Discussion of the “Simile and Parable” Chapter (Chapter 3).
Saito: People often ask why the Lotus Sutra contains drawn-out passages describing inconceivably long periods of time — such as those which expound major world system dust particle kalpas and numberless major world system dust particle kalpas.
Endo: I often wonder the same thing. Numberless major world system dust particle kalpas is explained in the “Life Span” chapter. First, we are asked to imagine a person pulverizing to dust the astronomical number of five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a million nayuta asamkhya major world systems. Then the person proceeds to the east, dropping one speck each time he passes five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a million nayuta asamkhya major world systems. Then Shakyamuni asks: “Good men, what is your opinion? Can the total number of all these worlds be imagined or calculated?” (ISOC, 266)
Suda: On top of that, all those infinite numbers of worlds passed in this process are then also pulverized to dust, and each resulting particle of dust stands for one kalpa, or aeon. This represents an enormously, unthinkably long period of time. It might indeed have been easier to express such numbers as one followed by x hundreds of zeros or ten to the xth power.
Ikeda: Yes, and the Lotus Sutra would have ended up much shorter, then, wouldn’t it! But seriously, let’s consider this. If the Buddha had said, “I became a Buddha ten-to-the-x-hundredth-power years ago,” his listeners could only respond passively, “Yes, we see.” But when this fact is presented to them as a narrative— “five hundred, a thou-sand, ten thousand, a million nayuta asamkhya major world systems are pulverized to dust, and then one speck of the dust is dropped every five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a million nayuta asamkhya major world systems” — the listeners are forced to form their own image of this incredibly long period, to think for themselves and actively assimilate this information.
Saito: I see. The many parables in the Lotus Sutra also attest to this power of the image to stimulate our minds.
Ikeda: Precisely. A certain educator once explained that when parables are used to teach, students follow the same path of thought that the teacher once followed. In other words, students don’t simply listen passively to information but are encouraged to engage in the active mental process of thinking for themselves.
Endo: In the treatment of psychological disorders, encouraging patients to think for themselves is also regarded as very impor-tant. There is, for example, the so-called sand-play therapy, in which patients are given a sandbox along with miniature houses, human figures and so on, and allowed to create their own little world. The process of creating their own narrative is thought to assist in activating the patients’ inherent powers of self-healing.
Ikeda: We use the sand-play therapy in the educational counseling centers run by the Soka Gakkai’s education division, don’t we?
Saito: Yes. There are twenty-seven such educational counseling centers throughout Japan. In the twenty-seven years since the first one was opened, more than 200,000 people have availed themselves of this counseling service, and the program has been very well received.
Ikeda: Members of the education division provide a wonderful service, giving great encouragement to those with problems related to education. They are demonstrating the behavior of true bodhisattvas.
But to return to the Lotus Sutra, we all know that it is filled with memorable stories and parables. There are seven that are most outstanding and have come to be well known over the centuries. The first of the seven, the parable of the three carts and the burning house, appears in the “Simile and Parable” chapter.
Today let us discuss the significance of parables centering on this chapter.
Suda: Perhaps we should begin with an overview of the entire chapter.
THE PARABLE OF THE THREE CARTS AND THE BURNING HOUSE
Endo: “Simile and Parable” begins with Shariputra’s expression of his profound joy— the joy he feels after having heard and understood the teaching of the replacement of the three vehicles with the one vehicle, which was presented in the preceding
“Expedient Means” chapter. Shariputra expressed his exaltation with his whole being. The sutra states: “Shariputra’s mind danced with joy. Then he immediately stood up, pressed his palms together..” (ISOC, 82). In other words, he leaps up with joy and presses his palms together in a gesture of reverence toward the Buddha. Nichiren Daishonin writes that this passage describes how one “dances with joy when one comes to the realization that the elements of the body and the mind are the Wonderful Law” (orT, 45).
Saito: But the other disciples still don’t understand. It is for their sake that Shariputra asks Shakyamuni to preach “a Law never known in the past” (ISOC, 83). And Shakyamuni responds by preaching the parable of the three carts and the burning house.
Endo: As President Ikeda mentioned earlier, this is the first of the seven parables of the Lotus Sutra. The others are: the parable of the wealthy man and his poor son, which appears in “Belief and Understanding”; the parable of the three kinds of medicinal herbs and two kinds of trees, from “The Parable of the Medicinal Herbs”; the parable of the phantom city and the treasure land, from “The Parable of the Phantom City”; the parable of the jewel in the robe, from “Prophecy of Enlightenment for Five Hundred Disciples”; the parable of the priceless jewel in the topknot, from, “Peaceful Practices”; and finally, the parable of the skilled physician and his sick children, from “Life Span.”
