8th Issue (June, 2008)

Sadharmapuṇḍarika-sūtra: A Bird-eye View of Lotus Sūtra

K.Wong

Not just about Bodhisattva Avalokite’svara –
Heroic, lofty, mesmerizing tales of a great compassionate Bodhisattva
Not just about the supernormal knowledges of the Tathāgata
Psychokinesis, clairaudience, telepathy, clairvoyance, and divine eye
Most importantly,
the destruction of cankers
Most significantly
About the innate purity of all sentient beings
To be reached by only one vehicle - Buddhayāna

Śrāvakayāna, Pratyekabuddhayāna and Bodhisattvayāna
are merely expedient devices (upāyas)
expounded through the metaphor of
children playing in a house on fires
entreated by their anxious father
with three types of toys to save them
Actually only one type of toys and not three
Just one type of toys
One and the only Essence – the Buddha
existing intrinsically in all sentient beings
Hence one Buddha-vehicle only

Historical Gotama Buddha was merely a manifestation
of the eternal Buddha or Tathāgata
Realized Buddhahood countless eons ago
Not even a word spoken in 45 years of ministry
Profound, ineffable and obstruse
are the Ultimate Truth
of dependently co-arisen Unity or Non-duality

The ultimate Truth is penetrated
The Essence of the Buddha is discerned
The illusion of multiplicity is discarded
Intuiting the Dharma realm of Unity
Luminious, pure and infinite
it is unpeakeable or beyond words
Tathāgata neither existence nor non-existence
Neither arising nor ceasing
The realm of great Nirvāṇa – the Self