5. The Four Nobles
- Dharma Protectors
- Dharma Protector Bodhisattvas
- Bodhisattvas attaining Bodhisattvahood
- Maha Bodhisattvas vowing to become Buddhas
5.1 The First Class of Nobles: Dharma Protector
“In the beginning, it includes the willing dharma protectors, the faithful dharma protectors, and the voluntary dharma protectors. Whatever could be their way of protecting the dharma, they would remain in the rank of living creatures’ dharma protectors.” –TV
The willing dharma protectors and the faithful dharma protectors have gone through many lives of understanding the Buddhist dharma, becoming interested and faithful in helping living creatures to follow Buddhism. They generally have not yet sensed in giving up their individuality natures. For the dharma protectors who are neither discouraged in all situations nor abandoning their practice in critical moments, they are called voluntary dharma protectors. These dharma protectors are very willing and never contravened by any obstacle in their practice to help the life and create virtue; they were called unthinkable dharma protector.
Through many lives of being voluntary dharma protectors and when their merits become abundant, they would meet a reborn Buddha or a maha bodhisattva who would attest them. Then and only then, they could definitively become dharma protectors. Otherwise, they would have remained in the rank of “living creatures dharma protectors” no matter how ready or qualified they might be.
As far as the Buddha path is concerned, the rank of the dharma protector actually is not easy to enter the constitution of the universe that means penetrating the constitution of the Tathagata Buddha. That is how Buddhism is. It is similar in real life, no matter how excellent you might be; you have to wait to pass an entry exam before you are admitted in any professional school.
Therefore, dharma protector and boddisattva rank need the attestation from the Buddha who has been attested by the Tathagata that is the Lord Supreme Maitreya.
In this return to the world, Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha has attested no more than 30 of the total 3000 true disciples noted above in the Supreme Long Hoa to be the interior member of Dharma Protectors.
5.2 The Second Class of Nobles: Dharma Protector Bodhisattva
“The dharma protector bodhisattvas practice the bodhisattva conduct, deeply penetrating the dharma world to help living creatures, carrying out their vow of offering to Tathagata Buddha and gradually progress in their practice through many lives to attain the voluntary bodhisattva of prajna, the unthinkable bodhisattva. Then step up to the position of mahasattva called the maha bodhisattva.”–TV
Though practicing in the same dharma school with plenty of faithful disciples and dharma protectors; however, the venerable rank is specially helped and taught to practice the bodhisattva conduct.
This rank has to acquire one of the three dignities:
1. The Non-Productivity of Dharma Patience
2. The Equality of Nature and Mind
3. The Samadhi Dharma subject of Real Form and Formless
And they have to attain from awareness to ultimate awareness to have sufficient abilities to follow the bodhisattva conduct.
Every day the dharma protector bodhisattva rank unceasingly clears up his living creature’s natures in order to penetrate deeply into all dharma spheres and to offer to Tathagata Buddha.
Through many lives of offering to Tathagata sufficiently and clearing up his living creature’s natures, they could attain the level of bodhisattva, and they also have to be determined to practice for prajna, willing to practice the unthinkable dharma protector, like the Master Hsuan Tsang in His quest of sutra. He has to endure the likes of the cruelty in this last period where there are neither virtue, nor morality and everything as deadlocked as in hell fire, and gradually resolve all entanglement to understand thoroughly.
If the venerables try to keep away from all dharma, practicing insufficiently for the clearance of living creature’s natures, they are not yet achieving the conduct fully to become bodhisattvas. Until any life when they would thoroughly and clearly realize the form and formless, they have to wait for the attestation from either the Maha Bodhisattva or the would-be-Buddha in order to enter the rank of bodhisattvas.
5.3 The Third Class of Nobles: Bodhisattva attaining Bodhisattvahood
“From the maha bodhisattva called the great bodhisattva who has to undergo the no-receding bodhisattva and achieving abundant merits, then enters the rank of the great bodhisattvas.”–TV
Lord Supreme Maitreya would never attest the dharma protector bodhisattva, who is not yet acquiring the nine dignities of lotus flower in their practice, to be bodhisattva.
Within the nine dignities of lotus flower, the bodhisattva as the right meaning of the Buddhas has to know what dignities are those from the first dignity to the ninth dignity. Recovering yourself would make you know sensitively - neither strictly follow the Sutras nor the dogmatic. The ninth dignity is the supreme enlightenment. He who is termed to be a bodhisattva must know how to follow exactly the footprint of the bodhisattvas in the past, step by step, to be truly attested supreme rank, supreme master. Not knowing in ones self the order of Nine Dignities is the supreme rank, supreme master by theory and hypothesis without attestation.
In the dharma school, there is one case of terming oneself supreme rank who has neither been recognized nor attested to be dharma protector by Lord Supreme Maitreya. The awareness of the hypothesis is eternally erroneous. These ones are usually mistaken and they have to penetrate deeply in the dharma sphere thousands and thousands of times to acquire the supreme rank, supreme master. In this Final Law Period, there are countless cases of mistaking theory, hypothesis and terming oneself Buddha, which are caught in the Buddha sphere. They also concentrated their thoughts to get supernatural power and made the living creatures erroneous. The disciple is attached because of not knowing clearly the path of the bodhisattva.
The Lord has said: “The acquisition of the supreme enlightenment the Blessed One has ordained. Since the Bodhisattva until now, the year of 2538 of the Buddhist calendar, The Lord Supreme Maitreya could attain the Buddha hood. Thereby, His words could represent the Three Dharma Elements and be realistic.”
After being attested by the Buddhas, the bodhisattva could vow to be the maha bodhisattva. The maha bodhisattva also called the great bodhisattva could overcome all extreme difficulties, extremely miserable obstacles and yet he is neither discouraged nor giving up on his vow. Therefore, he could create abundant merits and offer to Tathagata to be able to enter the great bodhisattva rank.
5.4 The Fourth Class of Nobles: The Maha Bodhisattva vowing to become Buddha
“Becoming Buddha by just one rebirth. The four periods of the four nobles, are actually too long, one undergoes countless lives, countless merits, countless dignities offered to Tathagata, to the Buddhas before becoming Buddha. One cannot become Buddha by just one lifetime of practice. The becoming Buddha in one lifetime has been already sowed, planted beforehand, so that the attainment of enlightenment is possible today.”–TV
Now you should adore Lord Supreme Maitreya who has become the Buddha in this Final Law Period by just one rebirth. The year of 2500 has come. Long Hoa Chief Monk Maitreya Buddha has achieved perfectly the wonderful Bodhihood in this atomic era. The doomsday of the posterity is approaching the critical point. Such a fact is unique second to none.
The immobility, unable to manipulate all dharma in any difficult circumstances, would disqualify one from being the Buddha, although acquiring the supremacy, He is also mistaken, the attachment is caused by the self and self-possession, indeed such a waste of time to practice. It is already difficult to become an arahant in this Final Law Period; it is even more difficult to be the bodhisattva, as for the Buddha that is an utmost discrepancy. An extreme excellence, not ordinary with the wrong thought, which termed to be the Buddha. That really is a sin for the lifetimes of incalculability.
6. Opening the teaching for screening and choosing Dharma Protectors, Venerables, and Bodhisattvas
He has began His ministry since 1957, teaching Buddhist dharma, transmitting meditation and encouraging believers to come to practice with approximately 3000 disciples. Later, since 1974 He has decided to organize examinations by making use of the contrary form and formless also called the dharma of purity and impurity.
Since 1976, all the members of the dharma flower have gradually known that He has a concubine who is a true disciple. After the fact, most of His disciples became rebellious and attached to the doubt, leaving the dharma; only no more than 10 disciples have remained with Him.
He has written the third sealed point to teach believers and passed it down to the future, reminding bodhisattvas, venerables and dharma protectors of recognizing that besides the profound learning and studying of the Triple Canon they have to practice non rebellion, leaving all attachments and following the dharma subject of immeasurableness, unlimitedness, and non-ego ... to be able to reach the coast of enlightenment. We should always remember to recall adequate joyful detachment in order to be able to advance from Mahayana to Buddhayana.
7. The Third Sealed Indication of His teaching:
The Assimilation of Human Beings
The Salvation Dharma In the Eastern Land Period
The Third Sealed Indication.
Under the Divergence Of Recognition.
“Discussing about the recognition, most people are divergent and generating differentiation. Therefore, the similarity leading to bosom friend is thus very rare. Why are there such different recognitions? The recognition depends on the equal degrees, on the circumstances that generated the duality of neither classes nor discrimination. If most human beings are of the same degree and have lived together in the same situation and are in concord among them, they would mature in a unique mass. Otherwise, if each of them only recognized himself, He is the personal recognition.”–TV
Man is often rebellious on hearing contrary things; his individuality and personal character cause him to react. That is ordinary. Those who have learned to be noble should have known ascendant, also leaning on all dharma to practice for liberation. You should learn to be joyful and detached on hearing contrary things, reviewing all rebellious things generated from your body to control and dominate them.
If they were of the same degree as you in the wishes for enlightenment and the same difficult situation as you, you should be joyful and detached to avoid rebelliousness. You will thus be corresponding to the holy disciple and assimilating with him. It is very beneficial.
7.1 Under the Divergency of Recognition
“Because of such conditions the Buddha path is divided into four ways of recognition which is diverged by different seeds. The first way is the human beings mind, the second is the fairy and deity mind, the third is the bodhisattva mind and the fourth is the Buddha mind.”–TV
Because of divergence, the Buddha path is divided into four minds.
*Human Being Mind: Also called living creatures’ mind, living creatures need a form, and they could only see and know through the real aspect. Without the form, living creatures could not see and know.
*The Fairy and Deity Mind: Living by their thoughts, also making use of concentration to train their supernatural power. Also using concentration in the observation of the universe, collecting the deity quintessence to nourish their body for longevity and keeping away from the secular world. That is an error. The deva mind used their authority as a way of life. They are usually intelligent.
*The Bodhisattva Mind: Vowing to penetrate deeply to all dharma worlds like the human being mind, fairy and deity mind in order to get the great mind by guiding living creatures’ behavior so that they could practice all dharma in order to know the wonderful application later and understand thoroughly the Tathagata store in order to attain the Buddha mind.
*The Buddha Mind: Only the Buddhas can fully and clearly explain.
Being practical, the Bodhisattvas have lived among the living creatures without being polluted. That meant not losing the noble mind among the secular. They also have the great mind to save living creatures according to the first and the late minute with liveliness, never being known, neither strictly following the sutra nor leaving it, so they are always right in using their mind.
The rank of bodhisattvas mind is always recalled to release the entangled mind in presence of all situations to discover the awareness. That is the unique way.
“When the disciple has attained the supreme enlightenment and becomes the Buddha, every one of his words and his actions are wonderfully used, all of them are the Buddha mind of Saddharma Pundarika. From the Buddha mind, they penetrate the Dharani and examine all over from the bodhisattva rank to the second vehicle rank of arahants, pratyaka, and sravaka to secular mankind. Those of Buddha mind could illuminate from the top to the bottom from the interior to the exterior and because they have understood clearly the seed natures of all living creatures and of the bodhisattvas they could attain the Buddha hood. And they also know thoroughly every class of recognition and attachment, how the direct retributions of the individual's previous existence and the reception of results of one's deeds are, no more clinging and completely liberated.”–TV
The Bodhisattva Maitreya in this Dharma-Ending Age has attained the supreme enlightenment and became the Buddha. So He has to use the form and formless, belonging to the dharma of purity and impurity explicitly in order to cause disturbance in all true disciples’ characters. In 1975, when the Vietnam society was in chaos and the world was anxious about world war, He has used the Buddha mind to examine and seen that the Tathagata store was also manipulated in chaos. That was the right time to make use of the formless to attain Buddha hood.
