Tao-sheng Commentary on the Lotus Sutra, p89-90Taoism treats language as a tool somewhat deficient in unfolding ultimate reality to the full extent, as epitomized by the adage in the Lao-tzu: “Those who know do not speak; those who speak do not know” (Chapter 56). Also the Hsi-tz’u ch’uan (“Commentary on the Appended Judgements” of the I Ching), which is a text of Wang Pi’s commentary, quotes Confucius as stating: “Writing does not do full justice to words, which in turn do not do full justice to ideas” (11-12). The ineptness of words can be seen in the ineffable nature of li. Kuo Hsiang echoes this point: “The ultimate li is not something to be spoken of … li is not that which can be verbalized.”
Tao-sheng is in agreement with the Taoists on the limits of language. Various adjectival modifiers descriptive of li, such as deep, profound, wide, mysterious, far-off, and dark, all clearly identifiable in the Taoist literature, express the unspeakable nature of li. At best the role of language is to circumscribe li through approximation. He pointedly declares: “li is transcendent of words.”
Implicit in the limitation of words, on the other hand, is their intermediary value. Language belongs to the category of exigency (ch’ūan) or expediency (fang-pien, upāya). Tao-sheng declares: “li by nature is unspeakable, and yet we speak of it by resort to words in their temporary and false role, which we call expedient means.” Words as a medium or “ferry” are indispensable, especially to those who have not “witnessed” li in the course of their self-realization. In this respect, language can be best described as a catalyst in the realization of li. In Buddhist terms, it can be counted among the supporting causes (pratyaya), whereas the primary cause (hetu) making realization possible lies in the original capacity innate in human nature. …
Nevertheless, language, especially in connection with the Sage, is sometimes credited with more than a catalytic role. Here, Tao-sheng also finds common ground with the neo-Taoists. The words of the Sage, who has had an experiential encounter with li, are an authentic testimonial, a right source of mystical knowledge. Language here does not remain merely descriptive but becomes prescriptive. Therefore, in the adulation of the sūtra, repeatedly urged by the sūtra itself, there may not be anything unacceptable to Tao-sheng, whose approach in the commentary otherwise reflects a rationalist frame of mind.
Daily Dharma – Dec. 22, 2024
When we worship gods or Buddhas, we begin with the phrase of “namu.” Namu is an Indian word that has come to mean “offering of life to Buddhas and gods” in China and Japan. Our social standing is determined in part by possessing a spouse and children, retainers, fiefs, and gold and silver, though some people do not have those. Regardless of whether we possess these or not, no one possesses treasure more precious than life. Accordingly, sages and wise men in the past have donated their lives to the Buddhas in order to attain Buddhahood.
Nichiren wrote this passage in his Treatise on Phenomenal and Noumenal Offering (Jiri Kuyō Gosho). We tend to judge ourselves and others by the outward aspects of our lives: where we live, what we wear, our position in society, and the company we keep. It is easy to lose sight of what will happen when we leave this life and give up all those things, even our precious bodies. Nichiren reminds us that our lives are all we have, and when we live them in gratitude for what the Buddha teaches us, and dedicate ourselves to benefitting others, then we exist as enlightened beings.
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Daily Dharma – Dec. 21, 2024
The Śrāvakas will have already eliminated āsravas,
And reached the final stage of their physical existence.
They will become sons of the King of the Dharma.
Their number also will be beyond calculation.
Even those who have heavenly eyes
Will not be able to count them.
The Buddha sings these verses in Chapter Six of the Lotus Sūtra. The Śrāvakas are those who want only to eliminate their delusions and end their suffering. They do not yet realize that the Buddha leads them to become Bodhisattvas and work for the benefit of all beings. They do not believe they can reach the Buddha’s own wisdom. The Buddha assures even these beings that in the course of time, as they realize their true nature, they too will become enlightened.
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Gentry Buddhism in China
Tao-sheng Commentary on the Lotus Sutra, p3Tao-sheng’s life (ca. 360-434) lies mainly within the period of Eastern Chin (317-419), extending a little further to that of the Sung Dynasty (House of Liu) (420-477). The Chin era witnessed the development of “gentry Buddhism,” a product of interchanges between monks and intellectuals who fled from the north after its conquest and helped found a new dynasty in the south. Gentry Buddhism thus refers to the class of people involved and their tendency to focus on philosophical rather than religious issues. Tao-sheng was first initiated into this form of Chinese Buddhism.
The introduction of Buddhism to China had taken place about three centuries earlier, generally believed to have occurred around the time of the Christian era. In spite of this great length of time, Buddhism had not really taken root in Chinese soil. Only since the middle of the second century, with the influx of missionaries from the Indian subcontinent and its perimeter (including An Shih-kao, from Parthia, the first missionary ever recorded), could tangible signs of development be found. The influx of missionaries led to the introduction and translation of āgamas, sūtras, and expositions, activities that had increased greatly by the time of Tao-sheng, due mainly to the missionary zeal of Kumārajīva, with whom the former studied for some time. These thinkers were to encounter and challenge the presuppositions of the existing traditions and face a number of new hermeneutical and exegetical problems.
