Monday 28 January 2013

Daily Gosho - On Repaying Debts of Gratitude


Over the last couple of months, I have noticed a fair bit of opposition to my practice. It's not aggressive but it's there and when it involves slander, it doesn't feel that nice! My mission is so clear in my mind that I would  never be swayed - the opposition just proves to me the correctness of the Mystic Law - but even so, I can be affected by it. This quote helps me to remember to be courageous just like Sensei who has endured slander and criticism throughout.

"Shakyamuni taught that the shallow is easy to embrace, but the profound is difficult. To discard the shallow and seek the profound is the way of a person of courage."

(On Repaying Debts of Gratitude - The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, Volume 1, page 712) http://www.sgilibrary.org/view.php?page=690 Selection source: Kyo no Hosshin, Seikyo Shimbun, October 20th, 2012


Background
This lengthy treatise is one of Nichiren Daishonin’s five major writings. It is dated the twenty-first day of the seventh month, 1276, a little more than two years after the Daishonin had taken up residence at Minobu. It was prompted by the news of the death of Dozen-bo, a priest of Seicho-ji temple in Awa Province, who had been the Daishonin’s teacher when he first entered the temple as a boy of twelve. Nichiren Daishonin wrote this treatise to express his gratitude to Dozen-bo and sent it to Joken-bo and Gijo-bo, senior priests at the time he entered the temple, who later became his followers. He entrusted this text to Niko, one of his disciples, and requested that it be taken to Seicho-ji on his behalf and read aloud at Kasagamori on the summit of Mount Kiyosumi where he had first chanted Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, and again in front of the tomb of his late teacher.
In 1233, Nichiren Daishonin entered Seicho-ji temple to study under Dozenbo. At that time, temples served as centers of learning as well as religion. During his stay at this temple, the Daishonin developed his extraordinary literary skills that later proved so valuable in propagating his teachings. He also embarked on a lifelong journey to find and proclaim the unique truth of Buddhism, which had been all but obscured by the emergence of various misleading schools.
On the twenty-eighth day of the fourth month, 1253, the Daishonin proclaimed Nam-myoho-renge-kyo to be the sole teaching leading directly to enlightenment in the Latter Day of the Law, while denouncing the doctrines of the then prevalent Pure Land school. Tojo Kagenobu, the steward of the area and a fervent Pure Land believer, became furious on hearing of this and sent his men to the temple to arrest the
Daishonin. Dozen-bo, a devotee of the Pure Land teaching, could not defend him openly, but instructed the two senior priests, Joken-bo and Gijo-bo, to guide his young disciple to safety.
Nichiren Daishonin and his former teacher met again in 1264, when the Daishonin visited his home in Awa after returning from exile on the Izu Peninsula. He later wrote that Dozen- bo had asked him on this occasion if his practice of the Pure Land teaching would lead him into the hell of incessant suffering. In reply, the Daishonin told Dozen-bo that he could not free himself from the effects of his slander unless he revered the Lotus Sutra as the fundamental teaching. Afterward, though Dozen-bo did not entirely abandon his belief in Amida, he carved a statue of Shakyamuni Buddha. The Daishonin rejoiced that Dozen-bo was apparently beginning to see his error because he felt indebted to this man who had initiated him into the priesthood and earnestly desired to lead him to the correct teaching.
Nichiren Daishonin begins this treatise by emphasizing the need to repay one’s obligations to one’s parents, teacher, the three treasures of Buddhism, and one’s sovereign. He teaches the importance of repaying debts of gratitude as a fundamental aspect of human behavior. Of these four debts of gratitude, this work stresses specifically repaying the debt owed to one’s teacher. Next, the Daishonin states that to repay such debts one must master the truth of Buddhism and attain enlightenment. To accomplish this goal, one must dedicate oneself single-mindedly to the Buddhist practice. However, to attain enlightenment, one must also practice the correct Buddhist teaching. The Daishonin traces the development of the various schools of Buddhism in India, China, and Japan, and examines their doctrines in terms of the relative superiority of the sutras on which they are based, emphasizing the supremacy of the Lotus Sutra. In particular, he refutes the erroneous doctrines of the True Word school. He vehemently denounces Jikaku and Chisho who, though they were patriarchs of the Japanese Tendai school, corrupted the school’s profound teachings, which are based on the Lotus Sutra, by mixing them with esoteric elements. The Daishonin concludes that only the Lotus Sutra contains the ultimate truth and, moreover, that the essence of the sutra, and of the whole of Buddhism, is Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. This is the teaching to be propagated in the Latter Day of the Law.
The concluding part of this work makes clear that the Buddha of the Latter Day is none other than Nichiren Daishonin himself, and that the Buddhism he teaches comprises the Three Great Secret Laws - the invocation or daimoku of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, the object of devotion, and the sanctuary - which are implicit in the “Life Span” chapter of the Lotus Sutra but have never before been revealed. The Daishonin also makes it clear that, in establishing the Three Great Secret Laws for the enlightenment of all people, he is at the same time repaying his debt of gratitude to the deceased Dozen-bo. Flowering and Bearing Grain, written two years later, states, “The blessings that Nichiren obtains from propagating the Lotus Sutra will always return to Dozen-bo” (p. 909). This passage restates the message of the concluding part of this letter.
The present treatise is particularly important because it is the first extant writing in which Nichiren Daishonin specifies each of the Three Great Secret Laws, declaring that this teaching will save people for the ten thousand years of the Latter Day and more, for all eternity. These three, the core of the Daishonin’s Buddhism, represent the Law that was transferred to the Bodhisattvas of the Earth in the “Supernatural Powers” chapter for propagation in the Latter Day. The object of devotion is the Gohonzon that enables all people to attain Buddhahood; the daimoku is the chanting of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo with faith in the object of devotion; and the sanctuary is the place where the object of devotion is enshrined and the daimoku is chanted to it.

2 comments:

  1. Thankfulness is the key to buddhahood: if U don't feel gratitude for life and for the unique chanche to change your karma, U will never practice with the right attitude.
    I suggest also to thank the gohonzon for a benefit before it comes: it works, try it!

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  2. Thank you for the comment, that's really inspiring advice

    ReplyDelete