|
| “Birth in the Pure Land and “Becoming a Buddha” |
|
|
|
Page 3 of 17
The Venerable Master interpreted this passage as follows: Through his compassionate working, all sentient beings who hear his Name, rejoice in faith and think on him at least once; aspiring to be born in his land, they will instantaneously attain birth and dwell in the “stage of nonretrogression.” I have already related that to the side of the kanji characters for shojoju, there is the notation, “being assured of birth in the Pure Land.” Further, in the Yuishin-sho (Notes on Mind Alone), it states: The Larger Sutra states that “those who desire to be born in that country will do so immediately and not fall back.” ... the phrase, “will do so immediately,” refers to the fact that our birth in the Pure Land is settled the moment we receive shinjin. As you can see, the Venerable Master interpreted “immediately be born (in the Pure Land)” (sokutoku ojo) in the “passage on completion of the Primal Vow” as being included in the “rightlyestablished group” of those assured of birth in the Pure Land. Rather than being born in the Pure Land after your life in this world is over, ojo is expressed in terms of being born in the Pure Land at the moment we “receive shinjin” (shinjin gyakutoku). From this we see that the Venerable Master’s use of the term ojo has two meanings: 1) “impossible-to-conceive-of birth in the Pure Land” (nanjigi ojo) and 2) “immediately be born (in the Pure Land)” (sokutoku ojo) which refers to being included among the “rightly established group” in our present life. |