Day 8 concludes Chapter 4, Understanding by Faith, and closes the second volume of the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

Having last month concluded The Parable of the Rich Man and His Poor Son, we consider how the Buddha is like the father in the parable.

You are like the father.
Knowing that we wished
To hear the Lesser Vehicle,
You did not say to us, “You will become Buddhas.”
You said of us to others:
“Though they are my disciples, they are Śrāvakas.
They eliminated āsravas,
But attained only the Lesser Vehicle.”

You said to us:
“Expound the most excellent Way [to Bodhisattvas]!
Those who practice the Way
Will be able to become Buddhas.”

By this order of yours
We expounded the unsurpassed Way
To the great Bodhisattvas
With various stories of previous lives,
With various parables and similes
And with various discourses.•

Hearing the [Way, that is, the] Dharma from us,
Those sons of yours
Thought it over day and night,
And practiced it strenuously.

Thereupon the Buddha assured them
Of their future Buddhahood, saying to them:
“You will become Buddhas
In your future lives.”

You expounded the real thing,
That is, the store
Of the hidden core of the Buddhas
Only to the Bodhisattvas.
You did not expound
This truth to us.

The poor son came to his father,
And took custody
Of the things of his father,
But wished to take none of them.

The same can be said of us.
We did not wish to have the treasure-store
Of the teachings of the Buddhas
Although we expounded it [to the Bodhisattvas].

We were satisfied with the elimination
Of illusions within ourselves.
What we accomplished was that elimination.
We did nothing more.

You told us
To purify the world of the Buddha
And teach all living beings.
We heard this, but did not wish to do so
Because we had already attained the truth:
“All things are void and tranquil.
Nothing appears or disappears.
Nothing is larger or smaller.
Nothing has āsravas.
Nothing is subject to cause and effect.”
Having thought this, we did not wish
To do [the Bodhisattva practices].

In the long night
We did not care
For the wisdom of the Buddha.
We did not wish to have it.
We thought:
“The Dharma we attained is perfect.”

Having studied the truth of the Void in the long night,
We emancipated ourselves
From the sufferings of the triple world,
Attained the Nirvāṇa-with-remainder,
And reached the final stage
Of our physical existence.

You said [to us]:
“When you attain enlightenment infallibly,
You will have already repaid
The favors I gave you.”

Although we expounded to the sons of the Buddha
The teachings for Bodhisattvas in order to cause them
To seek the enlightenment of the Buddha,
We did not wish to attain
The same enlightenment for ourselves.
You, our Leader, left us alone because you knew this.
You did not persuade us
To seek the enlightenment of the Buddha.
You did not say
That we should be able to have real benefits.

The rich man knew
That his son was base and mean.
Therefore, he made him nobler
With expedients,
And then gave him
All his treasures.

In the same manner,
You knew that we wished
To hear the Lesser Vehicle.
Therefore, you did a rare thing.
You prepared us with expedients,
And then taught us the great wisdom.

The Daily Dharma from April 27, 2022, offers this: