All posts by John Hughes

Foundations

Clarification of the Threefold Truth

[T]he clarification of the threefold truth. Many Sūtras contain the meaning [of the threefold truth] in detail, but the terms come from the Ying lo ching and the Jên wang ching, i.e., the truth of existence, the truth of non-Being, and the supreme truth of the Middle Way. This [Lotus Sūtra] also contains this meaning. [The chapter on] the life-span [of the Tathāgata] says, “neither like nor different.”605 This refers to the Middle Way. “Alike” refers to the real [truth] and “different” to the mundane [truth].

Foundations of T'ien T'ai Philosophy, p 253
605
See the Lotus Sūtra. The context reads (Hurvitz, Lotus Sūtra, 239): “The Thus Come One in full accord with Reality knows and sees the marks of the triple sphere. There is no birth-and-death, whether withdrawal from or emergence into the world, nor is there any being in the world nor anyone who passes into extinction. (The triple sphere) is neither Reality nor vanity, neither likeness nor difference.” return
Lecture on Lotus Sutra

Chanting the Lotus Sutra

Quote

The practice of chanting the Odaimoku was not intended to completely replace either the study of the sutra or the reading of the sutra, though it could replace the practice of reciting each of the twenty-eight chapters as a practice. In one of his letters to a believer he said it was permissible to replace the practice of reciting a chapter a day for twenty-eight days with the single practice of chanting the Odaimoku. It is important to note that he did not say it was wrong to chant the twenty-eight chapters, in fact in Nichiren Shu temples the entire Lotus Sutra is chanted on various cycles of twenty-eight days or in some cases fewer.

Lecture on the Lotus Sutra

WONS

Single-Mindedly Spread the Lotus Sūtra

How can we not spread the Lotus Sūtra even if very few people have the capacity for it while most people contradict it like water against fire? When we single-mindedly spread the Lotus Sūtra, there is no doubt that we will eventually succeed even if we should encounter such great difficulties as those that have befallen Never-Despising Bodhisattva.

Kangyō Hachiman-shō, Remonstration with Bodhisattva Hachiman, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 1, Page 272

Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – May 11, 2021

They also will be able to locate the Śrāvakas, Pratyekabuddhas, Bodhisattvas, and Buddhas by smelling their bodies from afar. Even when they recognize all this by smell, their organ of smell will not be destroyed or put out of order. If they wish, they will be able to tell others of the differences [of those scents] because they remember them without fallacy.

The Buddha gives this explanation to Constant-Endeavor Bodhisattva in Chapter Nineteen of the Lotus Sūtra, describing those who keep the Lotus Sūtra. Our sense of smell is often unconscious. We associate smells with places, experiences or even people that we like or dislike. These smells can even cause an emotional reaction by causing us to relive a situation associated with that smell. In the Lotus Sūtra, the Buddha teaches that our everyday experiences are no different from enlightenment, that his great wisdom is not about how to escape from this world. It is about how to use the senses and abilities with which we are blessed in ways we cannot imagine.

The Daily Dharma is produced by the Lexington Nichiren Buddhist Community. To subscribe to the daily emails, visit zenzaizenzai.com

LS32

Day 10

Day 10 concludes Chapter 6, Assurance of Future Buddhahood, and opens Chapter 7, The Parable of a Magic City.

Day 10 Text with annotationsPlay MP3
Having last month consider consider the prediction for Great Kātyāyana, we conclude today’s portion of Chapter 6 with the prediction for Great Maudgalyāyana.

Thereupon the World-Honored One said again to the great multitude:

