All posts by John Hughes

Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – Dec. 20, 2019

Annotations on the Great Concentration and Insight states: “The passage cited about the earlier teachings correctly distinguishes between the provisional and the true. This is because it explains the truer the teaching the lower the stage (of those enlightened by it); whereas the more provisional the teaching the higher the state must be (of those enlightened by it).”

Nichiren wrote this passage in his Treatise on The Four Depths of Faith and Five Stages of Practice (Shishin Gohon-Shō). The passage from T’ien-t’ai he quotes reminds us that we do not need to rely on our own talents or intelligence to become enlightened. The highest teaching of the Lotus Sūtra is meant for all beings, wise or simple, clever or stupid. The Buddha’s provisional teachings were intended to match the minds of those who heard them. But the Wonderful Dharma is the Buddha’s own mind, harmonizing with the seed of enlightenment within us all.

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

LS32

Day 12

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.

Day 12 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month considered Śākyamuni’s explanation of the Parable of the Magic City, we repeat in gāthās the story of
Great-Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Buddha.

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

Great-Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Buddha sat
At the place of enlightenment for ten [small] kalpas.
He could not attain the enlightenment of the Buddha
Because the Dharma of the Buddhas had not yet come into his mind.

The gods, dragon-kings,
And asuras rained down
Heavenly flowers,
And offered them to him.

The gods beat heavenly drums,
And made many kinds of music.
Withered flowers were swept away by fragrant winds;
And fresh and beautiful flowers were rained down.

After the ten small kalpas elapsed,
He attained the enlightenment of the Buddha.
The gods and men of the world
Felt like dancing with joy.

Surrounded by their followers,
Thousands of billions in number,
The sixteen sons of that Buddha
Came to him.

Worshipping the feet of the Buddha with their heads,
They begged him to turn the wheel of the Dharma, saying:
“Lion-like Saint! Send the rain of the Dharma
On us and on all others also!”

It is difficult to meet a World-Honored One.
He appears only once in a very long time.
When he appears, he causes all the worlds to quake
In order to awaken all living beings.

The palaces of the Brahmans
Of five hundred billion worlds in the east
Were illumined
More brightly than ever.

Traveling to find [the place from where the light had come],
The Brahmans of those worlds came to that Buddha.
They strewed flowers and offered them to him.
They also offered their palaces.

They praised him with gāthās,
And begged him to turn the wheel of the Dharma.
The Buddha sat in silence although he was begged
Because he knew that the time was not yet ripe for that.

The Brahmans came also from the three other quarters,
From the four intermediate quarters, zenith, and nadir.
They strewed flowers, offered their palaces,
And begged the Buddha to turn the wheel of the Dharma, saying:

“It is difficult to meet you.
Open the gate of the teachings as sweet as nectar
Out of your great compassion towards us,
And turn the wheel of the unsurpassed Dharma!”

Assenting to their appeal,
The World-Honored One of Immeasurable Wisdom
Expounded the various teachings, that is,
The four truths and the twelve causes, saying:
“All the causes, from ignorance to aging-and-death,
Rise one after another.
You should know
All these illusions.”

When he expounded these teachings,
Sixty quadrillions of living beings
Eliminated sufferings,
And became Arhats.

At his second expounding of these teachings also,
Tens of millions of living beings, that is,
As many living beings as there are sands in the River Ganges,
Became Arhats because they gave up wrong views.

Those who attained the enlightenment [of Arhats] afterwards
Were also innumerable.
No one would be able to count them
Even if he tried to do so for a billion kalpas.

See An Ideal This-Worldly Buddha Land

2buddhas, LS32, d9b

An Ideal This-Worldly Buddha Land

[Given Nichiren’s travails, did he understand] the sūtra’s promise of “peace in the present world” only as expressing an inner mental composure? By no means. Its promise was also that of an actual peace to be realized in the outer world through the spread of the Lotus Sūtra. Another letter he wrote from Sado reads: “Question: Those who practice the Lotus Sūtra as it teaches should be ‘at peace in this world.’ Why then are you beset by the three powerful enemies [who oppose the Lotus Sūtra’s practitioners]?” In this instance, Nichiren responds that teachers of the Lotus Sūtra in the past, such as Daosheng, Zhiyi, Saichō — even Śākyamuni Buddha himself — surely practiced in accordance with the Lotus Sūtra and yet they endured great trials to communicate its message; meeting hardships does not in and of itself imply flaws in one’s practice. Rather, troubles are to be expected in an evil age when the dharma has been obscured and everyone from the ruler down to the common people has turned against the Lotus Sūtra. That is why it is all the more important to persevere. He concludes: “When all people of the realm, including the various Buddhist schools, convert to the one vehicle and chant Namu Myōhō-renge-kyō as one, the wind will not thrash the branches nor the rain fall hard enough to erode the soil. The world will be as it was in the ages [of the ancient sage kings] Fuxi and Shennong. In this life, inauspicious disasters will be banished, and people will obtain the art of longevity. You will behold a time when the principle becomes manifest that persons and dharmas neither age nor die.”

