More on Yogacara (Mind Only) and the Lotus Sutra

More on Yogacara and the Lotus:

In Yogacara or Mind Only, all phenomena derive from the mind. This being the case, there is no empathy nor acknowledgement of others feelings and their sufferings since one aspect of empathy is being able to put oneself in another's shoes. How can you put oneself in the other's shoes if everything derives from YOUR mind? Yogacara is a selfish way to view the world. Despite Yogacaran's rhetoric of caring, they embrace the ignoble and selfish teachings of pre-Lotus Sutra Buddhism rather than the The Eternal Buddha's and Nichiren's caring and respect towards all beings.

Yogacara discourse explains how our human experience is constructed by the mind only. The Lotus Sutra teaching of suchness and the oneness of the Three Realms (The Realm of the Individual or Five Aggregates, The Realm of Society, and The Realm of the Environment) goes way beyond the One Realm of Yogacara (The Five Aggregates). In Yogacara everything is a construct of the mind, even the existence of others, let alone their suffering.

Two women are sitting in the Ob-Gyn office. One is an expectant mother who had been trying to have a child for many years and has finally become pregnant and is expected to have a healthy baby in two weeks. The other woman has just been diagnosed with late stage ovarian cancer. To the expectant mother, the office is brimming with vitality and joy, the pictures on the wall evoke an abiding sense of well being, the receptionist is an angel of mercy, the doctor is a compassionate father figure, and the wait to see the doctor passes as if a moment . To the woman with late stage ovarian cancer, the office is a gloomy prison cell, the pictures on the wall evoke a sense of foreboding, the receptionist is curt and uncaring, the doctor's bedside manner is disturbing, and the hour wait seems like an eternity.

From the perspective of the Lotus Sutra, Shakyamuni Buddha, Tientai, and Nichiren, the doctors office is thus: It simultaneously possesses all Ten Worlds, their Mutual Possession, One Thousand Factors, and Three Thousand Realms in an ever changing panoply, whose essence is the Eternal Buddha's Realm. Yogacara teachings derive from the mind of the common mortal while the Lotus Sutra teachings derive from the mind of the Buddha.

Tientai the Great of China classified the teachings of the Buddha as follows:*

The Five Periods are as follows:

Flower Ornament Period (華嚴時) Āgamas Period (阿含時) Vaipūlya (方等時) Prajñā (般若時) Lotus-Nirvāṇa Period (法華涅槃時).

The Eight Teachings are subdivided into two groups:

The Fourfold Methods of Conversion (化儀四教) Sudden Teaching (頓教) Gradual Teaching (漸教) Secret Teaching (秘密教) Variable Teaching (不定教) The Fourfold Doctrines of Conversion (化法四教) Tripitaka Teaching (三藏教) Shared Teaching (通教) Distinctive Teaching (別教) Complete Teaching (圓教)[11]

"The word “wonderful” in The Lotus Sutra of the Wonderful Law has two meanings. One is comparative myō, or wonderful, which indicates refuting the rough teachings and revealing the wonderful teaching. The other is absolute myō, which indicates opening up the rough teachings and merging them in the wonderful teaching." - Nichiren

We can literally find all the teachings of the Buddha in the Lotus Sutra; From the Flower Ornament teachings ("The mind is a skillful painter" and Yogacara or Mind Only); to the Theravada teachings (Four Noble Truths, Eight Fold Path, Precepts, Impermanence, Dependent Origination etc); to the Prajna Paramita or Heart Sutra teachings (The Two Truths, Temporary Existence and non-substantiality) and others of the Five Periods and Eight Teachings.

For example, the Theravada precepts are taught in Chapter 14 and Dependent Origination is taught in Chapter 7. Non-substantiality is taught principally in Chapter 2.

Here we see the the absolute myō, which indicates opening up the rough teachings and merging them in the wonderful teaching.

Chapters 11 and 23 for example, we see the comparative myo which indicates refuting the rough teachings and revealing the wonderful teaching.

These are the two aspects of the Lotus Sutra. Thus you can see how we can incorporate all the teachings of the Buddha in the faith and practice of the Lotus Sutra. This is the absolute wonderfulness. A child who in the 5th grade thinks that he knows all there is to know about mathematics is gently (or forcefully) scolded by his learned PhD teacher for the sake of the child's development. This is an example of comparative wonderfulness (Myo).

*From wikipedia, the Five Periods and Eight Teachings.

An example of a Yogacaran's delusion is the father of Yogacara in China:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonhyo

"Wonhyo spent the earlier part of his career as a monk. In 661 he and a close friend - Uisang (625–702, founder of the Korean Hwaom school) - were traveling to China where they hoped to study Buddhism further. Somewhere in the region of Baekje the pair were caught in a heavy downpour and forced to take shelter in what they believed to be an earthen sanctuary. During the night Wonhyo was overcome with thirst, and reaching out grasped what he perceived to be a gourd, and drinking from it was refreshed with a draught of cool, refreshing water. Upon waking the next morning, however, the companions discovered much to their amazement that their shelter was in fact an ancient tomb littered with human skulls, and the vessel from which Wonhyo had drunk was a human skull full of brackish water. Upon seeing this, Wonhyo vomited. Startled by the experience of believing that a gruesome liquid was a refreshing treat, Wonhyo was astonished at the power of the human mind to transform reality. After this "One Mind" enlightenment experience, he abandoned his plan to go to China. He left the priesthood and turned to the spreading of the Buddhadharma as a layman..."

A practitioner of the Lotus would immediately know that the water was brackish because of the purification of the senses thanks to the Lotus. He might have drunk it anyway were he overcome with thirst though, in actuality, this would be an impossibility for a votary of the Lotus Sutra.

The Tathagata knows and sees the appearance

of the Three Worlds in accordance with reality:

there is no Birth-and-Death,

whether backsliding or emerging;

likewise there is neither existence in the world

nor extinction; they are not real; they are not void,

they are not thus; they are not different.

It is not as the Three Worlds

see the Three Worlds. In such a matter as this

the Tathagata sees clearly

and is without error. -- Lotus Sutra Chapter 16 [Juryo-hon]

And likewise for the disciples of the Eternal Buddha and Nichiren.