Discussion of “The Parable of the Phantom City” Chapter (Chapter 7).
Suda: Recently, I heard a member say that the world today is in a pitiful state. Politicians shirk responsibility and spend all their time just trying to protect their own positions. This member felt that jealousy and irresponsibility, apathy and heartlessness reign, and that with the country in such straits, can very many be passionately devoted to high ideals?
Ikeda: I think many people share these sentiments. In 1846, the great Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard wrote in The Present Age, “Our age is essentially one of understanding and reflection, without passion, momentarily bursting into enthusiasm, and shrewdly relapsing into repose.”! He might just as well have been describing the situation in the world today.
Endo: An age when people lack passion and are turned inward will be dominated by jealousy. Once this tendency is firmly rooted in people’s lives, they will try to pull down anyone who is outstanding in an attempt to level the human geography, as it were.
This is the essence of Kierkegaard’s argument.
Ikeda: It was not until more than half a century after Kierkegaard’s death that people in other countries began to pay attention to his ideas. Many thinkers hailed his writings as prophetic; German philosopher Karl Jaspers, for example, marveled, “It’s as though it as written yesterday.”?
What gave Kierkegaard such profound insight into the problems of modern society? One reason, I think, is that he was convinced his life would be short, and so he struggled to accomplish everything he could in his limited span of years.
Endo: Armed with his pen, he stood up to the authoritarian clerics of his day and the libelous accusations made against him in the press. Never relenting in his struggles, he died at forty-two.
Ikeda: Kierkegaard believed that he would not live to be thirty-four. His mother had died young, and he had lost five of his six siblings; two elder sisters, who lived comparatively long lives, died at thirty-three. He felt certain that he would not outlive these older sisters.
When he reached his thirty-fourth birthday, he wrote in his diary that it was “astonishing” and “incomprehensible” that he had survived to this age.’
In just over a decade, mostly in his thirties, he published approximately forty works. As many as twenty more volumes of his writings were published posthumously. In his book The Present Age, he concludes that the only way to stave off the “leveling” of modern society is for individuals to attain immovable “religious courage.”* Kierkegaard’s philosophy consistently returns to the point that people have to know their mission in life, that they need to discover an ideal to which they can dedicate their lives and for which they would be willing to die.
Saito: The ability to awaken people to such an ideal and such a sense of mission will be one of the prime requirements of religion in the twenty-first century.
Ikeda: That wisdom is the Lotus Sutra’s gift to present and future generations. “Why was I born in this world?” “What do I need to accomplish in this life?” The Buddha appeared in this world to help people come to grips with these universal questions.
In “Expedient Means,’ the second chapter of the Lotus Sutra, Shakyamuni first expounds the truth to which he has become enlightened. At that juncture, only Shariputra grasps his meaning.
In the following chapter, the Buddha relates various similes and parables that enable the four great voice-hearer disciples to gain understanding. But the Buddha has to open the eyes of still more people. Toward that end, he expounds “The Parable of the Phantom City,’ the seventh chapter, which further dramatizes the great illuminating force of the Buddha’s wisdom:
THE MENTOR-DISCIPLE RELATIONSHIP ORIGINATES IN THE DISTANT PAST
“At that time the leader, knowing that the people have become rested and are no longer fearful or weary, wipes out the phantom city and says to the group, ‘You must go now. The place where the treasure is is close by. That great city of a while ago was a mere phantom that I conjured up so that you could rest.’
“Monks, the thus come one is in a similar position.
He is now acting as a great leader for you. He knows that the bad road of birth and death and earthly desires is steep, difficult, long,, and far-stretching, but that it must be traveled, it must be passed over.” (ISOC, 175)
Saito: The key concept in “Phantom City” is “causes and conditions.”
Endo: This term, which indicates a karmic relationship, is still part of the vocabulary of the Japanese language today; but the Buddhist meaning seems to have been lost, and instead it has rather negative connotations, such as an undesirable fate. This is of course not the original meaning of the term in Buddhism.
Saito: The karmic relationship described in “Phantom City” is the profound connection that has existed from past lives between Shakyamuni and his voice-hearer disciples. This chapter, in other words, expounds the bond of mentor and disciple.
In the Sanskrit text of the Lotus Sutra, this chapter is titled
“Relations From Past Lives” (Skt Purva-yoga). And in the Sho-hokke-kyo, a Chinese translation of the sutra by Dharmaraksha, the chapter is called “Distant Past,’ because it explains the distant past of major world system dust particle kalpas. Kumarajiva named the chapter “The Parable of the Phantom City” because of the well-known parable related in its latter half.
