Explanations by Master Cheng-Yan
Subject: Helping the Buddha to Promote the Teachings (助宣佛化 廣度眾生)
Date: June.23.2017
“He manifested as a Hearer and used the skillful means of the Small Vehicle to benefit sentient beings. He transformed others and enabled them to establish supreme Bodhi and practice to benefit others. He helped the Buddha to promote the teachings and would constantly do the work of the Buddhas to benefit all living beings. This reveals that Purna, from past kalpas until today, long had the merits and virtues of a Buddha.”
Let us try to mindfully experience and better understand why, over this period time, we have been continually talking about Purna, Purna Maitrayaniputra. He had helped the Buddha to promote the teachings in order to deliver sentient beings. This was the Buddha’s goal in appearing in the world. People can promote the Dharma; the Dharma cannot promote itself. Most important is that people promote the Buddha-Dharma. If there is no one to promote the path to enlightenment, if no one mindfully paves this path, then people will not know they can walk it. So, someone must blaze this trail; someone must pave the path. Those who promote the Dharma are like people paving a road. They know how to get from where they are to the destination. If we know the goal but not the path to get there, then we will never arrive. So, although the Buddha told us that everyone intrinsically has Buddha-nature, that everyone can attain Buddhahood, the method of attaining Buddhahood, the way to reach enlightenment, requires thorough spiritual practice.
How do we cultivate these methods of spiritual practice? We must get rid of afflictions and ignorance. How many kinds of ignorance and afflictions are there? How do we get rid of these afflictions, of this ignorance? We need a group of people who take the Buddha’s intent as their mission, who form aspirations and make vows just like the Buddha did, who let go of limited love to take up great love, who have gotten rid of their attached love for their small families to join the great family of the Sangha. How should we listen to the Buddha’s guidance, and how should we get rid of ignorance? How great is the connection between ignorance and spiritual practice? They are intimately connected! So, we must earnestly listen to the Dharma, because in our spiritual practice we must eliminate our ignorance in order to be able to return to our nature of True Suchness. Our nature of True Suchness has gotten caught in our ignorance. It has been covered by our ignorance. Thus it is impossible for our nature of True Suchness to manifest.
What is ignorance? Ignorance is our habitual tendencies. Our habitual tendencies is to constantly struggle, to strive for what we crave and wish to possess. “These are my prejudices and attachments; I just want it to be like this.” We only think of ourselves; we feel that everything should be ours, that we are always right. Even with other people’s things, other people’s possessions, we fight to make them our own. Isn’t the world today just like this? The business world is like a battlefield. To satisfy their greed, people disregard everything else. We open up markets, and once markets are opened up, the factories will open up soon after. Factories must respond to what the market needs, and the market responds to what people need. Humans are always focused on desire, on enjoyment, so there are so many things that people need. People have needs, and as long as consumers have things they need, the marketplace will try to [provide it], by any means necessary. However things are marketed, once many things have been sold, the factories begin [mass production]. Where do the raw materials for these factories come from? They come from the mountains, rivers and the earth. To get at the world’s raw materials, we continually destroy the earth. This is the cycle that has continued until our climate and the whole macrocosm has become imbalanced as a result. This is a series issue, because the four elements of the world are now out of balance and the mountains, rivers and land are destroyed. When will this stop? We are unable to stop it. It will only stop when people’s ideas, when those subtle ideas, can be transformed, when we have fewer desires and can be content and cherish material things to preserve the life of these material resources. If we can do this, just from these very small thoughts, from these small actions in daily living, if each person, each individual can change their attitudes toward even these smallest of things, then we will be able to form a pure and good human society. The beautiful virtues of simplicity and frugality will naturally affect commerce and industry so we can protect the earth. This is nothing but a state of mind.
