True Essences

by Nichiko Niwano

 
 

Dogen, the thirteenth-century founder of the Soto Zen sect, wrote the following brief verse about the natural features of the four seasons in Japan:
In spring, flowers; 
In summer, the cuckoo; 
In autumn, the moon; 
In winter, the snow cold and bright,
chilly and bracing.

This poem about the changing seasons also captures the true essence of things. Our true essence is our buddha-nature, which is the reality of our innermost being. Our perceptions of the seasons are influenced by our likes and dislikes. But it is self-centered of us to denounce the summer for being too hot or to praise the springtime for its lovely blossoms. The world of the Buddha and the grand realm of nature transcend such self-centered values.

Spring is delightful simply because it is spring. Summer is worthwhile because it is summer. This is equally true of autumn and winter. The seasons come to us in their true form--our personal likes and dislikes have nothing to do with the essence of the four seasons. In the same way, we cannot judge someone to be of value simply because that person is eloquent or another to be of less worth simply because, for example, that person is not good at sports.

When we look at things and think about what we see, we tend to pass judgment based on whatever way is convenient for us. We decide that what suits us is good and what does not is bad. But such thinking only narrows our view of the world. As ordinary as people may be, that does not mean they have no value. Each of us is precious. There is no need to rely on excessive humility or false pride when we know that life in and of itself is glorious. The buddha-nature exists in each of us. The gift of precious life that we have been granted provides meaning for our existence.
It is truly a revelation to realize the preciousness of all life, including one's own. This knowledge gives us the courage to live to the fullest and helps us to see how really wonderful life is.

The Life of the Buddha Is Eternal
To understand the meaning of transience is to recognize that everything in this world is always changing, from an unlimited past to an unlimited future. Nothing remains the same from one moment to the next. In other words, transience is eternity.

Chapter 16 of the Lotus Sutra, "The Revelation of the [Eternal] Life of the Tathagata," says that the Buddha's life is eternal. If the Buddha's life is eternal, this means our own lives also are eternal. Yet our real life spans actually are limited even as they are subject to constant change. For us, yesterday is different from today. Yesterday has gone and tomorrow is yet to come. It is not possible for us to live yesterday or tomorrow. We have no choice but to live today, living each day afresh. To live from yesterday to today and from today to tomorrow in a sense is a process of living in the "eternal today," in the "eternal now" that is not present, past, or future.

Human beings are like waves in the great sea of the "eternal now." We ebb and flow, live and die. Just as no wave in the sea appears more than once, so no human life is exactly the same as another. Each of us leads a life that is unique, that can never be replicated once it is gone. Yet, despite the constant appearance and disappearance of the waves, the great seas continue to exist for eternity.

Life can only be experienced once. Our eternal lives ebb and flow like the tides of a great sea. No human being can be born into the same life again. We live in this world only once, but we live--are allowed to live--within the eternal life of the Buddha.

The World Is Eternal
Human life is finite, but we are endowed with the ability to recognize the law of transience, the eternal truth. This makes it possible for us to touch eternity, to join our finite lives with infinite existence.

To recognize the law of transience is to know everlasting life. By joining our limited lives to that of eternity, we are able to live forever. Your life, my life, each is interconnected with everything in this world. We exist in the constantly interacting and unbounded expanse of dependent origination. Not a single life can be detached from this framework. Our lives are made possible by the complex interaction of all life. Life is not limited to the individual, but extends to all the world. And the life of the world continues without regard to the birth or death of an individual. Every human life must end someday, but the world is eternal and goes on forever.

Buddhism teaches us that the self and the other are one and the same absolute. When we recognize that all life is part of one great life, it is only natural that we should seek to live in harmony with each other.

Consider the self-centered person who awakens to the fact that his life is one with all of life. With that awareness comes the ability to live in a world without conflict, the world of eternal life.

A Word on "Time"
Let us look at the eternal present, eternal life, from another perspective. Our perception of time is defined by the calendar. We think in terms of the day, the month, and the year. We see time as a straight, continuous line. But real time is more than just one day following another in sequence; it is, in fact, three-dimensional rather than linear.
The time that is the present encompasses everything in the past. In terms of human life, the present--the here and now--is a condensation of our past and a portent of our future. Everything we do, everything that happens around us, becomes the causes and conditions of our future. Thus the present carries the accumulations of the past while at the same time it is pregnant with the future. Eternity is contained in each passing minute.
The fact that today is designated as a certain day of a certain month within a certain year is one aspect of reality. The fact that today, this very moment, is finite and yet a part of eternity is another. We who live in this present that contains both past and future are in essence living in the eternal now. This is especially true when we strive to live each day to the fullest.

Our perception of time is usually grounded in the present. Buddhism describes this as like standing on a riverbank and watching a boat sail down the river. Zuiryu Nakamura, the former president of Rissho University in Tokyo, speaks of this in his book, Honto no Michi, Hokekyo [The True Way, the Lotus Sutra]. 

"We call the instant which exists right now the 'present,' the one that comes before it the 'past,' and the one that comes after it the 'future.' But this is like standing on a riverbank and watching a boat sail by. We refer to the expanse of water that the boat travels before it comes to where we are standing as 'upstream.' When the boat reaches the point where we are standing, we consider it to be right before us. And when it passes us, we say it has gone downstream."

He goes on to say:
"But the reality of existence is that we live in tandem with the passage of time. The present moment will, in the next instant, become the past, and the future next moment will, in an instant, become the present. This suggests that it is a mistake to speak of time in terms of past, present, and future defined by one fixed moment in the passage of time. Time passes, just as life passes. The past was once the present, and the future eventually will become the present. We live from moment to moment. After all, if we are in the boat, it will always be right in front of us, neither upstream nor downstream."
I think this passage illustrates well that we live in the now of the eternal present. We are riding in the boat and floating along with the stream of time. Acknowledging this gives us the strength and the motivation to lead our lives in the now to the fullest.