Pure Land Breezes

2011-04-08T07:22:00.000+01:00

Samsara literally means "wandering-on." Many people think of it as the Buddhist name for the place where we currently live — the place we leave when we go to nibbana. But in the early Buddhist texts, it's the answer, not to the question, "Where are we?" but to the question, "What are we doing?" Instead of a place, it's a process: the tendency to keep creating worlds and then moving into them. As one world falls apart, you create another one and go there. At the same time, you bump into other people who are creating their own worlds, too.
From: 'Samsara' by Thanissaro Bhikku

2011-03-13T12:15:00.003Z

Somewhere
in the deep
accumulated memory
of the earth
there is a fine layer
of soil
cultivated by you
with ash and fertiliser
bringing life again
to the budding trees
you planted
for restful shade and fruit
an unbroken life
descending and re-ascending
anew
arising with the spring grasses
and calling birds
arising in the eyes
of newer years

2011-03-10T07:41:00.007Z

A Travelling Document (Part I)

The mountains are
still visible

against the ink-washed
night sky

simultaneous boundaries
of the known/unknown
worlds of experience
dream and awakening

(too late now for contemplations
of the setting sun
suspended upon the horizon
like a drum)

a hidden sutra
waiting to be called to life
with the morning bell
and the weaving voices of those
who each day
respond to its summons

Yesterday
a fine rain
of volcanic ash
descended
covering the steps
we climb each morning

Before I knew you
the circumference of these
mountains did not seem
so wide
to encompass
such disparate worlds
as seemed to be ours

2011-03-05T21:37:00.000Z

The truth of impermanence is the freshness of life, or creativeness of life. When this truth starts to permeate us and we start to embody this truth, we become seekers; we can no longer be complacent with fixed values. Then, what do we seek? We seek to fully seek—to fully embody the truth. We seek to become a perfect seeker—one who fully embodies the truth.
From 'What is the Pure Land' by Dr. Nobuo Haneda

The myriad
movements

transformations
of life

Calling of the Vow

2011-03-01T20:55:00.000Z

What, then, is the limitless wisdom of Amida Buddha? Limitless wisdom means the spirit that limitlessly keeps on seeking and discovering new meaning in all things one experiences in this life. It means the spirit that is not satisfied with fixed meanings, or with loving only positive values and hating negative values.

From 'Dharma Breeze' by Nobuo Haneda

2011-01-22T11:06:00.001Z

"Infinite Light is the working of the Buddha’s Wisdom that illumines all the worlds, and Eternal Life refers to the working of the Buddha’s Love that is endless."
Rev. Kemmyo Taira Sato from his talks on the Shoshinge given at the Buddhist Society

2011-01-17T16:12:00.001Z

As Fr John [Main] taught, our meditation becomes most purely prayer not just in the work of saying the mantra in the face of distraction, but in the ease of listening to it.
Fr Laurence Freeman WCCM International Newsletter

2011-01-15T11:48:00.002Z

"And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the eventide: and he lifted up his eyes, and saw, and, behold, the camels were coming."

Genesis 24:63

2011-01-11T09:06:00.000Z

sitting in my
favourite armchair

meditation

prayer

no idea

2011-01-08T22:55:00.002Z

Diving deeply

into the great ocean

embraced
by the Buddha-Name

2011-01-01T12:00:00.001Z

Celebrating
New Year

a jug of sake

to keep us
from the cold

2010-12-31T08:09:00.002Z

the motion is yours

for the river which
takes its course

into the ocean of
fulfillment

2010-12-30T07:52:00.000Z

The real misery of man is in the fact that he has not fully come out, that he is self-obscured, lost in the midst of his own desires. He cannot feel himself beyond his personal surroundings, his greater self is blotted out, his truth is unrealised. The prayer that rises up from his whole being is therefore, Thou, who art the spirit of manifestation, manifest thyself in me. This longing for the perfect expression of his self is more deeply inherent in man than his hunger and thirst for bodily sustenance, his lust for wealth and distinction. This prayer is not merely one born individually of him; it is in depth of all things, it is the ceaseless urging in him of the Āvih, of the spirit of eternal manifestation. The revealment of the infinite in the finite, which is the motive of all creation, is not seen in its perfection in the starry heavens, in the beauty of flowers. It is in the soul of man. For there will seeks its manifestation in will, and freedom turns to win its final prize in the freedom of surrender.