Ikeda: Not only had Shakyamuni Buddha taught the voice-hearers in his present life, he had instructed them tirelessly and ceaselessly since the remote past. This chapter explains the karmic relationship existing between them since that distant time.
“Our relationship is not limited to this lifetime alone,” Shakya-muni tells them in effect. “I have been together with you all along.” It is this impassioned message that enables the voice-hearers to awaken to the truth.
They are deeply moved. They realize that the teachings of the two vehicles (for voice-hearers and cause-awakened ones), producing only partial enlightenment, were an expedient means, a mere “phantom city.” And that the “treasure land” of Buddhahood was the true destination all along. They understand that their men-tor, Shakyamuni, guided them with such strong forbearance, such profound mercy and such great skill to bring them along with him to this treasure land. This is the significance of the parable.
Suda: “The Parable of the Phantom City,” it would seem, is an apt title for the chapter.
Major world system dust particle kalpas, which is used to explain the duration of the relationship between mentor and dis-ciple, is a period of staggering length. In “Phantom City,” this concept is explained as follows. Suppose someoné reduces all the lands in a major world system to dust and then, traveling eastward, drops one particle of dust each time he passes a thousand worlds. He continues in this way until he has disposed of the entire mass of particles. If the person then reduces to dust all the worlds he has pased, whether or not they received a dust particle, and if each particle signifies one kalpa or aeon, major world system dust par-rices kalpas is the length of time corresponding to the total number of dust particles.
The particles are in fact too numerous to be counted. The text speaks of first reducing a major world system to dust. In ancient Indian cosmology, a major world system could be compared to, in modern terms, a galaxy so vast as to include a billion solar sys-tems. The time unit “kalpa” is also unfathomably long.
I wonder why it’s necessary to go back to such a remote time to clarify a karmic relationship.
Endo: On that point, the Great Teacher T’ien-t’ai of China says that, in “Phantom City,” the “process of instruction is revealed from beginning to end.” The “beginning” is the remote past, the
“end” is the present of the Lotus Sutra.
Ikeda: The key lies in the beginning. If we understand what happened then, we can also understand Shakyamuni’s meaning when he preached the one supreme Buddha vehicle in the Lotus Sutra, which is the teaching for attaining enlightenment.
The initial planting of the seed is extremely important.
Nichiren Daishonin says:
“The relationship between Shakyamuni Buddha and his disciples can be traced back to the time when, as the sixteenth son of the Buddha Great Universal Wisdom Excellence, he planted the seeds of Buddhahood in their lives…. Ordinary people and the persons of the two vehicles came to the Lotus Sutra gradually through the first four flavors of teachings. They then revealed the seeds of Buddhahood from within themselves and were able to obtain the fruit of enlightenment” (WND-I, 368).
The seeds are sown, they mature, and at last fruit is produced.
In terms of this process, Shakyamuni is now about to lead the voice-hearers to the final stage of fruition, or attainment of Buddhahood, by bestowing on them prophecies of enlighten-ment. But before doing so, he teaches them the significance of the sowing of the seed at the beginning.
What sort of period, then, was the time of sowing? What were the circumstances under which Shakyamuni began giving instruc-tion? Why don’t we try first to give an overview of the contents of “Phantom City”?
Saito: This chapter starts by explaining the appearance in the distant past of a Buddha named Great Universal Wisdom Excellence.
The land of this Buddha is called Well Constituted and his kalpa, Great Form. From these names, we get a sense of the character of the age.
Great Universal Wisdom Excellence, as his name suggests, possessed penetrating mystic powers and perfect wisdom. Great Form, the name of the kalpa, means excellent in appearance. And Well Constituted, the name of the land, means begun or initiated well.
Ikeda: The appearance in the world of a great spiritual leader such as the Buddha Great Universal Wisdom Excellence probably signaled the dawn of a wondrous new age; it marked a time of beginning.
Spiritual reformers are sure to appear at the beginning of a new age. These people themselves develop a new dimension of spirituality and liberate the hearts of those caught up in outmoded ways of thinking. Again, they may exert an intangible yet profound spiritual influence on people.
Let us of the SGI always advance with the pride of pioneers.
