tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467466552105314472.post9040968501357787343..comments2023-04-24T08:22:01.715-07:00Comments on Amritayana Buddhism: Eighth Chapter of the Lankavatara SutraWillhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15340539277090876795noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467466552105314472.post-58471530946118767982011-07-09T09:59:57.942-07:002011-07-09T09:59:57.942-07:00Given that Chinese Mahayana Buddhism has the stron...Given that Chinese Mahayana Buddhism has the strongest Buddhist vegetarian tradition, many of them committed vegans, it would make sense that the 8th chapter of this sutra would have been included in the earliest version and was later removed from the original because people attached to eating animal flesh did not like it. Part of the reason for the veganism of Chinese Mahayana Buddhism is (1) this sutra and (2) when the Chinese Buddhists abandoned animal flesh, they did not have the attachment to dairy that the Indian Buddhists had. It seems that they extended this to eggs through understanding the implications of not killing animals nor stealing from them that relates to treating animals as sentient beings with a right to live and who are part of our transmigrational possibilities (aka we might have been them and we might become animals again).Willhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15340539277090876795noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467466552105314472.post-7183237757359678312011-07-09T09:55:33.099-07:002011-07-09T09:55:33.099-07:00Bodhidharma said that the Lankavatara Sutra was th...Bodhidharma said that the Lankavatara Sutra was the only sutra that a person needed to study in order to gain enlightenment. What is interesting is this regard is that the Lankavatara Sutra is less refined than some of the later Mahayana Sutras. All the themes of later Mahayana Buddhist writings seem to be in this sutra, but sometimes use different terminology, like "paravittri" (complete turning in the innermost consciousness) which seems to be a precursor to the Zen Buddhist idea of "satori" (sudden enlightenment). Bodhidharma is part of the lineage chain starting with Mahakasyapa, who upon understanding the Flower Sermon, is considered the first Zen Buddhist. If I remember right, Bodhidharma is the 6th lineage holder and this means that the Lankavatara Sutra has a trace right back to the Buddha. If I am right about the sutra going through three phases, (1) oral, (2), rough notes, and (3) refined writing. It would be two generations per a phase (by the time Bodhidharma brings it to China, there are Sanskrit, Chinese, and Tibetan versions of this sutra which D. T. Suzuki compares in his book on the subject).Willhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15340539277090876795noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467466552105314472.post-65693017191325268882011-07-09T09:47:41.577-07:002011-07-09T09:47:41.577-07:00There is some question about the historicity on th...There is some question about the historicity on the Lankavatara Sutra in general. The modern scholarship theme is to question the Mahayana canon of scriptures and consider them less historical than the Pali canon. I feel that the Buddha, being the son of a king, was versed in more than one language and would have taught in more than just the Pali dialect when he wandered India preaching the dharma.<br /><br />It seems that early Buddhism had reciters who memorized various sutras and passed on the duty to others over time, for the first 500 years, until a famine had two reciter chains end. Some sutras were already committed to paper or to inscriptions on leaves. The Lankavatara Sutra is time dated, because it mentions two other sutras (see the notes in the text above) within itself, suggesting that it was written after these. But what is interesting is there are two sections of the sutra, one is "cruder" than the other and is the second half. What I deduce is that the Lankavatara Sutra, too, was an oral tradition that became a series of notes, and that these notes were appended in the back of a later scholarly editing and refinement of the notes into a narrative. The later edit was probably very much after the Buddha, but the oral tradition and notes were from an earlier period and could go all the way back to the Buddha. There are some parallel passages in the Mahaparinirvana Sutra that are shared in common with the Lankavatara Sutra that suggest a common root in an earlier source.Willhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15340539277090876795noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8467466552105314472.post-22728001643368924582011-07-09T09:39:11.029-07:002011-07-09T09:39:11.029-07:00I transfered this re-translation from another site...I transfered this re-translation from another site that I created:<br /><br />https://sites.google.com/site/amritayanabuddhism/Home/the-8th-chapter-of-the-lankavatara-sutra<br /><br />The above site has the numbering system working correctly so that each verse has a unique number. The editor software on this blogspot does not have the power to easily fix the verse numbering, but the text is very readable.<br /><br />The re-translation has been reposted, with my permission on the site of Tony Page, who is the leading scholar on the Mahaparinirvana Sutra and on Shakbar.org which is a reform movement in Tibetan Buddhism to bring back the practice of vegetarianism. Several high lamas are part of this and are mentioned on this site. The retranslation is also on the site of Dharma Sangha.<br /><br />I felt it was important to update the English of D.T. Suzuki's early translation and add notes to show how integral vegetarianism is to Buddhism, and to address the issues that are now interwoven into the various stances different Buddhist groups have taken about the subject. This chapter is the longest discourse the Buddha ever gave on this subject.Willhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15340539277090876795noreply@blogger.com