Transcriber’s Notes
Misspelled words have been corrected. These are identified by a ♦
symbol in the text. The change description is shown immediately
below the paragraph or section in which the correction appears.
Details and other notes may be found at the end of this text.
THE LOTUS OF THE WONDERFUL LAW
[Illustration: THE RETURN OF THE CHINESE ENVOYS SENT TO INDIA ABOUT
A.D. 63 who brought back to their emperor an image of the Buddha, and
copies of the scriptures ]
THE LOTUS OF THE WONDERFUL LAW
OR
THE LOTUS GOSPEL
SADDHARMA PUNDARĪKA SŪTRA
MIAO-FA LIEN HUA CHING
BY
W. E. SOOTHILL
PROFESSOR OF CHINESE IN THE UNIVERSITY
OF OXFORD
OXFORD
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
1930
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
AMEN HOUSE, E.C. 4
LONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW
LEIPZIG NEW YORK TORONTO
MELBOURNE CAPETOWN BOMBAY
CALCUTTA MADRAS SHANGHAI
HUMPHREY MILFORD
PUBLISHER TO THE
UNIVERSITY
Printed in Great Britain
PREFACE
The Lotus Sutra of the Wonderful, or Mystic, Law is the most important
religious book of the Far East. It has been described as “The Gospel
of Half Asia”. Dr. Timothy Richard twenty years ago translated a
brief summary of its teaching, as also the profounder Śastra which he
termed “The Awakening of Faith”. These he published under the title of
_The New Testament of Higher Buddhism_. He says: “though Buddhism
has twelve different sects, yet I found the Lotus Scripture on the
lecterns of every Buddhist temple I visited. It is also the chief
Scripture in the Tiendai School of Buddhism in China, and is therefore
the chief source of consolation to the many millions of Buddhists in
the Far East.” Quite recently Dr. Kenneth J. Saunders in his _The
Gospel for Asia_ has expressed the opinion that the three most
influential religious books in the world are The Gospel of St. John,
The Bhagavadgita, and The Lotus Sutra, and that what the Gospel of St.
John is to the Christian and the Bhagavadgita to the Hindu, such is The
Lotus to the Buddhist in the Far East. He goes farther and sees closer
resemblances between the three books than others may see, at least in
their ideals. When Dr. Richard published his synopsis of the Sutra
under the title given above, the late Hon. Mrs. E. A. Gordon annotated
it throughout with references to our New Testament with varying degrees
of approximation.
Whatever view may be held of the intrinsic value of the work by
Western readers, there is no doubt of its appreciation in the Far
East, and it is perfectly justifiable to consider it as one of the
greatest and most formative books of the world. Its influence from
Tibet to Japan, from Mongolia to Cochin China has been greater than
that of any other single book. For the ordinary Western reader it is
much too long, as all that is said in prose is repeated in verse. There
is, in consequence, repetition wearisome to the reader of many books.
Undoubtedly the method of the author and of his period was useful for
driving home truth to the sluggish mind, or to the mind free from other
attractive entanglements. It is a method beloved of the unlettered. In
order, therefore, that the Western reader may not miss the essential
meaning I have omitted the repetitions and much unnecessary detail,
while making it my aim to portray the message of the book as nearly as
possible in its own way.
As a living book it is no longer read in Sanskrit, but only in the
languages of the Far East. It is therefore their tone that I have
sought to express in this abbreviated version.
The advent of Christianity to Japan has had its usual influence in
arousing a moribund religion from lethargy, a lethargy which is
inherent in Buddhism. A somewhat similar revival with a similar cause
is occurring in China. In consequence, a fresh interest has arisen in
Buddhist literature and not least in The Lotus. For this reason in
1921 I wrote to China for a copy of the Chinese text. Though the pages
are less peppered with Sanskrit transliterations and Buddhist
terms than other Buddhist classics, the work still presents serious
difficulty to the Chinese reader and not less so to the Western
student. It was therefore my purpose to translate the text for the use
of the Western student.
