此外，圣严法师创办的法鼓山还把他们更多系列的研究心血，和多年的翻译工作成果公之于世，奉献给大众，让更多追求智慧真理的人们受益。 法鼓全集2020纪念版 堪称一百多年来中国大乘佛法信，愿，行的修证成果的总结和写照。 Section 9 of 2020 Edition of Dharma Drum Collection contains several books in English translation of various sutra and meditation guide.
As crises facing humankind have become more numerous and more acute, interest in the Lotus Sutra has begun to increase. Lotus Sutra takes up the main part of Tiantai Threefold Lotus Sutra (法华三部经), which is the composition of three complementary sutras that together form the “three-part Dharma flower sutra“ – the essential doctrine of the Tiantai Lotus Sec ( 天台宗，也叫法华宗). Rev. Nikkyo Niwano (1906-1999) is one of the founders and first presidient of the Japan Buddhist organization Rissho Kosei Kai. He wrote a study guide to the Tiantai Threefold Lotus Sutra and illuminate to people who adhere the teaching of the sutra the many spiritual benefits, among them:
“First, this sutra makes the unawakened bodhisattva aspire to buddhahood, makes a merciless one raise the mind of mercy, makes a homicidal one raise the mind of great compassion, makes a jealous one raise the mind of joy, makes an attached one raise the mind of detachment, makes a miserly one raise the mind of donation, makes an arrogant one raise the mind of keeping the commandments, makes an irascible one raise the mind of perseverance, makes an indolent one raise the mind of assiduity, makes a distracted one raise the mind of meditation, makes an ignorant one raise the mind of wisdom, makes one who lacks concern for saving others raise the mind of saving others, makes one who commits the ten evils raise the mind of the ten virtues, makes one who wishes for existence aspire to the mind of nonexistence, makes one who has an inclination toward apostasy build the mind of non‐retrogression, makes one who commits defiled acts raise the mind of undefilement, and makes one who suffers from delusions raise the mind of detachment. Good sons! This is called the first inconceivable merit‐power of this sutra.”
This sutra dates back almost seventeen centuries. In the mid‐fourth century Kumarajiva (鸠摩罗什 344‐‐413) journeyed from Kucha （龟兹）, his homeland in Central Asia, to India for study and there he became learned in the teachings of Mahayana Buddhism. When he had completed his studies and was about to leave India on his mission of carrying the Buddha’s teachings to other countries, his teacher, Suryasoma, recommended the Lotus Sutra to him, telling him to transmit it to the east and disseminate it there. In 401 Kumarajiva finally reached China, where he became an eminent translator of Buddhist scriptures. In the dozen years before his death he translated a number of Mahayana texts into Chinese, and the most important and best known is his elegant translation of the Lotus Sutra.
Following its transmission to China, Buddhism flourished there, producing many distinguished monks. Among all those monks, the great patriarch of theTientai sect (天台宗, 也叫法华宗), was founded by Zhiyi ( 智顗 538‐‐597), who made an exhaustive study of all the Buddhist scriptures available to him. As a result, he concluded that the core of Shakyamuni Buddha’s teaching is revealed in the Lotus Sutra, and thus in the latter half of his life Master Zhiyi dedicated himself to studying, explaining, and disseminating this sutra.
First, the Lotus Sutra reveals and explains the infinite possibilities open to human beings. People have an infinite capacity for degeneracy if left unawakened and unmindful of discipline, yet at the same time they have an infinite capacity for elevation if they live in accordance with spiritual truth. Today, people are simply falling ever downward. Unless we stop now and think and completely change our way of living, we will certainly destroy ourselves. The Lotus Sutra reveals and explains both the theory and the practice necessary for bringing about such a change. Thinking that there is no answer for human foolishness, we are likely to become deeply depressed. But if, through the Lotus Sutra, we come to the realization that it is possible to change human nature for the better, fresh hope and courage ceaselessly well up in our hearts and minds.
Second, the Lotus Sutra teaches that, since all non‐living and living things, including human beings, are manifestations of the great life‐force of the universe, all of them are equal in terms of the fundamental value of their existence. A view of the world based on this thought naturally gives rise to a basic principle of living that can be stated as follows: “When human beings enjoy coexistence and mutual prosperity, respecting the life‐force inherent in all existences, including themselves, and loving that life‐force completely, great harmony will be achieved in this world. The ultimate happiness of human beings lies in such a state of mind.” People have so far tended to consider all non‐living and living things except themselves as existences at their disposal and have exploited, consumed, and destroyed them at will, and one result of this kind of thinking has been the pollution of nature. If we do not correct our wrongdoing immediately, we cannot be saved. The Lotus Sutra not only makes us keenly aware of these facts but also serves as an always dependable guide to the new way of living necessary for us now and in the future.
