HEAVEN AND ENLIGHTENMENT
(Various Aspects of the Buddha's Extensive Teaching)
The Marvelous Teaching of the Lotus
If we are asked to condense the meaning and purpose of practising Buddhism as explained in thousands of volumes of Buddhist scriptures into one short phrase, a good choice is "attaining the Buddha's cosmic experience". In his last seven years of teaching, the Buddha concentrated on helping his followers actualize this phrase, i.e. to attain Buddhahood. This advanced teaching, which is the cumulation of all previous teachings, is recorded in the Saddharma Pundarika Sutra, or Lotus Sutra, and the Nirvana Sutra, or Enlightenment Sutra.
The Buddha explained that because most people were initially not ready to accept the higher wisdom of his teaching, he set up an expedient way to prepare them for subsequent profound teaching:
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These men are hard to save.
For this reason, Sariputra,
I set up an expedient for them,
Proclaiming a Way to end suffering,
Revealing it as Nirvana.
Yet, though I proclaim Nirvana,
It is not real extinction;
All things from the beginning
Are ever of Nirvana nature.
When a Buddha-son fulfills his course,
In the world to come he becomes Buddha.
It is because of my adaptability
That I tell of a Three-Vehicle Law,
But truly the World-honoured Ones
Preach the One-Vehicle Way.
The quotation illustrates that the teaching concerning the way to end suffering as emphasized in the Four Noble Truths and Eight-fold Path, is a preparatory stage towards later, more profound teaching in the Buddha Vehicle. The three other vehicles -- the Sravaka Vehicle, the Pratyekabuddha Vehicle, and the Bodhisattva Vehicle -- are expedient means; the ultimate path, the one taught by all Buddhas, is the Buddha Vehicle.
Sravakas, literally meaning "hearers", are disci¬ples who attain nirvana through hearing and practising the Buddha's teaching, especially the teaching of the Agama period. The Sravaka Vehicle is based on the Four Noble Truths and Eight-fold Path, helping aspirants to elimi¬nate lust, hatred and sufferin
Pratyekabuddhas, literally meaning "enlightened alone", refer to those who attain nirvana through their own effect, and who are not concerned with the enlightenment of other people. Pratyekabuddhas may or may not use the Buddhist way in their cultivation. This illustrates another admirable aspect of the liberal attitude of Buddhism, which recogizes that non-Buddhist methods too can lead to enlightement. The onus of the Pratyekabuddha training is to meditate deeper and deeper into the nature of phenomena until finally ultimate reality is reached. In Buddhism, the Pratyekabuddha Vehicle focuses on the Doctrine of Dependent Origination, which explains how the originally undifferentiated cosmic reality is gradually transformed into differentiated phenomenal worlds.
The two vehicles of Sravakas and of Pratyekabuddha lead to Arahantship, attaining nirvana in a narrow, Hinayanist sense, because although Arahants have freed themselves from the illusion of self, they have not freed themselves from the illusion of dharmas, for they believe that dharmas are ultimately real though existing only momentarily.
The Bodhisattva Vehicle is of the Mahayana tradi¬tion, with emphasis on compassion and helping others, in contrast to the Hinayana tradition of self-development. The Bodhisattva mode of cultivation is the Six Paramitas, which lead to the Buddha Vehicle, where the emphasis is on emptiness and attaining Buddhahood.
In striking contrast to the Theravadin belief that the highest level any being in this aeon can ever attain is to become an Arahant (and never a Buddha), because Sakyamuni Buddha is the only Buddha in our aeon, Mahayanists and Vajrayanists believe that not only every being is a potential Buddha, but every being is originally a Buddha. This concept becomes clear if we understand the concept of emptiness, where the Spiritual Body of the Buddha penetrates the infinitesimal particles as well as fills all the infinite galaxies. Moreover, the Buddha says:
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Know, O Sariputra!
Of yore I made a vow,
In desire to cause all creatures
To rank equally with me.
