Chapter XIII: ) follows naturally on the call just made to take the

Mahayana vow. It is said that Kumarajiva omitted this part from his Chinese version, or, if he included it, that for a time it was omitted from the copies made. The hermit referred to in the opening incident of our Chapter XII is named, in the verse section, Asita. Now it is recorded that after the birth of Gautama a certain saint Asita took the infant into his arms, as Simeon did the child Jesus in the Gospel, and foretold his destiny. The chapter is styled Devadatta. This was the name of the cousin and rival of Śakyamuni Buddha, whom he is accused of trying to kill, for which it is reported he was swallowed up in hell. Nevertheless there was a sect which worshipped him as a Buddha up to A.D. 400, but his story is unreliable. By some he is said to be a reincarnation of Asita, which naturally is beyond proof. Here the Buddha is made to announce that it was Devadatta who had taught him The Lotus Sutra. The devout consider this chapter to prove that even a wicked creature like Devadatta, though doomed to hell for trying to kill the Buddha, may still be converted and become Buddha.

The chapter opens by Śakyamuni recounting that, in a former incarnation when he was a king, he devoted himself to a tireless search for the Supreme Wisdom. During long kalpas he gave alms of every kind with the utmost self-sacrifice. At last he, the king, offered to become the menial follower of any one who would reveal to him the Truth. Then it was that the hermit Devadatta called him to be his disciple, promising to teach him The Lotus Truth. He responded with joy and became his servant, for love of the wonderful truth revealed by the hermit. Śakyamuni now foretells the glorious future of Devadatta.

Soon, one of the attendants on the Ancient Buddha from a lower region, evidently a-weary, invites his master to dismiss the durbar and return home. On this Śakyamuni intervenes, requesting the attendant to await the arrival of Manjuśri who will tell of the marvellous effect of The Lotus Sutra during his preaching of it. Manjuśri arrives on a thousand-petal lotus flower and, after paying his homage to the two Buddhas, tells the story of his adventures in the Dragon Palace of the sea, where, in the deep, he has converted infinite numbers. At his call myriads of bodhisattvas arise from the ocean and are assembled on the mountain side seated on jewelled lotuses, after which they ascend into the sky to join the great multitude. Later a greater marvel occurs, for the daughter of the Dragon-king attains to The Lotus wisdom and thereby is instantly changed into a young man. It amazes the assembly for “the body of a woman is filthy and not a vessel of the Law”, whereas here, by immediate conversion, a female can enter into all the privileges of the man, even to that of becoming a king, a Brahma, a Buddha. The moral is easy to draw, that The Lotus doctrine knows no distinction of male or female, but that even a woman may enter into the fullness of Anuttara-samyak-sambodhi, or Perfect Enlightenment.

In Chapter XIII the Lord of Healing bids Śakyamuni Buddha, who is going to his Nirvana, not to have any anxiety, for he and his twenty thousand Bodhisattvas now take a vow to make The Lotus Sutra their charge. During the evil age to come they will faithfully preach it to all creatures, unsparing of body or life. Other countless followers of the Buddha take a like vow. Then the Buddha’s aunt, his foster-mother, leading her six thousand nuns, stands before him, looking sadly on his face. Realizing that they think they have been overlooked, he asks them why they have not understood? Has he not promised perfect enlightenment to _all_ his disciples, and does not this include them? Then he promises that they also will in turn become Buddhas. His foster-mother will become a Buddha called Loveliness, and all her disciples will become perfectly enlightened. His wife, the mother of his son Rahula, he foretells will become a Buddha entitled The Perfect One of the Myriad Rays. All the women thereupon vow to preach The Lotus Sutra in all lands. Following this, the countless number of spiritual bodhisattvas, as with a lion’s roar, vow to preach the Sutra in all worlds in every direction.

The following Chapter XIV, called “A Serene Life”, is an instruction how the vow is to be kept. Rules of life for the disciple are laid down in considerable detail. His virtues are patience, gentleness, a mind unperturbed, seeing all things in their reality, or, as we might say fluid, or spiritual. There must be no intimacy with kings and rulers as such, nor with heretics, nor with authors of worldly literature or poetry, nor with players, boxers and jugglers, nor with butchers, hunters or fishermen, nor with women; he may preach to them, but have no intimacy with them of any kind. To all and in all circumstances he must show charity. Let him fear not staves nor swords, for he will be divinely protected on every hand. Then follows the parable of the king, who rewards his faithful soldiers with all his possessions, save only the lustrous jewel he wears on his brow. At last even this he cannot keep for himself but bestows it also. Thus is it with the Buddha and his priceless jewel The Lotus.

