A lie is also a skillful means.
—Japanese proverb
Skillful means are precious.
—Nikkyo Niwano
Upāya, or skillful means (Skt., upāya-kauśalya; Chn., fangbian; Jpn., hōben), is an important Buddhist principle that becomes a core issue in Mahayana Buddhist texts, including the Srimala-devi, Vimalakirti, and Lotus sutras. The most basic meaning of upāya is “to approximate, draw near, or arrive,” and by extension upāya may also indicate what one uses to attain one’s aim. In Buddhism upāya indicates opportune methods, means, or teachings, which are deftly tailored to particular needs in order to end people’s suffering and guide them to enlightenment. However, as temporary or highly contextualized means to these ends, upāya are also understood as relative and provisional. On this account, upāya are often described as “expedients”—an ambiguous word that also captures another shade of the meaning of the original Sanskrit: a craft or artifice.
It is this last notion of upāya that is especially prominent in Japanese popular culture. The Japanese word hōben invariably evokes the proverb “A lie is also a skillful means,” which may be uttered with a mischievous wink and nod to excuse a white lie. It can also carry a disapproving tone when directed at the self-serving behavior of someone who cheats or causes harm in the selfish pursuit of their own advantage, such as a scam artist or a shady businessperson. The most common English translation of this proverb—“the end justifies the means”—goes even further in demonizing the notion of skillful means, evoking images of the great evil figures of world history.
Rev. Nikkyo Niwano, the founder of Rissho Kosei-kai, repeatedly pointed out this Japanese proverb in order to correct what he saw as a long-standing misapprehension of the meaning of skillful means. For Rev. Niwano and Rissho Kosei-kai, skillful means are indispensable ways of teaching and transforming the hearts and minds of living beings without which no one could encounter the Dharma or attain liberation from suffering. In this sense, skillful means are certainly not ad hoc temporary solutions or stopgaps, nor are they “provisional” in the sense of being something entirely different or separate from ultimate truth. Instead, skillful means are, as skillful means, part and parcel of ultimate truth. In the words of Rev. Niwano, “skillful means are precious.”
What’s in a Name?
Upāya is multifaceted, even within a single text like the Lotus Sutra, and this is part of what makes it so difficult to get a handle on. Since translation is essentially an interpretive exercise, the various English renderings of upāya capture one aspect of it, or what various scholars might consider the most salient feature of upāya. Common translations utilizing expedient emphasize the opportunistic, convenient sense of upāya, and consequently its provisional nature. The metaphor of a raft is often used to explain upāya—a helpful tool or partial truth to get one to a desired goal but whose usefulness comes to an end once the goal has been attained, or when one grasps the higher order truth.
Several parables in the Lotus Sutra do indeed accentuate the interim nature of upāya. Others seem to directly address the issue of artifice, and the degree to which these parables succeed is an ongoing debate. Some passages of the Lotus Sutra seem to dismiss upāya as relative truths, while others laud their power and efficacy. The entire second chapter of the sutra, “Skillful Means,” juggles the provisional character of skillful means on the one hand and their merit and indispensability on the other, holding both views in a precarious balance. Even after Shakyamuni Buddha declares that he will forthwith put aside upāya and fully disclose the truth to his disciples, he proceeds to teach the Dharma through forms of upāya such as parables and examples from the past, suggesting that as long as one seeks to convey truth, one can never really eschew upāya.
For Rev. Niwano, the salient feature of upāya is “properness” or “tact,” a sense that Gene Reeves’s term appropriate means captures well. The Buddha’s upāya are appropriate in two ways. First, they properly accord with the dispositions, abilities, and desires of living beings. This is a critical point that the Lotus Sutra makes repeatedly. Upāya are “tactful”—designed with great skill and sensitivity in dealing with others. But for Rev. Niwano, appropriateness carries another meaning. To be appropriate also means to be in accord with the ultimate truth. Thus, as appropriate means or methods, skillful means embody a dialectical movement: toward living beings, their dispositions, abilities, and desires, on the one hand, and toward ultimate truth on the other. This understanding considerably complicates the notion of skillful means as simply provisional and relative.
The Relationship of Skillful Means and Ultimate Truth
Perhaps the best way to explain this dialectic is to use the metaphor of a bridge, which Rissho Kosei-kai has sometimes used to understand skillful means and its relationship to ultimate truth. The buddhas and bodhisattvas establish skillful means as a bridge in order to allow people to cross from the shores of delusion to the opposite bank, which is the realm of enlightenment. Just like a bridge, skillful means extend to people on the far side of delusion and transport them over to the opposite shore of enlightenment.
The end of the bridge on the shores of delusion must be anchored to the river bank at exactly the place where people stand, which is a way of saying that skillful means must reach out to people in ways that are tailored to their needs, perspectives, and life circumstances. The person who begins to cross the bridge from the side of delusion may not fully understand from the very beginning exactly where the bridge is leading them, but the person who lays down the bridge for them—a buddha or bodhisattva—knows where it leads and realizes that the bridge is a means or measure that is directly connected to ultimate truth, to the shores of enlightenment, and as such, is one with ultimate truth.