With His title of Chief Monk, He has been respected and adored by the Four Species, but He has given it up, determining to carry out the abandonment of the self and self-possession. From His words to His affectionate acts with His concubine, all are aimed to show to His followers to hear and to see in generally or particularly according to their profound or superficial faith, making them no more rebellious by the fact. When recognizing that the dharma flower nature has calmed, then understanding the liveliness and practicality of Saddharma Pundarika in life, with no more praying and supplicating while not hearing and seeing the Saddharma Pundarika, the Enlightened One in accord with the times having the Buddha mind, could see the Tathagata store thus manipulated to establish the Saddharma Pundarika in order to attain the Buddhahood.
The Lord has seen meticulously the Tathagata eye store, which illuminates thoroughly all His disciples. Some are still interested and joyfully followed Him, supporting Him when the chaotic scenes occurred with Him. Some have remained ascendant and kept still, some have felt disagreeable, but continued to follow Him, some were discontented and left, and others were strongly objected and considered that it was unethical and a characteristic of animals. Thereby, He could identify and make up classification, some are allowed to be close to Him, some have His limited permission to come, and while others are forbidden from hearing, seeing and meeting Him. He has classed them clearly into living creatures’ world, sravaka conduct, pratyaka conduct, arahant conduct, and bodhisattva conduct who has attained the Buddhahood that is called the wonderful fruit of Bodhi.
“Talking about all the human beings, the illumination from the inferior to the superior is extremely difficult, we have to rely on the merits of Tathagata, leaning on those merits, gradually clear the nature, dissolving the stupidity little by little and do not intensively criticize at random. That is called secular criticizing Buddha’s work. Because of that the Buddha has said: You should know that human beings could not understand the fairy and deity mind. The fairy and deity could not understand those of second vehicle such as arahants, Pratyaka Buddha, sravaka, and pratyaka mind. The second vehicle could not understand the bodhisattva mind. The bodhisattva could never understand the Buddhas. They have to carry out the vow of becoming Buddha through right mind.”–TV
Living creatures could not understand the work of the fairy-deity mind. The fairy and deity could not understand the mind of the second vehicle such as arahant, pratyaka, and sravaka. The second vehicle could not understand the bodhisattva mind. The bodhisattva could not understand the Buddha mind. That is extremely difficult. That is an eternal illness.
Therefore, because of their stupidity, the inferiors often criticized and ridiculed the work of the bodhisattvas and Buddhas. That is ‘Secular Criticizing Buddha's work.’
Be joyful and detached to transfer merits to Tathagata, suppress the rebellion, and overcome the doubt until adequacy and you will acquire the wisdom. With wisdom, one can escape from human beings mind.
Consequently, He has opened the enlightened mind way to the disciples in the Dharma-Ending Age, but few of them could recognize it. The majority has criticized and denigrated it, thus could not clearly understand what the practice for liberation is.
“The inequality in the recognition results from inadequate knowledge which leads to attachment. Once the knowledge is adequate and clear, it is the enlightenment itself. The Enlightened One usually knows thoroughly every faculty, level, and intention of mankind, the fairy-deity and various rank of attainment or not yet reaching the degree of attainment in the six ways. He who wonderfully applies the Buddha mind could identify clearly as a good physician who know well the pharmacology of every medicine and every disease of the patient to treat appropriately. Because of his presence in front of the human beings, the arahants or the fairy, deity, whatever their rank and degree may be, he could set them free from divergence and bring joyfull equalality among them. According to the will of the living creatures’ sphere, he could also appear through His actions and speech to be in concord and assimilation with living creatures. All that He has done is the wonderful application.” –TV
The Enlightened One has generally observed in the Dharma-Ending Age, until now the year of 2539 of the Buddhist calendar. All the patriarchs, dharma protectors in the past have fully assembled in Long Hoa association; their ardent faculty to practice the dharma has to be tested for classification of truth and falseness.
Then, He has wonderfully applied the contrary and all the Four Beings manifested surprisingly their manner of practice, which preferred the noble to the rough, the clean over the dirty, praise over criticism. Ninety percent of the disciples in Long Hoa have preferred purity to impurity and became eternally isolated.
Gradually through his deportment and preaching, the Lord has selected each doubtful attachment of the faithful disciples in his appearance to make them conscious so that they could develop their wisdom later, comprehending clearly the Buddha, some of them have acquired the attainment to the full enlightenment.
His wonderful application of the contrary has caused almost all the inhabitancy of Nha Trang to criticize blame and consider him to be the pagan. Only a few of His faithful disciples have continued to support and follow Him. They have realized the non-attachment and non-rebellion in the presence of chaotic scenes.
He has realized that the living creatures’ level is such as that, no more and no less. If there were some living creatures free from attachment and rebellious, they would be similar to the past patriarchs and dharma protectors. But with the degree of the human being mind, it is not easy to find someone who has compassion and is joyfully detached toward Him.
“The divergence in recognition is a difficult problem for the concordance. We can say that the disciples have not yet entirely and meticulously acquired the essential mind. For instance, in the existence of the Blessed One, the bodhisattvas have been brought up and taught by the Buddha himself. And yet the bodhisattvas are still erroneous in their recognition of the right and the wrong and vice versa. Contemporaneously, the Vimalakirti has appeared as a bourgeois to dissolve his attachment and stupidity. How would there be any in this last period who could have a right recognition?”–TV
He has been re-born in this Dharma-Ending Age in order to preach the dharma, helping the disciples to rise higher than human beings. If having a poisonous nature and being haughty, self-conceited, and even inferior than an ordinary good man, how could they detoxify themselves to be better than the human being mind? He has to create the contrary dharma, showing the disciples to lean on the footprint of the bodhisattva to be ascendant in presence of real scenes. So that they necessarily know how to correct and tame their nature in order to relieve their accumulated karma, eventually mature and acquire the essential mind.
Those who have divergently rebelled against His wonderful application made the concord impossible. Therefore, it is extremely difficult for them to be assimilated and to advance into saints and noble devas rank. The Four Beings at the time of the Sakyamuni Buddha are in the same state of mind of divergence. Therefore, from 1250 of them, only 10 venerables and a few bodhisattvas in the existent time have been attested.
“Because of the divergence in the recognition, whatever the Enlightened Ones have said, the mistaken ones are never able to understand it. Therefore, they have to practice diligently to create their merits, realizing the six paramitas to get the abilities in order to partly understand the Buddha's words. Because it is difficult to hear and understand, the Buddha has said, “Living creatures have never ever read the sutras”. Such are the above ironic words; on the contrary, living creatures of human being mind have recited and known by heart the sutras, wonderfully. Talking about the error from the hearing, here it is: When the Patriarch Bodhidharma from Tibet went to China and met the King Wu Liang. The King was of human being mind, so he has recognized himself to be the King. The Patriarch of Buddha mind had not known well that the King was not practicing dharma. He has unknowingly taught the dharma to the King, which was wrong dharma. Instead, he could have wonderfully applied the right dharma. The King could gradually realize the practice of dharma. Because of the two ways in recognition, they became divergent and different.”–TV
As explained above, the Patriarch was at the term of emptiness about his action, but he was at the unique career vehicle on theory. Therefore, the King who did not understand his words became divergent. When a disciple despite his long practice still became rebellious in the presence of the contrary, he then became divergent, discriminating and remained in the stupidity because of not understanding what has been done by the Buddha. We have to correct our nature, creating merits and carrying out the six paramitas until having sufficient abilities and being cleared of rebellion, you can then understand part of what the Buddha has taught. That is why those who did not correct themselves, having plenty of divergence and rebellion, though reading thousands of sutras, are still considered by the Buddha as never reading sutra at all.
The King then asked him: Do you know who I am?
“No” answered the Patriarch. That made the King disbelieve the Patriarch was the Buddha, when not yet recognizing there was no place for the worship. The king continued asking: Reverend, I have built 48 thousand temples and stupas, offering the places for monks and nuns to practice in my country, was that my merits?
“No” answered the Patriarch. The King Wu Liang was discontented and the Patriarch has to turn his face to the wall for nine years without preaching dharma.
Why did the Patriarch Bodhiharma answer that there were no merits? Because of the supreme Buddhayana, you must practice yourself the dharma, and the merits must be created by yourself to be called merits. Otherwise, if you have built temples and stupas for others to practice, while you did not practice one day by yourself that was not the merits. That was only for the blessed rewards from devas and men, so the Patriarch has answered “No”, which was true, but incorrect application of dharma.
With his existent will, the King believed the Patriarch was the Buddha, but in presence of the answer of immediateness, the king could not recognize the fact, hence in his mind disbelieved the Patriarch was the Buddha and became rebellious and divergent.
The Patriarch has taught the practice for stainless merits of the buddhayana, while the king practiced for the stained merits of the blessed rewards from devas and men. Both were not in accord, thus not assimilated to become bosom friends. The universal door has been opened wide, but the Patriarch did not manipulate to catch it thus the universe has to shut, and then he had faced the wall for 9 years.
The divergence is present in living creatures for all times, especially for those who have practiced for the blessed rewards from devas and men and could not comprehend the truth of the buddhayana:
“The wonderful application of the Buddhas towards the primary bodhisattva is already hard to understand, how could the second vehicle rank and human beings mind know it? Therefore, the Blessed One has usually entered into the right concentration and known thoroughly all the bodhisattvas and the levels of the believers who are thinking, each of them with a particular reason, a different recognition. Some have recognized in such a way and believed themselves to be right, the others have recognized in this, that or another way and all of them are right, according to their degree of ability and capability.”–TV
The Buddhas have only a unique vehicle, which is the ultimate one, a unique dharma subject that is the supreme enlightenment, but for the bodhisattvas, arahants, pratyaka, sravaka, fairy and deity to living creatures, each class and each disciple has a different recognition, thus a different reason for their practice. The Blessed One has known it thoroughly, thus according to each case, He has taught them a mean, which has become great means of teaching for the Four Beings.
It is the same in this Final Law Period. Long Hoa Chief Monk has known thoroughly all of the Four Beings and living creatures too. He has used all the means to teach them without omission for 37 years. Some of them with a profound faculty could recognize the truth and carried out adequately. There are also some who left things intact after hearing the teaching that is the theory without action. Furthermore, others are well spoken in preaching but are defeated in the practice because they are unable to overcome the karma-power.