Ikeda: Parables play a very important part not only in the “Simile and Parable” chapter but in the entire Lotus Sutra. As it says in
“Expedient Means,” “The marks of tranquil extinction borne by all phenomena / cannot be explained in words” (ISOC, 78). The infinitely profound Law to which the Buddha has awakened is very difficult to put into words. Yet if that enlightenment remained locked in the Buddha’s heart, the road to Buddhahood for all living beings would stay closed. The Buddha uses parables to preach the Law to open the way to enlightenment for all living beings.
Suda: I think now would be a good time to introduce the general outline of the parable of the three carts and the burning house.
In a certain town, there was an elderly man of considerable wealth. He owned a large mansion, but it was old and dilapidated.
Suddenly the house caught fire, and soon the whole building was engulted in fames. But the man’s many children were still inside.
Though the house was burning down around them and their lives were in great peril, the children were so engrossed in their games that they did not notice their predicament.
As the sutra says, “There is no safety in the threefold world; / it is like a burning house” (SOC, 105). The burning house is a metaphor for this world of ours, enveloped as it is in the flames of suffering. The sutra describes the house with great vividness.
Endo: The house is infested with poisonous insects, snakes, rats, foxes, wolves, goblins, trolls, yakshas and evil spirits. Suddenly great walls of flame leap up, driving these creatures from their hiding places in wild and frenzied panic. One terrifying scene unfolds after another, just like a modern horror movie. Then the focus shifts to the children playing innocently, unaware of the dangers around them.
Ikeda: It’s like watching the masterful camerawork of a gripping suspense movie. “Life is like a burning house” — this simile successfully stamps on our minds the powerful image of the dangers of a life lost in pleasure. The Lotus Sutra describes the sufferings of human existence in an extremely realistic fashion. That is one reason the Lotus Sutra has such a fine reputation as a work of literature. The Chinese writer Lu Xun (1881-1936) used the image of the flames of the burning house to write his novel Sihuo (The Flame of Death).
Saito: This is a big difference from other Mahayana sutras, which tend to regard reality as an illusion. I think this is a defining characteristic of the Lotus Sutra, which stresses that all phenomena are one with the true aspect.
Ikeda: Yes, that’s probably part of it. But the heart of the sutra is compassion, a determination to save all living beings, a profound empathy that feels the sufferings of other living beings as one’s own.
Endo: The second half of the parable of the three carts and the burning house is just such a story of salvation. The wealthy man runs into the burning house and tells the children to leave at once. But the children, wrapped up in their games, aren’t fazed by the burning house. They don’t understand what it means to be burned alive, and so they keep running about the house, having fun.
Suda: When the children demand the promised carts from their father, he gives them not goat-carts, deer-carts or ox-carts but presents each one with “a large carriage of uniform size and qual-ity” (ISOC, 93) — a large carriage drawn by a white oxen. The three kinds of carts he had originally promised — carts drawn by goat, deer or ox-stand for the three vehicles: The goat-cart is the teaching for voice-hearers (people of learning); the deer-cart is the teaching for cause-awakened ones (people of realization); and the ox-cart is the teaching for bodhisattvas. But the large carriage drawn by white oxen that the father actually bestows on each of his children equally is the one Buddha vehicle in other words, the teaching leading to Buddhahood.
Endo: Of course, the wealthy man in this parable is the Buddha, and the children playing in the house represent all living beings who do not recognize that they are in the midst of a world of suffering and will eventually be scorched by the flames of those sufferings.
The way the father gains the attention of his children with the three carts is a metaphor for the way the Buddha taught the three vehicles, shaping his teachings to match people’s capacities in order to save them.
The fact that in the end the father gave each of his children a large carriage drawn by white oxen tells us that the Buddha’s true teaching is not the three vehicles but the single Buddha vehicle.
Ikeda: The large carriage drawn by white oxen, representing the single Buddha vehicle, are described in great detail in the sutra.
This description itself is a parable, an attempt to communicate the wonder of the state of Buddhahood.
Saito: The sutra calls them “large carriages adorned with seven kinds of gems” (ISOC, 93). The wealthy man has many treasures in his store-houses, and he uses them to adorn the carriages with gold, silver, lapis lazuli, agate and other precious stones. These are great carriages drawn by white oxen. The carriages had “railings running around them / and bells hanging from all sides. / Ropes of gold twisted and twined, / nets of pearls/stretched over the tops” (ISOC, 104).
