Event Announcements from the Hongaku Buddhist Community
Your Monthly News & Updates


What :
Day retreat focused on the The Teaching of Buddha: The Buddha's Last Words

The Buddha is renown for the teaching of anatta (in Pali or anatman in Sanskrit). It means "no-self" or "not-self" ("no-soul" or "not-soul"); so who is this self he speaks about here? What is "Big Self" and "little self"? If there is no self then what is the teaching about "self power" and "other power" all about. We will try to answer these questions and relate them to daily human experience as we continue in our study of The Teaching of Buddha this week.

Hongaku Jōdō, a Buddhist Community, will hold a workshop this weekend that centers on the Sutra studies revolving around the legend of Siddhartha Gotama's life and enlightenment as seen through the Pāli and Sanskrit Canons.

The root texts for this series of talks and workshops will be given to the participants at this workshop. It is in book form and easily readable. We will be using it for the next few sessions.

We usually view the Buddha's journey to enlightenment as an interesting sideline to the Dharma, but if we look closely at what is being said a new world of teaching opens up to us. The Buddha's enlightenment is an example to us that it is possible to attain enlightenment in this very lifetime.

Shaku Mui Sensei will be in Great Britain from October 17 - 31 to lead retreats and workshops in the UK. Workshops at St. Mark's will resume on schedule on November 5th with the next Chapter of the Teaching of Buddha.

Meditation Monday at Curt's Cafe on Central Street will also resume on November 7th with a new series of meditation methods. Ya'll come now, hear?

Where:
St. Mark's Episcopal Church
1509 Ridge Ave, Evanston, IL 

Parking located in front, at the rear of the building and on the street. Close to CTA and Metra with a bus stop in front of the church

Please enter through the back door marked "Cathedral Counseling Office" at the SE corner of the building in the alley. 

When:

Saturday October 15, 2016

10am - Session 1 begins with a meditation and brief introduction to the last teaching of the historical Buddha. What was it he said? What did he mean by "be a light unto yourself"?  This session ends at 12 Noon.

Noon to 1pm - lunch break and social time.

1pm - Session 2 is about mindful movement & Yoga. The session starts promptly at 1pm and goes for 45 minutes.

2pm - Workshop begins with a short meditation followed by a Dharma talk and discussion and ends at 5pm.

Please be on time so as not to disturb meditations. 

Cost:

$30 per person for the 7-hour retreat. If you can only make part of it please RSVP and let us know so we can schedule you in appropriately.

Tea will be provided

Please RSVP to let us know you are coming. Invite a friend or two or five - there's plenty of room and tea.

About Hongaku Jōdō

Hongaku Jōdō is a 501(3)c not-for-profit organization formed to teach the Dharma and make the teachings of Buddha available to everyone. We are supported through the generosity of the public, our students and our members. Nothing happens unless people get involved.

The Hongaku Buddhist Community are the people that study with Hongaku  Jōdō and support the teaching and the teachers, who are available for consultation and teaching, for individuals and for groups. Our practice is simple we recognize the one-ness of reality, the sentience of all being, emphasizing the Pure Land (Jōdō) approach to daily life and the Zen approach to reality.

Hongaku is a Japanese word that means "Primal Light", "Original Emptiness" and often used to express the idea of "Original Enlightenment".  Jōdō is also a Japanese word the usually means "Pure Land" but can also be used to expressed the "Pure Way". If the Mind is pure, Hongaku, then the environment is pure, Jōdō. On it's most fundamental level Hongaku Jōdō is a community and a practice that seeks to help others to see clearly so they can remove the mental distortions that lead to stress and suffering thereby leading them to inner peace. This translates to peace in the communities in which we live.

Namo Amitabhaya!
The Matrix of Practice

Dengyo Daishi once wrote, "A devout believer in the Buddha's Law who is also a wise man is truly obliged to point out to his students any false doctrines, even though they are principles of his own sect. He must not lead the students astray. If, on the other hand, he finds a correct doctrine, even though it is a principle of another sect he should adopt and transmit it." Because of this Tendai has always been diverse in its practices, adaptations and this shows in the many lineages found within the Sect. Hongaku, as a school of practice (Hongaku Shu) has great respect for Tendai (Tientai) but Hongaku has no affiliation with or ties to Tendai Shu. Hongaku Shu is a fully independent lineage.
 