The books had scarcely arrived in Oxford when one of those curious
coincidences occurred, which the devout ascribe to external
intervention, be it by the Buddha, as my visitor thought, or by some
other Spiritual Power. An unusual type of visitor called on me. His
name was Bunno Kato. It transpired that he was a Japanese leader of
the Nichiren School of Buddhism. Most modestly he preferred of me an
earnest request, that I would help him in translating into English The
Lotus scripture. It is the great text of his School as also of certain
other Schools of Buddhism. He knew the lengthy text by heart, and was
intimately acquainted with the voluminous commentaries written on the
work. The Chinese text common to Japan and China is the Kumarajiva
version made in A.D. 406. It was with pleasure that we began our work
on it together. A more faithful, or intelligent devotee of the work
could not have been found. After nearly four years of application
the English translation was finished in 1925. My final revision was
completed at Harbin in Manchuria, while waiting for the Trans-Siberian
train to bring me home after a visit to China, where I had gone as a
member of Lord Willingdon’s Commission. I was anxious to send the final
corrections to Mr. Kato via China, for any papers carried through
Russia were suspect and liable to confiscation, as I proved on my way
through.
The translation of the whole work is still in manuscript, along with
Mr. Kato’s extensive introduction. It will form too large a book to
appeal to any but students of the subject. I am therefore taking this
method of making the work better known to the general reader of the
Western world.
Too long has this literary masterpiece been buried in translations,
unavoidably cumbrous and inspirationally innocuous. Hence this
endeavour to reveal the contour of the most powerful spiritual drama
known in the Far East.
W.E.S.
CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xi
INTRODUCTION
Historical 1
Form and Content 10
Doctrine 34
THE LOTUS SUTRA
I. The Assembly and the Illumination 59
II. Tactful Revelation 65
III. Parable of the Burning House 81
IV. Faith-discernment, the Prodigal Son 106
V. Parable of the Rain 122
VI. Prediction of the Four Disciples 129
VII. Parable of the Magic City 131
VIII. Prediction of Five Hundred Disciples 142
IX. Prediction of Ananda, Rahula, and others 146
X. The Preacher 149
XI. The Precious Shrine 157
XII. Devadatta. The Dragon-King’s Daughter 169
XIII. Steadfastness. Prediction of Women and others 176
XIV. The Serene Life. The Four Spheres 181
XV. Hosts of Disciples issue from the Earth 192
XVI. Eternity of The Buddha. The Physician 200
XVII. The Merit and Reward of Faith 209
XVIII. The Merit and Reward of Accordance 216
XIX. The Merit and Reward of the Preacher 219
XX. The Bodhisattva “Never Despise” 226
XXI. Divine Power of a Buddha’s Tongue 230
XXII. The Final Commission 234
XXIII. The King of Healing. Bodhisattva Beautiful 236
XXIV. Wonder-sound 242
XXV. Kuan-yin, Regarder of the Cries of the World 247
XXVI. Spells 252
XXVII. King Resplendent and Buddha Thunder-Voice 255
XXVIII. Universal Virtue 260
GLOSSARY 267
INDEX 271
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Introduction of Buddhism into China _Frontispiece_
1. Part of a scroll of the Sutra _Facing page_ 8
2. Modern Buddhist Monks 30
3. Conception of the Buddha 58
4. Buddha and the child’s offering 76
5. Buddha dividing the waters 122
6. Buddha telling of a former Buddha 136
7. The Precious Shrine 158
8. The Dragon King 172
9. Kuan-yin saving sailors 196
10. The laying of the purchase money in bricks of gold 216
11. Holding back the sun 230
12. Kuan-yin breaking the Sword 248
13. Spell-making 252
Acknowledgement for permission to use the above illustrations is
gratefully made to the British Museum and Dr. Lionel Giles for Nos. 1,
9, and 12; to Lady Hosie for No. 2, and to the Bodleian Library for
the other illustrations, which are taken from the eighteenth-century
woodcuts of the 釋迦如來應化事蹟, _Shih-chia Ju-lai Ying-hua Shih-chi_, or
_Scenes from the Life of the Buddha_.
