Monthly Archives: December 2019

d14b, WONS

Abusing a Faithful Believer

As I reflect on things, it is preached in the “Teacher of the Dharma” chapter of the Lotus Sūtra, fascicle 4, “Suppose there is an evil person with a wicked mind who ceaselessly slandered a Buddha for as long as a kalpa (aeon). The sin of such a person would still be considered minor when compared to a person who abused with just a word a faithful believer, clergy or laity, who reads or recites the Lotus Sūtra.” Grand Master Miao-lê interprets this passage stating, “We can say this because the Lotus Sūtra is profound in doctrine and excellent in merit. We cannot say the same about other sutras.”

Hōren-shō, Letter to Hōren, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Volume 6, Followers I, Page 43

Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – Dec. 15, 2019

Medicine-King! An evil man who speaks ill of me in my presence with evil intent for as long as a kalpa is not as sinful as the person who reproaches laymen or monks with even a single word of abuse for their reading and reciting the Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

The Buddha declares this sentence in Chapter Ten of the Lotus Sūtra. Since the Buddha is secure in the enlightenment he enjoys, anyone attacking him either questioning his enlightenment or disparaging his wisdom is only going to make themselves look bad. Attacking someone just starting on the path towards enlightenment could lead them to doubt the value of the Wonderful Dharma. It is beneficial to remember these words, not just for what they mean about how we treat others, but for how we treat ourselves.

The Daily Dharma is produced by the Lexington Nichiren Buddhist Community. To subscribe to the daily emails, visit zenzaizenzai.com

LS32

Day 7

Day 7 concludes Chapter 3, A Parable, and begins Chapter 4, Understanding by Faith.

Day 7 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month considered the greatness of the One Buddha Vehicle, we consider the Buddha’s expedient teachings.

(The Buddha said to Śāriputra:)
All of you
All Are of my you children.
I am your father.

You were under the fires of many sufferings
For the past innumerable kalpas.
Therefore, I saved you
From the triple world [ with expedients].

I once told you that you had attained extinction.
But you eliminated only birth and death
[By that extinction].
The extinction you attained was not the true one.
What you should do now is
Obtain the wisdom of the Buddha.

The Bodhisattvas in this multitude
Should hear
With one mind
The true teaching of the Buddhas.

The Buddhas, the World-Honored Ones,
Say only expediently [that some are not Bodhisattvas]
To tell the truth,
All living beings taught by them are Bodhisattvas.

[I said:]
“To those who have little wisdom,
And who are deeply attached to sensual desires,
The Buddhas expound the truth that all is suffering.
Those [who hear this truth]
Will have the greatest joy that they have ever had.
The statement of the Buddhas that all is suffering
Is true, not false.
To those who are ignorant
Of the cause of all sufferings,
And who are too deeply attached
To the cause of suffering
To give it up even for a moment,
The Buddhas expound
The [eight right] ways as expedients.

The cause of suffering is greed.
When greed is eliminated,
There is nothing to be attached to.
The extinction of suffering
Is called the third truth.
In order to attain this extinction,
The [eight right] ways must be practiced.
Freedom from the bonds of suffering[,]
[That is, from illusions] is called emancipation.”

From what illusions can one be emancipated, however,
[By the practice of the eight right ways]?
He can be emancipated only from unreal things
[That is, from the five desires] thereby.
He cannot be emancipated from all illusions.
The Buddhas say
That he has not yet attained
The true extinction
Because he has not yet attained
Unsurpassed enlightenment.
I also do not think that I have led him
To the [true] extinction thereby.

See Avoiding Hell

LS32, 2buddhas

Avoiding Hell

The modern reader may quickly grow impatient with Nichiren’s harping on the Avici hell. People at the time, however, envisioned the hells as actual postmortem destinations and depicted their torments in gruesome detail in narrative scroll paintings and didactic tales. Many thought that, without some form of earnest effort in Buddhist practice, rebirth in the lower realms would be inevitable. Hell had come to stand for the entire samsaric process. Although inflected through his Lotus exclusivism, Nichiren’s frequent references to frightful karmic retribution in the afterlife were consistent with his larger religious milieu. The resolve to close off that terrible possibility both for himself and others was part of what motivated his aggressive proselytizing.

Two Buddhas, p86
Kaleidoscope

The Father of This Sahā World

Quote

The presentation of the relationship Buddha-humanity in terms of father and son also deserves attention. The term “the Buddha’s children” appears often in the sutra to indicate the Buddha’s disciples, bodhisattvas, and all those who practice according to the teaching of the Buddha. They are called “children born of the Buddha’s mouth.” Nichiren underlines that only a Buddha coming from this Sahā world can be considered father of the beings living in this world. Other Buddhas who abide in different parts of the universe are not qualified because they do not have this bond, thus their existence is almost irrelevant for people, or at best an upāya.
A Buddhist Kaleidoscope; Lucia Dolce, Between Duration and Eternity: Hermeneutics of the ‘Ancient Buddha’ of the Lotus Sutra in Chih-i and Nichiren, Page 233-234

WONS

When a Sage Appears and Preaches the Lotus Sūtra

As a tiger roars, wind blows hard; as a dragon howls, clouds surge up. However, winds do not blow nor do clouds appear if it is only a rabbit crying or a donkey braying. Likewise, if only the foolish read the Lotus Sūtra, and the wise merely lecture about it, nobody makes noise and nothing happens in the country. It is believed, however, when a sage appears and preaches the Lotus Sūtra as the Buddha did, the country will be excited and persecutions more severe than those in the Buddha’s lifetime will occur.