Nichiren Daishonin says, “The votaries, who chant Nam-myoho-
(отт, 74).
renge-kyo, are the Buddha Great Universal Wisdom Excellence”
Suda: “Phantom City” explains the attainment of Buddhahood by Great Universal Wisdom Excellence in considerable detail. What I find difficult to understand here is why it says that, even after he powerful devilish forces, he still did not attain Buddhahood for ten kalpas. The sutra states:
This buddha at first sat in the place of enlightenment and, having smashed the armies of the devil, was on the point of attaining supreme perfect enlighten-ment, but the Law of the buddhas did not appear before him. This state continued for one small kalpa, and so on for ten small kalpas, the buddha sitting with legs crossed, body and mind unmov-ing, but the Law of the buddhas still did not appear before him. (ISOC, 156)
Ikeda: The statement that he “smashed the armies of the devil” is taken to mean that he had fundamentally conquered earthly desires. But simply overcoming earthly desires is not in itself attaining enlightenment. It is one aspect of enlightenment. True enlightenment is inseparable from the compassion and wisdom to lead people to happiness.
“Phantom City” is expounded for the voice-hearers. The voice-hearers suppose that enlightenment means extinguishing earthly desires and entering a state of perfect calm and tranquillity. It may be that Shakyamuni describes Great Universal Wisdom Excellence’s Buddhahood in this way to indicate to the voice-hearers that conquering earthly desires does not in itself constitute attaining the Buddha’s true enlightenment.
Compassion, wisdom and earthly desires, of course, belong to the realm of the intangible, of non-substantiality, and they should not be viewed in a phenomenal sense. On that premise, to put it simply, the Buddha’s enlightenment lies not in “eradicating” earthly desires but rather in infusing them with compassion and wisdom.
It is a matter of changing the turbid river of earthly desires, karma and suffering into a pure stream of compassion and wisdom, of turning the negative waves of life into waves of goodness.
Those who achieve this possess a perfectly tranquil and serene state of life in the sense that they are not troubled by earthly desires; at the same time, their lives have a vigorous dynamism.
The Buddha’s state of life is like the ocean. No matter what turmoil there may be on the surface, in its depths there is absolute calm and tranquillity. And the Buddha’s life constantly pulses with
“waves of goodness.” The Buddha is called the thus come one because the workings of the Mystic Law “come thus,” or manifest purely and directly, in his life.
This is the Buddha’s enlightenment in perfect unification with
the Mystic Law.
Endo: I find it interesting in this chapter that heavenly beings continuously make offerings to Great Universal Wisdom Excellence during that interval of ten kalpas before he has attained Buddha-hood. The beings of the heaven of the thirty-three gods make an offering of a grand lion seat, the Brahma kings cause heavenly flowers to rain down continuously, and the four heavenly kings constantly beat on heavenly drums. It could be said that these beings are like cheerleaders urging him on in his efforts to attain supreme perfect enlightenment.
Ikeda: In becoming cheerleaders for the Buddha, these heavenly beings, who represent all living beings, express people’s spirit of longing for the Buddha to appear. In a broad sense, the Brass Band, Fife and Drum Corps, and all the chorus or music groups of the SGI, are cheerleaders to urge us on in our individual attainment of Buddhahood and in our efforts to accomplish kosen-rufu.
While we might think of the Buddhist deities as inhabiting some distant realm, they are in fact close at hand.
Endo: When Great Universal Wisdom Excellence finally attains supreme perfect enlightenment, the entire world is filled with a brilliant light surpassing that of the sun and moon.
Ikeda: The Mystic Law thoroughly permeates the Buddha’s life, and the fragrance of the Buddha’s vast compassion and infinite wisdom to lead people to enlightenment pervades the universe.
This, I think, is what this light signifies.
THE RESTATEMENT
OF THE BUDDHA’S TEACHING
Suda: Next, the sixteen princes appear. These are children of Great Universal Wisdom Excellence from before he had renounced the world. The sixteenth of these sons is Shakyamuni in a previous incarnation. Learning that their father has become a Buddha, the princes approach him and entreat him to expound the Law.
In addition to the sixteen sons, the Brahma kings in the worlds throughout the universe in the ten directions —north, south, east, west, northwest, northeast, southeast, southwest, up and down — also unanimously beseech Great Universal Wisdom Excellence to expound the Law. The sutra describes in detail this event, known as the “appeal of the Brahma kings,” which takes place on a truly colossal scale.