As we get into struggles of the 21th century, Master Thich Nhat Hanh (1926-2022) placing the Lotus Sutra in its historical context (around the time when Mahayana Buddhism was just emerging, and had to distinguish itself from non-Mahayana schools, which it terms “Hinayana” or “Lesser Vehicle”), and expounds on how this sutra can be the most important guidance to take the path of Bodhisattva in our modern time, and why this sutra firmly proclaimed that _everyone_ could become a fully enlightened buddha in his writing Opening the Heart of the Cosmo – Insighs on the Lotus Sutra (2003). Shining sixty years of study and practice, Master Thick Nhat Hanh demonstrates the practical and direct applicability of Buddhist teachings to today’s issues, from the Palestinian-Israeli tragedy to the threat of terrorism and the degradation of our environment.
Previously, the primary goal of early Buddhism had been to become a saint (“arhat”), liberated from samsara, with the joy of nirvana, but not an actual buddha oneself. Moreover, this path was restricted to renunciant monks, and not open to everyone. In this sutra, the Buddha proclaims that he taught this as a skillful means, because if he had said right away that people could attain buddhahood, no one would believe it. Now, however, the time being right, and people having understood the basics of the Four Noble Truths, etc., he could give this profound teaching. All the teachings and vehicles (Sravakayana, Pratyekabuddhayana, Bodhisattvayana, etc.) point to the one single vehicle: the buddhayana, the path to full buddhahood for all sentinent beings.
“The work of translating the Sutras is sacred work, and it will last for endless generations. We are common people doing the work of sages. Not only is this our duty, it is also very meaningful, for we can benefit others and establish merit. In the past, the kings and emperors used their imperial authority and the strength of the government to carry out the translation of the Sutras. Now we are merely using our strength as ordinary citizens. If we can produce some results, I believe the national leaders will also become involved in this work in the future. Right now, we must first lay a foundation. We must first gather strength among the people.”
While we pay tributes to the great works of these Bodhisattvas, we hope Lotus Sutra shed the light to more and more people in their path to liberation.
While China’s harvesting human organ from falungong members is atrocity, Jeffery Epstein, who affliciated with a huge network of high profile elites, involving in the human trafficling crimes sexually abusing under age children horrifying, we are in another gilded age with big corporations dominate our society and international relations in a globalization setting. The general situation is the corrupt merger of the state and corporate power with revolving door between government politicians, government agencies and corporation power. Politicians entering their career with modest income end up millionaires and billionairs after decades in the position. Executives of big corporations got out of size compensations. The corruption had infiltriated mind, body and spirit of modern world. We need a total purification, we need a peaceful revolution from these toxics.
In an interview with UnHerd’s Freddie Sayers, Robert Kennedy Jr. spoke of the traditional liberal Democratic value passed down from his uncle President John Kennedy and his father Senator Robert Kennedy. His father generation had an antipathy and suspicion of war and the military industrial complex. They did not want corporations running the American government. They were completely against censorship. They were against the use of fear as a governing tool, and they spoke out about it often.
Robert Kennedy Jr. had spent forty years litigating against the regulatory agenies in the United States. He spoke of the domination of democratic governments by corporate power as the center of issues. The government regulation started out not strong enough to protect the public interest. Widespread corruptions take advantage of legalizd bribery, as well as illegalized bribery. The rules supervising conflicts of interest are just ignored, systematicaly ignored. We have what they call honest graft and dishonest graft.
The result is a systematically hollowing out the American middle class, through wars, through bank bailouts, through lockdowns, etc. We are just printing money to make billionaires richer. During the COVID lockdown, there was a $4 Trillion shift in wealth fromt the American middle class to this new oligarchy of billionaires. We created 500 new billionaires with a lockdown and the billionaires we already had increased their wealth by 30%. The total cost of the lockdowns was $16 trillion. That is jus one of the assaults.
Then we got the bailout of the Silicon Valley Bank, the War in Ukraine, which is costing us $113 billion. The war in Iraq, and the wars that followed that have cost us $8 trillion. For all those wars we fought, American people bear all the cost and the consequence. That is $24 trillion in total loss! Is it any wonder that we don’t have a middle class left in the Unived States of America? Unless we rebuild the middle class and rebuild our economy, we can not maintain democracy when there are high concentrations of wealth in the same place with widespread proverty.
The political climate become more polarised than ever with good reason. To some extent co-opted by Bill Gates, by the World Economic Forum, and the billionaires’ boys club in Davos in the same way the COVID crisis was appropriated by them, to make themselves richer, to impose totalitarian controls on society. and to stratify our society with a group of very very powerful and wealthy people at the top, and then the vast majority of human beings with very little power, very little sovereignty over their own lives. Every crisis is an opportunity for those forces to clamp down controls.
