If anyone, guilty or not, calls the name of World-Voice-Perceiver Bodhisattva when he is bound up in manacles, fetters, pillories or chains, those things [in which he is bound up] will break asunder, and he will be saved.
The Buddha gives this description of World-Voice-Perceiver Bodhisattva (Kannon, Kanzeon, Kuan Yin, Avalokitesvara) to Endless-Intent Bodhisattva in Chapter Twenty-Five of the Lotus Sūtra. The bonds of ignorance and delusion in which we find ourselves are not the result of our personal inadequacy, and neither do they come entirely from the circumstances of the world around us. But these bonds are real, and in our struggles to escape we often just make them worse. When we remember World-Voice Perceiver, the embodiment of compassion, and call on her for help, then we awaken compassion within ourselves and others in the world, and break the bonds of delusion for everyone.
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Day 20 completes Chapter 15, The Appearance of Bodhisattvas from Underground, and concludes the Fifth Volume of the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.
Having last month considered in gāthās Maitreya’s questions about the Bodhisattvas from Underground, we consider the Buddha’s response to Maitreya’s questions.
At that time the Buddhas, who had come from many thousands of billions of worlds outside [this world], were sitting cross-legged on the lion-like seats under the jeweled trees in [this world and] the neighboring worlds of the eight quarters. Those Buddhas were the replicas of Śākyamuni Buddha. The attendant of each of those Buddhas saw that many Bodhisattvas had sprung up from under the four quarters of the [Sahā-World which was composed of one thousand million Sumeru-worlds and stayed in the sky. He said to the Buddha whom he was accompanying, “World-Honored One! Where did these innumerable, asaṃkhya Bodhisattvas come from?”
That Buddha said to his attendant:
“Good Man! Wait for a while! There is a Bodhisattva
mahāsattva called Maitreya [in this congregation]. Śākyamuni
Buddha assured him of his future attainment of Buddhahood,
saying, ‘You will become a Buddha immediately after me.’
Maitreya has already asked [Śākyamuni Buddha] about this
matter. [Śākyamuni] Buddha will answer him. You will be able
to hear his answer.”
Thereupon Śākyamuni Buddha said to Maitreya Bodhisattva:
“Excellent, excellent, Ajita! You asked me a very important question. All of you should concentrate your minds, wear the armor of endeavors, and be resolute. Now I will reveal, I will show, the wisdom of the Buddhas, their supernatural power without hindrance, their dauntless powers like a lion’s, and their great power of bravery.”
Thereupon the World-Honored One, wishing to repeat what he said, sang in gāthās:
Exert yourselves and concentrate your minds!
Now I will tell you about this matter.
Do not doubt me!
My wisdom is difficult to understand.
Arouse your power of faith,
And do good patiently!
You will be able to hear the Dharma
That you have never heard before.
Now I will relieve you.
Do not doubt me! Do not be afraid!
I do not tell a lie.
My wisdom is immeasurable.
The highest Dharma that I attained
Is profound and difficult to understand.
Now I will expound it.
Listen to me with all your hearts!
That preserving the teachings was an important issue for the Saṃgha can be gauged from the references to dhamma-dhara (dharma-dhara) and dhamma-kathika (dharma-kathika) in Buddhist writings. However, Mahayana, which combined in the bodhisattva way the self-benefiting practice of preserving the correct Dharma and the other-benefiting practice of the propagation of the sutras, called the preacher who bore that mission the dharma-bhāṇaka. Why different terms were used is of considerable interest.
We have seen already that the bhāṇaka, as a memorizer and reciter of sacred works, had from old been counted as a type of musician, and that his existence is confirmed by dedicatory inscriptions at Sāñcī and Bhārhut. Around the second century BCE the bhāṇaka came to be connected with stupas, performing offerings in praise of the Buddha, reciting the sutras, and conducting sermons, for the benefit of visiting lay pilgrims. At that time (the period of sectarian Buddhism) the Theravāda sect laid claim to being the orthodox preserver of the teachings, and paid no heed to the bhāṇaka. It was the humble bhāṇaka, though, whom the Mahayana sutras referred to as a bodhisattva and gave the mission of propagating the true Dharma. Therefore it is not impossible to find in the bhāṇaka of that period certain evidence for one source of Mahayana Buddhism.
