Yesterday I wrote about harvesting the promises found in the Lotus Sutra for my yearlong daily Myōhō Renge Kyō Promise project. In that blog post I slighted Kannon Bodhisattva (World-Voice-Perceiver) and suggested some promises contained in the Lotus Sutra were less valuable than others.

I considered just deleting those arrogant portions of the post but decided I needed to confess and to apologize.

The Lotus Sutra has been attacked as a work whose “purpose is wholly to attract stupid lay people.” In particular, the critics pointed to Chapters 19, The Merits of the Teacher of the Dharma, and Chapter 25, The Universal Gate of World-Voice-Perceiver Bodhisattva.

In excluding Kannon Bodhisattva and large portions of Chapter 19’s promised merits from my project, I sought to show that even without those parts, the Lotus Sutra is full of wonderful promises that illustrate why Myōhō Renge Kyō is considered the Buddha’s highest teaching.

Not only was I arrogant, but I was the very definition of hypocritical – suggesting one has higher standards or more noble beliefs than is the case.

Each month, when my daily reading of the Lotus Sutra gets to Chapter 25, I face my Kannon Bodhisattva statue, light additional incense as an offering to the Bodhisattva, and focus on the benefits of calling the name of World-Voice-Perceiver Bodhisattva as I read aloud.

My altar is crowded with protective amulets and statues of protective deities. My practice is the epitome of “inferior, shallow stuff, best laughed at, for alluring stupid men and women.”

“I’m with stupid,” I want to shout. I am proud to say I prefer “inferior, shallow stuff.”

Having scheduled a year’s worth of praise and promises from the Lotus Sutra on this website, I need to address the criticism of that same praise and those lofty promises that were detailed in Yoshiro Tamura’s “Introduction to the Lotus Sutra.”

Evaluations of the Lotus Sutra have traditionally run to the two extremes. In this respect, too, the sutra is indeed a wonder. First of all, one of the most severe criticisms of the sutra is the idea that it has no content. In chapter 25 of Emerging from Meditation, Nakamoto Tominaga comments that “the Lotus Sutra praises the Buddha from beginning to end but does not have any real sutra teaching at all, and therefore should not have been called a sutra teaching from the beginning.”

Yoshiro Tamura, "Introduction to the Lotus Sutra", p59

This is not new. I’ve already addressed this “emptiness” of the Lotus Sutra in the past. One can argue that it is deliberate.

In the Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra, Chih-i portrays the Ultimate Truth by equating it with empty space in a house:

Empty space in a house has neither roof beams nor pillars. The substance of a house, empty space, thus represents the Ultimate Truth. On the other hand, the roof beams and pillars are taken to analogize the cause and effect of Buddhahood. This is because if a house has no void, it cannot contain and receive anything. If the cause and effect of Buddhahood are not based on the Ultimate Truth as substance, they cannot sustain themselves. Thus, Chih-i holds that it is necessary to single out the correct substance that consists of only one empty space, upon which everything is able to function. (Vol. 2, Page 407-408)

The Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra: Tien-tai Philosophy of Buddhism

The Lotus Sutra is, in effect, a blueprint for assembling all of the Buddha’s expedient teachings. Those roof beams and pillars form the house with empty rooms in which to practice. The emptiness essential to the function of the house is a function of the teaching of the Lotus Sutra.

More recently I published Taigen Dan Leighton discussion of the supposed shortfalls of the Lotus Sutra. In “Visions of Awakening Space and Time: Dōgen and the Lotus Sutra,” Taigen Dan Leighton lists these criticisms and then demolishes them.

The text does refer, in third person, to a designated text that one might keep vainly waiting for, as if for Godot.

However, this perspective misses the manner in which the Lotus sermon certainly does exist. Fundamental messages of the Lotus, such as the One Vehicle and the primacy of the Buddha vehicle, are difficult to miss, even if they might be interpreted in various ways. Furthermore, between the lines the Lotus Sutra functions within itself both as a sacred text or scripture and as a commentary and guidebook to its own use, beyond the literal confines of its own written text. The Lotus Sutra is itself a sacred manifestation of spiritual awakening that proclaims its own sacrality. Right within the text’s proclamation of the wonders of a text with the same name as itself, the text celebrates its own ephemeral quality with the visionary splendors of its assembly of buddhas, bodhisattvas, and spirits, and with the engaging qualities of its parables.

The synthesis of the immanent spirit spoken about in the text and the text’s own intended functioning as an instrument or skillful catalyst to spark awakening has been carried on among its followers.

