Two Buddhas, p168-169Nichiren knew the Lotus Sūtra thoroughly, and, as he did with other chapters, drew occasionally on phrases and passages from the “Ease in Practice” chapter to support his teaching. For example, he cited the statement following the parable of the jewel in the topknot) — “This Lotus Sūtra is the secret treasure house of all the buddha tathāgatas, and the foremost among all the sūtras” — to argue against claims that the secret or esoteric teachings surpassed the Lotus Sūtra. He quoted the passage, “Even the title of this sūtra cannot be heard in incalculable lands,” to stress the immense good fortune of being born in a country where, although far from Buddhism’s birthplace in India, one could encounter the Lotus Sūtra and chant its daimoku. He also cited the “Ease in Practice” chapter’s reference to “the troubled world to come,” which his predecessor Saichō had identified specifically with the age of the Final Dharma, and frequently invoked the statement that the Lotus is “treated with hostility by the entire world and is difficult to believe in.”
Category Archives: LS32
Actualize Our True Identities
We learn in the Lotus Sutra that these Bodhisattvas who appear from beneath the ground have trained with the Buddha since the remotest past. This is our relationship with the Eternal Buddha, not with the historical Buddha. As Bodhisattvas from underground we read the Lotus Sutra from the perspective of an infinite bond with the Buddha, as lifelong practitioners of the Eternal Buddha who have in this lifetime manifested as the beings we currently are but who underneath it all are in fact golden-hued Bodhisattvas. We have received training and are eminently qualified to carry out the lives we have and attain enlightenment in our present form. Everything we need is within us, and the Lotus Sutra is our activation code to actualize our true identities.
Lecture on the Lotus SutraDay 18
Day 18 concludes Chapter 13, Encouragement for Keeping this Sutra, and begins Chapter 14, Peaceful Practices.
Having last month concluded today’s portion of Chapter 14, Peaceful Practices, we return to today’s portion of Chapter 13, Encouragement for Keeping this Sutra, and hear the vow of eighty billion nayuta Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas.
Thereupon the World-Honored One looked at the eighty billion nayuta Bodhisattva-mahāsattvas. These Bodhisattvas had already reached the stage of avaivartika, turned the irrevocable wheel of the Dharma, and obtained dhārāṇis. They rose from their seats, came to the Buddha, joined their hands together [towards him] with all their hearts, and thought, “If the World-Honored One commands us to keep and expound this sūtra, we will expound the Dharma just as the Buddha teaches.”
They also thought, “The Buddha keeps silence.’ He does not command us. What shall we do?”
In order to follow the wish of the Buddha respectfully, and also to fulfill their original vow, they vowed to the Buddha with a loud voice like the roar of a lion:
“World-Honored One! After your extinction, we will go to any place [not only of this Sahā-World but also] of the worlds of the ten quarters, as often as required, and cause all living beings to copy, keep, read and recite this sūtra, to expound the meanings of it, to act according to the Dharma, and to memorize this sūtra correctly. We shall be able to do all this only by your powers. World-Honored One! Protect us from afar even when you are in another world!”
Jikyōsha vs. Gyōja
Two Buddhas, p164-165In Nichiren’s time, those who devoted themselves to reciting or copying the Lotus Sūtra as their primary practice were known as jikyōsha, “one who holds the sūtra.” Nichiren instead used the term gyōja (literally, “one who practices”; translated in this volume as “practitioner” or “votary”). Gyōja was often used to mean an adept or ascetic, denoting those who performed harsh austerities, such as going without sleep, fasting, and practicing in isolation in the mountains, with the aim of acquiring spiritual powers. Though Nichiren did not endorse ascetic practice for its own sake, his use of the word gyōja, like that of “bodily reading,” suggests both that he was “living” the Lotus Sūtra, personally encountering the hardships it predicts, and also that he had committed his life to its propagation. The term reflects his self-understanding as one entrusted with the task of spreading the Lotus in the Final Dharma age. He wrote, “None of the jikyōsha of Japan have encountered the trials predicted in these passages. I alone have read them. This is what is meant by the statement [in the “Perseverance” chapter], ‘We will not be attached to our bodies or lives. We only desire the highest path.’ This being the case, I am the foremost votary of the Lotus Sūtra in Japan.”
Day 17
Day 17 covers all of Chapter 12, Devadatta, and opens Chapter 13, Encouragement for Keeping this Sutra.
Having last month learned of Devadatta’s role in a past life as the Buddha’s teacher, we hear the prediction for Devadatta’s future enlightenment.
