Pure Land and the Bodhisattva Path according to the Great Teacher Chih-i of T'ien-t'ai

by Master Tsung-pen

Question 

The work of the buddhas and bodhisattvas is great compassion. In order to rescue sentient beings, they must vow to be born in the Triple World, in the world of the five corruptions, in the midst of the three mires, to save the suffering beings there. How could they seek birth in the Pure Land, to put themselves at peace while abandoning sentient beings. How could they be without compassion, and concentrate only on benefitting themselves? This would block the bodhisattva path. 

Answer 

There are two kinds of bodhisattvas. One kind have cultivated the bodhisattva path for a long time and attained the [perfect] forbearance [that comes with realizing that all] phenomena are unborn. This objection would apply to them. 

The second kind have not yet attained [perfect forbearance]; this includes ordinary people with the first aspiration for enlightenment. These "ordinary people bodhisattvas" must never be apart from the perfection of the Buddha's power of forbearance: only then can they dwell in the Triple World, in the world of evil, and save suffering beings. Thus the Perfection of Wisdom Treatise says: 

It is impossible for ordinary people in bondage to have the mind of great compassion and vow to be born in evil worlds to save sentient beings. 

Why so? In evil worlds, the afflictions are powerful. Since ordinary people themselves lack the power of forbearance, their minds would follow objects and they would be tied down by sound and form. Since they themselves would fall into the three mires, how could they save other sentient beings? 

Even if they [avoided the rebirth as animals, hungry ghosts, or hell-beings, and] were born as humans, the path of the sages would be hard for them to find. Perhaps by upholding discipline and cultivating merit they would be born as human and get to be kings or great ministers or nobles or independent people, but even if they encountered enlightened teachers, they would not believe them. They would be covetous and deluded and self-indulgent and would commit many bad deeds. Because of this bad karma, they would fall into the three mires. After countless eons, they might emerge from hell, only to be born poor and lowly. If they did not encounter an enlightened teacher, they would fall back into hell. They would go on transmigrating like this until now. All people are like this. This is called the path that is hard to travel. Thus the Vimalakirti Sutra says: 

It is impossible for people who cannot save themselves from their own illness to rescue other sick people. 

The Perfection of Wisdom Treatise says: 

Suppose there are two men. Each of them has a relative drowning in a river. One man impetuously plunges straight into the stream, without the power of skill-in-means, so he and his relative both die. One man has skill-in-means, so he goes and gets a boat and rides it out to rescue his relative. Both he and his relative escape drowning in the river. Bodhisattvas who have first generated the aspiration for enlightenment are like this too. If they have not attained the power of forbearance, they are unable to rescue sentient beings. Therefore they must constantly be near to Buddha until they attain the forbearance [of realizing that all phenomena] are unborn: only then can they save sentient beings. It is like getting the boat [in the parable]. 

The Perfection of Wisdom Treatise also says: 

It is like a baby who must not leave his mother. Otherwise he might fall into a well looking for milk to drink and die. It is also like a baby bird whose wing feathers have not yet fully formed. He must stay close to the tree branch: he cannot venture far. Only after his wing feathers have fully formed can he fly through the sky free and unobstructed. 

Ordinary people with no power can only concentrate on reciting the name of Amitabha Buddha until they achieve samadhi, stable concentration. When this work is completed, then when they are about to die they can gather in their thoughts and attain birth in the Pure Land and definitely get to see Amitabha Buddha. 

After they have realized the forbearance that comes from knowing all things are unborn, then they can return to the Triple World: riding on the boat of forbearance, they can save suffering beings and serve buddha as they please independently. Therefore the Perfection of Wisdom Treatise says: 

Those who wander at play in hell are those who have been born in the Pure Land, attained forbearance toward unborn phenomena, and reentered the land of birth and death in order to convert hell beings and rescue suffering sentient beings. 

For this reason, you should concentrate on cultivating Pure Land practice and vow to be born there. ... 

related post: Yen-shou (Yung-ming) Advocates Pure Land

Source Of Information:
《Pure Land Pure Mind 心净佛土净》, by Master Chu-hung and Tsung-pen, translated by J.C.Cleary, distributed by: Persatuan Penganut Agama Buddha Amitabha Malaysia, 90 & 92, Jalan Pahang, Gombak, 53000 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.)
*** The information provided above does not contain personal opinion of this blog.

