Did Chi-i or tendai tradition recite NMHRK or lotus sutra title?

[mansurhirbi87]

Did Chi-i or tendai tradition recite NMHRK or lotus sutra title? I guess Nichiren wrote that. If it is a tendai practice the only difference between both kinds of buddhism it's that odaimoku recitation is the principal practice ? Or we could say that for Nichiren NMHRK has a diferent and special meaning ?

[Queequeg]

NMRK is found in some Tiantai/Tendai texts among other invocations.

The connection between Nichiren and Tiantai/Tendai is deep, but it would be too much of a simplification to say that the only difference is the Daimoku. Daimoku is the title of the Lotus Sutra. Its meaning is expanded in the Profound Meaning of the Lotus Sutra by Zhiyi. Nichiren took that as his base and relied on it to explain that all the Buddha's teachings are embodied in the Daimoku.

The Lotus Sutra says that one should have faith in the Lotus Sutra. NamuMyohoRengeKyo literally is a declaration of faith in the Lotus Sutra.

[mansurhirbi87]

Thank you, brother.
could you point the other differences ?
And i missed the answer to the question : could we say that for Nichiren NMHRK has a diferent and special meaning ?

[narhwal90]

NMHRK is also recited in some Soto Zen practice, though my impression its auxiliary. Perhaps thats related its Tendai heritage.

[Queequeg]

When you find NMRK in Tiantai/Tendai sources, it is one of many invocations - NamuIchijoMyoten, NamuShakamuniButsu, NamuTahoNyorai... etc.

To single NMRK out has significance, at the very least, in the emphasis. As for special meaning - Nichiren explained that it is the Essential Teaching, the universal gate to Buddhahood. This was Nichiren's novel teaching. Before Nichiren, the universal gate did not have an explicit invocation, but was only vaguely referred to.

[mansurhirbi87]

Great, Q ! Thank you very much ! _/\_

[Queequeg]

NMRK is found in some Tiantai/Tendai texts among other invocations.

For instance:

From Zhiyi's Confessional Samadhi:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050317183 ... textD4.htm

[Queequeg]

IIRC, Prof. Stone traces previous appearances of the Daimoku. Can't recall if it was in an article or her Original Enlightenment book.

[Queequeg]

NMHRK is also recited in some Soto Zen practice, though my impression its auxiliary. Perhaps thats related its Tendai heritage.

Interesting. Do you know the background of that practice?

[narhwal90]

I found the practice in the Los Angeles Zen Center instructions for sewing Okesa garments, though there are a number of different mantras that can be used for the purpose. I don't know its heritage beyond that, but it looks like there is a lot of history related to the sewing practice. I think the idea is that a daimoku is recited for each stitch. There are a number of different instructions focused on the sewing, patterns etc that don't include the mantras etc.

[Seishin]

For instance:

From Zhiyi's Confessional Samadhi:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050317183 ... textD4.htm

I think though, if one were listening to these chants in Tendai temples, one would completely miss this sentence as it is chanted thus;
一心敬禮大乘妙法蓮華經十方一切尊經十二部經眞淨法寶
ISSHIN KEI REI TAI SHI BEU HŌ REN GA KEI SHI HŌ ISSEI SON KEI SHU JI HA KEI SHIN SEI HA PŌ

There is another instance in the Hokke Senbo where a more familiar phrase occurs, but again I think it would be missed by the casual listener;
南無妙法蓮華經
NA MO BEU HŌ REN GA KEI

[Queequeg]

For instance:

From Zhiyi's Confessional Samadhi:

https://web.archive.org/web/20050317183 ... textD4.htm

I think though, if one were listening to these chants in Tendai temples, one would completely miss this sentence as it is chanted thus;
一心敬禮大乘妙法蓮華經十方一切尊經十二部經眞淨法寶
ISSHIN KEI REI TAI SHI BEU HŌ REN GA KEI SHI HŌ ISSEI SON KEI SHU JI HA KEI SHIN SEI HA PŌ

There is another instance in the Hokke Senbo where a more familiar phrase occurs, but again I think it would be missed by the casual listener;
南無妙法蓮華經
NA MO BEU HŌ REN GA KEI

Interesting... I'm guessing that is the archaic pronunciation?

