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How to read a Sutra - Dharmavidya

Dharmavidya answers this question :: link

QUESTION: What is the best way of reading and interpreting a sutra?

SHORT ANSWER: One tries to understand the Dharma contained in it and let the images bring that Dharma to life deep within.

LONGER ANSWER: I think one of the points in the questioner's mind is the question of how literally to take such things as descriptions of the Pure Land. Different readers certainly do differ in such matters and there is not really a strong orthodoxy on the matter. If we take the descriptions of the Pure Land, I think we have to take it that these are descriptions of visions. They do not necessarily correspond in detail to the geography. If you plan to emigrate to New Zealand you no doubt have an image in your mind of what it is like but this image will not correspond exactly to what you find when you get there. Nonetheless, the image does, in a certain way, correspond to the aspiration that is in your heart. So Pure Land Buddhists expect to be somewhere after death and they expect it to be a place close to the Buddha that is inspiring and some have been so inspired that they visualise that land and some of those visions have found their way into the texts.

Not just in the Pure Land schools. Much of Mahayana Buddhist literature from the Avatamsaka Sutra onwards is visionary. These visionary samadhis are themselves important practice. If you cultivate that vision it will work magic in your soul.

I am in Korea at the moment. There are lots of depictions of Buddhas here with Korean facial features. Now we know that Shakyamuni was not Korean, but never mind, we all know what the picture or statue is about.

So what matters is, on the one hand, the Dharma within the imagery and, on the other hand, the way that the imagery itself gives life to Dharma. Dharma is not just intellectual, it is supposed to lodge deeply within you. It is not just something to think rationally about, but, rather, something that should enter into one’s dream body. When Dharma has penetrated and permeated the unconscious mind then one is somewhere near to being a practitioner and to get to that state poetry, imagery and story are more effective than reductive literalism.

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The Famous Dialectic of Chan ~ Dharmavidya

The most famous classic of Chan Buddhism (Chinese Zen) is the Platform Sutra 六祖壇經. The sutra presents the teachings of Huineng 慧能 (638-713) [However, the text went through many revisions and the ten chapter edition that is currently taken as authoritative actually dates from 1291]. The most read section is the first chapter which records the competition for succession to Hongren 弘忍, the fifth patriarch. There were two contenders, Huineng and Shenxiu 神秀. The competition was conducted by the writing of a verse. The verse should show the author's understanding of the fundamental meaning of Chan.

The verse of Shenxiu is as follows

The body is the bodhi tree,
The mind like a mirror bright.

Ceaselessly, diligently, wipe the mirror
Let no dust alight!

Huineng then wrote a rejoinder to this verse

Fundamentally bodhi has no tree,
The mirror has no stand.
Originally there is not a single thing
Upon which dust could land.

These two verses are of enormous importance in understanding the deep meaning of Buddhism. On the one hand, there is the work of cleaning the mind. On the other hand, there is the realisation that mind itself cannot be contaminated. All delusion is adventitious and ephemeral. To not work at the practice is to sink further into delusion, yet to work too hard at the practice is to take delusion too seriously. What is one to do?

All Buddhist practices seek to cut through this seeming contradiction in one way or another. We could say that if Shenxiu's verse is the thesis, Huineng's is the antithesis; and the task is to find the synthesis.

Whether we see a Bodhi Tree
Or a mirror bright
When we welcome everything
Dust will shine with light.

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The Sutra on the Contemplation of the Buddha Amitayus

NOTE: The famous "Sutra on the Contemplation of Buddha Amitayus" (or simply, "Contemplation Sutra") is revered as canonical by all Pure Land Buddhists, and is one of the Three Sutras of Pure Land Buddhism, the others being the Larger Sukhavati-vyuha Sutra and the Smaller Sukhavati-vyuha Sutra. In the Contemplation Sutra, the Nembutsu (Namo Amida Butsu) is specifically proclaimed as the avenue to liberation of suffering beings from samsara. This English translation by J. Takakusu published originally as vol. XLIX of The Sacred Books of the East series (Oxford, 1894, public domain) has been edited for ease of reading and comprehension by modern readers. Footnotes from the original edition are dated and have thus been eliminated. A reprint of the unaltered and fully annotated translation exists in Dover paperback.
PART I.

1. Thus have I heard: At one time the Buddha dwelt in Rajagriha, on Vulture Peak, with a large assembly of Bhikkhus and with thirty-two thousand Bodhisattvas, with Manjushri the Dharma-Prince at the head of the assembly.

2. At that time, in the great city of Rajagriha there was a prince, the heir-apparent, named Ajatasatru. He listened to the wicked counsel of Devadatta and other friends and forcibly arrested Bimbisara his father, the king, and shut him up by himself in a room with seven walls, proclaiming to all the courtiers that no one should approach (the king). The chief consort of the king, Vaidehi by name, was true and faithful to her lord, the king. She supported him in this way: having purified herself by bathing and washing, she anointed her body with honey and ghee mixed with corn-flour, and she concealed the juice of grapes in the various garlands she wore in order to give him food without being noticed by the warder. As she stole in and made an offering to him, he was able to eat the flour and to drink the juice of grapes. Then he called for water and rinsed his mouth. That done, the king stretched forth his folded hands towards Vulture Peak and duly and respectfully made obeisance to the World-Honored One, who at that time was living there. And he uttered the following prayer: 'Mahamaudgalyayana is my friend and relative; let him, I pray, feel compassion towards me, and come and communicate to me the eight prohibitive precepts of the Buddha.' On this, Mahamaudgalyayana at once appeared before the king, coming with a speed equal to the flight of a falcon or an eagle, and communicated to him the eight precepts.

Day after day he visited the king. The World-Honored One sent also his worthy disciple Purna to preach the Dharma to the king. Thus a period of three weeks passed by. The king showed in his expression that he was happy and contented when he had an opportunity of hearing the Dharma as well as of enjoying the honey and flour.