LS32

Day 9

Day 9 covers Chapter 5, The Simile of Herbs, and introduces Chapter 6, Assurance of Future Buddhahood.

Day 9 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month considered in gāthās how the Buddha is like the cloud, we consider the Buddha’s impartiality.

I see all living beings equally.
I have no partiality for them.
There is not ‘this one’ or ‘that one’ to me.
I transcend love and hatred.

I am attached to nothing.
I am hindered by nothing.
I always expound the Dharma
To all living beings equally.
I expound the Dharma to many
In the same way as to one.

The Daily Dharma offers this:

I see all living beings equally.
I have no partiality for them.
There is not ‘this one’ or ‘that one’ to me.
I transcend love and hatred.

The Buddha makes this declaration in Chapter Five of the Lotus Sūtra. He compares himself to a rain shower that waters all plants equally. He uses this example to show us how we should approach all living beings. Our respect for them and wish that they become enlightened cannot depend on whatever personal feelings we have towards them.

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

Dogen

Nichiren Venerating the Eternal Śākyamuni

Nichiren states that the “Eternal” Śākyamuni Buddha “exists forever throughout the past, present, and future. All those who receive His guidance are one with the Eternal Buddha.” He goes on to state that the Śākyamuni Buddha of the sixteenth chapter differs from the earlier Śākyamuni Buddha of provisional sutras, and advocates that the enduring Śākyamuni, and his image, be the new object of veneration in the current Age of Decline (mappō), replacing images of the Śākyamuni who expounded the pre-Lotus sutras.

Nichiren strongly emphasizes the end of chapter 15 and chapter 16. This is the part of the sutra that “Nichiren judges to be almost exclusively representative of the meaning of the entire scripture.” Lucia Dolce describes the difference in Nichiren’s interpretation of the sutra from Zhiyi’s as Nichiren seeing the long-lived Śākyamuni Buddha as the single ultimate buddha encompassing all others. Whereas Zhiyi emphasized the sambhogakāya, or recompense body, and valued many other particular buddhas, Nichiren declares “that all Buddhas enlightened in the past are emanations of Śākyamuni” of chapter 16, based on the events of chapter 11, in which emanations arrive to witness the other Buddha in his stūpa. For Nichiren, this long-lived Buddha includes all three bodies, including the manifested transformation body, nirmāṇakāya, and even Vairocana, the reality body or dharmakāya: “Only the [chapter 16] Śākyamuni who reveals his enlightenment in the past embodies the true Mahāyāna Buddha.”

Nichiren’s view of temporality is determined by this story, as his emphasis on it “corresponds to the dilation of the temporal dimension expressed in those chapters, that is, the distant past in which Śākyamuni obtained his original enlightenment. Nichiren absolutizes this original moment and makes it the only significant time and relates it to the existence of humanity in a certain time and place.” He does not describe this Buddha as literally eternal, but “uses the expression ‘without beginning and without end,’ ” signifying “an existence not subject to temporal limitations.” Because this limitlessness includes the transformation body, “the Buddha has always abided in this world and … his soteriological activity has been constant since the original time.” [Dolce]

Dōgen and the Lotus Sutra, p55
Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – Aug. 11, 2024

He said to them, ‘Know this! Now I am old and decrepit. I shall die soon. I am leaving this good medicine here. Take it! Do not be afraid that you will not be cured!’

The Buddha gives this explanation in Chapter Sixteen of the Lotus Sūtra. It is part of the Parable of the Wise Physician in which a father finds his children have taken poison and gives them an antidote. The poison has caused some of the children to lose their right minds and not trust that the medicine will cure them. By faking his death, the father used an expedient to get the children to realize that there was no other medicine that would cure them, and summon the courage to take it. When we accept the Wonderful Dharma and put it into our lives, we are cured of our delusions and find the Buddha’s wisdom.

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

LS32

Day 8

Day 8 concludes Chapter 4, Understanding by Faith, and closes the second volume of the Sutra of the Lotus Flower of the Wonderful Dharma.

Day 8 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month considered in gāthās how the father encouraged his son, we consider why the father gave his treasures to his son.

Seeing the mind of his son
Becoming less mean and more noble,
The father called in
His relatives, the king, ministers,
Kṣatriyas, and householders,
In order to give his treasures to his son.

He said to the great multitude:
“This is my son.
He was gone
For fifty years.
I found him Twenty years ago.
I missed him
When I was in a certain city.
I wandered, looking for him,
And came here.
Now I will give him
All my houses and men.
He can use them
As he likes.”

The Daily Dharma offers this:

The son thought: “I was poor, base and mean.
Now I have obtained
The treasures, houses,
And all the other things
From my father.
Never before
Have I been so happy.”