In the case of an actual bridge, such as the span over the Tama River connecting Kawasaki and Tokyo, can we say that the bridge is entirely in one city or the other? Of course, maps will show us that somewhere in the middle of the river there is a determined borderline, and as we travel across the span we may be conscious of being closer to one side or the other. But when we think of the bridge as a whole, it is anchored in both cities, and consequently we can say that as a whole, the bridge is located in two places at the same time.
In this sense, there is no clear distinction between skillful means and ultimate truth: they are of one body, one whole, which is to say they are consubstantial. Hence Rev. Nikkyo Niwano’s formula “skillful means are inseparable from the ultimate truth.” In addition he writes:
It is through skillful means that people come to understand truth. . . . It is not possible to say that ‘up until this point is skillful means, but beyond this is truth.’” (Kono michi, 384)
In other words, the truth that the Buddha teaches us can be realized through all the events and experiences of daily life. Anything and everything can be a method that the Buddha uses to teach us and transform our hearts and minds. There is no set of practices for dealing with practical or mundane problems that is entirely separate from another set of practices for realizing ultimate truth. Like the lotus, whose flower blooms at the same time it bears fruit and its seeds appear, true skillful means embody both cause and effect. They are both causes of enlightenment and expressions of enlightenment. Skillful means are reflexive in this way, and for this reason it could be more productive for us to think of skillful means as process rather than as static entities.
Importance of Wisdom and Telos
In these ways, “everything can be skillful means,” as Rev. Niwano taught. However, if everything can be skillful means in order to realize the ultimate truth, the specter of a certain antinomianism, an attitude of “anything goes,” would appear to present a problem. Indeed, a certain moral laxity and permissiveness is often associated with skillful means, the attitude of “whatever gets you through the night.” While historically there is evidence to substantiate such fears, in the sutras, skillful means come with qualifications. Wisdom and skillful means are supposed to work together, like two doors connected by a hinge, or the wings of a bird. As Michael Pye observes in his seminal work on skillful means, “skilfulness in means” is “inextricably related” to prajñā, or insight, in the Perfection of Wisdom literature, as well as the Lotus and Vimalakirti sutras (Skilful Means, 2). Compassionate wisdom reorients ordinary activities or phenomena into means to help people transform their hearts and minds in the direction of buddhahood.
This is why it is critical that the person who lays down the bridge—the Buddha or a person undertaking the compassionate bodhisattva work of a buddha in this world—has his or her feet firmly rooted on the side of truth and has fixed their side of the bridge on the shores of enlightenment. Using skillful means should necessarily entail self-reflection—“repentance” (Jpn., sange) in the parlance of the Threefold Lotus Sutra. Gene Reeves, a translator of the Lotus Sutra and an advisor to Rissho Kosei-kai, alludes to this when he writes of another sense in which skillful means implies a “double appropriateness”: they allow for the capabilities of both the practitioner and the recipient. The practitioners of skillful means must ask themselves, “What needs to be done?” and also, “What can I do?” (The Stories of the Lotus Sutra, 52). Reeves reminds us that practitioners must always be self-reflective, aware of their own abilities, appropriately tailoring what they can do to the needs of others.
Skillful Means in Rissho Kosei-kai
Perhaps the most effective way to learn about the theory and practice of skillful means in Rissho Kosei-kai is to consider hoza, often translated as “Dharma circles” or “circles of compassion,” which are regarded as the “life” of Rissho Kosei-kai practice. Sometimes described as a unique form of group counseling, Dharma circles are gatherings of Rissho Kosei-kai members who sit in a circle—symbolizing harmony—for their discussions. The subjects for discussion in Dharma circles are surprisingly ordinary—members share their worries, challenges, sufferings, as well as their joys. Participants in Dharma circles learn that the problems of ordinary life, even gripes and complaints or the dissatisfaction we feel with others or ourselves, are all precious opportunities for growth and personal development to be faced rather than avoided or ignored. “Don’t change others, change yourself,” “always practice self-introspection,” “everything is the workings of the Buddha,” “savoring our encounters,” and “everything is within me” are some of the pithy phrases that sum up the way members of Rissho Kosei-kai approach solutions to the challenges in their lives.
Rissho Kosei-kai members share everyday experiences and awareness in a hoza (Dharma circle) meeting.
In the absence of contemplative practices and the dearth of Buddhist jargon, some observers may see Dharma circles more as a form of group therapy, empathic listening, or a teaching of positive thinking than as a Buddhist practice. They are indeed all of these things, but Dharma circles also possess a telos that makes them skillful means, like the bridge that is anchored on the other side to the realm of enlightenment. Rissho Kosei-kai members learn that “a seed of enlightenment is contained within your delusions” and “liberation is found within delusion.” Rev. Niwano recognized that the afflictive emotions are extremely difficult to sever directly, but because these emotions are in the end not separate from the truth, and since the truth can be found within them, when we can objectively examine them in a calm and composed state of mind, we can free ourselves from being ruled by them. This resonates with the famous Chinese monk Zhiyi’s (538–97) practice of “contemplating the objects of affliction” (Chn., fannao jing). Instead of attempting to directly suppress or cut off negative feelings and desires, one takes them as objects of contemplation and uses them as the very means of achieving enlightenment. This approach assumes the nonduality of delusion and enlightenment, which is to say they are inseparable, like two sides of a coin. In Dharma circles we see an example of how Rev. Niwano strove to weave many of Zhiyi’s teachings into the fabric of Rissho Kosei-kai practice in ways that could be practiced in the context of daily life (Kono michi, 313).