All of humanity is like this, but what does this have to do with partial practice? Because it is already impossible for human to bring their thoughts back [under their control], the only way I with the Dharma, the principles. The Buddha is the Great Enlightened One; He thoroughly penetrated all the principles of the universe, including how our thoughts, from the smallest of sources, spread out like this until our heart’s desires encompass the earth. Nowadays, as soon as people’s thoughts stir, their [desires] spread so quickly that to try and pull them back is very difficult. This is something we must help everyone thoroughly understand. We see how everyone, all sentient beings, already face all kinds of [suffering], not only from the imbalance of the four elements, but also from the imbalance in the four elements of the body, from birth, aging, illness and death, from the mental suffering that comes from parting with those we love, from meeting those we hate and from not getting what we want. This is the suffering of nature; disasters and impermanence and constantly created with continually increasing frequency, drawing continually closer to us. This all started with humans. Humans, in confusion and ignorance, ignorantly become ensnared in delusion, become lost in this web. Only the Buddha-Dharma can help; He had to start from the beginning to teach us about life, teach us how we should live. If one person says this, is that enough? The Buddha was already enlightened. Even though He is the Great Enlightened One, even though His spiritual powers are great, His affinities were not enough. For the affinities of one person to encompass this great space, to reach everything universally, is difficult. To encompass this great space, we need everyone to pass on the teachings to each other and connect heart to heart. All our hearts must connect through the Dharma. The Dharma must be procaimed through our speech, but to genuinely connect to the Buddha-mind and comprehend the Buddha’s intent is truly not easy. Without great causes and conditions, it is truly difficult.
Purna Maitrayaniputra comprehended the Buddha’s intent. He understood the Buddha’s intent and likewise understood the minds of the world’s sentient beings. Sentient beings’ desires and sentient beings’ behaviors were all very clearly understood by him. This is how he was; he still manifested as a Small Vehicle Hearer, still engaged in spiritual practice together with his fellow practitioners to deliver them through “working together”; by working together, they could experience the Buddha’s teachings. In any case, among the Hearers, it was Purna Maitrayaniputra who could most thoroughly understand the principles of all things in the universe, the things the Buddha taught and the Dharma contained within them not only in regard to people, but all the world’s matters, things and principles. He wanted to help people understand.
However, for people, merely understanding others’ minds is difficult; how can we possibly comprehend the states of the matters, things and principles of the macrocosm? This is very difficult. So, he had to use all sorts of skillful means; more and more people are needed to help the Buddha promote the teachings. So, the Buddha continually praised Purna in the hope that his fellow practitioners, those monastic disciples, would shoulder the mission of passing down the Dharma, in the hope they would let go of small families to work for the great family of the whole world. The Buddha [knew] the strong points and shortcomings of each disciple in the Sangha. In the Lotus Sutra, He let them express these themselves, one by one, or else the Buddha would praise them like this. Sariputra told of his own shortcomings as well. The four disciples including Mahakasyapa were the same. They too had confessed their own faults. Purna Maitrayaniputra was also the same; he praised the Buddha’s wisdom as something that neither these disciples nor ordinary people could possibly comprehend. This shows that from where he was, the Buddha’s views and understanding, His merits and virtue and wisdom were still quite a ways off. This was made evident in previous passages.
Spiritual practice always follows a sequence. In the Sangha, we concentrate on understanding the Buddha’s teachings, and after understanding, we need a sense of mission. Our mission is to take the Dharma and use all kinds of skillful means to benefit sentient beings. Sentient beings are suffering greatly. Sentient beings, in the midst of their suffering, are still creating karma. Even the smallest thoughts in our minds can cause the entire earth to become imbalanced. The affairs of the world are great issues; people’s discursive thoughts and ways of thinking are very insignificant. But these kinds of subtle thoughts can influence the entire world and cause the four elements to become imbalanced. This is very inconceivable!
We previously spoke of the “butterfly effect”. We can simply look at the butterfly’s state and thus know that throng wind are coming. The principle is the same. Although or thoughts are insignificantly small, they can significantly influence the whole world and many great issues.
