“That Epictetus is a Trip!” by Ranjini George

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Today we are delighted to bring you this excerpt from the memoir Days and Nights in Tokyo: Our 33-Kannon Edo Pilgrimage by Ranjini George and Lee Gowan.

 

“Don’t demand that things happen as you wish, but wish that they happen as they do happen, and you will go on well.”

Epictetus, Enchiridion

The walk from Okannon-ji to Daianraku-ji is easy—ten minutes on level ground instead of the uphill climb my husband and I endured to reach some of our stops on the 33-temple Edo Kannon pilgrimage. We pass an Indian restaurant offering chicken tikka beer sets that entices Lee and a stall selling taiyaki, fish-shaped pastry stuffed with red-bean or custard, a favorite of mine. Good pilgrims, we resist gourmet bliss and continue our pilgrimage to a temple on what was once prison grounds. A seated Jizo has replaced the executioner’s chopping block.

Denma-cho prison (1613-1875) was once a hell on earth. An estimated 100,000 to 200,000 prisoners died here from disease, torture, executions and murder.  At the beginning of the Meiji period, after the demolition of the prison, a monk suggested the building of a temple. The prison grounds now house a quiet city park called Jisshi Koen and two temples, Daianraku-ji and Minobu Betsuin, that were reduced to two small plots after the Great Kanto earthquake of 1923.

We are greeted by an outdoor statue of a seated Jizo or Ksitigarbha, dressed in simple monk’s robes, holding a staff and the cintamini, the jewel of the awakened mind.  Jizo, the Boddhisattva of Great Resolve, lives by the vow that he will not rest until the hell realms are empty. A  boddhisattva is one who dedicates their life to benefit others. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa are boddhisattvas. Innumerable boddhisattvas walk past us every day, quietly following their purpose of helping others.

The hell realms are also psychological states we inhabit through our thinking and destructive behaviors. Our aversions and desires, our ignorance, greed and anger, creates a prison in our thinking. Buddhism emphasizes compassion, fellowship and the importance of training one’s mind—“right view.” The wish-fulfilling jewel in Jizo’s palm reminds us of our Buddha nature. Through study and practice we uncover the inherent wisdom and luminosity of our mind.

*

Standing on what was once prison grounds, I recall the words on the cover of Jeff Traylor’s The Epictetus Club: “nothing stops a bad future like good thinking.” In his novel, Traylor drew from his experience as a furlough officer in maximum-security prisons, the old Ohio Penitentiary and the Marion Correctional facility.

Zeno, the main character, once a death row inmate and now serving a life sentence, facilitates the Epictetus Club. He is named for Zeno of Citium, who founded Stoicism around 310 BC. The inmates of the Ohio Penitentiary meet not at the Stoa Poikle, the Painted Porch in the Ancient Agora in Athens, but in the Death House that once held an electric chair.

On Friday evenings the club studies the Handbook of Epictetus, The Enchiridion. The prisoners are intrigued by the teachings of the freed Roman slave turned philosopher (AD 50-135), finding in the ancient Greco-Roman philosophy of Stoicism a new way of thinking.

We cannot control external events such as the judgement or behavior of others, but we can control our own—”It’s not events that upset us, but rather our opinions about them.”

The prisoner Zeno creates pithy acronyms for his mates:

ABC.

1. Identify the Attacking thought.
2. Block the defeating thought.
3. Counter punch. Replace the negative thought with a positive one.

No action exists without a consequence, but we kid ourselves that we can escape the consequences of our actions.  An inmate nicknamed Animal because he speaks in animal parables says, “We want the front of the dog that we can pet, cuddle and walk, but not the back end that poops.”

To illustrate Epictetus’ words, “Determine what happens first, consider what that leads to, and then act in accordance to what you’ve learned,” Zeno tells his story.

Outside the walls, Zeno was a professional boxer. He returns to his apartment one evening to discover his girlfriend beaten almost to death by her jealous ex-boyfriend. Some days later, Zeno accosts him in a parking lot, pounding him to death, and then waits for the police. Looking for drugs in his new prison cell, Zeno finds instead a skinny handbook, Epictetus’ teachings recorded by his student Arrian, The Enchiridion.

