Category Archives: WONS

d20b, WONS

Seed of Buddhahood Sown in Eternal Past

The Lotus Sūtra, fascicle 5 (15th chapter on “The Appearance of Bodhisattvas from Underground”) preaches, “I have always taught them in their past existence… , and as Soon as they saw Me and heard My preaching in this life, they received My teachings by faith, entering into the wisdom of the Buddha.” Interpreting this, Grand Master T’ien-t’ai states in his Words and Phrases of the Lotus Sūtra, “People today were taught and received the seed of Buddhahood in the eternal past.” Grand Master Miao-lê, on the other hand, declares in his Annotations on the Words and Phrases of the Lotus Sūtra, “Although it is in the present when people gain the benefit of attaining Buddhahood, the seed of Buddhahood was sown in the eternal past,” and in his Commentary on the Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sūtra, “Thus I know that the preaching of Śākyamuni Buddha today is for those in whom the seed of Buddhahood was sown in a past existence.” I do not have to explain what is said in the sūtra and its annotations, which are very clear in meaning. It is like a woman, regardless if she is a royal princess or a maid-servant, unless she becomes pregnant by the son of heaven, her child will never be the king of a country.

Soya Nyūdō-dono-gari Gosho, A Letter to Lay Priest Lord Soya, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 3, Pages 150.

2buddhas, d19b, d20b, WONS

Bodhisattvas for the Final Dharma Age

Nichiren observed that these four bodhisattvas [who are leaders of the Bodhisattvas from beneath the earth] were not present at the Buddha’s first sermon nor at the last. They appear in no sūtra other than the Lotus, and even there, they are present only to receive the Buddha’s transmission of the sūtra and his charge to propagate it after his parinirvāṇa. Based on his understanding of the Buddha’s teaching process, Nichiren argued that these bodhisattvas could only appear in the Final Dharma age. During the two thousand years following the Buddha’s passing, that is, the True Dharma and Semblance Dharma ages, persons who had received the seed of buddhahood from Sakyamuni Buddha were led to the stages of maturation and harvesting through provisional teachings. Had the bodhisattvas from beneath the earth appeared and spread the daimoku during that time, many of those people would have reviled it, thereby destroying the merit gained through the maturing of the seeds that they had already received. During those two thousand years, Nichiren said, some of the bodhisattvas from other worlds remained to teach the Lotus Sūtra in this world. Specifically, Zhiyi and his teacher Huisi, long revered as manifestations of the bodhisattvas Bhaiṣajyarāja (J. Yakuō; Medicine King) and Avalokiteśvara (Kannon), respectively, had taught the three thousand realms in a single thought-moment from the abstract perspective of the trace teaching. But by the beginning of the Final Dharma age, those able to achieve liberation through the provisional teachings had vanished, and the bodhisattvas from other worlds had all returned to their original lands. Now, in the present, mappō era, “Hinayāna is employed to attack Mahāyāna, and the provisional used to destroy the true. East and west are confused, and heaven and earth turned upside down. … At this time, the bodhisattvas who emerged from the earth will make their first appearance in the world, solely to have the children drink the medicine of the five characters Myōhō-renge-kyō.”

Two Buddhas, p175-176
WONS

Consecrating Myself to the Lotus Sūtra

I have no doubt that I am at the brink of death. I hope you will be very pleased in case I am beheaded, (consecrating myself to the Lotus Sūtra). It is like being robbed of a strong poison by a bandit in exchange for a precious treasure.

Toki-dono Go-henji, A Response to Lord Toki, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 119

WONS

From ‘Classics’ to the One-Vehicle Teaching

Prior to the introduction of Buddhism into China books written by the Three Emperors, Five Rulers, Three Kings, T’ai Kung-wang, Tan (The Duke of Chou), Lao-tzu and Confucius were called “sutras” or “classics,” through which people learned the proprieties: children’s indebtedness to their parents, and the relationship between rulers and the ruled. The teachings of these books were observed by the people, and heaven has accepted them. When one didn’t follow these dharma, he was punished as a disobedient child or an outlaw. When Buddhism was introduced from India, there arose a dispute between the two sides. One insisted that it should be accepted while the other argued that it should be rejected. The emperor summoned the two sides to debate the issue. The supporters of Buddhism refuted the anti-Buddhists. Since then whenever they debated, anti-Buddhists were defeated just as the sun melts ice, or water puts fire out. Eventually they no longer argued against Buddhism.