While the Mahayana sutras referred to the preserver of the true Dharma as bhāṇaka, they used the terms dharma-dhara and dharma-kathika to indicate those who considered themselves to be orthodox preservers of the teachings. Most such references are found in the oldest parts of the Mahayana sutras; the newer parts invariably use dharma-bhāṇaka. In the Lotus Sutra, for example, the use of dharma-dhara and dharma-kathika is confined to the section before “A Teacher of the Law,” whereas dharma-bhāṇaka is used mainly in the chapters after that. If we allow that the chapter “A Teacher of the Law” marks a temporal shift in the formation of the Lotus Sutra, we may consider that the use of dharma-dhara, dharma-kathika, and dharma-bhāṇaka likewise belongs to specific periods of time. As discussed earlier, the chapters before “A Teacher of the Law” encouraged the veneration of relic stupas, but those after it discouraged that practice and recommended instead constructing caityas containing verses from the scriptures. To reiterate, although the Lotus Sutra called transmitters of the teachings by the general terms dharma-dhara and dharma-kathika, the sutra gave the special task of propagating itself to the dharma-bhāṇaka, as a Mahayana bodhisattva.
Ten days were spent in the journey from the southern coast of Japan to the northern, and Nichiren now stood on the exposed coast of Echigo, gazing upon the waves raging in a winter gale. On the way thither he had travelled over hills and passes, crossed streams and valleys never before trodden by him. Now, in the midst of winter, the lands all along the northern coasts were covered with snow. There he saw for the first time the Sea of Japan – this man who hitherto had known only the Pacific Ocean. The gale raged so continuously that he was obliged to stop at the little haven of Teradomari for a week. All of his past life seemed to him something like a series of frightful dreams, yet the dreams were as real as any facts of human life – nay, more real than anything else, because the records had been written in his tears and blood. During his stay there, while waiting to embark, he pondered over the past and the future. “Mountains beyond mountains” he had found in his journey in coming thither, and “waves upon waves” were raging in the sea before him. Similar had been his past experience, and such was also the prospect of the coming years. He examined and reviewed all the history of his life, comparing it with the words of the [Lotus Sutra], and could only arrive at the same conclusion he had come to in Izu, but now upon more conclusive evidence.
Although every step of his perilous life had been a subject of reflection in the light of the prophecies in the [Lotus Sutra], Nichiren had never before had an opportunity so well suited to a comprehensive retrospect and profound meditation as at this time. As he reviewed it, his career had step by step fulfilled, almost to the letter, the prophecies concerning the propagators of the Truth; and now he was entering a new life, after a resurrection – the proper part of his life as the man wholly dedicated to the cause of the Truth, as well as to the spiritual welfare of all people in the coming days of degeneration. “The one, the pioneer, who lives the life of the Lotus of Truth,” was surely not a product of chance, but a realization of the vows and promises recorded in the [Lotus Sutra]. Then, why should not he, Nichiren, be in vital continuity with some of those saints who had been commissioned by Buddha to work in the future, and were destined to suffer persecutions on that account? Many persons are mentioned who appeared in the assembly of the Lotus and took the vows to perpetuate the Truth. Whoever they might be, Nichiren must be one of them – this was the conviction that was now firmly established in his mind. This is stated in a letter addressed to one of his earliest believers, Lord Toki, written one day after his arrival at Teradomari. This letter is the first of a series of testimonies evincing Nichiren’s consciousness that he was a reincarnation of one of the saints in the prophecies.
After a brief narrative of the journey, the letter quotes the passages to which Nichiren had paid special attention, interpreting the meaning of his life. The quotations are similar, but in this letter a special emphasis is laid on passages in the thirteenth chapter on “Perseverance,” such as, “They will deride us and abuse us, and assail us with weapons and sticks,” “We shall repeatedly be driven out of our abodes.” He continues:
“Nichiren has indeed been driven out repeatedly, and exiled twice. The Lotus of Truth proclaims the truths which are universal to all ages, past, present, and future. (What it says concerning the past is to be true of the present, and what it announces to occur in the present will be fulfilled again in the future.) Thus, the chapter on the Bodhisattva Sadāparibhūta [Never-Despising Bodhisattva] telling what happened to him in the past, is now being realized in (the life of one who is practicing) what the chapter on Perseverance tells, and vice verso. Then, surely (the man who is now realizing) the Perseverance will be in future (the man who practices the life of) Sadāparibhūta. Thus, Nichiren will be the Bodhisattva Sadāparibhūta. … (The chapter on Perseverance says that in the future, in the days of the Latter Law, there will appear eight billions of millions of saints who practice their vows.) Now, in these days there are the three kinds of opponents of the Truth (as exemplified in Nichiren’s persecutors); and yet, if not one of those millions of saints should appear, it would be something as if an ebb were not followed by a flood; and as if the moon, when it had waned, did not wax again. When the water is clear, the moonlight is reflected in it; when a tree grows, birds abide in its branches. Nichiren is the vicar of those saints, eight billions of millions in number, and is protected by them all.”