This is one of the few passages in Nichiren’s extant writings that sets forth his vision of an ideal, this-worldly buddha land to be established in the future. It seems to entail a state of harmony with nature, just government, long life, and freedom from catastrophe. Included in the ichinen sanzen principle is the idea that sentient beings and their insentient environments are nondual; human actions, whether wise and compassionate or selfish and deluded, shape the world that they inhabit. Thus, for Nichiren, the awakening of the Lotus Sūtra was not simply to be experienced subjectively by individual practitioners, but would also find expression as concord, creativity, and fulfillment in the outer world. This conviction gives his teaching a distinctively social dimension. On this basis, he took “peace in this world” to mean not only the unwavering inner wisdom and security established by faith, but also an ideal to be concretely and visibly realized in everyday life.

Two Buddhas, p103-104
Kaleidoscope

The Doctrine of Universal Buddhahood

Quote

In Chih-i’s view there can be no doubt that the ultimate truth revealed in the Lotus Sutra is the inherent Buddha-nature. Chih-i felt that the Lotus Sutra surpasses all others in its articulation, demonstration, and explanation of the promise that all sentient beings can become Buddhas. The doctrine of universal Buddhahood is proclaimed in the second chapter, where Śākyamuni explains that instead of three “vehicles,” or ultimate goals for three different kinds of beings, the śrāvakas, pratyekabuddhas, and bodhisattvas, there is only one goal, Buddhahood, for all. The sutra also demonstrates the universality of Buddhahood by depicting the dragon king’s daughter (possessing the disadvantages of being both female and a reptile) instantaneously attaining enlightenment, and by predicting the future enlightenment of the Buddha’s cousin, Devadatta, who had committed the most heinous evils — attempting to kill the Buddha and to disrupt the Buddhist Saṃgha. Chih-i believed that only a doctrine of universal Buddha-nature could justify the sutra’s unqualified promise that all sentient beings can become Buddhas. The sutra’s visionary representation of the identity of the Buddha Śākyamuni with all reality may therefore be taken as a revelation of the Buddha-nature inherent in all things.
A Buddhist Kaleidoscope; Susan Mattis, Chih-i and the Subtle Dharma of the Lotus Sutra: Emptiness or Buddha-nature?, Page 246-247

Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – Dec. 19, 2019

Needless to say, anyone who not only keeps this sūtra but also gives alms, observes the precepts, practices patience, makes endeavors, concentrates his mind, and seeks wisdom, will be able to obtain the most excellent and innumerable merits. His merits will be as limitless as the sky is in the east, west, south, north, the four intermediate quarters, the zenith, and the nadir. These innumerable merits of his will help him obtain the knowledge of the equality and differences of all things.

The Buddha makes this declaration to Maitreya Bodhisattva in Chapter Seventeen of the Lotus Sūtra. We often think of merits as bonus points we get for good deeds. Good karma we create to offset the bad karma that came from our less skillful actions. Another way of looking at merits is as a measure of clarity. The more merit we gain, the more we see things for what they are. When we offer our merits for the benefit of all beings, we resolve to use this clarity to enhance the lives of others.

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

LS32

Day 11

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

Day 11 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month concluded today’s portion of Chapter 7, The Parable of the Magic City, we return to the top and witness what happened when Great-Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Buddha attained Anuttara-samyak-saṃbodhi.

The Buddha said to the bhikṣus:
“When Great-Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Buddha attained Anuttara-samyak-saṃbodhi, 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 palaces of the Brahman-heavenly[-kings] of the five hundred billion worlds in the east were illumined twice as brightly as ever. The Brahman-heavenly-kings [of those worlds] each thought, ‘My palace has never been illumined so brightly before. Why is that?’ They visited each other and discussed the reason. There was a great Brahman-heavenly-king called All-Saving among them. He said to the other Brahmans in gāthās:

Why are our palaces illumined
More brightly than ever?
Let us find [the place]
[From where this light has come].
Did a god of great virtue or a Buddha
Appear somewhere in the universe?
This great light illumines
The worlds of the ten quarters.

