Abstract (by the team of "Dilato Corde") Even though Western languages generally translate “metta” as “compassion,” the expression of compassion in Eastern Buddhist cultures is significantly different from the way it is usually expressed by Westerners.

Both Buddhism and Christianity stress the importance of compassion. But do these two religions mean the same thing by that word? There are good reasons to think that they do not.

One of the tasks of philologists is to clarify the similarities and the differences of meaning in the bicultural use of a word like compassion. Their findings are obviously very important, but I would like to argue that it is sometimes appropriate to look behind language and cultural conventions to the undifferentiated spiritual life of infancy where basic symbols are given shape. It will then become clear that a purely philological study does not eliminate the risks of misunderstanding. Dictionaries of languages and cultures, religious studies, history, etymology—in the last analysis none of these will be able to help us.

It would be naive to believe that because suffering is a universal reality, all we need do is observe its occurences in order to reconcile different points of view. In fact, it is precisely the observance of actual suffering that put me on guard about a problem that may be caused by homonyms, a problem that, in my opinion, translators, moralists and theologians are insufficiently critical of. We shall therefore begin at the beginning and, if you will, bypass the intellectuals and the scholars as we make our way to a particular battle field where good-willed Buddhists and Christians meet. Later on we can return to semantics and ethics.

The Battlefield

I spent six years in a Thai hospice taking care of terminally ill HIV patients that the medical system of the country had basically abandoned. There were, on average, one or two death per day. The hospice was also a Theravada Buddhist monastery, whose charismatic abbot, in order to raise money for the hospice (there was no state aid) and for an AIDS prevention program, made his monastery a center for AIDS information and education in Thailand.

Each week, hundreds, even thousands of visitors—soldiers, students, tourists, healers, monks, pilgrims, priests, journalists, members of religious communities and sects—passed through the two wards where I was treating patients.

I was the privileged witness of an exceptional encounter between the agony of the dying and the compassionate reactions of people from different cultures, encounters that were exceptional both because they were so heart wrenching and because they happen so rarely.

All, or almost all these visitors, experienced great discomfort in the presence of the dying, most of whom were young and whose symptoms could occasionally take a very dramatic turn (Cf. Aids Hospice or "Spouse" on YouTube).

I noticed some recurring differences in the ways visitors reacted to the manifestation of pain. Their cultural and religious origins were clearly indicating something. The difference between the behavior of the Thais and that that of the Westerners was especially remarkable. In short, I would say that Westerners felt that their first duty was one of “mothering” while Thais felt their duty was to be “generous.”

By “mothering” I mean a desire to love and cherish the dying patient and reduce his or her pain. The Westerners were much more concerned than the Thais about such things as providing presence, nursing, psychology and medicine (analgesics!).

As for “generosity," I use it here in the sense it has in the West: a certain equilibrium between “having” and “sharing,” the opposite of avarice. Thai visitors almost always brought gifts: very good food, flowers, even coffins! They would place a banknote between the fingers of the dying, even those who were already unconscious. It was not uncommon that the poorest visitors would leave half their wages at the hospice.

The Westerners were usually far richer, of course, but it was rare that they would give the overworked staff more than a 20 or 100 Euro bill—with impossibly precise instructions on how it was to be used.

At the time my rather simplistic observation was that the Thais were curiously devoid of compassion, while the Westerners were clearly not very generous. My analysis of the situation was certainly not very nuanced, but at least I was already aware of a clear cultural gap between the ways people responded to the spectacle of anguish and death.

At this point language did not come into play. For various reasons (not the least of which was timidity and worry about contagion), it was not possible for the visitors to engage in conversation with the dying. What I observed were attitudes, not talk.

The abbot of the monastery-hospice was no exception. Once or twice a month he came to visit the wards of the dying. He knew I was chronically short of morphine, but over a period of six years he never provided me with any, even though his stature in Thailand was such that he would be able to get it for free with very little effort. The real problem was not legal or logistic. The simple fact was that this monk did not feel the need to find ways to reduce the suffering of the patients entrusted to his care.

550 deaths per year, and absolutely no morphine. In the West, this would have become a national scandal in less than a week!

The only way I could get morphine to provide some relief for my patients was to rely on especially courageous Westerners who, precisely because they were motivated by compassion, decided to take the huge risk of smuggling morphine into the country in their luggage. They were able to get this morphine from the bedside tables of people who had died in Europe, especially in Holland where, it seems, many still die at home.

The abbot knew all this, of course. He just smiled and attributed it to nothing more than an peculiar obsession of Westerners, who always struck him as becoming too emotional when they were confronted with pain.

The doctors, professors, businessmen and other members of the modern Thai elite who now and then made their way through our wards, with a few rare exceptions, seemed to have the same ethical priorities as the abbot.

 

Initiating an Analysis

For years the only thing I saw behind the word "compassion" was a charitable act done on behalf of those who suffer. Later, when I became more adept at introspection, I saw compassion as something more complex because I found that it referred to both a feeling I can sense (the discomfort that is passively experienced when pain is observed) and also my reaction to that discomfort.

It is the reaction to the discomfort caused by the spectacle of pain that gives compassion its ethical dimension. Because the ways of constructing moral value can vary considerably according to culture, compassion in its entirety is going to be affected by particular cultural characteristics.

Whereas in one culture the spectacle of pain and the culture's ethical orientation lead to one way of acting, in another culture, the same spectacle may well lead to other attitudes and actions.

This is exactly what I observed on the battle field!

As my perception of cultural differences improved with time, using the word “compassion” became ever more problematic. At least, in theory, I could already think of situations where the compassionate attitude of one person would be judged uncompassionate by another. In a more general way—that is, in areas not specifically related to compassion—I guessed that misunderstandings of this kind could cause a lot of religious or political squabbles. Without a doubt, one can look for ways to avoid these squabbles by making an effort to understand the other. But that often requires doing the work of analyzing homonyms that are not always very apparent and that surreptitiously corrupt interreligious dialogue.

To return to our consideration of “compassion,” modernity—which is never all that concerned about spiritual differences—seeks to avoid misunderstandings of this kind by removing the specific symbolic content that each culture gives to what it calls “compassion”, leaving nothing more than the common denominator, namely, the particular sensation that makes us shudder when we observe someone else's suffering.

