Zen, Emotion and Social Engagement (Feleppa)

Some common conceptions of Buddhist meditative practice emphasize the elimination of emotion and desire in the interest of attaining tranquility and spiritual perfection. But to place too strong an emphasis on this is to miss an important social element emphasized by major figures in the Mahayana and Chan-Zen Buddhist traditions who are shaprply critical of these quietistic elements and who stress instead, as Peter Hershock puts it [in his Liberating Intimacy: Enlightenment and Social Virtuosity in Ch'an Buddhism, Albany 1996], "total immersion in the flux of daily life and never a private and necessarily transcendental retreat from it". This understanding of enlightenment emphasizes enriched sociality and a flexible readiness to engage, not avoid, life's fluctuations in fortune and essential impermanence. I shall argue that we can understand the insights of these criticisms of quietism by considering some relatively recent advances in the philosophy and psychology of the emotions. Just as this recent literature challenges the idea that emotions are largely impediments to clear thinking, it can support Chan's concern that the emotions not be understood as mere impediments to enlightenment. (Robert Feleppa, in Philosophy East and West, July 2009, first paragraph of this article)