“Thereupon the Brahman-heavenly-kings of the five hundred billion worlds went to the west, carrying flower-plates filled with heavenly flowers, in order to find [the place from where the light had come]. Their palaces also moved as they went. They [reached the Well-Composed World and] saw that Great­Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Tathāgata was sitting on the lion­like seat under the Bodhi-tree at the place of enlightenment, surrounded respectfully by gods, dragon-kings, gandharvas, kiṃnaras, mahoragas, men and nonhuman beings. They also saw that the sixteen princes were begging the Buddha to turn the wheel of the Dharma. Thereupon the Brahman-heavenly­kings worshipped the Buddha with their heads, walked around him a hundred thousand times, and strewed heavenly flowers to him. The strewn flowers were heaped up to the height of Mt. Sumeru. The Brahman-heavenly-kings offered flowers also to the ten-yojana-tall Bodhi-tree of the Buddha. Having offered flowers, they offered their palaces to the Buddha, saying, ‘We offer these palaces to you. Receive them and benefit us out of your compassion towards us!’ In the presence of the Buddha, they simultaneously praised him in gāthās with all their hearts:

You, the World-Honored One, are exceptional.
It is difficult to meet you.
You have innumerable merits.
You are saving all living beings.

As the great teacher of gods and men,
You are benefiting all living beings
Of the worlds of the ten quarters
Out of your compassion towards them.

We have come here from five hundred billion worlds.
We gave up the pleasure
Of deep dhyāna-concentration
Because we wished to make offerings to you.
Our palaces are beautifully adorned
Because we accumulated merits in our previous existence.
We offer [these palaces] to you.
Receive them out of your compassion towards us!

“Thereupon the Brahman-heavenly-kings, having praised the Buddha with these gāthās, said, ‘World-Honored One! Turn the wheel of the Dharma and save all living beings! Open the Way to Nirvāṇa!’ They simultaneously said in a gāthā with all their hearts:

Hero of the World,
Most Honorable Biped!
Expound the Dharma!
Save the suffering beings
By the power of your great compassion!

“Thereupon Great-Universal-Wisdom-Excellence Tathāgata gave his tacit consent to their appeal

See The Richest Man In All Japan

2buddhas, LS32

The Richest Man In All Japan

During the bleak Sado Island years, Nichiren grappled with the question of why, when the Lotus Sūtra promises “peace in this world,” he should have to undergo such ordeals. He also pondered other doubts, sometimes voiced by his followers: If he was indeed correctly practicing the Lotus Sūtra, why didn’t the benevolent deities who protect the buddha-dharma intervene to assist him? Why didn’t those who persecuted him meet with obvious karmic retribution?

Nichiren addressed these questions in a deeply introspective mode, for example, in his famous treatise Kaimoku shō (“Opening the Eyes,” 1272), one of his most important writings, written as a testament to his followers in the event of his death. Here he reflects that in prior lifetimes, he himself must have committed offenses against the Lotus Sūtra and its devotees and was now enduring his present trials to expiate such offenses, just as iron is cleansed of impurities when forged in a fire. In this context, Nichiren drew upon the six-fascicle Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra, which states: “By the power of the merit gained by protecting the dharma, one receives lightened [karmic retribution for past offenses] in the present life.” In adopting this perspective, Nichiren claimed agency for his sufferings by representing them, not as a trial inflicted upon him by his enemies, but as an ordeal that he had deliberately chosen as an act of expiation. He also encouraged his followers by saying that the hardships they faced had in fact been predicted in the Lotus Sūtra itself, and thus confirmed the legitimacy of their practice and the certainty of their eventual buddhahood.

As for why their tormentors failed to experience obvious karmic retribution, Nichiren simply noted that when a person’s sins are so weighty as to condemn them after death to the Avici hell, there may be no sign of retribution in that individual’s present life. Alternatively, Nichiren maintained that because people had abandoned the Lotus Sūtra, the protective deities, no longer able to hear the true dharma, had abandoned their shrines and returned to the heavens; thus, they could not be counted on to safeguard Lotus devotees or to punish their persecutors. Yet his conclusion was a resolve that seeks no explanation for adversity and no guarantee of protection; it is a resolve to simply persevere, whatever may happen: “Let heaven forsake me. Let ordeals confront me. I will not begrudge bodily life. … Whatever trials I and my disciples may encounter, so long as we do not cherish doubts, we will naturally achieve buddhahood. Do not doubt because heaven does not extend its protection. Do not lament that you do not enjoy peace in this world.”

