Two Buddhas, p133-134In [Chapter 10, The Teacher of the Dharma], Śākyamuni declares: “There are immeasurable thousands of myriads of kotis of sūtras I have taught in the past, which I teach now, and which I will teach in the future. Among them, however, this Lotus Sūtra is the most difficult to accept and to understand.” As a literary device, this statement cleverly preempts possible challenges to the Lotus Sūtra’s authority. Other sūtras might claim to be the Buddha’s highest teaching, but such claims could always be dismissed by saying that any sūtra might be the “highest” that the Buddha had preached up until that point and yet had been superseded by later ones. The inclusion of both present and future teachings here precludes such a dismissal. East Asian interpreters, however, did not see this claim on the Lotus Sūtra’s part as a mere literary device. For Nichiren, it was nothing less than the Buddha’s own statement of the relative ranking of the sūtras that he had expounded during his fifty years of teaching.
Monthly Archives: February 2020
Four Great Vows and Four Noble Truths
It is stated in the Discourse on the Diamond Scalpel by Grand Master Dengyō:
“The truth that motivates the bodhisattvas to take the Four Great Vows is the Four Noble Truths (the truth regarding the suffering, the cause of suffering, the extinction of suffering, and the path to enlightenment). Delusion of life and death that everything in the universe (3,000 Existences in the 100 Realms) repeats is the truth that life is full of suffering. Realizing in mind and body that this delusion of life and death is itself enlightenment is called the ‘vow to save all the people.’ The existence of three delusions in everything in the universe (delusion in view and thought, delusion that prevents bodhisattvas from mastering the teaching and saving the people, and delusion concealing the fundamental truth) is expressed as the ‘truth that the cause of suffering is evil passions.’ Realizing in mind and body that the evil passions themselves are enlightenment is called the ‘vow to eliminate evil passions however numerous they are.’ Extinction of suffering of life and death is called ‘the truth that extinguishes the evil passions.’ Since suffering of life and death is itself enlightenment, realizing the Buddha-nature of the perfect teaching is called the ‘vow to attain the supreme teaching of the Buddha.’ Delusion itself is enlightenment and at once the wisdom of the Buddha. Therefore, bodhisattvas take a vow to study all the teachings of the Buddha however limitless they are. As delusion and the wisdom of the Buddha are inseparable, people and the Buddha are one and the same. Both delusion regarding the suffering and cause of suffering and enlightenment by the extinction of suffering and the path to enlightenment exist in mind. The four great vows of bodhisattvas are fused in one’s mind and the one becomes all. This teaching of the Buddha is extremely important.”
Nizen Nijō Bosatsu Fu-sabutsu Ji, Never-Attaining Buddhahood by the Two Vehicles and Bodhisattvas in the Pre-Lotus Sūtras, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 3, Page 221-222
Daily Dharma – Feb. 18, 2020
Anyone who reads this sūtra
Will be free from grief,
Sorrow, disease or pain.
His complexion will be fair.
He will not be poor,
Humble or ugly.
All living beings
Will wish to see him
Just as they wish to see sages and saints.
Celestial pages will serve him.
The Buddha sings these verses in Chapter Fourteen of the Lotus Sūtra. When we cultivate the mind of the Buddha, and bring his teachings to life, we help other beings find true happiness. This is different from our normal pattern of attempting to manipulate what others think about us through bribery, threats, and other forms of coercion. When we help others find their minds, they realize that they share our true mind of joy and peace.
The Daily Dharma is produced by the Lexington Nichiren Buddhist Community. To subscribe to the daily emails, visit zenzaizenzai.com
Day 4
Day 4 concludes Chapter 2, Expedients, and completes the first volume of the Sūtra of the Lotus flower of the Wonderful Dharma.
Having last month considered the ways of attaining the Buddha path, we consider how all past and future Buddhas use expedients.
The World-Honored Ones in the future
Will be countless in number.
Those Tathāgatas also
Will expound the Dharma with expedients.The Tathāgatas save all living beings
With innumerable expedients.
They cause all living beings to enter the Way
To the wisdom-without-āsravas of the Buddha.
Anyone who hears the Dharma
Will not fail to become a Buddha.Every Buddha vows at the outset:
“I will cause all living beings
To attain the same enlightenment
That I attained.”The future Buddhas will expound many thousands
Of myriads of millions of teachings
For just one purpose,
That is, for the purpose of revealing the One Vehicle.The Buddhas, the Most Honorable Bipeds,
Expound the One Vehicle because they know:
“All things are devoid of substantiality.