Ueno-dono Gohenji, A Reply to Lord Ueno, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Faith and Practice, Volume 4, Page 112

Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – Dec. 14, 2019

You, the World-Honored One, are our leader.
You give peace to gods and men.
Hearing that you assured us of our future Buddhahood,
We are relieved and satisfied.

These verses are sung by Maha-Prajāpatī Bhikṣuṇī, Yaśodharā Bhikṣuṇī, and their attendants in Chapter Thirteen of the Lotus Sūtra. In our lives we have many desires, some of which we may not recognize. We believe that when these desires are met, only then can we be happy and peaceful. At the foundation of these desires is the desire for liberation. These women recognize that with this desire, just knowing that it will be fulfilled is enough to bring joy.

The Daily Dharma is produced by the Lexington Nichiren Buddhist Community. To subscribe to the daily emails, visit zenzaizenzai.com

LS32

Day 6

Day 6 continues Chapter 3, A Parable

Day 6 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month learned the differences in the three carts, we consider the rich man’s decision to give each child a large cart.

“Śāriputra! Seeing that all his children had come out of the burning house safely and reached a carefree place, the rich man remembered that he had immeasurable wealth. So without partiality, he gave them each a large cart. I am also a father, the father of all living beings. Seeing that many hundreds of thousands of millions of living beings have come out of the painful, fearful and rough road of the triple world through the gate of the teachings of the Buddha, and obtained the pleasure of Nirvāṇa, I thought, ‘I have the store of the Dharma in which the immeasurable wisdom, powers and fearlessness of the Buddhas are housed. These living beings are all my children. I will give them the Great Vehicle. I will not cause them to attain extinction by their own ways. I will cause them to attain the extinction of the Tathāgata.’

“To those who have left the triple world, I will give the dhyāna concentrations and emancipations of the Buddhas for their pleasure. These things are of the same nature and of the same species. These things are extolled by the saints because these things bring the purest and most wonderful pleasure.

“Śāriputra! The rich man persuaded his children to come out at first by promising them the gifts of the three kinds of carts. But the carts which he gave them later were the largest and most comfortable carts adorned with treasures. In spite of this, the rich man was not accused of falsehood. Neither am I. I led all living beings at first with the teaching of the Three Vehicles. Now I will save them by the Great Vehicle only. Why is that? It is because, if I had given them the teaching of the Great Vehicle at first directly from my store of the Dharma in which my immeasurable wisdom, powers and fearlessness are housed, they would not have received all of the Dharma. Śāriputra! Therefore, know this! The Buddhas divide the One Buddha-Vehicle into three by their power to employ expedients.”

See Saving the Benighted Persons of the Mappō Era

LS32, 2buddhas

Saving the Benighted Persons of the Mappō Era

In Nichiren’s understanding, during the ages of the True Dharma and the Semblance Dharma, people had been able to achieve buddhahood through provisional teachings such as nenbutsu or Zen because they had already formed a connection to the Lotus Sūtra by hearing it from Śākyamuni Buddha in previous lifetimes. But people born in the age of the Final Dharma have not yet formed such a connection and thus cannot benefit from the nenbutsu or other provisional teachings, no matter how earnestly they might practice them, just as one cannot reap a harvest from a field where seeds have never been sown. Now in the age of the Final Dharma, Nichiren taught, it is the daimoku, the essence of the Lotus Sūtra, that embodies the seed of buddhahood. “At this time,” he wrote, “Namu Myōhō-renge-kyō of the ‘Fathoming the Lifespan’ chapter, the heart of the origin teaching, should be planted for the first time as the seed [of buddhahood]” in the hearts of the benighted persons of the mappō era.

Two Buddhas, p118-119
WONS, Kaleidoscope

The Past of Śākyamuni Is Reflected in the Past of His Disciples

Quote

For Nichiren, the revelation of the original Buddha which takes place in the sixteenth chapter has two meanings: that of a theory of the nature of the Buddha, and that of a speculation on the situation of humankind. Śākyamuni’s “original causes and original results” become the turning point which allows postulating the contemporaneity of human beings to the Buddha. Human beings, in their spatial and temporal limitations, share the temporality of Śākyamuni in this world. Nichiren uses a theory elaborated by Chih-i according to which the past of Śākyamuni is reflected in the past of his disciples. This is the tie established, in the original time, between Śākyamuni and those who listen to the sutra or are willing to accept it. From here Nichiren draws the certainty of buddhahood for human beings:

We living beings of this land are since as many kalpas ago as five hundred particles of dust Śākyamuni’s beloved children. [The relation] between a Buddha with ties and the living beings [bound] by karmic ties can be compared to [the reflection of] the moon in the sky floating on clear water. A Buddha without ties in relation to sentient beings is like a deaf man listening for the sound of thunder or a blind man turning to sun and moon.

A Buddhist Kaleidoscope; Lucia Dolce, Between Duration and Eternity: Hermeneutics of the ‘Ancient Buddha’ of the Lotus Sutra in Chih-i and Nichiren, Page 233