感恩节快乐！ － Happy Thanksgiving！

感恩施加摩尼佛从兜率天曾降世为我们说正法。 感恩药师玻璃光如来的十二大愿。感恩我住在夏威夷，美国最有佛教的州。感恩我住在瓦胡岛，夏威夷群岛之最有佛教宗派的岛。感恩我住瓦胡岛北海岸，该岛之最美丽的地区。感恩我所有参加的佛教宗派，尤其是佛光山中心、唐人街的观音庙、还有（日本）哈雷一瓦净土宗传道部。

可是，在今天特别的感恩节，我最感恩的发展真真正正的是本宗派的佛光山取得了一位很理解正传佛法、还是代表现代中国大陆所引发的新佛教大乘革命的方丈, 就是说新担任休斯敦中美寺者，隆相法师。

南无药师琉璃光如来
性平

I’m thankful that Shakyamuni Buddha descended from Tushita Heaven to speak correct Dharma to us. I’m thankful for Medicine Master Crystal Radiance Tathagata’s twelve vows. I’m thankful that I live in Hawii, America’s most Buddhist state. I’m thankful that I live on Oahu, the island in the Hawaiian archipelago that has the most Buddhist sects. I’m thankful that I live on the North Shore, Oahu’s most beautiful area. I’m thankful for all the Buddhist lineages that I’ve participated in, but must especially Fo Guang Shan Center, Guan Yin Temple in Chinatown, and the (Japanese) Haleiwa Jodo Mission.

But on this particular Thanksgiving Day, the development I’m really, really most thankful for is that my root lineage, Fo Guang Shan, has acquired an Abbot who understands the orthodox transmission of the Buddhadharma, and who represents the new Mahayana Revolution that has been fomented in our times on the Chinese mainland, namely, the new Abbot in charge at Zhongmei Temple in Houston, Longxiang Fashi.

NAMO BHAGAVATE BHAISAJAYA-GURU-VAIDURYA-PRABHA-RAJAYA
TATHAGATAYA
Xing Ping

What. It. Is.

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

The Five Precepts – My Next Translation Project

This Chinese source is from a handout that Fo Guang Shan Abbess Yi Feng gave us last Sunday:

五戒 – The Five Buddhist Lay Precepts

I think this is a really good discussion of something that the Chinese tend to go to extremes about.

I will take the Five Precepts at Fo Guang Shan on 1 Mar 09, and I intend to continue working on this document in the meantime.

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

Kuan Yin Temple Honolulu – a Study in Feng Shui

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

Are. We. Having. Fun. Yet?

Someone has been searching this site for “international association membership card,” so I thought I’d give them something to find. It’s true, when you join Buddha’s Light International, which is the international umbrella of Fo Guang Shan, you become a card-carrying Buddhist, with a tewtally kewl plastic Buddhist picture ID. I consider mine more important than my driver’s license.

But that’s not really the important part; in fact, that doesn’t even really make you a Buddhist. You’re not Buddhist until you’ve taken Refuge with the Triple Jewel and gotten a Dharma name. Refuge and the Five Lay Precepts will be given on 1 Mar 09 at Fo Guang Shan Center Honolulu, on the 2nd floor of the Chinese Cultural Center. You have to fill out an application in advance, and provide two passport pictures. Refuge is free, but if you’re taking Precepts for the first time there’s a fee, which is something like $25.00, to help pay for your black robe.

[mode=Darth_Vadar] It is your DESTINY, Luke! [/mode]

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

Photos of 1 Feb 09

For a few more shots of this occasion, see my Fo Guang Shan/1Feb 09 Album.

Oh, and hey, is this below what happens when you combine pseudo-yuppie drivel with Chinese Pure Land Buddhism?

Human? Vehicle? Buddhism? I DON’T THINK SO !!!

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

Recent Photography

For a few more images of Fo Guang Shan activities last Saturday, please see my Fo Guang Shan/17 Jan 09 Album

And for more photos of other activities in the Chinese Cultural Center on that day, please see my Chinatown/17 Jan 09 Album

My Best Girl

– and a couple of her innumerable transformation bodies!