The seed of Buddhahood comes from dependent origination.”The Leading Teachers expound the Dharma with expedients
After realizing at the place of enlightenment:
“This is the abode of the Dharma and the position of the Dharma.
The reality of the world is permanently as it is.”Gods and men are making offerings
To the present Buddhas of the worlds of the ten quarters.
The Buddhas as many as there are sands in the River Ganges
Who appeared in these worlds,
Are expounding the Dharma
For the purpose of giving peace to all living beings.They know the Highest Truth of Tranquil Extinction.
They have the power to employ expedients.
Although they expound various teachings,
Their purpose is to reveal the Buddha-Vehicle.Knowing the deeds of all living beings,
And their thoughts deep in their minds,
And the karmas they have done in their previous existence,
And their desires, natures, and powers to make efforts,
And also knowing whether each of them is keen or dull,
The Buddhas expound the Dharma according to their capacities,
With various stories of previous lives, parables, similes and discourses,
That is to say, with various expedients.I also do the same.
I show the enlightenment of the Buddha
With various teachings
In order to give peace to all living beings.I know the natures and desires of all living beings
By the power of my wisdom.
Therefore, I expound various teachings expediently,
And cause all living beings to rejoice.
Attaining the Path
Buddhism for Today, p50-51All living beings can enter the Buddha-way from any point: from worshiping the buddhas’ relics, from building stupas and memorials, from building temples and shrines to the buddhas in the wilderness, or even from heaping sand in play to form a buddha’s stupa. All living beings can enter the Buddha-way by doing anything good. As they increasingly strive after virtue and develop the great mind of benevolence, they finally become buddhas.
Ambassadors of the Tathāgata
Two Buddhas, p132-133Nichiren also stressed to his followers that they themselves are the “ambassadors of the Tathāgata” praised by Śākyamuni Buddha in this chapter, the very people who, in an evil era after the Buddha’s passing, will be able to uphold the sūtra and teach it to others. To one individual, borrowing the sūtra’s language in this passage, he wrote: “It is rare to receive human birth, but you have done so. You have also encountered the buddha dharma, which is difficult to meet. And within the buddha dharma, you have found the daimoku of the Lotus Sūtra and now put it into practice. Truly you have ‘already paid homage to tens of myriads of kotis of buddhas of the past.”
The idea that one is an “ambassador of the Tathāgata” and has “already paid homage to tens of myriads of kotis of buddhas” might seem to contradict another of Nichiren’s claims … that people born into the age of the Final Dharma have never before received the seed of buddhahood. Like most founders of religious movements, Nichiren taught according to his audience and circumstances and did not fully systematize his teachings; this would be one way to account for this apparent inconsistency. But there are also other ways to think about it. Past lives are unknowable, and talk about them by Buddhist teachers is intended to cast light on the present. Thus, we might think of the tension between these two ideas as Nichiren offering his followers alternative perspectives on their practice. To say that one has now received the seed of buddhahood for the very first time engenders gratitude for the rare opportunity of having encountered the daimoku of the Lotus Sūtra; to say that one has served countless buddhas in the past and been dispatched to this world as the Tathāgata’s ambassador invests one’s personal practice with the quality of a noble mission.
Nichiren said of himself that, being an ordinary person steeped in delusion, “my mind is far from that of the Tathāgata’s ambassador.” But because he had endured great trials for the Lotus Sūtra’s sake with his body and chanted its daimoku with his mouth, he continued, “I am like the Tathāgata’s ambassador.” His claim to legitimacy as the teacher of the Lotus Sūtra for the Final Dharma age lay not in superior spiritual attainments, something he never asserted, but in the fact that he had fulfilled the sūtra’s own predictions of the hardships its devotees would encounter in a troubled age after the Buddha’s passing.
Those Who Do Not Aspire to Buddhahood Will Never Attain It
Those who do not aspire to Buddhahood will never attain it. Lord Śākyamuni Buddha was abused by all non-Buddhist teachers in India as an evil man. Grand Master T’ien-t’ai was spoken ill of as “a man who destroys his own five-foot body by slandering the Buddha with a three-inch tongue” by the three Southern masters and seven Northern masters of Buddhism in China and Monk Tokuitsu of Japan. Grand Master Dengyō was laughed at by scholar-monks of Nara for not having seen the capital of T’ang China. However, these masters had nothing to be ashamed of because they were abused just for the sake of the Lotus Sūtra. Praise by the ignorant should be regarded most dishonorable.
