Category Archives: LS32

Innumerable, LS32, WONS

Another Innumerable Day Before Day 1

Having last month considered the first of the 10 Beneficial Effects of the Sutra of Innumerable Meaning, we consider the second beneficial effect:

“O you of good intent! Second, this sutra’s unimaginable power for beneficial effect is this: If there are living beings who obtain this sutra—whether a section of it, whether a verse of it, or whether a phrase—and thus become able to perceive millions upon millions of meanings, even though uncountable numbers of kalpas may pass they will not be able to elucidate the teaching they have acquired and kept. Why is this so? It is because the meanings of this teaching are unlimited. O you of good intent! This sutra can be likened to a single seed from which a thousand million seeds result. And each of these seeds, in turn, also results in a thousand million in number. In this way, the production of seeds is limitless in measure. So it is also with this sutra—it is a single teaching that gives rise to a hundred thousand meanings, and each one of these, in turn, produces a thousand million in number. In this way, meanings are produced to an unlimited and boundless extent. Thus is this sutra named Infinite Meanings. O you of good intent! This is known as the inconceivable power of the second beneficial effect of this sutra.

I am reminded of Nichiren and the progress from his first declaration of Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō:

At first only I, Nichiren, started chanting the daimoku, Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō, but then two, three, then one hundred people, gradually began chanting it. This will continue in the future. Isn’t this what emerging from the earth means? When an innumerable number of people emerge from the earth and this Wonderful Dharma spreads extensively, there will be no mistake, just as a shooting arrow never misses the earth, Japan will be filled with people chanting Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō. You should therefore establish your fame as the practicer of the Lotus Sūtra and devote your life to it.

Shohō Jisso-shō, Treatise on All Phenomena as Ultimate Reality, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Faith and Practice, Volume 4, Page 78

A single seed from which a thousand million seeds result.

LS32, Universal Sage

Between Day 32 and Day 1: Purification of the Six Sense Faculties

As promised last month, I’m going to go through each of the senses and their karmic consequences – the sense faculty of sight, the sense faculty of hearing, the sense faculty of smell, the sense faculty of speech and the sense faculty of the body and mind – but before that I need to set the stage for the practitioner:

Emerging from the specialized focus of mind, the practitioner will perceive, in front of him- or herself, all the emanated buddhas sitting on lion seats beneath numerous jewel trees. He or she will also perceive soil of lapis lazuli, resembling clusters of lotus flowers, springing up from the space below the ground. Between each flower are untold countless numbers of bodhisattvas sitting in the lotus posture. The practitioner will also discern bodhisattvas emanated from Universal Sage giving praise to the Great Vehicle within their own assemblies.

Then, with one voice, the bodhisattvas will instruct the practitioner on the purification of the six sense faculties.

One instruction says: Be steadfastly mindful of the Buddha!
Another instruction says: Be steadfastly mindful of the Dharma!
Another says: Be steadfastly mindful of the Sangha!
Another says: Be steadfastly mindful of your attitude toward the behavioral principles!
Another says: Be steadfastly mindful to have consideration for others!
Another instruction says: Be steadfastly mindful that blissful conditions exist!

Becoming mindful in these six ways constitutes the aspiration for enlightenment and gives birth to bodhisattvas! Now, therefore, face the buddhas, avow your past wrongdoings, and sincerely undertake self-amendment!

See Little Gems of Stories

d4b, Peaceful Action

Reconciling and Unifying the Teachings of the Three Vehicles into the One Vehicle

The Buddha taught these three vehicles to respond to the different levels and capacities of beings, the different causes and conditions, and the different times and situations in which the teachings were given. The three-vehicles teaching is a skillful means in the historical dimension. In terms of the ultimate dimension, however, the Buddha always aims to reveal the deepest meaning, the absolute truth. The reason for all Tathagatas appearing in the world is to guide living beings to the ultimate truth of the One Vehicle, which is also called the Buddha vehicle – opening up, pointing out, awakening to, and entering the insight of the Buddha. So the philosophy of the One Vehicle revealed in the Lotus Sutra has been called “opening up the three to the one” or “gathering the three and returning them to the one.” The teaching of the three vehicles is but a skillful means; in fact, there is only One Vehicle. The Buddha says in a verse:

Within the Buddha Lands of the ten directions
There is the Dharma of only One Vehicle.
There are not two, nor are there yet three,
Save where the Buddha,
Preaching by resort to expedients,
And by merely borrowing provisional names and words,
Draws the beings to him.

This passage is considered the essence of the second chapter of the Lotus Sutra. With this insight, the Sutra achieves something that all previous Mahayana sutras had not yet been able to do. It reconciles and unifies the teachings of the three vehicles into the One Vehicle, the great vehicle that has the capacity to carry all beings to the shore of liberation. This is the heart of the wonderful Dharma, and it is for this reason that the Lotus Sutra is regarded as the king of sutras, not because it expresses more profound or mystical theories, but because it reunites all the disciples and paths of practice into the one great family of the Buddha.

