Constantly Following the Buddha in Study: To Recite the Buddha Is to Take Him as the Model to Learn

7.9 Constantly Following the Buddha in Study: To Recite the Buddha Is to Take Him as the Model to Learn

The last three vows are the close of the whole vow-king. The eighth: constantly following the Buddha in study.

The first seven vows were every kind of service rendered to the Buddha — bowing, praising, offering, repenting, rejoicing, requesting the Dharma, requesting the abiding. This vow steps one pace further: not only to serve the Buddha, but to learn the Buddha — to walk, step by step, the road the Buddha walked.

The model Samantabhadra raises is the Tathāgata Vairocana of this Sahā world:

Further, good son! To follow the Buddha constantly in study is this: as the Tathāgata Vairocana of this Sahā world, from His first arousing of the mind, advanced with vigor and never turned back, giving away bodies and lives beyond all speaking; flaying His skin to make paper, splitting His bones to make pens, drawing His blood to make ink, copying out scriptures until they were heaped high as Mount Sumeru — and all because He so honored the Dharma, He did not begrudge body or life.

From the first arousing of the mind, vigor without retreat; bodies and lives given away past all counting; for the sake of honoring the Dharma, skin flayed for paper, bones split for pens, blood drawn for ink, the scriptures copied out and heaped high as Mount Sumeru. For the Dharma, not even body and life begrudged — "how much less a throne, a city, a settlement, a palace, a garden, or anything one has." Such is the weight of the road the Buddha walked. And the Buddha cultivated thus all the way to "great awakening beneath the tree," then displayed every kind of spiritual power, manifested every kind of buddha-body, dwelt amid every kind of assembly, with a perfect voice like a great thunder, ripening beings according to their wishes, down to the final showing of His entry into nirvāṇa. Samantabhadra says:

All of this I shall follow and learn. … And so, throughout the realm of dharma and the realm of empty space, in every dust of all the lands of the ten directions and three times, all Tathāgatas being likewise — in every moment, I follow and learn from them all.

The Buddha's whole road, from arousing the mind to nirvāṇa, I follow in study; and not this one Buddha only — the road so walked by all Tathāgatas throughout the dharma-realm, I too, "in every moment," follow and learn, thought after thought.

Learning the Buddha Is Learning the Road of the "Causal Ground"

This vow differs from the first seven in one key way. The first seven served the Buddha already accomplished — bowing to Him, praising Him, offering to Him. This vow learns the road the Buddha walked "while not yet a Buddha": from the "first arousing of the mind," the whole stretch of vigor, hard practice, and honoring the Dharma, all the way to awakening beneath the tree. Samantabhadra speaks deliberately from Vairocana's "first arousing of the mind" — no accident: what he would have you see is not only the light above the Buddha's head, but the road beneath the Buddha's feet, climbed step by step up from being an ordinary person.

In learning the Buddha, the easiest place to go astray is to bow to the result alone — to take the Buddha as a god set high above, to be worshiped and begged for protection. Constantly following the Buddha in study sets this straight: the Buddha is not an idol for you to worship, but a model for you to learn; and the learning must begin from His "causal ground" — learning that one heart of His, willing to arouse the mind, willing to honor the Dharma, willing to spare neither body nor life for beings. Skin for paper, bone for pen — the ordinary person cannot learn that outward form; but the heart beneath the form, willing to give up anything for the Dharma's sake, this can be learned, and ought to be.

Buddha-Recollection Is the Simplest Doorway into "Following the Buddha in Study"

Even so — is this vow of "constantly following the Buddha in study" not, for an ordinary person who recites the Buddha, still too high?

It is not too high. For the root of "following the Buddha in study" lies not in those astonishing hard practices, but in that one line — "in every moment, I follow and learn." The place to lay hold of the learning is to set the Buddha before one's eyes, thought after thought, and take Him as the model to learn.

This is precisely buddha-recollection. What does buddha-recollection recollect? The Buddha's virtues, the Buddha's goodness — and the Buddha's virtues and goodness are the fruit of the road the Buddha walked. Recollecting the Buddha thought after thought, you are setting that "perfect likeness," thought after thought, upon your own heart; set there long, your own heart, your own word and deed, will lean unaware toward that likeness. Buddha-recollection is the plainest and steadiest doorway into "following the Buddha in study": of the gateways for learning the Buddha there are thousands upon thousands — some demand mastery of the teachings, some demand long sitting and inquiry, and the ordinary person, unguarded, easily takes a wrong fork; only this one Buddha-name is simplest, most direct, least liable to go wrong — you need only recite honestly, recollecting close upon the Buddha, and that road of "following the Buddha in study" is under your feet, not one step short. You cannot yet flay skin for paper, but you can do this: set the Buddha on your heart, and after His likeness, tune your every word and deed.

So this vow, brought down onto one who recites the Buddha, is this: to recite the Buddha is not only to ask the Buddha to come and receive you; it is to take the Buddha as the very likeness you would learn, thought after thought. Recollection first, learning behind; the recollection standing firm, the likeness to be learned stays before the eyes always.

This Vow, the Verse Sings It Thus

I follow all Tathāgatas in study, cultivating the perfect practice of Samantabhadra; making offering to all Tathāgatas of the past, and to the present Buddhas of the ten directions, and to all the teachers of devas and men yet to come — all their joys and aims being perfect, I vow to follow the three times in study, and swiftly accomplish great awakening.

I follow all Tathāgatas in study, cultivating the perfect practice of Samantabhadra, making offering to all the Buddhas of past, present, and future — "I vow to follow the three times in study." The object of the learning is not one Buddha, not one age's Buddha, but all Buddhas of the three times; and the root of that "following the three times in study" is still the setting of the Buddha, thought upon thought, before one.

This vow closes, again, on those eight words: "moment by moment continuous, without interruption; my actions of body, speech, and mind without weariness." Following in study moment by moment — keeping close to that likeness of the Buddha, thought after thought, as one walks.

Learning the Buddha is to lift the eyes toward the Buddha, toward what is above. But the road of awakening has a downward face too. The next vow, accommodating sentient beings: turning the eyes from the Buddha onto sentient beings.