The text specifically mentions four Brahma kings named Save All, Great Compassion, Wonderful Law and Shikhin. Shikhin is the name of a leading Brahma king, but none of the others appears in standard Indian mythology. Save All, Great Compassion and Wonderful Law may represent the spirit of yearning for the appearance of a Buddha who will widely and compassionately expound the Mystic Law to lead people to happiness.
Ikeda: That’s probably so. Before the appearance of Great Universal Wisdom Excellence, people’s lives were filled with suffering, and the age had reached a deadlock. The sutra describes people’s plight, saying “From darkness they enter into darkness” (LSOC, 158).
In the depths of their lives, people yearned for the appearance of a Buddha who would put an end to the negative spiral described as “from darkness to darkness.” These names express that spirit.
President Toda often said: “In commerce or in any other sphere, what people are seeking will catch on and spread. Kosen-rufu can definitely be accomplished in this age because people now seek the Mystic Law.”
Endo: In response to the requests of the sixteen princes and the Brahma kings, Great Universal Wisdom Excellence begins expounding the Law. He first explains the doctrines of the four noble truths and the twelve-linked chain of causation. By mastering this partial truth, many people achieve the state of voice-hearer.
But the sixteen princes are not satisfied with those doctrines, and they implore the Buddha to expound the true cause of his enlightenment.
Ikeda: The four noble truths and the twelve-linked chain of causation are provisional teachings that reveal only one aspect of the Buddha’s enlightenment. Various things can be said about these doctrines; but essentially, their basic point is that people can gain a state of peace and tranquillity by extinguishing earthly desires, which are understood to be the cause of suffering. But the Buddha’s true intention is to enable people to acquire the unsurpassed enlightenment that he himself has attained. And so, at the request of the sixteen princes; and after awaiting the proper time, the Buddha expounds the Lotus Sutra, clarifying that intention.
Saito: The sutra says that after Great Universal Wisdom Excellence has expounded the Lotus Sutra for a period of eight thousand kalpas, he goes into meditation for a period of eighty-four thousand kalpas. During and after his meditation, the sixteen princes, who have become bodhisattvas, expound the Lotus Sutra just as their father had. This is known as the “restatement of the teaching of Great Universal Wisdom Excellence.” It is called a restatement because they reiterate the Lotus Sutra that the Buddha, their mentor, had expounded.
Ikeda: Great Universal Wisdom Excellence and the sixteen princes all taught the same Lotus Sutra. The sixteen princes truly followed the path of oneness of mentor and disciple.
Suda: As bodhisattvas, the sixteen princes expounded the Lotus Sutra, each instructing countless beings. These beings were then reborn in the lands of various Buddhas together with the bodhisattvas who were their teachers, their mentors, and from whom they then received further instruction. In a well-known passage, the sutra says that they “dwelled here and there in various buddha lands, constantly reborn in company with their teachers” (ISOC, 178).
Endo: At the end of “Phantom City,” Shakyamuni reveals that he is the sixteenth prince, and that the voice-hearers who are his disciples at present and those who will appear after his passing are the beings he began instructing at that time. Shakyamuni addresses the voice-hearers, saying:
I myself was numbered among the sixteen and in the past preached for you.
For this reason I employ expedient means to lead you in the pursuit of buddha wisdom; because of these earlier causes and conditions I now preach the Lotus Sutra.
I will cause you to enter the buddha way…. (ISOC, 179)
Here, reference is made to the “causes and conditions” from previous lives linking Shakyamuni and the voice-hearers. Purna, Ananda and the other voice-hearers who could not grasp the meaning of the Buddha’s preaching in the “Expedient Means” or “Simile and Parable” chapters, attain the way for the first time when they hear Shakyamuni’s explanation of their karmic relationship here in “Phantom City.” And in the subsequent
“Prophecy of Enlightenment for Five Hundred Disciples” the eighth chapter, and “Prophecies Conferred on Learners and Adepts,” the ninth chapter, they receive prophecies of their future attainment of Buddhahood.
Ikeda: The unfathomably profound bond between Shakyamuni and the voice-hearers has now been clarified. The origin of this bond is their having heard Shakyamuni expound the Lotus Sutra in the distant past, at the time of the restatement of the teaching of the Buddha Great Universal Wisdom Excellence.
Saito: In other words, that’s when the seed of Buddhahood was sown in their lives.
