Lotus Sutra Quote – Buddha – Lotus

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/lotus-sutra-quote-buddha800.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/lotus-sutra-quote-buddha1024.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/lotus-sutra-quote-buddha1280.jpg

It has been  a while since I posted here. So, another wallpaper from the archives in my PC

This is very similar to my previous post Blue-Lotus-Diamond-Sutra-Quote . It has a Buddha statue, a Lotus and a Quote from a Sutra. Not to say it is from the same website. Try to find the link in the wallpaper !

[ Speaking of Lotuses, remember our Sanskrit Lessons : White Lotus - Pundarika पुंडरीक ;  Blue Lotus - Utpala उत्पल ; Red Lotus - Padma पद्म ]

The Lotus is a white lotus (Pundarika), which looks yellow due to the gradient effect.  The Sanskrit Title of Lotus Sutra reads “saddharma puṇḍarīka sūtram – सद्धर्म पुण्डरीक सूत्रम्” – which can be translated to the English as “Sutra on the White Lotus of the Good Dharma”. But for the color gradient, the white lotus denotes perfectly denotes the sutra !

The choice of color gradient is sort of strange not completely bad though.  Though I would like to know, why they chose such an odd color combination.

The Wallpaper also has  Devanagari text which is placed above the English text. Atleast in the Diamond Sutra, they tried to type something similar to the original Sanskrit. This Lotus Sutra text is complete rubbish !!!. It is just used to give it  an “Indic” feel so as to say.  I dont understand, why the heck, do they want to include rubbish. The Original Devanagari version follows later in this post.

Also, there is this big chinese character thingy on the wallpaper, I just dont know what it is !. If you guys know what it is, post a comment !!

The Quote is from the Lotus Sutra – The Prediction of Buddhahood Chapter (vyākaraṇaparivartaḥ – व्याकरणपरिवर्तः )

In this chapter, the Lord Shakyamuni Buddha provides prediction of Buddhahood to all of his disciples i.e the Arhats.  This is to show that [in mahayana] the Arhathood is not the final goal and is not the end to the path. The attainment of Buddhahood is the true final achievement of the path. All of the Arhats, eventually will become Buddhas establishing their own Buddhalands (Buddhakshetra बुद्धक्षेत्र) or Purelands

In the following verses, the Lord predicts Buddhahood to his discple Mahakashyapa, which He  sees using his Buddha-eyes (Buddhachakshus  बुद्धचक्षुस्).

atha khalu bhagavāṁstasyāṁ velāyāmimā gāthā abhāṣata—

(Then, at that time the Lord uttered these verses – )

paśyāmyahaṁ bhikṣava buddhacakṣuṣā
sthaviro hyayaṁ kāśyapa buddha bheṣyati|
anāgate’dhvāni asaṁkhyakalpe
kṛtvāna pūjāṁ dvipadottamānām ||1||

triṁśatsahasrāḥ paripūrṇakoṭyo
jinānayaṁ drakṣyati kāśyapo hyayam|
cariṣyatī tatra ca brahmacaryaṁ
bauddhasya jñānasya kṛtena bhikṣavaḥ ||2||

kṛtvāna pūjāṁ dvipadottamānāṁ
samudāniya jñānamidaṁ anuttaram|
sa paścime cocchrayi lokanātho
bhaviṣyate apratimo maharṣiḥ ||3||

kṣetraṁ ca tasya pravaraṁ bhaviṣyati
vicitra śuddhaṁ śubha darśanīyam|
manojñarūpaṁ sada premaṇīyaṁ
suvarṇasūtraiḥ samalaṁkṛtaṁ ca ||4||

ratnāmayā vṛkṣa tahiṁ vicitrā
aṣṭāpadasmiṁ tahi ekameke|
manojñagandhaṁ ca vimuñcamānā
bheṣyanti kṣetrasmi imasmi bhikṣo ||5||

अथ खलु भगवांस्तस्यां वेलायामिमा गाथा अभाषत—

पश्याम्यहं भिक्षव बुद्धचक्षुषा
स्थविरो ह्ययं काश्यप बुद्ध भेष्यति।
अनागतेऽध्वानि असंख्यकल्पे
कृत्वान पूजां द्विपदोत्तमानाम् ॥१॥