That, it seems to me, is what everyday language is surreptitiously doing all the time in the West and in the East. Only a few of the faithful are startled by the ethical contradictions between ancient spiritual traditions that are caused by these semantic shifts .

And so, John Doe, who has been following a televised report on a recent disaster, thinks of himself as a “compassionate” person because he is deeply affected by the suffering of the unfortunate people he has just seen on television. However, a wise and experienced Christian would say that John Doe is less compassionate than he thinks because, because, even though he is saddened by the trials these poor people are undergoing, he doesn't do anything for them.

The media conglomerates make their money by getting their customers to experience such pseudo compassion.

I don't think John Doe remains passive because he knows that his government will be using his tax money to send aid. I think it is because there is nothing he can do. Apart from rare exceptions, John Doe's excuses do not stand up to analysis, but I will forego such analysis here for fear of revealing my own failings! John Doe does nothing, does not even make an electronic bank transfer, because he usually has very little compassion in the religious sense of the word.

In fact, the kind of pseudo compassion that John Doe feels when he is glued to the televised report is as perverse as that of John Smith who is about to watch —on YouTube or somewhere else— a death sentence being carried out. It is not out of compassion for the victims of the criminal, nor for the criminal himself, that John Smith attends the show! What draws him to the scaffold is not compassion, but a sado-masochistic impulse that he is not sufficiently aware of or does not deal with very well.

All spiritualities endow the word “compassion” with very precise and specific ethical connotations. Good Christians or good Buddhists will never think of themselves as compassionate merely because their emotions are aroused when they see people suffering. Should this put us on guard about the indirectly harmful effect caused by the media's interpretation of the great spiritual traditions? If the word "compassion" is allowed to remain on the slippery slope of semantic alteration, much greater intellectual effort will be needed to understand these spiritual traditions.

One occurrence does not establish a custom, so on this matter of semantics we need to be somewhat conservative. The mental deconstructions that those involved in interreligious dialogue undertake inevitably draw them into more complex symbolic territories. Their job is to assume (and, as far as possible, to help others to assume) the linguistic ambiguities that this complexity entails.

The compassion of the Buddhist is NOT the same as the compassion of the Christian nor of the Muslim, nor of the Shaman, nor of the Marxist, etc. And yet, with regard to the word "compassion", the scholar who compares religions will discover that the consequences of expressing these differences by means of a homonym are not all that significant. The compassion of Buddhists, for instance, is not totally incompatible with the compassion of Christians, nor with that of secular materialists (who often practice a Christian ethic), nor with those of various kinds of animism, etc.

Everybody will admit that apart from a few very specific questions, such as euthanasia or the use of certain hallucinogenic drugs, different ways of expressing compassion are not mutually exclusive. Thus, in concrete circumstances there will be no or very little controversy (except in the confined world of medical practice).

Moreover, these variations in the meaning of crucial words, a variantion caused by their religious contexts, will be a source of confusion only for those who work on the periphery of their own religious culture and in an area where different religious cultures are in contact with one another. For example, Christians who have been working in a Buddhist environment for only a short time will be more apt to say that the Buddhists are not compassionate and that their use of this word is hypocritical.

Some will say that today different religious cultures are everywhere in contact with one another and that this kind of linguistic ambiguity strikes at the very roots of peaceful coexistence in almost all major metropolitan areas. They will add that while it may be true that the ambiguity of "compassion" probably does not often lead to serious consequences, the same might not be true for words like “universality”, “impurity”, “fidelity”, “fraternity”...

This objection is valid, but the argument is not enough strong to induce us to abandon the semantic “conservatism" already referred to. Confusion must be clarified, but not in the surreptitious way the media go about it. We must demystify the directions for making the transition from one culture to another. The solution must not be a semantic impoverishment.

It is common knowledge that all spiritual traditions give special importance to the spiritual commentaries of the ancient masters ("Tradition" with a capital "T”). In all these spiritual traditions, there were some who attained the highest levels of spiritual refinement, of humanism and of merit by riding on the shoulders of their predecessors who themselves already rode on the shoulders of their predecessors. What shall become of such a pyramid if in the course of ascending ever higher a word like "compassion," which they both used and misused, changes its meaning? In the Christian world, for example, in order not to compromise the substance of the Gospel, would we not be obliged to change the words of Christ, and then those of Paul, and then those of Augustine? To start all over from ground zero? What battles will we choose to get involved in when we already have so much work to do in order to deconstruct all the other pernicious effects of history in our search for the original meaning of texts?

Anyone who has become closely involved with other cultures knows that when it comes to spiritual differences, the symbolic tiling on which language dances is more than the language itself. For a Christian, understanding Buddhism is not a matter of being able to read the Lord Buddha by making good use of a Pali or Sanskrit dictionary. Nor does the mastery of modern languages provide much help. I am willing to wager that the most eminent philologists will continue to translate the word "compassion" by "compassion" for a very long time to come. There is probably no better option!

In spite of what I have written above, it is not pemitted to translate the word "compassion" as “generosity” when the word appears in Theravada Buddhism. There are many reasons for this, the main one being that "generosity" does not necessarily imply the discomfort one feels when confronted with someone's suffering. For reasons that are even more obvious, we are not permitted to substitute the word “mothering” for "compassion" in the Christian realm.

To understand the Buddha or the Christ, philology must give way to hermeneutics. Interreligious dialogue must be rooted in something deeper than linguistic studies. Even if we all spoke the same language, we would still have to work to throw light on our differences.

It is clear that Buddhism has not divided up the spiritual world in the same way we have in the West; the basic realities that are the referents of their words are not exactly the same as those referred to by our languages. Without a hermeneutical approach (which I am convinced considerably increases the complexity of things) there is no way of getting beyond the ambiguities transmitted by those important and homonymous words.

To make the point more clearly, let us take another word. What the Buddhists call "forgiveness", for example, is an array of basic realities that do not correspond (and never will correspond) to what the Christians designate by the same word. Hermeneutics will show us, in no uncertain terms, that they are irreconcilable. (I could make the same point with words like "desire," "will,” etc.)

