The Letter of Petition from Yorimoto

Chapter12(Refusing to submit a written oath)

As for the Hinayana precepts,⁴⁵ the two hundred and fifty precepts were expounded for the heavenly gods by the great arhat Pūrna, but the layman Vimalakīrti reprimanded him, saying, “You should not place impure food in a jeweled vessel.”⁴⁶ Angulimāla reproached Manjushrī, saying, “You will never realize the truth of emptiness expounded in the Mahayana teachings through [Hinayana] practices, which are as insignificant as mosquitoes and gadflies.”⁴⁷ Manjushrī later set forth seventeen flaws in the Hinayana precepts,⁴⁸ and the Thus Come One likewise repudiated them with the eight analogies.⁴⁹ The Great Teacher Dengyō denounced them as donkey’s milk and likened them to a toad.⁵⁰ The later disciples of Ganjin⁵¹ accused the Great Teacher Dengyō of calumny and appealed directly to Emperor Saga, but because what Dengyō had said is clearly indicated in the sutras, their efforts were to no avail. The petition submitted to the emperor by the schools of Nara proved futile, and the great ordination platform [for conferring the Mahayana precepts] was erected at Enryaku-ji temple on Mount Hiei. Thus the Hinayana precepts have already long since been discarded. Even if I, Yorimoto, should compare the priest Ryōkan to a mosquito, a gadfly, or a toad, because such assertions are clearly based on the sutras, you would have no reason to find fault with me.

Now it is unimaginably grievous to me that you would order me to submit a written oath [discarding my faith in the Lotus Sutra]. If I, Yorimoto, were to follow the trend of the times, which goes against the Buddhist teachings, and write such an oath, you would immediately incur the punishment of the Lotus Sutra. When the Sage Nichiren, the envoy of the Thus Come One Shakyamuni, was exiled because of the false charges leveled against him by the priest Ryōkan, fighting broke out within one hundred days,⁵² just as he had predicted, and a great number of warriors perished. Among them were the scions of the Nagoe clan.⁵³ Is not the priest Ryōkan solely to blame for their deaths? And if you now pay heed to the views of Ryūzō and Ryōkan and force me to write this oath, will you not be equally guilty?

I am not sure whether those who slander me are simply ignorant of this causal principle, or whether they are intentionally trying to do you harm. In any event, I urge you to summon those who are plotting to use me in order to provoke some major incident, and have them confront me in your presence.

With my deep respect.

The twenty-fifth day of the sixth month in the third year of Kenji (1277), cyclical sign hinoto-ushi

Submitted by Shijō Nakatsukasa-no-jō Yorimoto.

Notes

45. The Hinayana precepts are divided into several categories, such as the five precepts, the eight precepts (both being for lay believers), the ten precepts for both male and female novices of the Buddhist Order, the two hundred and fifty precepts for fully ordained monks, and the five hundred precepts for fully ordained nuns. Ryōkan, whom Lord Ema revered, took great pride in observing the two hundred and fifty precepts.

46. Vimalakīrti Sutra. This means that one should not exhort those of superior capacity to observe the Hinayana precepts. It also refers to the inferiority of the Hinayana in comparison to the Mahayana teachings.

47. Presumably a rephrasing of a passage in the Angulimāla Sutra.

48. The “seventeen flaws” refers to the reasons why the Hinayana precepts are inferior to the Mahayana precepts, according to the Pure Monastic Rules Sutra. For example, the Hinayana precepts reflect abhorrence of the threefold world, the realm inhabited by unenlightened beings, while the Mahayana precepts do not; the Hinayana precepts show disdain for benefits, while the Mahayana precepts encompass them all.

49. Comparisons by which Shakyamuni Buddha emphasized the superiority of the Mahayana precepts over the Hinayana, according to the Pure Monastic Rules Sutra. For example, the Hinayana precepts practiced by voice-hearers do not even produce benefit as small as the print of a cow’s hoof, while the Mahayana precepts upheld by bodhisattvas produce benefit as vast as the ocean.

50. Donkey’s milk is said to be too distasteful to drink, while cow’s milk (the Mahayana precepts) appeases people’s thirst and nurtures life. With this metaphor, Dengyō indicates that the Hinayana precepts do not lead to enlightenment. In addition, he employs the simile of a toad to denounce the blindness of attachment to the Hinayana precepts, using an analogy similar to “a frog in a well.” Jikaku cites these analogies in his Treatise Clarifying and Praising the Mahayana Precepts.

51. This refers to the leaders of the six schools of Nara, who upheld the Hinayana precepts that the Chinese Precepts priest Ganjin (688–763) had established in Japan.