Ikeda: This calls to mind the description of the jeweled stupa in “The Emergence of the Treasure Tower.”
Suda: The white oxen that draw the carriages are also beautiful.
Their hides are pure and clean, and when they walk, they pull the carriages straight and smoothly. When they run, they are as swift as the wind. The sutra says that the children, riding in these jeweled carriages, enjoyed themselves in utter freedom.
Ikeda: This is a description of the state of Buddhahood. Offering the children the three carts to lure them from the burning house is the Buddha’s act of relieving suffering. Presenting them with the large carriages drawn by white oxen is his act of conferring joy. He gave the children the state of unsurpassed ease and happi-ness— that is, the Buddha’s wisdom.
‘”I am the father of living beings and I should rescue them from their sufferings and give them the joy of the measureless and boundless Buddha wisdom so that they may find their enjoyment in that'” (ISOC, 95).
The large carriages drawn by white oxen, which traverses freely over the most treacherous peaks, represents the state of Buddhahood, which knows no limitations. In “On the Large Carriages Drawn by White Oxen,” the Daishonin writes, “These large carriages drawn by white oxen are able to fly at will through the sky of the essential nature of phenomena” (WND-2, 976).
The Daishonin remarks here that the description of the large carriage drawn by white oxen is abbreviated in Kumarajiva’s Chinese translation of the Lotus Sutra. For his description of the magnificent vehicle, the Daishonin refers directly to a Sanskrit edition of the sutra.
Endo: As the Daishonin notes, the large carriage drawn by white oxen is five hundred yojanas long, wide and high. This is even larger than the treasure tower that appears in the sutra’s eleventh chapter. They are the same height, but the large carriage drawn by white oxen is twice as wide and as long as the treasure tower.
Suda: The Sanskrit text that the Daishonin refers to seems to be different from the surviving Sanskrit versions. But according to the Daishonin, it described the large carriage drawn by white oxen as having thirty-seven gleaming silver-thatched stairways leading up to it. Eighty-four thousand jeweled bells were hung on all four sides of the large carriage, and on the forty-two thousand railings, the Four Heavenly Kings stood as guardians. Inside the large car-riage, more than 69,380 Buddhas and bodhisattvas were sitting on lotus seats.
Ikeda: Such splendor defies the imagination. We certainly shouldn’t imagine the large carriage drawn by white oxen as looking anything like the humble ox carts one used to see in the countryside long ago! Of course, you don’t see them much anymore. I would be delighted if a gifted and inspired painter could depict this large carriage drawn by white oxen in all its glory.
Saito: The number 69,380 refers to the number of characters in the Chinese translation of the Lotus Sutra, doesn’t it? In “The Opening of the Eyes,” Nichiren Daishonin writes: “The Lotus Sutra is a single work consisting of eight volumes, twenty-eight chapters, and 69,384 characters. Each and every character is endowed with the character myo, each being a Buddha who has the thirty-two features and eighty characteristics” (WND-I, 250).
Each character of the Lotus Sutra is a Buddha, and so 69,384
Buddhas are there inside the large carriage drawn by white oxen.
Ikeda: The large carriage drawn by white oxen is none other than the Lotus Sutra itself. Its substance is the wondrous life of the Buddha, the great life of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. That is why the Daishonin writes, “The large carriage drawn by white oxen described in the Lotus Sutra are the carriages that we and others who are votaries of the Lotus Sutra ride in” (WND-2, 976).
Endo: The splendid vision of the large carriage drawn by white oxen is also meant as a sharp contrast to the burning house.
Ikeda: Precisely. Living beings, submerged in foolishness and igno-rance, not only fail to recognize that the house in which they dwell is actually burning up with them inside it but also fail to realize that their very lives contain the Buddha’s life. Using para-bles, the Buddha seeks to awaken them to the brilliantly shining life inside them.
THE WIDE INFLUENCE OF THE LOTUS SUTRA’S PARABLES
Saito: There are many similes, parables and analogies in the Lotus Sutra, in addition to the seven we have already mentioned. The others most frequently referred to are: the great king’s feast, in
“The Bestowal of Prophecy”; the grinding of earth particles in the major world systems into ink powder, in “Phantom City”; the digging of a well in a high plateau, in “The Teacher of the Law”; the grinding of five hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, a million nayuta asamkhya major world systems to dust, in “Life Span”; the ten comparisons in “Former Affairs of the Bodhisattva Medicine King”; and the one-eyed turtle, in “Former Affairs of King Won-
derful Adornment.”
