From what i know a Buddha is one who has become awakened....a common sentient who becomes awakened....

Once you start in with primordial Buddhas i think your talking about something else....

It's wierd how the Nichiern sects are in consatnt flux....from what i gather...they have all changed since the Master....yes /// No?

I've been here for awhile now and no one sect can state exactly what the Master intended or agree on practically the simpliest of matters...

Sad this is

Sad this has become....

will it ever get back to the days of Nichiren with absolute certanty....how can this be

Doctor Who, no not ready, the master is Nichiren, he had put down all his teaching in over 900+ of writings / gosho.
The issue is it is extremely difficult to follow the teachings literally and fundmentally in the reality , especially in middle age Japan, unless all his those disciples are willing to take the similar persecutions same as their master.
The different schools that follows each has different intereptation of either compromising too much or took it exterme rigid without assessing the various condition.
These are just different approaches , but they all have the similar goal of to achieve Kosen Rufu, casting away all those provisional methods and reveal the ulitmate truth.
The success of the emerging practitioners who embraced the Lotus Sutra teaching in this Latter Age of Dharma is itself the valid proofs in Nichiren's advocation.
That's why they constinue to carry Nichiren's name in their lineages and could came together when the title of 'Rissho Daishi" was bestowed to Nichiren.

Ansanna

How do you expect to accomplish kosen rufu if the spirit of the master is lost....Nichiren wanted his legacy to unfold as did the the martyrs and members of his time...in Ita doshin....lets be honest...there is none btw the existing sects...they continue to schism along....now from what i read even the SGI is schismed inside ...no one knows if Nichiren is to be the true Buddha of Kuon ganjo or not in sgi it seems.....


I like robbie's take on the whole deal...but even here sides are drawn up on every subject.....

why is this....


Seriously ...lets a say a total new comer to this site asked....

Who is teaching exactly like the Master who started it all and what sect should i join....

it can't be answered.....

i say this cause one day before the sgi schism....i prayed....i faced east and asked....what is this all about ...is the dai gohonzon really real?

Tell me ...i have devoted my entire life to this practice......

one year later at a new year's celebration the news was announced to the general populace of SGI......


i have talked and asked here questions questions.....repracticed my faith...tried it over and over...and every time i come to this conclusion....it's lost....toally lost....


the fact here some say that even the lotus sutra was totally invented well after Gotama's death and from like some persian scholoar...perplexis me to no end....and that Mahayana came after Gotama's death.....

i mean wow......


sorry people that i'm this cynical.....but as the saying goes ...without doubts ...wihout the right questions.....


there seems to be proof that the plank od wood known as the dai gohonzon is just some myth and that the actuall tools used to make it were not even invented at the time it was suppossed to be inscribed...leaving shoshu's and the old gakki's 3 great secrte laws...a sham...


i want to know reality....i want to know if there is a God or not....is buddhism real?

Buddhists in all sectcs pray to buddha...the very guy who demanded they don't pray to him....yet millions line up everyday burning incense hoping...and priests let it happen....

i'm completelty totally confused ...where as at one time i knew!

sorry for even asking and editing that post a million times...i'm at a crisis....

it seems my chanting has led me to run from this religion...really...i'm serious!!!!

Who.

Maybe listen to your favorite music, relax, forget about it, and enjoy the moment. It is an awesomely beautiful day here.

robin

Who,

I think the study is very very good, but, if we don't chant, no study will change our life... I think of it as the prospect that comes with medicines, I read it usually, but I eat the pill, I don't go to the university to be a doctor before I take the pill...

I have a lot of interrogants, but I have a clear big sure answer to all of them and more: the Lotus Sutra strategy -> daimoku

when somebody says 'no response', well, see your attitude... are you chanting to outside or to receive something from outside or to inside nurturing your Buddha nature, to see your life, your karma and change what is wrong?

secondly, are your chanting just for yourself or to make a difference for other people? are you looking for some egoistic reward or to help others?

well, that's all my very limited English make me able to write

Big hug

I really do not understand this level of jadedness and cynicism at all - maybe I can't relate to it because I was never in SGI. I mean, I've heard people talk about it, but I have no first-hand experience of it.

I also don't understand why some people have to take everything so literally and have these perfect, rational explanations for everything, and no apparent ability to stomach uncertainty of any kind. I see it all the time on this site (not just the Nichiren boards) and I just don't get it.