Negative emotions and hurtful feelings are embraced without being grasped, recognized but not endorsed. When we take this middle-way approach, these feelings teach us rather than beguile us. Even greed and attachment are understood as transformations of buddha-nature, and Dharma-circle participants begin their approach to problems by affirming the feelings of others in the faith that within those passions they will discover the seeds of enlightenment. For example, in lieu of condemnation, the gripes or impositions of an angry spouse might be reframed as an earnest desire for emotional intimacy, or the disobedience of a rebellious child understood as a cry for help. This is not necessarily a moral judgment, that is, an assertion of the rightness or wrongness of a person’s feelings, but an acknowledgment that those emotions stem from basic human desire for affirmation, human connectedness, and other wholesome aspirations, which in Rissho Kosei-kai are seen as the virtues of one’s buddha-nature.
Adopting the viewpoint of the other and affirming their emotions are done by those standing on the enlightenment side of the bridge, those who have faith that “the Buddha is always with us” and that “everything is a gift of the Buddha.” These pithy phrases are themselves skillful means designed to help people apprehend delusions as indivisible from enlightenment and see our world as the world of the Buddha. In an attempt to alleviate another’s suffering, Dharma-circle participants will also offer simple practical advice based on these perspectives as well as their understanding of causation. What becomes important, however, is that the person who has shared their suffering in a Dharma circle and has afterward attained a degree of relief progresses to some realization of the basic principles behind what they have practiced. If so, the workings of a retroactive theology ensue. The ground upon which they are standing links up with “the other shore,” and the “provisional” or “exigent” methods they have practiced become consubstantial with ultimate truth.
Journeys and Steps
There is a famous maxim taken from chapter 64 of the Daode-jing that goes: “A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step.” If we consider skillful means akin to the steps of a journey, we might say “A journey of a thousand miles is a collection of single steps.” Furthermore, since each of these steps is ultimately connected in sequence to the goal, each step articulates the goal. Thus, we can also say that the journey of a thousand miles is a single step. Or as Hegel said in one passage of the Phenomenology of the Spirit: “The True is the whole. But the whole is nothing other than the essence consummating itself though its development” (p. 11).
In Rissho Kosei-kai, skillful means are understood as appropriate methods—appropriate to the person, their character and understanding, and even their desires. When we think about skillful means as mediated, particular phenomena, we see their situatedness most clearly, and this tends to highlight their provisional and expedient nature. However, what takes concepts and practices in Rissho Kosei-kai that sound like positive thinking or moral proverbs and transforms them into Buddhist skillful means is the orientation that anchors them to the other shore of liberation. In Rissho Kosei-kai the contingent, that is, the ordinary praxis of everyday life, is taken as necessity—the practices and mind-sets required to obtain liberation from suffering and attain awakening. When the ordinary and mundane, which everyone can comprehend and put into effect, is given soteriological orientation, you have a “great vehicle”—a practice that can benefit a wide range of people.
Allow me to conclude with some words from Rev. Niwano:
If we lead people to the Way of the Buddha by explaining right off the bat the truth within the teachings of the Lotus Sutra, the great principle of the cosmos, it will not come to them immediately. People are understandably most concerned with themselves, and dealing with the problems that immediately confront them. So, first, we must ask people to share what concerns them right now, what troubles or worries them. Then we respond to their problems with practical advice, suggesting, “Why not think about it this way, or how about giving this a try?” And by doing this, they will get a grasp of what this teaching of truth means. This is skillful means. That’s why skillful means are themselves the ultimate truth, and the reason everyone is able to understand the ultimate truth through skillful means. (Kaiso zuikan, 112–113)
References
Hegel, G. F. W. Phenomenology of the Spirit. Translated by Arnold V. Miller. London: Oxford, 1977.
Niwano, Nikkyo. Hokekyo no atarashii kaishaku. Tokyo: Kosei Publishing, 1989.
———. Kaiso zuikan. Vol. 11. Tokyo: Kosei Publishing, 2001.
———. Kono michi. Tokyo: Kosei Publishing, 1999.
Pye, Michael. Skilful Means: A Concept in Mahayana Buddhism. London: Duckworth, 1978.
Reeves, Gene. “Appropriate Means as the Ethics of the Lotus Sutra.” In A Buddhist Kaleidoscope: Essays on the Lotus Sutra, edited by Gene Reeves, 379–92. Tokyo: Kosei Publishing, 2002.
———. The Stories of the Lotus Sutra. Boston: Wisdom, 2010.