Peaceful Action, Open Heart, p41-42
LS32

Day 32

Day 32 covers Chapter 28, The Encouragement of Universal-Sage Bodhisattva, closing the Eighth Volume of the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

Day 32 Text with annotationsPlay MP3
Having last month considered Śākyamuni’s reaction to Universal Sage’s vow, we conclude Chapter 28, The Encouragement of Universal-Sage Bodhisattva.

“Universal-Sage! Anyone who keeps, reads and recites this sūtra [in the later five hundred years] after [my extinction], will not be attached to clothing, bedding, food or drink, or any other thing for living. What he wishes will not remain unfulfilled. He will be able to obtain the rewards of his merits in his present life. Those who abuse him, saying, ‘You are perverted. You are doing this for nothing,’ will be reborn blind in their successive lives in retribution for their sin. Those who make offerings to rum and praise him, will be able to obtain rewards in their present life. Those who, upon seeing the keeper of this sūtra, blame him justly or unjustly, will suffer from white leprosy in their present life. Those who laugh at him will have few teeth, ugly lips, flat noses, contorted limbs, squint eyes, and foul and filthy bodies, and suffer from bloody pus of scabs, abdominal dropsy, tuberculosis, and other serious diseases in their successive lives. Therefore, Universal-Sage! When you see the keeper of this sūtra in the distance, you should rise from your seat, go to him, receive him, and respect him just as you respect me.

When the Buddha expounded this chapter of the Encouragement of Universal-Sage, as many Bodhisattvas as there are sands in the River Ganges obtained the dhārāṇis by which they could memorize hundreds of thousands of billions of repetitions of teachings, and as many Bodhisattvas as the particles of dust of one thousand million Sumeru-worlds [understood how to] practice the Way of Universal-Sage.

When the Buddha expounded this sūtra, the great congregation including the Bodhisattvas headed by Universal-Sage, the Śrāvakas headed by Śāriputra, and the other living beings such as gods, dragons, men and nonhuman beings, had great joy, kept the words of the Buddha, bowed [to him], and retired.

[Here ends] the Eighth Volume of the Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

See Completing the Dharma

LS32, d32b, stories

Completing the Dharma

That this Chapter comes last and therefore can be seen as a kind of conclusion to the Sutra means that the Dharma is not complete without being put into practice – that is, without being put into action in everyday, concrete life. It is not enough to study and gain wisdom, not enough to feel compassion. One must also embrace the Sutra by embodying it in one’s life. Faith is not faith if it is only believed, or only felt; it must be lived. One must strive to become a buddha by being a bodhisattva for others, which means nothing more and nothing less than embodying Buddha Dharma by helping others in whatever ways are appropriate and in whatever ways one can. Among those ways is giving encouragement and strength to others, being Universal Sage Bodhisattva for them.

The Stories of the Lotus Sutra, p309
d16b, WONS

The Heart of the Eleventh Chapter of the Lotus Sūtra

I now realize, though dimly, the heart of the eleventh chapter of the Lotus Sūtra, “Appearance of the Stupa of Treasures.” It is stated in this chapter: “Even a man as powerless as I can throw Mt. Sumeru over to countless numbers of Buddha lands. … Even more so, it is not easy to uphold the Lotus Sūtra in the evil world after the death of the Buddha.” Grand Master Dengyō interprets this in his Outstanding Principles of the Lotus Sūtra (Hokke shūku): “The Buddha has determined that it is easy to spread the sūtras which are shallow in meaning, and difficult to spread those which are profound in meaning. A man should leave the shallow and take the deep. Therefore, Grand Master T’ien-t’ai, putting faith in Śākyamuni Buddha, spread the Lotus Sūtra in China; and all the kinsfolk of Mt. Hiei, receiving the teaching of the Lotus Sūtra from T’ien-t’ai, spread it in Japan.”

Kembutsu Mirai-ki, Testimony to the Prediction of the Buddha, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 178

LS32

Day 31

Day 31 covers Chapter 27, King Wonderful-Adornment as the Previous Life of a Bodhisattva.

Day 31 Text with annotationsPlay MP3
Having last month concluded Chapter 27, King Wonderful-Adornment as the Previous Life of a Bodhisattva, we begin again with the story of a Buddha called Cloud-Thunderpeal-Star-King-Flower-Wisdom.