Ikeda: Precisely. At that time, the voice-hearers heard the Lotus Sutra and conceived the desire in the depths of their lives to attain the same unsurpassed enlightenment as the Buddha Great Universal Wisdom Excellence. They aroused a seeking mind. Thus, in the “Five Hundred Disciples” chapter, the voice-hearers say:
Through the long night the world-honored one constantly in his pity teaches and converts us, causing us to plant the seeds of an unsurpassed aspiration. (ISOC, 192)
Saito: At the same time as the seed of enlightenment is planted in their lives, they conceive an “unsurpassed aspiration.”
Ikeda: “Unsurpassed aspiration” means a desire to attain the Buddha’s unsurpassed enlightenment. That this enlightenment can in fact be attained is also part of the Lotus Sutra. Since the Buddha’s unsurpassed enlightenment is the manifestation of his compassion and wisdom to save people, this aspiration is informed by the wish to lead all beings to enlightenment just as the Buddha does.
Saito: Elsewhere in the same chapter, Purna says, “Only the Bud-dha, the world-honored one, is capable of knowing the wish that we have had deep in our hearts from the start” (ISOC, I82). The wish “deep in our hearts” is the original aspiration that the disciples have cherished in the depths of their lives. It seems to me that the desire to attain unsurpassed enlightenment and to lead all beings to happiness is an aspiration that, fundamentally, all people
possess.
Tkeda: Isn’t that what we call the Buddha nature? The term Buddha nature does not appear in the Lotus Sutra. But it seems that this is what original aspiration in the depths of one’s life indicates.
Suda: Understanding the causes and conditions that existed in the past, then, in essence means understanding the aspiration —the Buddha nature — in the depths of one’s being.
Ikeda: Stated more simply, this fundamental wish could be described as an aspiration or desire for the happiness of oneself and others. The very simplicity of this might seem anticlimactic, since it’s something that all people understand on some level; but making this one’s guiding and fundamental spirit is in fact extremely difficult. This is because hindrances in the form of earthly desires, ignorance, greed, egoism and divisiveness prevent people from doing so.
To base our lives thoroughly on this spirit, therefore, we need a teacher, a mentor, who can guide us in the right direction. It seems that this is what the “Phantom City” chapter teaches through the elucidation of the karmic causes and conditions linking mentor and disciple over an extremely long time.
In short, “causes and conditions” indicates the eternal bonds that form between people. These bonds certainly do not exist apart from human beings, nor do they fetter or bind people externally.
On the contrary, the disciples themselves perceive the cause for attaining Buddhahood at the core of their being. That is, they recollect their original aspiration. Also, they awaken to a sense of gratitude for the condition provided by their mentor —that is, for their relationship with him — in helping them develop this cause for the effect of Buddhahood. This sense of appreciation and excitement at realizing this supreme bond with the mentor is the spirit of “Phantom City.”
Saito: T’ien-t’ai says of the “one great reason lit. cause and con-dition]” for which all Buddhas make their appearance in the world: “Living beings possess the capacity to respond to the Bud-dhas; so this is called the ’cause. The Buddhas, observing this capac-ity, act in response to it; so this is called the ‘condition?» He indicates that the “cause” rests with the disciples (i.e., living beings), while the “condition” rests with the Buddha.
Ikeda: Yes. And of cause and condition, cause is naturally primary.
Conditions function to support and assist the cause. In the path of mentor and disciple, too, the awareness of the disciple is pri-mary. The response of the mentor depends on the strength of the disciple’s seeking spirit, sense of responsibility and determination.
That said, the Buddha industriously teaches and guides his disciples over past, present and future, never abandoning any of them.
He educates them and embraces them in his mercy. It seems to me that the Buddha’s immense compassion is the main point the Lotus Sutra seeks to convey.
The disciples believe in and seek out the mentor, and the mentor protects and trains the disciples. The mentor, ultimately, does not abandon even disciples who have forgotten their pledge. This most beautiful of human bonds is the relationship of mentor and disciple in Buddhism.
Saito: The mentor-disciple relationship in Buddhism is neither a one-way relationship from the mentor above to the disciple below nor is it an oppressive, feudalistic type of master servant relationship.
Endo: If I may digress, Karel Dobbelaere, former president of the between our successive presidents, has observed that the Soka Gakkai is pervaded by the mentor-disciple relationship. He also feels that the Soka Gakkai’s unity, built on these human bonds of mentor and disciple, provides members with a great deal of guidance and direction. In other words, he sees that human bonds constitute the very nucleus of the SGI.