He said to the four kinds of devotees:
“Devadatta will become a Buddha after innumerable kalpas.’ He will be called Heavenly-King, 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 world of that Buddha will be called Heavenly-Way. That Buddha will live for twenty intermediate ka]pas. He will expound the Wonderful Dharma to all living beings. [Hearing the Dharma from him,] as many living beings as there are sands in the River Ganges will obtain Arhatship; another group of innumerable living beings will aspire for the enlightenment of cause-knowers; and another group of living beings as many as there are sands in the River Ganges will aspire for unsurpassed enlightenment, obtain the truth of birthlessness, and reach the stage of irrevocability. After the Parinirvana of Heavenly-King Buddha, his right teachings will be preserved in that world for twenty intermediate kalpas. During that time a stupa of the seven treasures sixty yojanas tall and forty yojanas wide and deep will be erected to enshrine the śarīras of his perfect body. Gods and men will bow to the wonderful stupa of the seven treasures and offer various flowers, incense powder, incense to burn, incense applicable to the skin, garments, necklaces, banners, streamers, jeweled canopies, music and songs of praise [to the stupa]. [By doing all this,] innumerable living beings will attain Arhatship; another group of innumerable living beings will attain Pratyekabuddhahood; and another group of inconceivably numerous living beings will aspire for Bodhi and reach the stage of irrevocability.”
He said to the bhikṣus:
“Good men or women in the future who hear this chapter of Devadatta of the Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma with faithful respect caused by their pure minds, and have no doubts [about this chapter], will not fall into hell or the region of hungry spirits or the region of animals. They will be reborn before the Buddhas of the worlds of the ten quarters. They will always hear this sūtra at the places of their rebirth. Even when they are reborn among men or gods, they will be given wonderful pleasures. When they are reborn before the Buddhas, they will appear in lotus-flowers.”
Evil Persons Attaining Buddhahood
Two Buddhas, p 155-156According to conventional Buddhist thinking, moral conduct is the beginning and foundation of the path; persons can achieve liberation only by first renouncing evil and cultivating good. It is said that one cannot control one’s mind until one first learns to control one’s body and speech. The Buddhist ethical code seeks to provide such control. However, some Buddhist thinkers in Nichiren’s time were concerned with the problem posed by evils that one cannot avoid. This concern had to do with a keen awareness of human limitations, heightened by a sense of living in an age of decline. It also spoke to the situation of warriors, who were gaining influence both as a social group and as an emergent body of religious consumers. From a Buddhist perspective, warriors were trapped in a hereditary profession that was inherently sinful, requiring them to kill animals as a form of war training and kill humans on the battlefield. Thus, they could not escape violating the basic Buddhist precept against taking life. Nichiren, who had a number of samurai among his followers, stressed that, as long as one chants the daimoku, one will not be dragged down into the hells or other evil paths by ordinary misdeeds or unavoidable wrongdoing. To one warrior, a certain Hakii (or Hakiri) Saburō, he wrote: “In all the earlier sūtras of the Buddha’s lifetime, Devadatta was condemned as the foremost icchantika in all the world. But he encountered the Lotus Sūtra and received a prediction that he would become a tathāgata called Devarāja. … Whether or not evil persons of the last age can attain buddhahood does not depend upon whether their sins are light or heavy but rests solely upon whether or not they have faith in this sūtra.”
Day 16
Day 16 concludes Chapter 11, Beholding the Stūpa of Treasures, and completes the Fourth Volume of the Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.
Having last month witnessed Śākyamuni taking a seat in the stupa and then raising the congregation into the air so they can see better, we repeat the story of Many-Treasures Tathāgata in gāthās:
Thereupon the World-Honored One, wishing to repeat what he had said, sang in gāthās:
The Saintly Master, the World-Honored One,
Who had passed away a long time ago,
Came riding in the stūpa of treasures
To hear the Dharma [directly from me].
Could anyone who sees him
Not make efforts to hear the Dharma?It is innumerable kalpas
Since he passed away.
He wished to hear the Dharma at any place
Because the Dharma is difficult to meet.His original vow was this:
“After I pass away,
I will go to any place
To hear the Dharma.”The Buddhas of my replicas
As innumerable
As there are sands in the River Ganges
Also came here
From their wonderful worlds,
Parting from their disciples,
And giving up the offerings made to them
By gods, men and dragons,
ln order to hear the Dharma,
See Many-Treasures Tathāgata,
Who passed away [a long time ago],
And have the Dharma preserved forever.I removed innumerable living beings from many worlds,
And purified those worlds
By my supernatural powers
In order to seat those Buddhas.Those Buddhas came under the jeweled trees.