Yet, there are so many things we do not know; we are deluded. Don’t we speak now of the web? Of the internet? Now, everything is on the internet. The internet can help us understand everything, but we can also become tangled up in the internet. Our spiritual wisdom can become tangled up in the internet so that we cannot be released from it. We can become lost in this web. How do we escape, escape from the web of delusion and spread a network of Bodhisattvas? The Lotus Sutra already mentioned several times nets of pearls and coral, nets of the seven kinds of treasures. This is a network of Bodhisattvas; they connect all manner of things. Once connected, we can awaken and then continue upon this path, connecting eventually to the mind of the Buddha and to this enlightened love within us. This is the web of the Dharma, a network of Bodhisattvas. When everyone upholds the Dharma, we can connect our minds together. Then we can pave this path of awakening through everyone’s hearts. So, now in this great era, we must clearly discern right and wrong. We should all understand well that right and wrong are separated by only the space of a single though. So, “He manifested as a Hearer”. Although he knew so many things, Purna Maitrayaniputra remained within the Sangha and “used skillful means to benefit sentient beings”. He wanted to “transform others, enable them to establish supreme Bodhi and practice to benefit others”. It was more skillful to do it this way. The way the Buddha expanded the Sangha was by sending His monastics out to promote the Buddha‘s teachings so that everyone would know them, so everyone would understand the principles of all things in the universe, of how people create karma and multiply their afflictions. These are intimately tied. They helped everyone open their minds and be clear and not again become entangled by outer things. These people could put aside their small families, sever attachments to limited love, and thus join this great family in order to experience the Buddha-Dharma.
Strengthening the Buddha-Dharma in the world, they enabled others to “establish supreme Bodhi and practice to benefit others”. We begin our spiritual practice to be able to further benefit sentient beings. If we want to benefit even more sentient beings, then we ourselves must establish supreme Bodhi, must establish our own awakened path. If we have not yet established our own awakened path, then how can we practice to benefit others? So, we use all kinds of methods to benefit sentient beings, to teach and transform them, help them open their minds and put things aside. By engaging in focused spiritual practice, we will better be able to benefit others.
Bodhisattvas give rise to Bodhicitta and, from one, give rise to infinity. So, this is why we must “help the Buddha to promote the teachings”. We must mindfully try to help, to assist the Buddha with His teachings. So, we “help the Buddha to promote the teaching and constantly do the work of the Buddhas”. We must constantly use what the Buddha taught us, the precepts, Samadhi and wisdom He taught us. The Buddha’s work is to bring scattered minds and undisciplined ways of living back to a dignified demeanor so that people would see the Sangha in unison, replete with dignity. This is a simple life, yet dignified. Thus He first needed to help the Sangha flourish; this was called doing the Buddha’s work. For the Buddha-Dharma to be spread widely, He first had to establish the dignity of the place of practice and the spiritual practitioners. He wanted the place of practice to be pure, so He established rules to maintain dignity. Then when sentient beings approached, they would naturally feel joy, and a feeling of trust would arise toward the Buddha’s teachings and religion. This is what benefiting sentient beings by doing the Buddha’s work means. It is “helping the Buddha promote the teachings and constantly doing the work of the Buddhas”. The monastics here in the Abode are also like this. We strive to make our resident practitioners our monastic community and our spiritual training ground all very dignified. A dignified spiritual training ground is a living spiritual training ground. Where is this living spiritual training ground? It is among the people, among the Sangha, among the people and in our everyday living. So, we “constantly do the work of the Buddhas to benefit all sentient beings”. Then when people see us, they feel joy; they form aspirations and make vows. This is a kind of education. This is a place of practice where we are educated, a spiritual training ground for guiding and transforming sentient beings.