The law of karma has no room for Christian forgiveness. In Christianity, the cause/effect sequence “A+B+C” can become “A+C” by the pure miracle of the supra-temporal intervention of a good God. But in realm of karma, where nothing can be wiped away, if one is to obtain more or less the same merit, it will be necessary to pass from “A+B+C” to “A+B+C+D,” where “D” is an obligatory new act that more or less equals “-B” and that the Buddhist must perform. For Christians, however, the grace of Redemption is given freely; it is not a reward for a human act. Christian love is not affected by time, whereas for the Buddhist, there is no way to erase one's history. Science will probably feel at ease with the “dependent origination” of the Buddha (Cf. the "Paticcasamuppada"), but there is no place for grace; everything depends on whether or not good deeds outweigh the bad. The spiritual raw material that is necessary to depict a divine Redeemer or Christian forgiveness is already being made use of elsewhere in the Buddhist world. This means that in the best of cases, Christian ethics only vaguely resembles Buddhist ethics. On the battle field, the difference is obvious! Karma gives a cultural coloring to pain and death that at times can leave the Christian speechless.

If we are to understand religious difference, the first thing we will have to do is clearly distinguish the linguistic stratum from the symbolic stratum. Words function differently from the symbols that gave rise to these words. Lapalisse would have told us the same, but Lapalisse would not have focused his attention, as we should, on the possibility or impossibility of breaking the symbols up into smaller elementary symbols that can serve as new variables in shedding light on the most delicate of cultural nuances.

For example, it was necessary to make a mental distinction between compassion in a passive sense (the discomfort initially felt) and compassion in an active sense (the ethically shaped reaction) in order to be able to find a trustworthy bridge between Christian compassion and Buddhist compassion that might be of service to interreligious dialogue.

The work on what I have here called "symbol", unlike the work of the philologist, is not directed to linguistic conventions, even if it is slightly influenced by the cultural environment and dabbling in the sciences.

The downside of such an enterprise of deconstruction and reconstruction —both of which are necessary in interreligious dialogue and the comparative history of religions— is that we can only express ourselves through language, which is essentially a set of conventions.

It is not possible to develop this topic in an article of this length, but you can find out more about it by consulting the section dedicated to Christian-Buddhist dialogue on the website Stylite (in French), which is in constant development.

 

Chiangmay - July, 2011

(Translated from French by the board of "Dilato Corde")

 

 

 

 

Abstract (by the team of "Dilato Corde") Even though Western languages generally translate “metta” as “compassion,” the expression of compassion in Eastern Buddhist cultures is significantly different from the way it is usually expressed by Westerners.

Abstract formulé par l'équipe de "Dilato Corde" Même si nous traduisons souvent le mot "metta" par "compassion" dans nos langues occidentales, la manifestation de la compassion est significativement différente chez nous et dans le Bouddhisme du Theravada...

Both Buddhism and Christianity stress the importance of compassion. But do these two religions mean the same thing by that word? There are good reasons to think that they do not.

Le Bouddhisme et le Christianisme font grand cas de la compassion. Mais est-ce exactement la même chose que chacune de ces religions recouvre par ce mot? Il y a de solides arguments qui nous affirment le contraire.

One of the tasks of philologists is to clarify the similarities and the differences of meaning in the bicultural use of a word like compassion. Their findings are obviously very important, but I would like to argue that it is sometimes appropriate to look behind language and cultural conventions to the undifferentiated spiritual life of infancy where basic symbols are given shape. It will then become clear that a purely philological study does not eliminate the risks of misunderstanding. Dictionaries of languages and cultures, religious studies, history, etymology—in the last analysis none of these will be able to help us.

Est-ce aux philologues d'élucider les similitudes et les différences de sens dans l'usage biculturel d'un tel mot? Les avis des philologues sont évidemment très précieux mais je voudrais montrer qu'il serait opportun de remonter parfois en amont des langages, des conventions culturelles, là où se découpent des symboles élémentaires dans la vie spirituelle indifférenciée du nouveau-né. On constatera alors, hélas ou tant mieux, qu'il n'y a aucune chance d'épuiser les malentendus par une étude strictement philologique… Dictionnaires des langues et des cultures, sciences religieuses et histoire, étymologie… rien, absolument rien de cet ordre ne pourra nous aider…

It would be naive to believe that because suffering is a universal reality, all we need do is observe its occurences in order to reconcile different points of view. In fact, it is precisely the observance of actual suffering that put me on guard about a problem that may be caused by homonyms, a problem that, in my opinion, translators, moralists and theologians are insufficiently critical of. We shall therefore begin at the beginning and, if you will, bypass the intellectuals and the scholars as we make our way to a particular battle field where good-willed Buddhists and Christians meet. Later on we can return to semantics and ethics.

Il serait naïf de croire que l'observation du terrain réconciliera de toute façon les deux clans parce que les réalités de la souffrance sont universelles. C'est justement l'observation de ce qui se passe sur le terrain qui, la première, me mit en garde contre un problème d'homonymie et cette confusion me semble trop peu dénoncée par les traducteurs, moralistes, philologues et autres théologiens. Commençons donc par le début et laissons quelques instants, voulez-vous, les sages et les savants de côté. Allons sur un champ de bataille où Bouddhistes et Chrétiens de bonne volonté se retrouvent. Nous reviendrons à la sémantique et à l'éthique plus tard.

The Battlefield

Le champ de bataille

I spent six years in a Thai hospice taking care of terminally ill HIV patients that the medical system of the country had basically abandoned. There were, on average, one or two death per day. The hospice was also a Theravada Buddhist monastery, whose charismatic abbot, in order to raise money for the hospice (there was no state aid) and for an AIDS prevention program, made his monastery a center for AIDS information and education in Thailand.

J'ai passé six ans à soigner dans des conditions précaires des mourants du SIDA que le corps médical thaïlandais ne voulait plus prendre en charge. J'avais en moyenne un à deux morts par jour. Le mouroir était aussi un monastère du Bouddhisme Théravada... Le charismatique supérieur de ce monastère, à la fois pour attirer l'argent nécessaire au financement de son oeuvre (pas de financement étatique) et par souci de combattre l'épidémie du SIDA, avait donc aussi fait de son monastère un haut lieu d'information et d'éducation.

Each week, hundreds, even thousands of visitors—soldiers, students, tourists, healers, monks, pilgrims, priests, journalists, members of religious communities and sects—passed through the two wards where I was treating patients.