The vicar of the innumerable saints who took the vows of “Perseverance” was the Bodhisattva Sadāparibhūta [Never-Despising Bodhisattva]. Nichiren is not here quite as definite as he was in a letter addressed to the same lord, more than one month later, from Sado. In the latter he says, in part:
“During nearly two months since my arrival in this island of Sado, icy winds have been constantly blowing, and, though the snowfall is sometimes intermitted, the sunlight is never seen. My body is penetrated by the cold, whereof (as is told concerning the cold hells) there are eight kinds. … As I have written you, during the two thousand and two hundred years since Buddha’s death, various masters have appeared in the world and labored to perpetuate the Truth, knowing its import, and yet adapting it to the needs of the times. The great masters T’ien T’ai and Dengyō made explicit the purport of the Truth (by uttering its Sacred Title), and yet they did not propagate it. One who shall fulfil this task is to appear in this country. If so, may not Nichiren be the man? … The Truth has appeared, and the omens are already more clearly manifest than ever before. The Scripture says, ‘There appeared four leaders, Viśiṣṭacāritra’ etc.”
This is the first definite statement about his personal connection with Viśiṣṭacāritra (Jap. Jōgyō), the leader of the saints called out of earth in the [chapter 15, The Appearance of Bodhisattvas from Underground]. From this time on, Nichiren remained constant in the belief that his former life was that of Viśiṣṭacāritra, although he often referred to other saints as his predecessors and spoke as if he were a reincarnation of one of them.
Chapter 6 The Exile In Sado And The Ripening of Nichiren's Faith in His Mission
[I]t is said in the Lotus Sūtra, 13th chapter: “We will not spare even our lives; we treasure only the unsurpassed enlightenment.” In the Nirvana Sūtra it is said: “Do not hide the teaching of the Buddha even at the cost of your life.”
If we spare our lives in this life, in which life will we be able to become Buddhas? In which life can we save our parents and masters? Thus, I decided to speak up with the true teaching. As expected, I have been expelled out of my residence, abused, beaten, and hurt. On the 12th of the fifth month in the first year of the Kōchō Era (1261), I fell out of shogunal grace and was exiled to Itō of Izu Province. On the 22nd of the second month of the 3rd year of the same era, I was pardoned.
Thereafter, the more intense my aspiration for Buddhahood became, the more fervently I spoke up. Great difficulties were brought about just as high waves are caused by strong winds. I could imagine through my experiences how terrible it was when Never-Despising Bodhisattva was beaten with sticks and hit by stones and broken tiles were thrown at him. The difficulties experienced by Monk Virtue Consciousness toward the end of Rejoice (Kangi) Buddha’s period seem incomparable to mine. I have no place to live at all in the sixty-six provinces and two islands of Japan even for a day or a moment. Even sages who, like Rāhula in the past, keep the 250 precepts and bear the intolerable and men of wisdom like Pūrṇa abuse me, Nichiren, whenever they see me. Even men as honest as Wei-chêng of ancient China and as wise as Imperial Regent Fujiwara Yoshifusa of Japan treat Nichiren with hostility beyond reason, not to mention ordinary people in this world who hate me just as dogs hate monkeys and hunters chase deer.
Hōon-jō, Essay on Gratitude, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 3, Pages 46.
This sūtra is
The most excellent.
To keep this sūtra
Is to keep me.
The Buddha sings these verses in Chapter Eleven of the Lotus Sūtra. We may believe that before we can practice we need to find a Buddha or another enlightened being alive in our world to guide us. These verses remind us of the ever-present Buddha Śākaymuni who was revealed in the Lotus Sūtra. Whether or not we see him as another human in our presence, he is always guiding us to enlightenment. The Buddha also reminds us that by living as he has shown us in the Lotus Sūtra, as Bodhisattvas who exist for the benefit of all beings, we show our respect for him and bring his wisdom to life.
