What is the Ekayana?

 Eka = one, single. Yana = vehicle or the way or track the vehicle travels on. 

 I translate Ekayana as "One Vehicle," Mahayana is Great Vehicle, Dviyana is Two Vehicles, and Triyana is Three Vehicles. There is, in some circles, confusion about the word because of the similarity to the Christian term "One Way." In Buddhism, the One Vehicle is not "the One Way" in the Christian sense of exclusivity as "the one and only way to get salvation by professing faith in Jesus Christ." In Buddha Dharma, the One Vehicle is an all-inclusive way, the one great Buddha vehicle that allows all people to work out their liberation and become Buddhas.

 In the Lankavatara Sutra the Buddha declares, "The way to realise the path of the Ekayana is to understand that the process of perception is due to discrimination; when this discrimination no longer takes place, and when one abides in the suchness of things, there is the realisation of the Vehicle of Oneness.” (Studies in the Lankavatara Sutra, by D.T. Suzuki, p.361.)

 

 D.T. Suzuki wrote: "Besides this Ekayana and Dviyana, the Mahayana sutras generally speak of Triyana, which consists of the Sravaka-yana, Pratyekabuddha-yana, and Bodhisattva-yana. But we must remember that the Ekayana has really nothing to do with the number of Yanas though eka means 'one'; eka in this case rather means 'oneness,' and Ekayana is the designation of the doctrine teaching the transcendental oneness of things, by which all beings inclusive of the Hinayanists and Mahayanists are saved from the bondage of existence." (Studies in the Lankavatara Sutra, by D.T. Suzuki, p. 359.)

 

 Zen in China is the lineage of the One Vehicle brought by Bodhidharma. As stated in the Continued Biographies of Eminent Monks, the Second Ancestor Huike taught the Lankavatara Sutra according to how he learned it from Bodhidharma by "relying on the One Vehicle (Ekayana) lineage of Southern India (依南天竺一乘宗)."  (Cf. Studies in the Lankavatara Sutra, by D.T. Suzuki, p. 51-51 and 54-55, and The Platform Sutra of the Sixth Patriarch by Philip B. Yampolsky, p.29,n.87.)  The essence of the One Vehicle is what Bodhidharma called “entering by principle”: awakening with the deep faith that holds beings are the same one true nature.

 The origins are clouded in historical uncertainty, but approximately 500 years after the Buddha, a new movement came out of the clouds restoring vitality to the Buddha Dharma. The story as I see it, necessarily briefly: the One Vehicle movement was the response to the sectarianism of the period known as “the Eighteen Schools.” Under the schism between the school of the Elders, the Sthaviravada, and the new school of the Great Assembly, the Mahasanghikas, each branch further subdivided over splitting hairs of doctrine. There is no definitive count, but for conventional purposes they were called “the 18 schools.”  The One Vehicle movement held that nit-picking divisions like those of the 18 Schools were nonsense in the light of the Buddha’s Dharma that teaches one taste of liberation.  The One Vehicle perspective is that all schools teaching awakening are the One Vehicle of the Buddha, i.e., the One Buddha Vehicle. As a synonym, the term Great Vehicle, Mahayana, arose to indicate that the One Vehicle was so great that followers of all vehicles had a place in the Buddha’s Vehicle. “Again, we see that the term ‘Ekayana’ appears in the place where Buddha’s Ontological doctrines are dealt with, while on the contrary when there is an indication of Buddha’s personality or his theory upon nhuman beings then the terms ‘Buddhayana’ and ‘Bodhisattvayana’ were used.” (Buddhist Sects and Sectarianism, by Bibhuti Baruah, p. 79.)  At this phase, the monk-scholars of the 18 Schools and of the Mahayana “worked, each in his own tradition of scholarship, side by side in the monasteries of India, but their works were resultantly different in form as well as in kind and quality.” (Buddhist Monks and monasteries of India, by Sukumar Dutt, p.248.)

 However, as are human proclivities to grasp onto concepts for personal gain and imaginings of superiority, even  Buddhists succumbed to the temptation to put their views above others, and these people among the Mahayana then appropriated the term Great Vehicle in a narrowed sense to denigrate the followers of the 18 schools as the Small or Lesser Vehicle, the Hinayana.   These followers interpreted the Mahayana as an exclusive vehicle not an all-inclusive vehicle. They then said that their Great Vehicle was the Bodhisattva Vehicle, the third vehicle as opposed to the small vehicles of the two vehicles of listener-disciples (sravakas) and pratyekabuddhas. In this scheme, all the 18 Schools were swept into the first of the two-vehicle categories of sravakas, the listener-disciples. The second of the two-vehicle categories was the pratyekabuddhas; these are people who awaken not by following the teaching that is heard, but by working out or receiving their liberation by awakening independently.  