त्रिंशत्सहस्राः परिपूर्णकोट्यो
जिनानयं द्रक्ष्यति काश्यपो ह्ययम्।
चरिष्यती तत्र च ब्रह्मचर्यं
बौद्धस्य ज्ञानस्य कृतेन भिक्षवः ॥२॥

कृत्वान पूजां द्विपदोत्तमानां
समुदानिय ज्ञानमिदं अनुत्तरम्।
स पश्चिमे चोच्छ्रयि लोकनाथो
भविष्यते अप्रतिमो महर्षिः ॥३॥

क्षेत्रं च तस्य प्रवरं भविष्यति
विचित्र शुद्धं शुभ दर्शनीयम्।
मनोज्ञरूपं सद प्रेमणीयं
सुवर्णसूत्रैः समलंकृतं च ॥४॥

रत्नामया वृक्ष तहिं विचित्रा
अष्टापदस्मिं तहि एकमेके।
मनोज्ञगन्धं च विमुञ्चमाना
भेष्यन्ति क्षेत्रस्मि इमस्मि भिक्षो ॥५॥

The Wallpaper has a rough English translation of these verses.

Buddha in the Lotus – Daimoku

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/buddha-in-lotus-daimoku800.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/buddha-in-lotus-daimoku1024.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/buddha-in-lotus-daimoku1280.jpg

Time for another wallpaper of mine !

The Plain Wallpaper has the face of the Buddha imprinted on one of its petals.  This wallpaper was lying in my PC in some folder, just came across it some time ago !. The figure of Buddha in the Lotus,  reminded me of the Lotus Sutra. Upon thinking of Lotus Sutra, the next thing that came upon my mind was Nichiren Buddhism, along with its associated chant “Nam Myoho Renge Kyo” – The Daimoku - Homage to the Lotus Sutra.  So, I thought I would spice up the wallpaper with some calligraphy as usual .

(BTW, The letters on the Lotus are some Random Devanagari characters, just give it an Indian Feel)

The Lotus Sutra, who full Sanskrit Title is ” saddharma puṇḍarīka sūtram – सद्धर्म पुण्डरीक सूत्रम्” – which can be translated to the English as “Sutra on the White Lotus of the Good Dharma”. Pundarika means White Lotus.  In my earlier post, if you had noted, I had said that a Blue Lotus is known as a Utpala in Sanskrit.  However, this wallaper has a Red Lotus which is called in Sanskrit as “Padma – पद्म” !! . Yeah, it would have been completely perfect, if this wallpaper had a White Lotus ie A Pundarika

Back to the chanting.  The Daimoku – “Nam Myoho Renge Kyo” is a japanese chant, which means “Homage to the Lotus Sutra” as said earlier.  It is to be noted, though this is in Japanese, it qualifies as a Mantra.  Because it was expounded by Nichiren, and as all Mantras, they are to be chanted as expounded by the Master.  And there are a lot of theological, character by character explanation of the Daimoku.

But, I was actually thinking to render the chant in Sanskrit as “namaḥ saddharmapuṇḍarīkāya sūtrāya – नमः सद्धर्मपुण्डरीकाय सूत्राय“.

[ Some Sanskrit Notes: Skip if you may wish lolzz

namaḥ saddharmapuṇḍarīkāya sūtrāya - This can be literally rendered in English  as:

Namah - [Homage]

Saddharmapundarikaaya – [to Sadddharmapundarika]

Sutraya – [to Sutra]

i.e  [Homage] [to Saddharmapundarika] [to Sutra] – I know it sounds wierd. But Sanskrit works this way, no other go !

A similar chant is:

Namo Avalokiteshvaraya Bodhisattvaya Mahayasattvaya Mahakaruniya – [Homage] [to Avalokiteshvara] [to Bodhisattva] [to Mahasattva] [to Mahakarunika(Great Compassionate one)] i.e Homage to Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattava,  Mahasattva,  Mahakarunika !

End of Sanskrit Note ]

When I realized the above,  I thought it would be more proper to the transliterate the chant in Siddham as – “nam myoho reṅge kyo – नम् म्योहो रेङ्गे क्यो“, rather than translate.  So thats what I exactly did in the wallpaper.