Of course, there are many more; far too many to cite here. Why is the Lotus Sutra so rich in parables and analogies? One apparent reason is the general fondness for parables and metaphor in Indian thought, but I think a more important reason is that the Lotus Sutra is a scripture that speaks to the people.
Suda: And, in fact, the marvelous parables of the sutra have fascinated and charmed many people, transcending boundaries and ages. Among the Chinese people, for example, faith in the Lotus Sutra stimulated the development of several genres of popular lit-erature, recounting the benefits conferred on those who praised the Lotus Sutra and relating biographical accounts of sincere believers and practitioners of the sutra.’ Clearly, it was the accessibility and illuminating nature of the parables of the Lotus Sutra that led to the emergence of such popular literature.
Endo: Though we don’t possess enough evidence to draw a firm conclusion, some scholars suggest that the Lotus Sutra even influenced the New Testament of the Bible. For example, the story of the prodigal son in the Gospel according to Luke is very similar to the parable of the wealthy man and his poor son, which appears in the sutra’s “Belief and Understanding” chapter.
Dr. Hajime Nakamura, the famous Japanese Buddhologist, refers to the possibility that Western religions espousing teachings of love may have developed under the influence of the Eastern ideal of compassion.
Saito: In Japanese literature, too, the Lotus Sutra is the most frequently cited of all the many Buddhist scriptures. In the Nara period (710-94), shortly after Buddhism was introduced to Japan, the educated classes began to write poetry referring to Buddhist themes and ideas. But at this point, the Lotus Sutra was not yet widely adopted as a topic.
Among the common people, however, around this same time, the Lotus Sutra was becoming a subject of popular literature. In the Nihon ryoiki (Miraculous Stories From the Japanese Buddhist Tradition), a collection of Buddhist tales recounting the karmic rewards and punishments of all sorts of people, the Lotus Sutra crops up with a frequency that far exceeds any other scripture.
Ikeda: In the Nara period, the Lotus Sutra was more favorably received among the common people than the elite. How appropriate for a scripture dedicated to helping people grapple with the realities of human existence!
Suda: From the time that Great Teacher Dengyo founded the Lotus Sutra-based Tendai school of Buddhism in Japan during the Heian period (794-1185), the Lotus Sutra came to be regarded as the king of the scriptures not only as a religious text but as a work of literature as well, even among the learned people of the capi-tal. Lectures on the Lotus Sutra were regularly held in aristocratic society, and knowledge of the sutra was regarded as an indispensable part of one’s general education.
Ikeda: In The Pillow Book, the Heian-period writer Sei Shonagon reveals the widespread currency of the Lotus Sutra among the nobility in a humorous anecdote. ” The episode refers to Shakya-muni’s statement in the “Expedient Means” chapter of the Lotus Sutra, when he responds to the departure of the five thousand arrogant believers from the assembly by saying, “It is well that these persons of overbearing arrogance have withdrawn” (ISOC, 63). As Sei Shonagon prepared to leave a lecture on the Lotus Sutra, a certain nobleman named Fujiwara no Yoshichika remarked sar-castically, “Ah, you do well to depart!” To which she retorted,
“Your Excellency, too, will surely be among the five thousand.” It is clear from the ease with which Sei Shonagon and her friends bandied references to the Lotus Sutra that it had penetrated deeply into people’s consciousness at this time.
Suda: The Lotus Sutra is also the most frequently cited Buddhist scripture in Murasaki Shikibu’s The Tale of Genji, regarded by many as the world’s first novel. Among the various Buddhist ceremonies that the characters of the novel hold, the custom of the Eight Lectures on the Lotus Sutra” is frequently mentioned.
The novel’s leading character, Hikaru Genji, is said at the age of twenty-three to have read the three main Tendai scriptures!? and their many commentaries — sixty volumes in all— and so was deeply versed in the Lotus Sutra.
Saito: Some scholars say that a well-known scene in “The Broom Tree” chapter follows the structure of the three cycles of preaching’s of the Lotus Sutra.
Endo: From the mid-Hean period on, the emperor and the aristocracy often composed poems based on various Lotus Sutra chapters. This custom of writing a poem based on a single chapter seems to have been popular in China and was transmitted from there to japan. According to scholars of Japanese literature, the
“Expedient Means” and ” Life Span” chapters were the most fie-quent choices for such poems, followed by the “Devadatta” chapter and those chapters in which the seven parables are expounded: “Simile and Parable,” “Belief and Understanding,” “The Parable of the Medicinal Herbs,” and “Prophecy of Enlightenment for Five Hundred Disciples.”
