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Arigatō and the Five Contemplations

Everyone knows the word arigatō. I think I learned it from the classic rock band Styx's truly terrible song, "Mr. Roboto." Or it might have been Tom Cruise's valiant attempt at Japanese when he says it in The Last Samurai. Whether from these or the many elements of Japanese pop culture that have found their way into western societies, I would guess the majority of people know that it means "thank you." Certainly that's what you'll find it glossed as in an elementary Japanese textbook or by punching it into Google Translate.


English "thank you," comes from the Latin word for "thinking," as in, "I'll remember the good you did for me." "Thanksgiving," then, is to be "giving thought" or "reflective." For arigatō as it's normally used in day-to-day Japanese conversation, "thank you" is a perfectly serviceable translation, a simple expression of gratitue.


We might be surprised, then, to learn that the Chinese characters used to write arigatō (有り難う) mean "exist" and "difficult," as in "It is difficult [for this phenomenon] to exist at all." The deceptively simple "thank you" is actually a succinct expression of one of Buddhism's most beautiful teachings, that of Dependent Origination, the idea that all phenomena come into being as the result of an inscrutible web of causes and conditions.


Think about just one ingredient of your last meal, say, the lettuce on your sandwich. Thinking at the most basic level, that lettuce required fertile soil to grow in, water to nourish it, and of course people to tend and harvest it. The soil is the product of millennia of organic processes; the water has flowed back and forth between ocean and sky more times than a human could count; the people who grew it had specific upbringings, triumphs, and hardships that led them to be lettuce farmers. Considering the origins of any given object or event, our thoughts must almost immediately spiral out to include the entire universe and all its processes.


In this infinite web of possibilities and outcomes, what are the chances of that lettuce adding a nice crunch to your sandwich? Indeed, what are the chances of you becoming a human with the physical and mental capacity to enjoy it? The answer to this question about the odds of any given phenomenon existing is "infinitely small." In other words: it's difficult for anything to exist. But here we are. So what do we do about it?


The Mealtime Service for Shingon, introduced from the Zen tradition, includes a meditation called the "Five Contemplations" (Jp. 五観 Gokan). The first of these is a reflection on exactly the situation described above: "Reflect on the portions of the results before you, and consider their origins." Reflecting on my own reactions to this meditation, I can say that I naturally feel a combination of gratitude and smallness.


This smallness is addressed in the Second Contemplation: "Weigh the presence or absence of your own benevolent action." In other words: have my actions merited the entire universe acting to nourish me? My natural response to this is a clear awareness of my own unwholesome habits and, importantly, a desire to address and be free of them.


The Third Contemplation reminds us of why this happens: "Lacking mindfulness and displaying excess is nothing but the Three Poisons (of craving, ill-will, and ignorance)." Our bad habits and actions, like any other phenomenon, may seem incompehensibly complex and unnapproachable, but the only place to address them is right here, right now. During my meal (and at all other times), I must watch my mind to see exactly when the Three Poisons arise, and what kind of action they propel me toward without intervention. Do I want more than I need, or do I complain about not getting exactly what I want? Do feelings of ill-will arise when someone has more than me? Do I get carried away by the sensual experience of eating and forget myself?


The Fourth Contemplation gives us a concrete process for doing this: "Eat this food, as it is truly good medicine that relieves suffering during practice." While the First Contemplation is backward-looking gratitude, the Fourth is present- and forward-looking; this food is not an end, but yet another cause in the great web of reality; this time it causes my body to stay alive and well. But to what end?


The Fifth and final Contemplation answers the question: "We eat for the purpose of fulfilling the Path, not for any kind of worldly benefit." In other words, eating allows me to go on practicing, in my own small way, for the benefit of every being in the universe. Transforming my food into practice purifies the entire web of causes and conditions that led to the infinitely unlikely meeting between my food and me.


In these Five Views, we find a wonderful formula for how the view expressed in arigatō can transform our approach to any experience we encounter in life: consider the causes, weigh your relationship to them, reflect on your reactions to them, give thanks for them, and vow to transform them into wisdom and compassion. Letting this formula animate even our most mundane "thank yous" can carry us a long way down the Buddhist path.


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