Ikeda: That’s keen insight. “The ’cause and condition for our appearance in this world,” President Toda declared, “is to hoist up the great flag of kosen-rufu. That’s the raison d’etre of the SGI organization. And the essence of this organization is the mentor-disciple relationship.
In Buddhism, therefore, mentor and disciple are comrades advancing together toward the common objective of kosen-rufu, toward the creation of a world where Buddhist ideals and principles are widely embraced. The mentor-disciple relationship is an extension of the kind that exists between those with greater experience in life or in faith and those with lesser. In one sense, mentor and disciple stand face to face. Yet on a more fundamental level, mentor and disciple are comrades standing side by side.
Endo: It is a bond that absolutely cannot be broken. In this con-nection, Mr. Toda, reminiscing about his mentor— the first Soka Gakkai president, Tsunesaburo Makiguchi — once said:
I explain the persecution that I underwent on account of the Lotus Sutra [during which I was imprisoned for two years] with the following passage from the [“Phan-tom City” chapter of the] Lotus Sutra: “[They] dwelled here and there in various buddha lands, constantly reborn in company with their teachers” (ISOC, 178).
“Reborn in company with” indicates that, through the beneficial power of the Lotus Sutra, mentor and disciple will definitely be born together at the same time, and will together study the Lotus Sutra. All we (Mr. Makiguchi and I] did was put into practice this rule that has existed for countless millions of aeons.
Our relationship as mentor and disciple is not limited to this lifetime alone. When I am the mentor, President Makiguchi becomes the disciple; and when President Makiguchi is the mentor, I become the disci-ple. We are inseparable companions in both the past and the future.’
Suda: At Mr. Makiguchi’s third memorial in November 1946, President Toda said:
In your vast and boundless mercy, you took me with you even to prison. Thanks to that, I could read with my life the Lotus Sutra passage, “[they] dwelled here and there in various buddha lands, constantly reborn in company with their teachers.” As a result of that bene-fit, I could understand the true meaning of the teaching of the Bodhisattvas of the Earth and could, albeit only dimly, grasp the meaning of the Lotus Sutra with my life. What great happiness this is!
A certain Japanese religious scholar was deeply impressed by these words, which he said expressed the very essence of Mr. Toda’s religious encounter.
Saito: At a time when other disciples bore grudges against Mr.
Makiguchi and condemned him for having provoked the perse-cution, President Toda alone expressed gratitude to his mentor for having allowed him to accompany him to prison.
Ikeda: When we become aware of this indestructible bond of mentor and disciple, limitless power wells forth. Our lives well with boundless hope, infinite mercy and inexhaustible wisdom.
To Shijo Kingo, who had accompanied the Daishonin during the Tatsunokuchi Persecution and been prepared to die at his mentor’s side, Nichiren Daishonin wrote: “If you should fall into hell for some grave offense, no matter how Shakyamuni Buddha might urge me to become a Buddha, I would refuse; I would rather go to hell with you. For if you and I should fall into hell together, we would find Shakyamuni Buddha and the Lotus Sutra there” (WND- I, 850).
Learning of this supreme bond of mentor and disciple in “Phan-tom City,” Shakyamuni’s disciples finally recall their own original aspiration, and their fundamental mission. In doing so, they finally enter the path of attaining Buddhahood. They have received a bestowal of prophecy that they will attain enlightenment.
Before that point, when they heard Shakyamuni talk about the truth to which he became enlightened in the “Expedient Means” chapter or relate allegories in “Simile and Parable,” it had seemed to them that the Buddha’s teaching concerned other people or matters external to themselves. But now they suddenly realize,
“This is about me personally!” “The Buddha is explaining my own situation!” This is a key point.
In President Toda’s day, virtually all Soka Gakkai members were poor. But Mr. Toda, with great persistence, repeatedly taught these people, who were widely derided as a “gathering of the poor and sick”: “You yourselves are the Bodhisattvas of the Earth whom the Lotus Sutra describes.” He praised the members as “emissaries of the Buddha” and even “emanations of the Daishonin.” “Aren’t ordinary people most worthy of respect?” he proclaimed. “Aren’t you and I, the members of the Soka Gakkai, the most noble personages of all?” 10
Those who developed the confidence that they possessed a mission trom the remote past advanced together with their mentor on the great path of kosen-rufu. This is the path for attaining Bud-dhahood. And by following this path, they recalled and awakened to their own original aspiration from the distant past.