“Springing up out of the Earth” is the title of the next, the fifteenth chapter. The host of Bodhisattvas from other realms offer to Śakyamuni to remain in his realm and preach the Sutra. No need, is his reply, and from the earth spring vast, countless numbers of bodhisattvas, each of them leading forth disciples many as the sands of Ganges, who all make obeisance to the two Buddhas, the Ancient One and Śakyamuni, and walk in procession round them. Fifty kalpas, or myriads of years pass while thus they march, though it seems but as half a day. Whence came they? ask the disciples. Then the Buddha calls forth Maitreya, who is the Buddha-to-come, and to him announces that these are the disciples he has taught through vast ages, who now dwell in a vast realm below the earth in the Space-region of the world. But, how is it possible that Śakyamuni in so short a lifetime can have taught such a vast multitude? ask the disciples astonished. Through Maitreya they express their doubt while depicting in detail the brief life and period of Śakyamuni.

This leads in Chapter XVI to the climax of the drama, where he reveals that his life is hemmed in by no bounds of time and space, for he is eternal. The chapter is called The Revelation of the Buddha as Eternal. “Since I veritably was Buddha, infinite, boundless, hundreds, thousands, myriads, kotis, nayutas of kalpas have passed.” With much illustration, as will be found in this volume, he tries to explain the incalculable meaning of eternity and claims that he has always been Buddha. He describes his eternal being, his omniscience and his omnipresence. He tells them he must leave them for their own good, because even a Buddha may only appear at rare intervals, for familiarity breeds contempt, even for a Buddha. All this he shows in the Parable of the Good Physician, whose sons drink poison and refuse his remedies till he temporarily departs and leaves them.

In the next Chapter XVII, he tells Maitreya that, during the time that he has been proclaiming the Eternity of his Life, beings countless as the sands of Ganges have been saved, and numberless others attained enhanced powers. Flowers, incense, jewels rain down from heaven upon the two Buddhas in the heavenly shrine, while all the Bodhisattvas sing countless praises with heavenly voices. Vast and eternal are the rewards promised to the true believer, all expressed with a wealth of detail impossible to repeat here.

In Chapter XVIII, called The Merits of Joyful Accordance, the Buddha recounts still further the reward that will follow the merit of believing in The Lotus Sutra. Other merits of untold value are discussed, but the merit of faith in The Lotus surpasses all these myriad-fold. On earth the believer will be free from every ailment, for instance, “his teeth will never be dirty, black or yellow, nor in gaps, nor fall out, nor be irregular, nor crooked, his lips will not be pendulous, nor twisted and shrunk, nor coarse and rough, nor have sores and pustules, nor be cracked and broken, nor awry and out of shape, neither thick nor big, neither sallow nor black, having nothing loathsome; his nose will not be flat, nor crooked and distorted,” and so on in further detail. Hereafter he will be born among gods or men, possessing elephants, horses and carriages, jewelled palanquins and litters, and every other luxury.

Further rewards are promised in Chapter XIX—rewards for merits of eye, of ear, of nose, of tongue, of body and of mind, all which are separately described. With his ear he will hear the sounds of his entire universe, from its highest heaven to its lowest hell, the sounds of elephants, horses, oxen, carriages, wailing, lamentation, conches, drums, gongs, bells, laughter, speech, men, women, boys, girls, the lawful, the unlawful, pain, pleasure, and so on, the sounds of its Bodhisattvas and Buddhas being included. In like manner are the other organs presented in unstinted detail.

This is followed by Chapter XX on the Bodhisattva “Never despise”. Wherever he met a person, good or bad, he always addressed him with reverence, as one whose final destiny was buddhahood. Ignorant of everything else, and always repeating “You are to become buddhas”, he stirred people to anger. They beat him severely, while he still saluted them and told them they were destined to buddhahood. As he drew near the end of his normal term of life, he acquired control over the six organs referred to in the last chapter and became possessed of the rewards attached thereto. So influential did he become that all those who had despised and beaten him, chief among whom were his fellow-monks and nuns, became his disciples. After his translation he entered the company of myriads of Buddhas in Light. Then the Buddha, after telling this story, says, I myself was that Buddha “Never Despise.” The persecuting monks are, of course, those of the Hinayana, the persecuted those of the Mahayana.

In Chapter XXI the “Divine Power of the Buddha is revealed”. The method of the revelation of power is startling and far from attractive to the Western mind, but it indicates the value of lingual enlightenment. All living beings in all the universes now assemble together before the Celestial Shrine, and flowers, incense, garlands, canopies, jewels, and every precious thing fill the sky like gathering clouds, being transformed into a mighty jewel-canopy above the Buddhas. Śakyamuni again addresses the gathered host in praise of this Sutra, which he declares contains all the law of the Buddha, all his sovereign powers, all the mystery of his treasury.