“He then said: You all should know that what you recognized today to be righteous, that righteousness belonging to today, may not belong for tomorrow. In the future, it may remain righteous, but the righteousness for the future may not be completely true for the enlightenment. Therefore, you have to practice gradually through many stages, many attachments to attain the adequate Buddha mind and recognize judiciously.”–TV
In the time of the Blessed-One, He has explained the truth to the Four Beings to apply it in practicing of the dharma. Until now, the truth has still remained righteous after 2500 years in the Buddhist calendar, but the great means applying to this Final Law Period have to be modified and modernized. Why? The Tathagata store has transformed in a period of excessively advanced civilization and science. The enlightened one like Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha with the Tathagata Eye- Store could see precisely the time to make all living creatures understand the flowered dharma nature chaotically manifest to be enlightened, recognizing the righteousness of yesterday that might not be righteous for today and tomorrow. Thereby, they could have the wisdom, being known no longer in order to attain the perfect acquirement to the true enlightenment.
Therefore, He has transformed to allow monks and nuns of the dharma store to follow the behavior of laymen in order to realize adequately the bloom of the Tathagata store. As laymen, they often have chaotic family scenes and the flowered dharma nature blooms. Then, the disciples have to dissolve it. He has relied on these facts to guide faithful believers towards the true supreme. Those who have disbelieved and attached themselves to doubt and rebelliousness are unable to follow in time. His forefinger pointed out to the transformation of the Tathagata store, they have remained still and considered as a failure in an examination despite their presence in Long Hoa Association.
“The following story would help you to know that it is extremely difficult to recognize the enlightenment of the Buddha Mind. It is only by sufficient labor in practicing that you could recognize it wonderfully and interestingly. Otherwise, you would not understand it by human beings mind. There is a Buddhist Master attaining enlightenment by Buddha Mind who could observe entirely understand thoroughly and recognize judiciously all ranks of practitioners. He has thought it is very hard to make them recognize judiciously with each other in order to eliminate their mistakes and help them to attain true enlightenment.
At that time, the Buddhist master has usually cogitated to pacify all dharma, making it a resting place waiting for the day of entering the Great Eight Pari Nirvana. He has known that it is not the time of great salvation. Why? Because living creatures are living in a peaceful and favorable period, it is thus hard for them to practice the dharma. Very few of them could make up their mind to practice for liberation. By the Eastern Land period, living creatures are bombarded with thoughts, ambitions and defiled karma. All the dharma are lively, the practical use of the transforming Tathagata gradually thus could be able to dissolve and save them. Because of the above reasons, the Buddhist master has then fully rejoiced in the emptiness of the resting place.”–TV
In the confidences of the Buddhist master, who has attained the full enlightenment by Buddha mind, which is already extremely difficult, how could living creatures recognize the true dharma so that he could liberate them from their mistakes? He has to wait for the occasion until the practical use of the Tathagata transformed all the dharma lively and the living creatures generated abundant ambitions, then he could save them. As for the enlightened ones, they should not be immediate to enlighten the living creatures, because the living creatures still rejoice in a satisfactory life and a peaceful society. Very few of them have thought of the practice for enlightenment.
“One day, a great writer who has studied the sutras and sincerely practiced for the truth, paid a homage and visited the Buddhist master and respectfully addressed: Reverend Master, would you please tell me how to reach and understand thoroughly the true enlightenment”, then he had kept standing aside. The Buddhist master had smiled and answered him: “Keep on practicing and looking, what I say today would make you curse me” saying that, the Buddhist Master then entered into contemplation, sitting, and the great writer left. Twenty years later during his contemplation sitting, as the great writer in raising his cup of tea and dropped it, and the broken cup resounded the wisdom. The great writer then stood up, facing towards the Buddhist Master direction and solemnly bowed down. That is wonderful, and hard to recognize, but once the wisdom is recognized, it is the best of all.”–TV
“Keep on practicing and looking, what I say today would make you curse me”
Thus, what is special in the practice for enlightenment so that the practitioner of the dharma would curse against it? In fact, the Enlightened One has practically transformed you into the non- ego and the non-possession
*The non-ego: For example, when the enlightened one expels you from the practice path of dharma, excluding you from the dharma community, you would get angry and curse at Him if you still have your insubstantial self
*The non-possession: Every human being is fond of three things, which are material, fame and love. Everyone is cultivating and protecting these things. If it is a living creatures mind practicing for awareness, the noble friend, like a great physician, would wonderfully apply the unfavorable dharma to one of these three things. If you are joyful and ascendant you will be awakened and will get the ultimate awareness.
- Wishing for truth enlightenment, awakened one would wonderfully apply the impurity dharma of all three things.
- Being ascendant and wishesing to save living creatures nature, you would be enlightened, basing on the practices or facts, not the theory.
The Buddhist Master did not teach for the great writer because he, first, did not have sufficient confidence obedience and respect. Secondly, the great writer was practicing by learning and studying, not by correcting his nature, so it was impossible to open his eyes for him. If losing his honor, the great writer unknowingly will curse against the master so it is very dangerous to open for him without correcting his nature. If it was someone else who had the authority, he could even kill the Buddhist Master. It is only by immediacy that you would be awakened. The immediacy gave rise to the doubt. In relieving the doubt, you would be awakened.
- No awareness is without doubt.
- Little doubt creates little awareness.
- Great doubt creates great awareness.
Those who have practiced for awareness have to digest insults, make concessions and be patient in order to control living creatures’ nature, transforming it into great men nature, and getting free from living creatures’ nature. The idiot, seeing the true disciple practicing for enlightenment excluded through wonderful application, is hasty to be glad and laugh at it. These idiots would waste all their labors even through countless lifetimes of practice. Like the disciple who does not apply himself to practice the Dharma and keeps on requesting the enlightened one to give him the blessed rewards from devas and men to enjoy the happiness.
Because of that, the great writer has to follow the footprint of Buddhist Master’s disciple to correct his nature, being aware of his own nature, and leaning on all dharma to achieve it perfectly. Once getting plenty of merits to offer to Tathagata and having an extraordinary ability, he then could directly recognize the truth when dropping his cup of tea. It was 20 years later! The Buddhist Master became an old man and left the world. The great writer repented, he would gratefully prostrate. Unfortunately, the enlightened one has already gone, and then he has faced towards the enlightened one solemnly to bow down and expressed his gratitude.
If the great writer were not attached to his education to show off his self-conceit nor was it attracted by the fame and the non-possession he could readily be awakened by just one teaching word from the enlightened one. Fortunately enough for the great writer who has met the disciple of the Buddhist master and awakened twenty years later. Otherwise, he would ceaselessly suffer countless lifetimes in the three realms, six ways.
DURING THIS DHARMA-ENDING AGE:
“All the human beings and Four Species have lost their way of practice, lost the orthodoxy of the precious dharma. That makes them unable to recognize the direction of their practice. Therefore, they are practicing according to their needs and their desires, studying the dharma by their fictitious human mind along with dream and ambition. The more they are willing to seek for the way of liberation through wisdom, the more they accept their selves, because this period of construction generates plenty of thoughts, which becomes the rebellion of the reason and fact. Therefore, they prefer practicing whichever dharma subject where there is attainment without cultivation. They are wishing to penetrate the wonderful enlightenment without practicing the dharma. Few of them have based on the true nature to practice. Others are practicing in the true nature, but not yet in the perfect awareness. From the Buddhist believers to the practitioners of fairism, all are attached to the dream and falsely looking for it. Few of them have based on the wonderful application and Practical use, penetrating the dharma sphere. Therefore, they are putting the enlightened Buddha's words in the nonsense of human beings minds, expecting the rebirth of the Buddha according to their wishes.”–TV
For Long Hoa Chief Monk, the Supreme True Venerable in this Dharma Ending Age has witnessed thoroughly the majority of practitioners who have wrongly practice and do not recognize the right way of practice for enlightenment. Most of them practice in conformity with their preferable wisheses. If someone is willing to practice for liberation, he could still be caught in the enormous karma of self-complacency.
The bodhisattvas and Buddhas even with good will would not be able to save them. Everyone is inclined to the material, form and sound, praying and supplicating, without paying attention to correct their nature. Therefore, their practices then become that of expectation and illusion in the dreaminess.
His wonderful application has waited for a monk or a nun, but neither has arrived. Some of them are waiting for the apparition of Long Hoa and of Lord Supreme Maitreya according to their own conception while He has already appeared right in Nha Trang in his flesh and blood, just like every other living person.
“The Blessed One has thoroughly known that in this Dharma Ending Age, living creatures predict with their secular eyes and human minds through reading the sutras and being attached to the words, relying on their foolish superstition. Because of that, their root faculty is deficient and as fragile as a clay casserole, so He said:
The explanation by following strictly the sutra would make the Buddhas’ Three Dharma Elements a victim of injustice.
By leaving just one word of the Sutra they are explaining Mara wrongly.”
These two verses imply that the sutra is precisely the words of the Enlightened One, which is impossible to understand by using the two real aspects of writing. Only through the awareness of yourself and of others, you could recognize it or make the vow of practical use thus receive it. For that reason, the reciting of the sutra by heart becomes that of being-known and unable to understand the Buddha Mind.
The Sakyamuni Buddha has ordained Lord Supreme Maitreya to return to the world in the year of 2500 of the Buddhist calendar to save living creatures. That meant the Blessed One had known thoroughly in the Dharma-Ending Age, there would not be true practice and true attainment, but strictly learning and studying the Sutras then attaching to it the extensive explanation of word by word which is considered to be high doctrine.
They have observed and deduced through their ordinary eyes, that which could only see by the form and were unable to see the formless. Therefore, He has recommended the bodhisattvas in the Final Law Period to lean on the living creatures’ stupidity then gradually detach it, not to openly point out that which would make them feel attached, obstructed, and hated then leave it just like a fragile clay casserole which would be broken by a hard touch.
So, what is to be pointed out openly to get the Insight without strictly following the sutra?
Those with understanding would point out the bad habits, the cruel character of living creatures in their daily life, at work, at home and all the surroundings thus relieve the toxicity. One day being completely clean, they would get the insight to see and know without error in every degree of attainment.
Those who acquire the insight need to follow the sutra and their words of wisdom as purely a sutra of hearing, seeing, and knowing in the secular world, in the whole Three Great Thousand Worlds, so it is not separated from the sutra of Buddha.
Making clear everything at the right time, at the right place, is not separated from the sutra. The sutra which is generated by awakening oneself is different from or contrary to the secular world. Nonetheless, it is always precise, because it aims to relieve the toxicity of the living creatures. Therefore, that is the way it should be. Those who denigrate it would be far behind.
“In His skillful preaching of the dharma, the Buddha has delicately shown living creatures and believers the way to understand the dharma. He has loved the Four Species as a mother who loves her three month old baby. He has analyzed the difference between the practice by awakening oneself, and that of being awakened. He said that if you were practicing by being awakened even becoming the Buddha you would be a Buddha who results from fixed perception of the Buddha form. He has told that in a sutra titled “The Great Means of Buddha to Acknowledge the Sutra.” That means to be precisely the Buddha; one should achieve the Buddha mind of enlightenment. Through reciting the sutra by heart eventually becomes the Buddha, that bounds to be the great means of Buddha to acknowledge the sutra. That is a wonderful application in such a meticulous and wonderful manner of the Blessed One who has taken great care of all living creatures.”–TV
As mentioned above, many of the disciples who are erroneous in using the fixed perception, believing in their own minds to be Buddha, remained countless lives in the Buddha sphere. It would be hard to liberate a disciple who is caught in the attachment.
