Absorbing

  During the discussion period this afternoon on the Lotus Sutra, I had asked Fashi about the relationship between meditation practice and the Lotus Sutra. Is there something in the philosophy of the sutra itself which helps people to meditate? The answer that I received is that meditative practice is one stage in how people read and recite the Lotus Sutra. However, the actual philosophy of the sutra is not meant to be contemplated during meditation practice itself. In fact, it is simply best to let go of words altogether and embrace meditation in itself rather than try to 'read into' the experience of the sutra. One could say that eventually, reading a sutra can sow the seeds for right view, but meditative practice sows the seeds for uncovering the wisdom of mind. In a sense, there is a clear difference between knowledge and wisdom, and meditative practice is intended to uncover the natural wisdom of mind rather than clarify concepts which are necessary to gaining a good perspective on the Buddhist teachings.
    As I was reflecting tonight, I realized how impossible it can be to really absorb or even grasp wisdom through any kind of language. It's not that sutra study is useless, but it is that the sutra can only be a map to help practitioners to clarify their experiences. As Fashi had related in her discussion, without the meditative foundations for experience, there is nothing on which to base the conceptual aspects of the sutra. That is why a good attitude toward reading the sutra is not to try to gain wisdom from it at all, but simply to use the concepts to clarify the methods and directions of the teaching. Perhaps an analogy might be: the GPS can show where a car can go, but cannot substitute for the workings of the car itself.
    I also begin to respect the fact that the Lotus Sutra can inspire a person to practice, just through reading it and gently reciting parts of it. In other words, it's not so much about grasping  the sutra to milk its 'central wisdom' and take that wisdom with me. It's more a matter of allowing the sutra to be a vision or dream, a little bit like having a picture of a loved one in front of their computer at work. The picture is often meant to be a way of inspiring the person to exert their best in their work, rather than providing a specific wisdom for that person to work on. The fact is that there really isn't any wisdom that a person can read, because words simply  cannot substitute for a live experience. And it truly can never be that way, even if a person swallowed all the words in the ocean of books.
    Over the past week, I was able to read the 'truncated' 1930s version of the Sutra (translated by Mr. Soothill), a commentary by Yoshiro Tamura, and parts of a modern English translation sent by Fashi. I learned to love this sutra, to delight in its metaphors, and to also feel connected to it, even though I can't pretend to understand a lot of it. That is beautiful, because it shows me that I don't need to fully understand something to connect with it in some way. And for that reason, the story can continue into another day.