Probably nobody's teaching is exactly like Nichiren's, because we aren't living in 13th century Japan. Why do some people think that because a teaching has changed, evolved, or expanded, that it necessarily means that it's become distorted or corrupted?

The Mahayana arose well after the time of the historical Buddha, and the Lotus Sutra was surely not literally taught by him - is there seriously anyone who questions or does not know this? If so, then I am absolutely dumbfounded. Now, the precedent for these teachings is certainly there in the early Buddhist scriptures. I really don't get what the big deal is.

It's a popular thing to say that the Buddha told people not to venerate him, but I've never seen the cold hard proof that he actually said any such thing. In fact, I seem to remember parts of the Pali scriptures (which many like to uphold as definitive Buddhist scriptures, another thing I don't really get, considering they were put on paper about the same time the Mahayana scriptures appeared - i.e., hundreds of years after the Buddha's passing) where he said the exact opposite. Personally, I think these kinds of devotional practices are very valuable.

Sorry if this post sounds snotty, I don't mean it that way.

Well Bodhi and austex...thanks for putting your time into this for me...i really appreciate it....

Bodhi..i needed the hug....you knew that ,i can tell from your compassionate post....thank you....


austex i hear ya and yes i'm jaded beyond redemption of practice....i think i blew it somewheres or just burnt the whole thing out...

we used to sing this song...let me see if i recall.....

Do your gongyo early in the morning
Daimoku late at night
Gonna follow president ikeda
Gonna make the planet peaceful and bright
Shakkubukku is the way to kosen rufu

Keep chantin keep chamting
we just got 20 years to go....



i think back then they were competing with trancendendtal meditation's claim of 20 years of pracitice and your emlightened....

maybe it was just to keep ya round for that long....


no one thats been round in any of the nichiren sects diplays enlightenment or like mega happy happy life.....

i know ...i know....more jaded ness....


thanks anyway....


it's all so not lived up to my expectations...and i think religion has given me false hope....

Religion rubs me the same way. Thats why I have been looking at it as a philosophy to improve myself. If I improve myself enough will I be enlightened? Who knows....(o.k. bad pun )

I think it is because linguists can date the composition. For example, :the Rigveda was probably not written down until the Gupta period(4th to 6th century CE). The oldest surviving manuscripts date to the 11th century." However, the contents are dated to 1500 to to 200 BC. So that puppy was an oral tradition for as much as 2500 years.

On the Pali Canon, iirc, there are layers or strata within the corpus. I think the older layers show a greater sophistication of thought. There are fewer fantastic events. It is as though the more complex discourses were condensed into fables. Also, words that have more distinct meanings in early strata tend to be used as synonyms in later strata. I do not know the details of how compositions are dated; but it sounds reasonable enough to me.

r

Have you met all of them to know that? How would you define an Enlightened life? I can float in the air and emit beams of light from my brow; how is that?

I'm not a bad person....all i do is try to brighten people's day....and do good....

i don't even let the offline world see this side of me that i am trying to share with you....keep your sunnyside up and all that rot

i need some place where i can say that which i can't speak to others about....yes ///no ????

ok robby ....As far as the lotus sutra is concerned have you read the whole thing about the capabilities of the Buddha...he can smell where you have been....see into your past lives...all that...

I'm not looking for that ...just someone that has reached a level of compassion and kowledge about life.....I always was under the impression that enlightned beings were totally happy...living in the moment...not shallow liers and back stabbers and supporters of such....not that happens in nichiren sects.....

happy ...just totally happy and able to overcome all challenges in the Saha world...



the whole beam troll stuff robby is not called for....i never expected that from you....

it's easy to make fun....why dude why?
i'm freakin bummed beyond anything...i paid my dues in Nichiren schools of thought ...33 years dude....most of it practising....serving in some form or another....i should be allowed the courtesy to be allowed to ask stuff as i wallow in hell...and look for a lifeline or some semblance of help....

My wife won't me do that stuff in public anyway.

When I feel gloomy. I try not to think, and just lighten up.

The below is part of a guidance that I sent an SGI member who was struggling a few months ago. If I understand it correctly you are not a member, but I post it nevertheless in the hope that you may find something of encouragement within it. h-h y

I once knew someone who was suffering the most appalling ill health who used to chant that he wouldn't stop chanting.