INTRODUCTION
_Historical_
By whom was this classic given? Devout Buddhists in the Far East
say it contains the very words of Śakyamuni, the Buddha, his final
teaching spoken towards the end of his days on the Vulture Peak in
Nepal. Equally devout Buddhists in Ceylon, Burma, and Siam declare
that it was entirely unknown in the ancient Canon, that it contradicts
the essential teaching of the Buddha, and that it is the invention
of a much later age. Thus we see Buddhism separated into its two
great divisions, and it is over the works, of which The Lotus is the
most representative type, that the division of Hinayana and Mahayana
arises. These two terms were invented by the Mahayanists, who form
the “Northern” School of Buddhism, that is the Far Eastern School now
found in China, Japan, Korea, Mongolia, Tibet. The Hinayanists are
the “Southern”, or Orthodox, School of Ceylon, Burma, Siam. Hinayana
means Small wain, or vehicle; Mahayana, Large wain, or vehicle. By the
Northern Buddhist, Hinayana is charged with conveying only the few to
Nirvana, that is, those seeking salvation by the arduous way of works.
Mahayana, on the other hand, professes to open the way for the many,
indeed finally for all. Consequently Mahayanism is another term for
Universalism, or Catholicism.
In Mahayana, salvation is attained not by laborious effort, but
simply by faith in the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. The great Bodhisattvas
in particular are objects of faith and invocation. They are not
historical beings but idealizations. Accredited with a vow not to enter
into the final bliss of Buddhahood until all creatures are saved, they
instantly respond to all who call upon them. Their salvation is not
to a Nirvana of individual extinction or annihilation, but to heavens
of joy-and blessedness. Such happiness is infinite, to which all will
finally attain. Those who claim it now by faith and invocation will
escape the perils and pains of reincarnation. Those who delay their
belief will continue to suffer until they cry for salvation, as they
ultimately will cry.
Here lies the contrast, the difference, between the one School and
the other—a difference at least as fundamental as between Roman and
Reformed Christianity. But Roman and Reformed virtually make appeal to
the same Book, or collection of books, the Bible. Not so is it with
Hinayana and Mahayana, for they appeal to two differing sets of textual
authorities. Hinayanists claim, with a measure of justice, that their
texts are the only ancient and valid canons, and that these alone
contain the real teaching of their Founder. Mahayanists, it is true,
claim all those texts equally with their rivals, but declare that they
were only the Buddha’s preparatory teaching, suited to the immature
degree of his disciples’ immediate development. They insist that their
Mahayana texts were his developed doctrine, given towards the end of
his ministry, when his disciples were mature enough to understand
his spiritual interpretation of the universe and of universal truth.
They say that his attitude, during the period of Hinayana texts, was
similar to the attitude of the schoolmaster, who leads on his pupils
according to their ability through the preparatory stages, but when
they are sufficiently grounded reveals to them the higher learning.
Consequently they claim that the Buddha only in the later stages of his
life and before his departure, made the full revelation. This perfect
revelation, they assert, is only to be found in the Mahayana texts; it
is a revelation of the “All-Truth” which his disciples had been trained
by easy stages finally to apprehend in its fullness.
The detached mind will not easily be beguiled into acceptance of the
Mahayanist’s special pleading. Mahayanists have not a shred of real
evidence to show that the Buddha ever delivered any of the addresses
attributed by them to him. All the weight of evidence is indeed against
them. Whatever evidence there is rather supports the Hinayanists’ claim
to Apostolic Succession. Though these may not possess documentary
evidence of the Buddha’s actual sermons, at least the Sutras of
Southern Buddhism may be considered as in the direct line of his
teaching. As to the Mahayana Sutras, the unprejudiced cannot doubt
that they are the invention of a later period, and that Mahayanism is
a shoot grafted on to the original stock of the Buddhist Bodhi-tree.
Whence, where and when this scion was grafted is still unknown. There
are able scholars who assert that there is no need to look abroad
for Mahayana ideas, because their embryo can be discovered in the
orthodox scriptures. But there seems more justification for supposing
the new scion to be of external origin, grafted on to Buddhism, perhaps
in Northern India, perhaps still farther north in Central Asia.
Whatever its origin this scion, grafted into the old tree, produced
fruit of a different quality, more attractive to the eye and the taste;
it was this off-shoot that struck in the north and east of Asia. The
original stock grew older, died in its native soil, and was only saved
by a branch which had been transplanted away from its native hills with
their wintry snows to the southern sun, where it survives.