[Seishin]

Interesting... I'm guessing that is the archaic pronunciation?

Yes

[Queequeg]

Cool. Another bit of trivia to throw the Nam/Namu debate into a spin.

[illarraza]

Thank you, brother.
could you point the other differences ?
And i missed the answer to the question : could we say that for Nichiren NMHRK has a diferent and special meaning ?

Dave confuses theoretical and actual Ichinen Sanzen

Dave: “Mark, the Shakyamuni you are worshipping is not the Gautama from India. It is a fictional Shakyamuni, symbolically created by the authors of the Lotus Sutra, who were trying to enlighten people to their own Eternal Buddha nature.”

Mark: That's true. The Shakyamuni Buddha of India, as are you, is a reflection of the Eternal Buddha.

Dave: The reality these authors knew for themselves from their own enlightenment. The Shakyamuni of the Lotus Sutra is a story of how a person can attain buddhahood and how he realized that the Buddhahood he attained, was not just a recent occurance (under the bodhi tree), but that Eternal Buddhahood is within all beings.

Mark: He was the first person in the history of the universe to perceive Myoho renge kyo. It is thanks to the Eternal Shakyamuni Buddha that we will attain Buddhahood.

Dave: i know you think this connection to Shakamuni is important and it is important, but if interpreted the wrong way you miss the real point.

Mark: We interpret our connection to Shakyamuni Buddha as Nichiren taught. Nichiren didn’t revere a disembodied Buddha like Dainichi or Buddha-nature. He revered the flesh and blood Three Bodied Tathagata Shakyamuni.

Dave: Gautama was a regular person who dicovered how to have the experience of enligtenment. Worshipping him was never his teaching anymore then worshipping Nichiren, was Nichiren’s teaching. Both taught the law.

Mark: The evil Kobo Daishi too called Shakyamuni Buddha of the Juryo Chapter of the Lotus Sutra an ordinary person: “In his Precious Key to the Secret Treasury he [Kobo] claims that the Shakyamuni Buddha of the ‘Life Span’ chapter of the Lotus Sutra is an ordinary person,…” — The Actions of the Votary of the Lotus Sutra

Shakyamuni Buddha of the Juryo Chapter was an extraordinary person, the Parent, Teacher, and Sovereign of the priests, nuns, laymen, and laywomen.

Dave: In the context of Nichiren dealing with a country of weirdos who worshipped imaginary, fictional buddhas, he pointed back to Shakayamuni a real historical person. he had to break the bad habit of worshipping imaginary beings who would forver be greater then the common mountain folk.

Mark: All of Nichiren’s tears in gratitude for Shakyamuni Buddha was just a teaching device, not real tears, crocodile tears? You are cold Dave…and reading too much into a simple religion based largely on gratitude. Shakyamuni Buddha was Nichiren Daishonin’s teacher [and yours], more important than sovereign or parent.

Dave: Scouring the gosho for ways to try to refute this is pointless. Nichiren either did not know the Lotus Sutra wasn’t direct from Shakyamuni or wasn’t saying. I believe he had a good idea about it though, based on various statements he made.

Mark: No teachings of the Buddha were directly from Shakyamuni Buddha. Those who put the Lotus Sutra into words were more Enlightened and better at the game of telephone than the others. They were more faithful, disciplined, and had better memories. That is one reason the present day votaries too experience hatred and jealousy. The best among us, Nichiren Daishonin, remembered the teachings he received from Shakyamuni Buddha in the remote past and again at the Ceremony in the Air on Vulture peak. But of course, if we are to believe you, unlike real tears, Nichiren was lying or merely using a teaching device. Thankfully, it is a free country and you are entitled to believe your mind as the source [of Myoho renge kyo]. We believe it was the Buddha’s mind. We thank Shakyamuni Buddha and you thank yourself. Whose view is superior and whose inferior? Whose view is based on reality and whose on wishful thinking? Whose is based on ego and whose view is based on egolessness? Whose is based on gratitude and whose is based in the World of Anger? Whose view is based on the Sutra and writings of Nichiren Daishonin and whose is not?