“Now I will tell you. This Great Maudgalyāyana will make various offerings to eight thousand Buddhas, respect them, and honor them. After the extinction of each of those Buddhas, he will erect a stūpa-mausoleum a thousand yojanas high, and five hundred yojanas wide and deep. He will make it of the seven treasures: gold, silver, lapis lazuli, shell, agate, pearl and ruby. He will offer flowers, necklaces, incense applicable to the skin, incense powder, incense to burn, canopies, banners and streamers to the stūpa-mausoleum. After that he will make the same offerings to two hundred billions of Buddhas. Then he will become a Buddha called Tamālapattra-candana-Fragrance, the Tathāgata, the Deserver of Offerings, the Perfectly Enlightened One, the Man of Wisdom and Practice, the Well-Gone, the Knower of the World, the Unsurpassed Man, the Controller of Men, the Teacher of Gods and Men, the Buddha, the World-Honored One. The kalpa in which he will become that Buddha will be called Joyfulness; and his world, Mind­Happiness. The ground [of his world] will be even, made of crystal, adorned with jeweled trees, and purified with strewn flowers of pearls. Anyone will rejoice at seeing it. Innumerable gods, men, Bodhisattvas and Śrāvakas will live there. The duration of the life of that Buddha will be twenty-four small kalpas. His right teachings will be preserved for forty small kalpas, and the counterfeit of his right teachings also will be preserved for forty small kalpas.”

Thereupon the World-Honored One, wishing to repeat what he had said, sang in gāthās:

After he gives up his present existence,
This Great Maudgalyāyana, a disciple of mine,
Will see many Buddhas,
Many World-Honored Ones.
He will see eight thousand of them,
And then two hundred billions of them.

In order to attain
The enlightenment of the Buddha,
He will make offerings to them, and respect them.
He will perform brahma practices under those Buddhas,
And keep the teachings of those Buddhas
For innumerable kalpas.

After the extinction of each of those Buddhas,
He will erect a stūpa of the seven treasures.
There will be a long golden yasti
On the top of the stūpa.
He will offer flowers, incense and music
To the stūpa-mausoleum of the Buddha.

He will finally complete
The Way of Bodhisattvas,
And become a Buddha
Called Tamala [pattral-candana-Fragrance
In a world called
Mind-Happiness.

The duration of the life of that Buddha
Will be twenty-four [small] kalpas.
He will expound to gods and men
The enlightenment of the Buddha.

As many Śrāvakas as there are sands in the River Ganges
Will have the six supernatural powers,
Including the three major supernatural powers.
They will be exceedingly powerful and virtuous.

Innumerable Bodhisattvas also will live there.
They will be resolute in mind, and strenuous.
They will never falter
In seeking the wisdom of the Buddha.

After the extinction of that Buddha,
His right teachings
Will be preserved for forty small kalpas.
So will the counterfeit of them.

The five hundred disciples of mine
Are powerful and virtuous.
They also shall be assured
Of their future Buddhahood.
They will become Buddhas
In their future lives.

Now I will tell you
About my previous existence
And also about yours.
All of you, listen attentively!

The Daily Dharma from May 16, 2020, offers this:

Now I will tell you
About my previous existence
And also about yours.
All of you, listen attentively!

The Buddha sings these verses in Chapter Six of the Lotus Sūtra. When the Buddha taught in India 2500 years ago, people took for granted that their lives continued from previous lives and would continue on into future lives. Whatever comforts we enjoy or calamities we endure in this life were thought to be caused by what we did in our former lifetimes. Our actions today were thought to determine what happens in our future lives. To our modern understanding this can sound mystical and unlikely. But if we understand that everything, including our joy and suffering, has causes and conditions, whether or not we realize these results immediately, we know that the result of creating benefit is benefit, and the result of creating harm is harm. When we hold the happiness of all beings to be as precious as our own, we would no more mistreat others than we would want them to mistreat us.

The Daily Dharma is produced by the Lexington Nichiren Buddhist Community. To subscribe to the daily emails, visit zenzaizenzai.com

Lotus Seeds

Home Practice

Quote

Aside from reading books or articles online, you are probably most likely to encounter Buddhism at a temple, at a practice center, or at a small group meeting in a home. However, Nichiren Buddhism is focused on daily practice, and daily practice means home practice. Practice at temples and at practice centers are aimed at helping people learn and practice Buddhism in their daily lives.

Lotus Seeds

Foundations

Consummated in the Lotus Sūtra

There are immeasurable doctrines, with vast and far-reaching meaning. Further, they are mutually interrelated, from the shallow to the profound, some apparent and some hidden. The horizontal [identities] are all included and the vertical [grades of teaching and practice] are culminated. They are all consummated in the Lotus Sūtra. The Buddhas of old, the twenty-thousand [named Sun and Moon] Glow,594 Kasyapa, and so forth, constructed teachings, and the subtle was here culminated.

