At WCBT’s Obon Service on July 15, 2001, Rev. Mas Kodani spoke on the deeper meaning behind the Obon Festival and Service. He began by strongly clarifying the distinction, regarding death, between certain common Japanese cultural beliefs and the Buddhist teachings themselves. On the one hand, he stated that many Japanese believe in the existence of a soul ("tamashi") that survives after death. To Rev. Mas, this is unfortunate. "They make the mistake of believing that the ‘next world’ after death will be like this world, that they will see ‘ji-chan’ again. According to Buddhism, these are fatal mistakes," Rev. Mas said. "Buddhism is based on the rejection of the soul. You are not a soul, but merely a combination of your senses," he said.
The reason for his usage of the term "fatal mistakes" in referring to mistaken beliefs in a soul or afterlife became clearer as he continued his talk. First, Rev. Mas clarified that Amida Buddha, the central figure in Shin Buddhist altars, is not some kind of divine entity, and certainly not a symbol of an eternal "Pure Land" we "go to" after we die. "Amida represents infinite light and infinite life," he said. In Buddhism, "infinite light" means "wisdom" and "infinite life" means "compassion." He pointed out that "infinite light" and "infinite life"—wisdom and compassion—represent the "truth" that we, as Buddhists, are trying to understand, to awaken to in our present lives. "Namu Amida Butsu really means, ‘I take refuge in this truth,’ and Amida is that which is trying to show us this truth." said Rev. Mas.
However, difficult as "receiving wisdom" in our lives may seem, Rev. Mas stated that "Compassion is harder to get." We’ve heard statements such as, "Amida’s compassion always surrounds me," but they probably don’t have much meaning to us. To Rev. Mas, to really receive "Amida’s compassion," we must deeply encounter this truth called Amida Buddha. And, in encountering it, we will be changed by it. On the one hand, the "change" is negative because the self is challenged. On the other hand, Rev. Mas said that the positive aspect is that, "Life becomes profoundly beautiful." Clearly, the "life" that Rev. Mas was referring to here is our daily life, not an "afterlife."
Furthermore, Rev. Mas pointed that there is an crucial and powerful connection between the "profoundly beautiful"—as expressed in music, dance and the visual arts—and Buddhism. Unfortunately, this connection is overlooked and forgotten in most Shin temples today. As important as they are, Rev. Mas said that "Math and science are secondary; the purpose of life is to produce art, music and dance. This is because art and music express that which is beautiful. Art is the expression of our religious connection. Take art seriously. We cannot live without it."
"Mahayana Buddhism says, ‘If you do not produce art, you do not understand Buddhism,’" Rev. Mas emphatically stated. "So, if you don’t dance at the Obon because you are too shy or afraid of looking silly, that’s your ego getting in the way. We should all live "sono mama" (just as we are), but we cannot "just dance" because of our ego; the ego is always in control. This is why the purpose of Buddhism is to get the ego to ‘step down from its throne,’" he said. Removing the ego solves the problem because, "What’s left when you remove the many layers of self is simply the appreciation, not of ‘me,’ but of ‘us’…thus the self really doesn’t exist at all; we are really only what we do."
In conclusion, Rev. Mas said that, as Shin Buddhists, we have a unique path to follow. In contrast to other schools of Buddhism which attempt to apply a "practice" to gradually "transcend" or "purify" the ego, "In Shin Buddhism, there is no practice; the diagnosis itself—deeply seeing how our self-centered ego-nature gets in our way—is the cure. As Shin Buddhists, our only job is to understand what is ‘honto’—that which is ‘profoundly beautiful’—enjoy it, and then die."