True Vows

Pure Land master Tz'u-chao said: 

Practice without vows means the practice will be isolated. Vows without practice means the vows will be empty. If you have neither practice nor vows, you live in the world in vain. If you have both practice and vows, you enter directly into uncontrived reality. 

Thus vows are the basis of the buddhas' and patriarchs' cultivation of Pure Land practice. Why? Understanding is guided by wisdom, practice flourishes because of vows. When vows and practice are given equal weight, understanding and wisdom are both present. 

To vow [to do something] means to want to do it. If you want to be born in the Pure Land in the west, if you want to see Amitabha Buddha, you must make a vow: only then can you go to the Pure Land. Without the intent of the vow, the roots of goodness will disappear. The Flower Ornament (Avatamsaka) Sutra says: 

Those who do not make great vows are controlled by delusion. All forms of service to Buddha arise from vows. If you want to attain the Supreme Path, you must attain the perfection of vows. 

This is why Samantabhadra's vows are vast and boundless as the ocean, and Amitabha took forty-eight vows. 

Thus we know that all the buddhas of the ten directions and all the sages from ancient times onward have all achieved enlightenment on the basis of the power of their vows. The Perfection of Wisdom Treatise says: 

People cultivate a little bit of merit and a little bit of discipline, but they do not know the correct basis for liberation. They have heard talk of the pleasures of humans and devas, and in their minds they are always vowing to enjoy them after the end of their [present] lives and be reborn as humans or devas. This will be brought about by the power of their vows. Bodhisattvas seek birth in the Pure Land. This is a matter of having a firm will and strong vows - only then will they attain it. 

The Perfection of Wisdom Treatise also says: 

Even though people have only cultivated a little bit of merit, because they have the power of their vows, they will attain great rewards. 

The Great Adornment Treatise says: 

[Being born in] a buddha-land is a great affair. It cannot be achieved through the merit of isolated practice. It requires the power of vows as an aid: only then can you attain birth in a buddha-land and see Buddha. 

The Flower Ornament (Avatamsaka) Sutra chapter on practice and vows [of Samantabhadra] says: 

When a person is on the brink of death, in his last moment, all his faculties disintegrate, and he is bereft of all his kinfolk; all his powers are lost and none of his possessions remain with him. The only thing he does not relinquish is the power of his vows: at all times, they lead him forward. In an instant, he attains birth in the Land of Ultimate Bliss. 

From this we can infer that we must make vows all the time to honor birth in the Pure Land, and pray every day that we will not regress. Thus it is said, "The Gate to the Dharma is vast and great, but without vows we cannot go through it." This being so, Buddha fulfills people's vows according to [the condition of] their minds. 

Alas! These days we often see people who aspire to join a Buddhist congregation because of the pain of illness, or to repay their parents, or to protect their families and homes, or who maintain a vegetarian diet because they fear [the consequences of] their wrongdoings. Though they have faith, they do not have practice or vows. Though they say they are reciting the buddha-name, they have not comprehended the basic root [of buddha-remembrance, namely, vows]. 

All those who cultivate good causes do so in order to repay promises they have made. Those who take vows to recite the buddha-name and seek birth in the Pure Land rarely do so for the sake of their own [liberation from] birth and death. Usually when they burn incense and candles at shrines, or make dedications and transfer merit, it is only to announce their offerings to the spirits, to ward off disaster or extend their lives. They go against the fundamental idea of repentance explained in the scriptures and do not accord with the basic vow of the buddhas. Even if they chant the scriptures throughout their lives, they do not understand their meaning, and they misuse their effort. This is what is called "counting the treasures of others all day long but not having half a cent for oneself." The reason why such people do not go to the Pure Land when they die is that they have no [real] practice or vows. 

There is another sort of ignorant people who when they take refuge with Buddha and receive the precepts, burn incense in front of the Three Jewels and swear that if they break the precepts they will willingly accept [all sorts of dire punishments], fall into the clutches of the government in this lifetime, and after they die descend into the three mires [to be reborn as hungry ghosts, as animals, or in hell]. Alas! These people do not know that the buddhas and enlightened teachers operated with compassion, and never taught people to act like this. This is all the fault of misguided teachers, who wrongly consider taking oaths on pain of punishment to be making vows. What utter confusion! 