Of his actions, Zeno says, I could’ve called the police. I could’ve sat at my girlfriend’s bedside in Emergency. We could’ve married and had a life. Instead, his girlfriend, battered and alone, spirals into depression and overdoses on sleeping pills. Zeno feels not just remorse for his actions but wishes for atonement, refusing for many years to apply for furlough.

Zeno offers his book club inmates another acronym: What makes us FAIL?

Fear. Apathy. Inertia. Lack of Vision.

How can we replace FAIL with HOPE?

Hope. Opportunity. Possibility. Enthusiasm.

How can we CALM ourselves?

Cognition. Consider the opening line of the Enchiridion, “Is this up to me or not up to me?”

Act. If it is up to me. Break the action into smaller steps.

Let Go. If it is not up to me. Learn Epictetus’ Art of Indifference: “it’s none of my business.”  Don’t give energy to what you have no control over.

Move on.

In prison, Zeno responds “like a stone” when he could easily hit back, reminding himself of the tenet of America’s founding fathers—freedom of expression. He plays a comic, turning insults into a joke. The Stoics remind us that anger is “temporary madness” and destroys our best thinking. Zeno refuses to respond in anger as that will result in him being the day’s entertainment.

The inmates find in Epictetus’ words wisdom that eschews blaming others for one’s actions and taking responsibility. “That Epictetus is a trip!” says inmate Ross. “I didn’t think ancient Greeks could be so cool!”

“Don’t be afraid of verbal abuse or criticism. Only the weak feel compelled to defend themselves or explain themselves to others. Let your good actions speak on your behalf. We can’t control the impressions others form about us, and trying to do so only demeans us. So if someone comes up to you and says so-and-so is saying bad things about you, don’t get defensive and upset, but instead just reply, ‘Obviously he didn’t know my other bad traits, since he just mentioned these few.’”

Studying Epictetus—One cannot secure his own self-interest without contributing to the general welfare—the inmates question their sense of entitlement, their victim mentality, desires and wants, and contemplate how little they need to be happy, even if so many equate the good life with the accumulation of money, power, fame and shiny things. The men grasp the radical practice of gratitude and the Stoic value of work: “I am grateful for what I have and can earn what I want.”

The prison inmates say the Prayer of Cleanthes (330 BC-230 BC). Cleanthes, student of Zeno of Citium and the second head of the Stoic school, was a boxer like inmate Zeno. He became a water carrier who watered the gardens of Rome by night and studied philosophy by day.

Lead on God and Destiny to that goal fixed for me long ago.

I will follow and not stumble.

 Even if my will is weak, I will soldier on.

 Inmate Zeno finds his purpose in facilitating the book club:

“I know I can never undo my crime, but I believe that I still have a purpose on earth and by fulfilling it I will somehow get right with my life again…It doesn’t matter if anyone knows you exist, you know it and God knows it…If character is wealth, I have as much of an opportunity to die a rich man as anyone on the outs.”

*

Before the closed doors of the beige three-level hondo is the bodhisattva of compassion, the eleven-headed Kannon. I sound the small gong. I press the buzzer outside the  office door. An old woman in a long skirt and blouse, her white hair in a bun, smiles and takes our goshuin books. Bowing, I leave her to do her fine temple-red calligraphy and head out to join Lee.

I spot Lee in the park, jeans belted low on his narrow waist, strolling in that tall loping gait of his with camera in hand.  Beneath his baseball cap, his blue eyes squint in the sun, pirate-like, one eye shut and the other open. We reach for each other, my hand curling around his broad palm and long fingers, before letting go, cognizant that in Tokyo we’ve seen almost no public displays of emotion or affection—instead a precise orderliness, elegant courtesy and reserve.

We enjoy the peaceful afternoon.  The hell that was for two centuries Denma-cho prison is emptied. Children play by the bell tower in the park, an office worker sleeps on the bench, and a homeless man eats ramen from a Styrofoam container.