The school which specializes on the Lotus Sutra, and which represents a synthesis of the characteristic philosophies of various Buddhist schools is the Tian Tai School, which is named after a famous mountain in China where this school developed. The Tian Tai School is also called the Lotus School in English. But the term "Lotus School" is almost never used in the Chinese language for the Tian Tai School; if it used in Chinese, the Lotus School usually refers to the Pure Land School.
The Tian Tai School (Tendai in Japan) provides some excellent examples of the Chinese contribution to Buddhist philosophy. Again, it should be noted that in Buddhism, the term philosophy never means "speculative intellectualization"; it always means "love and search for truth". Buddhist masters have always insisted that the intellect, while highly regarded in Buddhism too, is subordinate to direct experience. All Buddhist teachings are not arrived at through logical or spe¬culative reasoning; they are the result of direct experience. When a master teaches, for example, that by practising the Noble Eight-fold Path or the Six Paramitas, one can attain enlightenment, this teaching is acquired not through rigorous reasoning, but through his and other masters' personal practice.
One of the fundamental doct¬rines of the Tian Tai School is poetically described as "One Thought, Three Thousand Worlds". "Three Thousand" here is a figur¬ative term meaning "myriad". This Tian Tai doctrine postulates that all the myriad worlds in the cosmos, including heavens and hells, are created by thought!
Again, we are amazed at not just how much earlier, but how much more profound were the Buddhist masters than modern quantum physicists in discovering that external reality exists only if we perceive it. Professor David Mermin exclaims that "We now know that the moon is demonstratively not there when no body looks", and he wants us to take his bold declaration literally. At present quantum physicists deals only with matter and at the sub-atomic level on our earth (despite this quotation about the moon); but Buddhist wisdom deals with matter, perception, thought, activity (or processes), and consciousness, ranging from the micro-world of a mote of dust to the countless worlds of the infinite cosmos.
Closer to the Original Teaching
Theravadins in general, as well as some scholars, including Professor Soothill from whose work the above quotations from the Lotus Sutra are taken, postulate that the Lotus Sutra and other Mahayana sutras were not taught by the Buddha, but were developed by later Buddhist masters.
Even if we presume that these sutras were not taught by Siddhartha Guatama Sakyamuni -- though Maha¬yanists and Vajrayanists sincerely believe they were, and have a stronger case to believe that theirs is closer to his original teaching, as will be shown presently -- a true Buddhist could still use them if they help him to attain the highest enlightenment. Sakyamuni Buddha himself has likened his teaching to a raft that could be discarded after it has ferried sentient beings from samsara to nirvana, clearly indi¬cating that the onus is on arriving at the destination, and not on squabbling over the type of raft.
Moreover, as there are countless other Buddhas in the universe -- a fact also shared by Theravadins -- it is highly possible that some of them might have chosen to be reborn on earth to add their teaching to help us. Vimalakirti, for example, is reckoned to be an incarnation of Jinli Buddha, and Shan Dao an incarnation of Amitabha Buddha.
More significantly, the Mahayana sutras are probably closer to the Buddha's original teaching than the Theravada sutras. The Buddha's teaching was initially transmitted orally from masters to disciples, and was only written down as sutras about the first century BCE, a few hundred years after his parinirvana, because it was a tradition then that only personal transmission was worthy enough for the highest teaching. The Buddha's teaching was taught, and later written down, in many languages, but the two most important languages in India at that time were Sanskrit and Pali.
The Sanskrit sutras had been translated into Chinese since the second century CE, generally in a most meticulous manner under imperial order. The great translator Kumarajiva, for example, with 800 of the best minds the emperor could provide to help him, worked for a few years to translate and revise a sutra.
Sanskrit continued to flourish in India until the Muslim conquest in the 13th century, but by that time all the important Buddhist texts had long been translated into Chinese. So when Sanskrit became obsolete, Chinese succeeded it as the main language that recorded the Buddhist Canon. It is important to note that the transmission and preservation of the sutras in the Chinese Canon have been continuous.
