While Kwan-yin, Manjushri, and Maitreya are famous, especially in China and throughout East Asia, for taking on whatever body is needed in order to be helpful to others, Wonderful Voice Bodhisattva is hardly known outside of the Dharma Flower Sutra, or even outside of Chapter 24 of the Dharma Flower Sutra. He seems, for example, to have been completely neglected by artists. I do not know why this is so. It certainly cannot be because this story is any less encouraging to women than the Kwan-yin chapter. Here, by indicating numerous ways in which Wonderful Voice takes on female bodies, the text goes to some lengths to assure women that they too can become bodhisattvas, that they themselves can become Wonderful Voice Bodhisattva. Perhaps one reason that this bodhisattva failed to attract artists is that it is difficult to portray a face as beautiful as millions of moons together!

Nor do we know whether the story of Wonderful Voice Bodhisattva is older or younger than the story in the Dharma Flower Sutra of Kwan-yin Bodhisattva. But I think it is no accident that in the Dharma Flower Sutra this story is placed just before the Kwan-yin chapter. Kwan-yin is enormously famous for being able to take on any form in order to save others. One could easily think that this special power to take on different forms belongs to Kwan-yin alone. But in the Dharma Flower Sutra we are clearly shown that almost exactly the same power and list of forms is also attributed to Wonderful Voice. The point, I believe, is not that there are two bodhisattvas with such power, but that every bodhisattva has such power. We are not talking about magical tricks here. The ability to take on different forms according to what is needed means just that, an ability to adapt to different situations, particularly to the different needs of people. Taking on different forms is no more and no less than the ability to serve others usefully, practically, and effectively. This is a power given not only to the bodhisattvas Kwan-yin and Wonderful Voice, but to each and every one of us.

Thus, one obvious meaning of this story for us is that we too can become bodhisattvas who take on different forms and roles in order to help others. And there is another side to this, even its opposite – anyone can be a bodhisattva for us. If Wonderful Voice Bodhisattva can take on any form, anyone we meet might be Wonderful Voice Bodhisattva in a form designed to help us! But very often at least, someone can be a bodhisattva for us only if we let them, only if we open ourselves in such a way as to enable someone to be a bodhisattva for us.