The trees are adorned with those Buddhas
Just as a pond of pure water is adorned
With lotus flowers.There are lion-like seats
Under the jeweled trees.
Those Buddhas sat on the seats.
The worlds are adorned
With the light of those Buddhas as bright
As a great torch in the darkness of night.Wonderful fragrance is sent forth
From the bodies of those Buddhas
To the worlds of the ten quarters.
The living beings of those worlds
Smell the fragrance joyfully,
Just as the branches of a tree bend before a strong wind.
Those Buddhas employ these expedients
In order to have the Dharma preserved forever.
See Opening of the Buddha Realm in the Act of Chanting the Daimoku
Opening of the Buddha Realm in the Act of Chanting the Daimoku
Two Buddhas, p145Nichiren understood the emergence of the jeweled stūpa as the opening of the buddha realm in the act of chanting the daimoku. One of his followers, a lay monk known as Abutsu-bō, once asked him what the jeweled stūpa signified. Nichiren explained that, in essence, the stūpa’s emergence meant that the śrāvaka disciples, on hearing the Lotus Sūtra, “beheld the jeweled stūpa of their own mind.” The same was true, he said, of his own followers: “In the Final Dharma age, there is no jeweled stūpa apart from the figures of those men and women who uphold the Lotus Sūtra. … The daimoku of the Lotus Sūtra is the jeweled stūpa, and the jeweled stūpa is Namu Myōhō-renge-kyō. … You, Abutsu-bō, are yourself the jeweled stūpa, and the jeweled stūpa is none other than you, Abutsu-bō. … So believing, chant Namu Myōhō-renge-kyō, and wherever you chant will be the place where the jeweled stūpa dwells.”
Day 15
Day 15 concludes Chapter 10, The Teacher of the Dharma, and opens Chapter 11, Beholding the Stūpa of Treasures.
Having last month concluded Chapter 10, The Teacher of the Dharma, we greet the arrival of the stupa of the seven treasures.
Thereupon a stupa of the seven treasures sprang up from underground and hung in the sky before the Buddha. The stupa was five hundred yojanas high and two hundred and fifty yojanas wide and deep. lt was adorned with various treasures. It was furnished with five thousand railings and ten million chambers. It was adorned with innumerable banners and streamers, from which jeweled necklaces and billions of jeweled bells were hanging down. The fragrance of tamalapattra and candana was sent forth from the four sides of the stupa to all the corners of the world. Many canopies, adorned with streamers, and made of the seven treasures-gold, silver, lapis lazuli, shell, agate, pearl and ruby were hanging in the sky [one upon another from the top of the stupa] up to the [heaven of the] palaces of the four heavenly-kings. The thirty-three gods offered a rain of heavenly mandārava-flowers to the stupa of treasures. Thousands of billions of living beings, including the other gods, dragons, yakṣas, gandharvas, asuras, garuḍas, kiṃnaras, mahoragas, men and nonhuman beings, also offered flowers, incense, necklaces, streamers, canopies and music to the stupa of treasures, venerated the stupa, honored it, and praised it.
Thereupon a loud voice of praise was heard from within the stupa of treasures:
“Excellent, excellent! You, Śākyamuni, the World-Honored One, have expounded to this great multitude the Sūtra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma, the Teaching of Equality, the Great Wisdom, the Dharma for Bodhisattvas, the Dharma Upheld by the Buddhas. So it is, so it is. What you, Śākyamuni, the World-Honored One, have expounded is all true.”
The Appearance of the Jeweled Stupa
Two Buddhas, p 144Throughout East Asia, the imagery of [The Appearance of the Jeweled Stupa] chapter has inspired painting, sculpture, and exegesis. In Tiantai Buddhism, that imagery became part of a narrative of mythic origins: Zhiyi and his teacher Huisi, it was said, had together heard Śākyamuni Buddha’s original preaching of the Lotus Sūtra in the Vulture Peak assembly and were later born together in China, where they became master and disciple. The Japanese Tendai founder Saichō incorporated this tradition into his account of his Tendai dharma lineage. Shortly after Saichō’s death, when a new state-sponsored ordination platform was erected at the monastery that he had established on Mount Hiei, a representation of the jeweled stūpa of Prabhūtaratna, together with an image of Śākyamuni, was enshrined there. In medieval Japan, the Tendai esoteric “Lotus rite” or Hokke hō, conducted to realize buddhahood, eradicate sin, prolong life, quell disasters, and achieve other aims, employed a mandala depicting the two buddhas Śākyamuni and Prabhūtaratna, seated side by side on a lotus, in its central court.