Daily Dharma – Dec. 20, 2024
The father thought, ‘These sons are pitiful. They are so poisoned that they are perverted. Although they rejoice at seeing me and ask me to cure them, they do not consent to take this good medicine. Now I will have them take it with an expedient.’
The Buddha gives this description as part of the Parable of the Wise Physician in Chapter Sixteen of the Lotus Sūtra. In the story, the physician’s children have mistakenly taken poison, yet refuse the remedy their father provides for them. The children are just like us as we cling to our attachments and delusions and refuse the good medicine of the Buddha Dharma. This refusal can be for many reasons. The children may think the remedy is worse than the poison. They may be holding out for another remedy that may be even more pleasant. They may enjoy being poisoned. They may not trust that their father can cure them. As the father in the story faked his death to bring the children to their right minds, the Buddha seems to disappear from our lives so that we may learn to accept the teaching he provides for us. And as the father reappeared to the children once they took the remedy, the Buddha reappears to us when we practice his teaching.
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The Value of Tao-sheng’s Commentary
Tao-sheng Commentary on the Lotus Sutra, p145[Tao-sheng’s commentary] has extraordinary historical value. As the first commentary ever written on the Lotus, a work that itself was to become an increasingly important scripture in East Asia, it set many patterns for later commentators as well as founders of the Chinese Buddhist schools. Most likely, [this commentary] is the first exegetical commentary in a full-fledged form in Chinese Buddhism. In that respect, it is probable that the work had a far-reaching impact beyond the area circumscribed by the Lotus, whether individual writers realized or acknowledged it.
The [commentary] naturally had a considerable effect on the interpretation of the Lotus. The fact that Tao-sheng attached such importance to the scripture by writing a commentary foreshadows the rise of the Lotus as a basic text in the Chinese Buddhist tradition. The Lotus emerged as one of the most influential of the scriptures of Mahāyāna Buddhism.
Tao-sheng’s attempt at schematization and rationalization of the Buddha’s diverse, if not contradictory, doctrines under a single teaching program in four units long prefigures the p’an-chiao systems of the T’ien-t’ai and Hua-yen doctrines. This rationalization is linked closely with the motif of diversity in unity, which was to be stressed especially by the T’ien-t’ai syncretists. As for the p’an-chaio [ the Chinese systems of doctrinal classification], the T’ien-t’ai and the Hua-yen Buddhists owed Tao-sheng more than the general idea of it. In their p’an-chiao schemas are found the two components, sudden and gradual teachings, for whose conception, as fully seen in the [commentary], Tao-sheng was primarily responsible. Thus one may say that the essence of Tao-sheng’s understanding regarding the Lotus found its way into some of the more important theoretical works in Chinese Buddhism.
Daily Dharma – Dec. 19, 2024
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.
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Tao-sheng and the Lotus Sutra
Tao-sheng Commentary on the Lotus Sutra, p77-78The only credible information about how Tao-sheng came to take an interest in the Lotus is his own statement found in the preface to the commentary itself. He writes that earlier, “when young,” he happened to attend a series of lectures on the Lotus, which were “rich in literary content and meaning” and “deep in reflection in the explanatory medium (shih) and underlying principle (li).” The notes he jotted down then, he goes on to say, became the basis of the present commentary compiled toward the end of his life in 432. The lecturer is not specified. Possibly, it could have been either Chu Fa-t’ai (320-387) or Kumārajīva (344-413). The expression “when I was young” makes Chu sound like the more plausible author, because Tao-sheng was presumably with Chu between ages eleven (ca. 371) and twenty-seven (ca. 387), whereas he studied under Kumārajīva in his late forties, between 405 and 408.
However, no other evidence supports the theory of the earlier master. Furthermore, the commentary is based on the text of Kumārajīva, not on any other translation, though it is not categorically impossible that he initially attended the lecture based on another version and later used the new translation. The oldest of the three extant translations is the one by Dharmarakshita (translated in 286). Tao-sheng may have studied it at some point in the thirty years following his conversion to Buddhism. Yet, the study of the Prajñāpāramitā Sūtras (especially in the circle of Chu Fa-t’ai as in the circle of the latter’s colleague Tao-an) dominated and overshadowed the study of other scriptures.
As a matter of fact, Tao-sheng was in Ch’ang-an when Kumārajīva translated the Lotus. The translation was not limited to rendering the Sanskrit text into the Chinese language but involved the master’s interpretation of the text, eliciting lively discussions among students concerning the most appropriate translations of the original Sanskrit terms. It may be pointed out here that in his colophon to the Lotus, Seng-chao recognized Tao-sheng’s presence in the translation, also stating that “the letters and meanings (as suggested by Kumārajīva) were both penetrative,” resembling Tao-sheng’s description cited earlier. In any event, a long gap of at least twenty-seven years lies between Tao-sheng’s introduction to the Lotus and the compilation of his commentary. During this period Tao-sheng was occupied with many subjects and sūtras, covering practically all of his theories and writings. The commentary thus marks the culmination of his scholarship.
