Friday, July 22, 2022

Just say the Nembutsu without adding anything to it


“Once a devotee from the Chinzei district came up to Kyoto to visit Honen at his cottage.
Before meeting him, he asked one of Honen’s disciples if it was a good thing to meditate upon the Buddha’s signs of eminence while one is repeating the Nembutsu. The reply was that it was an excellent thing to do.
 
Honen who was sitting in the adjoining room before the Buddha’s image, overheard the conversation. He opened the sliding door and remarked, ‘I don’t think so. It is as Zendo (Master Shan-tao) says, ‘If a single one of the sentient beings in the ten quarters of the world should fail to be born into the Pure Land through calling of my Name at least ten times, then I refuse for myself the perfect Enlightenment of Buddhahood. Now the fact is that He did become a Buddha and now exists as one. So from this we are perfectly sure that His Great Primal Vow was not in vain. If therefore any sentient being now does call upon His Name, he shall certainly attain Ojo (birth in the Pure Land). No matter how much we may meditate upon the Buddha, we cannot do it in the perfect way as Shakyamuni explained it (in the Contemplation Sutra). So the only thing for us to do is to put our trust deeply in the Primal Vow itself, and call upon the sacred Name with our lips. This is the one and only way to practice religion.[1]’”[2] 
Commentary:
We should always come back to the Primal Vow whenever we have a question. So, where in the Primal Vow did Amida mention that we should say His Name while meditating upon His signs of eminence? Nowhere! The inquiry in the above passage was made on the basis of the thirteen contemplations in the Contemplation Sutra which is a provisional teaching for those who still cling to their self-power. However, it has absolutely no connection with the Nembutsu of the Primal Vow or the Nembutsu of Amida centered Power. In His Primal Vow, Amida asked us to entrust to Him and say His Name “perhaps even ten times” which means that our relaxed saying of Nembutsu (without being obsessed with numbers) should be an expression of faith in His Power. It is a simple saying of the Name without adding anything to it. The Primal Vow mentions a simple saying of the Name in faith because Amida wanted this to be the easiest Path among all Dharma methods. As long as He didn’t consider to add anything else except the saying of His Name in faith and the wish to be born in His Pure Land, why think we are smarter than Him and add something else? Certainly, the Primal Vow does not need any improvement.
 
More than this, Amida linked this Path of birth in the Pure Land with His own attainment of perfect Enlightenment:
 
“If, when I attain Buddhahood, sentient beings of the ten quarters who sincerely entrust themselves to me, desire to be born in my land, and say my Name perhaps even ten times, should not be born there, may I not attain the supreme Enlightenment.” (The Primal Vow) 
 
As He actually attained Enlightenment, we should have no doubt that to say His Name in faith leads to birth there. A Buddha never breaks His promise and He is the only one to know the karmic causes for birth in His own Pure Land, so have trust in Amida and do exclusively what He told you to do. Those who think that the requirements of Amida in His Primal Vow are not enough to cause birth in His Pure Land doubt His wisdom and do not have genuine faith.
 
 
 
[1] Words in brackets are my own.
[2] Honen the Buddhist Saint - His Life and Teachings, volume III, compiled by imperial order, translation by Rev Ryugaku Ishizuka and Rev Harper Havelock Coates, The Society for the Publication of Sacred Books of the World, Kyoto, 1949, p. 442-443


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