Thereupon the Buddha said to the great multitude:
“Innumerable, inconceivable, asaṃkhya kalpas ago, there lived a Buddha called Cloud-Thunderpeal-Star-King-Flower-Wisdom, the Tathāgata, the Arhat, the Samyak-sambuddha. His world was called Light-Adornment; the kalpa in which he lived, Gladly-Seen. Under that Buddha lived a king called Wonderful-Adornment. His wife was called Pure-Virtue. They had two sons, Pure-Store and Pure-Eyes by name. The two sons had great supernatural powers, merits, virtues and wisdom. A long time ago, they had already practiced the Way which Bodhisattva should practice. They had already practiced the dana-pāramitā, the sita-pāramitā, the kṣānti-pāramitā, the vīrya-pāramitā, the dhyāna-pāramitā, the prajña-pāramitā, and the pāramitā of expediency. They also had already obtained the four states of mind towards all living beings:] compassion, loving-kindness, joy and impartiality. They also had already practiced the thirty-seven ways to enlightenment. They had done all this perfectly and clearly. They also had already obtained the samādhis of Bodhisattvas: that is, the samādhi for purity, the samādhi for the sun and the stars, the samādhi for pure light, the samādhi for pure form, the samādhi for pure brightness, the samādhi for permanent adornment, and the samādhi for the great treasury of powers and virtues. They had already practiced all these samādhis.

See Our Relationship With the Buddha

LS32, d31b, stories

Our Relationship With the Buddha

One of the truly liberating teachings of the Dharma Flower Sutra and Mahayana Buddhism generally is that one does not have to become a monk or nun in order to follow the bodhisattva way of being, just like the Buddha himself, a Dharma teacher. As we see most explicitly in Chapter 10 of the Dharma Flower Sutra, anyone can be a Dharma teacher for others. Such Dharma teachers are all children of the Buddha. But here being a child of the Buddha is not so much an alternative, as it is when one leaves home to follow a buddha, as it is an addition, a kind of fulfillment of being a child of one’s biological parents. This is what is symbolized in this story by the fact that the whole family – father, mother, children, and servants – gives up domestic life in order to follow a buddha together.

Thus, the meaning of this story for us is that we can be children of our parents and parents of our children, or have no children at all, and still be children, true followers, of the Buddha. potential to be a true child of the Buddha, according to the Dharma Flower Sutra, is not initially something we have to earn or learn, it is given to us, just as both our parents and our children are given to us. Relationships created by birth can be grossly distorted or even forgotten, but cannot be completely destroyed or abolished. So, from the moment of our birth, our relationship with the Buddha, a relationship that has close affinities to the relationship of a parent with a child, is always being given to us and can never be completely rejected or abolished.

The Stories of the Lotus Sutra, p293-294
LS32

Day 30

Day 30 covers all of Chapter 26, Dhāraṇīs

Day 30 Text with annotationsPlay MP3
Having last month considered the dhārāni spells offered by Medicine-King Bodhisattva and the Buddha’s response, we consider the dhārāni spells offered by Brave-In-Giving Bodhisattva.

Thereupon Brave-In-Giving Bodhisattva said to the Buddha:

“World-Honored One! I also will utter dhārānis in order to protect the person who reads, recites and keeps the Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma. If he keeps these dhārānis, this teacher of the Dharma will not have his weak points taken advantage of by any yakṣa, rākṣasa, pūtana, kṛtya, kumbhāṇḍa or hungry spirit.”

Then he uttered spells before the Buddha:

“Zarei (1), makazarei (2), ukki (3), mokki (4), arei (5), arahatei (6), netsureitei (7), netsureitahatei (8), ichini (9), ichini (10), shichini(11), netsureichini (12), netsurichihachi (13).”

[He said to the Buddha:]

“World-Honored One! These dhārānis, these divine spells, have already been uttered by as many Buddhas as there are sands in the River Ganges. Those Buddhas uttered them with joy. Those who attack and abuse this teacher of the Dharma should be considered to have attacked and abused those Buddhas.”

See Dhārāṇi Resources

d3b, Peaceful Action

Realizing the Ultimate Reality of Everything

The Buddha describes in some detail the profound insight that is “without measure and without obstruction,” the wisdom and understanding he has learned and practiced according to the immeasurable methods of countless other Buddhas. Only a Buddha can perfect and realize the insight into the suchness, the true nature, of all dharmas (phenomena) – the suchness of their marks (outer appearance), their nature, their substance, their powers, their functions, their causes and conditions, their effects, their retribution, and their ultimate origin. These are called “the ten suchnesses.” Many scholars and Buddhist teachers say that this passage contains the basic philosophy of the Lotus Sutra, and they have spent a lot of ink and paper and time analyzing it in great detail. But the meaning of the ten suchnesses can be distilled into one thing: the Buddha’s wisdom is very deep, and with this insight he is able to see the true nature, the ultimate reality of everything – all dharmas – in time and in space, in the phenomenal world as well as in the ultimate dimension.

Peaceful Action, Open Heart, p36