In the same token, there is a shift from habitat preservation, regenerative farming. We need to reduce carbon, whether you believe in climate change or not. Anywhere there is carbon, there is also mercury, ozone particulates, aluminium, there is all these other kinds of really horrible toxins that come from burning hydrocarbons. What we see is a shift from those concerns, but more towards carbon capture, which can be monetized by the corporations and exploited without seeing any real benefits on the ground. There are also geo-engineering solutions, which Robert Kennedy Jr. oppose. Look at the kind of geoengineering solutions that are being pushed, tends to be by the same group of people who also have IP(patent rights) rights in a lot of those technologies. There is definitely an optic of self-interest and self-serving.
This combination of corporate and government power, which colluded to get farmers to switch over to heavily nitrate fertiliser dependent for farming and chemical dependent farming is very toxic. That was a deliberate systematic and GMO farming. Once you get all the farmers to switch to carbon-based fertilisers and to monocultures, this is a way of corporate power to destroyig small farmers. We want to have democracy, we need a broad ownership of our land by a wide variety of yeoman farmers, each with a stake in our system. As Thomas Jefferson said, wiping out small farmers and giving control of food production to corporation is not in the interest of humanity, and we need to help those farmers transition off the addiction that we imposed upon them in the first place.
With so many important issues going on, vaccine is a issue that for most American, is not on their top list, but they have far reaching consequence.
Examples most egregious of those issue are like the Environmental Protection Agency effectively run by the oil industry, the coal industry and the pesticide industry. The Big Pharma runs FDA – FDA get 50% of its budget from Big Pharma. The CDC spends half of its budget purchasing vaccines, NIH essentially is a incubator for new pharmacetical products. It doesn’t do the basic research people want them to be doing – where diseases, allergic diseases are coming from, autoimmune disease and neurological diseases, why are we seeing this explosion? Those kinds of studies don’t get done. Studies do get done are studies for the pharmaceutical products, and then NIH collects royalties when pharma company sells those product. You have the regulator that is essentially a partner with the regulated industry. Department of Transport is run by the railroads in our country, by the airlines. The banks have utterly corrupted the SEC. Media has corrupted the FEC. That was how pernicious the systems are, particularly polluting corporations, the military industrial complex, the financial industry.
If you want to achieve peace, you got to put yourself in the other guys’ shoes, you have to understand your opponents’ position. Robert Kennedy Jr. spoke of the end of cuba missle crisis happened because President John Kennedy reached out to Khrushchev directly and said, ‘let’s settle this between us’, and their settlement was secret and remain secret for many years. President Kennedy and Khrushchev were both surrounded by people who DID want to go to war.
We don’t want constant war in our country, we can not afford them. The CIA needs to be regoranised in a way. Most of the people who work at the CIA are very good public servants, and we need them to function. But we really need to separate the espionage functions of that agency and the plans division – the division that actually does dirty tricks, kills people, and makes wars that invovles itself in actions because what happens is, that operations tail begins to wag the espionage dog. The information gathering, analysis, that is the function that the CIA was created to perform. From very early on, Allen Dulles, essentially corrupted the purpose of it by getting the CIA invovled in assassinations and fixing elections. CIA has been invovled now in fixing coup d’etats or attempted coup d’etats in about a third of the countries in the world, most of them democracies. So our national policy as a country is to promote democracy. The CIA’s policy has been the opposite.
Pastor John MacArthur said in one of this sermons: ” You do’nt need information about the disappointments in our culture, the disappointments in our world, you don’t need to know that everything is upside down, as in Isaiah Chapter 5, bitter has been swapped with sweet, good has been swapped with bad, and we are living in an inverted and upside down world. But I want to give you a perspective biblically, so you can understand what is going on. The first thing I want to say is, you have to understand this, what is happening in our country and largely in our world, is a Divine Judgement. Mark that in your mind. It is a Divine Judgement. Joe Biden is not in charge of this, God is. “
Pastor MacAuthur continues to say, ” This is the wrath of Abandonment. This is historical as God allow all the nations to go their own way. The history of the world is the history of Nations going their own way and consequently experiencing the wrath of Divine Abandonment. This is what is the view in Romans 1:18. The wrath of God revealed from Heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrightenousness. “
Spiritual leader Marianne Williamson spoke of Consciousness, Spirituality and Politics in America on in a presentation with Harvard Divinity School. She reminded people that William Penn, an English writer, religious thinker, and influential Quaker who founded the Province of Pennsylvania during the British colonial era, was an advocate of democracy and religious freedom known for his amicable relations and successful treaties with the Lenape Native Americans who had resided in present-day Pennsylvania prior to European settlements inthe state.