 

 The third vehicle, that of the Bodhisattavayana, established the family of the Prajnaparamita Sutras and elaborated the Six, and later the Ten, Paramitas as the path of the Bodhisattva in contradistinction to the Eightfold Path of the listener-disciples.  The Dharma taught in what is now the extant Pali Canon was called the First Turning of the Wheel of Dharma in accord with the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta: “Setting the Wheel of Dhamma in Motion.”  To distinguish the teaching of the Prajnaparamita Sutras, this family of Sanskrit Sutras was proclaimed to be “The Second Turning of the Wheel of Dharma,” and with its usual self-erasing language, the Prajnaparamita states “They turn the wheel of Dharma, but they do not turn any dharma forward or backward. They do not behold any dharma, nor do they demonstrate any dharma. And why? Because that dharma cannot be apprehended which could turn forward or backward.” (As translated by Edward Conze in “The Large Sutra of Perfect Wisdom” p..311.)

 

 The relation of these two turnings of the Wheel of Dharma was that of thesis and antithesis. Without going into the ins and outs of the controversies, suffice it to say that this Second Turning itself became misunderstood.  Where the Prajnaparamita Sutra said that the three inherent and universal positions of reality, as the three gates of liberation, emptiness, signlessness, and desirelessness (the third interpreted in Zen as “wuwei” non activity and “buji” no-affairs) are equal, in the analysis of the later interpreters like Nagarjuna, emptiness became valorized as the primacy of the three. And on the question of own-being or own-nature (svabhava) the Sutra said “Moreover, Subhuti, all dharmas have emptiness for own-being, the signless, the wishless.  Moreover, Subhuti, all dharmas have Suchness (tathata) for own-being, the Reality limit (bhutakoti), the Dharma-element (dhrmadhatu).” Thus, emptiness and Suchness are synonyms in the Prajnaparamita Sutra. However, the Prajnaparamita scholars emphasized emptiness above Suchness and treated Suchness as a reified delusion.  

 

 The Prajnaparamita scholars saw themselves as correcting the mistakes of the First Turning of the Wheel by their antithesis philosophy. However, others said that they went too far and in turn reified emptiness making it into a nihilistic philosophy. This brought forth the resurgence of the One Vehicle movement that said the equation of the Bodhisattva Vehicle with the Mahayana was really an error and the true Great Vehicle was the One Vehicle, not a Bodhisattva Vehicle that is a third vehicle in relation to the two vehicles called Small Vehicles.In other words, Ekayana does not accept the idea that the so-called Hinayana and Mahayana are mutually exclusive or irreconcilable.  This One Vehicle movement produced the Mahayana One Vehicle Sutras that became called the Third Turning of the Wheel of Dharma, as the synthesis of the First Turning, as thesis, and the Second Turning, as antithesis, to create a coherent whole to the Buddha Dharma.  These One Vehicle Sutras include:

 

The White Lotus of the True Dharma Sutra - Saddharmapundarika Sutra;

The Union With Deliverance Sutra - The Samdhinirmocana Sutra;

The Lion's Roar of Queen Srimala Sutra  - Srimaladevi Simhanada Sutra;

The Going Down to Lanka Sutra - The Lankavatara Sutra;

The Flower Garland Sutra - Avatamsaka Sutra;

 The Great Complete Nirvana Sutra - Mahayana Mahaparinirvana Sutra;

Shurangama Sutra -  Śūraṅgama Sutra;

The Diamond Samadhi Sutra – Vajrasamadhi Sutra;

The Great Dharma Drum Sutra - Mahābherīhāraka-parivarta Sutra;and

The Non-regressing Wheel Sutra - Avaivartikacakra Sutra.

A quick look at this list shows that these are considered among the most important Mahayana Sutras that are not in the Prajnaparamita family of Sutras. Each of these sutras presents the One Vehicle perspective on the theme generally presented in the sutra, for example, the Lankavatara Sutra is on the theme of the psychology of awakening and the Lotus Sutra is on the theme of faith in awakening and the use of expedient means to arouse the faith.  

 The Sutra of Queen Srimala’s Lion’s Roar has the distinction of being the Sutra that presents the Entry into the One Vehicle most comprehensively as the Acceptance of the Real Dharma. The protagonist, Queen Srimala, is unique among Buddhist Sutras as a lay person and a woman who is at the highest Bodhisattva stages and receives the affirmation of future Buddhahood by the Buddha. Queen Srimala’s Sutra has sections presenting the One Vehicle perspective on all the major themes of Buddha Dharma, the Four Noble Truths, Nirvana, Emptiness, Tathagatagarbha, etc.

