Wonhyo

Bunhwangsa Pagoda around Buddha's Birthday.

Wohnyo's work influenced all of East Asian Buddhism. His commentaries on various texts were widely respected by Buddhist scholars in Korea, China and Japan. As noted by Hee-Sung Keel:

Wŏnhyo, commonly regarded as the greatest thinker in Korean Buddhism, was a prolific writer who produced no less than eighty-six works, of which twenty-three are extant either completely or partially. By his time, most of the important sūtras and treatises had flowed into Korea from China, and they were causing a great deal of confusion for Silla Buddhists, as they had for the Chinese. It was Wŏnhyo's genius to interpret all of the texts known to him in a way that would reveal their underlying unity of truth without sacrificing the distinctive message of each text. He found his hermeneutical key in the famous Mahāyāna text, the Awakening of Faith (Dasheng Qixin Lun).[10]

Wohnyo's collaboration with Uisang directly led to the establishment of the influential Hwaeom (Korean Huayan) school as a major stream of thought in Korea.[1]

Wohnyo is also thought to have founded Korea's lone riverside temple, Silleuksa, in the late 600s. While Wonhyo was in Bunhwangsa (in modern Guhwang-dong, Gyeongju), he wrote a number of books. For such strong association with Wonhyo, a research center and a shrine named Bogwangjeon hall dedicated to Wonhyo's legacy are located in Bunhwangsa.[11]

A key project of Wonhyo was to harmonize the various Buddhist teachings and traditions all of which he saw as non-contradictory. As such, the 'harmonization of disputes' (hwajaeng; 和諍) is central for Wonhyo's philosophical outlook.[1] Wohnyo's works often seek to harmonize the various seemingly contradictory Buddhist teachings found in all of the Buddhist texts by showing how they are based on a single deeper principle.[1]

Wonhyoʼs harmonization methodology is found in almost all his works and often expresses itself in a deep investigation of the root of seemingly conflicting Buddhist doctrines and positions. Wonhyo's generally seeks to show that these variant doctrines often arise from things like the background, biases and motivations of particular authors of doctrinal positions. This approach to doctrinal harmonization is quite different than that of most Chinese commentators who instead rely on hierarchical doctrinal classification schemas (Chinese: panjiao, Korean: pangyo 判教) which placed only some teachings at the top of a doctrinal hierarchy.[1][13] Instead of creating a hierarchy, Wonhyoʼs method seeks to show how the various Buddhist teachings are mutually interconnected in a harmonious whole. As such, Wonhyo criticized thinkers who hierarchically classificed the Dharma like Zhiyi. Wohnyo writes:

You should know that the Buddha's meaning is deep and profound without limit. So if you want [like Chih-i] to divide the scriptural meaning into four teachings, or limit the Buddha's intent with five periods, then this is like using a snail shell to scoop out the ocean, or trying to see the heavens through a narrow tube.[13]

Wonhyo's "Hwajaeng theory" (harmonization of disputes) was summarized in his work Ten Approaches to the Reconciliation of Doctrinal Disputes (Simmun hwajaeng non 十門和諍論, 십문화쟁론). Wonhyo often traces the origin of intra-Buddhist doctrinal conflict to a misunderstanding of linguistic conventions like difference and sameness, and affirmation and negation.[14][15] Ultimately, Wohnyo's analysis of conflicting interpretations of Buddhist doctrine and doctrinal disputes is thus centered on language and on the relationship between names and meanings (which are neither identical nor remain static/fixed).[14] According to Wohnyo, disputes among Buddhist schools often arise due to grasping at literal meaning of words. For him, all Buddhist teachings point to a single truth. As such, Wohnyo writes: "If you take a sentence literally, it could be disagreed with. If you focus on its meaning, you could understand it."[14]

In his Reconciliation of Doctrinal Disputes, Wonhyo proceeds to draw on numerous Buddhist philosophical systems and on the Mahayana sutras like the Lotus Sutra, Nirvana Sutra and Prajñāpāramitā to resolve doctrinal conflicts and demonstrate the compatibility of all of Mahayana Buddhist teachings.[1] For Wohnyo, all Mahayana doctrines are metaphors which point to the same ultimate truth.[14]