Rabindranath Tagore from Chapter 2 of Sadhana - The Realisation of Life.

2010-12-27T09:11:00.002Z

Luminous sky
silence

delicate strands of frost

on the evergreen

2010-12-26T08:55:00.000Z

As time
touches timelessness

the boundless embrace

of Amitabha

2010-12-24T00:44:00.000Z

This unsaveable
person

is the true object

of Amida's Love

2010-12-22T07:50:00.003Z

The Tathagata in his Boundless Compassion feels with the whole universe. The reason why He is come out in this world is to make the Way of Truth shine out, to save all beings, and to bestow the true benefit on them. It is very difficult to meet and see the Tathagata who appears into this world only once in innumerable kalpas.....
from The Larger Sukhavativyuha Sutra translated by Kenryo Kanamatsu in his book Naturalness.

Through one

true encounter

an immeasurable world

is revealed

2010-12-21T21:53:00.000Z

Sake cannot be poured into an overturned cup, but when it stands in its natural position, anyone can pour sake into it and as fully as it can hold. Therefore, have the cup of your heart upright ready to receive, and hear; it will surely be filled with Amida's mercy.

Gojun Shichiri

2010-12-19T08:00:00.005Z

Set down in the unthinkable past so that we may walk it today, our journey to the Other-shore is laid before us. Timeless yet always new, always now, we are called by the Name, Namuamidabutsu.

Beneath an untrodden
blanket of snow

the path to your door

remains

2010-12-17T11:00:00.002Z

"Those who are burdened with extreme evil, should simply pronounce the Buddha's Name."
Genshin from the Ojoyo Shu

This heavy weight
so difficult to bear

now carried onwards

by you

2010-12-15T07:00:00.001Z

Further, the Contemplation Sutra states:

I urge you to sit and practice contemplation, worship, and utterance. In all of these it is best to face the west. A tree falls in the direction that the top leans; it necessarily follows its bent. Thus, when there is an obstruction that prevents persons from facing the west, it is enough for them simply to turn toward the west in their thoughts.

Kyogyoshinsho - Chapter 2:24

Always to the West

the heart that entrusts
to Amida

will travel

2010-12-13T07:00:00.003Z

Then, O Ananda, that Bhikkhu Dharmakara, taking the perfections of all the excellences and good qualities of those Buddha countries, of those eighty-one hundred thousand nayutas of kotis of Buddhas, and concentrating them all on one Buddha country, worshipped with his head the feet of the Bhagavat Lokesvararaja, the Tathagata, turned respectfully round him to the right, and walked away from the presence of this Bhagavat. And afterwards, for the space of five kalpas, he thus concentrated the perfection of all the excellences and good qualities of the Buddha countries, such as had never been known before in the ten quarters of the whole world, more excellent, and more perfect than any, and composed the most excellent prayer. Thus, O Ananda, that Bhikkhu concentrated in his mind a perfection of a Buddha country eighty-one times more immeasurable, noble, and excellent than the perfection of the eighty-one hundred thousand nayutas of kotis of Buddha countries that had been told him by the Bhagavat Lokesvararaja, the Tathagata. And then, proceeding to where the Tathagata was, he worshipped the feet of the Bhagavat with his head, and said: "O Bhagavat, the perfection of all the excellences and good qualities of the Buddha countries has been concentrated by me".

Sukhavativyuha Sutra

Amida!

Through your Grace

we go

to the Realm of

Karmic Perfection

2010-12-10T07:00:00.002Z

It is stated in the Sutra on Amoghapasha's Divine Manifestation and Mantra:

The realm where you will be born is Amida Buddha's Pure Recompensed Land. Born transformed from a lotus-flower, you will see Buddhas all the time and realize various insights concerning dharmas. Your life-span will be immeasurable, extending to a hundred thousand kalpas. You will at once reach the highest, perfect Bodhi, from which you will never fall back. I will always protect you.

