Boy I've been terrible at keeping my blog up to date, and an experience soon to be published will probably explain why.
Now, for the December quote, I decided to do something slightly different.
In a recent newsletter that has formed the basis of pretty much any training session I have attended in the past few months, a line of the Lotus Sutra is quoted that has seen me through a very difficult time of my life. I did some research on it and hoped to find a Gosho about it. There is something in the Record of the Orally Transmitted Teachings, but in the end I thought, why the heck not?, and decided to quote the Lotus Sutra instead. This is a passage from the Expedient Means Chapter. The Expedient Means (Hoben), is one of the chapters featured in our daily practice of gongyo, but we only chant the first section. The passage I am going to quote refers to shakubuku and doubt and is not part of daily gongyo.
Immediately the thought came to me that the reason the thus come one has appeared is so he may preach the buddha wisdom. Now is precisely the time to do so. Shariputra, you should understand that persons of dull capacity and small wisdom, who are attached to appearances, proud and overbearing, are incapable of believing in this Law. Now I, joyful and fearless, in the midst of the bodhisattvas, honestly discarding expedient means, will preach only the unsurpassed way. When the bodhisattvas hear this Law, they will be released from all entanglements of doubt.The emphasis is mine. That is the line quoted in the guidance. Two simple words, joyful and fearless, and yet such power. I am still striving to read that LS line with my life and show true joy and fearlessness.
Quoted from here.
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