For example, the following poem is based on the parable of the jewel in the robe, from the “Five Hundred Disciples” chapter:
I only learned
By a chance meeting With an old friend
Of the jewel sewn in my robe
While I was drunk.
Another poem alludes to the parable of the three carts and the burning house:
The world is a dismal place
And yet how
Am I to escape
This house of burning desires
Without the ox cart?
Ikeda: The Lotus Sutra was so well known among the populace at this time that many of its famous phrases were incorporated in puns within poetry.
THE DISTINCTIVE FEATURES OF THE PARABLES
Suda: Where, I wonder, does this tremendous power of the Lotus Sutra’s parables to captivate people’s hearts and imaginations come from? In particular, the sutra devotes eight of its twenty-eight chapters to clarifying the true function of the three vehicles and replacing them with the one Buddha vehicle, thereby emphasizing that all living beings possess the potential for Buddhahood. Five of the Lotus Sutra’s seven parables are found in these eight chapters. This teaching is set forth with such persistence that some might find it a little tiresome. Bur what we see here, I think, is the extraordinary depth of Shakyamuni’s compassion.
Ikeda: Exactly. That is precisely the source of the richness of the parables of the Lotus Sutra.
The Great Teacher T’ien-t’ai of China comments: “The Buddha’s great compassion is never exhausted, his skillful wisdom operates without limit. That is why the Buddha preaches parables.
Moving the trees, he shows us the wind; raising his fan, he reveals the moon. This is how he awakens us to the truth?”
Nichiren Daishonin quotes this passage and adds his own com-ment: “[The Buddha’s] ‘great compassion’ is like the mercy and compassion that a mother feels for her child” (OTT, 43). It is deep compassion that gives birth to these skillful parables. He further cites the words of T’ien-t’ai’s disciple Chang-an: “One who rids the offender of evil is acting as his parent” (OTT, 43).
The Daishonin is describing the strict love of a parent who will fight to rid his or her child of evil, even if it means earning the child’s dislike.
“[Now this threefold world is all my domain,
and the living beings in it are all my children.
Now this place
is beset by many pains and trials.
I am the only person
who can rescue and protect others,…” (ISOC, 105-06)
Saito: I can see the parental concern of the Buddha here and there throughout the “Simile and Parable.” For example, Shakyamuni states: “These living beings are all my sons. I will give the great vehicle to all of them equally” (sOC, 97); and “Now this threefold world / is all my domain, / and the living beings in it / are all my children” (ISOC, 105-06).
Suda: The last passage is a very important one, for it makes the relation between the Buddha and living beings perfectly clear.
Ikeda: All seven of the central Lotus Sutra parables reveal the compassion of the Buddha for living beings. In three of them —the parables of the three carts and the burning house, the wealthy man and his poor son, and the skilled physician and his sick children — the Buddha is depicted as a father who saves his children.
In the parable of the three kinds of medicinal herbs, he is likened to a great cloud of compassion that delivers rain equally to all types of plants; in the parable of the phantom city and the treasure land, he is depicted as a leader of a group of people; in the parable of the jewel in the robe, he is depicted as a man who protects his friend; and in the parable of the bright jewel in the topknot, he is depicted as a king who praises a soldier.
The parables are not preached ‘in accordance to the mind of living beings,’ matching their capacities. They are preached ‘in accordance with the Buddha’s own mind, to reveal that mind and to draw living beings toward it. The Daishonin writes: “But the Lotus Sutra is an example of preaching in accordance with the Buddha’s own mind, because in it the Buddha had all living beings comply with his own mind” (WND-I, 969).
The parables of the Lotus Sutra are taught to make the minds
of living beings one with the Buddha’s mind.
Saito: The parables of the Lotus Sutra have the power to raise living beings to the state of Buddhahood.
Ikeda: Yes, they do. Earlier I noted that parables have the power to make one think in a very active and participatory way. Tsunesaburo Makiguchi designed his educational system to achieve that same effect. I am referring to what he called a “home environment course” and “practical education.” His idea was to lead students to experience what they could in their own home environment and then move on to learn things they couldn’t directly experience, always using their own experience as a reference point. With the students’ actual experiences serving as parables, as it were, Mr. Makiguchi’s method encourages students to expand their field of thought on their own. That is why he placed such importance on free activities for students.
Using easily understandable parables and similes to teach is the same as guiding students to think on their own. And it is precisely this that brings about a dramatic change in those being taught.