Since “Phantom City” is in the theoretical teaching, or first half, of the Lotus Sutra, it is of limited depth. Nonetheless, I feel its significance lies in teaching the disciples that each of them is a pro-I§tagonist in the grand and eternal drama of mentor and disciple.
THE PARABLE OF THE PHANTOM CITY AND THE TREASURE LAND
Saito: After explaining the karmic relationship linking him and his present disciples, Shakyamuni relates the parable of the phantom city and the treasure land.
Suda: In the parable, a group of people passing over a stretch of bad road, guided by a single leader, is undertaking a long and hazardous journey of five hundred yojanas to a place where there are rare treasures. Along the way, however, the people in the group become extremely weary and disheartened, and they tell the leader they cannot go any farther.
Were they to turn back, all their efforts up to that point would be in vain. The leader pities the people for wanting to return and give up the wonderful treasure. So when they have traveled more than three hundred yojanas, he uses his transcendental powers to create a great city; and he urges the people on, telling them that when they enter the city they can enjoy ease and tranquillity. The people rejoice upon hearing this, and they proceed ahead to the city, where they rest their thoroughly exhausted bodies and recoup their strength.
After they have had sufficient rest, the leader makes the city disappear. He then tells the people that the city was nothing more than an illusion he had conjured up to allow them to rest, and that their true destination, the treasure land, is close at hand (see SOC, 174-75).
The phantom city that the leader shows them corresponds to the expedient teachings of the three vehicles the Buddha expounds to guide people toward enlightenment. The treasure land represents the one Buddha vehicle toward which people should ultimately aim.
Specifically, this parable clarifies that the level of awakening achieved by the voice-hearers and cause-awakened ones (which corresponds to the phantom city is an expedient means, and that the Buddha’s unsurpassed enlightenment (the treasure land) is the true enlightenment toward which they should exclusively direct their efforts.
Endo: This is a metaphor that is easy to understand and that one can readily visualize. The disciples had grown content with the teachings of the three vehicles. But the Buddha refutes their willingness to be satisfied with a low state of life and points them toward the true objective of the one Buddha vehicle. In the para-ble, this is expressed by his provisionally creating the phantom city and then causing it to disappear.
Ikeda: Yes, but that’s only the surface meaning of the parable. From the text of the Lotus Sutra, we gather that the leader makes the phantom city disappear and that they then proceed to the treasure land. But Nichiren Daishonin goes beyond this interpreta-tion, explaining that the phantom city and the treasure land, rather than being distinct, are in fact inseparable.
Suda: In The Record of the Orally Transmitted Teachings, we find the following passage:
The Ten Worlds are all of them phantom cities, and each of these Ten Worlds is a treasure land.
Or again, the phantom city is the nine worlds /other than Buddhahood], and the treasure land is the state of Buddhahood. From the phantom city to the treasure land is a distance of five hundred yojanas. This distance of five hundred yojanas is symbolic of the illusions of thought and desire, of the dusts and sands that impede religious practice, and of darkness, or ignorance. To understand that these five hundred yojanas of earthly desires are the five characters of the Wonderful Law means to realize that the phantom city is identical with the treasure land. In this statement that the phantom city is identical with the treasure land, the single word
“identical”
is symbolic of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo. Each
moment of life in the phantom city is a moment of life in the treasure land. (OTT, 72)
Saito: When we view the phantom city and the treasure land as existing separately as “expedient means” and “truth,” respectively, the former becomes a “means” and the latter, the “end.” Conse-quently, we think of using a means to arrive at the end. On the other hand, when we view the phantom city and the treasure land as one and the same, the means includes the end.
Endo: If we view the end and the means as distinct, then the means becomes secondary and value resides exclusively in the end. Also, from this standpoint, we may tend to feel that, as long as the end can be attained, then the means whereby people arrive there is unimportant.
Ikeda: If the world of Buddhahood is the “end” or objective, then the nine worlds become the “process” leading to it. The view that we only arrive at Buddhahood after escaping the nine worlds implies discontinuity between the nine worlds and the world of Buddhahood — in other words, that the nine worlds do not contain the world of Buddhahood, and vice versa. But, as indicated in the above passage from The Record of the Orally Transmitted Teach-ings, the idea that we attain enlightenment only after eradicating
‘the three categories of illusion’ is the way of thinking of the pro-visional, pre-Lotus Sutra teachings.
Shakyamuni’s true intention in expounding the Lotus Sutra was to clarify that the nine worlds contain the world of Buddhahood and that the expedient means are themselves the truth.
