An Arrow to the Heart: A Commentary on the Heart Sutra [Paperback]

 

 

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Reading Ken McLeod's new work, "An Arrow To The Heart: A Commentary on the Heart Sutra", is akin to entering into a conversation with not only one's lifelong friends, but also a 2500 year-old panoply of nimble minds, both "eastern" and "western". This line by line exegesis of this classic Prajnaparamita sutra is, as the jacket blurb suggests, "trail-blazing and non-traditional." Others have noted with relief that this text comprises an avenue of approach to this work that invites a direct and experiential understanding as opposed to one that demands a scholastic or analytic response. This reviewer concurs, wholeheartedly.

My first exposure to the text of the Heart Sutra in its entirety was in Edward Conze's "Buddhist Wisdom Books", second edition, 1966. I picked it up on a trip to Berkeley in the late `60s, at Shambala Books on Telegraph Avenue. Since Conze first published his translation in 1957, when such texts were primarily of interest to a rarified academic audience, there have been numerous translations and commentaries, Red Pine's being one of the most recent and accessible of these. Red Pine significantly notes that as part of the Prajnaparamita, we are being introduced to a source of understanding that depends not on jnana (knowledge), but prajna (wisdom). Indeed, he suggests "the Heart Sutra must be Prajnaparamita's womb, with our conception and subsequent birth made possible by the mantra at the end of the sutra." In the 50 years from the publication of Conze's original translation, the sutra has moved from being an object of academic knowledge, to its repositioning as a subjective space of awakening.

In his own introduction, Ken McLeod states his intention with clarity: to elicit the experience of a moment of being completely awake and present, an experience that is "beyond explanation." His method here is analogous on one hand to Dzogchen-Mahamudra pointing out instructions, or Rinzai dokusan koan transmission, and on the other, to the deconstructivist and multi-perspectivist insights of Post-Modernism.

How might we judge whether he is successful? To some extent, this question hinges upon another, that of "tradition". In the "tradition", commentaries are generally intended to provide an "understanding" of a text. Elucidation of historical context, interpretation, and lexical analysis are among the tools employed in such an endeavor. Ken's "non-traditional" approach is more poetic. The central element of the text itself does scan like a series of poems, linked to individual words or lines of the Heart Sutra itself. The poem is followed by an auto-commentary, which in turn is followed by allusions to historical and textual references. The overall structure may leave the reader with the experience of a kaleidoscopic view or three-dimensional depth and transparency.

As with a poem, the reader and her reading becomes focal. It is the experience of the reader, of the "practitioner" that is primary. In his brilliantly agnostic "Buddhism Without Beliefs", Stephen Batchelor suggests that "awakening is no longer seen as something to attain in the distant future, for it is not a thing but a process - and the this process is the path itself." So it is with Ken's book, "Arrow To The Heart". From this perspective, it is a "practice" text, with which one develops a relationship, in which "practice" is both path and fruition.

Mention must be made of both the cover, featuring a stunning photograph of dancer-choreographer Gail Gustafson, a black and red clad archer in a field of snowy trees, and the whimsical illustrations by Dick Allen, a Vancouver graphic artist whose humor provides a brilliant counterpoint to the text.

I highly recommend this book. You can feel the gesture of the author's hand in every word, written with careful intent, yet no word locks you up, tells you where to be or gives you an outcome, the result of which leaves you wide open.

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