Il passait chaque semaine non pas des dizaines mais des centaines voire des milliers de visiteurs dans les deux salles d'agonisants où je sévissais: des bataillons militaires, des écoles, des touristes, des guérisseurs, des bonzes, des pèlerins, des prêtres, des journalistes, des communautés religieuses, des sectes...

I was the privileged witness of an exceptional encounter between the agony of the dying and the compassionate reactions of people from different cultures, encounters that were exceptional both because they were so heart wrenching and because they happen so rarely.

J'ai été là le témoin privilégié de la rencontre tout à fait exceptionnelle (non seulement par sa brutalité mais aussi par sa rareté) entre la souffrance de mourants et les réactions compassionnelles de divers groupes culturels.

All, or almost all these visitors, experienced great discomfort in the presence of the dying, most of whom were young and whose symptoms could occasionally take a very dramatic turn (Cf. Aids Hospice or "Spouse" on YouTube).

Tous ou quasi tous ces visiteurs éprouvaient un grand malaise en face de ces agonisants, très jeunes pour la plupart, et dont les symptômes pouvaient en l'occurrence prendre des tournures très spectaculaires (Cf. Aids Hospice et, par exemple, le très court VDO "Spouse").

I noticed some recurring differences in the ways visitors reacted to the manifestation of pain. Their cultural and religious origins were clearly indicating something. The difference between the behavior of the Thais and that that of the Westerners was especially remarkable.

J'ai pu remarquer quelques différences récurrentes dans les manières de réagir au spectacle de la souffrance. Les origines culturelles de ces visiteurs indiquaient clairement quelque chose.La différence de comportement entre les visiteurs issus de l'Occident et les visiteurs venus de Thaïlande criait aux yeux.

In short, I would say that Westerners felt that their first duty was one of “mothering” while Thais felt their duty was to be “generous.”

Pour faire court, je dirais qu'en face des souffrants, le «maternage» semblait le premier devoir ressenti par les Occidentaux alors que la «générosité» semblait le premier devoir des Thaïlandais.

By “mothering” I mean a desire to love and cherish the dying patient and reduce his or her pain. The Westerners were much more concerned than the Thais about such things as providing presence, nursing, psychology and medicine (analgesics!).

J'entends ici par «maternage» un désir de chérir l'agonisant et d'amortir ses souffrances… Les Occidentaux se focalisaient donc beaucoup plus que les Thaïlandais sur des questions d'accompagnement, de nursing, de psychologie et de médecine (analgésie!).

As for “generosity," I use it here in the sense it has in the West: a certain equilibrium between “having” and “sharing,” the opposite of avarice. Thai visitors almost always brought gifts: very good food, flowers, even coffins! They would place a banknote between the fingers of the dying, even those who were already unconscious. It was not uncommon that the poorest visitors would leave half their wages at the hospice.

J'entends ici par «générosité» ce que l'on en dit en Occident: un certain rapport entre l'avoir et le partage… l'inverse de l'avarice. Les visiteurs Thaïlandais venaient quasi toujours avec des cadeaux. Ils apportaient de la très bonne nourriture, des fleurs, des cercueils (!)... Ils glissaient un billet de banque entre les doigts des mourants sans négliger ceux qui n'étaient déjà plus conscients… En sortant du mouroir, il n'était pas rare que les plus pauvres y laissent la moitié de leur salaire…

The Westerners were usually far richer, of course, but it was rare that they would give the overworked staff more than a 20 or 100 Euro bill—with impossibly precise instructions on how it was to be used.

Les Occidentaux, pourtant bien plus riches, en général ne laissaient qu'un billet de 20 ou 100 euros qu'ils remettaient avec des consignes d'usage (insupportablement précises) au personnel déjà surchargé de tâches.

At the time my rather simplistic observation was that the Thais were curiously devoid of compassion, while the Westerners were clearly not very generous. My analysis of the situation was certainly not very nuanced, but at least I was already aware of a clear cultural gap between the ways people responded to the spectacle of anguish and death.

À l'époque, avec mes idées très simples, je pensais donc que les Thaïlandais étaient curieusement dépourvus de compassion alors que les Occidentaux étaient vraiment très peu généreux... Mon analyse était grossière mais j'avais au moins déjà pressenti qu'il existe un réel décalage culturel dans les manières de réagir au spectacle de la douleur et de la mort.

At this point language did not come into play. For various reasons (not the least of which was timidity and worry about contagion), it was not possible for the visitors to engage in conversation with the dying. What I observed were attitudes, not talk.

Le langage n'entre même pas en ligne de compte ici car, pour diverses raisons (dont la timidité et les angoisses de contagiosité n'étaient pas les moindres), il était le plus souvent impossible à ces gens de rentrer en communication verbale avec les agonisants. J'observais bien des attitudes, pas des mots, pas des pétitions de principes.

The abbot of the monastery-hospice was no exception. Once or twice a month he came to visit the wards of the dying. He knew I was chronically short of morphine, but over a period of six years he never provided me with any, even though his stature in Thailand was such that he would be able to get it for free with very little effort. The real problem was not legal or logistic. The simple fact was that this monk did not feel the need to find ways to reduce the suffering of the patients entrusted to his care.

550 deaths per year, and absolutely no morphine. In the West, this would have become a national scandal in less than a week!

Le supérieur du monastère-hospice ne faisait pas exception à la règle. Il passait une à deux fois par mois dans les salles d'agonies. Il savait que je manquais de morphine mais en six ans, il ne vint jamais en mettre à ma disposition. Il avait pourtant dans son pays une carrure charismatique suffisante pour en obtenir même gratuitement et avec très peu d'efforts. En fait, le vrai problème n'était ni juridique ni logistique ; surtout et avant tout, ce bonze ne se sentait pas vraiment concerné par la question de réduire la douleur éprouvée par ses protégés.

550 morts par an… Pas de morphine… Chez nous, il y aurait eu un scandale d'ampleur nationale en moins d'une semaine!

The only way I could get morphine to provide some relief for my patients was to rely on especially courageous Westerners who, precisely because they were motivated by compassion, decided to take the huge risk of smuggling morphine into the country in their luggage. They were able to get this morphine from the bedside tables of people who had died in Europe, especially in Holland where, it seems, many still die at home.

