Of Blood and the Buddha: A Nichiren Primer on Counseling Clients
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OF BLOOD AND THE BUDDHA: A NICHIREN PRIMER ON
COUNSELING CLIENTS
John W. Teeter, Jr. *
1. INTRODUCTION .............................. ..........343
II. SETTING THE STAGE: COUNSELING ACROSS THE CHASMS..........344
III. DECIPHERING THE DOCTRINE.. .............................346
IV. PERCEIVING THE PRACTICAL PROBLEMS.............. .....349
V. CONCLUSION ..................................... .....352
I. INTRODUCTION
Should you pray when you bleed? More specifically, should a
Buddhist woman refrain from chanting and reciting from the Lotus Sutral
during her menstrual cycle? This was the query fielded by the fiery
prophet Nichiren in 1264 in Kamakura, Japan.2 Nichiren's response,
however, is far more than a doctrinal resolution of an esoteric theological
uncertainty. To the contrary, Nichiren's advice is a model of analysis,
* Professor, St. Mary's University School of Law; A.B. 1982, University of Illinois at
Chicago Circle; J.D. 1985, Harvard Law School. For Derek Teeter and with special thanks to
Vanessa Erps, Juliana Fong, Whitney Hill, Jennifer Martin, Maria Vega, Aurelia Vincent, Grace
Wang, and my students.
1. For a splendid translation of this sacred text, see THE LOTUS SUTRA AND ITS OPENING
AND CLOSING SuTRAs (Burton Watson trans., 2009) [hereinafter LOTUS SUTRA]. For its followers,
the Lotus Sutra integrates all the partial truths of the earlier teachings into a perfect whole, and
represents the essence and the entirety of the system of Buddhist philosophy. NICHIREN SHOSHU
INTERNATIONAL CENTER, LECTURES ON TIHE SUTRA 9 (3d ed. 1995). In fact, the LOTUS SUTRA itself
declares that it shines the brightest and is the profoundest and greatest of the sutras. LOTUS
SUTRA, supra, at 327.
2. 1 NICHIREN, The Recitation of the Expedient Means and Life Span Chapters,
[hereinafter The Recitation] in THE WRITINGS OF NICHIREN DAISHONIN 68, 71, 73 (Gosho
Translation Committee ed. & trans., 1999) [hereinafter THE WRITINGS]. For two excellent
biographies of Nichiren, see MASAHARU ANESAKi, NICHIREN: THE BUDDHIST PROPHET (1966);
NICHIREN SHOSHU INTERNATIONAL CENTER, THE LIFE OF NICHIREN DAISHONIN (rev. ed. 1993)
[hereinafter THE LIFE]. The term Daishonin is a title of honor meaning great sage. THE
ENGLISH BUDDHIST DICTIONARY COMMITTEE, THE SoKA GAKKAl DICTIONARY OF BUDDHISM 105
(2002) [hereinafter DICTIONARY OF BUDDHISM].
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Of Blood and the Buddha: A Nichiren Primer on Counseling Clients
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