Also, if there were any Buddhist sect that couldn’t have had any existence in India, it is Nichiren Buddhism. Because by 13th century virtually Buddhism was extinct [got fused with Hinduism in one sense] in Indian Mainland.  So, Even a back propagation to India would have been completely impossible. Consequently, a Sanskritized version of the chant, would not have existed at all ! .  But it was not the same in the case of Pure Land Buddhism etc, there were definite sanskrit precursors to them.  The Nembutsu/Nienfo would have had a clear Sanskrit precursor “namo’mitābhāya buddhāya नमोऽमिताभाय बुद्धाय“, due to the existence of the Indian Pureland Tradition.

So,  It would be completely unwise to render it in a Sanskrit Translation, hence I rendered that chant Nam Myho Renge Kyo phoneticaly as it is in Sanskrit as < नम्‌ म्योहो रेङ्गे क्यो > .

Actually, When written as a single line, it should have been written as – “nammyohoreṅgekyo – नम्म्योहोरेङ्गेक्यो“. However I split up the word and used a Virama [Inherent Vowel Removing Sign] and wrote it as “नम्‌म्योहोरेङ्गेक्यो”, because it counted correctly to seven charecters in this way, similar to the that of the Kanji version. Writing it as a conjunct, would reduce it to 6, & obviously the symmetry would be lost. And the other reason is that “mmyo – म्म्यो” conjunct letter was not available in the CBETA siddham font

You can see the Siddham Version of Daimoku on the left, and the Kanji version in Brush Style to the right [Both Font based].

Speaking of Nichiren, it is interesting to know, how chanting the name of book had gained such a huge popularity in East Asia. Some one pointed out in E-Sangha that this is purely an East Asian phenomenon and not Indian.  Its so true, even though India as lots of sects with all their associated literature, I have never heard any one chaning “Namo Vedaya’ or “Namo Bhagavadgitaya” or whatever ! .  Even though various texts themselves claim that even saying the name of it, is equivalent to reading it. & Many modern religious speakers also make a similar point in their lectures.  It was  understood more as a Rhetorical Point, to show the importance and authority of the Text.  It was never understood literally [atleast to the Indians].

But Nichiren was so convinced of the Lotus Sutra’s efficiency and authority as the ultimate Dharma taught by Shakyamuni Buddha, that he literally thought chanting the name of the sutra, would lead to salvation. Though it is said the daimoku was chanted in the secrecy by the TienTai sect long before Nichiren, but it was Nichiren who openly advocated the Daimoku.

Anyways, all of the 84,000 dharma doors are effective. Each is one is aimed at a difference individual, based on his capacity .

Nam Myoho Renge Kyo

南無妙法蓮華經

(The following the list of the chant rendered in all the Indian Languages)

नम् म्योहो रेंगे क्यो

নম্ ম্যোহো রেংগে ক্যো

நம் ம்யோஹோ ரெங்கெ க்யோ

నం మ్యోహో రెంగె క్యో

ನಂ ಮ್ಯೋಹೋ ರೆಂಗೆ ಕ್ಯೋ

നം മ്യോഹോ രെംഗെ ക്യോ

નમ્ મ્યોહૉ રેંગે ઙ્યો

ਨਮ੍ ਮ੍ਯੋਹੋ ਰੇਂਗੇ ਕ੍ਯੋ

ନମ୍ ମ୍ଯୋହୋ ରେଙ୍ଗେ କ୍ଯୋ

!!! Homage to the Lotus Sutra !!!!

Blue Lotus – Buddha – Diamond Sutra Quote

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/blue-lotus-buddha-diamond-sutra-quote1280-1.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/blue-lotus-buddha-diamond-sutra-quote1280-2.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/blue-lotus-buddha-diamond-sutra-quote1024.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/blue-lotus-buddha-diamond-sutra-quote800.jpg

This is what I call as a Wallpaper with a Quote ( I know it doesn’t rhyme !. But it sounds cool erm atleast to me . Ok ! Ok ! Bad Joke !!!)

So we have here a bluish background wallpaper, with a Statue of the Buddha, and a Lotus.  Lotuses have unique names in Sanskrit, based on their color. A blue lotus, that we have in the wallpaper  is specifically called as a “ Utpala – उत्पल ” in Sanskrit.

The quote given in the wallpaper is from the Diamond Sutra, whose proper title is “वज्रच्छेदिका प्रज्ञापारमिता सूत्रम् -  vajracchedikā  prajñāpāramitā sūtram” . Fully translated into English as the “Diamond Cutter Perfection of Wisdom Sutra”. Since people like to abbreviate things, it has become popularly known as “Diamond Sutra”.

