Day 15 concludes Chapter 10, The Teacher of the Dharma, and opens Chapter 11, Beholding the Stūpa of Treasures.

Last month and the month before I focused on the promises made to those who expound this sutra after the extinction of the Buddha.

Now it is time for the arrival of the stupa of treasures:

Thereupon a stupa of the seven treasures sprang up from underground and hung in the sky before the Buddha. The stupa was five hundred yojanas high and two hundred and fifty yojanas wide and deep. It was adorned with various treasures. It was furnished with five thousand railings and ten million chambers. It was adorned with innumerable banners and streamers, from which jeweled necklaces and billions of jeweled bells were hanging down. The fragrance of tamalapattra and candana was sent forth from the four sides of the stupa to all the corners of the world. Many canopies, adorned with streamers, and made of the seven treasures–gold, silver, lapis lazuli, shell, agate, pearl and ruby–were hanging in the sky [one upon another from the top of the stupa] up to the [heaven of the] palaces of the four heavenly-kings. The thirty-three gods offered a rain of heavenly mandarava-flowers to the stupa of treasures. Thousands of billions of living beings, including the other gods, dragons, yaksas, gandharvas, asuras, garudas, kimnaras, mahoragas, men and nonhuman beings, also offered flowers, incense, necklaces, streamers, canopies and music to the stupa of treasures, venerated the stupa, honored it, and praised it.

Thereupon a loud voice of praise was heard from within the stupa of treasures:

“Excellent, excellent! You, Sakyamuni, the World-Honored One, have expounded to this great multitude the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma, the Teaching of Equality, the Great Wisdom, the Dharma for Bodhisattvas, the Dharma Upheld by the Buddhas. So it is, so it is. What you, Sakyamuni, the World-Honored One, have expounded is all true.”

From Rev. Ryuei McCormick’s book “Lotus Seeds“:

Many Treasures Tathagata represents many things. On one level, he represents all the Buddhas of the past, and his testimony shows that Shakyamuni Buddha’s teachings are in accord with the universal truth, valid in all ages and in all worlds. On another level, Shakyamuni Buddha personifies subjective wisdom while Many Treasures Tathagata personifies objective reality. When they share the seat within the Stupa of Treasures they are actually demonstrating the unity of wisdom and reality, subject and object. The emergence of the Stupa of Treasures itself and the testimony of the Many Treasures Tathagata from within it could also indicate the emergence of Buddhahood from within our lives and our own inner recognition of and response to the truth when we hear it.

Lotus Seeds

Day 14 covers all of Chapter 9, The Assurance of Future Buddhahood of the Śrāvakas Who Have Something More to Learn and the Śrāvakas Who Have Nothing More to Learn, and opens Chapter 10, The Teacher of the Dharma.

Last month, I focused on Ananda, who is foremost in hearing the sutras. This month I’ll move to Rahula.

When I was a crown prince,
Rahula was my eldest son.
When I attained the enlightenment of the Buddha,
He received the Dharma, and became the son of the Dharma.

In his future life he will see
Many hundreds of millions of Buddhas,
Become the eldest son of those Buddhas, and seek
The enlightenment of the Buddha with all his heart.

Only I know his secret practices.
He shows himself
To all living beings
In the form of my eldest son.

He has many thousands of billions of merits.
His merits are countless.
He dwells peacefully in the Dharma of the Buddha,
And seeks unsurpassed enlightenment.

Ryusho Jeffus Shonin’s Lecture on the Lotus Sutra says this about Rahula’s secret practices:

It is the ordinary day-to-day practice that each of us performs that is actually the great secret practice of Rahula. It isn’t fame or acquiring a big name that is required to attain enlightenment. It isn’t being famous that will lead others to practice the Lotus Sutra. It is our practice of the Lotus Sutra in our everyday lives that will enable countless others just like us to ultimately take faith in the Lotus Sutra. We should not be discouraged, instead we can look at Rahula who will become Walking-On-Flowers-Of-Seven-Treasures Buddha and we too can walk on the flowers of the seven treasures of Myoho-Renge-Kyo.

Day 13 covers all of Chapter 8, The Assurance of Future Buddhahood of the Five Hundred Disciples.

Last month, I focused on Purna, the son of Maitrayani. The Buddha reveals that his appearance as the Sravaka foremost in expounding the Dharma is only an expedient. He is really a Bodhisattva.

After the Buddha assures “these twelve hundred Arhats, who are present before me,” of their future attainment of Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi one after another, the arhats come to understand “we were like men of no wisdom because we were satisfied with the wisdom of the Lesser Vehicle although we had already been qualified to obtain the wisdom of the Tathagata.”

They offer the Parable of the Priceless Gem and recognize that they had forgotten that they, like Purna, are really bodhisattvas.

