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105 SOGA RYŌJIN long history of Buddhism is none other than the history of the              Sutra of Immeasurable Life. In other words, it is the history of the transmission of nenbutsu and the history of the progress of Amida Buddha’s original vow. Hence, Soga is critical of the evolutionary view of Buddhist history current in      % =åkyamuni and developed in various ways over time. Soga questions whether such an interpretation can provide an adequate framework for explicating the spiritual dimensions of Buddhist history. Although not repudiating =åkyamuni is, from the commonsense point of view, the        > =åkyamuni himself was born from the history of the original vow. Buddhism does not %  =å  %           ƒ   =å ^ % # ^ =åkyamuni arose from, and participates in, the history of the actualization of the Dharma that reaches back to beginningless time. Through our encounter with this tradition, we discover our true selves and are given the courage to live on the basis of the Buddhist teachings. In 1937, Japan began a full-scale invasion of China. Ironically, the atmosphere of increasing crisis that the war created allowed Soga to % "   ]    %   ] ‚    ‰[™‰  %    Dharmå     #   %    %   of the eternal Tathågata and, at the same time, am amazed about my own inconceivable existence. What, then, is this Dharmåkara Bodhisattva? None other than the subject of the surrendering faith that is mindful of the Tathågata. His eighteenth vow is the expression of the Tathågata’s loving experiment with the entrusting child-mind of the sentient beings. Our founder Shinran stated that the eighteenth vow realizes the faith of a beliver (ki 機), but what does it mean, after all, to realize the “entrusting person” (tanomu ki たのむ機)? What does it mean to say that the Tathågata has deigned to realize or accomplish the faith that we were supposed to arouse? If it were said that the Tathågata had realized the vow and practice that we were supposed to bring forth, we could still understand that in an objective way, since vow and practice are objective to some extent. It is a different matter with faith, however, since this cannot be conceived at all apart from the subject. What could it mean, then, that an objective Tathågata has realized in the subject’s place the one moment of real faith of the true subject, whereby the self entrusts itself intimately to the Tathågata? Is not precisely faith the true life of our pure subjectivity? It would appear, therefore, that this at least cannot be realized on the side of the objective Tathågata. Indeed, Masters Shandao and Hønen, in their interpretation of the three aspects of faith and the ten moments of invocation in the eighteenth vow21 —an interpretation that asserts that faith, vow, and practice (nenbutsu) are the causes of birth in the Pure Land—make a distinction on this point: Of the three causes, faith as pertaining to the believing subject is detached from the original vow as the object of faith. They, then, consider the name, as endowed with both vow and practice, to be realized by the Tathågata, and therefore call the eighteenth vow the “Vow of Birth by Nenbutsu” (nenbutsu øjø no gan 念仏往生の願). Only our founder Shinran, experimenting with this vow in the depth of his own heart, and discovering the original vow of Dharmåkara Bodhisattva in his own subject, resolutely called this 114 SOGA RYŌJIN vow the “Original Vow of Faith and Entrusting” (shishin shingyø no hongan 至心信楽の本願). Truly, in his self-awareness, Shinran was not only the “true guest” (object) of the original vow, but also its “master” (subject). At this point, for one, we feel that, when the doctrine of our founder is said to be directly transmitted by Amida, these certainly are no mere words of idle praise. For he discovered the great spirit wherein the vows of Dharmåkara were made precisely in his own one moment faith. As our savior, Dharmåkara is none other than the eternal Tathågata but, when in his experiment with entrusting he is turned toward the eternal Tathågata, he is none other than the faith, which is the subject’s true self for us sentient beings. Among the words of the eighteenth vow, the oath, “if there are sentient beings that are not born in my land, may I not attain the supreme enlightenment,” presents Dharmåkara Bodhisattva directly in his capacity of father of eternal light, and the summons, “with sincere mind entrust yourselves, aspiring to be born in my land, and...

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