La seule source de morphiniques dont je pus finalement faire profiter mes malades étaient les Occidentaux les plus courageux qui, au nom de la compassion justement, décidaient de prendre des risques énormes en franchissant les frontières avec de la morphine dans leurs bagages. (Ils avaient organisé des récoltes de morphine sur les tables de chevet des morts d'Europe, de Hollande principalement où semble-t-il on meurt encore souvent à domicile).

The abbot knew all this, of course. He just smiled and attributed it to nothing more than an peculiar obsession of Westerners, who always struck him as becoming too emotional when they were confronted with pain.

Le bonze le savait et en souriait sans y déceler plus qu'une fantaisie d'Occidental. L'Occident, ce moine bouddhiste le trouvait d'ailleurs résolument trop émotifs en présence de douleurs…

The doctors, professors, businessmen and other members of the modern Thai elite who now and then made their way through our wards, with a few rare exceptions, seemed to have the same ethical priorities as the abbot.

Les médecins, les professeurs d'université, les hommes d'affaires et autres puissants de la Thaïlande contemporaine qui sont passé pour une raison ou l'autre dans le mouroir ces années-là, à quelques rares exceptions près, semblaient tous penser les priorités morales exactement comme le Bonze

 

 

Initiating an Analysis

Ébauche d'analyse.

For years the only thing I saw behind the word "compassion" was a charitable act done on behalf of those who suffer. Later, when I became more adept at introspection, I saw compassion as something more complex because I found that it referred to both a feeling I can sense (the discomfort that is passively experienced when pain is observed) and also my reaction to that discomfort.

Pendant des années, je ne voyais derrière le mot «compassion» qu'une action charitable produite en faveur des malheureux. Plus tard, lorsque mes outils d'introspection se sont améliorés, la compassion est devenue pour moi quelque chose de plus complexe puisque j'y repérais d'une part une perception purement sensorielle (un malaise passivement ressenti lorsqu'une douleur est observée) et d'autre part, la réaction à ce malaise.

It is the reaction to the discomfort caused by the spectacle of pain that gives compassion its ethical dimension. Because the ways of constructing moral value can vary considerably according to culture, compassion in its entirety is going to be affected by particular cultural characteristics.

C'est la réaction au malaise suscité par le spectacle de la douleur qui donne à la compassion sa dimension morale. Comme la manière de produire une valeur morale peut varier considérablement en fonction de la culture, c'est toute la compassion qui va prendre des caractéristiques culturelles.

Whereas in one culture the spectacle of pain and the culture's ethical orientation lead to one way of acting, in another culture, the same spectacle may well lead to other attitudes and actions.

This is exactly what I observed on the battle field!

Alors que dans telle culture le spectacle de la douleur et les tendances morale inclinent à un style de comportement, dans telle autre culture, le même spectacle inclinera peut-être à d'autres attitudes...

C'est bien ce que j'observais sur le champ de bataille!

As my perception of cultural differences improved with time, using the word “compassion” became ever more problematic. At least, in theory, I could already think of situations where the compassionate attitude of one person would be judged uncompassionate by another. In a more general way—that is, in areas not specifically related to compassion—I guessed that misunderstandings of this kind could cause a lot of religious or political squabbles. Without a doubt, one can look for ways to avoid these squabbles by making an effort to understand the other. But that often requires doing the work of analyzing homonyms that are not always very apparent and that surreptitiously corrupt interreligious dialogue.

Au fur et à mesure que ma perception des différences culturelles s'étoffait, la gestion du mot «compassion» se compliquait. En théorie au moins, je pouvais déjà concevoir des situations où l'attitude compatissante de l'un serait jugée non compatissante par l'autre. D'une manière plus générale, donc pas spécifiquement en connexion avec la compassion, je devinais que ce type de malentendus pouvait susciter bien des guéguerres religieuses ou politiques en dehors des mouroirs… Il y a toujours moyen d'éviter les guéguerres en commençant par essayer de mieux nous comprendre les uns les autres bien sûr. Mais cela exige un travail sur des homonymies pas toujours très visibles et qui subrepticement pervertissent le Dialogue interreligieux.

To return to our consideration of “compassion,” modernity—which is never all that concerned about spiritual differences—seeks to avoid misunderstandings of this kind by removing the specific symbolic content that each culture gives to what it calls “compassion”, leaving nothing more than the common denominator, namely, the particular sensation that makes us shudder when we observe someone else's suffering.

Pour en revenir plus strictement à la compassion, la modernité qui fait trop peu cas des différences spirituelles, pour éviter ce genre de malentendus, a tendance à vider le contenu symbolique spécifique de ce que chaque culture appelle «compassion» pour n'y laisser que le dénominateur commun, c'est-à-dire cette sensation particulière qui nous fait vibrer lorsqu'on observe la douleur d'un autre.

That, it seems to me, is what everyday language is surreptitiously doing all the time in the West and in the East. Only a few of the faithful are startled by the ethical contradictions between ancient spiritual traditions that are caused by these semantic shifts .

And so, John Doe, who has been following a televised report on a recent disaster, thinks of himself as a “compassionate” person because he is deeply affected by the suffering of the unfortunate people he has just seen on television. However, a wise and experienced Christian would say that John Doe is less compassionate than he thinks because, because, even though he is saddened by the trials these poor people are undergoing, he doesn't do anything for them.

C'est, me semble-t-il, ce que, subrepticement, le langage de tous les jours tend à faire en Occident et en Orient. Peu de croyants s'effarouchent des quelques contradictions éthiques que cela induit par rapport aux anciennes Traditions spirituelles.

Voilà donc que monsieur Untel, qui vient de suivre le compte rendu d'une catastrophe à la télévision, tend à croire qu'il est «compatissant» parce qu'il est sensible à la douleur des malchanceux qu'il vient de voir. Dans un même temps, le vieux sage chrétien dira plutôt que monsieur Untel est moins compatissant que jamais puisqu'il n'agit pas alors qu'il ressent très bien ce que ces malchanceux vivent comme épreuves!

The media conglomerates make their money by getting their customers to experience such pseudo compassion.

