The Buddha has come into the world of suffering and suffers with the living beings of this world. Like others, he participates in the creation of the world at every moment. He does so by being a teacher and medicine giver, not by being a kind of external, unilateral power. Above all, the Buddha is a teacher. And it is precisely in reference to his being a teacher that bodhisattvas are so frequently referred to in the Dharma Flower Sutra as children of the Buddha. Those whose lives are shaped by the teachings of the Buddha, by the Buddha Dharma, have been created as much by the Buddha’s words as by their biological parents. But, like normal parents, the Buddha does not have absolute power over his children. Like the father in the parable of the rich father and poor son in Chapter 4, the Buddha longs for his children to be ready to receive their inheritance from him, his great wealth of the Dharma.

The Buddha can be called the loving father of all, not because he has complete power over others, but precisely because he does not. Far from demanding that human beings be obedient to him, the Buddha challenges us to enter into and take up the way of the bodhisattva, a way to which we can be led but cannot be forced to enter. Like the poor son in Chapter 4, we may need encouragement in order to learn gradually to accept responsibility for the responsibilities we have inherited, for the buddhas’ business, or, like the weary travelers in Chapter 7, we may need a resting place, even an illusory one, in order to pursue the valuable treasure in our own lives, but finally it is we ourselves who have to be responsible.