We may say, then, that The Lotus never had any direct connexion with
Śakyamuni. It was the brilliant concept of a later age. The author,
whose name and place of origin are unknown, was one of the world’s
greatest Apocalyptists. He was gifted with a rare imagination, and with
remarkable dramatic powers which appeal to an imaginative and florid
race. He was endowed with talents of detail and repetition that, while
tedious and often puerile to our sated taste, were of prime value in
capturing the attention of his readers and in impressing his story
on a leisurely people. His brilliant drama of spiritual things has
outshone his name, while unconsciously he has been one of the chief
instruments in dividing Buddhism. The inspiration that was to weld a
fracture already yawning split it permanently in two. The two segments
remain apart. The Southern Buddhists of Burma, Ceylon, Siam guard
the treasure of the earthly Buddha’s law, as they now guard the coffin
supposed to contain his earthly remains so recently recovered. The
Northern or Far Eastern Buddhists guard the treasure of an Eternal
Buddha, of whom the earthly Buddha was but a temporal manifestation.
Thus does Mahayana, or the universal chariot of salvation, compare
itself with the Southern Hinayana, or the small chariot of laborious
“works”, which saves the few. In reality Mahayanism is, as the Southern
Buddhists believe, a betrayal of Śakyamuni Buddha, in the interests of
doctrines he never taught and which are a reversal of his principles,
as recorded by his disciples.
As to the author, not only is his name unknown, but even the region
of his origin is equally obscure. Presumably the writer composed the
work in Sanskrit and in Northern India; it may, however, have been
composed farther north in Central Asia. Though its date or period is
not discovered, it seems to have been both a product, and perhaps a
producer, of the reaction against the formalism which had fallen upon
ascetic Buddhism.
Was it the offspring of ideas which had already hailed the dawn of
spiritual liberation across Western Asia? That is a question to which
as yet there is no sufficient answer. Whatever the answer may be we now
know that Buddhism, at the beginning of the Christian era, was a potent
religious force across Central Asia, that its missionaries had already
reached Western China and that, during the first century of our
era, the religion, in a form clearly not of the Mahayana order, was
welcomed at the Imperial Chinese Court. The Scythian ruler of Northern
India, Kanishka, gave it his ardent support during that century, as the
ruler Aśoka had done centuries earlier. That the Buddhism of Kanishka’s
period differed from the original cult is probable, but we do not yet
know in what respect.
It must not be assumed that the new doctrines of salvation, which
found their expression in the tractate “The Uprising (Awakening) of
Faith” and in “The Lotus Sutra”, were necessarily created by these
works. It is more likely that those doctrines only found their ultimate
expression in these works. Nor can we assume that they were known
before Christian influence was felt in the lands of the new Buddhism.
Though by no means convinced, or concerned, that Christian influence
had anything to do with the creation of the new cult, yet I cannot
ignore the fact that the first assured appearance in China of The Lotus
was towards the end of the third century A.D. The Christian Church in
India, whose foundation is attributed to the Apostle Thomas, may or
may not have existed. That is perhaps a matter of minor importance to
our subject in comparison with an influence of recognized potency,
namely, the interchange of ideas which spread east and west along the
remarkable trading corridor that stretched from Northern China to the
Mediterranean. Graeco-Bactrian art is an instance of such propagation.
Whether this uprising of the human spirit was a natural protest against
priestcraft and ritual, is a question more easily put than answered.
Here I can only call attention to the undoubted interchange of such
ideas as existing before and after the Christian era.
We are on surer ground when we seek to trace the story of the
translation of The Lotus into Chinese. The first partial version,
of which no copy exists, was made by an unknown author in or about
A.D. 255–6. Another lost version in twenty-eight chapters was made in
A.D. 265, by the monk Dharmaraksha. He, or another of the same name,
apparently made another version in A.D. 286 which still exists. A
fourth version, now lost, was made by a translator of unknown origin
in A.D. 335. The fifth version, which holds the field, is that from
which the present excerpts are made. Its literary quality shows that it
could only have been composed by very scholarly Chinese. But the actual
translator to the Chinese pundits was Kumarajiva and he completed the
work in A.D. 406. Kumarajiva is said to have come to China, or as
some say was captured and brought there, from Kharashar in Turkestan.