If you notice closely,  some fading Devanagari text can been near the Statue of the Buddha. It is “supposed” to be the Devanagari version of the quote. But  it has not been input correctly.  It looks like somebody messed-up with the devanagari text, while typing it using a “Phonetic Keyboard”.

The Given Quote is :

( atha khalu bhagavāṁstasyāṁ velāyāmime gāthe abhāṣata- )

ye māṁ rūpeṇa cādrākṣurye māṁ ghoṣeṇa cānvaguḥ

mithyāprahāṇaprasṛtā na māṁ drakṣyanti te janāḥ

dharmato buddho draṣṭavyo dharmakāyā hi nāyakāḥ

dharmatā ca na vijñeyā na sā śakyā vijānitum

( अथ खलु भगवांस्तस्यां वेलायामिमे गाथे अभाषत – )

ये मां रूपेण चाद्राक्षुर्ये मां घोषेण चान्वगुः

मिथ्याप्रहाणप्रसृता न मां द्रक्ष्यन्ति ते जनाः

धर्मतो बुद्धो द्रष्टव्यो धर्मकाया हि नायकाः

धर्मता च न विज्ञेया न सा शक्या विजानितुम्

(Then, At that time, the Lord uttered these verses)

[ See translation in the wallpaper ]

Let us see what exactly leads to the utterance of this Gatha by the Bhagavan:

[The Lord Spoke: ] “Subhüti, what do you think about this? Is one to be viewed as the Tathägata due to perfect marks?” Subhüti replied, “Bhagavän, it is not so; one is not viewed as the Tathägata due to perfect marks.” The Bhagavän said, “Subhüti, it is so; it is so. One is not viewed as the Tathägata due to perfect marks.

Subhüti, if one were viewed as the Tathägata due to perfect marks, even a chakravartin king would be the Tathägata; therefore, one is not viewed as the Tathägata due to perfect marks.” Then, the venerable Subhüti said to the Bhagavän, “Bhagavän, as I understand the meaning of what the Bhagavän has said, one is not viewed as the Tathägata due to perfect marks.”  (Diamond Sutra, FPMT Translation)

But, when I checked  with the Chinese Version by Master. Hsuan Hua along with the Commentary, I got this: (Actually, I checked this first. Since it didn’t match up quite well with the  Sanskrit Version at Uwest Digital Sanskrit Canon, I referred the FPMT Version)

Subhuti, what do you think? Can one contemplate the Tathàgata by means of the thirty- two marks? Subhuti said, “So it is, so it is, World Honored One. One can contemplate the Tathàgata by means of the thirty- two marks

The Buddha said, “Subhuti, if one could contemplate the Tathàgata by means of the thirty- two marks, then a Sagely Wheel- turning King would be a Tathàgata. Subhuti said to the Buddha, “World Honored One, as I understand what the Buddha has said, one should not contemplate the Tathàgata by means of the thirty- two marks.

Now, you see the difference, don’t you ? Subhuti says “Yes” in Sanskrit but “No” in Chinese ! . There is some variations in the text. But I think it is more important to get the main point: “The Buddha cannot be seen based on external marks“. The minor details don’t matter [for practice]. That said:  I am academically interested in the reason for this variation, though .  I have posted a topic about this here:

http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/index.php?showtopic=90193&pid=1210116&st=0&#entry1210116

Back to the wallpaper business. You can see, that there are two versions from 1280 x 1024 resolution. One is the original version as provided by the site. This is the first file. But it was slightly different from the 1024 x 768 resolution. So,  I scaled-up the 1024 version to 1280 using photoshop. This is the secone one

Thousand Armed Avalokitesvara with Seed Syllable hrih

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/thousand-armed-avalokitesvara-hrih-800.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/thousand-armed-avalokitesvara-hrih-1024.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/thousand-armed-avalokitesvara-hrih-1280.jpg

It has been a while, since I designed by own wallpaper.  I learned a few tricks in photoshop, so I kinda over did them here .

The Wallapaper has the Eleven Headed Thousand Armed Thousand Eyed Avalokiteshvara (ekādaśamukha sahasrabhuja sahasranetra avalokiteśvara – एकादशमुख सहस्रभुज सहस्रनेत्र अवलोकितेश्वर ).  I think this term doesn’t mean He has exactly Thousand Eyes and Arms, it means more or less like “Thousands of” Arms, and “Thousands of Eyes”.

