Dependent origination (Pratītyasamutpāda) –
Feel the quiet cloud in the sky and the calm sea breeze.
Take compassion as the heart to save all sentient beings from suffering.
Take kindness as the eye to see the sorrowful sentient beings.
What all sentient beings worry is to forget inner cultivation.
What they suffer is from external demands.
– Local Magistrate Zhao Chanted in Praise of Avalokiteśvara by Shi Xinyue in Song Dynasty
June 19th of the lunar calendar is an important festival to commemorate the enlightenment of Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva (Guanyin), which has become a fixed traditional festival of thousands of years of Buddhist culture in China and the world. All disciples of the Buddha truly practice the spirit of kindness and compassion of Avalokiteśvara to save the world, jointly transmitting the power and light of kindness and compassion in different ways to resolve worries and suffering for all sentient beings.
The Nanputuo Temple with a history of over 1000 years is a famous site of Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva. Every year, tens of millions of people come to the temple to pay homage. At 18: 30 p.m. on July 28, 2018 (lunar calendar June 16), was a quiet night with a cool breeze and a full moon. In order to commemorate and carry forward the spirit and philosophy of Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva, the Nanputuo temple held a grand pre-festival practice dharma assembly, which was attended by over 1,000 people including venerable (monastics), volunteers and pious disciples from home and abroad. The Buddhist practitioners were endowed with dignity and respectfully invited the great monk Ven. Ze Wu to preside over the Dharma assembly in the great hall of the Buddha, to jointly practice the Dharma-gates or the teachings of the Buddha such as “The Universal Door of Avalokiteśvara of The Wondrous Dharma Lotus Flower Sūtra” and “Avalokiteśvara’s Mantra", and to preach the Dharma essentials to the Buddhist practitioners. It is expected that the Buddhist practitioners will carefully understand and implement the world-saving spirit of “responding of Avalokiteśvara to sentient beings and removing their suffering”, “showing up everywhere", and “showing great kindness to those with whom you have no affinities and embodying great compassion by regarding all beings as the same substance”. At 20: 00 p.m., the Dharma assembly was satisfactorily completed.
The great monk preached -
1. Dharma-gate of the perfect penetration of the ear - the ancient and modern treasure inherited from Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva
The Dharma-gate of Avalokiteśvara, the perfect penetration of the ear is from the sixth volume of Śūraṃgama Sūtra. The Dharma-gate is a practical path used by ancient Buddhas to teach Avalokiteśvara to attain enlightenment. At the Śūraṃgama conference presided over by the blessed Śākyamuni Buddha, Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva described all the practical steps and processes of this method, which was praised and recommended on the spot by Mañjuśrī Bodhisattva and was believed the most suitable for the basic religious capacities of all living beings in our world.
“This method is the essence of the teachings of the Buddha, which lies in the purifying function of the sound.” Because the ear has the advantage and convenience of unobstructed hearing, it has become an opportunity for the sentient beings to liberate from suffering and attain enlightenment. “By returning to hearing of self-nature and attaining supreme enlightenment” one can attain the supreme enlightenment by turning to the function of repeated hearing of the self-nature and clearly seeing the serene self with genuine self-nature. As a result, one can extinguish the delusions and distractions in the mind to become tranquil, remove all kinds of opposites between honor and disgrace, right and wrong, good and evil, etc., in the world, unite kindness, compassion and virtue with self-nature, pure and natural, free from afflictions (kleśa). When you are no longer attached to sounds, which are followed by the extinction of the phenomena of motion and stillness, you will reach the Dharma-gate of Avalokiteśvara the perfect penetration of the ear. Realizing the embodiment of Avalokiteśvara, have the merit and wisdom of Bodhisattva, and benefit the boundless sentient beings, “keeping the mind following the practices of the Buddha-path of all the Buddhas in the ten directions, and having the same kindness of the Buddha and equal compassion towards all sentient beings in the Six Realms of Saṃsāra (transmigration). ”
2. Being endowed with kindness and compassion - to achieve the true heart of all Buddhas
“What is the main content of teachings of Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva?” – Kindness and compassion. “Kindness” is to give happiness and hope to all sentient beings while “compassion” is to eliminate the pain and ignorance of all sentient beings. Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva with such spirit sacrificed his life to save every sentient being in distress in the suffering world. It is so-called that “Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva shows up in thirty-two adaptations in countless worlds and experiences hundreds of millions of eons in the human world ... responds to prayers everywhere, and acts as a boat or ferry for people in the bitter sea.” “Avalokiteśvara makes necessary adaptations to respond to the people in need.” Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva becomes the embodiment of wisdom and fearlessness in the hearts of people. Moreover, the compassion endowed with a right view has become the basic standard to test whether a person is a true disciple of the Buddha. Regardless of learning any discipline, culture or religion, compassion leads to the path of Buddhism, which is the basis of attaining enlightenment, and is the heart of all Buddhas.
3. Returning to the essence with virtue - the supreme path in daily life
The great master Ven. Tai Xu, the second abbot of the Nanputuo Temple, wrote a couplet for the Hall of Great Mercy of the temple. The first line is “Five old people stay in shape, and a pure heart brings in Potalaka; the universal door has no phase, and one with kindness and compassion for sentient beings is Avalokiteśvara.” It is well known that great causes and conditions exist between Avalokiteśvara and the sentient beings in our world. For thousands of years, people have been reciting Avalokiteśvara, chanting Avalokiteśvara, wearing Avalokiteśvara, enshrining Avalokiteśvara, and even taking Avalokiteśvara as “mother”. Up to now, “there are Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva and Maitreya Buddha in every household”, and Avalokiteśvara’s culture; worshiping great kindness and compassion have long been integrated into the lives of generations of people, which has brought in the chance and inspiration for countless people to cultivate their hearts and themselves. Meanwhile, it has brought rebirth and joy to the lives of countless people.
Nowadays, social development is changing rapidly, and the psychological and life pressures of people are constantly increasing. Relying on the practice of the Dharma-gate of the perfect penetration of the ear is not only conducive to alleviating the pressure of daily work and life, but also constantly opening up the potential of our wisdom in love. In daily life, one more share of care and compassion, one more share of tolerance and patience, one more share of communication and harmony, and one more share of attentiveness and awareness can take good care of all people and things in daily life.
The heavenly crown is full of wreaths with jade-like stones, and the wind sends the sound of the tide into Brahma’s bell.
I hope the heart is like the moon in water, and I should not worry about not seeing the golden countenance.
–Two Poems in Praise of Avalokiteśvara and Xiang Ling by Shen Tiansun in Ming Dynasty