In Sri Lanka, on the hand, the Buddhist Canon was first written down in Pali in the first century BCE at Aluvihara. Soon, "war and famine had depopulated the country and the oral transmission of the Pitakas was in danger. The holy language of the Canon was Pali, whereas the Commentaries were in Sinhalese." Because of social and political reasons, Pali also became obsolete.
Only about 400 CE a few Pali sutras were found in Sri Lanka. For the first time they were translated into Sinhalese, the main language of Sri Lanka. It is significant that at this same time in Sri Lanka, Maha¬yana Buddhism was also widely practised; for example in Abhayagiri Vihara, one of its principal monasteries, Mahayana doctrines and sutras were incorporated into the Theravada tradition practised in the monastery. It is therefore incompatible to say that Mahayana teaching was a later adulteration, when it was being practised in a prominent Theravada monastery at the time when the Theravada sutras, which the Theravada School claims to contain the original teaching of the Buddha, were first translated into Sinhalese. Moreover some Mahayanist teaching, such as the Bodhisattva concept, is still found in Theravada texts today, like mention¬ing that the Buddha-to-be cultivated for many lifetimes as a Bodhisattva before he was finally reborn as Siddhartha.
However, Theravada became the principal tradition in Sri Lanka when a council at Anuradhapura in 1160 ended the dissensions between the Mahavihara, a prominent Theravada monastery, and its rivals by suppressing them. Earlier in the previous century Theravada had spread to Burma, where Mahayana was also practised; and in the 14th century Sri Lankan Theravada was established in Thailand, which has continued to today as a stronghold of Theravada. However, beginning in the 16th century, the Portuguese perse¬cuted Theravadins in Sri Lanka, forcing many of them to become Roman Catholics.
The Theravada tradition in Sri Lanka was so severely affected that its sangha died out and monks had to be repeatedly imported from Burma and Thailand in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. Revival began about 1880, first stimulated by the Theosophical Society, then under the impulse of awakening nationalism. Today Sri Lanka has restored its position as the foremost champion of the Theravada tradition.
There were two significant breaks in the transmission of the Theravada tradition. The first break lasted about 400 years, starting in the first century BCE when the Buddha's teaching was first recorded in Pali, and then Pali became obsolete due to social and political reasons. Only a few Pali sutras were discovered about 400 CE, when they were for the first time translated into Sinhalese. The second break lasted about 300 years in the 17th, 18th ad 19th centuries, when the Theravada sangha in Sri Lanka died out, and its revival began about 1880. Thus the revived Theravada tradition in Sri Lanka today is only slightly more than a hundred years old.
On the other hand, the Mahayana tradition has been continuous in China for almost two thousand years. Sanskrit and Pali, in which the teachings of the Mahayana and the Theravada traditions were originally written, are now obsolete. The obsole-scence of Pali about first century BC affected the Theravada tradition severely, because it occurred soon after the start of recording sutras, with the result that only a few Pali sutras were available around 400 CE for translation to Sinhalese, the language of Sri Lanka today. Later, Pali revived for some time, but this revival could not recover the Pali sutras lost earlier. On the other hand, the obsolescence of Sanskrit about the 13th century had little effect on the Mahayana tradition, because long before that, by the 6th century, virtually all Mahayana sutras had been translated from Sanskrit to Chinese. There were also many translations after the 6th century, but they were improvement or revision over earlier versions.
Thus, with this historical background, it is sensible to ask whether those Mahayana sutras that are found in the Chinese Canon but not in the Pali Canon, are the result of their being lost in the Pali Canon, rather than their being added by later writers to the Chinese Canon. It is also significant to note that most of these Mahayana sutras in Chinese are also found in the Vajrayana tradition in the Tibetan Canon, which were mostly translated directly from Sanskrit.