A place of practice for guiding sentient beings is not about erecting grand buildings in a beautiful environment where people can come to play for a while, then happily go back home, no. It is a place where they can come open their minds. This is what spiritual practice and the principles have always been about. We must help people attain the principles so that upon returning home, they can actualize the principles in their daily living, so they can actualize them in the world. Only by doing this are we “helping the Buddha to promote the teachings and constantly doing the work of the Buddhas to benefit all living beings”. Only then have we truly established our spiritual training ground. We all need to be very mindful. So, this also reveals how, “Purna, from past kalpas until today, long had the merits and virtues of a Buddha”. Purna is Purna Maitrayaniputra. The Buddha continuously praised him. For 40 years He continuously praised Purna, the way he engaged in spiritual practice, seeking the Dharma while transforming others. He helped many others to understand better ever more thoroughly. So, this was not the work of a single lifetime. He had been accumulating this over the course of many kalpas, for a very long time, for dust-inked kalpas, since the rime of Great Unhindered Buddha or the time of the Sun-Moon-Lamp Buddha. For many kalpas, he kept following the teachings of those Buddhas, helping those Buddhas to promote their teachings in order to deliver sentient beings. while engaged in spiritual practice in the presence of 9villion Buddhas, he listened to what those Buddhas had taught. This is what he did for a very long time.
This is what the previous passages reveal. He was not only at Sakyamuni Buddha’s Dharma-assembly, but it the presence of 9 billion past Buddhas too. Whatever those Buddhas taught he practiced in those Buddhas’ presence, He practiced in those Buddhas’ Dharma-assemblies, accepted the teachings those Buddhas taught. This continually accumulated in this way. So it says, “From past kalpas until today, [he] long had the merits and virtues of a Buddha.” he continually accumulated these like this, accumulated them for a long time.
Dear Bodhisattvas, we must be mindful. We must not be a Bodhisattva in name only, but in true essence as well. I address you all as Bodhisattvas, but you must live up to the name and form Bodhisattva-aspirations. Although we now manifest as ordinary people and enter the teachings as unenlightened beings, our minds must have been transformed by Buddhas over the course of many kalpas, hence we have the causes and conditions to be willing to quietly sit here and listen to the Buddha-Dharma. This is not without its causes and conditions. so, we must put effort into forming great aspirations, making great vows and discerning right and wrong in these great times. If it is incorrect, we must change right away. If it is correct, we must quickly enact it now. Otherwise, we will not make it in time. Koko [the gorilla] said this as well. We must hasten to save protect the earth. nature is watching to see what humankind will do. We must truly be mindful.
So, the previous passage said, “The people in those Buddhas’ times all said that he was in truth a Hearer, but Purna was using this skillful means to benefit countless hundreds of thousands os sentient beings.”
“Those Buddhas” refers to those countless kalpas in the past. At the Dharma-assemblies of the 9 billion Buddhas, lifetime after lifetime, time after time, in those Buddha’s Dharma-assemblies, in those times, in those places, everyone always looked upon Purna as if he were a Hearer. Purna, lifetime after lifetime, was always likewise “using these skillful means”. He used the body of a Hearer; life after life he became a monastic. With the body of a Hearer, in times when there were Buddhas, he would practice at those Buddha’s training grounds. When those Buddhas taught the Dharma, he would listen reverently to it, listen earnestly and diligently, all in order to benefit countless hundreds of thousands of sentient beings. this is how Purna Maitrayaniputra ehgaged in spiritual practice over the course many lifetimes.
The next sutra passage then says, “He also transformed infinite asankyas of people and enabled them to establish Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi. In order to purify Buddha-lands, he constantly did the work of the Buddhas by teaching and transforming sentient beings.”
Sakyamuni Buddha is still praising Purna Maitrayaniputra,how he had practiced in the past as well, how he engaged in spiritual practice in each of those Buddhas’ Dharma-assemblies. Manifesting as a Hearer, engaging in spiritual practice like this, he continued to “transform infinite asankyas of people.
“Asankyas” means countless numbers. Their number was impossible to count. He “enabled them to establish Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi.” He did not merely go somewhere to teach and bring in 500-plus people, then go back to engage in spiritual practice with the Buddha. since long ago in the past, he had similarly been transforming and delivering infinite asankyas of people. These are countless numbers of people, difficult to calculate. He helped them form aspirations, helped them experience the Buddha’s principles of the wondrous Dharma. So, he had earnestly engaged in spiritual practice and earnestly awakened to Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi for himself.
