Daily chanting is a basic and important prayer as a Nichiren Buddhist. It is called Gongyo, Shingyo or Otsutome. It means to chant every morning to the Buddha and Nichiren Shonin for your family’s security, peace for your ancestors and for the happiness of other people, and to chant every evening to express thanks to the Buddha and Nichiren Shonin for your family’s safety and peace that day. The feeling after Otsutome is so peaceful, and brings to our mind hopes for tomorrow. It is also a valuable time to meditate on one’s own daily life, and to reflect on our past life. Otsutome is an important daily event, as well as a practice for approaching enlightenment.
Spring WritingsQuotes
Teaching with Parables
As I think about the various parables I tend to divide them up into three different kinds. One type of parable teaches a new concept in an illustrative way, the primary one of this category is the Burning House, and Simile of Herbs. Another category consists of parables which highlight the discovery of something that was always present; a realization, if you will. In this category I would put The Rich Man and the Poor Son, Gem in the Robe, Gem in the Top Knot, and perhaps the Physician and his Ill Children. The last category deals with difficulty of practice and in this category I would put the Magic City.
Lecture on the Lotus SutraThe Buddha’s Deep Understanding of Cause and Effect
The doctrine of Dependent Origination is the key insight upon which the entire teaching of the Buddha rests, because it describes the Buddha’s deep understanding of cause and effect.
As we have seen, the night the Buddha attained awakening, he reflected upon his own life and past lives; upon the lives, past lives, and future destinies of all other beings; and then upon causality itself. He observed, beginning with himself, how all beings forge their destinies through their own actions. He also saw how all phenomena arise and pass away as part of a network of mutually supporting causes and conditions. The Buddha shared this insight with others in many different forms, the best known being the Twelve-fold Chain of Dependent Origination.
Lotus SeedsThe Truth
In Mahayana Buddhism, Dharma means the Buddha’s teachings, and also indicates the fundamental cosmic or universal law. This law, however, does not mean a law established by legislative and social duties, but indicates a natural law of life, just as in the law of gravity or other natural phenomena. It is the pulse of life that permeates the entire universe and, in turn, is identical to the truth: the doctrine and the essence of all the Buddha’s wisdom, insight and subsequent teachings.
Odaimoku: The Significance Of Chanting Namu Myoho Renge KyoPrayer
Prayer in Buddhism is a somewhat different animal from the way it is frequently spoken of in other faith traditions. Prayer is about changing us and not changing something outside of ourselves. Yet, still it is not uncommon and in fact quite human to need certain things in our lives and so we may pray for them. When we pray for things outside ourselves we must realize that we may not have our prayer answered specifically as we decide it should be. Our intent in prayer should focus on the necessary change that needs to occur in our lives so that we can attain enlightenment.
Lotus Path: Practicing the Lotus Sutra Volume 1The Heart of Enlightenment
The Lotus Sutra as the Physician’s Cure can bring us back from spiritual death by revealing the heart of what enlightenment is and what our relationship with the infinite past and infinite future means. This life, this lived experience, is not just this moment, or just a collection of previous moments or just the unfolding of future moments. This life is all of those and our connection with all life in the universe. Intellectually this has no energy; on the spiritual level of the heart it has unlimited energy. This I know; this I have felt. My experiences, though, are beyond the realm of theoretical understanding or sharing. I do this writing and tell these stories in the hope of in some small way sharing my experience.
Physician's Good MedicineThe Buddhist Body
[T]o abstract a phase of Buddhist thought, apart from other factors, is as if one were to dissect a human body into parts, and treat one of them as a unit.
Nichiren, The Buddhist ProphetAnger and Retaliation
Giving peace and appeasing people’s anger is one purpose of religion. Anger cannot calm anger by itself. Retaliation cannot stop retaliation by itself. Anger can be calmed by a peaceful mind, and retaliation can be calmed only by compassion. Unfortunately, though we know this well, our actions are often less ideal than we intend them to be. This is one of the silliest characteristics of human beings. Animals know better than we do. We must change our ways now, otherwise the tragedies of human life will continue forever.
Buddhism is a teaching that can provide peace, ease, and compassion. There are many teachings that can help to prepare us to accept these virtues.
Spring WritingsThe Final Teaching
Some people say that Buddhism is not a religion but a lifestyle, or a way of living. In fact, Buddhism originated as a means to save suffering people. The scriptures containing the Buddha’s teachings are collectively known as the “sutras” or “0-kyo.” Of all the sutras, the Lotus Sutra is the conclusion, the final teaching.
Spring WritingsActualizing the Lotus Sutra in Our Own Lives
[W]hether or not we identify with the Bodhisattvas who emerge from the ground is a matter for our practice. I do believe that as we practice we do realize a connection with the Lotus Sutra that transitions it from a historical document to a living teaching directed specifically to ourselves. This is a transition that is available to us buried in the Lotus Sutra, but unlike those specifically spelled out in the teachings this one requires us to manifest it through our practice. This is also a transition from theoretically understanding the teaching to actualizing it in our own lives.
Lecture on the Lotus Sutra