Nichiren’s conviction infused his life with immense meaning and enabled him to assert — in the midst of privation and danger — that he was “the richest man in all Japan today.” Nichiren taught his followers that while faith might result in this-worldly good fortune, more importantly, it revealed inner resources of joy and assurance, independent of outward circumstances, that would sustain them through trying times.

Two Buddhas, p101-102
Kaleidoscope

The Emptiness of Śākyamuni

Quote

[I]n China the Buddha of the Lotus Sutra was traditionally understood as a representation of the eternal dharmakāya, his unimaginably long life span being seen as a metaphor for the “beginningless” truth realized by the Buddha. From this standpoint, the mythic images of Śākyamuni’s pores emitting light that pervades the universe and of his body splitting into innumerable forms that fill the ten directions are metaphorical representations of the pervasive and unchanging ultimate truth and its salvific function. When Śākyamuni of the Lotus Sutra is understood as the dharmakāya, and the dharmakāya or ultimate truth is identified as emptiness, the difference between the Lotus Sutra and the Prajn͂āpāramitā sutras appears to be one of style, not substance. As a representation of the dharmakāya, however, the concrete and dynamic image of the supramundane Śākyamuni may suggest a somewhat different conception of ultimate truth than that found in the Prajn͂āpāramitā sutras.
A Buddhist Kaleidoscope; Susan Mattis, Chih-i and the Subtle Dharma of the Lotus Sutra: Emptiness or Buddha-nature?, Page 245-246

Lecture on Lotus Sutra, d15b

Emphasis on the Teaching, Not the Teacher

In Chapter 10 there is another transition that takes place in the Lotus Sutra and that is the transition from an emphasis on the body of the Buddha to the teaching of the Buddha. In this chapter the Buddha tells his disciples that instead of enshrining his relics, the teaching of the Wonderful Dharma of the Lotus Flower Sutra should be what is contained within the stupa we revere. Here too in this great drama we should remember that because the teaching is true, the teacher is great. We devote ourselves to the Lotus Sutra and to the teacher of that sutra and through our devotion we bring it to life.

Lecture on the Lotus Sutra

WONS

Revelations of the Lotus Sūtra

Revealing the single path to Buddhahood in the Āgama sūtras, the Lotus Sūtra preaches in chapter two, “Expedients,” “I expounded various Hinayāna sūtras according to the capacities of all living beings. They are the entrance to the Mahāyāna teaching.” Revealing the single path to Buddhahood in the Flower Garland Sūtra, the Lotus Sūtra states in chapter 16, “The Life Span of the Buddha,” “The gods, men and asura in the world think that I, Śākyamuni Buddha, left the palace of the Śākyas, sat at the place of enlightenment not far from the City of Gayā, and attained Buddhahood. To tell the truth, however, it has been innumerable kalpa (aeons) since I attained Buddhahood.” In the case of the Wisdom Sūtra, the Lotus Sūtra states 18 types of voidness in chapter 14, “Peaceful Practices”—the voidness which is expounded in the Wisdom Sūtra is included in the Lotus Sūtra. In the case of the Sūtra of Meditation on the Buddha of Infinite Life, the Lotus Sūtra preaches the doctrine of reaching the Pure Land of Peace in chapter 23, “Anyone who hears this sūtra and acts according to its teaching will be reborn in this Pure Land upon death.” As for practicing virtuous deeds with distracted minds, the Lotus Sūtra reveals the single path by saying in chapter 2, “Expedients,” “Those who chanted just once ‘Namu Buddha’ without concentration in mind, have already attained the enlightenment of the Buddha.” For all living beings, the Lotus Sūtra says in chapter 3, “A Parable,” “This triple world is My property. All living beings therein are My children.” For the non-Buddhist teachings and writings, the Lotus Sūtra says in chapter 19, “The Merits of the Teacher of the Dharma,” “When they expound the scriptures of non-Buddhist schools, or give advice to the government, or teach the way to earn a livelihood, they will be able to be in accord with the right teachings of the Buddha.” Passages that describe the revelation of the single path to Buddhahood in the Tuṣita Heaven or of gods and men are too numerous to write them all down here.

Ichidai Shōgyō Tai-I, Outline of All the Holy Teachings of the Buddha, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 3, Page 93