Dōgen and the Lotus Sutra, p23-24

I should also address whether my entire “promise” project is just another example of how the Lotus Sutra is “merely a vulgar work meant to attract stupid men and women.” That was Tenyu Hattori’s criticism of the entire Lotus Sutra. Tenyu Hattori (1724–69) was a Confucian scholar in Japan who wrote Nakedness, a book that criticized Buddhism.

In Yoshiro Tamura’s “Introduction to the Lotus Sutra,” he discusses Hattori’s criticism:

There are many places in the section of the Lotus Sutra that is considered to have come third historically that emphasize the benefits to be obtained in this life, such as the wonderful powers of faith, overcoming suffering, and having good fortune. And generally speaking, in later times devotion to the Lotus Sutra became mainstream as a result of these chapters. This is why such criticisms arose. As we have already seen, the third part of the sutra was added in order to respond to the magical and esoteric Buddhist and folk religions of India. It adds to and supplements the earlier parts of the sutra and, if taken in a positive way, can be its applied part. It is not appropriate to characterize the whole sutra in that way by emphasizing the third part, though historically admiration for the Lotus Sutra in China and Japan generally rested on that part, so, in one sense, we can understand why there were such criticisms.

Yoshiro Tamura, "Introduction to the Lotus Sutra", p61

Perhaps I am stupid. I would even confess to being vulgar in the sense of lacking sophistication. But I enjoyed putting together my eight months of daily promises from the Lotus Sutra and an additional four months of encouragement from Nichiren’s writings. I’m looking forward to reading these promises each morning.

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See The Next 10 Years

See Harvesting the Promises of Myōhō Renge Kyō

Please see An Apology for My Arrogance

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My effort to replace references to the Lotus Sūtra with Myōhō Renge Kyō while extracting the promises of the sūtra was not as straightforward as I had expected.

Myōhō Renge Kyō is the title of the sūtra but that title is more than just the name of the sūtra.

In Chapter 2, Expedients, for example, the Buddha promises that his true teaching is the One Vehicle. That One Vehicle is Myōhō Renge Kyō.

For my Daily Promises this original quote:

There is only one teaching, that is, the One Vehicle
In the Buddha-worlds of the ten quarters.
There is not a second or a third vehicle
Except when the Buddhas teach expediently.

The Buddhas lead all Living beings
By tentative names [of vehicles]
In order to expound their wisdom.
They appear in the worlds
Only for the One Vehicle.

Becomes:

There is only one teaching, that is, Myōhō Renge Kyō
In the Buddha-worlds of the ten quarters.
There is not a second or a third vehicle
Except when the Buddhas teach expediently.

The Buddhas lead all Living beings
By tentative names [of vehicles]
In order to expound their wisdom.
They appear in the worlds
Only for Myōhō Renge Kyō.

This change is supported by other Nichiren Shu sources. For example,
in the traditional service Invocation the sutra is equated with the One Vehicle:

Honor be the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the
Wonderful Dharma,
The Teaching of Equality, The Great Wisdom,
The One Vehicle.

The “Dharma” is also Myōhō Renge Kyō.

The concluding stanza of Chapter 2, Expedients:

Those who do not study the Dharma
Cannot understand it.
You have already realized
The fact that the Buddhas, the World-Teachers, employ expedients,
According to the capacities of all living beings.
Know that, when you remove your doubts,
And when you have great joy,
You will become Buddhas!

Becomes:

Those who do not study Myōhō Renge Kyō
Cannot understand Myōhō Renge Kyō.
You have already realized
The fact that the Buddhas, the World-Teachers, employ expedients,
According to the capacities of all living beings.
Know that, when you remove your doubts,
And when you have great joy,
You will become Buddhas!

A footnote in Senchu Murano’s translation of the Lotus Sutra supports this interpretation.

In Chapter 26, Dhārānis, Medicine-King Bodhisattva said to the Buddha, “World-Honored One! Now I will give dhārāni spells to the expounder of the Dharma in order to protect him.” Murano’s note: ” ‘The Dharma’ means the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.”

For my purposes I’ve expanded “promises” to include those declarations underlining the importance of Myōhō Renge Kyō in Chapter 11, Beholding the Stūpa of Treasures; Chapter 12, Devadatta; Chapter 13, Encouragement for Keeping this Sutra; and Chapter 20, Never-Despising Bodhisattva.

For example from Chapter 11:

(The Buddha said to the great multitude.)
Who will protect
And keep Myōhō Renge Kyō,
And read and recite Myōhō Renge Kyō
After my extinction?
Make a vow before me to do this!