The commentary was completed in 432 while Tao-sheng was at Lu-shan after being excommunicated in 430 because of the icchantika issue. Tao-sheng apparently took up the Lotus as a medium to voice his thoughts and feelings about the Buddhist study and practice of his time. This is expressed in the first passage of the commentary, as he laments: “those who seriously tackle and grasp [the subtle words] are few while those who superficially touch and sneer at them are many.” In fact the doctrine of universal Buddhahood is manifestly embodied in the text.
Daily Dharma – Dec. 18, 2024
My words are true.
Believe me with all your hearts!
I have been teaching them
Since the remotest past.
The Buddha sings these verses to Maitreya Bodhisattva and others gathered to hear him teach in Chapter Fifteen of the Lotus Sūtra. Maitreya had never seen any of the other Bodhisattvas who sprang up from underground in this chapter, despite his memory of previous lives and other worlds. The Buddha explains that the beings who had just appeared are also his disciples and have come to spread this Wonderful Dharma in our world. Nichiren teaches that when he realized that he was an incarnation of Superior-Practice, the leader of the Bodhisattvas from underground, then all of us who follow Nichiren and continue to keep the Lotus Sūtra are the followers of Superior-Practice. We do not need to wait for someone to come to our world and lead us. The world does not need anyone other than those already here to teach the Dharma. We are the Bodhisattvas from underground.
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Li and Sudden Enlightenment
Tao-sheng Commentary on the Lotus Sutra, p33-34Does Tao-sheng provide adequate metaphysical and epistemological grounds for sudden enlightenment? The key to this question lies in the concept of li: a term of extreme significance in the Chinese philosophical tradition, and one that is ubiquitous in Tao-sheng’s writings. li has a wide spectrum of implications embracing both the particular and the universal, yet it may be safe to relate li to the essential substance underlying all things, including the Buddha’s teachings. However, Tao-sheng seems to take particulars as representations of the universal, and therefore, in his view, there is no serious conflict between the two levels. It may be possible to see li as a metaphysical term for the ultimate reality. li is identified with what is immutable (ch’ang): nirvāṇa, Dharmatā, and Dharma-kāya. By losing it one enters into the bondage of birth-and-death (saṃsāra); and by attaining it one reaches nirvāṇa. Whatever it is, li represents that by which one is to be enlightened; that is, it is the content of enlightenment.
Then, why sudden enlightenment? Because li is indivisible and nonanalytic, and the ontological nature of li dictates its epistemological mode. Tao-sheng makes this point in his [Commentary on the Nirvāṇa Sūtra]: “The true li (or Truth) is self-so (tzu-jan): enlightenment also is [the process of] mysteriously identifying oneself with [Truth]. What is true being not gradational (nondifferentiated), then can enlightenment allow any [stages of] changing?” The interrelation of ontology and epistemology seen here receives a clearer exposition by Tao-sheng in the following quotation: “What is the meaning of sudden? It means that li is indivisible; while the word enlightenment means illuminating the ultimate [that li is]. Hence, nondual enlightenment matches with indivisible li. [The distinction between] li and knowledge being done away with, we call it sudden enlightenment.” Thus, the indivisible nature of li requires an equally indivisible means to grasp it.
As a corollary, one also can consider the expression one. li is often described as “one,” especially in the [Commentary on the Lotus Sutra]. One is found along with such words as ultimate (or “final”) (chi), mysterious (miao), everlasting (ch’ang), as well as vehicle (yāna), referring to One Vehicle as the point of synthesis in the dialectical process involving the three vehicles. Hsieh’s argument in the [Pien-tsung lun] begins with the premise that “li is united with the One ultimate (or one and final).” As a logical consequence in his view, “one enlightenment” therefore is in order: “with one enlightenment all the fetters of existence are dispensed with simultaneously.”
Tao-sheng does not specifically reject the established doctrine of stages (bhūmi), which apparently typifies gradual enlightenment, but he locates the ultimate li beyond the confines of the ten stages. The ten stages and four grades of sagehood are merely the means that the Buddha devised to bring li within reach of all sentient beings.
Faith (hsin) is relegated by Tao-sheng as something short of enlightenment. “Understanding through faith” (hsin-chieh) in his view is not genuine enlightenment: when enlightenment sets in, faith gives way. In the [Pien-tsung lun] we find this view reiterated by Hsieh Ling-yūn; “Understanding is not to be gradually reached, whereas faith arises [gradually] from instruction. What do I mean by this? The fact that faith arises from instruction [shows that] there is such a thing as the work of daily advancement. But since [final] understanding is not gradual, there can be no such thing as partial entry into illumination.” In this way, Buddhahood does not allow gradual access, but rather an all-or-nothing, once-and-for-all situation.