Hearing a verse of sutra or reading the sutra resulting in the awareness is called the illumination of the sutra. The sutra is the great means passed down by the Buddha in order to practice the awakening oneself. If illuminated by the sutra, one should acknowledge the sutra to be the Buddha. The teaching of the genuine Buddha that succeeds the wisdom would not be caught in the awareness by the hypothesis and false doctrine.
“Hardly! Human beings have lost the faith, mistaking the orthodoxy by those who are eager for fame and desire, exploiting the human minds to propagate the Buddhism through their attitude of immovable sitting and predicting. They are neither sincere nor insistent in practice for dharma and not dissolving stupidity, demolishing attachment, and suppressing their ego in order to attain the Buddha mind.
I still remember: At the time when the Blessed One had attained Buddhahood, his appellation is Sakyamuni Buddha. He is believed and obeyed by the believers through the quality of a master, not a Supreme Enlightened Buddha. Thus, He said: You are honoring me as your master, if I have been truly your master, you obviously could have been liberated through wisdom. Why? Because there are thousands and thousands of masters in your body, that prevented you from believing and obeying, thus you have not been one pointed in mind faithfully prostrating to Him to become the Buddha. These words of the Blessed One are enough to allow the believers to understand men’s stupidity even in the time of true dharma with the existent Buddha. The four ranks of disciples in that time still have recognized wrongly and they have identified with the form of the Crown Prince Siddhartha or the custom and regarded as a master just like the usual manners of today.”–TV
As for the truth, you are recognizing it or not. If you could recognize it, your hearing seeing and knowing would be universally penetrating the truth. He has usually taught: “By just one word, you can understand the Buddha.” Just by eliminating complex invasions, the disciple would insightfully understand the supreme mind. If he were full of ambitions and desires, the disciple would be caught in the ignorance and could not receive any of his teachings though hearing them countless times.
Ambitions and desires are the karma consciousness, which is progressing countlessly and mastering ourselves, causing us to live in ignorance through immeasurable lifetimes with it; truly it is hard to see the ignorance by yourself. Uniquely, by having sufficient merits, you could meet the Buddhas and the bodhisattvas who have appeared to guide you.
“In the case of this Final Law period of wrongful dharma, you are willing to practice for wisdom and liberation, but rapidly becoming discontented and leaving the dharma whenever your individuality is touched and secondly you are waiting for the apparition of the Buddha in this Dharma-Ending Age. And now Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha has appeared in the world under the aspect of Long Hoa teaching. By that spirit of individuality and personality, how could you recognize it; therefore, whenever by chance you are meeting Him or practicing right in the Dragon Flower, and how could you recognize Him? While you are unable to recognize, your faith is deficient and your ability decreases too, then how could you receive the recognition? While you have not yet recognized the Supreme Venerable, you would never attain the awareness.”–TV
Secular people are hoping the apparition of Long Hoa according to their own extraordinary wisheses and expectations. If meeting Long Hoa Association who would show them to practice and correct themselves according to the footprint of the patriarchs who have undergone in the past, they soon get tired of it.
Because this type of practice differs from the individuality and personality of the living creatures thus they could not recognize the dharma subject of liberation through wisdom. Not recognizing the truth, they would not be able certainly to recognize Lord Supreme Maitreya who has been teaching the Dharma to them. Once not seeing and knowing what the way of practice for enlightenment is, in any lifetime it is just the same although they would have met the next coming Buddha who could have not have saved them either.
“Under the divergent judgment of the human being’s mind, the Buddha has done plenty of works of the wonderful application, but the more numerous sicknesses of the living creatures are, the more prescribed treatments that Buddha has to apply. The Buddha could only cease to make wonderful application once living creatures got no more sickness. Because of that the Buddha returning to the world has to undergo countless bitterness and hardships in every minute, every second. Especially when the Great Powerful Buddha has been returning in this Dharma-Ending Age, there would be insufficient papers and inks to describe all that He has to suffer for mankind and the four ranks of disciples. All that resulted from the false and fictitious hope of Buddhist believers.”–TV
The living creatures often do not understand the wonderful application of the Buddhas and are often in disaccord with His teachings. For each disease impregnated by living creatures, the Buddha must have the wonderful use. The Buddha would cease His wonderful use once living creatures are no longer impregnated and become awakened.
When living creatures are polluted with desire, the Buddha skillfully makes use to liberate them from the pollution of desire. Therefore, the realization of the formless aiming to help living creatures to be free from desire is often opposed. Then the Buddhas have to undergo countless cruel deeds, time after time put up with the bitterness and curses from the living creatures as well as the Buddhist believers. Living creatures and true disciples have opposed in this way due to their false and fictitious hope.
For example, the doctor is operating on a child's abscess. Unknowingly, the child keeps on screaming and crying to object the doctor. When recovered from the disease and grown, only then, he recognizes his error. Just like the child, living creatures by their human beings mind have objected to the help of the Buddhas.
His wonderful applications of the formless in Nha Trang have triggered unceasing criticisms and curses from living creatures. The purpose of the opening of the flowering dharma’s nature also called Long Hoa has aimed to treat the psychotic disease to cultivate holy disciples. Actually, in this final law period, only the Lord, who has lived among the fire, could still wonderfully dissolve stupidity and help living creatures.
“Currently, Buddhist disciples and believers should recognize the Truth in the two cases of rebirth of Lord Buddha which is still unknown as follows:
The first case: He has left home and become a High Virtuous, Most Venerable or Reverend.
The second case: He was a layman, living at home with His wife and children among the four ranks of disciples.”–TV
They should not hope for strange things, such as the explosion of the Seven Mountains with Lord Supreme Maitreya walking out of it. That does not naturally exist. Because of the prophecy, living creatures have understood according to their unrealistic expectations.
“If He has left home and became the Most Venerable, a High Virtuous or a Venerable in this time, He would have numerous disciples with different classes and levels of knowledge, from their narrow to their generous mind. But the problem of criticism and commentary, according to the human being minds, has still remained. He would have been criticized as like this or like that, do this or do that. His disciples have expected Him to follow strictly their human beings mind from His behavior to His wonderful application, so that they would be satisfied. Otherwise, they would become doubtful and attached. Very few of them have believed and obeyed fully His instructions to leave their self and self-possession to practice diligently and attain the true mind and Buddha mind. The cause of these scenarios where He has to suffer countless bitterness and hardships is the result of the divergence of opinions.”–TV
If He had wanted to save living creatures when leaving home, no matter how He had wonderfully applied the form and formless, the Buddhist disciples still would mistakenly criticize Him. They expected Him to speak and act according to their self and self-possession. By wonderful applications to save living creatures, He could not avoid the rumors and disturbances of the surrounding people, so He has to undergo measureless bitterness and pains day after day because of their incomprehension about the salvation of the Buddha.
“Otherwise, He could appear as a layman, assimilating with human beings and having His own family as well as the disciples. Among his numerous disciples with different classes and levels of knowledge, from the narrowness to the generosity, they are still different in divergence recognition. Nevertheless, the matter of criticism and commentary would not be any less, it perhaps could say like this: He has to live like this or like that and they could even criticize His behavior and His lifestyle. More than ever, every single movement is judged by the formality of condemnation or compliment. For his part, He has wonderfully applied all the dharma to guide mankind to the union of the religion and life. That is hard to express or to explain except by only Him who has been well aware of it. He has to accept all the accusations of the Four Species and the human beings because that is the human being's reasoning.”–TV
He has appeared in this life as a layman to teach the dharma, mainly aiming to assimilate the religion into Life, bringing about the truth to living creature. He has a wife and six children. His lifestyle is similar to that of other families with all the happiness and misery, love and anger. His wife and children are sometimes annoyed and quiet. They also have the same needs as others, no more and no less.
The four ranks of disciples with different levels of knowledge have become hostile, criticized and blasphemed Him, and considering His family to be as ordinary as other families. Seeing with their secular eyes and hearing with their secular ears, they are all rebellious.
The virtue is the fruit of the saint and sage. Everyone likes the elegance, but the chaos in every family is natural; none of them could avoid that. Many disciples did not recognize it. In search of the truth, they are still attached to the doubt and give up practicing the dharma. How sad it is!
“Besides the disciples of the dharma, he is also afflicted by His wife and children. Because of their stupid demands and foolish competition His children often reproached Him as follows: My father should look after us as this or as that. It is hard to express everything. Only those who lived in this Final Law Period could understand it. If living in a peaceful and prosperous period, one could not recognize the treatment of children toward their father and a wife toward her husband. As for his wife, who happened to carry the burden of the family, effectively he ought to overcome a lot of excessive obstacles and to undergo everything whenever His wife got in a temper.”–TV
On the outside, the four ranks of disciples and human beings have noticed the unusual differences and contradiction. Inside the family, His children have demanded the needs of fashionable living standards. But teaching the dharma for living creatures, His income was limited, He has unsatisfactorily provided for the children. Thus, he was blamed too. It was hard to tell all the scenes of His family.
As for His wife who loved and cared for their children, she wanted them to be as comfortable as the other families, she then took the side of the children, and yet again he has to put up with plenty of her tantrums. Occasionally, she threw at him the outburst of bad petulance, due to her jealousy over some disciples of all over who paid a visit to the temple, that made them doubtful and relate it to their friends and all of them have left the temple forever. He has patiently undergone all of that along with some of His true disciples who remained unshakable before these chaotic scenes and continued to follow and support Him as much as they could.
Only one bodhisattva and three venerables have remained with Him, all the others have left after witnessing the chaotic scenes. A few of them, when the situation was settled sometimes paid a visit to Him. The true disciples in other provinces have never witnessed these events and have only heard about them. They have still continued to practice and now became dharma protectors in several provincials Dharma Store Associations that is Long Hoa Association.
It is easy to leave home and practice the dharma at the temple in peace and tranquility. Therefore, The Blessed One has purposely ordained Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha to return to the world to guide living creatures and Buddhist disciples with their various classes and degrees in the mainstream of the society.
“Besides the family’s situation there are also the fictitious desires of human beings, the divergence in the conception of the Buddha path, so there often ocurred competitions among the religions, innumerable mutual criticism of different ways of cultivation. Indeed, people who do not cultivate the Buddha’s essence right in their own nature would rather run after the insubstantial wisheses and confused mind of the period of misleading dharma. All of that resulted from the self and self possession.
As for the three lives of Buddhas and all the Buddhas to each Buddha’s apparition are concerned, His words precisely are unique, the non dualistic one, but there are three different methods which lead to the perfect outcome that would become only one. What are the three different methods? First of all, the words, which are the sealed attestation of Buddha’s, preaching. Secondly, the means of Buddha’s preaching. Thirdly, the convenience of Buddha’s preaching.”–TV
That is His confidence in this Dharma Ending Age; He has witnessed the practices of all the human being minds.
As for the three lives of Buddhas, every single word of Buddhas are the words of enlightenment, but some have believed absolutely, some have believed moderately, and the others have still believed, but clinging to the doubt and leaving the dharma. Therefore, the Buddhas have three ways of speaking:
First, the words those are the sealed attestation of Buddha speaking which meant the straightforward speaking and pointing out the practitioner’s stupidity. The great bodhisattvas, the bodhisattvas, and the holy disciples have all eulogized and executed the instructions after hearing.