After collecting our goshuin books, we stop at the red-barrel Benten-do by the temple gate with its tiny fountain which flows into a stream and under a miniature red curved bridge beside a red torii gate. The small shrine is dedicated to the four-armed Benzaiten who holds a biwa, lute. Benzaiten’s Indian name is Saraswati. She is the goddess of the arts and the only woman among Japan’s Seven Lucky Gods. As writers, she is our patron goddess, a midwife for a successful creative birth. Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh writes that artists can add to the collective energy of fear and despair, or to that of love.

Lee and I are excited about our collaborative book on Kannon—each of the 33 temples including entries in both our voices. We got together too late to have children together and our pilgrimage book is our creative love child that we hope will add to the collective love.  But for all our noble intentions, we slide into prisons of our own making: Will our Kannon book be published? If it is published, will we have readers? 

If inmate Zeno were here, he would say: “Remember the first line of the Enchiridion? What’s up to us and what’s not up to us.”

“A person’s master is someone who has power over what he craves or fears, either to obtain it or take it away. Whoever wants to be free, therefore let him not crave or fear anything that is up to others. Otherwise he will necessarily be a slave.”

But. For all his wisdom and good example, do I want to meet inmate Zeno?

I cannot confide in him how my neighbors and I chorus fears about transitional housing too-close to our backyards in Mississauga. We worry about violence, theft, needles on the sidewalk, drug deals, the safety of children visiting the adjacent Dairy Queen and the elementary school across the road.  And what about my unease in a summer online memoir class when students spoke and wrote about guards and leg shackles, drug deals, assaults, delusions, fantasies of violence, and schizophrenic identities.

I look for a chink in the walls that imprison my heart. The outward journey of pilgrimage must accompany an inner journey of compassion. I gassho to Jizo Bosatsu who willingly travels to hell realms; to Traylor who worked behind “the Walls”; and, to inmate Zeno and the Epictetus Club for the strength to transform themselves in hell.

Inmate Ross guides the club through the metta, loving-kindness meditation:

May I be peaceful, happy and light in body and spirit.

May I be safe and free from injury.

May I be free from anger, afflictions, fear, and anxiety.

This three-stanza practice offered by the Buddha begins with a wish for oneself, extends to one’s loved ones and acquaintances, then to one’s enemies, and finally to all sentient beings.

The voices of Zeno, Ross, and Animal offer metta as we take the elevator adjacent to Jisshi Koen park down to Kodenmacho station on the Hibiya line, to continue on our pilgrimage.

“May you learn to look at yourself with the eyes of understanding and love. …

May you live fresh, solid and free.”

There are men in prison who pray for you and me.

 

References:

Metta, Loving-kindness meditation excerpted from Thich Nhat Hanh, Happiness: Essential Mindfulness Practices. Parallax Press, 2009.  “This is a love meditation adapted from the Visuddhimagga (The Path of Purification) by Buddhaghosa, a fifth-century CE systematization of the Buddha’s teachings” (pp.113-14).

Jeff Traylor, The Epictetus Club: Lessons from ‘The Walls.’ Papillon Press, 2004.

 

About the Author

Ranjini George holds a PhD and MA in English and an MFA in Creative Writing. She was an Associate Professor of English at Zayed University, Dubai, the United Arab Emirates. She currently teaches in the Creative Writing and Arts and Humanities programs at the University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies, courses such as Meditation and Writing, Stoicism and the Good Life and Buddhism and the Good Life. Her book, Through My Mother’s Window: Emirati Women Tell their Stories and Recipes, was published in Dubai (2016). Her award-winning memoir-in-progress, Miracle of Flowers, follows her path of immigration from Dubai to Canada, the unraveling of her marriage, and transition from evangelical Christianity to an appreciation of other faiths, specifically, Buddhism and Stoicism as a way of living. Her second memoir, a recipient of two Ontario Arts Recommender grants, Days and Nights in Tokyo: The Edo 33-Kannon Pilgrimage, explores love, literature, faith and philosophy and is written in collaboration with her writer and husband, Lee Gowan. Learn more at https://ranjinigeorge.wordpress.com/about or follow her on X @RanjiniGeorge1.