He also transformed infinite asankyas of people and enable them to establish Anuttara-sanyak-sambodhi: He had enabled countless people to comprehend the great path and become form in their spiritual aspiration to enter the treasury of Right Dharma and the ocean of wisdom to reach supreme, perfect enlightenment.
Purna Maitrayaniputra delivered so many people. See, when one person becomes awakened, one will then give rise to infinity. He was able to awaken so many people, to teach and transform so many. So, this was “in order to purify Buddha-lands. Purna Maitrayaniputra wished to help the Buddha purify the world and turn it into a Buddha-land. Thus, “He constantly did the work of the Buddhas by teaching and transforming sentient beings. always with a dignified demeanor, he traveled throughout the world; his mobile training ground was in the world. When people saw him, they would be happy. When they listened to him teach, they would form aspirations and make vows. This is “purifying the Buddha-lands.” In his actions and behavior, he always maintained a dignified demeanor. Whenever he opened his mouth to teach, everyone was able to accept it.
So, “He had enabled countless people.” These asankyas of people, these countless numbers, a great many people, could “comprehend the great path”. He enabled everyone to realize the principles of the great path and “become firm in their spiritual aspirations.” After everyone accepted the Dharma, their spiritual aspirations were firm. They even “entered the treasury of Right Dharma and the ocean of wisdom.” When people heard his teachings, they not understood the Buddha-Dharma, their spiritual aspirations also became firm. Every day they “entered the treasury of Right Dharma and the ocean of wisdom.” So everyone, with regard to the Dharma, naturally “reached supreme, perfect enlightenment.” They sought the principles of supreme, universal and perfect enlightenment. “In order to purify Buddha-lands, he constantly did the work of the Buddhas by teaching and transforming sentient beings.”
In order to purify Buddha-lands, he constantly did the work of the Buddhas by teaching and transforming sentient beings: The lands that Buddhas transform are divided into pure lands, impure lands, reward-lands, Dharma-nature lands and so on. All Buddhas’ dignified demeanor and conduct, all of Their behavior, are all part of the work of the Buddhas.
The lands transformed by Buddhas are pure, but these pure Buddha-lands do not need Buddhas to enter them to teach and transform. So, a Buddha’s ideal is to entre impure lands where they can teach and transform sentient beings so that these become pure lands. Thus, it says ” the lands that Buddhas transform.” These are called Buddha-lands. Actually, there are pure lands, there are impure lands, and there are reward-lands. This is about the ground of the Buddha’s mind. His mind abides in a pure land, yet He vows to enter impure lands, evil worlds of the Five Turbidities. He willingly enters places like this, like the evil world of the Five Turbidities, like the four forms of birth and the Five Realms. He likewise goes to these places in order to transform sentient beings. Wherever sentient beings’ karma leads them, wherever sentient beings’ circumstantial and direct retributions lead them, He follows them in their circumstantial and direct retributions and goes among them like this. As for circumstantial and direct retributions, there was period of time in the past when I repeatedly kept on explaining these to everyone. Our karma determines our circumstantial retribution, so we come here under the circumstances of this land. Those with blessings are drawn by their karma to blessed lands where there is peace and favorable weather, where the people are prosperous. Even the family they are born into has kind parents who are well-off. They have a good environment and extended family. This is the circumstantial retribution of those with blessings. Their circumstantial retribution takes them there. And their direct retribution? If they have created blessings but also [negative] karma, their blessings lead them to such an environment, and they are born in such a place. However, with their direct retribution, not long after they are born, there are changes in their country. Their country becomes unstable. There is unrest in the country that affects the family and so on.