There are also other reasons to suggest that the Mahayana tradition is closer than the Theravada tradition is, to the original teaching of the Buddha. At the Buddha's time, the Indian mind was already among the finest in the world, and the Indian people were highly philosophical and spiritual. Would such a people, keenly involved in seeking the mystery of man and the universe, and deeply trained in mystical experience, readily accept a religion that merely taught moral living on this earth, with little or no concern with meta¬physics and the after-life? It is reasonable to postulate that it was the Mahayana tradition, with its majestic grandeur of cosmic reality, rather than the Theravada tradition, with its stress on suffering and extinction, that had inspired kings to sacrifice the throne and men to sacrifice family life, to seek the ultimate truth.
Different Periods of the Buddha's Teaching
The Buddha taught for forty five years, from the time of his enlightenment at thirty five years of age to his parinirvana at eighty. He was an excellent teacher, always teaching according to the needs and levels of understanding of his disciples. Even an ordinary good teacher, teaching for any substantial length of time, would improve his methods and increase the amount of knowledge to be taught, as his students progress.
Do you think an excellent, selfless teacher like the Buddha, whose knowledge and wisdom is without any doubt unimaginably enormous, would continue teaching just the Four Noble Truth, the Noble Eight-fold Path, and the three doctrines of suffering (dukkha), impermanence (anicca), and non-soul (anatta) -- which he taught in the very first two sermons to humans in the Deer Park -- throughout his forty five years? Mahayanists and Vajrayanists believe that these form only his basic teaching for the first ten years in the Agama Period. The Buddha's teaching can be divided into the following five periods with their respective emphasis:
- The Avatamsaka (Flower Adornment) Period -- first seven days, emphasis on cosmic reality, recorded in the Avatamsaka or Hua Yen Sutra.
- The Agama (Transmission) Period -- first ten years, emphasis on moral purity and elimin¬ation of suffering, recorded in the Agama Sutras (or the Nikayas in the Theravada tradition).
- The Vaipulya (Development) Period -- next eight years, emphasis on compassion and the development of the Bodhisattva doctrine, recorded in sutras like Amitabha Sutras, Lankatavara Sutra, Surangama Sutra and Vimalakirti Nirdesa Sutra.
- The Prajna (Wisdom) Period -- next twenty years, emphasis on emptiness, recorded in the Wisdom Sutras.
- The Pundarika (Lotus) Period -- last seven years, emphasis on attaining Buddhahood, recorded in the Lotus Sutra and the Nirvana Sutra.
Mahayanists use many expedient means according to the needs and abilities of the followers, believing that there are many paths to the same goal. These expedient means include recitation of mantras and sutras, devotional worship of the Buddha and Bodhisattvas, transference of merits, moral discipline, practice of charity, meditation, and cultivation of wisdom. Many Mahayanists aim to go to heaven, which is comparatively easy if they accumulate good karma, because while there is only one heaven in most other religions, in Buddhism even in our Saha world system alone there are more than twenty heavens, before taking into account the countless heavens in other star systems, of which Amitabha Buddha's Western Paradise is only one of them. The Theravada School also believes in these heavens, but they are not emphasized, with the result that many Theravada followers may be denied a heavenly rebirth, as they may not be aware of the numerous heavens in Buddhism.
A more difficult and the most noble goal is nirvana or enlightenment, which can be attained in any realms of existence. Nevertheless, it is most difficult, but not impossible, to attain enlightenment in hell because conditions there are most unfavourable; it is almost equally difficult in heaven (with some exceptions like the Western Paradise, as will be explained in subsequent chapters) because conditions there are so joyful that heavenly beings have little incentive to cultivate. Hence, the Buddha and Buddhist masters have frequently reminded human beings to make full use of their opportunity, for their conditions for attaining enlightenment are most favourable. Enlightenment in the Mahayana tradition, or more commonly referred to as Buddhahood, is the actualization of transcendental cosmic reality. In other words, if you become a Buddha, you are awakened to the fact that you are actually the Supreme Reality. Can you think of a greater or more glorious attainment?