 

 Notable masters of the Zen lineage teaching the One Vehicle include Bodhidharma, “the first Ancestor” of the Chinese lineage; Sengcan, "The Third Ancestor" (“If you desire to take hold of the One Vehicle (Ekayana), do not despise the six dusts.”); Hongren, “The Fifth Ancestor” (“Indeed, for this reason the Tathagata accords with this gate of mind to lead them to enter the One Vehicle.” “This discourse reveals the One Vehicle to be the lineage, so that it arrives at the meaning for those destined for confusion about the Way.); Huineng, “The Sixth Ancestor”; Shitou; Matsu; Baizhang; Zongmi; Huangbo; Jinul of Korea; Dahui; Dogen; Hakuin; and Torei.  

 

As you can see, many Zen masters taught the One Vehicle.  I'd like to ask people to share and post in the comments section any references to the One Vehicle by these or other Zen/Chan masters that you have come across.

 In gratitude, _/|\_

 

The Intimate Idea of the One Vehicle

.

In the transplantation of Buddhism to the West, the One Vehicle of the Buddha Dharma is often misunderstood.  The terms “the West” and “westernization” are admittedly problematic generalizations in themselves, but are handy labels for the cultural world view into which Buddha Dharma is now being transplanted from the Eastern countries of Japan, Korea, Vietnam, China, Tibet, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, Sri Lanka, etc.  This accommodation, acclimation, and acculturation process is sometimes called the modernization or naturalization of Buddhism, and when focused on Buddha Dharma in the USA is often called the Americanization of Buddhism. 

 

Western/American Buddhists need to address justifications of their existence as a distinct group within Western/American culture. The cultural conditions of India were not the same as the cultural conditions of China, Korea, and Japan, and none of them are the same as the cultural conditions of the West. It is necessary for Western Buddhists to reach some form of accommodation with Western values and sociopolitical structures and functions in order for Buddha Dharma to take root and thrive in the Western cultural ground. In China, the two main streams of cultural conditions and values that Buddhism had to address were Confucianism and Daoism.  In the West, the two main streams of cultural conditions and values that Buddhists must address are the Judeo-Christian God-based theologies and scientific materialism. 

 

On the one hand, we in the West need to engage in the two-pronged hermeneutical process of first identifying the teaching of the Buddha Dharma and then correctly interpreting it. On the other hand, we need to make accommodations to Western languages and perspectives that allow for the transplantation of Buddhist ideas without corrupting their meaning. Already in the last 50 years, we have seen examples of both successful and corrupted accommodation strategies. In my view, one of the most promising bridges for transplanting Buddha Dharma to the West and making sense of the apparently confusing variety of Buddhist schools and practices is the One Vehicle.

To understand, appreciate, and support this process of transplantation, we should look at the history and prior experience of how Buddhism came to the East (i.e., to China) from what was considered their West in India. And to understand how the Chinese made sense of the confusing diversity of Buddhism we must have an appreciation of how the Chinese "analyzed the teachings" (panjiao) as they received them in unorganized and disorganized piecemeal translations from missionaries of different lineages and sects. However, none of the Chinese analyses of the teachings (panjiao) can be understood without appreciating the role of the One Vehicle.  Likewise, on the other hand, all of the limitations and shortcomings of the traditional Chinese taxonomical systems for the teachings may be understood by their mistakes related to the One Vehicle.

The Chinese correctly understood that the One Vehicle teaching was the orienting principle that make sense out of the diversity of the Buddhist teachings, however, they still fell prey to the human weakness of sectarianism. This is especially ironic because the One Vehicle movement itself was formed as the response to Buddhist sectarianism in India as exemplified by what was called "the 18 Schools."  However, when the One Vehicle came to China, the Chinese commentarial masters all too often failed to fully appreciate the One Vehicle and lost sight of the forest for seeing the trees. 

So while they often, and correctly, saw the One Vehicle as the "complete" or "perfect" (as in the perfection of a circle) teaching, they failed to see and understand the One Vehicle's universal inclusiveness, and instead they either took the One Vehicle as a separate teaching, distinguished from the other vehicles or took the One Vehicle as primarily attached to one Sutra and then claimed that that their favorite one Sutra was the superior sutra to all others.  Both these ideas are deeply mistaken. Thus, analyses of the teachings were created that gave "pride of place" to the Lotus Sutra, the Nirvana Sutra, the Flower Garland Sutra (Avatamsaka, Huayan), etc. But by putting a single One Vehicle Sutra above the other One Vehicle Sutras, these systems revealed that they really did not understand the purport of the One Vehicle. 