Others describe him as of “Takchas’ila” (Taxila) in the neighbourhood
of Chitral. From A.D. 397 to 415 he lived in the Ch‘in capital of
Ch‘ang-an in modern Shensi. At that time China was in a state of
partition. Yao Hsing, the Ch‘in ruler, supported and encouraged
Kumarajiva, providing him with a large staff of Chinese writers for his
very numerous translations and works.
A sixth version, still existing, was made in A.D. 601 by Jñanagupta and
Dharmagupta, two monks reputed to be of Indian origin, and it agrees
with the Sanskrit version in having twenty-seven chapters. The verses
in Chapter XXV of Kumarajiva’s version were not made by him but by a
Jñanagupta of the Northern Chou dynasty A.D. 557–89; whether it was the
same monk is not clear.
The three existing versions then are the Dharmaraksha version of
A.D. 286, that of Kumarajiva which agrees with the Tibetan version,
and that of Jñanagupta. Little is known of the sources whence these
versions were made. Jñanagupta says that he has seen two originals,
one on palm-leaves, the other on a silk-like fabric, which differed
considerably from each other. Dharmaraksha’s version he says was from
that on palm-leaves, Kumarajiva’s from the fabric. The palm-leaf
version seems to have been in Sanskrit; the fabric version was in
Kharashar characters, the writing used in Kuche (Kwei-tz), the supposed
native place of Kumarajiva. The Kharashar text used by him is said to
have been older than that on the palm-leaves.
We possess, then, a version by Kumarajiva which is accepted in the Far
East. The Chinese date for its translation, A.D. 406, may be accepted,
for its extraordinary popularity over a thousand years ago is attested
by the large number of portions brought from the Tun Huang monastery
by Sir Aurel Stein and now in the British Museum. These copies, made
between A.D. 533 and 972, as also an earlier commentary of A.D. 508,
lay hidden in a walled-up chamber probably from the eleventh century
until the present century. The discovery and the bringing of
these copies to the light of the world is one of the romances of our
generation. Sir Aurel, on his second intrepid journey of discovery from
Kashmir to Kansu, followed the route taken by the famous Chinese monk
Hsüan (or Yüan) Tsang, who in the seventh century made a pilgrimage
from China to India. After crossing the dread Taklamakan desert, he
reached Tun Huang in Kansu. In the cave-temple of The Thousand Buddhas
the abbot in charge, while making repairs, had broken into a closed-up
room, whose existence was till then unknown, where he found hidden a
great collection of written scrolls. Sir Aurel, after much difficulty,
secured a selection of the scrolls, and amongst them were the numerous
portions of The Lotus Sutra already mentioned.
[Illustration: 1. End of a roll of Chapter X of the Lotus Sutra in the
Stein Collection at the British Museum
It was written on paper on May 4th, A.D. 533, six centuries before
paper was made in Europe, The roll was found, with many others, by
Sir Aurel M. Stein, in the Cave of the Thousand Buddhas at Tun-huang.
The photograph shows the last five lines of the text, the name of the
Sutra, chapter, date, and name and description of the writer ]
From the Sanskrit versions previously brought to the west during the
nineteenth century two translations were made, one into French, the
other into English. The French version, made from a manuscript provided
by Mr. Brian Hodgson, was completed by Eugène Burnouf in 1852 under
the title _Le Lotus de la bonne loi_. The English version was
made by H. Kern of Leiden in 1909; it was published, under the title
_Saddharma Pundarika_, as vol. xxi of the Sacred Books of the
East. Both these translations were made for scholars.
As yet no translation of the Chinese version has been published, yet
it is the Chinese version which is most in use in the Far East. There
indeed The Lotus Sutra has its home; to many of the sects of “Northern
Buddhism” it is a fundamental work, and by all it is highly valued.
To “Southern Buddhists” it is, as already stated, heterodox and
contrary to the teaching of their founder Śakyamuni. The complete text
has now been translated into English by Mr. Kato and myself and it is
hoped will yet be available to the Western student of Buddhism. It will
be of value to those who wish to read in its entirety one of the oldest
and most popular works giving the fully developed Mahayana doctrine.
Nor will it be less useful to many who desire a work replete with
Buddhist terminology which, translated phrase by phrase, can easily be
compared with the Chinese text.