From Awakening to Enlightenment
In Mahayana philosophy, samsara and nirvana are not ontologically different; the difference is one of spiritual perspective. What is samsara to an ordinary person, is nirvana to an enlightened being. When he is unenlightened, he sees reality as the phenomenal world; he sees, for example, birds and people, streams and mountains as separated and differentiated. When he is enlightened, he sees reality as emptiness, where all duality, all separateness and differentiation cease. Thus, in the Mahayanist view, nirvana is not extinct¬ion, for there is nothing to be extinguished. There is no extinction of birds and people, streams and mountains, because they were not there in the first place. Their appearance was an illusion, created by the mind. Another unenlightened being operating under a different sets of conditions from us, such as a bacterium or a fairy, would have perceived the "same" phenomena differently.
What applies to the Mahayana tradition is generally applicable to the Vajrayana tradition too, because Vajrayana Buddhism is a development of Mahayana Budd¬hism, incorporating various prominent features from Tantricism and the Tibetan native Bon religion. Yet, because of this incorporation, there are some noticeable differences between these two traditions. The Mahayana teaching is open, but much of Vajrayana teaching is secretive, taught only to initiated disciples, which is a legacy of Tantricism. Mahayanists cultivate to go to heaven or to attain enlightenment, but while these are also the main aims of Vajrayanists, some Vajrayanists are also concerned with developing magical powers for more immediate purposes like curing illness, obtaining material wealth, exorcising evil spirits, and causing terror in an enemy, which are legacies of Tantricism as well as the Bon religion.
It should be pointed out that Mahayana, Vajrayana and Theravada are not three different Buddhisms; they are three Buddhist traditions representing different developments and emphasis of the same religion. Needless to say, the Mahayanist claim that Theravada Buddhism is only a preparatory stage, is made in good faith and sincerity, and is never meant as a slight to Theravadins. Mahayanists are also aware of the very meritorious work Theravadins have been doing in spreading Buddhism. Just as Mahayanist masters have impartially examined how valid the Theravadin claim is, that the Mahayana teaching is a later adulteration, it is hoped that for their own and their followers' sake, Theravadin masters would honestly examine whether the Mahayana teaching is really the Buddha's advanced teaching, so that they too can confidently look forward to experience nirvana in all its glory and magnificence, instead of being undecided whether it is total extinction.
It is also heartening to note that the supreme aim of Buddhism, especially as expressed in the Mahayana tradition, is similar to that of all the other world religions, despite their superficial, ritualistic difference. As William James mentioned in his classic The Varieties of Religious Experiences, "the overcoming of all usual barriers between the individual self and the Absolute is the great mystic achievement. In mystic states we both become one with the Absolute and we become aware of our oneness. This is the everlasting and triumphant mystical tradition, hardly altered by differences of clime or creed."
The Buddhist attainment is even deeper and more lasting. There are many levels of enlightenment; and a mystic glimpse of transcendental cosmic reality, like the one described above, is of an earlier level, known in Zen Buddhism as an awakening, or wu in Chinese, and satori or kensho in Japanese. At the ultimate level of perfect enlightenment, which is quite some distance from the earlier level of awakening, the spiritual fulfillment is not just a cosmic glimpse, but a total, unobstructed becoming of the Supreme Reality, known as bodhi or Buddhahood.
The similarity between Buddhism and other religions in their spiritual aims and accomplishments, like going to heaven in an after-life, or awakening to transcendental cosmic reality here and now, is one of several reasons why Buddhists genuinely respect all other religions. Although it is probably the religion with the most followers in the world today, and has never once in history resorted to force nor said a harsh word against any other religion, it has not attempted any active conversion of followers. Except for monks who literally have to beg to be admitted into the Sangha or Buddhist monastic order, one becomes a Buddhist in a most unofficial and unobtrusive way, often being unaware of the process itself. A person becomes a Buddhist by practising the Buddha's teaching, like disciplining oneself in moral purity, showing loving-kindness to all beings, and cultivating wisdom for spiritual development.
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