Also, some of the commentators argued that the One Vehicle was a "fourth vehicle" that was separate from and in addition to the Three Vehicles. This, too, was a grave mistake.  To understand the One Vehicle is to see that all the One Vehicle Sutras are equal without any of them being above the others, and to realize that the One Vehicle is not a separate vehicle but is the perspective that includes and embraces the Three Vehicles harmoniously.

Of the Chinese developers of the panjiao analyses of the teachings, only Guifeng Zongmi (780-841)developed a classification system that understood the One Vehicle as a nonsectarian movement that was the essence of the Zen, and the Zen motto of not being established on writings. Thus, his analysis of the teachings was not established on one sutra or another, but on the teachings as they were organized across and throughout the sutras.  Zongmi was both a master in the Huayan school and the Zen school, so he was uniquely situated to see that the One Vehicle was not solely appropriated to the Huayan Sutra (the Flower Garland Sutra) but was the essential teaching presented in all the One Vehicle Sutras such as the Flower Garland, Lotus, Nirvana, Lankavatara, Samdhinirmocana, etc.  Bodhidharma, the ancestral anchor of all of the Zen teaching lineages was said to have brought the "One Vehicle lineage of Southern India" to China for the correct understanding of the Lankavatara Sutra.

Especially troubling within some of the systems for analyzing the teachings was the creation of a spurious category called the "separate" teaching of the One Vehicle. This idea proclaimed that the One Vehicle was a fourth vehicle wholly separate from the Three Vehicles of disciples, pratyekabuddhas, and bodhisattvas. Most, but not all, of the Huayan commentators adopted this erroneous view, however, due to his Zen training Zongmi did not.

I recently translated a small section of the  Samdhinirmocana Sutra on this point. The  Samdhinirmocana Sutra is a One Vehicle Sutra that is often mistakenly called a "Yogacara Text" because it was adopted by the Chinese Yogacara proponents who appropriated certain sections of the Sutra to their Yogacara doctrines.  In this Sutra, the Buddha engages in questions and answers with ten bodhisattvas including Subhuti, Maitreya, Avalokitesvara, and Manjusri.  In the section of exchange with Avalokitesvara, Avalokitesvara asks about the One Vehicle teaching because it seems that the Buddha is saying all the prior teachings are within the One Vehicle and not separate from it.  The Buddha makes it clear that the vehicle of the disciples and the vehicle of the bodhisattvas are themselves not really separate, but only appear separate because of the way they are taught. Here's my translation:

~~~

Avalokitesvara bodhisattva again addressed the Buddha and declared, “World Honored One. it is such that the World Honored One articulates as if the Listener-disciple Vehicle and again as if the Great Vehicle are only the One Vehicle. What is the intimate idea of this?”

Buddha told Avalokitesvara bodhisattva saying, “Good Son, it is as if from within the Listener-disciple Vehicle, that I proclaim and articulate the own-nature of every kind of the various things (dharmas), and actually designate the five clusters (skandhas), or the internal six loci, or the external six loci, and such are the classifications. Then accordingly, from within the Great Vehicle, I articulate that Dharma that is identical with the One Dharma-realm and identical with the One Universal Principle.

"For that reason, I do not articulate that the nature of the vehicles is different, or from within them that there are such words by which the false meanings may give rise to discriminating one classification [of vehicle] as aggrandized and one classification as diminished. Or again, that from various vehicles, different principles of the Way are designated that oppose each other and thus are unfolded to convey and generate disputations. So within this is what is called the intimate idea.” (T16n0676_p0708a13 to a21)

~~~

[Note: The internal six loci are the six "places" of sensory reception, and the external six loci are the six "places" of sensory data, and together the six inner loci and six outer loci are the twelve loci, the twelve ayatanas (十二處) or locations within the field of the mind.]

 

Thus, all the commentators who argued that the One Vehicle was a separate teaching of the principles of the Way were in direct opposition to the actual One Vehicle and specifically to this sutra's presentation of the One Vehicle. The One Vehicle does not pump up the Mahayana (Great Vehicle) and deflate the teachings of the Two Vehicles of Arhats (fully accomplished disciples) and pratyekabuddhas. If anyone claims that the Great Vehicle is enlarged by the One Vehicle, while the vehicle of the disciples and Arhats is lessened by the One Vehicle, then that person does not perceive or receive the intimate idea of the One Vehicle.