Tassajara
19681
"The monks and nuns at the time being, who strove after supreme, highest enlightenment, numerous as sand of Ganges, applied themselves to the commandment of the Sugata.”
The number 86. "And the monk who then was the preacher of the law and the keeper of the law, Varaprabha, expounded for fully eighty intermediate kalpas the highest law according to the commandment of the Sugata."
In other words, Buddha's teaching is eternal truth, beginningless and endless. And Bodhisattva Varaprabha expounded it for fully eighty intermediate kalpas of time, in other words, from a limitlessly long time.
Number 87. "He had eight hundred pupils, who all of them were by him brought to full development. They saw many kotis of Buddhas, great sages, whom they worshipped."
"He had eight hundred pupils." This is different from the prose part, this place. Prose part, it doesn’t accord with this part.
"Now it happened so,” (page 32 [page 12]). "Now it so happened, Agita, that the eight son of the Lord Kandrasuryapradipa, Mati and the rest, were pupil to that very Bodhisattva Varaprabha. Enlightenment. They were by him made ripe for supreme, perfect enlightenment, and in after times they saw and worshipped many hundred thousand myriads of kotis of Buddhas, all of whom had attained supreme, perfect enlightenment, the last of them being Dipankara, the Tathagata, the completely enlightened one." And here it said, "He had eight hundred pupils, who all of them were—were by him brought to full development. They saw many kotis of Buddhas, great sages, whom they worshipped.”
And next one 88. "By following the regular course they become Buddha in several spheres, and as they followed one another in immediate succession they successively foretold each other's future destiny to Buddhaship.
"The last of those Buddhas following one another was Dipankara. He, the supreme god of gods, honored by crowds of sages, educated thousands of kotis of living beings." Dipankara Buddha.
Dipankara Buddha is supposed to be the Buddha who gave juki. I explained juki already [see previous lecture]. In Sanskrit: vyakarana, to tell one's future, not destiny but future attainment. "You will attain enlightenment, and you will be born in such and such place, and will attain enlightenment, and your name will be such and such." This is juki.
And Dipankara Buddha is supposed to be the Buddha who gave Shakyamuni Buddha juki. When Shakyamuni Buddha in his former life, he studied under this Bodhisattva. And when this bodhisattva came to the muddy place, Shakyamuni Buddha spread his hair over the muddy place. Because after he spread many things, but mud is so wide that the rug he gathered could not cover it, so after all Shakyamuni Buddha in his former life spreads his hair over the muddy place and let this Dipankara Buddha pass the muddy place. And this is why we bow, feeling Buddha's foot on our hands, three times like this. This is a Buddha.
Or another story is told, something similar, but—not so similar. Quite different, but anyway Dipankara Buddha is the Buddha who gave juki to Buddha. It may be the last buddha Shakyamuni Buddha served. Another story is there were in ancient time great king, or maybe kings, whose minister was very wise. And he was so wise that the king gave the half of his country—half of his world, you know, not country. Big, whole world, half of the whole world, to him. And he had a bright boy who became later a great teacher or a buddha—or a bodhisattva. Anyway, he became a bodhisattva then[?]. I don’t know what to say, a bodhisattva [laughs]. And he was so good that his father—oh, excuse me—his father sent him to his brother, who was a great scholar. He studied under him and became a bodhisattva. And the father was very much proud of him, and he brought him to his home and listened to his sermon. And again he brought him to his former king—or master—the king who he helped. And they went to the border of the country because half of the country was his own, the other half was the former king’s country. So, they went to the border of the country, and give him a great sermon. Since then the king for many hundreds of kotis of kalpas of time, sent various offering to that teacher. And later that teacher became Dipankara Bodhisattva, and that king who helped that Dipankara Buddha, was the Buddha himself. So, when Dipankara Bodhisattva became enlightened and true teacher of the whole world, Buddha became his disciple, and studied. And he received juki from Dipankara Buddha.
All of those story means that eternal teaching which is always with every being, from beginningless beginning to endless end. That is what it means.
