Enough has been said, I think, to show that to maintain there is no similarity between Zen and the philosophical practice of Wittgenstein, is untenable. But although the similarities mentioned may be interesting and surprising, and depending on our point of view and approach, even important, it does not follow that they warrant any claim of a similarity such as the one in question. Perhaps what they take to be the absence of this similarity is what some people have in mind when they say there is no real resemblance. I will now attempt to put forward some considerations which support this claim.

　　 When all is said and done Buddhist philosophy and Zen practice are based on a faith which understandably finds no expression in Wittgenstein's position. Naagaarjuna, for example, may indeed have been a great critical and dialectical philosopher in his own right, but he was a deeply religious man and his philosophy is carried out from this position and can be properly understood only in terms of it. Again, it is doubtful, to say the least, whether Zen has anything even approaching the same view of the dispersal of doubt and perplexity that Wittgenstein has. In Rinzai Zen for instance, one does not try to clear up and resolve doubts and worries about the meaning of life, the world, and so on, by

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

17. Ibid., para. 133.

p. 480

linguistic analysis or any other kind of analysis. One simply doubts and doubts until, as it has been said, one becomes one with the doubt. Indeed it is doubtful whether "doubt" is even quite the right word, for there is wonder and faith involved as well. Wittgenstein's procedure with his students is certainly surprisingly like that of a Zen master with his pupils. But their aim is different. The former wants to get his students to feel the doubt for themselves as a preliminary to exploring and probing it. The latter wants to help his pupils to dispose of anything that will distract them from just letting their doubt alone and becoming one with it. This, of course, applies, among other things, to the demonstrations of the absurdity of metaphysical types of questions and assertions. In other words he uses his supporting procedures to discourage the very kind of activities that Wittgenstein uses his to encourage.

　　 It might be said that understandably there is no analog in Wittgenstein's philosophy for meditation, which is central and crucial in Zen and in Buddhism generally; accordingly there can be no place for the techniques appropriate to meditation in the practice of his philosophy. This, of course, is true but the difference goes deeper than that. It has to do with the different diagnoses of spiritual disorder, provided one is prepared to describe the puzzlement and perplexity with which Wittgenstein was so afflicted. For whereas he seems to ascribe it to our lack of a clear view of the logical grammar of our discourse and uses the knowledge of this gained by philosophy to make the distinctions which help to release us from our worries, in Zen we come to see how ego-centeredness and attachment lead us to make distinctions and keep things apart when really they are together all the time. If one says that both agree in regarding ignorance as a crucial source of our troubles, then it seems clear enough that each understands the term differently. Again, Wittgenstein is much more concerned with therapy than with the style of life which follows successful therapy. One gets the impression that he regarded the kind of enlightenment he sought as marking the end of crucial philosophical practice for a person, though he may, of course deepen and extend his understanding and try to help others by acquainting them with his skills and techniques. So far as Zen is concerned, there is an unfortunate and rather prevalent misconception that enlightenment or satori is the end and culmination of Zen practice; whereas it is the beginning of it.

　　 For both Wittgenstein and Zen, enlightenment is thought of in terms of changing the angle of vision to what is natural or what is given rather than of replacing them with something else or of directing our attention elsewhere. Because the forms of nature, of life, and of language are all right as they stand, the source of our difficulties lies in ourselves. Wittgenstein likens philosophy to a therapy of the users of language rather than of language itself; there are different methods like different therapies and they should be used according to the circumstances. He refuses to tie us down to any one method and has no

p. 481

philosophical theses to propound. He is constantly trying to free us from the bewitchment of words and concepts and ignorance of what we are doing when we use language -- all of which lead to rigidity and dogmatism and one-sided emphases and theses. This instrumental approach and the attempt to free us from rigidity and dogmatism has obvious resemblances to what are regarded as the results of Zen practice. The enlightenment conferred by both Wittgensteinian and Zen practice is a kind of emancipation or freedom. For Wittgenstein it is the kind of emancipation which makes one capable of not philosophizing when one wants, of taking it up or putting it down. Above all it means freedom from the obsessive worries and perplexities which played a central role in his life. It might be said that any resemblance between the freedom attainable by Wittgensteinian and Zen methods can, at most, be only partial. But I think the position is that if a person did happen to attain Wittgensteinian freedom one could not guarantee that he would be free from such worries as those about death, the way he is treated by others, and the like; whereas if he genuinely attained the freedom sought by Zen one should be able to guarantee this. In other words one cannot assert that the Wittgensteinian would not be free from such worries but only that one could not guarantee it. Finally regarding procedure, there are certainly striking resemblances between Wittgenstein's practice of "assembling reminders for a certain purpose" and his procedure with his students, and certain aspects of Zen practice.