The Unanimous Declaration by the Buddhas of the Three Existencesregarding the Classification of the Teachings and Which Are to Be Abandoned and Which Upheld Chapter12

Written by Nichiren

If we consider the matter, we see then that the mind when it is dreaming is comparable to the state of delusion, and when it is awake is comparable to enlightenment. Thus if we fully understand the sacred teachings of the Buddha’s lifetime, we see that we have been viewing empty dreams, groundless and ephemeral, troubling our minds with them, pouring out sweat; but when we wake from them we find that our bodies, our homes, our resting places are just as they have always been. The empty world of dreams and the real world of the waking state appeared to our eyes and seemed in our thoughts to be two different matters, yet all along there was only one place and only one person involved. Thus we come to understand these two matters of false or empty, and true or real.

From this one should also understand that one’s own mind that views the dream realm of birth and death in the nine worlds is no different from the waking mind of the world of Buddhahood, the world that is eternal and unchanging. The place in which one views the dream realm of birth and death in the nine worlds is no different from the place in which one experiences the waking state of the world of Buddhahood, eternal and unchanging. There is no difference in the mind itself, and no difference in the place where all this occurs. But the dreams are all false or empty, while what is experienced in the waking state is all true.

Great Concentration and Insight relates that long ago there was a man named Chuang Chou¹⁹ who dreamed that he became a butterfly and passed a hundred years in that state. His sufferings were many, his pleasures few, sweat poured from him, and then he awoke. When he did so, he saw that he was not a butterfly, that no hundred years had passed, that he had experienced neither suffering nor pleasure, and that it was all false and empty, all a mere illusion. (This is the gist of the passage.)

On “Great Concentration and Insight” comments: “Ignorance is comparable to the butterfly dream and the three thousand realms [of three thousand realms in a single moment of life] are comparable to the hundred years. Not a single moment of life is real, just as the butterfly does not really exist, and the three thousand realms also do not exist, just as there is no real passage of years in the dream.”

These passages of commentary describe the attainment of Buddhahood in one’s present form. While dreaming he is a butterfly, he does not cease to be the same Chuang Chou as before, and when waking to find he is not a butterfly, he is not a different Chuang Chou. While one believes that one is an ordinary person in the realm of birth and death, this is comparable to dreaming that one is a butterfly, a state of distorted views and distorted thoughts. And when one realizes that one is the Thus Come One of original enlightenment, this state is comparable to the original Chuang Chou, or the attainment of Buddhahood in one’s present form.

This is not to say that one attains Buddhahood while in the form of a butterfly. The belief that one is a butterfly is empty or false. One could never speak of attaining Buddhahood in such a form—that would be out of the question.

Once we realize that ignorance is like dreaming that one is a butterfly, then our distorted thoughts are seen to be like yesterday’s dreams, things lacking in an intrinsic nature or entity, mere delusions. Who would ever put faith in the empty dream of the realm of birth and death and harbor doubts about the Buddha nature, or nirvana, that is eternal and unchanging?

Great Concentration and Insight states: “Ignorance or illusions are in themselves the essential nature of phenomena. But due to the influence of delusions, the essential nature of phenomena changes into ignorance, giving rise to all the topsy-turvy categories of good and not good. It is just as, when the cold weather comes, water congeals and changes into hard ice, or again as when one falls asleep and one’s mind undergoes a change and produces various sorts of dreams.

“Now these various topsy-turvy views are all part of the essential nature of phenomena, something to be understood as not identical with it and yet not different from it either. The arising and extinction of such topsy-turvy views is like [the illusion of] a ring of fire that one creates by whirling a torch in a circle.

“One does not really believe in the arising and extinction of such topsy-turvy views, but knows they are only a product of the mind; one believes only in the essential nature of phenomena. Arising is the arising of the essential nature of phenomena, and extinction is the extinction of the essential nature of phenomena.

“When one realizes this, one sees that there is in fact no real arising and extinction, that one has only mistakenly believed there was such arising and extinction. What we refer to as delusions are all simply part of the essential nature of phenomena. The essential nature of phenomena acts upon the essential nature of phenomena, the essential nature of phenomena gives thought to the essential nature of phenomena. It is the essential nature of phenomena throughout—there is no time when it is not the essential nature of phenomena.”

As we see from this passage, there is never an instant when the essential nature of phenomena ceases to exist. To fail to understand this principle and instead give way to the belief that the manifestations of ignorance such as the dream of a butterfly are real in nature is to be led astray.