Not understanding the true intent of “the evil person is the true object (of Amida Buddha’s concern)” can lead to dire consequences. Those words can lead to the assumption that they encourage us to do wrong. Actually, however, they point in exactly the opposite direction. Because our present society is in such a spiritually desolate state, if those words actually encouraged committing evil acts, they would cause irreparable harm.

That is why, as the Venerable Master is quoted in Article Thirteen of the “Notes Lamenting Differences,” he was very careful to note:

We should not take poison just because there is an antidote.

That is also why we must consider what “evil” is.

Evil comes in many different forms. There is the evil of breaking civil laws such as killing and stealing. There is the evil of immoral conduct, which while not illegal, is not beneficial to society. And then there is religious evil which is sensed only after reflecting on what sort of being we truly are.

What the Venerable Master meant when he referred to “evil” is religious evil.

As mentioned in Chapter One where I discussed the salvation of “Buddha-centered power,” the Venerable Master was an extremely introspective person. In Article Two of “Notes Lamenting Differences,” he is quoted as saying:

… I am incapable of any other practice, so hell is decidedly my abode whatever I do.

Because I (Shinran) am such an evil person and absolutely incapable of performing any religious practice that will redeem me, there is no place for me to go other than hell. That is how evil the Venerable Master considered himself to be. There are many other places in his writings where he refers to himself as an evil person.

And then there is the passage already quoted where the Venerable Master clearly indicates that he himself is that evil person:

Since even a good person can be born in the Pure Land, how much more so will an evil person?

Usually, even when we say things such as, “Many evil persons exist in this world,” we do not include ourselves in that group. The evil person that the Venerable Master had in mind when he said, “The evil person is the correct object (of Amida Buddha’s concern,” however, was Shinran himself. This is an extremely important point.

The famed Japanese writer, Akutagawa Ryunosuke (1892-1927), who wrote the story that was made into the award-winning motion picture Rashomon, wrote another short story titled “A Spider’s Thread” (Kumo no ito). The central character in this story is named Kandata, a career criminal who killed people, robbed them, and set fire to their houses. He fell into hell after leaving this world because of the sort of person he was.

Bad as Kandata was, however, there was one thing he did while living in this world that could be considered good. And that was, once, while walking deep in the forest, he came across a spider busily spinning its web. Ordinarily Kandata would have torn the web to make his way through, but that one time, he changed direction in order to not destroy it. Because of that one good act, the Buddha determined Kandata deserved to escape from the depths of hell.