Killing the Buddha, an anthology of creative nonfiction edited by Peter Manseau and Jeff Sharlet (and a website of the same title), is a work that defies easy categorization. Its subtitle, “A Heretic’s Bible,” hints at the unifying theme: this is a book about heresies, a word that derives from the Greek haíresis, the “act of choosing.” Chapters with titles (and topics) taken from biblical books are interspersed with Manseau and Sharlet’s accounts of their travels throughout the U.S. The result is an evocative account of all the American religious landscape and the dazzling array of choices it offers.
I’m writing about Killing the Buddha here because of its title. As the editors explain in their introduction, the phrase “killing the buddha” comes from a story about the Chinese Zen monk Linji (Lin-chi; d. 866) in which he explains to his disciples that they should kill the buddha if they happen to encounter him. Manseau and Sharlet read this as a statement of heresy, and extrapolate that Linji’s “buddha” includes all the dominant ideologies of his day. “Killing the buddha” for them means rejecting a single explanation of anything.
Linji’s instructions to kill the buddha come from his recorded sayings, a collection of teachings attributed to him after his death. The full passage reads as follows:
Monks, if you want to attain understanding of the dharma, just do not be misled by people. Kill everything you encounter, within and without. If you encounter a buddha, kill him. If you encounter a patriarch, kill him. If you encounter an arhat, kill him. If you encounter your parents, kill them. If you encounter your relatives, kill them. Only then can you attain liberation, such that you are not restrained by anything and can be completely free and at ease.
Manseau and Sharlet are correct in their basic interpretation of Linji’s meaning: “The Buddha you meet is not the true Buddha but an expression of your longing. If this Buddha is not killed, he will only stand in your way” (p. 1). Zen teachings hold that attachment to external buddhas prevents people from seeing that they themselves are already buddhas. We find in Zen writings many other statements or actions that are meant to shock: calling the Buddha a dried shit-stick, tearing up Buddhist scriptures, burning Buddhist images, etc. Zen rhetoric lends itself well to a book about heresy.
Zen’s heretical side is just one of its facets, and historically it has been a pretty small one. Linji’s buddhacide occurred in a world where Zen temples enshrined statues of buddhas, bodhisattvas, and gods; reserved halls for portraits of abbots; and Zen monks performed funeral rites for lay people for a fee. In some cases monks took steps to preserve their deceased teachers’ bodies through mummification, which is pretty much the opposite of killing the buddha.
Killing the Buddha uses an idea of Zen that is common in the American religious landscape: a godless, heretical Zen provides an alternative to the pious theism of Christianity. American Buddhists are also less likely to get mad about a book called Killing the Buddha (though I wonder how Buddhists in Asia would react). Had Manseau and Sharlet titled the book Killing Christ or Killing God, which would better fit the mainly Judeo-Christian content, it might have incited outrage.
One of the goals of this blog is to show how casually Americans throw around “Zen” without consideration for Zen’s historical or cultural context. Perhaps it is only fitting that a book about religious experience in America would reproduce the dominant view of Zen in America, but in such a reflective book I would hope for more serious reflection on this kind of appropriation.
Zensanity 
Wow — I’m deeply grateful for any review of this obscure first book of mine, which is also in many ways my favorite, and doubly appreciative of its thoughtfulness. That said, there are layers of context to every story, and I think you missed one here. Not your fault. The only real clue to the meaning of that story to us is in the book’s epigraph, a line from Yankev Glatshteyn’s 1947 poem “Mayn vogl-bruder,” “Der got fun mayn ungloybn iz priptek,” which can be translated as “The God of my unbelief is magnificent.” What’s the connection? A particularly Yiddish way of reading scripture, tales, parables, holy stories, etc, epitomized by Sholem Aleichem’s Tevye. (Yes, the same — or, sort of the same — as in Fiddler on the Roof.) You take the tale and you make it your own. You twist it, knowing that distortion does not destroy. If it did, there would be no Jews. Often, you make of something sacred a joke. The pious may screech, but the joke keeps the idea — or some cousin of it — alive.
Peter and I met working at the Yiddish Book Center, steeped in those kinds of stories, those kinds of distortions, and especially those kinds of jokes. Neither of us is a Buddhist (just as neither of us would count as a Jew to an orthodox rabbi, especially not Peter, who’s the son of a priest and a nun). Neither of us ever claimed to be. We took that story for its punchline, which, incidentally, we added. Imagine how sad we were when we found out — too late — that there’s a 70s self-help bestseller that exploits it just the same. (Well, again, sort of the same.)
For the record: We did consider calling it “Killing Christ,” but with our Yiddish background, we worried we’d be mistaken for a Lenny Bruce tribute band. Killing God we never considered. I believe Time Magazine already claimed that one, in so many words. It really doesn’t rile anyone. But Killing the Buddha! Sure, American Buddhists could live with it. But boy, did it make the liberal goyim uneasy.
Anyway, your riff on it seems to me as much in a Yiddish tradition as our (mis)appropriation, plus you actually know stuff. Seriously — thanks for reading, Megan.