Sake and Tea: A Translation of the Shucharon

In this article, I will examine Mahayana Buddhist teachings based on the “one mind in two aspects,” focusing on a sixteenth-century Japanese Buddhist writing entitled Shucharon 酒茶論 (“A Debate on Sake and Tea”). The Shucharon contains over two thousand words in Classical Chinese prose. This text illustrates the author Ranshuku 蘭叔 (fl. 16th century) both as a reclusive monk (Kanjin 閑人) and as a bodhisattva (Bosatsu 菩薩). The aim of the text is to ask a question of whether a bodhisattva possesses afflictions (Skt. kleshas). The work highlights the idea of exchanging questions and answers (mondo 問答). This idea can be part of a practice leading to the awakening of Buddhahood by fully discussing every possible means. In the text, sake, as amrta (good medicine), has cause for thirty-six mistakes. Tea, as tathatā (suchness) has cause for awakening. Accordingly, sake and tea both imply two opposite Buddhist notions. One is regarded as buddha-nature (Skt. buddha-dhātu) or suchness (Skt. tathatā): the other is regarded as ignorance (Skt. avidyā) or afflictions (Skt kleshas). While sake and tea can be described as something completely different, these drinks must be interpreted as no separation in the framework of Buddhist notions. The awareness stimulates the virtue of being released from habitual tendencies or dispositions (Skt. vāsanā). Being conscious about the duality in non- duality leads to the cognitive principle that one can have the potential to attain the realization of nothingness (or emptiness). It is in this context that this notion often comes to be debated within the larger framework of “Zen Buddhism.” It is most likely that the text can be best described neither as a pan-East Asian “playful writing” nor as a “vernacular playful writing.” This article includes the first English translation of the Shucharon in the appendix. I hope to further explore a new field of research in medieval Japanese literary studies by being approached from the perspective of Japanese Buddhism.