Related to this, a certain person once described the seven parables of the Lotus Sutra as medicine to cure the illnesses of life. I am speaking of the Indian Buddhist philosopher Vasubandhu, active around the fourth or fifth century.
Vasubandhu stated, for instance, that the parable of the three carts and the burning house is a cure for the arrogant mind that mistakenly seeks every kind of virtue. “Mistakenly” here refers to the folly of seeking true happiness in the burning house of this threefold world.
The parable of the phantom city and the treasure land, said Vasubandhu, is a cure for the arrogant mind convinced of the reality of things that do not actually exist or have substance. It specifically teaches the voice-hearers that the limited enlightenment of the two vehicles, which they believe to be everything, is in fact no more than a phantom city — in other words, that it doesn’t exist.
The parable of the jewel in the robe, meanwhile, cures the arrogant mind convinced that that which is true or real isn’t real. It teaches that the jewel (the Buddha nature) that living beings do not believe exists is there all along, sewn into the lining of their robes (inherent in their very lives).
Thus, Vasubandhu described the seven parables as beneficial medicine for curing the illnesses of life. And Shakyamuni, by thạt token, is a great doctor who cures and revives living beings. He is a great doctor and a strict father. In all of his incarnations, what shines through is Shakyamuni’s ardent compassion, which seeks to make all living beings happy.
Saito: The parable of the skilled physician and his sick children in the “Life Span” chapter shows the Buddha as both the great doctor and the strict father.
Ikeda: The Buddha of the “Life Span” chapter is the Buddha who works ceaselessly for the salvation of all beings — from the begin-ningless past and on into the endless future. The life of this Buddha is eternal, and yet he appears in the world to save living beings and then enters extinction again for the same purpose. His appearance and extinction are all for the sake of living beings. This Buddha is the perfect expression of a life of compassion.
Endo: In the first of the seven parables, the three carts and the burning house, the Buddha is depicted as a father. The passage mentioned earlier, “Now this threefold world / is all my domain, / and the living beings in it / are all my children” (ISOC, 105-06), illustrates the compassionate determination of the Buddha, who is the father, to save all living beings, who are his children. This Buddha who acts as a father to all living beings is then revealed in the
“Life Span” chapter as the Buddha of time without beginning, who represents the eternal function and activity of compassion.
Ikeda: “The One Hundred and Six Comparisons” refers to this passage as a hidden reference to the “Life Span” chapter (GZ, 856).
PARABLES ARE IDENTICAL TO THE ENTITY OF THE LAW
Suda: The similes and parables that appear in the Lotus Sutra have another very important feature. Not only does Shakyamuni employ them in his attempts to convey the profound depths of the teachings of the Lotus Sutra to his disciples, but his disciples use them, too, to demonstrate that they have understood his teachings
When we think of using parables to explain something, we usually consider it as a method employed by a teacher when instructing his students. But in the Lotus Sutra, parables are by no means a one-way street; the Buddha’s disciples also use parables when they speak.
Saito: For example, the four great voice-hearers,” who immediately grasped the meaning of the parable of the three carts and the burning house, reveal their understanding in “Belief and Understanding” by relating the parable of the wealthy man and his poor son. While in “Prophecy of Enlightenment for Five Hundred Disciples,” the voice-hearers, who have grasped the teaching of causes and conditions set forth in “The Parable of the Phantom City,” show their understanding by sharing the parable of the jewel in the robe.
Ikeda: Simply hearing the Buddha’s skillful parables and similes and declaring, “Yes, I understand!” do not constitute a full under-standing. Truly profound understanding results in a transformation of one’s entire being. By its very nature, understanding entails a transformation. As one rises to a higher state of being, wisdom is born. That is why the disciples who heard and truly understood the Buddha’s teachings could then speak in parables themselves.
We must also remember that Shakyamuni used parables to reach all living beings. His purpose was to open the path of Buddhahood to all without exception. Once his disciples understood the meaning behind the parables, the reason why the Buddha used them, it seems quite natural that they would respond with parables of their own. The joy of understanding filled them with an irrepressible desire to share this truth with others.
Endo: In a different context entirely, this “joy of understanding” reminds me of the story of the ancient Greek mathematician and inventor Archimedes’ discovery of the physical law of buoyancy known as Archimedes’ Principle.
The king wanted to confirm whether a certain crown was in fact made of pure gold, and he asked Archimedes to find out for him — without, of course, damaging the crown. Archimedes went to the public bath to puzzle over this problem when he noticed, as he lowered himself into the tub, that the water overflowed. At that instant, a way of measuring the gold struck him like a bolt of lightning. He leapt out of the bath and cried “Eureka! Eureka!” (I’ve found it!). This episode is quite famous, and the term eureka has been an expression for the joy of discovery throughout the West for centuries.
