Chanting Growers Group (2013-∞)

[Babbabud]

Nam myoho renge kyo

 

[weedtoker]

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo

 

[Weird]

Let us openly and clearly outline the virtues of Myoho-renge-kyo! Just as poisonous compounds are changed into medicine, so these five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo change evil into good. The Spring of Jewels is so called because, in this spring, stones are changed into jewels.13 In the same way, these five characters can change ordinary human beings into Buddhas. Therefore, because your beloved departed father chanted Nam-myoho-renge-kyo while he was alive, he was a person who attained Buddhahood in his present form, in the same way that stones change into jewels.

--- https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/wnd-1/Content/152

 

[Weird]

I, Nichiren, have abandoned both the approach that expands and that which condenses and favor the essence of the matter, which means the five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo that were transmitted to Bodhisattva Superior Practices.
When Chiu-fang Yin18 was appraising horses, he paid no attention to whether they were black or yellow but concentrated only on picking a thoroughbred. When Chih Tao-lin19 lectured on the sutras, he put aside questions of detail and concentrated on getting at the basic meaning. Shakyamuni Buddha has already entered the treasure tower and is seated side by side with the Buddha Many Treasures, the emanations of the Buddha have gathered from the ten directions, the Bodhisattvas of the Earth have been summoned, and the essence, the five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo, has been entrusted to these bodhisattvas so that they may transmit it to the Latter Day of the Law. No one in the present age can doubt this.

--- https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/wnd-2/Content/235

 

[Babbabud]

Nam myoho renge kyo

 

[Weird]

In essence, the entity of Myoho-renge-kyo is the physical body that the disciples and followers of Nichiren who believe in the Lotus Sutra received from their fathers and mothers at birth. Such persons, who honestly discard expedient means, put faith in the Lotus Sutra alone, and chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, will transform the three paths of earthly desires, karma, and suffering into the three virtues of the Dharma body, wisdom, and emancipation. The threefold contemplation and the three truths will immediately become manifest in their minds,18 and the place where they live will become the Land of Eternally Tranquil Light. The Buddha who is the entity of Myoho-renge-kyo, of the “Life Span” chapter of the essential teaching, who is both inhabiting subject and inhabited realm, life and environment, body and mind, entity and function, the Buddha eternally endowed with the three bodies—he is to be found in the disciples and lay believers of Nichiren. Such persons embody the true entity of Myoho-renge-kyo; this is all due to the meritorious workings that the spontaneous transcendental powers inherent in it display. Could anyone venture to doubt it? Indeed it cannot be doubted!

--- https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/wnd-1/Content/47

 

[weedtoker]

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo

 

[Weird]

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo

 

[Weird]

Now, no matter what, strive in faith and be known as a votary of the Lotus Sutra, and remain my disciple for the rest of your life. If you are of the same mind as Nichiren, you must be a Bodhisattva of the Earth. And if you are a Bodhisattva of the Earth, there is not the slightest doubt that you have been a disciple of Shakyamuni Buddha from the remote past. The sutra states, “Ever since the long distant past I have been teaching and converting this multitude.”11 There should be no discrimination among those who propagate the five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo in the Latter Day of the Law, be they men or women. Were they not Bodhisattvas of the Earth, they could not chant the daimoku. At first only Nichiren chanted Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, but then two, three, and a hundred followed, chanting and teaching others. Propagation will unfold this way in the future as well. Does this not signify “emerging from the earth”?

--- https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/wnd-1/Content/40

 

[SoCal Hippy]

”Shakyamuni’s practices and the virtues he consequently attained are all contained within the five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo. If we believe in these five characters, we will naturally be granted the same benefits as he was.”

(“The Object of Devotion for Observing the Mind Established in the Fifth Five-Hundred-Year Period after the Thus Come One’s Passing”, WND-l page 365)

 

[SoCal Hippy]

“If there are a hundred or a thousand people who uphold this sutra, without a single exception all one hundred or one thousand of them will become Buddhas.”

