As mentioned in the previous page, Finding Our True Home presents a new translation of the Amitabha Sutra along with Thich Nhat Hanh’s commentary on one of the most practiced forms of Buddhism in the world, the Pure Land school.
Introduced in the Buddha’s own lifetime, Pure Land practice puts us in touch with the beauty in our own world and brings us the security, solidity, and freedom we need in order to truly enjoy it.
Realizing that Buddha is within us, we see that the Pure Land (paradise) is here and now, rather than in the future. Finding Our True Home will open a new Dharma door to many students of meditation.
Source: amazon.com.au
The following are random quotes from the book.
We do not know that everything outside of ourselves also arises from our mind.
Pure Land without Meditation
Is a Pure Land of the future.
Our own mind is a land of purity
Meditation and Pure Land are not two.
“The true nature is Amitabha, the one mind is the Pure Land.” This means that the Pure Land lies in our mind and Amitabha is our true nature.
The Pure Land is something we live in our daily life. Every step, every breath, every word, every look, can produce the Pure Land.
Shakyamuni Buddha introduces Amitabha Buddha and the land of Sukhavati which lies in the West. At that time Buddha was sitting in the Anathapindika Monastery and he pointed to the western direction.
But if at that time we had been sitting in the other hemisphere, then the Pure Land would be to our east. When we consider this fact, we see clearly that the idea of whether the Pure Land is in the West or the East is not important.
When Anh first came to Plum Village she made this proclamation: “I want to live in a place where there is happiness in the morning, happiness in the middle of the day, and happiness in the evening.” She thought Plum Village was the only place where this could be possible.
If she were to stay in Plum Village for three or four months, she would discover that happiness depends on her own capacity to nourish happiness and transform her suffering.
Therefore our own Sukhavati, if it is really a land of Great Happiness in its true definition of the word, has to have the marks of suffering so that we can remind ourselves that the conditions for happiness are there.
In fact, learning how to handle our suffering is an important condition for our happiness. There are many people living in conditions of paradise, but they do not know how to make use of them because they are drowning in their suffering.
Someone who has never tasted the flavor of hell will never experience the joy of paradise. It is clear that if we don’t know what suffering is, we cannot know what happiness is. That is why a world that has only happiness is an unimaginable world.
And yet we are aware that the development of our holiness and of our freedom from suffering is wholly dependent on our practice, on our ability to transform our pain, our anxiety and our suffering into understanding, peace and happiness.
All the wonderful things described in the Amitabha Sutra are here in our own world. We only need a mind that is free, peaceful, and joyful to be able to see them.
The Pure Land Sutra is not about a world other than the world we live in.
I had learned that one cannot see the path of ending suffering, and the path of happiness can’t be obtained, unless one gets in touch with suffering and understands the nature of suffering.
The third and fourth noble truths cannot be found without the first and second noble truths.
If you do not know what suffering is, if you do not understand the nature of suffering, you have no way to cultivate your understanding, your compassion, and your happiness. Suffering and happiness inter-are.
I do not want to go to a place where there is no suffering, because I know that in such a place I have no means to learn and to cultivate my understanding and love.
Without understanding and love you cannot be happy, and you can’t help others to be happy. We learn from suffering.
We do not want to send our friends or children to a place where they can’t cultivate understanding and love.
Understanding and compassion can only grow on the ground of suffering.
Suffering is the compost much needed for the flower of understanding and love to grow.
My understanding is that the Pure Land, the Kingdom of God, is not a place where there is no suffering.
The Pure Land is a place where there is plenty of understanding and love, a place where everyone knows how to transform suffering into understanding, love and happiness.
If you are capable of cultivating understanding and love, you are able to help establish a Pure Land.
Source: Thich Nhat Hanh. Finding Our True Home: Living in the Pure Land Here and Now. Berkeley, CA: Parallax Press, 2003.
All the wonderful things described in the Amitabha Sutra are here in our own world. We only need a mind that is free, peaceful, and joyful to be able to see them.
The Pure Land Sutra is not about a world other than the world we live in.
(Thich Nhat Hanh, Finding Our True Home)