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Having last month concluded Chapter 14, Peaceful Practices, we consider the request of the Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas, more than eight times the number of the sands of the River Ganges, who had come from the other worlds.
Thereupon the Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas, more than eight times the number of the sands of the River Ganges, who had come from the other worlds, rose from among the great multitude, joined their hands together towards the Buddha, bowed to him, and said:
“World-Honored One! If you permit us to protect, keep, read, recite and copy this sūtra, and make offerings to it strenuously in this Sahā-World after your-extinction, we will [do so, and] expound it in this world.”
Thereupon the Buddha said to those Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas:
“No, good men! I do not want you to protect or keep this sūtra because there are Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas sixty thousand times as many as the sands of the River Ganges in this Sahā-World. They are each accompanied by attendants also numbering sixty thousand times as many as the sands of the River Ganges. They will protect, keep, read, recite and expound this sūtra after my extinction.”
When he had said this, the ground of the Sahā-World, which was composed of one thousand million Sumeru-worlds, quaked and cracked, and many thousands of billions of Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas sprang up from underground simultaneously. Their bodies were golden-colored, and adorned with the thirty-two marks and with innumerable rays of light. They had lived in the sky below this Sahā-World. They came up here because they heard these words of Śākyamuni Buddha. Each of them was the leader of a great multitude. The Bodhisattvas included those who were each accompanied by attendants as many as sixty thousand times the number of the sands of the River Ganges. Needless to say, [they included those who were each accompanied by less attendants, for instance,] fifty thousand times, forty thousand times, thirty thousand times, twenty thousand times or ten thousand times the number of the sands of the River Ganges, or by attendants just as many of the sands of the River Ganges, or by attendants as many as a half, or a quarter of the number of the sands of the River Ganges, or by attendants as many as the sands of the River Ganges divided by a thousand billion nayuta, a billion, ten million, a million, ten thousand, a thousand, a hundred, ten, five, four, three or two attendants, or only by one attendant. [The Bodhisattvas] who preferred a solitary life came alone. The total number of the Bodhisattvas was innumerable, limitless, beyond calculation, inexplicable by any parable or simile.
According to Tendai’s “Branches of the Lotus Sutra,” the parables are divided into two portions, the exposition and the explanation of correspondences.
Correspondences for the Parable of the Priceless Gem in the Top-Knot
Just as the powerful wheel-rolling king desires to conquer other lands by force, the Tathāgata by his powers of meditation and wisdom has taken possession of the domain of the Dharma, and rules as king over the triple world.
Just as, when minor kings do not obey him, he calls up his armies and goes to punish them, the Tathāgata’s wise and holy generals fight with the Māra kings, for they are unwilling to submit.
Just as the king, seeing his soldiers distinguish themselves in battle, is greatly pleased, the Tathāgata is pleased with those who distinguish themselves.
Just as the king rewards his soldiers according to their merit with villages, cities, garments, ornaments, or with all kinds of precious jewels, etc., the Tathāgata in the midst of the four groups preaches the sutras, causing them to rejoice, and bestows on them the meditations, the emancipations, the faultless roots and powers, and all the wealth of the Dharma. In addition, he gives them the city of nirvana, saying they have attained extinction, and attracts their minds so that they all rejoice.
Just as it is only the bright jewel on his head that the king gives to no one, the Tathāgata does not preach this Law-Flower Sutra.
Just as the king, seeing among his soldiers those whose merits were particularly great, is so greatly pleased that he gives them the jewel from his head, the Tathāgata, as the great Dharma-king of the triple world, teaches and converts all living beings by the Dharma. When he sees his wise and holy army fighting the Māra of the five mental processes, the Māra of earthly cares, and the Māra of death, and doing so with great exploits and merits, exterminating the three poisons, escaping from the triple world, and breaking through the net of the Māras, then the Tathāgata is very pleased, and preaches the Law-Flower Sutra, which has never before been preached, and which is able to cause all the living to reach perfect knowledge, though all the world greatly resents and has difficulty in believing it. This Law-Flower Sutra is the foremost teaching of the tathāgatas and the most profound of all discourses. I give it, says the Buddha, to you last of all, just as that powerful king at last gives the brilliant jewel he has guarded for long.