And next one, "Among the pupil of Varaprabha, the son of Jina, at the time of his teaching the law, was one slothful, covetous, greedy of gain and cleverness." Greedy of gain and cleverness. This I explained already. And here it says "cleverness", but in prose part it says "praise." And original text, the original words may not be the same. Because according to the result of the study of many scholars, this sutra in India has been held by some group like Zen Center [laughs] maybe. Zen Center had a special scripture which was called Lotus Sutra. And we had many branches. And at Tassajara we make some translation, at San Francisco or Los Altos or Berkeley they may make translation. And at Tassajara we will change our translation. So, originally it was not the same. The scripture they used was not the same. That is why we have so many translations—so many original text and so many kinds of translation. The original—they had of many kinds of original text. And many various people in various country [laughs] translated it, so naturally there must be many kinds of translation. It is quite natural.
Student: Are you…[?]
SR: Hai.
Student: Does the Japanese translation say and the Chinese translation, the one by Dogen, and the one in Chinese, do they stand up word for word? And just the symbolism is different? Is that so?
SR: Words is also nearly the same, not so different.
Student: Like an idea is the same, and the translation[?]—tries to make it word for word. May have[?] been for difficult[?], but he didn't try to change the symbolism to fit British symbolism, by the British scholar that translated it?
SR: They—no.
Student: I was wondering if they changed the symbolism to fit say Japanese symbolism.
SR: No, no, they don't. They try to, you know, be faithful to the original words, word by word, when they translated it. Even Kumarajiva's translation—his translation is very— not literal translation, they say, but actually you may say that is very literal translation. So, if they have original text, the Chinese scholar and Tibetan scholar, Nepalese scholars also—Nepal translation are very faithful to the word by words translation. And they discussed this word: he—"This word should be this word—translated from this word.” “No, that word." [Laughs] this kind of discussion is still going on [laughs] so that we should be faithful to the original text.
[22:15]
Student: And Dogen did this too?
SR: Dogen Zenji did not translate.
Student: Commentary?
SR: Commentary, yes. He expressed his way of understanding of this sutra. And almost all the time he’d write something, he referred to this sutra. And at least two fascicles, "Juki" and "Hokke Ten Hokke," is his own special understanding of this sutra. And "we should understand this way," he said.
Almost word by word translation. But Kumarajiva's contribution was that he—for instance, there is one hundred gathas, you know, but Kumarajiva sometime put two gathas together so that they can understand it easily. As you must have seen, [in the Sanskrit] one sentence—one long sentence, divided in two, to put them in gatha style. But Kumarajiva put the emphasis on more the meaning of the sutra; so for Chinese people, Kumarajiva's translation was easy to understand. That was a big reason why this sutra was appreciated Chinese people so much.
91: "He was also excessively desirous of glory, but very fickle, so that the lessons dictated to him and his own reading fade from his memory as soon as learnt."
This already I explained. Dogen Zenji was very faithful to this sutra, and he was very much impressed with those gathas. He is very strict with worldly desires as a Buddhist. And as a Buddhist we should not have even the desire to expect enlightenment. That was strict observation of this sutra, you may say. Of course, that was his character. His character was so pure and lofty. And he didn't mind anything but truth. He would give his whole body and mind to the truth. That was his idea—his way.
The 92. "His name was Yasaskama, by which he was known everywhere." Yasaskama means desirous of glory.
"By the accumulated merit of that good action, spotted as it was,"—but he helped people very much. So, with this merit he attained enlightenment.
93. "He propitiated thousands of kotis of Buddhas, whom he rendered ample honor. He went through the regular course of duties and saw the present Buddha Shakyamuni.
"He shall be the last to reach supreme enlightenment and become a Lord known by the family name of Maitreya, who shall educate thousands of kotis of creatures."
Maitreya was actually, you know, historical disciple—actually historical character and disciple of Buddha. Many stories are told about him. You know, his—Buddha's aunt who raised Buddha when he was young, gave a kesa of gold embroidery to Buddha.
[A portion of the tape is completely silent or nearly obscured here, where he tells the story of the gold kesa, amid some laughter.]
Student 1: Who wore it?
Student 2: No one would wear it. [Laughter]
SR: Wore—no one wore it [laughter], the gold embroidered kesa, but one disciple wear it that was Ajita Maitreya, who was supposed to be the last Buddha, who was supposed to attain enlightenment after all of the disciples attained enlightenment. He was something like this bodhisattva in his former life. He was called "desirous of glory." And Buddha was very glad that he wear it, but maybe because of that, he received that kind of juki, to be a last buddha [laughs].
