewhat awkward framing device (see xxiii, 254-55) for presenting a method of dialogue in which Tibetans played a much more prominent role. Thus it might be more accurate to describe Merton as an inspiration (as do some of Park’s sources – see 160, 203) than as a model for the type of dialogue Park is advocating here, though it is clear that for the author personally Merton has functioned as both and will continue to do so.
Nevertheless, the author’s detailed, clearly articulated, logically developed argument, based on a thorough familiarity with the full range of relevant primary and secondary sources, makes a strong, persuasive case for the crucial importance of Merton’s contribution to interreligious dialogue generally and to Buddhist-Christian inter-monastic/contemplative interaction in particular. Park demonstrates that the contemplative grounding Merton called for as a fundamental constitutive dimension of such encounters is essential for a recognition and appreciation of the spiritual validity of the experience of other religious traditions, faithful to the declaration of the Second Vatican Council that “the Catholic Church rejects nothing which is true and holy” in these traditions, which “often reflect a ray of that Truth which enlightens all” (67; see also 143), and for the personal and social transformation meditated by such encounters that can contribute to the healing of a fragmented world in desperate need of a recovery of meaning and purpose.