Monday, March 8, 2010

Does the Pure Land really exist?


Here are the words of Zuio Inagaki Sensei:
 
Question: Does the Pure Land really exist?

Answer: Yes it does. 

In our world of experience, everything we feel and perceive with our senses is ephemeral, ­ only momentarily existent and deceptive. As the Buddha admonished:
"All conditioned things are impermanent." (sarva­samskaaraa anityaah)
Normally, we are deeply attached to things which have come into being from causes and conditions and create all sorts of unwholesome karma, which, in turn, bring about pain and sufferings, thus creating worlds of Samsara. In the Mahayana, we conceive of bodhisattvas, who realize the reality of the world with profound insight. They undertake unattached prescribed practices and create pure karma. The pure karma thus created manifests itself in various ways. Broadly speaking, on one hand, it appears as one's glorious physical manifestation and, on the other, one's pure karma finds its expression as a realm of utmost bliss and enlightenment, free of karmic bondages.

We believe that we and the world around us really exist and that the Pure Land is a mental fabrication and does not exist anywhere in the world.
From the Buddhist viewpoint, the Pure Land really exists and the world of ours is ephemeral and unreal.



3 comentarii:

Unknown said...

Thank you, Adrian.

For me, the most compelling reason for saying that the Pure Land really exists is that Amida Buddha showed it to all those gathered at Vulture Peak.

As for those Pure Land teachers who say "Pure Land is pure mind", anyone who reads the Larger Sutra knows it is not so.

Shakyamuni Buddha begins his discourse by identifying 53 buddhas who existed before Dharmakara was a king. All of them had pure mind. But the Pure Land was not yet created by Dharmakara in his causal stage as a great Bodhisattva.

Gassho,

Paul

Josho Adrian Cirlea said...

Of course, the words of Shakyamuni Buddha should be enough for everybody to accept that the Pure Land exists.
However, this is not so for everybody and it is a pity that many Jodo Shinshu followers don't accept the words of Shakyamuni Buddha but instead they try to explain the Pure Land and Amida Buddha according to their limited views. Here, Inagaki Sensei shows that he doesn't agree with the modern divergences from Jodo Shinshu teachings. I think that for those who like him, read him and praise him as a nowadays teacher, this plain answer of Inagaki Sensei should be an example.

Josho Adrian Cirlea said...
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