Nichiren’s narrow escape, more unexpected and miraculous than in any preceding cases, impressed Nichiren so deeply that he regarded his life thereafter as a second life-the life after a resurrection. In a later writing [Opening the Eyes, 1272] he expressed this thought as:
“A man called Nichiren was beheaded at Tatsu-no-kuchi, a little after midnight of the twelfth day of the ninth month last year. His soul remained and came here to the island of Sado; it wrote this, in the midst of snow, in the second month of the year following, and leaves it to posterity.”
Another letter, written in 1277 to his beloved warrior-disciple Kingo, shows how gravely he regarded the crisis:
“Over and over I recall to mind that you came following me when I was going to be beheaded, and that you cried and wept, holding the bridle of my horse. How can I forget that as long as I may live? If you should fall to the hells because of your grave sins (accumulated in the past), I would not follow the call of my Lord Sakya, howsoever he might invite me to Buddhahood, but I would surely be in the hell where you are. If I and you are in the hells, Śākya Buddha and the [Lotus Sutra] will surely be there together with us.”
Another letter addressed to the same warrior, written while the crisis was still fresh in his memory, says:
“Tatsu-no-kuchi is the place where Nichiren renounced his life. The place is therefore comparable to a paradise; because all has taken place for the sake of the Lotus of Truth. … Indeed every place where Nichiren encounters perils is Buddha’s land. … Surely when I shall be on Vulture Peak, I shall inform our Lord of your fidelity shown in your readiness to follow me to death.”
The authorities were perplexed what to do. When the day dawned, it was decided that the prisoner should be sent to Echi, a village fifteen miles inland from Tatsu-no-kuchi. When, at noon, he arrived there, he was received very reverently into the mansion of the local chief, and the soldiers of the guard began to listen to what the wonderful man said and preached. Meanwhile, it seems, the government circle were much disturbed by the failure of the execution, and a faction among the officials seems to have raised its voice against those who had urged that Nichiren should be put to death. Late in the following night a special messenger came from Kamakura, ordering that good care be taken of the prisoner. Finally, he was sentenced to exile, and, nearly a month later, he left Echi for the Island of Sado, which was designated as his place of banishment.
Chapter 5 The Threatening Mongol Invasion And the Sentence of Death
QUESTION: I ask with much hesitation whether it can be that fire can beget water, or that a rock may beget flowers. From the standpoint of Buddhism, it is understood that a bad effect would follow from a bad cause; similarly, a good product would arise from something good. Nevertheless, should we look at our origins, it is clear that we are the products of the binding of our parent’s red and white blood. In like manner, the root of evil can spawn impurity. Whilst we attempt to wash it with the waters of the ocean, it would still not be cleansed. When we examine our minds and bodies–that which receives of this painful lot–we can say that it is composed of the three basic evil passions: greed, anger, and ignorance. When these two, evil passions and their painful results, come together to form various karma, they give rise to the paths of karma that chain us to the painful environment of the triple world and six realms (lower six of the ten realms). It is like a bird trapped in a cage. How is it that the three ways, evil passions, karma, and suffering can turn into the three merits, Dharma Body, Reward Body and Accommodative Body of the Buddha? It is, for example, as difficult to expect an appealing fragrance to arise from feces made to look like sandalwood.
ANSWER: Your question is quite natural. It is difficult for me to provide a sufficient answer as well. In any case, Nāgārjuna, the 13th transmitter of the Buddhist teaching whom even Grand Master T’ien t’ai respected as the Founder, comments on the single character “myō” in his Great Wisdom Discourse: “It is the same as a renowned doctor who prescribes a poison for medicine.” What is meant here by “poison”? It refers to the three paths, that are our evil passions, karma, and suffering. Then what is meant by medicine? It refers to the three merits: Dharma Body, unsurpassed wisdom, and emancipation. What is meant by prescribing a poison for medicine? It means nothing but transforming the three evils to three merits. Grand Master T’ien-t’ai in his Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sūtra states: ” ‘Myō’ of Myōhō Renge Kyō means unfathomable.” And in the Great Concentration and Insight, he claims: “As one thought contains ten realms, there should be no less than 3,000 modes of existence contained in one thought, making it impossible to separate one’s thought from all existing things. This relationship is difficult to explain in words, such that ‘thought’ falls within the realm of incomprehension.” Becoming a Buddha with one’s present body is not easily defined.
Shimon Butsujō-gi, Listening to the Once Buddha Vehicle Teachings for the First Time, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 247-248