Secondly, that means if Buddha speaks straightforward, directly pointing out the ignorance of the practitioner that would make them leave the dharma. Therefore, the Buddha beats about the bush and gradually comes straightforward to the point that applies to the rank of fairy, deity mind, and the living creatures mind.
Lastly, the convenience of Buddha speaking: Those of knowledge are discursive; they neither obey nor execute the instructions of Buddha. The liberal practice gives results according to their wishes. They practice by breaking up the attachment themselves and cultivating the impurity without the guidance of the Buddhas or bodhisattvas. Therefore, the Buddha has conveniently preached according to their personality and individuality.
In this Dharma Ending Age, when Long Hoa Chief Monk has came to the world, there are also some who practice liberally even in Long Hoa Association. He has conveniently leaned on them. It is extremely dangerous to make use of the formless without acquirement of the truth. Why? They are still polluted within the Six Ways. The liberal practices without obeying His instruction, they only believe in the Buddha, but do not know His wonderful applications. He never attested the acquisition of the doctrinal theory only. He has revealed that the perfect attestation should be entirely and completely without a minimal mistake.
“When the Buddha makes the sealed indication, the words of His are as followed: You should know that I have already become the Buddha, you are the Buddha-would-be. From the bodhisattvas to the great bodhisattvas, all have recognized that the words of Buddha are very accurate and precise. When the bodhisattva diligently practices to understand it then said these four verses:
To truly practice will bring the fruit of enlightenment,
Without practice, the attainment is yet to come,
Origination is obviously existent,
Human beings all have the Buddha nature.
The Buddha has sealed and pointed out under the stupidity of living creatures as the Blind-Deaf-Lisp-Dumb-Paralytic. He said: You should know that from this lifetime to the posterity; whenever you meet a bodhisattva coming or a Buddha appearing to this world, the blind could see, the deaf could hear, and the lisp and dumb could speak, the paralyzed person could walk. He has demonstrated that all human beings are Dumb-Deaf-Lisp-Blind-Paralytic persons. If they were not blind why would they not see the Buddha, if not deaf why would they not hear the Buddha's teaching, if not dumb why would they not preach the dharma, and if not paralytic why would their intelligence not be clear entering the Samadhi to travel to the millions of spheres. The above words are sincere and intuitive while the human being’s mind, by his false hope, is waiting for the rebirth of the Buddha or the appearance of the bodhisattva to cure all the Blind, Deaf, Lisp, Dumb, paralytic illnesses according to the reason and expectation of mankind. Thus they consider the Buddha and bodhisattva to be neither more nor less than a magician. That is precisely the words of Buddha speaking, which could be divergent to the secular minds.”–TV
Because of their false hope, the disciples are waiting for Long Hoa through Prophecy, such as the explosion of the Seven Mountains or expecting Lord Supreme Maitreya to act like a magician. That is unrealistic and unnatural; He could not guide them to the enlightenment even with His supernatural power.
“By using the means, He said: I have looked into the foolish delusions of living creatures and into the wishful ambitions of the faithful believers. If I leave them intact, they would be whatever they are and they need to be reborn into the worlds of the fairy, deity. Therefore, the Buddha has to use the means to speak about the fairy-deity world, the pure land and the Buddha realm, that would make them enthusiastic and vowing to achieve the fruit of liberated Buddha mind.”–TV
The secular people always dream of and consider the worlds of fairy, deity, which are the happy ones. In fact, the beings of this world are still subjected to the cycle of birth and death. The longevity is limited and the death still follows after old age. Definitely, the way to resolve the transmigration of birth and death according to the Buddhas is just the everlasting one. Indeed, it is the destination of the ultimate tranquillity.
“The Buddha has also spoken conveniently: His flexibility does neither harm to Buddhism nor destroy the meritorious deeds and the merits of the disciples. For example, if there are some disciples who have left home to become the ranks of Bikkhus, Bikkhunis, upasaka and upasaki, through a long or short time of practice with sufficient or insufficient knowledge. But because of their unstable character and being unable to preserve the virtue, they have violated the precepts, causing heavy criticism from the four ranks of disciples. In the meantime, the Buddha has conveniently said that you should not criticize this Bikkhus or that Upasaka. They all diligently practice their vows. Some have appeared to practice for the deliverance of the animality, some are cultivating for the deliverance of the hungry devil, some are practicing for the deliverance of hell, and others are vowing to be the Manibhavedha or the Gandharva, thus because of their vow that they have acted in such a way. It is precisely the words of good and evil that the Buddha has said about the consequences, which happened so. In this period, the faithful disciples are practicing to relieve attachment or making use of it to practice in the impure way, according to the ardent desires. All of that is the result of the ambitious human mind and the vagueness about theory.”–TV
In the four ranks of disciples of the dharma store, the true disciples with deficient abilities and merits, they have believed in Him, but do not follow His teachings because of the lack of obedience. Knowing well each of their originations, He has wonderfully applied the dharma and they all adorably respected Him. Hundreds of disobedient disciples, who liberally practice, do not realize that. He has known their contaminated habits, which are impossible to improve, thus he would rather make them cling to it and enjoy than otherwise. Consequently, each disciple seems to feel being loved by Him at most. According to their level of knowledge, they could not understand whatsoever the Buddha has conveniently spoken of.
Among His disciples, one practitioner takes pride in himself, who claimed to be the Buddha; He has conveniently made him joyful, but determined not to attest him even in the rank of dharma protectors.
For the venerables rank, according to their abilities and merits, He has appointeded them to help the dharma protectors rank. By His order, the bodhisattvas rank has seriously managed all the dharma activities. For those who claimed to be Buddha, He has skillfully kept him away as the outside circle and he is isolated in the community, not being given any responsibilities, because of his unreliable egoism.
Being able to meet a coming Buddha and seizing the opportunity to practice for attaining the truth is not easy either. Just a minimal negligence would make a failure, and one should be highly awakened in order to be close to Him, being guided by Him meticulously and sufficiently. Due to your unstable practice in the past and being polluted, you could not change your dharma nature in this Dharma-Ending Age. What a waste of lifetimes when you have met an Enlightened Buddha!
“For the Buddhas of the three periods (the past the present and the future) and other Buddhas, if any Buddha has appeared to attest and save the living creatures: First of all, He has to base on the period of times such as the superior period, the middle period, and the inferior period, to make His appearance. He has also to base on their fundamental abilities and their wishesful thinking to make practical use until the living creatures have more or less recognized it, then He would make wonderful application in order to help them to get the liberation through wisdom.”–TV
The Sakyamuni Buddha has initiated the dharma in the Middle Ages. At that time, the civilization and the Science were not yet developed and living creatures' characters perceived the Buddha dharma easily.
In this Dharma-Ending Age Long Hoa, the Chief Monk has clearly seen that the society has developed excessively with the modern science and the degree of knowledge of mankind has also advanced. He has wonderfully applied the formless, mainly guiding the living creatures to penetrate deeper into the truth, just in time to catch up with the modern society and demolishing the doubtful attachment and the immobility of clinging. Thereby, the living creatures could recognize the coalescence of all dharma belonging to the Tathagata store which is transforming, if they follow closely, they could have acquired the eyes of Tathagata store, then attained the intuition thus to perceive the path of liberation through wisdom.
“About the Buddha mind of the Buddhas, which has always illuminated in all three periods of times and resolved them into one; that is to contemplate thoroughly whatever the Buddhas in the past have done, the Buddha at the present should have done and in the meantime should explicitly teach the bodhisattvas to do as well. Clearly explaining in the present time, resolving all obstacles to overcome infinite doubts, attachments and their Wisdom grow steadily to acquire the Intuition. He has applied the Immediate and the gradual education in a parallel manner according to the classes and the ranks, making the four ranks of disciples adapt to their fundamental abilities, wisdom and virtue to attain the Buddha mind.”–TV
The Three Periods of time are the Superior Period, Middle Period and the Inferior Period that He has entirely illuminated to help the four ranks of disciples attain awareness.
It is impossible to resolve the boundary of attachment and anxiety by purely sitting and speaking. In this period, one should skillfully apply the formless to treat the boundary of attachment and anxiety along with your sufficient joyful detachment; you could suddenly achieve the intuition to eliminate the boundary of attachment and anxiety. According to the degrees of the four ranks of disciples, He made use of the immediate education to make them aware then making use of the gradual education to establish the spiritual virtue in parallelism to attain the true enlightenment.
Indeed, it is extremely difficult to practice liberally; you could neither eliminate completely the boundary of attachment and anxiety nor achieve the insight to develop the wisdom and gradually approach towards the bodhisattva mind.
“He has also clearly shown to the four ranks of disciples what the practice is for the direct retribution of the individual's previous existence, and what is for the receiving the results of one's deeds. He has meticulously recommended and passed down it to the futurity, of which, the disciples of the posterity could not be erroneous. That has become the Triple Canon of today.
The Buddha has made the sealed attestation to ordain a Great Bodhisattva to return to the world and become Buddha by just one Birth to unify the three periods of time, universally and completely suchness that is called the non-dualistic form. The Buddha has often said that only the Buddha could know the wonderful application, which is only realized by the Buddha. So at the time, He has taught the four ranks of disciples the wonderful application of three methods of explanation in order to help human beings perceive it. In fact, the Buddha only has sealed and decided one method of teaching the dharma, not three. The Buddha mind is illuminating over the three periods of time and has a unique resolution and just one period of ordination, not three as mentioned above.”–TV
The practice for direct retribution of one's previous existence: The practice of correcting by improving one own’s nature, gradually resolving and manipulating all the dharma. Being perfect attains the direct retribution of one's previous existence.
The practice for receiving the result of one's deeds: The practice of without correcting one’s own nature, practicing within one’s own wishes and cultivating a fixed conception about the form of Buddha that results in fairism and deitism. The practice without seeing and knowing the ignorance would easily lead to the three ways of evils, which resulted in the asura, hungry devil, snimal and hell. It is not easy to recognize and relieve the ignorance. Only the Buddhas and bodhisattvas understand the ignorance well.
Getting insight of the ignorance deeply or superficially depends upon the abilities and merits. In this Last Return Period, many disciples could not see even ignorance dharma in their whole life, while ignorance is as numerous as the trees in a forest! Speaking well and writing marvelously accompanying with the failure of recognizing the origination of ignorance results in a waste of time practicing. What does one study the Buddha dharma for? It is through the recognition and annihilation of the ignorance that one could be free from living creatures’ nature and wait for the Enlightened One to initiate the intuition and be awakened one day.
“Therefore, when the Sakyamuni Buddha has made the sealed attestation to ordain Lord Supreme Maitreya the Buddha, the disciples in the Association, all have recognized through the two forms, acknowledging through the Three Periods of times (the past, the future and the present) that Lord Supreme Maitreya has become the Buddha. Subsequently, the Vimalakirti who was an ancient Buddha recognized the wrong perception of the four ranks of disciples in the association, which could be harmful to the golden words of the Blessed One. He then asked Lord Supreme Maitreya: Lord Supreme Maitreya, the Blessed One has ordained you to attain the fruit of supreme enlightenment in just one lifetime which one have you been ordained? The past? future? present?
