Peaceful Action

Viewing the Lotus Sutra from the Avatamsaka Sutra

I’ve spoken before of perspective in viewing the Lotus Sutra. Nichiren and T’ien T’ai examined the Lotus Sutra from the perspective of the Buddha’s highest teaching and used that perspective to interpret the provisional teachings. A very different result occurs when the perspective is shifted so that other sutras are used to view the Lotus Sutra.

Here’s a quote from Thich Nhat Hanh’s Peaceful Action, Open Heart:

When our mind faculty and our other sense faculties have been transformed and purified as a result of the merit we have received from hearing, understanding, and practicing this wonderful Dharma, then we need hear only one gatha or one line of the Sutra to understand all sutras and teachings. We do not need to study the entire Tripitaka in order to understand the Buddhadharma. One gatha contains all other gathas, one teaching reveals the deep meaning of all other teachings, just as the truth of impermanence contains the truth of no-self and the truth of interbeing.

Peaceful Action, Open Heart, p126

A follower of Nichiren would have no problem with that observation. But then Thich Nhat Hanh goes on:

This is the meaning of the Avatamsaka Sutra: the one contains the all.

Repeatedly in Thich Nhat Hanh’s Peaceful Action, Open Heart, he returns to the Avatamsaka Sutra [the Flower Garland Sutra]. In discussing Chapter 21, The Supernatural Powers of the Tathāgatas, when the Buddha emitts rays of light with an immeasurable variety of colors from his pores, Thich Nhat Hanh writes:

Then there is the image of the rays of light emitted by the Buddha. “Light” in Buddhist sutras is a metaphor for awakened understanding. The world of the Avatamsaka Sutra is a world of light. The Buddha is light; beams of light stream out from each pore of his body. His light of mindfulness is very strong, and with that source of light the Tathagata is able to illuminate all the world-spheres, as if by shining the beam of a powerful lamp into them. With the light of his great spiritual power the Buddha can see clearly whatever phenomenon the light of his mindfulness rests upon.

We also have the source of this light in our own consciousness. When we develop our capacity for mindfulness and allow it to shine within us and around us, we are able to see many things that we cannot ordinarily perceive. When the light of mindfulness, of awakened understanding, illuminates a leaf, a blade of grass, or a cloud, we are able to see all the wonders of that phenomenon and the multidimensional world of the Avatamsaka Sutra is opened up to us in an amazing way. And just like the Buddha, thanks to mindfulness we too can perform miracles.

Suppose there is someone who lives very mindfully, dwelling in concentration. She comes home, goes out, stands, sits, speaks, chops vegetables, washes pots, carries out all the activities of daily life in mindfulness and concentration. In all her actions of body, speech, and mind she shines the light of mindfulness. When others encounter her they are able to get in touch with that mindfulness, and they are influenced by it. Touched by the light of her mindfulness, the seed of mindfulness in their own consciousness begins to sprout, and naturally they also begin to cultivate mindfulness in their activities as she does. This is a true miracle that any one of us can realize.

The light of mindfulness of those around us – a brother or sister, parent or teacher, spouse or partner – shines out onto us, and thanks to that we also begin to cultivate mindfulness and shine it out toward others. What is a Buddha? A Buddha is nothing other than the light of mindfulness, and that light, wherever it shines, is able to show us the wonderful truth, the ultimate dimension of whatever it illuminates. Those who are touched by the light of mindfulness in turn shine the light of their mindfulness upon other people and objects. Just as the Buddha’s rays of light, when they reached all the other world-spheres, caused the countless Buddhas to emit their light, when we live mindfully we shine that light broadly all around us and help others get in touch with and shine their light of mindfulness as well.

Peaceful Action, Open Heart, p129-130

Another example of this comes in Thich Nhat Hanh’s discussion of Chapter 28, The Encouragements of the Bodhisattva Universally Worthy. Thich Nhat Hanh writes:

Universally Worthy is the last bodhisattva mentioned in the Lotus Sutra, and his role here is to protect and preserve the Sutra, to “broadly propagate it and cause it never to perish.” However, this brief chapter is not extensive enough to reveal the full dimension of Samanta-bhadra, who is called the bodhisattva of Great Action. So we can use elements from other sutras, such as the Avatamsaka Sutra, in which the great action of Samanta-bhadra is explicated more fully, to complete the chapter on this bodhisattva in the Lotus Sutra.

Peaceful Action, Open Heart, p203

Clearly Thich Nhat Hanh uses the Lotus Sutra to illustrate his teaching rather than using the Lotus Sutra as the basis of his teaching. The difference is not subtle.