We thought that we had attained extinction when we attained Arhatship because we forgot that we had been taught to aspire for the knowledge of all things by you when you were a Bodhisattva just as the man who had difficulty in earning his livelihood satisfied himself with what little he had earned. You, the World-Honored One, saw that the aspiration for the knowledge of all things was still latent in our minds; therefore, you awakened us, saying, ‘Bhiksus! What you had attained was not perfect extinction. I caused you to plant the good root of Buddhahood a long time ago. [You have forgotten this; therefore,] I expounded the teaching of Nirva]Ja as an expedient. You thought that you had attained true extinction when you attained the Nirvana [which I taught you as an expedient].’

World-Honored One! Now we see that we are Bodhisattvas in reality, and that we are assured of our future attainment of Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi. Therefore, we have the greatest joy that we have ever had.

Day 12 concludes Chapter 7, The Parable of the Magic City, and completes the Third Volume of the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

Last month, I promised to touch on the debt owed to the 16 young sramanera bodhisattvas, who convinced the Buddha to expound the teaching of Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi.

The Buddha assented to the appeal of the sramaneras, but it was twenty thousand kalpas afterwards that he expounded to the four kinds of devotees the sutra of the Great Vehicle called the ‘Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma, the Dharma for Bodhisattvas, the Dharma Upheld by the Buddhas.’

When the Buddha completed the expounding of this sutra, the sixteen sramaneras kept, recited and understood this sutra in order to attain Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi. The sixteen sramaneras, [ who were] Bodhisattvas, received this sutra by faith. Some Sravakas understood it by faith, but the other Sravakas and other living beings, thousands of billions in number, doubted it.

It took the Buddha eight thousand kalpas to complete the expounding of this sutra. During that time he did not take a rest. Having completed the expounding of this sutra, the Buddha entered a quiet room and practiced dhyana-concentration for eighty-four thousand kalpas. Seeing him practicing dhyana­concentration quietly in the room, the sixteen Bodhisattva­sramaneras each sat on a seat of the Dharma, expounded the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma to the four kinds of devotees for eighty-four thousand kalpas, and saved six hundred billion nayutas of living beings, that is, as many living beings as there are sands in the River Ganges. They showed them the Way, taught them, benefited them, caused them to rejoice and to aspire for Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi.

And most important, Sakyamuni was one of the srameaneras.

Bhiksus! When we were sramaneras, we each taught many hundreds of thousands of billions of living beings, that is, as many living beings as there are sands in the River Ganges. Those living beings who followed me, heard the Dharma from me in order to attain Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi. Some of them are still in Sravakahood. I now teach them the Way to Anuttara-samyak­sambodhi. They will be able to enter the Way to Buddhahood by my teaching, but not immediately because the wisdom of the Tathagata is difficult to believe and difficult to understand. Those living beings as many as there are sands in the River Ganges, whom I taught [ when I was a sramanera], included you bhiksus and those who will be reborn as my disciples in Sravakahood after my extinction. My disciples who do not hear this sitra or know the practices of Bodhisattvas, after my extinction will make a conception of extinction by the merits they will have accumulated by themselves, and enter into Nirvana as they conceive it. At that time I shall be a Buddha of another name in another world. Those who will enter into Nirvana as they conceive it will be able [to be reborn] in the world I shall live in, seek the wisdom of the Buddha, and hear this sutra. They will be able to attain [true] extinction only by the Vehicle of the Buddha in that world because there is no other vehicle except when the Tathagatas expound the Dharma with expedients.

Day 11 continues Chapter 7, The Parable of the Magic City

Today’s section of the Lotus Sutra is all about the light that accompanies the enlightenment of Great-Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Buddha:

When Great-Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Buddha attained Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi, five hundred billion Buddha-worlds in each of the ten quarters quaked in the six ways, and all those worlds, including those intercepted from the brilliant rays of light of the sun and the moon by the neighboring worlds, were illumined [by great rays of light], and the living beings of those worlds were able to see each other for the first time. They said to each other, ‘How did you appear so suddenly?’ The palaces of the gods of those worlds, including the palace of Brahmans, also quaked in the six ways. The great rays of light which illumined all those worlds were brighter than the rays of light emitted by those gods.

The Brahman-heavenly-kings of each of the 10 directions react to this sudden illumination. Today, I’ll single out the reaction of the Brahman-­heavenly-king called Great-Compassion of the five hundred billion worlds in the southeast. Great-Compassion and the other Brahman-heavenly-kings went to the northwest, carrying flower-plates filled with heavenly flowers. Their palaces also moved as they went.

After greeting the Buddha and offering the flowers and their palaces, the Brahman-heavenly-kings of the southeast sang in gathas:

Saintly Master, God of Gods!
Your voice is as sweet as a kalavinka’s.
You have compassion towards all living beings.
We now bow before you.
You, the World-Honored One, are exceptional.
You appear only once in a very long time.

No Buddha has appeared
For the past one hundred and eighty kalpas.
The three evil regions are crowded;
And the living beings in heaven, decreasing.

Now you have appeared in this world
And become the eye of all living beings.
As their refuge, you are saving them.
As their father, you are benefiting them
Out of your compassion towards them.
We are now able to see you
Because we accumulated merits
In our previous existence.

This gathering of Brahman-heavenly-kings is the only one to call the Buddha “God of gods.” More traditional is the description of the Buddha as “Most Honorable of Gods and Men.”