Kaimoku-shō, Open Your Eyes to the Lotus Teaching, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 114
Daily Dharma – Feb. 17, 2020
Thereupon Star-King-Flower Bodhisattva said to the Buddha: “World-Honored One! Why does Medicine-King Bodhisattva walk about this Sahā-World? World-Honored One! This Medicine-King Bodhisattva will have to practice hundreds of thousands of billions of nayutas of austerities in this world.
This excerpt is from Chapter Twenty-Three of the Lotus Sutra. Star-King-Flower Bodhisattva is aware of the difficulties that Medicine-King or any other Bodhisattva will encounter while living in this world of conflict (Sahā) and asks the Buddha why this Bodhisattva would give up the pleasures of the higher realms to which he is entitled. The Buddha then tells the story of Medicine-King’s previous life, in which he gave up many attachments, including the attachment to his own body. These stories of Bodhisattvas are reminders of our own capacities, and that no matter what difficulties we face in our lives, our determination to benefit all beings, our certainty of enlightenment, and the help we receive from other beings will lead us to overcome any problems.
The Daily Dharma is produced by the Lexington Nichiren Buddhist Community. To subscribe to the daily emails, visit zenzaizenzai.com
Attaining the Way and Bestowing the Precept Ceremony
Today I traveled to Hayward and the Nichiren Buddhist International Center for a Tokudo Jukai-shiki cermony, the Attaining the Way and Bestowing the Precept Ceremony for inducting a novice priest.
The new novice is Mark Herrick, whom I’ve met several times while attending services in Oakland with Rev. Ryuei McCormick.
Head Priest Seattle Choeizan Enkyoji Nichiren Buddhist Temple. Far right is Ryusho Jeffus of Syracuse, New York.
Ryuei’s Hōkoku-bun
Here is a good man, who is undertaking the ceremony of crossing over and receiving the precepts before the Buddha, the founder, and the Three Treasures. His name is Mark Herrick. Since he was born in this world, spring and fall have passed 63 times. His previous good roots have now met with opportune conditions so that he has finally made the determination to leave home and accept the precept of the Lotus Sutra and wear the black-dyed robe.
We humbly reflect that since our founder Nichiren Daishōnin left home and crossed over at the age of 16 he put the Great Dharma of the Great Sage, Śākyamuni, the World Honored One, into the Odaimoku and spread it everywhere under heaven. He dedicated his life to saving all sentient beings. Now, this good man, Mark Herrick, takes his position as the newest disciple in this lineage. He is taking up Śākyamuni Buddha and Nichiren Daishōnin’s saving vow and activities as his own, thereby inheriting the seed of the Buddha to spread throughout the ages so that he can requite one ten thousandth of the favor of the Buddha.
May the Eternal Śākyamuni Buddha who attained awakening in the remote past, our founder Nichiren Daishonin, the past ministers who have contributed so much to our school, all place their hands upon his head and certify this crossing over and reception of the precepts with joy.
May the great vow of happiness in this world and the next be accomplished.
Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō
On this, the 16th Day, and 2nd Month of the year 2020
Preceptor, Ryuei McCormick, (Kaō)
Day 3
Day 3 covers the first half of Chapter 2, Expedients.
Having last month learned that the Buddhas teach only Bodhisattvas, we consider the teachings of the one vehicle by the present Buddhas.
“Śāriputra! The present Buddhas, the present World-Honored Ones, of many hundreds of thousands of billions of Buddha-worlds of the ten quarters benefit all living beings, and give them peace. These Buddhas also expound various teachings with innumerable expedients, that is to say, with stories of previous lives, parables, similes and discourses, only for the purpose of revealing the One Buddha-Vehicle. The living beings who hear the teachings from these Buddhas will also finally obtain the knowledge of the equality and differences of all things.
“Śāriputra! These [present] Buddhas teach only Bodhisattvas because they wish to show the insight of the Buddha to all living beings, to cause them to obtain the insight of the Buddha, and to cause them to enter the Way to the insight of the Buddha.
“Śāriputra! So do I. I know that all living beings have various desires. I also know that they have attachments deep in their minds. Therefore, I expound various teachings to them with stories of previous lives, parables, similes and discourses, that is to say, with various expedients according to their natures.
“Śāriputra! I do all this for the purpose of causing them to realize the teaching of the One Buddha-Vehicle, that is, to obtain the knowledge of the equality and differences of all things. Śāriputra! There is not a second vehicle in the worlds of the ten quarters. How can there be a third?