I don't think John Doe remains passive because he knows that his government will be using his tax money to send aid. I think it is because there is nothing he can do. Apart from rare exceptions, John Doe's excuses do not stand up to analysis, but I will forego such analysis here for fear of revealing my own failings! John Doe does nothing, does not even make an electronic bank transfer, because he usually has very little compassion in the religious sense of the word.

La sphère médiatique gagne sa croûte en laissant ses clients se gargariser de cette pseudo-compassion en veux-tu en voilà…

Je ne pense pas que monsieur Untel reste inactif parce qu'il sait que son gouvernement va agir en son nom! Je pense pas plus que monsieur Untel reste inactif parce qu'il n'y a rien qu'il puisse faire. À de très rares exceptions près, ces excuses ne résistent pas à l'analyse que je n'aurai pas la faiblesse de développer ici par crainte de trop me dévêtir moi-même! Monsieur Untel ne fait rien, pas même un versement électronique, parce que monsieur Untel n'a souvent pas beaucoup de compassion dans le sens religieux du mot…

In fact, the kind of pseudo compassion that John Doe feels when he is glued to the televised report is as perverse as that of John Smith who is about to watch —on YouTube or somewhere else— a death sentence being carried out. It is not out of compassion for the victims of the criminal, nor for the criminal himself, that John Smith attends the show! What draws him to the scaffold is not compassion, but a sado-masochistic impulse that he is not sufficiently aware of or does not deal with very well.

En fait, cette espèce de pseudo compassion que ressent ce monsieur Untel scotché au JT est aussi perverse que celle de Mr. Y qui va voir une exécution capitale sur youtube ou ailleurs. Ce n'est pas par compassion envers les victimes du criminel ou du criminel lui-même que monsieur va au spectacle! Ce qui l'amène au pied de l'échafaud, ce n'est pas de la compassion pour qui que ce soit mais une pulsion sado-masochiste mal conscientisée ou mal gérée.

 

All spiritualities endow the word “compassion” with very precise and specific ethical connotations. Good Christians or good Buddhists will never think of themselves as compassionate merely because their emotions are aroused when they see people suffering. Should this put us on guard about the indirectly harmful effect caused by the media's interpretation of the great spiritual traditions? If the word "compassion" is allowed to remain on the slippery slope of semantic alteration, much greater intellectual effort will be needed to understand these spiritual traditions.

Chaque spiritualité utilise le mot «compassion» dans un sens qui a toujours été saturé de connotations éthiques très précises et spécifiques. Un bon Chrétien ou un bon Bouddhiste ne pourra jamais se considérer comme compatissant simplement parce que ses neurones s'agitent lorsqu'il regarde des gens souffrir. Ne doit-on pas alors craindre un effet pernicieux indirect de la nouvelle sphère médiatique sur l'interprétation des grandes Traditions spirituelles? Si le mot «compassion» est laissé à sa dérive sémantique sur laquelle il est en train de glisser, la consultation des Traditions spirituelles exigera un effort de réinterprétation de plus en plus conséquent…

One occurrence does not establish a custom, so on this matter of semantics we need to be somewhat conservative. The mental deconstructions that those involved in interreligious dialogue undertake inevitably draw them into more complex symbolic territories. Their job is to assume (and, as far as possible, to help others to assume) the linguistic ambiguities that this complexity entails.

Une fois n'est pas coutume, sur cette question sémantique, soyons donc un peu conservateur.

Les déconstructions mentales que fait l'acteur du Dialogue Interreligieux l'entraîne immanquablement dans des territoires symboliques plus compliqués. À lui, d'assumer et de faire assumer (autant que faire se peut) les quelques ambiguïtés linguistiques que cette complexité entraîne.

The compassion of the Buddhist is NOT the same as the compassion of the Christian nor of the Muslim, nor of the Shaman, nor of the Marxist, etc. And yet, with regard to the word "compassion", the scholar who compares religions will discover that the consequences of expressing these differences by means of a homonym are not all that significant. The compassion of Buddhists, for instance, is not totally incompatible with the compassion of Christians, nor with that of secular materialists (who often practice a Christian ethic), nor with those of various kinds of animism, etc.

Everybody will admit that apart from a few very specific questions, such as euthanasia or the use of certain hallucinogenic drugs, different ways of expressing compassion are not mutually exclusive. Thus, in concrete circumstances there will be no or very little controversy (except in the confined world of medical practice).

La compassion des Bouddhiste n'est PAS identifiable à la compassion des Chrétiens ni à celle des Musulmans, ni à celle des Chamanistes, ni à celle des Marxistes, etc. En fait, pour le mot «compassion», l'homonymie que va découvrir celui qui compare les religions ne porte pas à lourdes conséquences. La compassion des Bouddhistes par exemple n'est pas franchement incompatible avec la compassion des Chrétiens, ni avec celle de la laïcité matérialiste (qui fonctionnent souvent avec une éthique chrétienne), ni avec celles des divers animismes, etc.

Tout le monde admettra qu'en dehors de quelques rares questions précises comme celles de l'euthanasie et des traitements par euphorisants majeurs, les diverses formes de compassions ne s'excluent pas les unes des autres… De ce côté-là, sur le terrain, pas ou peu de guéguerres en perspective (sauf pour le microcosme des médecins)

Moreover, these variations in the meaning of crucial words, a variantion caused by their religious contexts, will be a source of confusion only for those who work on the periphery of their own religious culture and in an area where different religious cultures are in contact with one another. For example, Christians who have been working in a Buddhist environment for only a short time will be more apt to say that the Buddhists are not compassionate and that their use of this word is hypocritical.

Par ailleurs, ces variations sur le sens des mots cruciaux en fonction de l'appartenance religieuse ne peuvent être sources de confusions que pour ceux qui travaillent aux périphéries de leur propre culture religieuse, là où des cultures religieuses différentes se touchent. (Les Chrétiens qui travaillent depuis peu chez les Bouddhistes par exemple auront effectivement plus que les autres l'envie de dire que les Bouddhistes ne sont pas compatissant et que leur usage de ce mot est hypocrite…).

Some will say that today different religious cultures are everywhere in contact with one another and that this kind of linguistic ambiguity strikes at the very roots of peaceful coexistence in almost all major metropolitan areas. They will add that while it may be true that the ambiguity of "compassion" probably does not often lead to serious consequences, the same might not be true for words like “universality”, “impurity”, “fidelity”, “fraternity”...