(Wu-lung and I-lung

 

[weedtoker]

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo

 

[Babbabud]

Nam myoho renge kyo

 

[Weird]

nam myoho renge kyo

 

[Weird]

Point Five, on the words “to roar the lion’s roar” (sa shishi ku)

The Record of the Orally Transmitted Teachings says: The lion’s roar (shishi ku) is the preaching of the Buddha. The preaching of the Law means the preaching of the Lotus Sutra, or the preaching of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo in particular.
The first shi of the word shishi, or “lion” [which means “teacher”], is the Wonderful Law that is passed on by the teacher. The second shi [which means “child”] is the Wonderful Law as it is received by the disciples. The “roar” is the sound of the teacher and the disciples chanting in unison.
The verb sa, “to make” or “to roar,” should here be understood to mean to initiate or to put forth. It refers to the initiating of Nam-myoho-renge-kyo in the Latter Day of the Law.

--- https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/ott/PART-1/13

 

[Weird]

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo

 

[Weird]

Bodhisattvas of the Earth ［地涌の菩薩］ ( jiyu-no-bosatsu): An innumerable host of bodhisattvas who emerge from beneath the earth and to whom Shakyamuni Buddha entrusts the propagation of the Mystic Law, or the essence of the Lotus Sutra, in the Latter Day of the Law. They are described in the “Emerging from the Earth” (fifteenth) chapter of the Lotus Sutra, the first chapter of the sutra’s essential teaching (latter fourteen chapters). In this chapter, countless bodhisattvas from other worlds ask for permission to propagate the sutra in the sahā world after the Buddha’s death, but Shakyamuni refuses, saying that bodhisattvas who will carry out that task already exist in the sahā world. At this point the earth trembles and splits open, and from within it emerges a host of bodhisattvas equal in number to the sands of sixty thousand Ganges Rivers, each with his own retinue of followers. Their bodies are golden and they possess the thirty-two features that characterize a Buddha. They are led by four bodhisattvas—Superior Practices, Boundless Practices, Pure Practices, Firmly Established Practices—and Superior Practices is the leader of them all. In the “Supernatural Powers” (twenty-first) chapter, Shakyamuni transfers the essence of the Lotus Sutra to the Bodhisattvas of the Earth, entrusting them with the mission of propagating it after his death, specifically, in the Latter Day of the Law.
As the person who first revealed the Mystic Law, or Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, which he described as the essence of the Lotus Sutra, and began its propagation in the Latter Day, Nichiren (1222–1282) identified himself with Bodhisattva Superior Practices, the leader of the Bodhisattvas of the Earth. He also regarded his followers who embrace and propagate the teaching of the Mystic Law as the Bodhisattvas of the Earth. In this connection, Nichiren states in his work The True Aspect of All Phenomena: “There should be no discrimination among those who propagate the five characters of Myoho-renge-kyo in the Latter Day of the Law, be they men or women. Were they not Bodhisattvas of the Earth, they could not chant the daimoku. At first only Nichiren chanted Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, but then two, three, and a hundred followed, chanting and teaching others. Propagation will unfold this way in the future as well. Does this not signify ‘emerging from the earth’?” (385). See also bodhisattvas of the essential teaching.

--- https://www.nichirenlibrary.org/en/dic/Content/B/45

 

[SoCal Hippy]

“The fact that her prayers have gone unanswered is like a strong bow with a weak bowstring, or a fine sword in the hands of a coward.."

(The Royal Palace - WND, Vol. 1, page 489)

 

[SoCal Hippy]

"No life is completely free from problems and difficulties.. What matters is that we bring forth boundless courage, wisdom and life force so that we may calmly surmount every challenge and hardship that arises.. That is the purpose of our faith. We study Buddhism in order to learn the fundamental path for living with true humanity and to make our own character shine its brightest.”

Daisaku Ikeda

 

[SoCal Hippy]

”It is rare to be born a human being. The number of those endowed with human life is as small as the amount of earth one can place on a fingernail. Life as a human being is hard to sustain—as hard as it is for the dew to remain on the grass. But it is better to live a single day with honour than to live to 120 and die in disgrace.”

(The Three Kinds of Treasure
- WND- Vol. 1, page 851)