Dave: Were it really the case that the historical Buddha was what Nichiren worshipped, then why inscribe a gohonzon, using Ichinen Sanzen as a basis? Ichinen Sanzen was not taught by Gautama and does not appear in the Lotus Sutra, except when interpreted in the light of Ichinen Sanzen. Gautama had taught dependant origination, but did not go further.

Nichiren had his own awakening. So did Tientai. They both knew the Sutra does not teach Ichinen Sanzen directly. Instead they used Ichinen Sanzen as a way to interpret the core of the Lotus Sutra.

Mark: You confuse theoretical and actual Ichinen Sanzen. Actual Ichinen Sanzen is the Buddha himself, the Three Bodied Tathagata specifically, and those who realize their relationship to him generally. The Three Bodied Tathagata, is represented by Gohonzon and more profoudly He is Gohonzon. The Gohonzon itself is Actual Ichinen Sanzen. Since Gohonzon too exists within, no external Gohonzon is necessary and there are other ways to represent the Eternal Buddha and the Ceremony In the Air.

[illarraza]

As a corrolary:

Ri-Butsu or very real Buddha
Chris: Note he is referring to Shakyamuni Buddha, the Lord of Teachings. This is not the same as his "transient status". You could say that this "Lord of Teachings" is the Well of Wisdom from which each of us draws our water. Nichiren calls him Shakyamuni, but the members of the Fuji School were not totally remise to call the "Buddha of this well" Nichiren. Where they were remis was in calling each other names over the nomenclature rather than seeking to understand the point of the teaching -- which is that the Buddha Wisdom is available to all.

Response: Nomenclature? Nichiren was talking about Ri-Butsu or a very real Buddha, the Father, Teacher, and Parent of all Buddhas in the universe. His name is not Nichiren nor is his name Myoho renge kyo. His name is Shakyamuni.

Nichiren had faith in this reality and taught it extensively, second only to his teachings on the Daimoku. But the SGI and the Nichiren Shoshu would change these teachings.

Nichiren said that because of the severe times [as predicted in the Daijuku Sutra and others] in which we live, self power is not enough to attain the fruits of Buddhist practice. By necessity, we need to take refuge in the Law of Namu Myoho renge kyo [the Law to which the Eternal Buddha has been eternally Enlightened] by chanting it repeatedly and belief in the Original Eternal Buddha known as Shakyamuni. Our lack of concentration, memory, volition, fortitude and compassion is so attenuated [by merely having been born in this age], we may not by our powers alone, attain the same unsurpassed Enlightenment as the Original Buddha.

Therefore, the Buddha by virtue of his limitless compassion leaves for us, the people of this Latter Age, the Great Medicine of his Supreme and Perfect Enlightenmentin order to gain the very same inconceivable field of cognition as he. All we have to do is take (chant and believe in) the medicine [Namu Myoho renge kyo] and by virtue of the vast merit power of the Law and Eternal Buddha, the power to perceive Supreme and Perfect Enlightenment is transfered to us.

Another way to put it is, thus augmented by the Buddha's limitless Enlightenment, mercy, and teaching (Namu Myoho renge kyo), we become more powerful even than the Great Bodhisattva Mahasattvas in the Former and Middle Days

To attempt to separate The Eternal Buddha Shakyamuni's Enlightenment from the Eternal Buddha Shakyamuni is as futile as attempting to separate carbon from diamond. Namu Myoho renge kyo is the essential element of the Eternal Buddha as carbon is the essential element of the diamond. Without Namu Myoho renge kyo there is no Eternal Buddha Shakyamuni and without carbon there is no diamond.

Similarly, just as there would be no proof of the unsurpassed utility and magnificent beauty possible with elemental carbon were it not for the diamond, there would be no proof of the supreme benefits of Namu Myoho renge kyo without the Eternal Buddha Shakyamuni. Certainly this newsgroup is not absolute proof of the supreme benefits of Namu Myoho renge kyo and not even Nichiren affords such absolute proof.