D'aucun répondra que les différentes cultures religieuses, aujourd'hui, sont en contact absolument partout et que ce genre d'ambiguïtés langagières empoisonne donc aux racines la coexistence pacifique des diverses confessions dans quasi toutes les grandes villes contemporaines. Il ajoutera que s'il est vrai que l'ambiguïté du mot «compassion» ne conduit probablement pas souvent à de lourdes conséquences, qu'en sera-t-il pour d'autres mots comme «universalité», «impureté», «fidélité», «fraternité»…

This objection is valid, but the argument is not enough strong to induce us to abandon the semantic “conservatism" already referred to. Confusion must be clarified, but not in the surreptitious way the media go about it. We must demystify the directions for making the transition from one culture to another. The solution must not be a semantic impoverishment.

Cette objection est exacte, mais l'argument n'est pas fort assez pour nous incliner à condamner ce «conservatisme» sémantique évoqué plus haut ; il faut résoudre ces confusions mais pas les dissoudre subrepticement comme le fait la sphère médiatique. Il faut démystifier des algorithmes de passage d'une culture à l'autre. La solution ne doit pas être un appauvrissement sémantique.

It is common knowledge that all spiritual traditions give special importance to the spiritual commentaries of the ancient masters ("Tradition" with a capital "T”). In all these spiritual traditions, there were some who attained the highest levels of spiritual refinement, of humanism and of merit by riding on the shoulders of their predecessors who themselves already rode on the shoulders of their predecessors. What shall become of such a pyramid if in the course of ascending ever higher a word like "compassion," which they both used and misused, changes its meaning? In the Christian world, for example, in order not to compromise the substance of the Gospel, would we not be obliged to change the words of Christ, and then those of Paul, and then those of Augustine? To start all over from ground zero? What battles will we choose to get involved in when we already have so much work to do in order to deconstruct all the other pernicious effects of history in our search for the original meaning of texts?

C'est de bon droit que toutes les spiritualités accordent de l'importance aux commentaires spirituels de leurs anciens adeptes (la «Traditions» avec un grand «T»). Dans toutes ces spiritualités, quelques maîtres ont rejoint les plus hautes sphères de la subtilité spirituelle, de l'humanisme et du mérite en grimpant sur les épaules de leurs prédécesseurs qui eux-mêmes montaient déjà sur les épaules de leurs prédécesseurs… Que ferait-on d'une telle pyramide si en cours d'ascension un mot comme «compassion» dont ils usent et abusent venait à signifier quelque chose de neuf? Dans le monde chrétien par exemple, pour ne pas compromettre la fermeté de l'assise évangélique, ne serions nous pas alors obligés de changer les mots du Christ, et puis ceux de saint Paul, et puis ceux d'Augustin… Bref tout recommencer à zéro? Dans quels labyrinthes s'engagerait-on alors qu'il y a déjà tant à faire pour déconstruire les autres effets pernicieux de l'histoire si l'on veut retrouver le sens original des textes!

Anyone who has become closely involved with other cultures knows that when it comes to spiritual differences, the symbolic tiling on which language dances is more than the language itself. For a Christian, understanding Buddhism is not a matter of being able to read the Lord Buddha by making good use of a Pali or Sanskrit dictionary. Nor does the mastery of modern languages provide much help. I am willing to wager that the most eminent philologists will continue to translate the word "compassion" by "compassion" for a very long time to come. There is probably no better option!

In spite of what I have written above, it is not pemitted to translate the word "compassion" as “generosity” when the word appears in Theravada Buddhism. There are many reasons for this, the main one being that "generosity" does not necessarily imply the discomfort one feels when confronted with someone's suffering. For reasons that are even more obvious, we are not permitted to substitute the word “mothering” for "compassion" in the Christian realm.

Tous ceux qui ont fréquenté de près les cultures étrangères sentent que le carrelage symbolique sur lequel danse le langage est bien plus que le langage lui-même au cœur des différences spirituelles. Pour un Chrétien, bien comprendre le Bouddhisme, ce n'est pas être capable de lire Bouddha en faisant un bon usage du dictionnaire pali/français ou sanscrit/français. Manifestement, la maîtrise des langues vivantes n'est pas non plus d'un énorme secours. Il est à parier que le mot «compassion» restera traduit par «compassion» longtemps encore par les plus éminents philologues… Il n'y a pas de meilleure traduction à proposer!

En dépit de ce que j'ai écris plus haut, il ne nous est pas permis de traduire le mot «compassion» lorsqu'il est utilisé dans le Bouddhisme Théravada par celui de «générosité». Il y a pour cela de multiples raisons dont la principale est évidement que la «générosité» n'implique pas nécessairement le malaise ressentit lors du spectacle de la souffrance… De même, pour des raisons encore plus évidentes, il ne sera jamais question de substituer le mot «compassion» par celui de «maternage» dans la sphère chrétienne…

To understand the Buddha or the Christ, philology must give way to hermeneutics. Interreligious dialogue must be rooted in something deeper than linguistic studies. Even if we all spoke the same language, we would still have to work to throw light on our differences.

Pour comprendre Bouddha, ou Jésus, le philologue doit donc céder sa place à l'herméneute. Le dialogue interreligieux doit s'enraciner en amont des études linguistiques. Nous parlerions tous le même langage que nous devrions encore et toujours travailler à démystifier nos différences.

It is clear that Buddhism has not divided up the spiritual world in the same way we have in the West; the basic realities that are the referents of their words are not exactly the same as those referred to by our languages. Without a hermeneutical approach (which I am convinced considerably increases the complexity of things) there is no way of getting beyond the ambiguities transmitted by those important and homonymous words.

To make the point more clearly, let us take another word. What the Buddhists call "forgiveness", for example, is an array of basic realities that do not correspond (and never will correspond) to what the Christians designate by the same word. Hermeneutics will show us, in no uncertain terms, that they are irreconcilable. (I could make the same point with words like "desire," "will,” etc.)