Or Chapter 12:

Thereupon the Buddha said to the Bodhisattvas, gods, men and the four kinds of devotees: “When I was a Bodhisattva] in my previous existence, I sought Myōhō Renge Kyō for innumerable kalpas without indolence. I became a king [and continued to be so] for many kalpas. [Although I was a king,] I made a vow to attain unsurpassed Bodhi. I never faltered in seeking it. I practiced alms-giving in order to complete the six pāramitās. I never grudged elephants, horses, the seven treasures, countries, cities, wives, children, menservants, maidservants or attendants. I did not spare my head, eyes, marrow, brain, flesh, hands or feet. I did not spare even my life.”

The more recognizable promises appear in Chapter 10, The Teacher of the Dharma:

If after my extinction anyone rejoices, even on a moment’s thought, at hearing even a gāthā or a phrase of Myōhō Renge Kyō, I also will assure him of his future attainment of Anuttara-samyak-saṃbodhi.

And in Chapter 23, The Previous Life of Medicine-King Bodhisattva:

[T]he merits to be given to the person who fills the one thousand million Sumeru-worlds with the seven treasures and offers that amount of the seven treasures to the Buddhas, to the Great Bodhisattvas, to the Pratyekabuddhas, and to the Arhats, are less than the merits to be given to the person who keeps even a single gāthā of four lines of Myōhō Renge Kyō.

Of the 28 chapters, there were seven from which I didn’t extract any promises. Chapter 5, The Simile of Herbs; Chapter 6, Assurance of Future Buddhahood; Chapter 8, The Assurance of Future Buddhahood of the Five Hundred Disciples; Chapter 9, The Assurance of Future Buddhahood of the Śrāvakas Who Have Something More to Learn and the Śrāvakas Who Have Nothing More to Learn; Chapter 15, The Appearance of Bodhisattvas from Underground; Chapter 16, The Duration of the Life of the Tathāgata; and Chapter 27, King Wonderful-Adornment as the Previous Life of a Bodhisattva.

I confess that I chose to limit the number of promises from the one chapter that is nothing but promises.  Chapter 19, The Merits of the Teacher of the Dharma, promises purification of the six sense organs and supernatural powers to those who preach Myōhō Renge Kyō.

For example, I chose to skip these promises:

He will be able to know by smell
Whether an unborn child is a boy or a girl,
Or a child of ambiguous sex,
Or the embryo of a nonhuman being.

He will be able to know by smell
Whether a woman is an expectant mother,
Or whether she will give an easy birth
To a happy child or not.

He will be able to know by smell
What a man or a woman is thinking of,
Or whether he or she is greedy, ignorant or angry,
Or whether he or she is doing good.

He will be able to recognize by smell
The gold, silver, and other treasures
Deposited underground,
And the things enclosed in a copper box.

He will be able to know by smell
The values of various necklaces,
And the deposits of their materials,
And also to locate the necklaces [when they are lost].

The final promises I’ve collected fill every day from January 1 to August 31. I begin with Mañjuśrī’s promise:

The Buddha will remove
Any doubt of those who seek
The teaching of the Three Vehicles.
No question will be left unresolved.

And I conclude with this quote from Chapter 22: Transmission:

In the future, when you see good men or women who believe in the wisdom of the Tathāgata, you should expound Myōhō Renge Kyō to them, and cause them to hear and know Myōhō Renge Kyō so that they may be able to obtain the wisdom of the Buddha. When you see anyone who does not receive Myōhō Renge Kyō by faith, you should show him some other profound teachings of mine, teach him, benefit him, and cause him to rejoice. When you do all this, you will be able to repay the favors given to you by the Buddhas.”

Having heard these words of the Buddha, the Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas were filled with great joy. With more respect than ever, they bent forward, bowed, joined their hands together towards him, and said simultaneously. “We will do as you command. Certainly, World-Honored One! Do not worry!”

From September 1 through the end of the year I have chosen quotes from Nichiren’s writings that speak to the promise of Myōhō Renge Kyō.

Finally, I should note that I excluded Chapter 25, The Universal Gate of World-Voice-Perceiver Bodhisattva, from this project. The chapter is full of promises, but these are promises about World-Voice-Perceiver and his vow to protect those who call his name. Unlike Wonderful Voice Bodhisattva, who transforms himself into various living beings and expounds Myōhō Renge Kyō to others, World-Voice-Perceiver expounds an expedient Dharma to those who are to be saved. His protection is independent and disconnected from the promises of Myōhō Renge Kyō.

Next: About Those Empty, Vulgar Promises

Previous: The Next 10 Years