The Kumarajiva version, on which the present synopsis is based, is
especially remarkable for the skill shown by the Chinese scholars in
rendering his oral translations into their own written language. His
version is probably more a paraphrase than a literal translation, but
in the absence of the original text it is difficult to speak with
assurance. However that may be, the Chinese scholars produced under
him a work of great literary merit. The form of construction is strict
and difficult, and the skill shown in the prose is as great as in the
poetic part. A more gifted pen may yet reproduce the measure in English
where my efforts have failed. Such failure has at least emphasized
my opinion that Kumarajiva’s Chinese version is one of the world’s
literary masterpieces.
_Form and Content_
In Kumarajiva’s version, as in Dharmaraksha’s previous translation,
there are twenty-eight chapters. In the Sanskrit version and in
Jñanagupta’s Chinese translation there are twenty-seven. The difference
is brought about in Chapter XI of the Sanskrit, which is given in two
parts by the two first-named translators, making Chapters XI and XII.
From the first to the twenty-first chapters of Kumarajiva’s version
almost everything is said first in prose then in verse. The same remark
applies to the corresponding chapters in the Sanskrit. The remaining
chapters in both are without the verse repetition, with the noticeable
exception of the twenty-fifth chapter on ♦Avalokiteśvara, i.e. Kwan-yin
or Kwannon which, both in the Chinese and the Sanskrit versions, has
prose and verse.
♦ “Avalokitesvara” replaced with “Avalokiteśvara”
Each section, prose and verse, would, if separated, make a fairly
complete whole. Whether the verse section, the gathas, preceded the
prose is a question that Sanskrit scholars have not yet decided.
Linguistic differences suggest that the drama was first composed in
verse, and that the prose section was introduced later. The question
can only be decided by those competent to judge. At present we must
accept the version as it stands, The verse part in general follows the
tenor of the prose discourse, but the differences are many. All the
prose sections in Chinese are done into short sentences of similar
length, which can be read rhythmically. All the verse parts differ in
form from the Sanskrit, being in lines of sometimes four, sometimes
five monosyllabic words to the line. In the translation here offered no
attempt has been made to recast the order of the prose sentences
or the verse lines; for with rare exceptions it has proved possible to
translate them phrase by phrase, or line by line, thus providing the
reader with a translation conveying the structure of the original in
its presentation of ideas. No language not monosyllabic could possibly
portray the form.
The following quotation from Chapter II may be taken as an example of
the verse rhythm, if read as a four-beat measure:
“List well to the Law
Obtained by the Buddhas,
Which by infinite tact
They expound to the living,
Whose inmost thoughts,
The ways they tread,
Their desires diverse,
Their former karmas,
The Buddha knows well.
Hence with reason and parable,
Terms and expedients,
He leads all to rejoice,
Telling them sutras,
Or poems, or stories,
Or marvels, or reasonings.
To some I preach Nirvana,
An expedient to lead them
To enter Buddha-wisdom,
But to these I’d not yet said
‘You all shall become buddhas’,
For the time had not arrived.”
From the first chapter we find The Lotus Sutra to be unique in the
world of religious literature. A magnificent apocalyptic, it presents
a spiritual drama of the highest order, with the universe as its
stage, eternity as its period, and Buddhas, gods, men, devils, as the
dramatis personae. From the most distant worlds and from past aeons,
the eternal Buddhas throng the stage to hear the mighty Buddha proclaim
his ancient and eternal Truth. Bodhisattvas flock to his feet; gods
from the heavens, men from all quarters of the earth, the tortured from
the deepest hells, the demons themselves crowd to hear the tones of the
Glorious One.
Though the divine Speaker is the Buddha, even the earthly Śakyamuni
Buddha, no longer is he the human Buddha, but the Eternal One. On earth
he had assumed the human form with all its limitations. Now he reveals
himself, _sub specie aeternitatis_, as the Eternal, Omniscient,
Omnipotent, Omnipresent Buddha, creator-destroyer, recreator of all
worlds, every world a Lotus rising from the waters to flower, shed its
fragrance and die, only that fresh flowers may eternally spring.
The scene opens with the Buddha seated on Mount Gridhrakuta, or the
Vulture Peak, in Nepal. Here the mount on which he had taught is
spiritualized. Around him are gathered his 12,000 purified disciples,
thousands more who had not yet completed their course, 80,000
bodhisattvas, 60,000 devas or gods, Brahma and his following of 12,000,
dragon-kings with their hundreds of thousands, and demon kings
with hundreds of thousands of followers. There, to all these orders of
living beings, the Buddha displays the meaning of the Infinite, while
from heaven there rain down countless showers of superb flowers filling
the air with their fragrance, and all the universe is shaken.
