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Buddhism: Maitreya Buddha The Spiritual Bookstore Online World Religion Library
MaitreyaAccording to some Buddhist traditions, the period of the Buddhist Law is divided into three stages: a first period of 500 years is of the turning of the Wheel of the Law; a second period of 1,000 years is of the deterioration of the Law, and the third period of 3,000 years is the one during which no one practices the Law. After this, Buddhism having disappeared, a new Buddha will appear who will again turn the Wheel of the Law. This future Buddha known as Maitreya is beloved to be still in the Tushita heaven, in the state of a bodhisattva. It is believed that Gautama Buddha himself enthroned him as his successor. The word 'maitreya' is derived from the Sanskrit word for friendliness. Thus this bodhisattva is fundamentally said to embody the qualities of amiability and an attitude of well-meaning sympathy. According to a legend there once descended to the earth from Maitreya's Tushita heaven a Chinese layman and teacher named Mahasattva Fu, widely regarded as an incarnation of Maitreya. Fu attracted many students to his Dharma lectures. Living in a time of great hardships and famines for the peasants, he sold all of his possessions to feed the local villagers, and also fasted to give away his food to the needy. Fu once undertook a long hunger fast to protest against the king's treatment of the poor. He announced that he would finish the fast with a fiery self-immolation, as an offering to benefit all suffering beings. At the culmination of his fast, many of his followers offered to burn themselves in his place, some going to the extent of burning their fingers or cutting off their ears as offerings and engaging in other ascetic extremes. They finally convinced Fu to abandon his plan. The notion of a bodhisattva sacrificing his complete physical self or at least parts of it conforms to a similar notion expounded in ancient Buddhist texts. For example the 'Shat-sahasrika Prajna-paramita' (5th century AD) says: "Besides wealth and material objects, a bodhisattva should be ready to sacrifice his limbs for the good of others, his hand, foot, eye, flesh, blood, marrow, limbs great and small, and even his head." Indeed in the Jataka tales which are legendary stories about bodhisattvas, there abound numerous instances where they are shown sacrificing parts of their bodies or even their lives to save that of another. A persistent paradox regarding Maitreya is his visualization as an entity of the future. This presents a contrast to much of Buddhist practice and teaching which emphasizes the importance of the present, the current moment. This is sometimes referred to as the timeless eternal. According to the Buddhist viewpoint time does not exist as some external container, but is the vital expression and enactment of our own being right now. Time does not exist separate from our own presence. As a bodhisattva associated with the future, as against the fundamental stress Buddhism places on the present moment of time, Maitreya presents a wondrous amalgamation and a complex composite on the plane of time. Buddhist esoteric thought achieves this is in a skillful manner by associating him with children. Children are but the 'present' of our 'future.' A number of stories abound which illustrate his loving-kindness for children: Once in his incarnation as a spiritual poet, Maitreya was asked by a relative to help in dealing with his son, who was becoming a delinquent. The poet (Maitreya) visited the family and stayed the night without saying anything to the son. The next morning as he prepared to depart, he asked the boy's help in tying up his sandals. As the lad looked up from doing so, he saw a tear roll down the poet's cheek. Nothing was said, but from that time the boy completely reformed. The easy camaraderie with children and attention to young people shown by Maitreyan figures amply justifies the 'friendly' origin of his name as described above. from: http://www.kheper.net/topics/Buddhism/Buddhism.htm
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