This is interesting. Buddha was glad that he was not so good, you know. If I were Shakyamuni Buddha, I shall be very angry, maybe. I shall not be happy to see one of the disciple is not so good, treading wrong path. But Buddha was very patient [laughs], and he was very glad. He thought eventually he will attain enlightenment.
I think this is why Dogen Zenji always said all of us eventually will attain enlightenment. There is no need to expect attainment. Sooner or later, everyone will attain enlightenment because we have Buddha nature. As a Buddhist, we must have this kind of big mind and big scale of practice—not matter of today or tomorrow [laughs], or this year or next year.
“He shall be the last to reach superior enlightenment and become a Lord known by the family name by Maitreya, who shall educate thousands of kotis of creatures."
And 95: "He who then, under the rule of extinct Sugata, was so slothful—slothful” [Student helps with pronunciation, laughter] Okay [laughs, laughter] “was thyself, and it was I who then was a preacher of the law."
Manjusri was the preacher, and slothful one was Maitreya.
"As on seeing a foretoken of this kind I recognize a sign such as I have seen manifested of yore, therefore and on that account I know. —As on seeing foretoken of this kind I recognize a sign such as I have seen and at the place have"— in some translation it says “at that place”—“manifested of yore, therefore and on that account I know.”
97: "That decidedly the chief of Jinas, the supreme king of the kings of the Sakyas, the All-seeing, who knows the highest truth, is about to pronounce the excellent Sutra which I have heard before."
The same sutra you have proclaimed. The highest truth is daiji. It’s translated dai jiki in Chinese scriptures. “The highest truth, is about to pronounce the excellent Sutra which I have heard before.”
This is a question the emperor Wu asked Bodhidharma: "What is the First Principle?" The First Principle. Bodhidharma said, "I don't know." "I don't know" is First Principle [laughs]. Do you understand? The First Principle, it cannot be known in term of good or bad, right or wrong, because it is both right and wrong.
"That very sign displayed at present is the proof of skillfulness of the leaders; the Lion of the Sakyas is to make exhortations, to declare the fixed nature of the law." The fixed nature of the law, true nature of the law or ultimate nature of the law.
"Be well prepared and well minded; join your hands:” put your hands like that [gestures in gassho?] “join your hands: he who is affectionate and merciful to the world is going to speak, is going to pour the endless rain of the law and refresh those that are waiting for enlightenment.
"And if some should feel doubt, uncertainty, or misgiving in any respect, then the Wise One shall remove it for his children, the Bodhisattvas here striving after enlightenment." This is the last part.
I think you must have understand nature of our teaching. This is the Oriental tree. And you don’t know which way its root is going [laughs]. This is rather difficult for you to figure out which way the root is going. And if you know which way the root of Buddhism is going it may be easier to understand. And how the trunk of the tree of Buddhism is supported by the root.
There is characteristic in the way of making our effort. To which direction we make our effort is very interesting to know of for you maybe. If our human effort is directed all in the same direction by all the human being, that is a dreadful destiny. Everyone should strive for in own way, and everyone should find out his own way to develop himself. Even though each one of us making different effort, as long as we have Buddha Nature, as long as all the effort is supported by Buddha Nature, there is no problem. When we don't know that everyone's effort is supported by the same ground and attached to one’s own way, rejecting or ignoring the others' way and insisting upon his own way, then that is confusion. So, we Buddhists put emphasis on each one's own way. Especially this sutra put emphasis on each one's own way, and meaning of each one's own being. And at the same time, as you must have understood already, this sutra provide us a big, common ground for every one of us, where [some audio files end around here] we can enjoy each of us our own way.
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1 This set of Lotus Sutra talks was previously believed to have been given in February of 1968; however, for a number of reasons we now believe this series may have been given after the set marked Lotus Sutra No. II or at the earliest in June of 1968.
Checked, transcribed, and edited by Brian Fikes. Re-transcribed as verbatim by Peter Ford and Wendy Pirsig 01/2025 from audio file provided by Engage Wisdom and the Audio-2013 file. Lightly edited for readability by Wendy Pirsig, January 2025.
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