BUDDHACARITA 4.70: Tact & Delicacy

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dākṣiṇyam-auṣadhaṁ strīṇāṁ dākṣiṇyaṁ bhūṣaṇaṁ param |

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dākṣiṇya-rahitaṁ rūpaṁ niṣpuṣpam-iva kānanam || 4.70

4.70

For women, tact and delicacy are medicine;

Tact and delicacy are the highest adornment;

Beautiful form without tact and delicacy

Is like a garden without flowers.

COMMENT:

In general puṣpa means (1) flower, but the dictionary states that in drama it also means (2) gallantry, politeness, declaration of love. So today's verse may include a play on that double meaning.

In any event, a more fundamental double-meaning once again centres on the ambiguity of the genitive form strīnam, “for women” (as also in 4.67 and 4.68), which allows women to be understood as either the objects to which men should show dākṣiṇyam or as the subjects who themselves may possess dākṣiṇyam.

The former meaning is the ostensible meaning, in which case dākṣiṇyam might most naturally be translated as “gallantry” or perhaps as “good manners” or “courtesy” or “graciousness”; but I think Aśvaghoṣa's intention was that we should also dig out and consider the latter meaning, in which case dākṣiṇyam might be better understood as an expression of dexterity, or skill, or attentive consideration of means, or tactfulness, or – in the final analysis, for a woman or a man seated alone on a round black cushion – as an expression of delicacy of movement.

Dākṣiṇyam is derived from from dakṣiṇa, which indicates right-handedness, and hence dexterity or skillfulness. As a translation that preserves the original ambiguity, I considered “graciousness,” one of whose definitions is marked by tact and delicacy. Then, having slept on it, I realized that “tact and delicacy” might be the closest I could get, to both the ostensible and the hidden meaning of dākṣiṇyam.

I will change the translation of the 3rd pāda of 4.69 accordingly (“With tact and delicacy that befit such a beautiful form”). I may also go back and change the translation of a-dākṣiṇyam in 4.66 (from “unchivalrous” to “tactless”).

Though admittedly my judgement is biased by a load of bitter experience, I read today's verse as a criticism of the attitude – so common in Japan – which places form above content.

By neatly arranging a nicely-sewn robe, through judicious use of professional lighting, and by straightening himself up into what looks from the outside like “a good sitting posture” any unenlightened old bloke can make himself look in a photograph something like what people expect a Zen master to look like. If he is good with words, or by keeping his mouth shut in mock noble silence, he may be able to make himself sound like a Zen master to boot. But if he lacks real understanding of the delicacy of movement which is at the centre of what Dogen called “the subtle method which is supreme and free of doing" (最上 無為の妙 術; SAIJO MU-I NO MYO-JUTSU) what is the point of all that dressing up?

To say it with all due tact and delicacy, there is fuck all point in all that dressing up.

Dogen wrote:

HISASHIKU

for a long time

MOZO NI NARAUTE

having studied under a fake elephant

SHINRYU O AYASHIMURU KOTO NAKARE

do not doubt a real dragon.

I'm not trying to say that I am the real dragon. I am bearing witness to the fact that I studied for a long time under a fake elephant – a fake elephant who conned me when I was a gullible young bloke, a fake elephant who wrote a book called “To Meet the Real Dragon.”

You couldn't make it up.

VOCABULARY

dākṣiṇyam (nom. sg.): n. dexterity , skill , officiousness , gallantry , kindness , consideration , piety

dakṣiṇa: m. the right (hand or arm) ; mfn. able , clever , dexterous ; right (not left) ; straightforward , candid , sincere , pleasing , compliant

auṣadham (nom. sg.): n. herbs collectively , a herb ; n. herbs used in medicine , simples , a medicament , drug , medicine in general

strīṇām (gen. pl.): f. women

dākṣiṇyam (nom. sg.): n. dexterity , skill , officiousness , gallantry , kindness , consideration , piety

bhūṣaṇam (nom. sg. n.): embellishment , ornament , decoration

param (nom. sg. n.): mfn. best or worst , highest , supreme

dākṣiṇya-rahitam (nom. sg. n.): without gallantry

rahita: mfn. deserted by , separated or free from , deprived or void or destitute of (instr. or comp.)

rūpam (nom. sg.): n. outward appearance, handsome form, beauty

niṣpuṣpam (nom. sg. n.): without flowers

puṣpa: n. flower ; (in dram.) gallantry , politeness , declaration of love

iva: like

kānanam (nom. sg.): n. (said to be fr. √kan, to be pleased) a forest , grove

順女心爲樂 順爲莊嚴具
若人離於順 如樹無花果