Today and tomorrow I’m going to add the “missing” portion of Chapter 5, The Simile of Herbs. This is found in Leon Hurvitz’s Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, which was published in 2009. I used this version of the Lotus Sutra for two cycles through my 32 Days of the Lotus Sutra starting on April 18, 2019.

Hurvitz translated both Kumārajīva’s version and a surviving Sanskrit version. This material was found in the Sanskrit but not included in Kumārajīva’s version.

“Again, O Kāśyapa, the Thus Gone One, in his guidance of the beings, is equitable, not inequitable. O Kāśyapa, just as the light of the sun and the moon illuminates the whole world, both him who does well and him who does ill, both him who stands high and him who stands low, the good-smelling and the bad-smelling, just as that light falls everywhere equally, not unequally, in just that way, O Kāśyapa, does the light of the thought of the knowledge of the all-knowing, of the Thus Gone Ones, the worthy ones, the properly and fully enlightened ones, the demonstration of the true dharma, function equally among all beings in the five destinies according to their predispositions, be they persons of the great vehicle, persons of the vehicle of the individually enlightened, or persons of the vehicle of the auditors. Nor in the light of the knowledge of the Thus Gone One is there either deficiency or superfluity, for the light conduces to knowledge in accord with merit. O Kāśyapa, there are not three vehicles. There are only beings of severally different modes of conduct, and for that reason three vehicles are designated.”

When this had been said, the long-lived Mahākāśyapa said to the Blessed One: “If, O Blessed One, there are not three vehicles, what is the reason for the present designation of auditors, individually enlightened, and bodhisattvas?”

When this had been said, the Blessed One said to the long-lived Mahākāśyapa: “It is just as the potter. O Kāśyapa, makes pots with the same clay. Among them, some become pots for sugar lumps, some pots for clarified butter, some pots for curds or milk, while some become pots for inferior and filthy things; and just as there is no difference in the clay, but rather a supposed difference in the pots based solely on the things put into them, in just this way, O Kāśyapa, is there this one and only one vehicle, to wit, the buddha vehicle. There exists neither a second nor a third vehicle.”

Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, p103

And in gāthās:

As the light of the sun and the moon falls alike on all men,
The virtuous as well as the evil, and as in their glow there is no deficiency [for some] or fullness [for others],
So the glow of the Thus Gone One’s wisdom, as equitable as the sun and the moon,
Guides all beings, being neither deficient nor yet excessive.

As a potter may be making clay pots, the pieces of clay being quite the same,
Yet there take shape in his hand containers of sugar, milk, clarified butter, and water,
Some for filth, while yet others take shape as containers of curds;
As that potter takes one clay, making pots of it;
And as, whatever thing is put into it, by that thing the pot is designated:
So to match the distinction among the beings, because of the difference in their inclinations, the Thus Gone Ones
Tell of a difference in vehicles, whereas the buddha vehicle is the true one.

Lotus Blossom of the Fine Dharma, p107