He should expound the Dharma to them,
Wishing only two things:
To attain the enlightenment of the Buddha
And also to cause them to do the same.
This is a peaceful offering to them.
This offering will bring them a great benefit.

The Buddha sings these verses to Mañjuśrī Bodhisattva in Chapter Fourteen of the Lotus Sūtra. In our desire to benefit others, we often have expectations for how they should change in response to what we give them. The Buddha reminds us to abandon these expectations. People will make changes and progress towards enlightenment based on their own capacities rather than what we want for them. When we stay focused on the goal of awakening, both for ourselves and others, then we can keep the perspective of the Buddha and see things for what they are.

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

World-Honored One! It is difficult for anyone in the world to believe this. It is as difficult as to believe a handsome, black-haired man twenty-five years old who points to men a hundred years old and says, ‘They are my sons,’ or as to believe men a hundred years old who point to a young man and say, ‘This is our father. He brought us up.’

Maitreya Bodhisattva explains his perplexity to the Buddha in Chapter Fifteen of the Lotus Sūtra. The Buddha had just revealed that he was who taught all the Bodhisattvas who have appeared from underground to continue teaching the Wonderful Dharma after the extinction of the Buddha. Maitreya realizes that his doubts are no different from those of those gathered to hear the Buddha teach and asks the Buddha to explain. When our experience does not match what the Buddha teaches, we should not keep silence and just accept what he tells us. It is only through sincere questioning that we find the Buddha’s mind and make it our own.

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

Anyone who visits a monastery to hear
The Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma
And rejoices at hearing it even for a moment,
Will be able to obtain the following merits.

The Buddha sings these verses to Maitreya (whom he calls Ajita – Invincible) in Chapter Eighteen of the Lotus Sutra. The joy we find in the Buddha’s highest teaching is different from what we experience when our desires are satisfied. It is a joy we can learn to find at the heart of everything we think, say and do. The merit that comes from this joy does not make us better than anyone else; it only allows to see the world as the Buddha does. Joy is not something that needs to be added to our lives. It is what we find remaining when we let go of our attachment and delusion.

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

You should remember that the secret doctrine to save the evil, the stupid, women, and those without Buddha-nature is not revealed in sūtras other than the Lotus Sūtra. This is the very reason the Lotus Sūtra is superior to all other Buddhist scriptures.

Nichiren wrote this passage in his Treatise on Chanting the Great Title of the Lotus Sūtra (Shō Hokke Daimoku-shō). With so many proclaiming that their teaching is superior, it can be difficult to hear what Nichiren is telling us in this passage. Other teachings maintain that only some people can be saved. As a result, people who hear those teachings live in fear and uncertainty about their fate. The Lotus Sūtra proclaims that all who hear it will become enlightened, and that all who teach the Lotus Sūtra will create the conditions for others to be enlightened. Nichiren’s relentless determination to spread the Wonderful Dharma was not based on arrogance: merely wanting people to do as he said. It was based on compassion: the certainty that the Lotus Sūtra embodies the enlightenment of the Buddha and saves all beings.

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

But the merits to be given to the person who fills the one thousand million Sumeru-worlds with the seven treasures and offers that amount of the seven treasures to the Buddhas, to the Great Bodhisattvas, to the Pratyekabuddhas, and to the Arhats, are less than the merits to be given to the person who keeps even a single gāthā of four lines of this Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

The Buddha gives this explanation to Star-King-Flower Bodhisattva in Chapter Twenty-Three of the Lotus Sūtra. Generosity is the first of the perfections of a Bodhisattva, a being who vows to delay their own enlightenment so that they can benefit others. The offering of material goods helps remove the suffering caused by our sense of self-importance, and prepares us for the Buddha’s highest teaching. By offering the Buddha’s wisdom, embodied in this Lotus Sūtra, we benefit all beings.

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

If they think that I am always here, and do not think that I will pass away, they will become too arrogant and lazy to realize the difficulty of seeing me, and they will not respect me. Therefore I say [to them] expediently, ’Bhikṣus, know this! It is difficult to see a Buddha who appears in [this] world.’

The Buddha makes this explanation to those gathered to hear him teach in Chapter Sixteen of the Lotus Sūtra. We may wonder what took the Buddha so long to give his highest teaching to us, whether he was holding it back because of stinginess, not wanting to share the great treasure of his wisdom. Here and in other parts of the Sūtra, he shows that unless we cultivate our respect for the Buddha, and thus for all beings, we take him for granted and lose his precious wisdom.

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

I see the [perverted] people sinking
In an ocean of suffering.
Therefore, I disappear from their eyes
And cause them to admire me.

The Buddha sings these verses in Chapter Sixteen of the Lotus Sūtra. With the story of the wise physician in this chapter, the Buddha explains how he disappears from our view even though he is always present to us. The children in the story would not accept the remedy their father prepared for them to counteract the poison they had taken. Some of them hoped for another remedy, some believed the remedy would be worse than the poison. It was not until the father left and told them he would not return that the children realized the value of what they already had. When we take the Buddha for granted, as the children in the story took their father for granted, and ignore the path he has laid out for us, we lose sight of the Buddha. It is only when we realize we are lost that we look for a guide. When we bring the Buddha’s teachings to life, we find him everywhere.

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

When I saw that some people of little virtue and of much defilement were seeking the teachings of the Lesser Vehicle, I told them, ‘I renounced my family when I was young, and attained Anuttara-samyak-saṃbodhi [forty and odd years ago].’ In reality I became the Buddha in the remotest past as I previously stated. I told them so as an expedient to teach them, to lead them into the Way to Buddhahood.

In Chapter Sixteen of the Lotus Sutra, the Buddha gives this explanation of a parable he tells in Chapter Three. In that story, the foolish children of a wise man were playing in a burning house. The man tried to warn his children of the dangers of the house, but the children were so preoccupied with their games they would not leave. Only when the man promised them better toys outside would the children leave the house. The words used by the wise man were meant to get the children out of the house, even though the toys did not exist. These words were necessary to motivate the children to set aside their delusions. They were not meant to be taken literally. We learn from this explanation how the Buddha uses words, and why we formerly needed his expedient teachings.

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

I remember the extinction of that Buddha
As vividly as if he had passed away just now,
By my unhindered wisdom; I also remember
The Śrāvakas and Bodhisattvas who lived [with him].

The Buddha sings these verses in Chapter Seven of the Lotus Sūtra. Because the Buddha sees this world for what it is, his conception of time is much different from ours. We believe that our existence is tied up with the existence of our bodies. Here he reminds us that while our lives are certainly precious, this is not the whole story. Our existence is linked with that of countless beings, and there is no good reason to fear our extinction. There is no shortage of time, and no shortage of lives. Our opportunities to benefit others are truly boundless. The only things that restrict us are our own delusion and attachment.

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