Chapter on True Buddha and Land of the Kyogyoshinso

In the Buddha
who promised

to always protect us

I take refuge

2010-12-09T07:00:00.001Z

Through All
that has been done
for me

I can encounter
Amida's Light

2010-12-07T07:00:00.002Z

Tonight the moon has
a distant companion:
first breath of winter

2010-12-05T07:00:00.001Z

Peaceful awareness:

To hear the Name

is to encounter
Amida

2010-12-03T07:43:00.001Z

… this small I is embraced by the immeasurable and boundless Amitabha [Amida] Buddha. This has nothing to do with my small, limited thoughts of whether I think it is so or not. It does not depend on whether I believe it or not. I am, in fact, embraced and saved by the boundless Amitabha. Being thankful for this, I chant Namu Amida Butsu. When we say this with our mouths, we are expressing our deep sense of gratitude. When we perform it with our whole body, it is zazen as the activity of the reality of life…
Kosho Uchiyama from 'Opening the Hand of Thought'.

Within this moment

Amida's Life
becomes ours

breath
following
breath

2010-12-02T07:00:00.001Z

"Repentance and joyfulness - how intimate!" - Asahara Saichi

The call of the Vow

Repentance
and
Joyfulness

With every voicing

2010-11-30T22:52:00.001Z

As a lotus-flower blooms, a man is sitting there alone;
As the ripples arise, the Dharma is spontaneously proclaimed.
There is no calamity because the land is the state of Tranquility;
You do not regress because you have good friends of the Way.
You may ask those born before you,
"How many kalpas is it since you came here?"
- From the Liturgy for Birth in the Pure Land by Shan-Tao (Ojoraisan)

Bell sounds
for morning service

How many kalpas
have passed

since you arrived
here

2010-11-27T11:21:00.002Z

The truly other is essential to the mystical and loving mind. Otherness stimulates the mind to let go of its fixed points and expand beyond itself, enlarging the view we have of the world and of ourselves within it. In the face of the other we have to give up the fame of dramatizing them. This is a little of what I understand by the term “a catholic mind” because it has faced the other that we cannot describe or control. The catholic mind intuitively seeks to include rather than reject, even when it meets an abyss of difference in the other that it recoils from and finds wrong and threatening....... We become catholic in this full and embracing sense only by means of growth, which is a passing through the stages of healing and integration. So none of us is catholic yet, not even the pope.
Laurence Freeman OSB, CHRISTIAN MEDITATION NEWSLETTER, Vol. 34

2010-11-23T22:37:00.000Z

"I take refuge in the Tathagata of Eternal Life" (Shoshinge)

Chanting Shoshinge

a
boat
across

the stormy seas

of Samsara

2010-11-22T23:09:00.003Z

Nor need they despair of the evil they commit, for no evil can obstruct the working of Amida's Primal Vow. (Tannisho).

Every time

I
fall

It is into the arms
of
Amida Buddha.

2010-11-20T17:00:00.003Z

Having practiced for "inconceivable and innumerable eons of time", Dharmakara Bodhisattva fulfilled his vows and established the Pure Land where all beings, who have awakened even one-thought-moment of trusting faith in him, can be born.

Amida is the totality
Of all that has been done for me

2010-11-17T17:00:00.002Z

At the conclusion of our latest retreat we held a closing service as an opportunity to express our gratitude for the events of the last three days. After pronouncing the nembutsu (Namuamidabutsu) together we parted company. Although these retreats are now a regular event each are unique and special in there own way, never to be repeated.

After the service

only Namuamidabutsu

remains

2010-11-16T22:07:00.005Z

Having been born into Christianity and spending a valuable part of my life nurtured within its embrace, to my encounter with the inconceivable teachings of Shinran Shonin, there has been nothing but the Universal Vow of Great Love and Compassion working within them both.

Searching the scriptures:

there is only Amida

revealing his Vow.

2010-11-09T21:41:00.004Z

Sitting still and letting my breath settle I feel the rise and fall of my abdomen. Slowly I "voice" the six syllables in my mind: - Na Mu A Mi Da Bu. Not thinking of there meaning just hearing there sound: - Na Mu A Mi Da Bu...Neither meditation as such or prayer or contemplation as such. Only the working of the Name.

