6. Main doctrinal traditions (2). Mahayana developments

Excerpts from the Lotus Sutra

Excerpts from the Lotus Sutra"

These are excerpts (ch.1, ch. 2 and ch 16) from the Lotus Sutra, one of the most popular and influential Mahayana Sutra. The oldest parts of the text were probably written down between 100 BCE and 100 CE, and most of the text had appeared by 200 CE. Originally written in Sanskrit, was promptly translated into Chinese by 300 CE, becoming one of the most widespread Sutra in Est Asia. It presents important doctrinal innovations, such as the idea of a Supramundane Buddha who eternally adapt his teachings to help sentient beings attain liberation.

Excerpt 1

"Thus have I heard, at one time the Buddha dwelt on Mount Grdhrakuta, near the City of the House of the Kings, together with a gathering of Great monks [...]. After the Buddha had spoken this Sutra, he sat in full lotus and entered the meditation of the station of limitless principles, body and mind unmoving.
At that time there fell from the heavens a rain of mandarava flowers, mahamandarava flowers, manjushaka flowers, and mahamanjushaka flowers, which were scattered upon the Buddha and the entire great assembly.
All the Buddhas universes quaked in six ways.
At that time the entire great assembly of monks, lay devotees, gods, dragons, yakshas, gandharvas, asuras, garudas, kinnaras, mahoragas, beings human and non-human, as well as the minor kings, the wheel-turning sage kings, all attained what they had never had before. They rejoiced and joined their palms and, with one heart, gazed upon the Buddha.
Then the Buddha emitted from between his brows a white hair-mark light which illumined eighteen thousand worlds to the east, omitting none of them, reaching below to the Avichi hells and above to the Akanishtha Heaven. From this world were seen all the living beings in the six destinies in those lands".

Excerpt 2

"At that time the World Honored One arose serenely from meditation and told Shariputra, “The wisdom of all the Buddhas is extremely profound and unlimited. The gateway to this wisdom is difficult to understand and difficult to enter. It cannot be known by any of the Hearers or solitary Buddhas.
What is the reason? The Buddhas have, in the past, drawn near to countless hundreds of thousands of tens of thousands of millions of Buddhas, exhaustively practicing the unlimited teachings of the Way of those Buddhas. They are forging ahead with courage and vigor and their names are known everywhere.”
“They have accomplished the most profound Teaching, one which has never been before, and speak of it according to what is appropriate, but its purport is difficult to understand.”
“Shariputra, from the time I realized Buddhahood, I have, by means of various causes and conditions and various analogies, extensively proclaimed the verbal teaching. With countless skillful means, I have guided living beings, leading them to separate from all attachments.”

Excerpt 3

"From the time I attained Buddhahood, The eons that have passed Are limitless hundreds of thousands of myriads [...]
I always speak the Dharma to teach and transform
Countless millions of living beings,
So they enter the Buddha-Way.
And throughout these limitless eons,
In order to save living beings,
I expediently manifest Nirvana.
But in truth I do not pass into quiescence.
I remain here always speaking the Dharma.
At that time I and the assembly
All appear together on Magic Vulture Mountain,
Where I say to living beings
That I am always here and never cease to be".

Excerpts from the Lotus Sutra
Translated by the Buddhist Text Translation Society
http://cttbusa.org/lotus/lotus_contents.asp
(chapters 1, 2 & 16)

The Bodhisattva

The Bodhisattva

Wheel of Samsara

A representation of a Bodhisattva, called Avalokiteshvara. The Bodhisattva is the ideal of perfection of the Mahayana practitioner, namely, to attain enlightenment and to lead other beings towards it. At the same time, this idea gave birth to the worship of Celestial Bodhisattvas, to whom ask help for liberation.

Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara with One Thousand Hands and One Thousand Eyes
Bronze. China. 11th–12th century
Rogers Fund, 1956
Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)
http://www.metmuseum.org

Amitayus Buddha in his paradise

Amitayus Buddha in his paradise

Wheel of Samsara

This painting depicts Amitayus, one of the most revered Supramundane Buddhas of the Mahayana pantheon. This representation of a wondrous paradise reflect a development from an abstract ideal of liberation - like the extinction in Nirvana - to a more appeasing heaven.

Amitayus Buddha in His Paradise
Distemper with gold on cloth. Tibet (ca. 1700)
Purchase, Barbara and William Karatz
Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York)
http://www.metmuseum.org