52. The rebellion led by Hōjō Tokisuke in the second month of 1272. See also n. 40.

53. The scions of the Nagoe clan refer to Tokiaki and Noritoki, who were Ema Mitsutoki’s younger brothers and Chikatoki’s uncles. Since Tomotoki, the father of Mitsutoki, lived at Nagoe in Kamakura, his clan was called the Nagoe clan.

Lecture

This chapter constitutes the final part of Yorimoto’s petition, in which he firmly refuses his lord’s demand to submit a written oath. In the preceding section, Yorimoto cites Buddhist sutras to explain why he speaks ill of Ryokan, specifically attacking the Hinayana and Ritsu teachings to which Ryokan adheres. In the latter section, he explains his refusal to submit the written oath based on the historical precedent of the Nagoe clan members, and expounds upon this through the rigorous Buddhist principle of cause and effect.

As we have examined in the fifth chapter of these lectures, we have already clarified the true nature of Gokuraku-ji Ryokan. Here, however, the focus is not on Ryokan’s personal character, but rather a refutation from the standpoint of doctrine, targeting the Hinayana and Ritsu teachings he follows.

The passage in which the Vimalakirti Sutra describes Vimalakirti rebuking Purna serves as a refutation of Ryokan’s preaching, which teaches the Hinayana doctrines to people in the Latter Day of the Law. Furthermore, the passage where Angulimala rebukes Manjushri points out that as long as one remains attached to Hinayana teachings, one cannot grasp the philosophy of emptiness (sunyata) of the Mahayana, which is the fundamental thought underlying the Buddha’s preaching. The seventeen faults of Manjushri described in the Shojo Bini Kyo (Vinaya Sutra), as well as the eight types of metaphors used by Shakyamuni Buddha, demonstrate that there is an immeasurable difference, like that between heaven and earth, between the benefits accrued by those who practice Hinayana and those who practice Mahayana. It further states that while Hinayana precepts are teachings biased toward self-benefit, Mahayana precepts are teachings of altruism that not only encompass one’s own practice but also work broadly to save all living beings.

Next, Dengyo Daishi’s metaphor of “donkey milk” succinctly states that Hinayana precepts are not teachings that lead sentient beings to Buddhahood. This can be understood by noting that while cow’s milk nourishes life and quenches the thirst of those who are parched, donkey milk is foul-tasting and unfit for consumption. Furthermore, the metaphor of the “toad”—well-known through the proverb “a frog in a well knows nothing of the great ocean”—demonstrates that Hinayana precepts are not a religion opened widely for the sake of society, but rather a “closed” religion.

Moreover, these Hinayana precepts served their purpose only until the establishment of the Mahayana precepts. In Japan, with Dengyo Daishi’s establishment of the Mahayana ordination platform at Mount Hiei, the Hinayana precepts of the southern capital (Nanto) were effectively discarded. Therefore, Yorimoto argues that Ryokan’s insistence on preaching the Hinayana precepts is a profound anachronism, which serves as a core reason for his refutation of Ryokan.

Next, Yorimoto addresses the written oath, which was his lord’s primary concern. He begins by expressing his deep personal sorrow as a retainer that the Kuwagayatsu Debate led to his lord’s displeasure and the subsequent demand for a written oath—an outcome he had never anticipated. He then states the reason for refusing to submit the oath: in light of Buddhist principles, he does not write the oath because he wishes to prevent his lord from following in the footsteps of the Nagoe clan members. This “Nagoe precedent” refers to Nagoe Tokiaki and Noritoki, who met violent deaths during the Tokisuke Rebellion in the second month of 1272. This February Incident was the very manifestation of the “rebellion within one’s own domain” that Nichiren Daishonin had predicted on the tenth day of the ninth month of the previous year: “Within one hundred days, one year, three years, or seven years after the [Daishonin’s] exile and threat of execution, the ‘rebellion within one’s own domain’ will occur, and this clan will begin to destroy itself.” Yorimoto thereby indicates to his lord that the root cause of the Nagoe members’ violent deaths was none other than Gokuraku-ji Ryokan himself. For his lord, this was a stern warning that the demand for the written oath would lead him to repeat the tragedy of the Nagoe clan. This is because his lord’s devotion to Ryokan was deep, and the primary instigators behind the demand for the written oath were Ryokan and Ryuzobo.

Finally, he concludes the petition by requesting that his lord summon the individuals who are plotting to stir up trouble in his name, and that he be allowed to confront them in his lord’s presence.