In the Karandavyuha Sutra, Avalokiteshvara enters the Avici hells, to save the beings there. He converts the fire pits into cool refreshing pools, and makes the Avici Naraka – The most Painful and lowliest Hell -  a very nice place !!.  The Guardians report this to Yama. Yama wonders whether the being who had done such a transformation, was “Shiva”, “Vishnu”, a “Rakshasa” or some other supernatural being. When seen through his divine eyes, he finds Avalokiteshvara Bodhisattva Mahasattva there.

He then appears before Avalokiteshvara, he places his head at the feet of avalokiteesvara and worships Him. He utters the following praises on Avalokitesvara:

namo’stvavalokiteśvarāya, maheśvarāya, padmaśriye, varadāya, vaśaṁkarāya, pṛthivīvaralocanakarāya, jagadāśvāsanakarāya, śatasahasrabhujāya, koṭīśatasahasranetrāya, ekādaśaśīrṣāya, vaḍavāmukhaparyantāya,[...]

नमोऽस्त्ववलोकितेश्वराय, महेश्वराय, पद्मश्रिये, वरदाय, वशंकराय, पृथिवीवरलोचनकराय, जगदाश्वासनकराय, शतसहस्रभुजाय, कोटीशतसहस्रनेत्राय, एकादशशीर्षाय, वडवामुखपर्यन्ताय [...]

http://www.uwest.edu/sanskritcanon/dp/index.php?q=node%2F35&textID=c809c77369754ae553

The words in bold reads “Hundred-Thousand-Armed” , “Ten_Million-Hundred-Thousand-Eyed“, “Eleven-Headed“

The God of Death, Yama praises Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara as having hundred-thousand-arms and Ten-millions times that amount of Eyes !!! But his heads seems to be constant – always counting to Eleven

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Surrounding the Vishvarupa (विश्वरूप – Great Form) of Avalokitesvara, his seed syllable hrīḥ – ह्रीः  is placed around the four corners, in four different scripts.  All those play a very important role in Mahayana Buddhism.

BTW, I have written more abou the Seed Syllable hrIH here: Seed  Syllable of Great Compassion in Lotus .

Top Left – hrīḥ in Siddham Script

Siddham script is a very important script in Sino-Japanese Buddhism. It is  used to write Sanskrit Mantra/Dharanis and Mandalas.

Top Right – hrīḥ in Tibetan Script

Mantras/Mandalas/Yantras/Chakaras in Tibetan Buddhism are all inscribed in Tibetan Script

Bottom Left – hrīḥ in Ranjana/Lantsa Script.

Ranjana or Lantsa is an ornamental script, used in Tibet and Nepal regions. It is also used to inscribe Mantras. Tibet once had original sanskrit sutras written in Ranjana, but they were desotroyed during the cultural Revolution

It was quite difficult to find the hrIH in Ranjana, as there is no proper ranjana font. It was also difficult to find out the shape of hrIH in Ranjana.  Visible Mantra had one form of hrIH in Ranjana, but I couldn’t make this form using the incomplete Ranjana font, that I had.  A bit of googling, I got this – Unicode Proposal for Ranjana Script. This had a form of <<hra>>, from which I could create using the font. From <<hra>> adding vowel markers to create <<hrii.h>> was relatively easy.

Bottom Left – hrīḥ in Devanagari Script.

I have nothing more to add about Devanagari Script. It has become a standard script for Sanskrit these days. For its connection with Mahayana Buddhism, I guess it is used to write Sutra/Mantras/Dharanis in Newari Buddhism in Nepal.

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The Image credits go here: http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/qianshoufomu/

Direct Image link: http://hk.geocities.com/qianshoufomu/qianshoufomu.gif

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Hope to learn a few more Photoshop tricks and come up with better Wallpapers

Standing Thousand Armed Avalokitesvara – 3

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/standing-thousand-armed-avalokitesvara-800.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/standing-thousand-armed-avalokitesvara-1020.jpg

http://buddhaonthewall.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/standing-thousand-armed-avalokitesvara-1280.jpg

The Thousand Armed Avalokitesvara in this Statue is the same as in this Wallpaper. Its just that, Avalokitesvara takes the central place here.  There seems to some chinese text, beside Avalokitesvara. If you have any idea abt it, Just leave a comment