The Daily Dharma offers this:

The son thought: “I was poor, base and mean.
Now I have obtained
The treasures, houses,
And all the other things
From my father.
Never before
Have I been so happy.”

These verses are part of the story of the Wayward Son told by Subhūti, Mahā-Kātyāyana, Mahā-Kāśyapa, and Mahā-Maudgalyāyana in Chapter Four of the Lotus Sūtra. The son in the story has come into his inheritance after years of training and preparation by his father. The story explains the disciples’ understanding of how the Buddha uses expedients over time to prepare us for enlightenment. When we are not ready for the Buddha’s wisdom, he teaches to the capacity of our own minds. Now that we are ready for his highest teaching, he reveals his own mind in the Lotus Sutra.

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

Dogen

Nichiren as Bodhisattva Superior Conduct

Nichiren implied in 1272 in “Open Your Eyes” (“Kaimoku-shō”) that he was himself a manifest reincarnation of the Bodhisattva Superior Conduct, the leader of all the bodhisattvas who had emerged from the open space under the earth in chapter 15 of the Lotus Sutra. In identifying his efforts with those of Bodhisattva Superior Conduct, Nichiren was claiming a direct connection to the original Buddha. Later on, in the Muromachi period, some exegetes in one of the Nichiren branches would go further, claiming that Nichiren was himself the original Buddha of chapter 16.

But Nichiren also makes explicit in his writings that the long-lived Śākyamuni, and also the underground bodhisattvas, are existent within our own minds. He quotes this passage in chapter 16 of the Lotus Sutra: “The duration of my life, which I obtained through the practice of the way of bodhisattvas, has not yet expired. It is twice as long as the length of time stated above: 500 dust-particle kalpas.” He comments, “This reveals the bodhisattva-realm within our minds.” For Nichiren the realm of bodhisattva practice expressed by the primordial, enduring Buddha, as well as the bodhisattva practice that leads to such a buddha life, is an interior, psychic realm imaged within the minds and hearts of current practitioners.

Nichiren continues that the underground bodhisattvas of chapter 15, “who have sprung out of the great earth, as numerous as the number of dust particles of 1,000 worlds, are followers of the Original Buddha Śākyamuni who resides within our minds.” Nichiren here declares that this “original Buddha” lives as a potential within the minds of Buddhist devotees.

But the effect of the enduring Śākyamuni is not merely limited to the mental or subjective realm for Nichiren: “When the Eternal Buddha was revealed in the essential section of the Lotus Sutra, this world of endurance (Sāha-world) became the Eternal Pure Land.” Nichiren describes the external world of saṃsāra as now, immediately transformed by Śākyamuni Buddha, and consequently indestructible, transcending the changing kalpas. The powerful impact of the long-lived Buddha on the world itself is a significant model for Nichiren, which has allowed and encouraged Nichiren Buddhism to become one of the forms of Buddhism most concerned and engaged with this world, including social issues.

Dōgen and the Lotus Sutra, p54-55
Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – Aug. 10, 2024

Now I will transmit [the Dharma] to you. Keep, read, recite and expound [this sūtra in which the Dharma is given], and cause all living beings to hear it and know it! Why is that? It is because I have great compassion. I do not begrudge anything. I am fearless. I wish to give the wisdom of the Buddha, the wisdom of the Tathāgata, the wisdom of the Self-Existing One, to all living beings.

The Buddha gives these instructions in Chapter Twenty-Two of the Lotus Sūtra. In this transmission, the Buddha bestows his highest teaching not just on those gathered 2500 years ago. He gives it to all of us who hear and keep his teaching today. When the Buddha revealed his true nature as existing through all time and space, he assured us that he is always teaching us, and that the Lotus Sūtra is the vehicle by which he comes to us. By giving us this teaching, he does not lose it. In the same way, when we benefit other beings, we should not be afraid of losing anything, other than our delusion and attachments.

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

LS32

Day 7

Day 7 concludes Chapter 3, A Parable, and begins Chapter 4, Understanding by Faith.

Day 7 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month considered how those who slander this sūtra will be punished, we consider to which people we should expound the sūtra.

(The Buddha said to Śāriputra:)
A kalpa will not be long enough to describe
The punishments to be inflicted
Upon those who slander this sūtra.

Therefore,
I tell you.
Do not expound this sūtra
To people of no wisdom!

Expound it to clever people
Who have profound wisdom,
Who hear much,
Who remember well,
And who seek
The enlightenment of the Buddha!

Expound it to those who have seen
Many thousands of myriads
Of millions of Buddhas
And planted the roots of good
In their previous existence,
And who are now resolute in mind!

The Daily Dharma offers this:

Expound it to clever people
Who have profound wisdom,
Who hear much,
Who remember well,
And who seek
The enlightenment of the Buddha!

