Expert: Joe McSorley - 3/4/2007

Question
I've noticed that in several answers you've insisted that Zen does not believe in reincarnation.  If this is the case, that Zen holds neither reincarnation nor heaven/hell based views of the afterlife, then what view is there?  Nothingness?  Are all afterlives the same for everyone regardless of our Earthly lives, and if so, what is the point?  Doesn't life become trivial if there is nothing to follow it?

Answer
Dear Wayne,
If you’ve been reading some of my past answers then you’ve most likely noticed that when reincarnation is asked about the story of the poison arrow sutra comes up.  From the Zen standpoint since nothing can be definitively settled on this argument it becomes a futile cause, like wanting to know the poison in the arrow rather than removing it.  Zen doesn’t talk about the idea of an afterlife for many reasons.  For one, it begs the question who was it that was born and it going to die or reincarnates?  How can we talk about an after life when we don’t know who we are that is born?  Any idea we have about this is a premise based on knowing who or what we are and we don’t know that. Who were you before your birth?  We can hold any viewpoint we want but that does not make it a reality.  Belief in Santa does not make him real though many children with fervent innocence believe firmly in him.  There are no beliefs for nature, there is just pure life.  For Zen the problem lies right here and now and not in some conjectured future.  Ultimately, what does it matter what we believe about an afterlife when it is all so arbitrary?  Different religions have entirely different views on this topic so who can claim to be right in what is an unprovable premise?  Some of these systems create a fanaticism like we see in the Middle East because of particular afterlife beliefs but does that make it valid or right?  From the Zen standpoint if you know who you really are then you are free from birth and death and the afterlife is not an issue.  If you don’t know it doesn’t matter what you believe because there is nothing to sustain that belief.
  There are so many various views on the afterlife I can see why belief in these ideas may not give comfort to some people while for others they are happy to stick with their beliefs.  In the Tibetan idea of reincarnation where your aggregates can split into different rebirths really does nothing to sustain the idea of an individual’s comfort after death because there is no individual.  If we are living just for an afterlife then life is passing us by.  There is a common view among believers of the Western religions that without a template for good and evil, such as the Bible, then what is the motive for being good?  I find this a very cynical view of the human condition and life in general.  Nature does not live in a state of moral decay because it doesn’t have a dogma to follow. Quite to the contrary there is a harmony of life and death in nature, while man, living outside of nature, is the one who has the moral decay.  If you believe in an after life you should live your life to the best, right?  And if you don’t isn’t that more impetus to live your life to the best knowing that this might be all there is?  If you believe that an afterlife is a strictly human thing and if so, then the rest of nature has no afterlife, so is all of Nature’s life meaningless and trivial?   Why is man’s life so much more important that the rest of the planet? Emeralds are more precious because there are so few of them, if they were abundant they would have little value.   Our lives are very short and very precious because of it.  The rest of nature lives fully in the moment as it is and not for some after life so why do humans need this?
 It seems to me that one of the things you want to know about here is justice, not just should I get rewarded for being good but shouldn’t the evil be punished for their deeds.
Here the idea of karma, meaning cause and effect, comes more into light because the good live closer to wholeness in nature while the evil are always in turmoil.  I understand the desire for hoping there is justice in the world and the bad will get punished but I find it wasteful to live my life hoping for what I want to be rather than seeing what is.  If there were an afterlife this might get settled but more importantly for our lives in this moment is; since you are alive now you should be doing all you can to awaken now because you might not get the chance to do it for millennia.   This should make life very precious in the moment for you don’t know what is to come and would want to guarantee a good future.
  I hope this helps you.  Take care,
               Joe