I think of these people with pity, and urge them to take correct vows along with us, vowing to seek birth in the Pure Land, and to become buddhas together. They say, "We are ordinary people. How can we dare to hope to be born in the Pure Land and become buddhas? If we thought this, it would be false imagination." 

I answer them: Not so. "Buddha" means "enlightened one." The Pure Land is Mind. Who does not possess this Mind? If you awaken, you are a buddha; if you are deluded, you are an ordinary being. 

Worldly people turn their backs on enlightenment and join with the dusts of sensory experience, to revolve in the Triple World through various forms of birth in the six planes of existence. Their good and bad karmic connections, and the good and bad results they receive, are all because they falsely accept the physical body as their true body and the sensory world as really existing. They flow along day and night following these illusory objects. Never for a moment do they realize that they should turn the light around, keep a vegetarian diet and maintain discipline, and recite the buddha-name. 

From birth to old age, all they do is worry that their family affairs will not be taken care of and that their wealth will not be enough to please them. The more they have, the more they seek; the more they covet, the more dissatisfied they are. 

Though they claim they are accumulating virtue and serving Buddha and paying homage to Buddha and making merit and offering incense, all that they are hoping for [by doing this] is [to gain] riches and high rank and glory and eternal life. As soon as they do a little bit of good, they are hoping that it will guarantee them full granaries and prolific silkworms and famous descendants and fertile livestock. As soon as something goes against their wishes, they resent Buddha for not safeguarding them. Day after day they happily add to their wealth, saying that this is the response they have earned from the devas and nagas. 

Such covetous calculations are indeed false thinking. Though these people claim that they recite the buddha-name and seek birth in the Pure Land, since they are entertaining these false thoughts, are they not very deluded? 

Some say that making merit all belongs in the category of contrived action, and is a worldly, defiled causal basis, not a practice of the uncontrived world-transcending Path. You children of Buddha should think this over carefully. Today you have a causal connection and have gotten to meet with the Buddha Dharma. You must investigate the root: don't argue over the branches. 

Turn the light around for a moment and cultivate the world-transcending Dharma. 

Vow to abandon this world "Endurance" and vow to be born in the Pure Land, as if you were a long time traveller in another land who longs to return home. 

How can this vow to be born in the Pure Land and become a buddha be compared to the false thinking of ordinary people? Haven't you read what it says in Pure Land Repentance! 

I vow that when I am about to die, I will clear away all obstruction, and see Amitabha Buddha face to face, and be born in the land of peace and bliss. 

As the saying goes, "one morning you step onto the road to the future, and for the first time you realize that you have been misusing mind." 

related post:  Pure Land and the Bodhisattva Path according to the Great Teacher Chih-i of T'ien-t'ai

Source Of Information:
《Pure Land Pure Mind 心净佛土净》, by Master Chu-hung and Tsung-pen, translated by J.C.Cleary, distributed by: Persatuan Penganut Agama Buddha Amitabha Malaysia, 90 & 92, Jalan Pahang, Gombak, 53000 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.)
*** The information provided above does not contain personal opinion of this blog.

Zen is Hard, Pure Land is Easy

by Master Tsung-pen

Question 

In the world there are people who hold exclusively to Zen meditation cases - koans - and make people do their meditation work on them. They hope to awaken to the Path through studying Zen, and do not vow to be born in the Pure Land. What about this teaching? 

Answer 

People of sharp faculties and superior wisdom are capable of real Zen study and genuine awakening. But if there is the slightest error, [exclusive reliance on Zen] becomes a big mistake. 

Question 

How do we know this is a mistake? 

Answer 

The mistake comes in not awakening and going on as before revolving in the cycle of birth and death. It is better to cultivate practice by reciting the buddha-name and be sure of finding a direct road to birth in the Pure Land. 
It is not that enlightened teachers do not teach you to study Zen - it's that they are afraid you will not recite the buddha-name. What is the reason? Awakening to the Path by studying Zen is hard. Being born in the Pure Land by reciting the buddha-name is easy. 
Haven't you heard the saying of the ancient worthy? 
To study Zen it is necessary to completely comprehend birth and death, and not two or three in a hundred succeed. If they seek birth in the Pure Land by reciting the buddha-name, not one in ten thousand fails. 
As the saying goes: 
With Zen but without Pure Land, nine out of ten go wrong. 

Is it not so? 