As Buddhism was thus introduced into China, it became clear that some scriptures were superior or more profound in content than others. That is to say, they could be divided into Hinayāna and Mahāyāna, exoteric and esoteric, or provisional and true sutras. For example, all rocks are inferior to any gold, and gold can be graded variously. No gold in the human world, however, equals the gold mined from the Jambu River. Even the gold from the Jambu River can never match the gold in the Brahma Heaven. Likewise, all scriptures of Buddhism are like gold: some are superior to or more profound than others.

Hinayāna sutras are like small boats, which can accommodate a few people but not hundreds or thousands. Moreover, they must stay close to this shore and can’t cross over to the other shore. They can only carry a small amount of cargo. Mahāyāna sutras are like larger vessels, which can carry easily ten to twenty people. Loaded with a large amount of cargo, they can sail from Kamakura to as far as Kyūshū or Mutsu Province (Aomori and Iwate Prefectures) in northern Honshu.

The true sūtra is beyond comparison to the other Mahāyāna sutras. It is like an enormous ship that, loaded with hundreds or thousands of people and a great amount of treasures, is able to sail as far as Korea. This is the one-vehicle teaching of the Lotus Sutra.

Oto Gozen Go-shōsoku, A Letter to Lady Oto, Nyonin Gosho, Letters Addressed to Female Followers, Page 112-114

2buddhas, d17b, d18b, WONS

Willingness to Give Even One’s Life

Willingness to give even one’s life if need be took on deep soteriological meaning for Nichiren over the course of his career. By persevering for the Lotus Sūtra’s sake, he taught, one could expiate in a single lifetime one’s evil karma from countless past lifetimes; repay one’s obligations to the Buddha and to all living beings; fulfill the bodhisattva path; and be assured of fully realizing buddhahood in this lifetime. On this theme, he wrote to his followers: “Life flashes by in but a moment. No matter how many powerful enemies may oppose us, never think of retreating or give way to fear. Even if they should cut off our heads with a saw, impale our bodies with lances, or bind our feet and bore them through with a gimlet, so long as we have life, we must chant Namu Myōhō-renge-kyō, Namu Myōhō-renge-kyō. And if we chant up until the very moment of death, Śākyamuni, Prabhūtaratna, and the buddhas of the ten directions will come to us instantly … and surely escort us to the jeweled land of Tranquil Light.”

Two Buddhas, p165
d30b, WONS

The Great Merit for Those Who Chant the Daimoku

QUESTION: Is there any scriptural proof that we gain merits through the exclusive chanting of the daimoku?

ANSWER: The Lotus Sūtra says in chapter 26, “Dhārāṇi,” of the 8th fascicle that the merits obtained will be immeasurable when one keeps only the name of the Lotus Sūtra. The Lotus Sūtra of the True Dharma says in the chapter of “Total Upholding” that the merits of a person who hears this sūtra and keeps its name will be innumerable. The Lotus Sūtra with Additions says in the chapter of “Dhārāṇi” that the merits will be innumerably great when one keeps the name of the Lotus Sūtra. These clearly show how great the merits are for those who chant the daimoku.

Hokke Daimoku Shō, Treatise on the Daimoku of the Lotus Sūtra, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Faith and Practice, Volume 4, Page 39

2buddhas, d18b, WONS

Bodily Reading

[The verses] in the “Perseverance” chapter coincided eerily with Nichiren’s own ordeals. He himself had been “disparaged with evil words” and “attacked with sticks and swords.” He had been slandered to the high officials of the shogunate by monks revered as holy by the people at large and been “repeatedly expelled.” Especially during the ordeals of his Sado Island exile, Nichiren wrestled with self-doubts. Had the protective deities abandoned him? Was he, after all, not correctly practicing the Lotus Sūtra? By his own account, however, on recalling the verse section of the “Perseverance” chapter, he realized that he was living out the sūtra’s prophecies in a way unlike any other Lotus devotee. “Without me,” he concluded, “the predictions in these verses would all be lies.” One modern interpreter of Nichiren has termed this a “circular hermeneutic” in which text and reader simultaneously mirror and bear witness to one another. Nichiren validated the truth of the Lotus Sūtra’s words by undergoing in his own person the very trials that it predicted. Yet at the same time, the Lotus Sūtra now validated Nichiren’s practice, as the persecutions he encountered were predicted in the Lotus itself.