The past lifetime already passed, the future is not yet coming and the present is unceasingly continuing. The question of Vimalakirti implying the union of the three periods of times entirely have been ordained with the non dualistic form, the three methods of Buddha’s words all have explained to acquire the Buddha mind.”–TV
When the Sakyamuni Buddha has decided to ordain Lord Supreme Maitreya, the four ranks of disciples in the assembly have perceived it through the two forms of birth and death. Although the disciple had met the Enlightened Buddha, he himself has awakened and judges about Lord Supreme Maitreya through the three periods of times of the past, the future and the present by the relative form, that all are the erroneous.
The ancient Buddha Vimalakirti has known the wrong perception of the four ranks of disciples who do not understand that wonderful ordination which has shown clearly the three vehicles of non-birth. The Reverend Vimalakirti has asked Lord Supreme Maitreya to explain this enigma:
The past lifetime already passed, the future is not yet coming, and the present is unceasingly continuing. So, which lifetimes have Lord Supreme Maitreya attained the fruit of supreme enlightenment?
Now in this Dharma Ending Age, Lord Supreme Maitreya has solved the enigma as follows:
The union of the three lifetimes means that, from the without beginning and without end, the Supreme Buddha hood has already existed in all living creatures. But they could not attain it because of their deficiency of abilities, merits, not because of having to wait for the duration of 2500 ensuing years. When entertaining the intuition, one can perceive the teaching of the Blessed One: The Buddhahood always exists in the three lifetimes. It has a unique form, never the dualistic one, and is the true mind, the perfect tranquillity from the no beginning to the endlessness, eternally and constantly.
The 24th of the twelfth lunar month of the Nhâm Thân was the year of 1992, On behalf of the four ranks of disciples in the dharma store; I have organized the Great Ceremony of the 75th Birthday. It was also the memorial ceremony of the exceptional rebirth of the Supreme Long Hoa Chief Monk.
Rebirth means that the Enlightened One, after achieving the decomposition of His body into four great elements and being able to remain in the world or enter into the Nirvana, would appear wherever at His will, by making use of the Samadhi, just as when He was still alive.
He has made use of the great means, even during the right concentration, to save living creatures wonderfully and discreetly without being known by anyone of the human mind and the four ranks of disciples in Long Hoa. He has sacrificed so much of His life to save the four ranks of disciples. He has remembered the Blessed One’s words. So He has to appear in extreme mental sickness and suffering before the rebirth.
After the Great Ceremony, the ancient Buddha Vimalakirti has appeared to see Lord Supreme Maitreya at His residence in Nha Trang.
- It is said that you have attained the fruit of supreme enlightenment, where did you put it? Asked the Vimalakirti.
- I put it there, answered Lord Supreme Maitreya.
The Vimalakirti laughed and said: - Well, well, that's very wonderful! Your reputation is not falsely passed down. The Vimalakirti has then walked out of the residence, laughing.
“Putting it there”, this enigma could not be solved by anybody in the Dragon Flower association. In reality, only the Bodhisattva Moggallana realizing the Mahasatva could solve it, even the Sariputta, the Venerables and the Dharma Protectors in the circle of the Central are all pleased and happy to say that they have never heard that explanation.
“By the divergence of perception existing from the old time, and not only in this Dharma-Ending Age, human mind and Buddha mind are already in the stupidity and the awareness. When the mind is stupid, it is impossible to hope to attain the awareness of mind. When the mind is awakened it is impossible to wish it to become a stupid mind. Only the practice of the dharma could help to overcome all the mind limits to attain the full awareness of the truth and become Buddha.”–TV
In reality, it is very hard for a practitioner to overcome the limits. In this Dharma Ending Age, with the presence of all the patriarchs in the past, none of them has entered into the limit then emerged from it. They could at most practice to be aware of their own nature. Rare are those who know the limit, solve it and manipulate through it. It belongs to the fruit of the attainment and is very hard! It is only the faithful, sincere and fervent minded disciples, who have sufficient wisdom to follow his footprints in the way to enlightenment and have the opportunity to be taught, guided and relieved of the dharma limits. It is still noted in the scripture:
Sitting in the Tusita of heaven Gate
Supreme Reverend has returned.
The Blessed One has ordained Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha in His Rebirth, under the Nagarjuna tree to attain the Supreme Perfect Enlightenment, establishing Long Hoa Association, and self saved fairy and deity to help living creatures to become Buddha. The Prophecy, otherwise, said:
That Son is the Seven long mountain range,
Whenever it explodes resoundingly,
the Buddha King appears to initiate Long Hoa.
Relying on the golden words of the Buddha in the scriptures and on the prophecy using the combination of interconception, all are trying to practice diligently and waiting for the day of opening the association. How noble it is! How respectable it is! A great number of resolute Buddhist believers have spent countless labors and wealth in view of that. But unfortunately for them! From the bottom of their heart they are using human mind to practice and expecting the two forms. Practicing for true enlightenment has to seek for true nature to practice and to overcome the rebellious mind without fear and acquire pure eyes and fine ears in order to be able to recognize Lord Supreme Maitreya appearing right in Vietnam.”–TV
As mentioned above, the Nagarjuna tree meant the one life incarnation of Lord Supreme Maitreya. Seeking for the Nagarjuna tree through human mind and fairy-deity mind, could that tree enlighten him?
Now the Final Law Period has come, the Lord has returned for practicing and His ministry has experienced so many hardships, trials and countless bitterness with His wife and children as well as the secular people.
The Seven Mountains means that His wife and his six children added amount to seven enormous Volcanoes.
“Whenever they explode resoundingly the Buddha King appears to initiate Long Hoa.” When He has a concubine and used the formless, which is the impure dharma, His wife and six children are in the tantrum and caused the disturbances. The disciples in the dharma school and the secular people have considered it not to be the Enlightened Path of Lord Supreme Maitreya. None of them could recognize it and asked if such as the strange Long Hoa is different from all kinds of practice. Only a very few of them are not rebellious and continue to follow him to be initiated to the precious dharma. At this time, the entire flowering dharma nature has bloomed intensively. This event is called the resounding explosion. That is the occasion to practice for the domination, dissolution and manipulation to have the tranquil mind, achieving the dharma of supremacy.
Meanwhile, the human mind and fairy deity mind are still waiting for the explosion of the Seven Mountains at Chau Doc Province which according to the prophecy, creating the barrier not allowing those who have been waiting for Long Hoa to meet the Lord Supreme Maitreya.
They are all using the Perception to expect Long Hoa. Perception is the form of birth and death; these two forms of wisheses are sinking in the long unconscious dream of birth and death. Whereas only the patriarchs, the dharma protectors and the bodhisattvas who have cultivated according to their true nature in the past could recognize the Lord who has initiated Long Hoa Association in the city of Nha Trang of Vietnam.
“Why? The people of Vietnam are the descendants of fairy and dragon. The udumbara flower has bloomed in Vietnam called the unique form Long Hoa, including all those who have cultivated for the fairism, the deism, the holism and the Buddhism in the country of Vietnam, and forming the salvation Long Hoa. On hearing these sincere words of the non dualistic form, the disciples should dissolve their doubt attachment and judge through their own true nature to understand clearly the words of the non dualism, but not basing on it to develop the egoism self and considering it as an argument for rebelling, wasting a rare occasion of return. The rebellion may not result from your egoism, but from the lack of diligent practice and incapacity to hear; sometimes the hearing is interfered with the Mara of three vehicles, which makes you unable to recognize the occasion.”–TV
In 1976 when there were chaotic scenes in his family, He has dominated, tolerated and endured all. He has advised the disciples in Long Hoa and the outsiders to look at these scenes with joyful detachment without their doubt attachment to cling, if any, they should dissolve it because that is Long Hoa, which would lead them to the true enlightenment. They should not judge by the two forms of birth and death of fairy, deity mind, human mind to defame, thus they might waste a whole lifetime of practice waiting for the appearance of Long Hoa. The Lord Supreme Reverend Maitreya has vowed to release the entire flowering dharma natures for the living creatures who would no longer have an attached barrier.
When Long Hoa was opened, there were some disciples who were neither attached nor clung. But the Mara of three vehicles, isolating them, invaded their body and they cannot approach Him, they certainly do not have the opportunity to hear, to see chaotic scenes, so they do not know how to relieve flowering dharma nature at all.
“Once recognizing that Vietnam is symbol of the Fairy Dragon. The Udumbara has flowered in VietNam and the Buddha has been reborn in Vietnam, forming the Vietnamese Supreme Long Hoa in this land with all other religions, the disciples of all ranks seriously assembled, there is no more doubt. Only you should blame yourself for not having full Confidence, so you could not attain enlightenment.
It is recognized that the Nagarjuna tree is the same form as Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha and not very different from the Vietnamese Long Hoa. If it were judged that there are two forms, one of the Nagarjuna tree and the other of Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha, has the Nagarjuna tree given Him the supreme perfect enlightenment? Did He make the sealed pointing for the Nagarjuna tree to be enlightened? The Buddha path uniquely intuits toward the true supreme, there are not two forms to be enlightened. Those are exactly the words of the Orthodox Supreme.”–TV
Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha has come into the world and initiated the teaching of dharma in the province of Khaùnh Hoa, Vietnam. At that time, all other religions have their representatives cultivating with the Buddhist Dharma Store, which is Long Hoa. They are not different from those who have followed the Blessed One in the past, as far as 2539 years ago according to the Buddhist calendar. Reborn now they already have the fundamental abilities and the degree of attainment for the fairy, deity, sravaka, Pratyeka Buddha, arahant and bodhisattvas. The difference is that today the derayana behavior (renunciation conduct) has been replaced by the men-devas behavior (layman conduct). He has purposely made the wonderful applications for all of them to see and hear the pure and impure dharma without getting rebellious, and overcoming all obstacles to be satisfactorily liberated through the great compassion self-satisfied and enlightenment.
For His part, He has realized the solemn nation unique form. That is a unique way of practicing for the intuition without the two forms of birth and death, of obscurity and brilliancy to be to toward the true supreme.
“The judgement on the prophecy is often absorbed with dualism, the life is based on relative idea, often with fixed perceptions, so there are many interpretations which form an intermixed acceptance. Such a life is just a life based on the smoke of cigarette. When the smoke is ascending, those who do not know will run after it to interpret, while those of knowledge will know how to find out the reason of life with its solid principles and base on the smoke to find out the origin true nature of the cigarette along with its fire of tobacco. As for the dualism, relative perception and acceptance through interpretation is a chaotic life and unrealistic.”–TV
Most of the disciples practicing for fairy, deity mind, human mind, believe in the Prophecy in accordance with their personal judgement. The dualism is the two forms of full and empty, increase and decrease, right and wrong, that is the two forms of birth and death. The relative judgement is due to the fondness of the idealism, the wishes for the usual conception, and the desire for the individuality that is called the fixed perception. The interpretations related to rebirth of Long Hoa Lord Supreme Maitreya run after the rumor, the expectation, and the unrealistic nature of the true awareness.
Otherwise, those who know how to base on the prophecy to recognize that the wife and six children causing chaotic scenes with tantrums are just the explosions of the Seven Mountains. They would, of course, live with perception of reality according to the true nature without the chaotic expectation. Thereof, they would be able to recognize that Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha has been practicing His vows of saving the living creatures’ nature and myself for thousand of years until now in Long Hoa, they are cultivating to acquire the complete enlightenment.
