Important Knowledge in the Pure Land Teaching
淨土小常識
158. The Self-Awareness of an Amitabha-Reciter (continued)
Honen Shonin, the founder of Japanese Pure Land Buddhism, described this mental state in his Petition for Entering the Mountain Monastery:
“Wandering through the three realms of delusion, where do I go? I was not born in the time of the Buddha’s appearance in the world.
Circulating through the four modes of birth — what form do I take? I did not hear the Tathagata’s teaching.
I never joined the assembly for the teaching of the Avatamsaka Sutra; I was not present at the preaching of the Prajna-paramita.
I was not at Vulture Peak for the Buddha’s Dharma discourses. I was not in the forest of Kuśinagara for the Buddha’s Nirvana.
Was I living in the city of Sravasti among the 300 million households, or was I suffering in the deepest hells of the eight scorching flames?
How pitiful, sorrowful and tragic!”
With this passage, Honen conveys the sorrowful emotion of being lost in the three realms of delusion, unable to be born during the Buddha’s time or to directly hear the Dharma. It is a deeply personal realization that one has been endlessly wandering through the cycles of birth and death in the six realms of existence since time without beginning. This is the state of self-aware subjectivity, clearly revealing the inner sense of being caught in delusion, afflicted by karmic hindrances, and disconnected from the Buddha’s teaching of deliverance.
As described above, this awareness of one’s evil karma is a deeply personal, subjective self-realization. It is to recognize oneself as ordinary, deluded, and filled with afflictions. Seen from another perspective, such recognition is the mark of an extremely sincere and reverent Amitabha-reciter.
(to be continued tomorrow)
158 念佛人的自覺 (續)
日本法然上人在其《登山狀》中對此心境說：
流浪三界之中，往何界乎？不遇釋尊之出世；
輪迴四生之間，受何生乎？不聞如來之說法。
未參華嚴開講之筵，亦未列般若演說之座；
未臨鷲峰說法之庭，亦未至鶴林涅槃之場。
我宿舍衛三億之家乎？我住地獄八熱之底乎？
可慚可恥！可悲可傷！
講述了自身流浪於迷界之三界間，對於不能生在佛世，不能親聞佛法而 感到悲嘆的心情。
此心境是將自己從曠劫以來流轉生死，迷於三界六道的世界，主體性的 自覺境地，明顯地表露出來。這是自身因為煩惱而流轉於生死世界的存在， 又因為沒有遇到佛的教法，而屢犯罪業的自己罪業之自覺心境。
Namo Amituofo!