The six syllables
of Namuamidabu
Inexhaustible!

2010-11-05T14:55:00.000Z

A frog sits shrouded
in a blanket of grey rain
I too pass you by

2010-07-15T07:00:00.004+01:00

The Saikontan ("vegetable root discourses) by Kojisei is a collection of 359 short pieces of poetry and prose which harmoniously blends Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism. It reached Japan in the 16th Century having been imported from China possibly either by Zen Priests or merchants.

Item 288:

An ancient worthy says, "The shadow of the bamboo sweeps over the stairs, but the dust does not move. The disc of the moon passes through the water of the lake, leaving no trace." One of our Confucians says, "The stream rushes down swiftly but all is silent around. The flowers fall incessantly, but we feel quiet." If you have grasped the meaning of this, in all your relations with things, you are free in mind and body.

Translated by R.H. Blyth.

2010-07-14T07:00:00.000+01:00

From the 'Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana' by Asvaghosa

"All beings since their first aspiration till the attainment of Buddhahood are sheltered under the guardianship of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas who, responding to the requirements of the occasion, transform themselves and assume the actual forms of personality.

Thus for the sake of all beings Buddhas and Bodhisattvas become sometimes their parents, sometimes their wives and children, sometimes their kinsmen, sometimes their servants, sometimes their friends, sometimes their enemies, sometimes reveal themselves as devas or in some other forms."

2010-07-13T07:00:00.001+01:00

On the subject of Kannon whilst travelling in Japan last year, on the road mid-way between Fukuoka and Kagoshima prefecture, we stopped of at a roadside shrine with a gigantic statue of the Bodhisattva.

2010-07-12T07:00:00.001+01:00

When I was viewing flowers
Darkness came down, but soon -
Unlooked for - sudden - through the trees,
Above the mountain side rose the moon.

Masatsune

2010-07-11T08:00:00.001+01:00

You be the butterfly
And I the dreaming heart
Of Chuang Tzu

Matsuo Basho

2010-07-10T18:38:00.005+01:00

Chapter One of 'The Doctrine of the Mean' attributed to Confucius (summary of the whole work):

1. What Heaven has conferred is called THE NATURE; an accordance with this nature is called THE PATH of duty; the regulation of this path is called INSTRUCTION.

2. The path may not be left for an instant. If it could be left, it would not be the path. On this account, the superior man does not wait till he sees things, to be cautious, nor till he hears things, to be apprehensive.

3. There is nothing more visible than what is secret, and nothing more manifest than what is minute. Therefore the superior man is watchful over himself, when he is alone.

4. While there are no stirrings of pleasure, anger, sorrow, or joy, the mind may be said to be in the state of EQUILIBRIUM. When those feelings have been stirred, and they act in their due degree, there ensues what may be called the state of HARMONY. This EQUILIBRIUM is the great root from which grow all the human actings in the world, and this HARMONY is the universal path which they all should pursue.

5. Let the states of equilibrium and harmony exist in perfection, and a happy order will prevail throughout heaven and earth, and all things will be nourished and flourish.

2010-03-28T16:08:00.002+01:00

everything i have
given to me
dozing til noon

like saichi two horns on my head
namuamidabutsu

sitting quietly
thoughts come and go
nodding off

a long time
since we first met
inconceivable spring

2010-03-07T20:38:00.001Z

morning grows lighter
from winter to spring
yellow crocus

scattering seeds
beneath hidden eyes
spring morning

returning returning
one bird after another
reddening sky

2009-04-14T14:22:00.006+01:00

a grey heron
standing alone
first light

2009-04-12T06:04:00.001+01:00

such quietness
beneath trembling branches
shaft of light

2009-04-11T19:18:00.002+01:00

beginning the day
short time for meditation
another hand claps

today's work finished
sitting back in my chair
overgrown hedge

early rising
bird has left
magnolia scent

hard to get up
this morning you greet me
magnolia tree

The meditating
haiku poet counts his breaths
up to seventeen