7.2 Why did the book of Oracles come into being? The truthlike recognition
“When prophecy originates, mainly from the sincere will of expressing and nature, the sincere mind gives rise to all dharma of suchness. All dharma are originally from the mind, and once produced the Buddha soon attests them. The attesting Buddha is the Buddha of the dharma, not the Buddha mind of the unique branch enlightenment.”–TV
The Prophecy is usually expressed in the form of poems and verses, due to the practice for fixed perception of the fairy, deity mind. Despite sincere practice, the fixed perception is always the mind, which originates all the dharma. The appearing Buddha hereby is the Buddha of dharma of acquisition, not the intuitive Buddha of enlightenment of attestation.
The fixed perception belongs to the dualism and the intuition belongs to the supreme. Living creatures thus are often mistaken and wrongly attached.
“According to the prophecy, the sincerity of the believer having faith in the sutra, combined with the suchness of the masses which manifest the truth for the sincere believer, but it is not yet true to the insincere believer. Therefrom, there is a saying: “Efficacious or inefficacious that depends upon yourself”, when you believe it then it is and when you don’t then it isn’t. The scenery and the sentiment are co-response. When you are sad so is the scene and when you are happy so is the scene, but the scene itself is still only a scene. It is either sad or happy. Such a remark matches the spirit of the prophecy, but does not match the Buddha mind, which according to the Buddha’s transmitting words, is unique. Therefore, the recognition is as follows:
- “the Salvation of Long Hoa: Recognition of the Nationwide Congregation.
- Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha:
Recognition of the Homogenous Birth.
- THE SCENE OF THE SEVEN MOUNTAINS: Recognition Of The Fire-Vomiting Scene.”–TV
Living creatures are often touched by the scenes as the cause gives rise to the effect. There is no effect without cause. Therefore, the faith brings almost efficacy, while the faithlessness does not. Those who have no faith are indifferent and the dharma nature did not appear to them, making it inefficacious.
For those who practice the correction according to the realistic truth, the path of intuition belongs to wisdom. When seeing the scene of his family, with chaos caused by his wife and children, these disciples controlled their rebellious character. Consequently they dissolved the flowering dharma nature, gradually becoming sensible, understood thoroughly, and saw clearly the false recognition about waiting for Long Hoa of as those who practiced with fixed perception that have become the eternally mistaken.
*The Salvation Long Hoa: Cruelty and all the bad characters are impetuously bursting out through his wife and children. He has borne it without any complaint.
*Recognition of the Nation-Wide Association: The disciples, from the patriarchs to the dharma protectors in the time of the Blessed One, all gather today as the layman conduct at Long Hoa. Lord Supreme Maitreya Buddha: He has appeared from the impure dharma to the great purity.
*Recognition of the Homogenous Birth: All the patriarchs are adequate in accordance with him. They, therefore, have equally generated the Buddha mind. Those who have been around Him, all support and execute his instructions to dissolve by all means in order to develop the intuition, which is the wish of all to achieve.
*The Scene of the Seven Mountains: All the patriarchs in the past and dharma protectors have recognized that His wife and six children are really the Seven Mountains.
*Recognition of the Fire Vomiting Scene: The scene of explosion in His family is uniquely the Seven Mountains. There is no explosion of the Seven Mountains, largely expected according to the Prophecy. Recognizing it as the human beings and fairy-deity, you could never see Long Hoa.
“In the account of recognition of the Seven Mountains, the Blessed One has appeared in India. As for the Seven Mountains in Cambodia and those situated at Chau Doc, Vietnam, the Buddha has not made the sealed transmission. As far as the salvation of Long Hoa and the Nagarjuka tree of Lord Supreme Maitreya are concerned, the homogeneity is naturally in relation with the appearance. The appearance in some place or nation is usually judged from it. On the contrary, in the case of the Seven Mountains, the scene itself has to manifest around Lord Supreme Maitreya. That is called the “Fire Vomiting Scene” that means the situation of favor or disfavor, before or after, superior or inferior, inside or outside all that is the dharma savior of the period of Eastern Salvation. He has assumed the responsibility of saving the Four Species of living creatures and named the great power Buddha.”–TV
The dharma savior of the period of Eastern salvation: Dharma Ending Age is the period of common salvation. All the practitioners and living creatures are all saved. Why is that? - Because all the dharma have been proceeding in the extremity, the practitioners and the non-practitioners are affected by the scene beyond endurance that caused the living creatures nature to manifest all its toxicity without omission.
Finally, realizing it’s extremely toxic; the disciples are frightened and repent towards the good will because the Supreme Reverend Maitreya has secretly manipulated the Tathagata store, which is transforming. The practitioners and the non practitioners are all discreetly saved, that is the period of Eastern salvation of present enlightenment. And the Four Species are also saved according to the Proclamation Attesting the Universe as mentioned in the previous section. Consequently, He is named the great power Maitreya Buddha.
“There are two cases of fire-vomiting scene: His dharma savior of the renunciation or His salvation of the layman. Although they are different, the two above cases have the same manifestation: By the renunciation, He has had six monks and a lady-owner of the temple. As the layman, He also has had six children, a wife as well, the same four ranks of disciples.”–TV
If the great power Maitreya Buddha has appeared from the explosion of the Seven Mountains without being born by his parents, the aspect of the initiation of Long Hoa by all means would have been unnatural. Therefore, He could only appear in reality in these two cases:
First of all, leaving home to go to the temple, He must have the Buddhist believers as well as the lady owner of the temple, each of them with their own personality and individuality to experience the manifestation of the Six Ways in order to be saved by Him.
Secondly, appearing as a layman, He must have a wife and His six children as well as the four ranks of disciples, each of them with their personality and individuality also to experience the manifestation of the six ways in order to be saved by Him. By recognizing the reality, one could understand that He has initiated Long Hoa in Vietnam.
“The six monks or six children represent the six ways. Each monk, or each child, has His own character. Being different from each other in their manner and their actions, for that reason they are called the six ways. Whenever in harmony, they have discussed about His manner of walking, standing, laying, sitting, and sometimes they have gone to see the lady owner of the temple or the mother to tell of it. He has really known all of that and He has often said that these six people are the six ways in manifestation, do not take any notice of them.”–TV
He has appeared as a layman, His six children do not know the wonderful application of their father, so they all have reacted differently according to their character through the manifestation of the six ways.
A very few faithful disciples have continued to come to Him calmly. With all His chaotic family scenes and the disciples still follow Him, the neighbors laugh at these disciples and look at them scornfully. At the same time, the members in the family of the disciples rigorously forbade them from continuing the practice; furthermore, His sons have assaulted the disciples and do not allow them to visit Him. Furthermore, one of His daughters informed the police for arresting any disciples thet still tried to make an effort of seeing Him. In fact, the disciples are very resolute, in spite of seeing and hearing the shameful events, they are still faithfully and secretly grasping any opportunities to meet Him as usual.
He said that it is the dharma of no-obstruction they have to practice without paying attention to the manifestation of the six ways by His children.
A very few remaining disciples have still believed in Him, but they have returned only rarely to see him. A majority, as many as 3000, had left without giving news.
Later, when the chaos was over, a great number of new disciples have also left Him because they were told about the impure dharma, which was too strange and unacceptable for them. The others have still preserved their faith. At the end of his life, there remained about 100 true disciples who have only heard, but unfortunately did not have a chance to witness and experience the scenes of tantrum.
At that time, living in the re-education camp, I have been adequately informed about the dharma situation, but I have firmly recognized the true dharma and dissolved my living creatures’ nature. When I was discharged from the re-education camp, I still continued to cultivate and remained close to Him as I used to be.
“Because of the difference between human mind and Buddha mind, between the manners of practice of the second vehicle and the supreme, the more they are dissuaded, the more the six monks and the lady owner of the temple become unified in their action. The wife with six children have persistently criticized and blamed Him in every thing. In hearing that He is the Buddha, their incredulity increased and enhanced all kinds of manifestations. He could say nothing, because the divergence in the judgement has generated the criticism and the unpleasant things. As for the faithful disciples, some could have a good judgement, but others are still confused about His wonderful application in the Final Law Period. So that He has written a poem, emphasizing that He has two important responsibilities. The first is the reorganization of the Buddha path and the second is the salvation in the Final Law Period.”–TV
His six children belonging to human mind and other disciples of the second vehicle have a different judgement from that of the Buddha mind. Therefore, His children and His wife disbelieve He is a Buddha, they also have intended to contravene His wonderful application as intensely as it can be, increasingly causing an explosion that is known by everybody in the city of Nha Trang. For the disciples of the second vehicle, they are so frightened that most of them have fled and given up the practice of the dharma.
Among them there are more than 10 Venerables who have been accustomed to practicing by renunciation through many previous lifetimes but could not tolerate the formless and retreated into their private homes. The dharma protectors also fell in great numbers. That is the time of return in the Final Law Period when He has appeared to save living creatures, making them recognize the wrong and fictitious practice of the second vehicle and return to the practice of the Intuition with enormous, boundless and wonderful outcomes.
“On the one hand, it is the internal manifestation, and in the external it is the time of return in the last period which is too hard for everything. Every family with its chaos and every temple in disturbance are confined by the communist government into the forbidden areas. For that reason, He and the four ranks of disciples have patiently kept silent, relying only on the dissolution by the great power. He has known it well, but never spoken out.”–TV
Since 1975, historical events in South Vietnam began to unsettle. He has intuitively seen that it was necessary to expand Long Hoa into a phase of higher dharma. He has then initiated the impure dharma to the world in correspondence to the Tathagata store, which is intensively transformed in accordance with the Tathagata dharma.
Only the sensible practitioner having the eyes of the Tathagata store could recognize it. It’s rare to find the true disciple who could see and know. As for Him, He has silently initiated the dharma, intentionally creating the instability to give rise to the upheaval. Most of His disciples became astonished and bewildered in presence of chaotic scenes in the secular world as well as in the dharma school. At that time, every disturbance or disorder in the family or in the temple was reported by the group of vigilant neighbors, immediately the ward authority would force the involved parties to go to the new economic zones, facing the hardship and death in front of them. Everybody was obviously frightened and preserved himself and His family.
He did not hide and showed to everybody the impure dharma about His concubine, so that His wife and children manifested all scenes of asura, animals, hunger devil, and hell to rebel against their father and husband. Many times on His beam ends and having no-means for dissolution, He had to rely on His abilities and merits, which have been accumulated through incalculable lifetimes that are called the great power to render and settle everything. Only the true disciples whose sincere sentiment was higher than their noble sentiment could share their common worries and defend for each other so as not to be forced to the ‘economic zones’ or to the ‘labor camps’.
Facing such manifestations of the dharma, a number of unlisted venerables and dharma protectors in the previous chapter were afraid and fled, scared to bear the brunt of another’s wrong deed, and abandoning Him unprotected.
Here is what He has Himself taught me: “Later, when Long Hoa true dharma comes into the world, many of my true disciples who ran away before, will bombastically speak up and show off themselves to be the disciples of Lord Supreme Maitreya. They would eloquently exaggerate and excellently preach the dharma, but that dharma is being awakened. You should inform the human beings not to be mistaken by those who only speak well on the theory without sincerely practicing the dharma.”
