http://journeytozen.wordpress.com/20...-the-one-life/
Recently I have been reading a lot about Amida Buddha and in particular Jodo Shinshu Buddhism. Jodo Shinshu is a 800 year old sect of Buddhism that rose up in Japan during the Kamakura period. The founder of the school is Shinran Shonin. To some Jodo Shinshu followers he is considered the incarnartion of the Buddha of Compassion. Shinran Shonin taught a path that was open not just to monks and nuns, but for all people. He emphasize what his teacher Honen Shonin emphasize of the Pure Land Sutras.
The main teaching and practice of the Jodo Shinshu school is the Nembutsu. Taitetsu Unno a Jodo Shinshu priest translates the Nembutsu as “the Name that Calls”. Then Nembutsu is the saying of Namo Amida Butsu. Namo or Namu is to take refuge or to revere. Amida Buddha is the Buddha of Infinite Life and Infinite Light.
But what exactly is Amida Buddha? Jodo Shinshu just like Buddhism in general is based on intuitive or direct experience of the divine. It is experiencing truth here and now. So, in order to understand Amida Buddha, one has to experience Amida. In Buddhism, words are like a finger pointing to the moon. Do not mistake the finger for the moon. We have a bit of information that will point us to Amida, but what remains is for us to experience Amida here and now in this life.
Amida Buddha is not just a physical essence or Buddha man somewhere in a literal western pure land. Amida Buddha is here and now all around us. He or it is within all things. Be it rocks, trees, humans, or animals, sky, earth it is all Amida. Yet Amida also transcends this. Amida Buddha is the One Life. It is that which we merge back into when we shed this physical body. It is that One Life that manifest in unicity into forms. It is the Ocean of Oneness that connects all beings. It is that which Quantum Physics are trying to understand in terms of entanglement. All of it is around us and yet transcends us.
Amida Buddha is not a God. It is not some Judgemental father figure residing over a paradise or heaven. It is not Allah above the 7 heavens, it is not God the Father with christ seated next to him. Amida is beyond God. God is just a concept never to be experienced, whereas Amida is that which can be experienced here and now. We can never say: “I have become God”. The religious zealots would pelt us with stones and/or the masses would brand us crazy. All of though can awaken to our Buddha Nature, that which is our Original Nature and Witness the Unicity of all Life. In such a state we can say that we are Amida Buddha.
In the great Shin work by Kenryo Kanamatsu “Naturalness: A Classic of Shin Buddhism” it states:
“The time when the heart asserts itself and forces us to look beyond our narrow self. Here we feel an unthinkable power stronger than ourselves, compelling us to choose between the self and the not-self, between ignorance and enlightenment. This Unthinkable Power stronger than ourselves, this persistent urge impelling the self to transcend itself, is a call to us of the All-feeling Compassionate heart, the Eternal Spirit of Sympathy-who is in his essence the Light and Life of all who is World Conscious. To feel all, to be conscious of everything, is the Spirit.”
This is a beauty explanation of the experience of Shunyata or emptiness. It is the losing or shedding off of the Ego and transcending the Self to awaken in the Eternal Spirit of Compassion. It is entering the realm of the Uncreated, Nirvana.
The beauty of Jodo Shinshu is that it is a path to ridding oneself of the little self. This path is not a path of going off into a forest or monastery to spend a lifetime of meditation and practice. It is not a path that only monks and nuns can take up. It is a path for modern men and women. For children for everyone. It is a path of deep hearing. That is our only task is to deeply hear the call of Amida or the One Reality calling us to awaken to Truth. Amida herself gives us deep entrusting. With deep entrusting in that One Life we awaken to Enlightenment. Our ignorance is revealed and we transcend our own ignorance. Complete Wisdom flows through all things at all times. Amida is in our every breath and inbetween breath.
To be intouch with this One Reality, we can listen to the call of Amida herself. That call is the name that calls. It is the Nembutsu. Namo Amida Butsu. Simply chanting this and entrusting in Amida one is saved by the powerful underlying nature of all existence. One is saved by the greater Self that which transcends Ego consciousness. The beauty of this is we dont have to strive in hard practice to deeply entrust in Amida, because in Shin Buddhism, Amida herself gives us shinjin or deep entrusting. So relax and do not use your calculating mind to calculate how many times you should say Namo Amida Butsu, or how hard you should try, instead give all this thinking up to Amida and just sail on the easy waterways of Amida.
Namo Amida Butsu!
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