In February, we observe our Nirvana Day Service commemorating Sakyamuni Buddha’s passing from this world into the lasting peace of parinirvana. In departing from this world, Sakyamuni embodied the essential truth that all who are born into human life will eventually pass through the gate of death. Given that our bodily form will not last forever, where shall we find meaning and purpose in this life? Observing the world in which we live, it seems that many lives are devoted to the pursuit of fame and profit. Shinran Shonin himself concludes his Hymns of the Dharma-Ages with the following verse:
I am such that I do not know right and wrong
And cannot distinguish false and true;
I lack even small love and small compassion,
And yet, for fame and profit, enjoy teaching others.