The four ranks of disciples usually approached Him. He has dissolved the doubt-attachment, and He has taught them meticulously and sufficiently. Unfortunately, their abilities and wisdom are insufficient, they, therefore, could not understand them all. He has treated the four ranks of disciples as His own children. He often said: I am happy when you are receiving the precious dharma, I am glad when you are dissolving the stupidity, so I have written these verses…
…The truly good disciples are my consolation
We are now warmed by this dharma store
Provided that under one roof of temple
We are all happily enlightened, that is all I wish.”–TV
With all the proceeding chaos in His family, any true disciples having decided to follow Him in the practice for liberation through wisdom is meticulously and carefully taught without any omission. However, the disciples are not of the same degree of perception of the precious dharma, so they are divided into many classes of unequal knowledge. A number of true Buddhist disciples who are faithful and transcendental and overcome a lot of suffering and hardship are guided to dissolve the stupidity in order to perceive the dharma, some of them are awakened, and others are fully awakened.
At last, only the truly good disciples are His source of joy, because one of them already attained the enlightenment to the full enlightenment. Listening to Him and reading His wonderful poems, the four orders of disciples indescribably have respected and admired Him.
One day, he is sitting at ease
The disciples are offering tea and He is reciting poems,
They are patiently waiting
He has then smiled joyfully and given His poem
What we would like to say
He has soundly solved the poem
The six monks (ways), six names of His children
Plus the wife, all formed the Seven Noisy Mountains
The four orders of disciples thus stand up
Loudly reciting the six ways, six names in the poem:
Khanh, the end of Human beings occurred without a word,
Tuong, without comprehending the tantrum arose.
An, by Grace the tears rolled copiously
Oanh, the Oriole was darting over the sea and all over
Xoa, alleviating the situation in a sweet afternoon
Thu Minh, the brilliant King was reigning peacefully over all.
Hien, the offering to the Three Dharma Elements was attested by the Fairy-Deity.
Kim Le, presenting the Golden Pear of the Altar of Dharma Treasure.
“Khanh, the end of Human Beings occurred without a word”:
His first daughter, who was mute since her childhood, growing up with an aimless life, time and again she slipped away from her parents then become inadvisable. Miss Khanh symbolizes for hells gate.
“Tuong, without comprehending the tantrum arose”:
His second son named Tuong (Comprehension) who neither knows the works of his father nor understands the wonderful application of the Buddha who himself is his father. He has created a lot of suffering for his father and the four orders of disciples. He belongs to the animal dharma, which usually caused chaos.
“An, by grace the tears rolled copiously”:
The third son named An (grace) who sees the chaotic scene of his family, often got angry, cried, violently shouted and shattered everything. He represented the asura.
“Oanh, the Oriole was darting over the sea and all over”:
The fourth daughter in the family named Oanh (Oriole) who usually went here and there or visited the relatives to complain about her family situation, belonging to the Hunger Devil.
“Xoa, alleviating the situation in sweet afternoon”:
His fifth daughter, named Xoa (Alleviating) often consoled her mother. She belonged to the Humanity Dharma.
“Thu Minh, the brilliant king was reigning peacefully over all”:
Thu Minh (brilliant) is His youngest daughter in the family who belongs to the devas sphere. After the noisy explosion of the initiation of Long Hoa, she practiced among the four ranks of disciples; some have successfully achieved the fruit of enlightenment. His six children have symbolized the Six Ways.
To the secular world, He has wonderfully manipulated the dharma, helping mankind to avoid the third World War that threatened to destroy the two systems, the liberalism and the communism.
Though He is not a king, His concealment is similar to a brilliant king of the world. As far as the dharma is concerned, He has entirely achieved the Buddha hood, unifying perfectly the dharma and the life in parallelism. He has richly deserved to be the successor of the Buddha and is worth the title of the Blessed One.
“Hien, the offering to the Three Dharma Elements three lives was attested by the fairy-deity”:
Hien (offering) was His wife's name. Her duty of dharma protector in the family to share the responsibility with Him is the offering to the three lives that was attested by the fairy-deity. At the end of her life, she would be reborn to that sphere and enjoy the happiness.
“Kim Le, presenting the golden pear of the altar of precious dharma”:
The result of the dharma in Long Hoa Superior Association lead to enlightenment, which is the altar of precious dharma.
After reciting the poem, the four orders of disciples have bowed to him and left. As I remember, he has usually manifested Himself from one nature to another in saying that is the wonderful application of the Buddha nature. My doubt is increasing day after day because I have practiced mechanically and believed that the destruction of ignorance would show the Buddha nature. For me, the Buddha nature is a perfectly good and favorable nature, so I felt very uneasy at unfavorable things. One day I came to bow to Him and expose what I have not yet understood, He has smiled and said: Listen to me, it is beneficial in this life and the future to recognize correctly what the Buddha nature is.
The Buddha nature is like a general warehouse containing all precious gems with full spectrums that completely includes all the natures of the living creatures, natures that are attaching without discrimination of the good and the evil; the purity and the impurity are called the unique principle Buddha nature. It is incredibly hard to recognize the Buddha nature. You have to correct and dissolve through the practical life to be able to recognize the truth. Reading and studying the sutra without practice, clinging to the reason, is not the real Buddha nature.
The Buddha nature does not differ much from a treasure, which contains all the precious gems with their various colors, shapes and all the black, white, yellow, red lustrous… Since the conciousness store is thrown into the sky, spreading out the whole Tathagata. The idiot picks up one or two pieces at his will and believes them to be precious gems; all the others are not. This man belongs to living creatures’ nature, while those who receive thousands and thousands of natures countless natures compose the supreme and unequal nature of enlightened Buddha mind. Why? All of them are precious gems without difference. The nature originally resembles the nature produced in each series, each stage it is not different from the nature of suchness, and you should not discriminate between one nature and another. I am delighted to hear that, I have prostrated and eulogized Him who has given me such a very precious gem.
Many disciples who achieved the truth through their practice and hastily proclaimed themselves to be Buddha are caught in the Buddha limit. You have to practice in the reality strictly following His footprint in accompaniment and collaboration with the Maha Bodhisattva in view of reaching the path of the unique principle. At the same time as His appearance, there are some practitioners who proclaimed themselves to be Buddha. But unfortunately without seeing, hearing and knowing Him, they who should reconsider that in avoiding the entanglement with their egoism thus waste a lifetime, in which Long Hoa is being transformed in the world.
He has then looked at me and said: I am returning in this return period to relieve the stupidity of living creatures, leading them to the Buddha nature of enlightenment. He, who listens to or believes in Me, should not look at Me in whatever manners and will, of course, get the liberation through wisdom. Otherwise, if he persistently keeps on regarding Me and being attached with the doubt, until the next three hundred and fifty years, I shall appear to attest them. Then He has passed down the verses:
“When the Earth is divided into two parts,
I’d sit attesting the two ranks of the Heaven World.”
The Rebirth of the Lord Supreme Maitreya is ordained in the three hundred fifty years later.
The first stage of examination of Long Hoa is over. If the true disciple repented and left his self, he could certainly meet Long Hoa in Vietnam, which is being transformed to guide living creatures to enter the Tathagata store in order to access the path of complete liberation through wisdom. If the disciples were indecisive and hesitant, unable to hear and receive the teaching, He would reappear 350 years later to attest the deliverance of the Bodhisattva through His salvation of living creatures. Having attained the supreme Bodhihood like the Buddhas of Ten Directions, He would not teach meticulously and repeatedly from the beginning.
In 1993, He has already entered the Great Eight Pari Nirvana. He has known that 350 years later the bodhisattva and the patriarchs would minister, rendering considerable benefits to the living creatures and save them. The majority of the human beings in this earth would practice through the layman conduct, basing on their true nature. At that time, the renunciation people can see the dharma of the Buddhas, which handed down to us, will bring the practical interest to both of them - the renunciation and the lay people. He as a prince appeared at another constitutional- monarchical country at the age of 17, among the Prime Minister, the ministers, the generals, the general directors and the province chiefs, who are called the heaven’s officials, who are seriously sitting under His power and influence. He will attest the bodhisattva, the patriarchs who should have accomplished the teaching of the practical truth to the living creatures equally.
He has attested mainly for penetrating the fruit of the attainment of the universe. Therefore, the patriarchs according to their diligent practices and vows would have correspondingly perceived the Bodhihood. Afterwards, the disciples of renunciation conduct, who are still discarding the dharma, should return to the practical truth of the Lord Supreme Maitreya.
These courtiers will not be the strange ones; they are the bodhisattvas, the patriarchs, the dharma protectors themselves who are reborn as laymen of the heaven world so they could see Him once again. Those courtiers are very well educated such as scientists, specialists, doctors, professors and engineers…After attestation, He has immediately announced His entering the Great Eight Pari Nirvana without staying back in this secular for enjoyment and lavish lifestyle.
I have remembered all the scenes displayed before Him, the stupidity of the four orders of disciples, including myself, which made Him undergo countless sufferings, only because of the seed-karma of the living creatures nature. I was uneasy, returning home with a vague state of mind.
Near the time to enter into the Great Eight Pari Nirvana, the Lord has repeatedly reminded:
“Perhaps, I shall return to the world at the age of 17. I will recall my previous lifetime I would stay for 8 to 10 more years and would appear for the salvation once again. If the living creatures on this earth are threatened under entire annihilation, to which nation, which place and where he would be reborn, that the Great Bodhisattva has already been taught by the Lord.”
Superior Association, the 20th day of the 4th month of the lunar year (06-06-19.)
SEALED TRANSMITTING
THE UNIQUE PRINCIPLE PURE KING
He has carefully reminded the patriarchs, the rank of venerables, the arahants, and the dharma protectors who are practicing the conduct of the saints and sages. If any of them wrongly followed the formless that is the impure dharma, he must be guided by a bodhisattva realizing the mahasatva in order to be free from the belt of dharma limit. Otherwise, he would fall into the three ways of evil that is extremely dangerous in the incalculable lifetimes.
In the future, if the patriarchs, the venerables, the arahants, the dharma protectors are making their vows, but unfortunately without meeting the Bodhisattva realizing the mahasatva, they must be careful, should not exaggerate, and proclaim themselves as Buddha or Bodhisattva. By doing so, they would offend the sangha, be self-styled of the Buddha form, as well losing the dharma of preservation which has been long cultivated.
You should not proclaim yourselves confusedly to be Buddha or Bodhisattva as in the Final Law Period as the Lord has witnessed. You should have sufficient abilities, merits and also wait until meeting a bodhisattva realizing the mahasatva to attest to be in communication with the Buddha-power and officially become Bodhisattva.
Being a Buddha-King, He not only reorganized and rectified the way of practice to transmit it to the posterity and in the Three Thousand Great Thousand Worlds, but He has also restored the orders and stabilized for the sake of the living beings on this earth.
For the Patriarchs who have recently acquired the truth, they should carefully consider whether they could manipulate the samadhi, making the ultimate peace for the four species? If not, they should neither proclaim themselves to be Buddhas nor Bodhisattvas. Prudentially, they should preserve the fruit of the saints and sages in order to allow the devas, the human deities, the land deities, the supreme virtue deities, and the quadruple deities to supportably establish the true dharma.
