Day 27

Day 27 concludes Chapter 23, The Previous Life of Medicine-King Bodhisattva.

After Gladly-Seen-By-All-Beings Bodhisattva “burned his arms adorned with the marks of one hundred merits, and offered the light of the flame to the eighty-four thousand stūpas for seventy-two thousand years and we hear “Anyone who aspires for, and wishes to attain Anuttara-samyak-saṃbodhi, should offer a light to the stūpa of the Buddha by burning a finger or a toe,” we are told:

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.

Star-King-Flower! Just as the sea is larger than the rivers, this Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma is more profound than any of the other sūtras expounded by the Tathāgatas.

And …

Star-King-Flower! This sūtra saves all living beings. This sūtra saves them from all sufferings, and gives them great benefits. All living beings will be able to fulfill their wishes by this sūtra just as a man who reaches a pond of fresh water when he is thirsty, just as a man who gets fire when he suffers from cold, just as a man who is given a garment when he is naked, just as a party of merchants who find a leader, just as a child who meets its mother, just as a man who gets a ship when he wants to cross [a river], just as a patient who finds a physician, just as a man who is given a light in the darkness, just as a poor man who gets a treasure, just as the people of a nation who see a new king enthroned, just as a trader who reaches the seacoast. Just as a torch dispels darkness, this Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma saves all living beings from all sufferings, from all diseases, and from all the bonds of birth and death.