Foundations of T'ien T'ai Philosophy, p 250
594
Candrasūryapradīpa. In the introductory chapter of the Lotus Sūtra it is said that these Buddhas, all with the same name, preached the Sūtra of Immeasurable Meanings as an introduction to the Lotus Sūtra. return
WONS

Misunderstanding by Scholars of the Tendai School

In this respect, it can be said that those scholars of the present Tendai School who insist on the superiority of the Great Concentration and Insight over the Lotus Sūtra are ungrateful to their Founder T’ien-t’ai. How can they escape from that charge? Grand Master T’ien-t’ai was called Medicine King Bodhisattva when he heard Śākyamuni Buddha preaching the Lotus Sūtra on Mt. Sacred Eagle. He was at once Grand Master T’ien-t’ai in Sui China and Grand Master Dengyō in Japan. The teaching he propagated in his past, present and the future lives is on the whole the teaching of the Wonderful Dharma. There is no such person but Śākyamuni Buddha in India, China and Japan who has propagated the Lotus Sūtra throughout the past, present and future. Being the noblest, Grand Master T’ien-t’ai was misunderstood by scholars of the Tendai School inheriting his teaching, who pinned the guilt of their mistake on the innocent Grand Master. Is this not a serious sin?

Risshō Kanjō, A Treatise on Establishing the Right Way of Meditation, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 226

Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – May 10, 2021

Medicine-King! The Bodhisattvas who, having been surprised at hearing this Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma, doubt and fear it, know this, are beginners in Bodhisattvahood. The Śrāvakas who, having been surprised at hearing this sūtra, doubt and fear it, know this, are men of arrogance.

The Buddha makes this declaration to Medicine-King Bodhisattva in Chapter Ten of the Lotus Sūtra. In his earlier teachings, he described the thoughts, words and deeds which would help shed our delusions and remove suffering. Many of those following him came to believe that they were superior to other beings and did not want to waste their time even associating with them much less attempting to save them from their suffering. With this Lotus Sūtra, the Buddha reveals that even the most wicked and deluded among us have the capacity for enlightenment and deserve our respect. The more we resist this teaching, in our thoughts, words and deeds, the farther we place ourselves from the Buddha’s wisdom.

The Daily Dharma is produced by the Lexington Nichiren Buddhist Community. To subscribe to the daily emails, visit zenzaizenzai.com

LS32

Day 9

Day 9 covers Chapter 5, The Simile of Herbs, and introduces Chapter 6, Assurance of Future Buddhahood.

Day 9 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month considered how the Buddha is like the great cloud covering the entire world, we consider the equality and differences of all things.

“The various teachings I expound are of the same content, of the same taste. Those who emancipate themselves [from the bonds of existence,] from illusions, and from birth and death, will finally obtain the knowledge of the equality and differences of all things. But those who hear or keep my teachings or read or recite the sutras in which my teachings are expounded, or act according to my teachings, do not know the merits that they will be able to obtain by these practices. Why is that? It is because only I know their capacities, appearances, entities and natures. Only I know what teachings they have in memory, what teachings they have in mind, what teachings they practice, how they memorize the teachings, how they think of the teachings, how they practice the teachings, for what purpose they memorize the teachings, for what purpose they think of the teachings, for what purpose they practice the teachings, and for what purpose they keep what teachings. Only I see clearly and without hindrance that they are at various stages [of enlightenment]. I know this, but they do not know just as the trees and grasses including herbs in the thickets and forests do not know whether they are superior or middle or inferior. My teachings are of the same content, of the same taste. Those who emancipate themselves [from the bonds of existence,] from illusions, and from birth and death, will finally attain Nirvana, that is, eternal tranquility or extinction. They will be able to return to the state of the Void.

“Although I knew the equality and differences of all things, I refrained from expounding it to them in order to protect them because I saw their [various] desires.

“Kāśyapa, and all of you present here! It is an extraordinarily rare thing to see that you have understood, believed and received the Dharma which I expounded variously according to the capacities of all living beings because it is difficult to understand the Dharma which the Buddhas, the World-Honored Ones, expound according to the capacities of all living beings.”

See The Universality of the Dharma Flower Sutra