This is like the tide of refugees which we constantly talk about now. Syria in the past was also a very wealthy country. In the past, in the history of Iraq, it had also once been very wealthy. But people’s minds are not in harmony, and with this constant turmoil it changed, changed over the years to become a broken country from which the people have fled. This is direct retribution. So, the two types of retribution, both circumstantial and direct retribution, determine one’s reward-land. The Buddha is in a pure land. He Himself is in a pure land but He cannot bear sentient beings’ [suffering], so He goes where they are, follows sentient beings in their retributions in order to deliver them. Sentient beings’ reward-lands are places where the Buddha wants to go. But the land of Dharma-nature is the ground of the mind of the Buddha’s own Dharma-nature. With Buddha-nature, the ground of the mind is fundamentally a pure land. The Buddha’s pure land is the ground of the mind of His Dharma-nature. Outside, people form so many discriminations, but the Buddha-nature is intrinsically like this, so pure. The Buddha-land is pure. This is the Buddha-nature.
So, “All Buddhas’ dignified demeanor and conduct, all of their behavior, are all part of the work of the Buddhas.” The pure lands of all Buddhas are like this. They are so dignified in demeanor. Their behavior and conduct, their actions, are all so dignified in demeanor. So, for each of us, our bodies are a spiritual training ground. There are so many people with dignified demeanors, with propriety and discipline, gathered together in a great place of practice, with such a spiritual atmosphere. This is a pure land. This is a great spiritual training ground where people can come to be educated. So, “In order to purify the lands, he constantly did the work of the Buddhas by teaching and transforming sentient beings.” As he went among the people, among the bhiksus, he hoped everyone would have such dignity, have demeanor and conduct like this, have such propriety in their comings and goings. We must have this kind of demeanor, a very dignified appearance. All of this is “doing the work of the Buddhas.”
Spiritual practice is done to bring out this kind of spiritual training ground. So, “Because we want to purify Buddha-lands, we follow the Buddhas’ practices.”
Because we want to purify Buddha-lands, we follow the Buddhas’ practices. This is called doing the work of the Buddhas. What we ourselves attain, we teach to transform others. Through our practices to benefit others, we dignify and purify our own Buddha-lands. Without forming affinities with sentient beings, Bodhisattvas have no chance to transform them. Then how can they attain the causes and conditions to reach Buddhahood?
In helping the Buddha purify the Buddha-lands, although we say that we are helping the Buddha, we are in fact helping ourselves; we engage in spiritual practice for the sake of purifying our own minds. The Buddha’s Dharma-nature is pure. Our Dharma-nature is likewise pure, it is just that ours has been defiled by ignorance. Fundamentally, our Dharma-nature is pure. Once we get rid of our ignorance, our Dharma-nature id fundamentally pure. So, all of us have always been replete with a pure Buddha-land. But now we must start again from the beginning. To get rid of ignorance, we must practice earnestly and diligently. “We follow the Buddhas’ practices.” We should learn to emulate the Buddha’s dignified demeanor in delivering sentient beings. Purna Maitrayaniputra learning this. He could accomplish this. so, “This is called doing the work of the Buddhas. “What we ourselves attain, we teach to transform others. We ourselves must learn what the Buddha taught, learn the Buddha’s teachings of precepts, Samadhi and wisdom, faith, vows and practice. When we have all learned this we will have gained insights that in turn we teach to others. This is very important.
Dear Bodhisattvas, this is what it means to be Buddhist practitioners. We must continuously benefit sentient beings in order to truly perfect our own practice. We take this practice of benefiting others to say we are transforming sentient beings, when in fact, we are training ourselves and our own Buddha-lands. So, without earnestly forming good affinities with sentient beings, Bodhisattva will not. We must quickly form good affinities with people; Bodhisattvas want to transform sentient beings. if those who are called Bodhisattvas do not seize the opportunity to transform sentient beings, how will they have a chance to attain Buddhahood? So, when we give to help other people, we are creating affinities with sentient beings. this is purifying our own dignified Buddha-lands, thus, we must earnestly seize the moment and mindfully connect our mind the Buddha’s. in our conduct we should unite with Bodhisattvas and all sentient beings. if we can do this, we will draw nearer to the path to Buddhahood. So, we must always be mindful.
(Source: Da Ai TV – Wisdom at Dawn program – Explanation by Master Chen-Yen)
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