Ikeda: No doubt it is because Archimedes’ jubilation continues to pulse in this expression that it has survived over the centuries down to the present day. Likewise, the uncontainable joy of the Buddha’s disciples permeates the parables they offer.
Interestingly, Shakyamuni tells Shariputra that he is preaching the Lotus Sutra to make him recall the Buddha way, which the latter had aspired to and practiced in the past. The Buddha states:
“Now, because I want to make you recall to mind the way that you originally vowed to follow,.. I am preaching this great vehicle sutra called the Lotus of the Wonderful Law” (ISOC, 86).
Understanding and conveying the truth to others are acts of remembering. Recollection is possible because the truth is already within one’s life. That is why the Lotus Sutra places such importance on both parables and the influence of causes and conditions.
The “Life Span” chapter teaches the ultimate causes and conditions dating back to the beginningless past.
Saito: The Japanese poet Makoto Ooka writes:
The words we use in everyday speech can suddenly assume, depending upon the ways in which they are combined or the moments in which they are uttered, a tremendous power…. The language we use is like the tip of an iceberg. What is the part of the iceberg that rests below the ocean surface? It is the intent, the mind of the person who speaks the language, and the mind of the listener, to which the word communicates, also below the ocean’s surface of language.
Ikeda: In a sense, when we use a parable, we are changing the ways in which we usually combine words, selecting expressions that perfectly communicate our message. When we do this, ordinary, familiar words and phrases take on a new meaning that transcends their typical uses. They acquire a power to link the minds and character of people that are submerged and exist on a level deeper than language.
This communication is the real meaning of understanding and conveying ideas. And this is why parables have such power.
Endo: To share one of my own experiences, I remember once being really down in the dumps, and one of my seniors said to me simply, “It’s been really tough, hasn’t it?” I felt that very ordinary phrase as a great encouragement, and I was deeply moved. It’s amazing how our sincere concern for another can be so moving, can have such a great effect.
Ikeda: Yes. They are words, but they are more than words. The power of words derives from the human heart. The mind, the heart, is what lies at the bottom of words and what gives them life.
Nichiren Daishonin observes, “Words echo the thoughts of the mind and find expression through the voice” (WND-2, 843). The same words can have very different degrees of power, too, depending upon the depth of the hearts of those who speak them.
In one of his commentaries, the Great Teacher Dengyo writes,
“These seven parables [of the Lotus Sutra] are none other than the entity of the Law, and the entity of the Law is none other than these metaphors and parables” (WND-I, 426). This means that the Lotus Sutra parables are the very heart and mind of the Buddha.
In “The Entity of the Mystic Law,” the Daishonin elucidates that Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is the ultimate expression of this principle that the parables of the Lotus Sutra are identical to the entity of the Law.
Suda: In the past, the Lotus Sutra has been criticized for lacking doctrinal teachings and constituting nothing more than a collection of parables and lavish praise for the Buddha.
Ikeda: Japanese scholars such as Tominaga Nakamoto and Hirata Atsutane are well known for voicing such criticisms.
Suda: After studying the Lotus Sutra, the Edo-period philosopher Tominaga concluded that it contained little more than praise for the Buddha and presented no teachings worth mentioning. He also criticized the parables of the sutra for merely emphasizing the superiority of the sutra itself.
Hirata, a scholar of Japanese classics, declared the Lotus Sutra to be inferior to all other Mahayana scriptures. Compared to the other Mahayana sutras, he said, it was decidedly unsatisfying, having no real substance; it was filled with warnings about the destruction of Buddhism and had many fantastic tales but never stated its purpose.
According to Hirata, the only thing one could say for the twenty-eight chapters was that they were long and, though they were filled with praise for the remedy they promised, they never actu ally delivered the medicine they touted.
Ikeda: Nichiren Daishonin wrote something that seems at first glance to be of similar intent: “Bear in mind that the twenty-eight chapters of the Lotus Sutra contain only a few passages elucidating the truth, but a great many words of praise” (WND-1,673). But the Daishonin’s conclusion is the opposite of Hirata’s. He asserts, «The more one praises the blessings of the Lotus Sutra, the more one’s own blessings will increase” (WND-1, 673).
