On throwing plastic chairs at fighting dogs

When I told a Buddhist teacher that was I serving in Peace Corps he thanked me for my "life of sincerity." I believe he did this because he assumed that my service was motivated by a desire to help relieve the suffering of others. (It was, in part. I also wanted to learn Spanish.) The one-word name for this motivation is "compassion," which is the key Buddhist virtue.

This seems beautiful and simple, but like any other world religion Buddhism is subdivided into different schools of thought and what exactly constitutes "compassion" is a matter of debate. There are probably as many different Buddhist interpretations of compassion as there understandings of God's Love among the different Christian churches.

Zen, the Buddhist school in which I have principally practiced, teaches a very specific understanding of compassion. It is not the self-sacrifice of Christ, nor charity, nor generalized goodwill toward all beings. This is all good stuff but it's just not compassion. In Zen, compassion is not just the desire to help but the correct extension of help itself. And help, also, is a complicated notion.

Sometimes when we "help" someone we do them no favors. We "help" them because it makes us feel good about ourselves and thus we do things that are unnecessary or downright counterproductive. Which is to say no help at all. Sometimes the best help is no help at all! Every parent knows that sometimes the most compassionate thing you can do for your child is to consciously withhold aid so that they will develop the capacity to do things for themselves.

Zen, in all things, is wary of multiplying entities beyond necessity and compassion is no exception. Dogen, perhaps Japan's greatest Zen Master explained Buddhist compassion by likening it to a sleeping person who adjusts their pillow in the middle of the night. They do it selflessly, without thinking of anything at all, let alone how good it will make them look. And they do it just right. No more or less than necessary and without some complicated system of ethics to justify their actions.

The checkered history of international aid is full of examples of ego-gratifying help that was really no help at all. In my Peace Corps service I think a lot about how to get things just right. I tend to err on the side of caution. Many times, it seems like so much more work would get done (and faster!) if I just pushed my Dominican counterparts aside and did things for them. But where will that leave them after I leave?

Instead, I ask questions to make them think, answer questions when I actually have the answers, and show them how to do the things that I know how that they do not, even if it takes me longer than I'd like. I am unsure if this is approach is compassionate. Sometimes though, my work here presents a situation where it is so perfectly clear what help is needed that the compassionate thing almost does itself.

The other day I visited a Dominican counterpart at her home to offer her my aid in preparing for an important, upcoming meeting. Her literacy is only so-so and though she did not ask, I imagined that she would appreciate my help composing the report required of her. She accepted my offer readily and, no, that is not the compassionate act I am talking about.

We sat in plastic picnic chairs on her front patio so she could keep an eye on the kids and as we talked I petted the following dog:

¡Superma'!

He is not mine but follows me around because, unlike many of the humans he is used to, I am kind to him and, no, that is not the compassionate act I am talking about. That virtue that is commonly translated as "loving kindness."

In the middle of our conversation, in the blink of an eye, my friends' dog confronted and attacked the dog whose head was in my lap.

There is nothing faster than fighting dogs but I was almost as fast. In the span of a second I stood, lifted the chair on which I had been sitting and launched it into the furry fray. This act so startled the dogs that they parted and fled their separate ways.

That is compassion.

The dogs might have hurt each other - they were certainly trying too! They might have hurt my friend or the children playing nearby. If I had tried to intervene more directly I might have gotten hurt. And the implement of my intervention was soft enough that it didn't hurt the dogs. It was just right.

The dogs were fighting because they were angry. Buddhism teaches that anger is one of the three poisons that we must never ingest if we ever wish to be enlightened. Yes, I am aware that dogs enjoy fighting- as do people. But Buddhism teaches that attachments to the excitements of the body (and fighting is exciting if nothing else!) will not lead dogs or people out out of suffering. Yes, Buddhism teaches that the suffering of dogs is important, and what is more, that dogs have what it takes to be enlightened. Yes, Buddhism is kind of weird.

I am confident of everything in the above two paragraphs but I had reasoned none of this before acting. I just chucked the chair like a sleeping woman reaching for her pillow and it was just right.

When the dogs were gone, I grabbed the chair again and sat on it and we resumed our conversation as if nothing major had happened.