This is the third of four teachings on The Lotus Sutra. Let’s turn our attention to the role of the Sutra in Eihei Dōgen’s teachings. Shōhaku Okumura-roshi has been a life-long student of Dogen and as such he brings to bear the later Mahayana teachings from The Chinese Caodong School into Dōgen’s works
The Dōgen Institute is a wealth of information on all things Dōgen. Below are four aspects of the Sutra that Okamura-roshi offers in the role of the Lotus Sutra in Dōgen’s teachings.
- Universal Buddha-nature and “what things really are.”
Okumura emphasizes that the Lotus insists all beings have the capacity for buddhahood and that the Buddha’s activity reveals the true reality beyond appearances — a point he ties directly to Dōgen’s metaphysical questions (e.g., “what is the reality of water?”). Shundo David Haye – Zen PriestAncient Dragon
I think this is important as underscoring the Sutra’s explanation that all things are thus, until a different awareness unfolds. In our earlier review of The Mountains and Waters’Sutra, we discussed the turn of-a-phrase : You can’t know the Mountain without loving the Moutain… This depth and breath is expansive.This in turn meshes with Okumura’s second point.
- Skillful means (upāya) and the One Vehicle.
He explains the Lotus teaching of expedient means as showing how the Buddha adapts the Dharma to different capacities while ultimately pointing to the single full path (the One Vehicle). Okumura uses this to soften dualistic views of “higher” vs. “lower” teachings and to stress compassion in practice. See Chapter 2. of: 500 YojanasTreeleaf Zendo
Okumura-roshi suggests that Dogen’s flare with words reflects his fluency in the ancient Chinese Court language and its poetry. All of which is summed up in the term Sanskrit word upaya. This too is richly pursued by Dogen in his treatise on “Uji.”
- Parables and everyday practice.
Okumura draws lessons from the Lotus parables (e.g., Parable of the Plants) to show how the Dharma is expressed through ordinary lives and encounters — connecting sutra imagery to zazen and daily activity rather than abstract dogma. zenstudiespodcast.comTreeleaf Zendo
If one can say the Sutra is about potential, upaya liberates ignorance allowing one to be more open to the practice of the Buddha Way. Parables then show this “Dharma” in lighted-awareness of everyday life as interconnectedness.
- Practice as embodiment of the sutra.
For Okumura, recitation, reading, and living the Lotus’s spirit are not just intellectual but transformative practices that reveal the sutra in one’s day-to-day life; he often encourages studying the sutra alongside strict practice forms (zazen, chanting). The Dōgen Institute+1
Here Okumra suggests that the Lotus Sutra chapters on Expedience and Life Span are used by Dogen as an inclusive undertaking. Inclusive I suggest means everything we read, think, and do are as Buddhas following the Way of Buddhas.
108 Bows,
Sangaku