Moreover, studying Zen does not obstruct reciting the buddha-name, and reciting the buddha-name does not obstruct studying Zen. 

Now the relative difficulty and ease of Zen and Pure Land is clear. There are indeed eighty-four thousand methods including the direct pointing [of Zen], but none of them is as good as the one phrase "Amitabha Buddha." Although there are seventeen hundred Zen koans, they do not equal the one phrase "Amitabha Buddha." 

In the teaching of Amitabha Buddha, there is both sudden and gradual, both inner truth and apparent manifestation. People of superior faculties and wisdom take it up directly, see reality-nature and become buddhas. The middle and lower sort are incapable of sudden transcendence: they rely on the power of Amitabha Buddha and attain birth in the Pure Land. For this reason, the teaching of reciting the buddha-name is superior to all other teachings. The other meditation cases are not one percent as effective as the buddha-remembrance meditation case ["Who is the one reciting the buddha-name?"] What is the reason? If they were equally as effective, then all the past, present, and future buddhas of the ten directions would not have extolled Amitabha Buddha, and all the countless scriptures would not point the way to the Pure Land in the west . . . 

In olden times, the Tathagata [Shakyamuni] said to Maudgalyayana: 

It is like the floating plants in the myriad ever-flowing rivers. The ones ahead do not look at the ones behind them, and the ones behind do not look at the ones ahead of them, but all of them meet in the ocean. Worldly life is also like this. Though some people are powerful and high-ranking and rich and happy and independent, not one of them manages to avoid old age and sickness and death. Because they do not believe in the Buddha's scriptures, they are unable to be born in the thousand buddha-lands. Therefore I say that the land of Amitabha is easy to go to and easy to attain. But people do not cultivate the practice needed to be born there. Instead they serve the ninety-six kinds of heretical paths. I call them people without eyes or ears. 

In the records of birth in the Pure Land and the biographies of eminent monks, [we read that] both worthy people and ignorant people are born in the Pure Land, and both people of ancient times and people of today go there. All of them totally abandoned impure lands and all of them went to the Pure Land. They were reborn [in a lotus flower] in the Seven Jewel Pond [in the Pure Land] and left behind the pains of incarnation in a womb. They transcended ordinary existence and entered into the sagely realm. They attained the Path and witnessed Reality. Without going through three incalculable eons, they achieved the Path of the Buddha. Isn't the power of [Amitabha] Buddha inconceivable? 

If you want to rise above the cycle of birth and death forever, and attain the bliss of nirvana, you need the Dharma-Gate of birth in the Pure Land. Why? 

This world of ours called "Endurance" is a defiled realm, where all forms of suffering are assembled: if you seek the Path here, it is hard to succeed. 

The Pure Land is a realm of bliss, where all good things are gathered together, from which there is no falling back. (41) If you invoke the buddha-name, all the buddhas will protect you and you will be born in the Pure Land. As for generating enlightenment, [in the Pure Land] the light of Amitabha shines on you and promotes your progress, the bodhisattvas and arhats accompany you, and the water birds and forest trees are all reciting the buddha-name. You constantly hear the wondrous Dharma in your ears. In your mind, craving and anger are suddenly cut off, and there is happiness without end. Your lifespan is not limited to one [earthly] lifetime ...

Alas! The faith of those with the first aspiration for enlightenment (bodhi mind) is shallow: without the power of Buddha, it is hard for them to advance in their practice. The vows of our [Amitabha] Buddha are profound: all who have an affinity with him are gathered in. 

Good people, since ancient times the buddhas and enlightened teachers have established teachings and shown the method of reciting the buddha-name. Why then do [certain] followers of Zen today not believe in birth in the Pure Land? Cultivating Pure Land practice does not interfere with studying Zen, so why should those who study Zen denigrate it and not cultivate it? 
............................................
41. Non-retrogression to the realm of birth and death is a key advantage of rebirth in the Pure Land (compared, for example, to rebirth in the Tushita Heaven, etc.) 

related post: True Vows

Source Of Information:
《Pure Land Pure Mind 心净佛土净》, by Master Chu-hung and Tsung-pen, translated by J.C.Cleary, distributed by: Persatuan Penganut Agama Buddha Amitabha Malaysia, 90 & 92, Jalan Pahang, Gombak, 53000 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.)
*** The information provided above does not contain personal opinion of this blog.