Manifestement les Bouddhistes n'ont pas divisé le cosmos spirituel comme nous l'avons divisé en Occident; aucune des entités élémentaires qui composent le sens de leurs mots n'a des frontières parfaitement identifiables aux entités élémentaires que nos propres langages manipulent. Sans l'herméneutique qui, j'en conviens complique fameusement les choses, il n'y a pas moyen de dépasser les ambiguïtés des mots importants porteurs d'homonymies.

Pour être clair, prenons un autre mot ; ce que les Bouddhistes désignent par exemple par le mot «pardon» est un ensemble d'entités élémentaires qui ne correspond pas non plus et ne correspondra jamais à ce que les chrétiens désignent par ce même mot. L'herméneutique montre l'impasse d'une manière irréfutable. Je pourrais aussi parler du mot «désir», du mot «volonté», etc

The law of karma has no room for Christian forgiveness. In Christianity, the cause/effect sequence “A+B+C” can become “A+C” by the pure miracle of the supra-temporal intervention of a good God. But in realm of karma, where nothing can be wiped away, if one is to obtain more or less the same merit, it will be necessary to pass from “A+B+C” to “A+B+C+D,” where “D” is an obligatory new act that more or less equals “-B” and that the Buddhist must perform. For Christians, however, the grace of Redemption is given freely; it is not a reward for a human act. Christian love is not affected by time, whereas for the Buddhist, there is no way to erase one's history. Science will probably feel at ease with the “dependent origination” of the Buddha (Cf. the "Paticcasamuppada"), but there is no place for grace; everything depends on whether or not good deeds outweigh the bad. The spiritual raw material that is necessary to depict a divine Redeemer or Christian forgiveness is already being made use of elsewhere in the Buddhist world. This means that in the best of cases, Christian ethics only vaguely resembles Buddhist ethics. On the battle field, the difference is obvious! Karma gives a cultural coloring to pain and death that at times can leave the Christian speechless.

Il n'y a pas de place pour le pardon chrétien dans une législation karmique… Dans le Christianisme, un enchaînement d'attitude «A+B+C» peut devenir «A+C» par le pur miracle de l'intervention supra-temporelle d'un Dieu bon. Mais dans l'empire du karma ou rien ne s'efface, pour obtenir a peu près le même mérite, il faudra passer de «A+B+C» à «A+B+C+D» où «D» est un nouvel acte vaguement égal à «-B» mais que le Bouddhiste doit faire. Il n'y a rien à faire pour obtenir la Rédemption. La grâce des Chrétiens est donnée ou n'est pas donnée mais elle ne dépend pas de nous. L'amour chrétien n'est pas conditionné par le temps. Dans le puzzle spirituel Bouddhiste, pas de chiffon pour effacer l'ardoise du temps. Dans les «Productions Conditionnées» de Bouddha (Cf. le «Paticcasamuppada»), la science se sentira probablement à l'aise mais pas de place pour une grâce ; la balance et rien d'autre! La matière spirituelle nécessaire à la représentation d'un Dieu Rédempteur ou du pardon chrétien est déjà mobilisée ailleurs dans la sphère bouddhiste. C'est dire aussi que dans le meilleur des cas, l'éthique chrétienne ne ressemble que très vaguement à l'éthique bouddhiste. Sur le terrain, la différence se paye cash! Le Karma donne aux douleurs et à la mort des colorations culturelles qui laissent le Chrétien parfois purement et simplement sidéré…

If we are to understand religious difference, the first thing we will have to do is clearly distinguish the linguistic stratum from the symbolic stratum. Words function differently from the symbols that gave rise to these words. Lapalisse would have told us the same, but Lapalisse would not have focused his attention, as we should, on the possibility or impossibility of breaking the symbols up into smaller elementary symbols that can serve as new variables in shedding light on the most delicate of cultural nuances.

S'il y a une intelligence de la différence religieuse, pour y accéder, il faudra donc d'abord et avant tout bien dissocier la strate linguistique de la strate symbolique. L'ordre des mots n'est pas l'ordre des symboles que ces mots remuent. Lapalisse en aurait dit autant, mais Lapalisse n'aurait peut-être pas antant que nous devrions le faire focalisé son attention sur la possibilité ou non de briser les symboles en nouveaux symboles élémentaires plus petits devenus ainsi susceptibles de servir comme des nouvelles variables dans la démystification des nuances culturelle les plus subtiles.

For example, it was necessary to make a mental distinction between compassion in a passive sense (the discomfort initially felt) and compassion in an active sense (the ethically shaped reaction) in order to be able to find a trustworthy bridge between Christian compassion and Buddhist compassion that might be of service to interreligious dialogue.

Il fallait par exemple que je divise mentalement la compassion en une composante passive (le malaise premier) et une composante active (la réaction influencée par la morale) pour être en mesure de trouver un pont fiable pour passer de la compassion chrétienne et la compassion bouddhiste lors des discussions du Dialogue.

 

The work on what I have here called "symbol", unlike the work of the philologist, is not directed to linguistic conventions, even if it is slightly influenced by the cultural environment and dabbling in the sciences.

Le travail sur ce que j'ai appelé ici «symbole», contrairement au travail du philologue, n'est pas un travail sur des conventions linguistiques mais il est tout de même vaguement influencé par l'environnement culturel et la fréquentation des sciences.

The downside of such an enterprise of deconstruction and reconstruction —both of which are necessary in interreligious dialogue and the comparative history of religions— is that we can only express ourselves through language, which is essentially a set of conventions.

La misère d'une telle entreprise de déconstruction qui est pourtant de la plus haute utilité pour le Dialogue interreligieux et l'histoire comparée des religions, c'est bien de ne pouvoir se proclamer qu'à travers le langage qui est par essence truffé de conventions…

It is not possible to develop this topic in an article of this length, but you can find out more about it by consulting the section dedicated to Christian-Buddhist dialogue on the website Stylite (in French), which is in constant development.

Ce sujet-là je ne vais pas le développer ici car il demanderait beaucoup plus de place que ce qu'un simple article peut offrir. (Vous pourrez trouver plus d'information à ce propos en consultant d'autres titre dans la section de ce site dédiée au Dialogue Christiannisme/Bouddhisme. Ces articles sont évidemment tous en perpétuelle ré-écriture puisque ce site est un écho de mes recherches actuelles)

 

paul yves wery - Chiangmai -June 2011

paul yves wery - Chiangmay - Juin 2011