Clarifying Doubts About the Pure Land (I)
淨土釋疑(一)
Question 2: May I ask the Master? Many people care deeply about determinant faith. What defines determinant faith and assures rebirth?
Answer:(continued)
“You can attain assured(determinant) rebirth through exclusive Amitabha-recitation.” You can continue to recite for the rest of your life or just once before death. In doing so we are one hundred percent certain to be reborn!
It is an other-powered teaching. Amitabha Buddha joins his palms while standing in front of us, before we even know about aspiring to be reborn. Amitabha has been calling out to us for ten eons, offering to save us from our world of suffering, and deliver us to his Land of Bliss. Through the exclusive recitation of Namo Amitabha Buddha: we nourish our faith, renounce the Land of Saha, and aspire to rebirth in the Land of Bliss. These are the natural functional capacities of the Name.
At this point, we need not differentiate self-power and other-power, belief and doubt. They are all “Naturally” included in Namo Amitabha Buddha. So, in the end, it is “always exclusively reciting Amitabha’s Name.”
“Always’ is emphasized because it also means “exclusive”. As Master Honen says, “The one single Name of Amitabha Buddha is naturally replete with the “Three States of Mind”. Though you may not always be aware of it , it is naturally complete with the three states of mind. Why? Because the Name “Namo Amituofo” has this functional capacity.
續答:
不過,你如果能夠肯定「專稱佛名必定往生」而一生念佛下去,百分之百往生,必定往生!
因為這個法門是他力法門,我們不知道求往生的時候,阿彌陀佛都在我們面前合掌,十劫以來都在要求我們了,何況我們有厭離娑婆、欣生極樂的心而稱名號?自自然然這句名號的功能就在運作,使我們往生極樂世界。
所以,從這一點來講,已經拋開自力他力,已經拋開是信是疑了,自自然然地信就在裏面。自自然然——這就是一種彌陀的運作,就是一種他力。因此,到最後善導大師就說:一向專稱彌陀佛名。
一向專念阿彌陀佛名號,都是強調「一向」,也就是要專。法然上人說:一向專稱名號,自然具足「三心」。即使你不知道,自自然然地就具足「三心」,為什麼?因為「南無阿彌陀佛」名號本身就有這種功能。
Namo Amituofo!