Nichiren wrote in the True Object of Worship in the section, The Pure Land of the Eternal Buddha:

"Now, when the Eternal Buddha was revealed in the essential section of the Lotus Sutra, this world of endurance (Saha-World) became the Eternal Pure Land, indestructible even by the three calamities of conflagration, flooding, and strong winds which are said to destroy the world. It transcends the four periods of cosmic change: the kalpa of construction, continuance, destruction, and emptiness. Sakyamuni Buddha, the Lord-preacher of this pure land, has never died in the past, nor will He be born in the future. He exists forever throughout the past, present, and future. All those who receive His guidance are one with this Eternal Buddha...."

And in the section, The Form of the true Object of Worship, he writes:

"The object of worship (honzon) at the scene of this transmission of "Namu Myo-ho-ren-ge-kyo" from the Eternal Buddha to his original disciples is: Suspended in the sky above the Eternal Buddha Sakyamuni's Saha-world is a stupa of treasures, in which Buddhas Sakyamuni and Taho sit to the left and right of "Myo-ho-ren-ge-kyo". They are waited on by four bodhisattvas such as Jogyo (Superior Practice)representing the original disciples of the Eternal Buddha called out from underground. Four more bodhisattvas including Manjusri and Maitreya, take lower seats as followers, other great and minor bodhisattvas---those converted by the Buddha in the theoretical section and those who came from other lands---resemble numerous people sitting on the ground and looking up at court nobles. also lined up on the ground are Buddhas in manifestation (funjin Buddhas) who gathered together from all the worlds in the universe in praise of the Buddha's preaching, representing provisional Buddhas in their respective lands.

The true object of worship (honzon) such as this was not revealed anywhere else by Sakyamuni Buddha during more than fifty years of His preaching in this life. Though He spent eight years preaching the Lotus Sutra, the scene was limited to the preaching in the sky above Mt. Sacred Eagle recounted in eight chapters, from the fifteenth to the twenty-second chapters.. During two milleniums after the death of Sakyamuni Buddha, the Ages of the True Dharma and the Imitative Dharma, some worshipped Sakyamuni Buddha accompanied by Kasyapa and Ananda as described in the Hinayana sutras; others worshipped Him accompanied by such bodhisattvas as Manjusri and Samantabhadra as he appeared in quasi-Mahayana sutras. the Nirvana Sutra, or the theoretical section of the Lotus Sutra.. Many wooden statues and portraits were made of Sakyamuni as He preached Hinayana or quasi-Mahayana sutras, but statues and portraits of the Eternal Shakyamuni Buddha revealed in the Duration of Life of the buddha" chapter of the lotus sutra were never made. Now in the beginning of the Latter Age of the Decadent Dharma, is it not the time that such statues and portraits are made?"

[illarraza]

Thank you, brother.
could you point the other differences ?
And i missed the answer to the question : could we say that for Nichiren NMHRK has a diferent and special meaning ?

Most concisely. Nichiren teaches in the Opening of the Eyes:

"Even though it is so, because they have not yet opened the Manifestation to reveal the Original (hosshaku kempon) neither do they reveal the true one thought is three thousand [realms] nor is the Attainment of Buddhahood by the Two Vehicles determinate. They are like seeing the moon in the midst of the water; they resemble rootless grass floating on top of the waves. When one arrives at the Doctrine of the Original (Hommon), when it destroys the First Time Attainment of True Enlightenment, it destroys the Effects [Buddhahood] of the Four Teachings. When it destroys the Effects [Buddhahood] of the Four Teachings, it destroys the Causes of the Four Teachings. Striking down the Causes and Effects of the Ten Realms of the Previous [Sutras] and the Manifestation Doctrine, it preaches and reveals the Causes and Effects of the Ten Realms of the Doctrine of the Original. This is the very doctrine (homon) of the Original Cause and the Original Effect. The Nine Realms are possessed in the Beginningless Buddha Realm and the Buddha Realm is provided with the Beginningless Nine Realms and it is the True Mutual Possession of the Ten Realms (jikkai gogu), the Hundred Realms and Thousand Thusnesses (hyakkai sennyo) and One Thought is Three Thousand Realms (ichinen sanzen). -- Kaimoku Sho

Mark