“The Final Commission” is the title of Chapter XXII. Śakyamuni by supernatural power places his hand on the heads of the countless Bodhisattvas present, entrusting to them The Lotus law of Perfect Enlightenment. The Tathagata is described as the Great Lord of Giving and they in like manner must give this Sutra to all. Thereupon Śakyamuni dismisses all the Buddhas from all the other Buddha-realms: “Buddhas! Peace be unto you. Let the stupa of the Buddha, Abundant Treasures, be restored as before.” On this all depart rejoicing greatly that they have heard the preaching of Śakyamuni.

It seems probable that the author here ended his drama, though it is noteworthy that this chapter is not done into verse and that, with the exception of Chapter XXV, no further verse portion is found. Nothing is said about the entry of Śakyamuni into his Nirvana, but that may be an artistic and intentional omission. Six more chapters follow, by which presumably some later writer or writers thought to improve the work. They serve no such purpose, and Buddhism would lose nothing by their omission That they formed part of the work as it reached China need not be doubted, but the dismissal of the Celestial Assembly seems the natural conclusion for a work revealing such dramatic skill and power.

It may be added that this Chapter XXII is not, in the Sanskrit version, found here, but as the final chapter, and also in Jñanagupta’s Chinese translation. In Dharmaraksha’s version, Chapter XXV on Avalokiteśvara, or Kuan-yin, precedes it. This may be an indication of the position already gained in the third century A.D. by Kuan-yin, the Regarder of Cries. The remaining chapters are, however, clearly _hors d’œuvre_, and spoil the drama. Whether it was for this reason that Kumarajiva placed the Final Commission here, or whether such was its position in the text he used, can at present only be matter of conjecture. In the Sanskrit version our Chapters XXIII to XXVIII are interpolated, or so it would appear, the present chapter being put last. That Chapters XXIII to XXVIII have been considered as additions seems also evident from the different order in which they appear. Kern points out that the Sanskrit and Jñanagupta’s versions take as their order our Chapters XXVI, XXIII, XXIV, XXV, XXVII, XXVIII, and XXII; while Dharmaraksha’s order is our Chapters XXV, XXII, XXIII, XXIV, XXVI, XXVII, and XXVIII.

Assuming then, what is doubtful, that our Chapter XXII is the final chapter of the original apocalypse, and that the remaining six are by later writers, though as early as the third century A.D., we find in Chapter XXIII “The Story of the Bodhisattva King of Healing”. It may be noted that sickness and religious healing are closely associated in Buddhism. The King of the Constellation-flower asks Śakyamuni-Buddha why the King of Healing wanders through, and suffers in this universe, healing countless diseases. The Buddha in reply tells him that, in ages gone by, there was a Buddha called Brilliance of the Sun and Moon, who finally preached The Lotus Truth to one of his numberless Bodhisattvas called Beautiful. Beautiful thereupon entered into the samadhi known as the Revelation of all forms, or things. In thank-offering he resolved to offer up his body to Buddha Brilliance. Before doing so for full twelve hundred years, he partook of all the fragrant flowers, oils, resins, and incense, and also anointed himself with sweet unguents. Finally, he bathed in perfumed oil, wrapped himself in a celestial garment and, by his transcendent will, burnt his body as a sweet-smelling offering to the Buddha who had revealed to him The Lotus. Its brightness illumined worlds numerous as the sands of millions of Ganges rivers. It is in this chapter that we first meet with dharanis, or magic spells. When the Buddha Brilliance enters Nirvana, it is to his disciple Beautiful that he commits The Lotus Law, bidding him distribute his relics and erect over them thousands of stupas. After burning the Buddha’s body, the disciple collected 84,000 relics and over each built an immense and beautiful stupa. Still not satisfied, he burnt off his arms in homage, but after a vast interval, during which he was honoured of gods, men, and demons, his arms were restored to him. Therefore, if any one “is able to burn a finger of his hand, or even a toe of his foot, in homage to a Buddha’s stupa, he will surpass him who pays homage with domains, cities, wives, children” and so on. It was this disciple Beautiful who became the King of Healing, and such is said to be the power of this his sutra, that “if a man be sick, on hearing it his sickness will instantly disappear, and he will neither grow old nor die”.

The next Chapter XXIV tells the story of the Bodhisattva Wonder-Sound, in the realm of the Buddha, King Wisdom of the Pure-flower Constellation. He had attained to a great number of samadhis, or trance-like concentrations, the names of which are given. Seeing the ray of light from Śakyamuni Buddha’s brow, he seeks permission to visit this world. The Buddha-king warns him that this is a world of great ruggedness, “full of earth, stones, hills, and filth, the body of the Buddha is short and small, and all his Bodhisattvas are small of stature”. Then Wonder-Sound enters into a samadhi, and first projects 84,000 jewel lotus-flowers, with stalks of gold, on to Mount Gridhrakuta, a sign which Śakyamuni recognizes as portending a visit from Wonder-Sound with his 84,000 disciples. Manjuśri asks the reason, whereupon the Ancient Buddha, Infinite Treasures, (who departed in