The Daishonin is suggesting that we adopt the position of the Buddha. Since the Buddha praises the Lotus Sutra, we are bound to reap great benefit if we do the same. It means embracing the Buddha’s spirit as our own. Unless we have this attitude — that is, unless we have faith — we will never understand the Lotus Sutra, which expounds the Buddha’s heart and intent. Indeed, when we read the Lotus Sutra with the heart of faith, it is immediately clear how shallow such criticisms of it are.
For in those “few passages elucidating the truth,” of which the Daishonin speaks, the seed of Buddhahood for all living beings is indisputably present.
Suda: Contemporary scholars also point out that the objections of Tominaga and others to the Lotus Sutra are ill-founded. For example, Dr. Nakamura, whom we cited earlier, writes:
There is no systematic presentation of an abstract philosophy in the first half of the Lotus Sutra. It restricts itself to a repeated, richly expressed assertion, employing a variety of parables, of the doctrine that all of the Buddha’s teachings are solely the one Buddha vehicle.
As a result, anyone who seeks a particular philosophical or doctrinal system in this part of the sutra will be dis-appointed. But it is this very absence of a specifically stated philosophy that indicates the Lotus Sutra’s important philosophical position.”
Saito: Earlier, through the parables, we discussed the power of language to encourage and enlighten. But in our society today, unfortunately, language is frequently put to other purposes: to deceive, to exploit, and to render insensible people’s awareness of basic human rights.
Suda: Mr. Toda declared, “Speech or writing bereft of conviction is as insubstantial as smoke. When we see smoke, we can evade it. But in Japan today, public discourse is so engulfed in the smoke of lies that there is nowhere to escape.” No one even tries any more.
Ikeda: We live, if not in a burning house, in a smoking house!
Suda: Dr. Toshio Kamba, a noted sociologist and professor at Soka University, once noted:”The ruling elites of government and business are trying to bring the media under their control in order to steer public opinion in a direction favorable to their own agen-das….” And he warned:
It is crucial that such fascist political tendencies are nipped in the bud, before they can take firm hold.
Japan’s prewar experience taught us that a repressive government begins by instituting relatively mild measures of control. But it quickly picks up the tempo and organizes its forces. Once that has happened, a great deal of effort is required to oppose the rise of fascism. And that is why we must strike hard against the conservative reactionary forces now, when they are just beginning to exercise their power.?
Ikeda: That’s true. We must be alert to the forces running beneath the smallest changes in society. And we must nip evil in the bud and encourage the growth of good. Every phenomenon has implications that must be understood, and every phenomenon can be transformed into a productive development, into something of ultimate value.
At the closing lines of his tragedy Faust, Goethe writes that all that is changeable is but an eternal parable.
Saito: It is easy enough for us, too, if we’re not careful, to fall victim to the illusion that the most profound essence of Buddhism is to be found in some theory or doctrine separated from our daily lives, but the parables of the Lotus Sutra teach us that this real world before us is true Buddhism.
Ikeda: The proof of faith that we manifest in our lives represents parables or illustrations of the virtues to be obtained from embracing the Mystic Law. Such proof is an eloquent testimony to the truth of the Mystic Law.
The great examples of Shijo Kingo, the two Ikegami brothers and other disciples of Nichiren Daishonin who faced and overcame great difficulties in their pursuit of faith are a tremendous encouragement to us who face similar problems. The Daishonin encouraged the Ikegami brothers when the two united in the face of persecution, writing, “Could there ever be a more wonderful story than your own?” (WND-I, 499). And just as the Daishonin asserted, the story of the brothers is now told around the world The same applies to us. Our individual experiences of triumph over our problems give courage and hope to many others. Our personal victories, in other words, become parables expressing the power of the Mystic Law. And those who hear our experiences can share them with still others.
Mr. Makiguchi started the Soka Gakkai’s discussion meeting movement, which centers on members sharing their experiences in faith with others. He taught the Mystic Law not in the form of difficult abstract theories but through easily intelligible personal experiences.
Each individual experience is a parable of the all-pervading Mystic Law. And the discussion meeting, based on sharing such personal experiences, is a contemporary representation of the
“Simile and Parable” chapter, a modern version of the seven parables of the Lotus Sutra, an infinite treasury of parables.
Parables are wisdom and compassion distilled to their most fragrant essence. The Soka Gakkai initiated a revolution in the way Buddhism is spread by adopting the same method as the Lotus Sutra. The spirit of the Lotus Sutra’s parables lives on in the sixty-five-year history of the Soka Gakkai. And we will continue to write the brilliant story of the widespread propagation of the Lotus Sutra (Nam-myoho-renge-kyo) day after day, a story that will be passed down through eternal future generations.