When Tasogare Shinju, a Tendai priest, came to the United States to inaugurate the Compassionate Lotus lineage in the West, of which Hongaku (本覚) Jōdo (浄土) is the Western "lineage assembly", he had the Bodhisattva Vows in mind, especially the one that challenges us to master all Dharmas. This may be the motivation for maintaining such a wide array of undertakings within the Tendai sect. We continue that motivation in Hongaku Shu and it is because of the determination to offer practices benefiting people of radically diverse karmas, objectives, and propensities in their individual pursuits of Enlightenment.
 
Below are listed separately in no order of importance, just a few of the practices found within the scope of Hongaku practice. There are many more, but these seem to stand out.

Even when listed individually these practices are actually interwoven and are to be executed in innumerable blends and at different junctures during the practitioner's spiritual vocation:
  • Actively, dynamically and enthusiastically practicing harmony with other sects and religions
    • Many of fail at this one from the start
    • That is why it is listed first
  • Academic study of all religious subjects contained within Buddhism
  • Amida / Amitabha veneration and the Pure Land practices such as Nembutsu
  • Artistic projects such as painting or sculpting
  • Ascetic practices such as periodic fasting, marathons of walking
  • Calligraphy - particularly the Heart Sutra
  • Developing gratitude, loving kindness, friendliness, and compassion towards all living beings - beginning with yourself
  • Developing a healthy vegetarian regime (shojin ryori)
    • Or at least, mainly vegetarian while respecting the animal that provides nourishment
  • Development of skillful means (upaya)
  • Expounding the teachings of Śākyamuni Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama) to willing listeners
  • Fire Rituals such as goma (homa in Sanskrit) and the Invocation of Fudo Myo-o
  • Formal Teacher-Pupil relationships which is the transmission of the Dharma
  • Generating Bodhicitta and making vows for the benefit of all sentient beings without exception
  • Half-Sitting and Half-Walking Samadhi
  • Mahāmudrā practice (makabodara)
    • Mantra is the "Mantra of Light": On abokya beiroshanō makabodara mani handoma jimbara harabaritaya un
  • Maintaining the Samaya  (sanmaya-kai)
  • Maintaining the Ten (10) Major and Forty-eight (48) Minor Precepts of the Mahāyāna 
  • Practice the perfection of the paramitas
    • You may choose between the
      • Pāli Canon's Ten Perfections or
      • The Mahāyāna Six Perfections
  • Make pilgrimages to temples, monasteries and sacred sites
  • Making offerings to the people, such as donations to food banks, homeless shelters, clothing banks, etc.
  • Offering healing ceremonies
    • There are many besides the usual Medicine Buddha sadhanas
  • Organizing convocations to deliberate on the Dharma
  • Performing Priestly Services Such as Weddings and Funerals
  • Upholding and teaching the Lotus Sutra and other Dharmas
  • Protecting local "sacred places" as wildlife refuges
  • Providing the circumstance for people to live, study, and practice the
    Buddha's way in harmony with their unique abilities
  • Purifications, cold-water cleansings and prostrations
  • Recitation of Sutras and Dharanis
  • Relinquishment of personal desires and practicing ahimsa (harmlessness)
    • Buddhism is a practice of renunciation
  • Repetition of mantras
  • Samadhi
    • Through concentration using an object
    • Through choiceless awareness while avoiding choiceless distraction
    • Also called Jhāna or Dhyana practice
  • Shikan (chich-kuan) meditation (samatha-vipassana)
  • Singing and chanting
  • Sitting-only samadhi
  • Sustaining temples as places where people can freely make offerings,
    Pray, Meditate, Chant, Study and Celebrate
  • Visiting hospitals, rest homes, schools, etc.
  • Visualizations of mandalas and other esoteric practices
  • Walking-only samadhi
Hongaku Shu and the Hongaku Jōdo Buddhist Community are tremendously wide-ranging in possibility of lineage and practice. The priests and lay practitioners are exposed to essentially all the components of Dharma practice. Because of individual proclivities each is inclined to indulgence in a specialization of some kind, a limited number of practices they have an attraction to. The diverse lineages or schools and diversity of persons within Buddhism will have "friendly" disagreements with each other over the true nature of the Dharma, lineage and practice.

One need not believe every feature of practice, not even of your own lineage, school or teacher. We are a Mahāyāna tradition and takes seriously Shakyamuni Buddha's final instructions to the Sangha: "Work out your own comprehension with persistence!" It has been so for 2500 years, passed from teacher to student with assiduousness. This is advice that anyone who hopes to be happier, calmer and more free can gladly follow. It makes you fully responsible for your own happiness, realizations and liberation. It means that you are the matrix of practice.

If you find these teachings useful or would like to help Hongaku Jōdo Buddhist Community in its work to help others, please donate to Hongaku Jōdo by clicking here.