Accordingly, the phantom city and the treasure land are not separate or distinct. The phantom city is identical to the treasure land.
From this perspective, the process is, in actuality, the end. In other words, the attainment of Buddhahood is not a destination at the end of the road of Buddhist practice. Rather, the actions of someone who practices and spreads Buddhism are themselves the actions of the Buddha.
Suda: This is the principle to which Nichikan refers when he says,
“Buddhahood means a strong mind of faith in the Lotus Sutra.” Tkeda: Yes. The Buddha is not some nonhuman or superhuman being who dwells apart from this world. Nichiren Daishonin says, “Buddha in fact is the living beings of the nine worlds” (OTT, 29). Ordinary people who uphold and propagate the Mystic Law are themselves Buddhas; this is the essence of the Dai-shonin’s Buddhism.
The state of Buddhahood manifests in our every action; the wisdom and compassion of the Buddha manifest in our lives from moment to moment. Truly, this is the meaning of”each moment of life in the phantom city is a moment of life in the treasure land.”
Saito: Also, great importance attaches to the Daishonin’s statement,
“identical’ is symbolic of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo.” He is saying that Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is the driving force for manifesting the moment of life of Buddhahood amid the reality of the nine worlds.
Endo: Regarding the principle of the oneness of the phantom city with the treasure land, I recall that you, President Ikeda, have said that kosen-rufu is like the flow of a great river. We tend to have an image of kosen-rufu as a kind of goal that is reached when a great many people embrace the Mystic Law. But you went beyond that perspective, explaining that the practice of spreading Buddhism is itself kosen-rufu.
The principle of the unity of phantom city and the treasure land reminds me of the words of Goethe that you borrowed to express your feeling when you took faith after meeting President Toda: “It is not enough to take steps which may some day lead to a goal; each step must be itself a goal and a step likewise.
Ikeda: To view kosen-rufu as a point when an ideal has been attained is not without meaning. But I wanted to emphasize the importance of the spirit to spread Buddhism. We must not think of the “journey,” the process of achieving this ideal, as just a means.
Those who make this mistake, using others as mere tools to achieve some end, may repeat the mistakes of revolutionary movements of the past that produced innumerable tragedies.
Buddhism is a religion that exists for the sake of human beings.
Under no circumstances should people be victimized or turned into a means to an end. That is my conviction as a Buddhist.
To advance, we have to set up “phantom cities” in the form of targets. But on a deeper level, efforts to proceed toward and reach these “phantom cities” are themselves the actions of the Buddha.
And the arena for these endeavors is itself the “treasure land.”
Saito: Attaining Buddhahood is not like reaching the goal in a board game. To view it as representing a final destination or point of attainment is, ultimately, an expedient means. As long as there is life, there is motion and change; therefore, there’s no such thing as a static final destination. Our actions in continuing to struggle for kosen-rufu are themselves the actions of the Buddha.
Ikeda: It is important, therefore, that we thoroughly enjoy all of our activities. Who has ever heard of a Buddha whose life is filled with suffering? Developing the state of life to delight in working hard for kosen-rufu, to view challenging circumstances as opportunities to create even more good fortune and to further expand our state of life prove that the world of Buddhahood is shining in our lives.
Endo: Those whose attitude is to complain when a new target appears cannot actualize the principle of the phantom city is identical to the treasure land in their lives.
Teeda: It wouldn’t be so bad, perhaps, if people could develop a state of life in which they could really enjoy complaining!
As long as we are alive, we will have problems of one kind or another. That’s only natural. But it’s ridiculous to be constantly reeling back and forth between feelings of elation and dejection every time something comes up.
We need to earnestly and steadfastly challenge ourselves to achieve goals. Resolving to overcome all obstacles, we must open a path forward. When we look back later, we will see that these moments, while perhaps trying, were in fact the most fulfilling and rewarding times of our lives. They will be a treasury of golden memories, great scenes in the eternal drama of our lives throughout the past, present and future.
Nichiren Daishonin says: “Now, when Nichiren and his followers chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, they are revealing that the phantom city is none other than the treasure land. These mountain valleys and broad plains where we live are all, every one of them, the treasure lands of the Eternally Tranquil Light” (отт, 77).
This explains the state of life of us who embrace and practice the Mystic Law. Wherever we may be, and no matter what our cir-cumstances, in the depths of our lives we can experience the
“greatest of all joys” (OTT, 212).