Two Precious Scroll Narratives of Guanyin and Her ... - Khamkoo

Introduction 5
nastic community and achieve enlightenment too. No deed promised
more merit than donations to the monks and nuns, who were
forbidden to engage in either agriculture or commerce and had to
survive by begging.
The biographies of the historical Buddha Śākyamuni tell how
he prepared himself for his final life of teaching and liberation
over the course of innumerable lifetimes, during which he performed
many meritorious deeds of self-sacrifice. 11 At one stage in
this process toward becoming a buddha, he had received the promise
of his future buddhahood from the preceding buddha, Ratnagarbha.
As he pursued his pious career through many reincarnations
he was called a ‘‘bodhisattva,’’ one who is destined to become
a buddha. If early Buddhism focused on this single buddha and
bodhisattva, Mahayana taught that in this cosmos, which is made
up of innumerable worlds, there exists not just one buddha, but
innumerable buddhas, and that, by the same token, innumerable
bodhisattvas are preparing themselves for a future buddhahood.
Mahayana commends the bodhisattva-path and its goal of future
buddhahood as an ideal that all beings should embrace, a goal that
is in fact deemed superior to that of an arhat. Eventually Mahayana
thinkers would teach that all living beings share the same Buddhanature
and that each has the potential to become a buddha.
Mahayana also taught that some of these innumerable buddhas
had dedicated their hard earned merit to the creation of a Pure
Land or a world of heavenly bliss. In China none of these Buddhaworlds
became more popular than the Pure Land of the Buddha
Amitābha, the buddha of the west, who held out the promise of a
rebirth in his paradise to each and every believer who called on his
name with complete sincerity, even if only once. 12 The cult of Amitābha
was often paired with that of Maitreya, the future buddha.
Maitreya was believed to be residing in the Tuṡita Heaven, preparing
for his descent to the human world, from which he would lead
all who had faith in him to final liberation. 13
Mahayana not only turned buddhas from human teachers into
supernatural deities, it turned the buddhas-to-be or bodhisattvas
into compassionate saviors, as Mahayana bodhisattvas have taken a
vow to put off their final exit from saṁsārauntil they have saved each
and every sentient being. As a result, Mahayana Buddhism introduced
into China a large pantheon of buddhas and bodhisattvas, all
eager to deliver pious men and women. 14 One of the most popular