Purelands that decay

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zamotcr
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Purelands that decay

Post by zamotcr »

I always though that the Pure Lands were some kind of a special land where the Buddhas teach the dharma without restriction, a place where we can attain buddhahood without problems.

But it seems that this is not always the case. I have read that every Buddha has a Pure Land, and the Shakyamuni's Pure Land is this Saha world.
So, not every Pure Land is created by a Buddha, like our world, that wasn't created by Shakyamuni, and other Pure Lands are created by merit of some Buddha (like Amitabha's Pure Land, created by his own merits).

In the Lotus Sutra are a lot of examples of Buddha Lands that decay in the hands of Mara, so not every Buddha Land is perfect.

So, why these differents, what make each Pure Land so different?
Why some pure lands are outside samsara, and others are inside samsara?

Sorry for my bad english :(
Malcolm
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Re: Purelands that decay

Post by Malcolm »

zamotcr wrote:I always though that the Pure Lands were some kind of a special land where the Buddhas teach the dharma without restriction, a place where we can attain buddhahood without problems.

But it seems that this is not always the case. I have read that every Buddha has a Pure Land, and the Shakyamuni's Pure Land is this Saha world.
So, not every Pure Land is created by a Buddha, like our world, that wasn't created by Shakyamuni, and other Pure Lands are created by merit of some Buddha (like Amitabha's Pure Land, created by his own merits).

In the Lotus Sutra are a lot of examples of Buddha Lands that decay in the hands of Mara, so not every Buddha Land is perfect.

So, why these differents, what make each Pure Land so different?
Why some pure lands are outside samsara, and others are inside samsara?

Sorry for my bad english :(

The term "Pure land" is wrong. The Sanskrit term is buddhakṣetra which means "Buddhafield" -- some, like Sukhavati, are considered outside of samsara. Some, like the Sahaloka, are part of samsara. However, both the Lotus Sutra and the Vimalakirti Nirdesha Sutra show that the idea of distinguishing between pure and impure buddhakṣetras is based on an error.
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zamotcr
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Re: Purelands that decay

Post by zamotcr »

I got it, but for me it's still unclear.

I know that the disctintion between pure and impure is just a manner of deluded percepcion, but im still deluded haha.

I still have some doubts about pure lands, like why some pure lands have differences like gender (like Akshobhya Pure Land, where the womens can be pregnant (?) ) and some others Pure Lands dont make any distinction like Amitabha's Pure Land.

My last question is, are this Pure Lands or Buddhaksetras in a Sambhogakaya level or like another realm or a dimension? I raise this question because, like we can't see any Pure Land with our normal physical senses, they must be somewhere than our physical world. We can't see Shakyamuni's Pure Land, that exist right here and now, but we can't see it unless we develop some kind of senses or purity.

Thanks!
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