Nichiren termed his practice “bodily reading” of the Lotus Sūtra, meaning that he had fulfilled its predictions in his own person and was “not attached to body or life” in his efforts to propagate it. The same applied, he said, to those disciples who shared his commitment. On the eve of his banishment to Sado Island, he wrote to his disciple Nichirō who had also been seized and imprisoned, praising his dedication. “Others read the Lotus Sūtra with their mouths alone, reading only the words, but they do not read it with their mind. And even if they read it with their mind, they do not read it with their body. To read the sūtra as you are doing with both body and mind is truly admirable.”

Two Buddhas, p163-164
WONS

As Much as the Soil on a Fingernail

In explaining the difficulty to be born a human being and to encounter the teaching of the Buddha, the Nirvana Sūtra, fascicle 33, states:

“The Buddha then picked up a small portion of soil placing it on a fingernail and asked Kāśyapa whether or not this was more than the soil in the worlds all over the universe. Kāśyapa Bodhisattva answered the Buddha, “World Honored One, the amount of soil on a fingernail cannot be compared to that in the worlds all over the universe.”

“With this simile in mind, the Buddha preached to Kāśyapa, “Gentleman, it is as rare as the amount of soil on a fingernail for a man to be reborn as a man or for those in the three evil realms to be reborn in the human realm equipped with all six organs in the central land of Buddhism, and furthermore to have the correct faith, study the way of the Buddha, attain freedom by practicing the correct way, and then to enter Nirvana. On the contrary, it is as vast as an occurrence as the soil in the worlds throughout the universe for human beings to fall into the three evil realms after death, for those in the evil realms to be reborn in those evil realms again, and for those who were born to the human realm without having six organs properly functioning, to be reborn in remote corners where Buddhism is unknown, to believe in evil ideologies or to practice evil ways without ever attaining freedom or Nirvana.”

Many teachings are condensed in this passage, so some words of explanation are needed. The number of human beings who will be reborn in the human realm after death is as small as the amount of the soil on a fingernail while those who will fall into the three evil realms are as vast as the soil in the worlds all over the universe. The number of those in the three evil realms who will be born after death in the human realm is as little as the amount of soil on a fingernail while those who will be reborn in the three evil realms after death are as immeasurable as the soil in all the worlds of the universe. Those who will be born human beings are as numerous as the soil in the worlds of the universe, but those who will be born human beings with six senses functioning properly are as small in number as the soil on a fingernail. Of those born human with six senses properly functioning, those born in remote areas are as numerous as the soil in the worlds all over the universe but those born in the center of the land are as small in number as the soil on a fingernail. Even though those born in the center of the land are as numerous as the soil in the worlds all over the universe, those who encounter Buddhism are as minute as the soil on a fingernail.

Shugo Kokka-ron, Treatise on Protecting the Nation, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 1, Pages 53-54

2buddhas, d17b, WONS

Guaranteed Buddhahood For Women

In Nichiren’s reading, the predictions of future buddhahood that Śākyamuni Buddha confers at the beginning of [Chapter 13, Encouragement for Keeping this Sutra] on the remaining śrāvaka disciples — Mahāprajāpatī, his aunt and foster mother, and Yaśodharā, his former wife and the mother of Rāhula — were further evidence that the Lotus, unlike other Mahāyāna sūtras, guaranteed buddhahood to women, a point he stressed to his female followers. To one woman he wrote that she, practicing as she did in the present, troubled world, far surpassed Mahāprajāpatī, who had vowed in this chapter only to “extensively expound this sūtra in other lands.”

Two Buddhas, p162
WONS

Heavenly Support

Having studied most sūtras of Buddhism, I have no doubt that I, Nichiren, am a practicer of the Lotus Sūtra. However, it seems that there are three reasons why I have not had any heavenly support. First, the deities may have abandoned this awful country because it is filled with people without faith in the Lotus Sūtra. Secondly, as the deities have not heard the sound of the Lotus Sūtra for a long time, they grew powerless. Thirdly, powerful devils have gotten into the minds of the three kinds of strong enemies of the Lotus Sūtra and controlled them, so deities such as the King of the Brahma Heaven and Indra cannot do much.

Toki-dono Go-henji, A Response to Lord Toki, Writings of Nichiren Shōnin, Doctrine 2, Page 118-119