Another element of his harmonization method was to draw on Huayan metaphysics of interpenetration to demonstrate how all Buddhist teachings are ultimately in a state of non-obstruction.[13] Thus one can say that Wohnyo saw all Buddhist doctrines as a harmonious interpenetrating reality, and as such he often called his philosophy "interpenetrated Buddhism" (t'ong pulgyo, 通佛教).[1][13]

Wonhyo's philosophy is centered on the "One Mind theory" (Ch: yixinshixiang, 一心思想; Korean: 일심사상). Wŏnhyo's worldview sees the one mind as the ultimate reality which manifests in two aspects:[16]

• “true-thusness”, which is intrinsically pure and unchanging Thusness (Tathātā, 眞如), the ultimate reality, the true nature of the mind, which is without concepts or discrimination, without arising or ceasing.
• “arising-and-ceasing”, which is impure, impermanent, subject to cause and effect and manifests as all forms of samsara and delusion. This is the mind of everyday reality, the mind of suffering (dukkha) and the mind of the six realms.

As such, the One Mind is the non-dual source of all phenomena, the source of both samsara and nirvana, and it contains both purity and ignorance and defilement.[16]

The one mind (一心) theory is drawn from the influential treatise The Mahayana Awakening of Faith (大乘起信論; pinyin: Dàshéng Qǐxìn Lùn) and is discussed in Wonhyo's numerous commentaries.[16] This doctrine is a synthesis of the Mahayana doctrines of the ālayavijñāna (storehouse consciousness) and buddha-nature.[16] The importance of the Awakening of Faith's theories for Wonhyo is proved by the fact that he wrote nine commentaries on this text (only two are extant).[17] The Awakening of Faith's One Mind teaching is one of the central principles which Wonhyo uses to harmonize the various Buddhist teachings.[17]

Another important and related doctrine which Wonhyo relies and expands upon is the Chinese theory of essence-function (體用, Chinese pinyin: tǐ yòng, Korean: che-yong) which is also found in the Awakening of Faith.[13] Essence here refers to pure Suchness, the ultimate reality, i.e. the One Mind; while function refers to all relative phenomena (dharmas).[13] These two aspects are seen by Wonhyo as non-dual, as part of a harmonious whole.[13]

Wonhyo also wrote on and developed the related theory of original enlightenment (Chinese: 本覺; pinyin: běnjué, Korean: bongak), which sees enlightenment as immanent in the mind, though it has to be discovered through purifying the mind and practicing the six paramitas.[13][15] Indeed, for Wohnyo, the ultimate principle (Dharma), the essence or One Mind, is nothing but the principle of enlightenment itself which penetrates the minds of all sentient beings.[13]

According to Wohnyo, liberation or enlightenment means to truly know that all phenomena are the One Mind which is already immanent within the mind of sentient beings. It is thus to understand that we already are enlightenment. As such, enlightenment is also called "returning to the original source".[16] Thus, for Wohnyo, nothing new is attainment in enlightenment, one merely recognizes what is already there.[16]

How does one reach or return to the original enlightenment? For Wohnyo, this happens through the process of "actualizing enlightenment" through which a Buddhist practitioner can move away from the state of non-enlightenment towards the enlightened source (though in reality, these two states are non-dual, not completely separate, but are like waves and the ocean).[16] To actualize enlightenment and let go of ignorance and duality, religious practice is required. As one practices, original enlightenment reveals itself as ignorance and the defilements are gradually eliminated. Indeed, it is through the power of original enlightenment itself that the mind is purified in the process of actualizing enlightenment.[16]

Wonhyo's held that it was possible to apply these deep principles in one's personal everyday life. As such, he met with commoners and elites alike and taught people according to their needs. For the commoners he generally taught a flexible teaching which included Buddhist metaphysics and the simple Pure Land practice of reciting the name of Amitabha with a sincere mind intent on bodhicitta.[13]

In 2011, retired Canadian journalist Tony MacGregor walked across the Korean Peninsula in an attempt to understand the awakening experience of Wonhyo. Legend says that Wonhyo walked across the peninsula in the 7th century and found enlightenment in a cave on the western side of the peninsula. MacGregor's journey, which involved staying at mountain monasteries and talking to monks, was the first in over 1,000 years to honor Wonhyo's accomplishment. A documentary film of the walk was completed [22] and a project to establish a permanent pilgrimage trail is currently being developed.[23]