On reflection, that made absolute sense.

I know if we have a bad patch it can be terribly difficult to start practicing again, to feel comfortable with it, to find faith again. We just don't feel like making the effort to practice. We don't really believe it's worth the effort. We look for easier, faster ways to happiness. We do not give ourselves credit for any effort we do make.

But this is a delusion. If we abandon faith, we become victims again, swept downstream on the river of delusion.It's at times like this that we need to convince ourselves that we are Buddhas'. Nichiren says "I am convinced that you are a person who can inherit the soul of the lotus sutra.".

If our practice flags, just remember why you're still here, or attending meetings, or just looking at your butsudan: your seeking spirit is alive and well. Sometimes we need to give it a chance to guide us.

Here's part of a lecture that was reproduced at our HQ meeting on Sunday.

"To chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo is to put yourself in harmony by appreciating your own life. We always look for validation outside of ourselves -- we'll never get it. If we validate ourselves, we will be able to influence everything around us. Don't chant to overcome obstacles 'out there'. Chant for the harmony of your life. Awaken to the greatness of your life.

Everything about our character is wonderful. We think that we have to fix what we believe to be broken, when in reality nothing is broken... Don't betray your dreams, don't judge yourself, and turn unhappy situations around."

Let the devil king lament like in the words of Bob Dylan…. ‘That son of a b*tch is brave and getting braver’.

It dose feel good to just get your frustrations out there. When I am feeling down about religion I go and watch Christopher Hitchens on YouTube rip it apart for a while. Then afterwards when I am feeling better I look at religion once again to find out what inspired me about it.

ha ha yana....excellent!!! most escellent....thank you...i was indeed an sgi member for over 20 years.....and still carry with me skills learned....just don't use them as much these days....thanks again

livsindesert....maybe it's not the time for me to watch that....LOL


all here inspried me to alter me sig....check out the red

Hi Who,

I think this words are good to come back to the basics:

"If one doubts the strength of the Buddha when he says, "I am the only person who can rescue and protect others"; if one is suspicious of the rope held out by the Lotus Sutra when its teachings declare that one can "gain entrance through faith alone"; if one fails to chant the Mystic Law which guarantees that "such a person assuredly and without doubt [will attain the Buddha way]," then the Buddha's power cannot reach one and it will be impossible to scale the embankment of enlightenment. "

Questions and Answers about Embracing the Lotus Sutra - WND-1, 59

Once in my life I was in the hell... I felt like I have no future... I was leaving me die to the point I can't eat and even drink Sprite (my favorite drinking that time, well, until that time ... then, some words from a girl friend make me awake... I realized I had been well most of my life, and from that moment I had to think not about me but about my childrens and friends and other people... and, magic! ... I began to feel happy... 8 years later I meet the Nichiren Buddhism... and sometimes I think about why I didn't knew this Buddhism before... what an easy life I could had had... but then I think that my change of point of view (from me to others) was the reason I meet this Buddhism!

and I'm really happy... not no-problems... not no-doubs... but seeing each obstacle as a way to show the validity of the practice...

you see, I'm building a Nichiren Shu Sangha in my country... there are only 2 reverends in South America... the 2 temples near my city are 1,000 miles away in other country... the reverend who 'will' be my master is waiting his permanent residence in that country, so he can't come to meet me... my contact is via email... I don't know him in person... I translate from English to Spanish because there are not Nichiren Shu texts in my language... and I have not much money, have a wife an a little boy and a lot of responsabilities, but I'm trying to make a trip to the temple and be iniciated as a student of the priesthood, and thinking about a minimun of 3 trips to Japan and 5-10 years before to be a priest (in the case I were accepted ... obstacles? ha ha... just mission

So... are there different perspectives in Nichiren Buddhism? yes, there are... and we probably can't see the things exactly as Nichiren, not the whole thing, but we can in the essence... we have the tool... just chanting, to transform our lives from the inner side and to help others... and putting the things in motion

More hugs

hugs back....

great stuff...hope all goes well for you in your monumental task ....

maybe you have been chosen...

cheers mate
d

chanting and doing, will be not what we want, but what we need



all of us have been chosen, depends on us what we'll do about



here, 'mate' is an infusion of 'yerba mate', is that what you mean?

... anyway, cheers too

Bodhi,



Mate is tasty, but he means "mate" as in "friend"

ha ha