From the centre of his forehead the Buddha sends forth a ray of light
which lights up 18,000 worlds to the east, upwards to their highest
heavens, downwards to their lowest hells. In like manner he shines upon
and reveals the worlds in the other quarters, with all their living
beings. In every world is revealed a Buddha teaching vast congregations
of disciples.
Thus does the Buddha reveal his infinite worlds in infinite time. It is
a colossal conception, expressed with an art that appeals to all who
can enter into the spirit of the drama and allow the mind to imagine so
tremendous a scene.
In the second act, Chapter II, the Buddha is presented coming forth
from a trance-like meditation to explain why he had heretofore confined
his teaching to the narrower way of works, while now he makes the
greater revelation of faith. As a wise master he had been compelled to
follow the tactical method of expediency, because his disciples could
not receive the higher wisdom, the more brilliant light, except by
previous preparation. Only a Buddha, an Enlightened One, can fathom
the meaning of All Existence, and his disciples, in their lower stage
of wisdom, would never have been able to believe it possible that they
also were called to Buddhahood, to the fullest enlightenment of
the Buddha himself. Hence he had to lead them on by measured steps.
Even now his All-truth is so vast that he fears to express it lest
“all the worlds of gods, men, and demons be startled and perplexed
and the doubting amongst his disciples fall into the great pit”. So
portentous is the air, and so filled with doubt and foreboding are the
hearts of his hearers, that multitudes withdraw, unable to bear the
announcement which is to shatter all their past hardly-acquired merits.
Here we trace an indication of the breach between the Hinayanists who
withdraw and the Mahayanists who remain. At last only the host of
faithful bodhisattvas remain, and to them he declares that none but
they have power to apprehend his mystery. He proceeds to tell them that
though he has seemed to preach other vehicles or modes of salvation,
essentially there is but One Vehicle. The other yana have been but
temporary expedients. There is but the One Vehicle, that in which the
Buddha himself abides, and with which he will save all creatures,
bringing them to the true Nirvana, which is not extinction of existence
but extinction of all ills and all ignorance. All who pay homage to
the Buddha, if with but a simple flower, are thereby admitted to the
fellowship of countless Buddhas. Not one will fail to become Buddha,
for all Buddhas have vowed to save all beings to perfect enlightenment,
that is to perfect Buddhahood.
In the third chapter comes the joyous response of Śariputra, full of
ecstasy at the assurance that he is now “really a son of Buddha,
born from the mouth of Buddha”, freed from all his errors and doubts
and already possessed of the real Nirvana, the extinction of all ills,
filled with a sublime peace. The Buddha responds telling him that in
his later development he will be called Flower-Light Buddha, that he
will reign over a world called Undefiled, and that wherever the feet of
his disciples tread jewel-flowers will spring. Soon follows the Parable
of the Burning House which is given in this volume. Śariputra, wishing
to share his joy with his 1,200 brethren, asks what is to be their lot.
The answer is withheld for a time, or perhaps expressed in the form
of parables; for instance, in Chapter IV occurs the Parable of the
Prodigal Son, or the Seeking Father, the Buddha being the Father who
seeks his wandering son and at last finds him and endows him with
all his wealth. Again, in Chapter V, is the Parable of the Trees
and Herbs, on which the Buddha, like a great cloud, pours his rain
without discrimination or stint; fertilizing each according to its
need and receptivity. After this interlude he proceeds to predict in
Chapter VI the future of his disciples; for instance, he foretells
that Maha-Kaśyapa will be the Buddha Radiance, his Buddha-world being
known as Radiant Virtue and his Buddha-period named Great Magnificence;
that Subhuti will be the Buddha Name-Form in a Realm of Jewels, in a
Buddha-period Jewel-kalpa; another’s Buddha-name will be Golden-Light,
and another’s Fragrance of Sandalwood. Then comes a further artistic
interlude in the Parable of the Magic City on the weary way to
the Land of Jewels, which forms the title and one of the subjects of