For a couple of more images of the U. S. Vets in the Martin Luther King Day parade in Honolulu on 19 Jan 09, please see my new US Vets Album

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

觀音普門品之 “偈答無盡意” The Gatha in Guan Yin’s Universal Gate

Read the whole page.

Complete text of the Universal Gate in Chinese

Searching the Web, this seems to be almost unknown in the West. I have not found any English translations of it online. Kwan Yin Temple in Honolulu, which I value more the more I find out about it, distributes a number of practice manuals containing this wonderful chapter of the Lotus Sutra, which is the basis of their practice. The gatha below, when sung by the nuns at Kwan Yin Temple, is literally the most beautiful Buddhist practice I have ever heard in any language. …

(editing on 20 Nov) I thought this was going to take me months, but it only took a week. I think I recieved unseen help. We need a fresh translation of the Universal Gate in its entirely, as well as the Lotus Sutra in its entirety. What Kwan Yin Temple publishes in English on this is an incredibly archaic and kludged version by H. Kern, from Sanscrit sources. Not good enough! Maybe I will continue with this, and maybe I won’t, depending on other issues.

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

What Ails the Leadership at FGS Hawaii

Read the whole page.

…It’s not that we have to have an attitude of disobedience towards the lineage. Obviously, that would also go nowhere. It’s that we have to insert the American convention that communication is a two-way street into an administrative structure which has been one-way, that is to say essentially despotic, up to now. For example, if we say “why,” and they come up with reasons that are acceptable to the group as a whole, then, for sure, we should absolutely break our backs to enact whatever they want. But to AUTOMATICALLY enact every damned thing that comes out of Taiwan, simply because they came up with it, is something that would be ethically wrong for me to be a part of, knowing what I know about what inevitably happens when you fail to interfere with despotic administrative habits.

Up to now, this kind of feedback has existed, but it has been informal. That is not satisfactory to me, because of the unjust political burden it places on whistle-blowers. If I am on the Board, I will insist on a FORMALLY ENACTED AND VIGOROUSLY USED process of feedback about the suitability, and the demonstrated results, of what comes out of Taiwan.

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping

Earth Rat Year comes to Fo Guang Shan – III

Earth Rat year is a time of karmic fruition. The appearances fall off, and what has been earned appears. In 1948, the last time Earth Rat happened, America had a positive experience, resulting from the fruition of the good karma we gained in WWII. Now we are having a negative experience because of the evil karma of corrupt government and an unjust war.

Fo Guang Shan has great karma. It controls huge assets, and throughout its existence, has used them for the good of humanity. Therefore, we should not fear structural change at Fo Guang Shan in this year, or in Metal Ox. We know that there can be nothing but good results from this, as long as we remain in good faith.

Many of the people who read this blog are like me: Buddhist activist outliers who would like to participate in a proper Sangha, but have been frustrated in this by the fact that what calls itself a Buddhasangha in America tends to be one of these three things:

1. A bunch of touchy-feely Santa-Barbara-class yuppie weekend seminar artists, or

2. A cabal of racist and cultural chauvinist immigrants who are essentially too paralyzed by primal fear to deal with the American mainstream, in any form. Particularly terrorizing are American Buddhists, who tend to actually have read scripture, unlike the members of such groups. Or else

3. A group of intellctuals whose Buddhism is mere words.

If you read what I’ve written over time in this blog, I think you may conclude that, although it is not clear what Fo Guang Shan actually is, it is unlikely to be any of the above. And that’s true. It is none of the above, although what is kvelled about it by recent returnees from mass extravaganzas in Asia is equally unlikely to be exactly the truth.

So then what is Fo Guang Shan, exactly? Hey, who’s asking, you know what I mean?

Whatever FGS is, it is on the brink of major structural change. So this is the time, Buddhist activist outliers, to get on board and be part of the change. To do that in spades, join FGS before the November elections so that you can participate in them. We need to pack the Board with activists that are going to do absolutely nothing for the rest of the year but grow membership, so that the group will be strong enough to start building a proper temple in Metal Ox.

Opportunity knocks but once! The train is leaving, get on board! There is no doubt in my mind whatsoever at all that this opportunity will not come again to any of us in this life. Please act immediately!

Namu Amida Butsu
Xing Ping