The Buddha sings these verses to all those gathered to hear him teach in Chapter Three of the Lotus Sūtra. Much of this teaching is about how we see things as opposed to how certain we are of what we see. When we believe that those whom we wish to benefit are stupid, lazy and incompetent, then it surely will be difficult to help them. But when we realize the Buddha nature within all beings, then we can see them as wise and compassionate despite the obstacles they face.

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

Dogen

Nichiren as Leader of the Underground Bodhisattvas

Dōgen refers to the Lotus Sutra as “the great king and the great master of all the various sutras that the Buddha Śākyamuni taught.” But Dōgen’s central practice was zazen, and he also amply references other sutras, and, even more than the sutras, the recorded sayings or kōans from the Chinese Zen “buddha ancestors.” For Nichiren (1222-1282), on the other hand, the Lotus Sutra is the single sacred object around which his whole theology revolves. The main practice of the various Nichiren schools and their offshoots involves chanting the name of the Lotus Sutra and venerating a scroll of the sutra’s name. And in the more elaborated theology and sutra study also prevalent in Nichiren Buddhism, chapter 16 is especially central. Nichiren focuses on this story of the enduring Śākyamuni as the fulcrum for his teaching. Given this focus, it is fitting that the discussion of Nichiren in this chapter dwarfs most of the other sections in length. For Nichiren, Śākyamuni Buddha’s remaining ever-present and his teaching sustained by the underground bodhisattvas is the central spiritual fact.

Dōgen and the Lotus Sutra, p53-54
Daily Dharma

Daily Dharma – Aug. 9, 2024

Thereupon Medicine-King Bodhisattva said to the Buddha, “World-Honored One! Now I will give dhāraṇī-spells to the expounder of the Dharma in order to protect him.”

This promise to the Buddha from Medicine-King Bodhisattva comes in Chapter Twenty-Six of the Lotus Sutra. The dhāraṇīs are given in a language that nobody understands any more. But this does not reduce their effectiveness. In the second chapter of the Lotus Sutra, the Buddha declared that his wisdom cannot be reached by understanding alone. There is another, nonverbal aspect of his teaching that we must comprehend. The dhāraṇīs not only give us reassurance that beings we cannot comprehend are helping us to become enlightened, they also remind us to look for the unspoken teachings that are part of the Buddha Dharma.

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

LS32

Day 6

Day 6 continues Chapter 3, A Parable

Day 6 Text with annotationsPlay MP3

Having last month considered in gāthās the Parable of the Burning House, we consider in gāthās dangers of the burning house and the rich man’s pleas to save his children.

This old and rotten house
Was owned by a man.
Shortly after he went out
To a place in the neighborhood,
Fires broke out suddenly
In the house.

Raging flames came out
Of all sides at the same time.
The ridges, rafters,
Beams and pillars
Burst, quaked, split, broke and fell.
The fences and walls also fell.

All the demons yelled.
The eagles, crested eagles,
And other birds, and kumbhandas
Were frightened and perplexed.
They did not know
How to get out of the house.
The wild beasts and poisonous vermin
Hid themselves in holes.

In that house also lived
Demons called pisacakas.
Because they had few merits and virtues,
They suffered from the fire.
They killed each other,
Drank blood, and ate flesh.

The small foxes were
Already dead.
Large wild beasts
Rushed at them and ate them.
Ill-smelling smoke rose
And filled the house.

The centipedes, millipedes,
And poisonous snakes
Were driven out of their holes
By the fire,
And eaten
By the kumbhanda demons.

The hair of the hungry spirits caught fire.
With hunger, thirst and burning,
The spirits ran about
In agony and dismay.

The house was so dreadful.
[In that house] there were
Poisonings, killings and burnings.
There were many dangers, not just one.

At that time the house-owner
Was standing outside the gate.
He heard a man say to him:
“Some time ago
Your children entered this house to play.
They are young and ignorant.
They are engrossed in playing.”
Hearing this,
The rich man was frightened.
He rushed into the burning house.

In order to save them
From burning to death,
He told them
Of the dangers of the house:
“There are demons and poisonous vermin here.
Flames have already spread all over.
Many sufferings are coming
One after another endlessly.
There are poisonous snakes,
Lizards, vipers,
Yakṣas, kumbhanda demons,
Small foxes, foxes, dogs,
Crested eagles, eagles,
Kites, owls and centipedes here.
They are unbearably hungry and thirsty.
They are dreadful.
These sufferings are difficult to avoid.
Worse still, there is a big fire.”

Though the children heard his warning,
They were still engrossed in playing.
They did not stop playing
Because they were ignorant.

See Problem Children

On the Journey to a Place of Treasures