To travel the Shin Buddhist path is to experience a new life of received compassion, wisdom and beauty in every moment. Its main practice of voicing and chanting of the nembutsu is the catalyst for living this invigorating life of awakening. As stated in a previous page, the source and nature of the nembutsu is Amida herself. The Nembutsu is the living embodiment of Amida. Shinran Shonin wrote, "Though we speak of Primal Vow and Nembutsu, these are not two different things. There is no Nembutsu separate from the Vow; there is no Vow separate from the Nembutsu." What does Namu-Amida-Butsu mean? Firstly, it is the Japanese version of the original Sanskrit term Namo Amitabha Buddhaya, which means “I take refuge (entrust) in the Buddha of Immeasurable Life and Light.” The nembutsu is Japanese for Buddha Name or Buddha Recitation.

The nembutsu is Amida’s essential living prayer that allows us to live a truly happy and meaningful life by transforming our confusion and suffering into our true potential as authentic human beings, and to be spiritually reborn in the Pure Land. It must be clarified that the nembutsu is not a practice to attain spiritual liberation but is the living expression of Enlightened Mind and conveys our deep gratitude towards Amida's gift of liberation to us and all beings.  As Shinshu Kyodan Renmei so eloquently said, “the nembutsu is not my call to the Buddha but the Buddha’s calling me.”  What do the components of Namu-Amida-Butsu mean?

Namu – Historical Dimension and Devotion

 The namu component expresses our historical dimension of birth and death. In this linear dimension, we experience our lives as imperfect, finite and ultimately self-centered beings. Furthermore, namu signifies our directionless and confused lives, and our endless ability to cause and experience suffering.  Namu, also, conveys our devotion to the Buddha Dharma and focuses on Buddha’s compassion. Through faith, study and practice of the nembutsu, our lives will naturally improve by the innate momentum of Buddha’s karma (Primal Vow); thereby, we gradually evolve to our potential and are then spiritually enabled to make our world a better place to live.

Amida – Ultimate Dimension and Compassion

Boundless Life and Compassion is the transcendent reality beyond duality (pair of opposites) which is beyond life and death and is the true essence of the cosmos and our deepest nature. This ultimate dimension also known in Buddhist terms as the Dharmakaya is personified as Amida, who is the living expression of immeasurable life and light, and is the one Life of all beings in our vast universe. In addition, the ultimate dimension is without description, definite location and has no beginning or end, but can be experienced in the timeless now through the voicing of the nembutsu. Being one with all things, Amida corresponds to absolute compassion because she equally identifies herself with the joys and sorrows of all beings.

Butsu – Awakening and Way of Life

Butsu is Japanese for Buddha, an honorific title symbolizing the living mind and essence of awakening. Butsu is the vehicle to express our lives because he bridges the separate realities of Namu and Amida. As the originator of the Primal Vow and our voicing of the nembutsu, the Buddha is the dynamic karmic momentum that makes us realize our limitations (namu) within the nurturing embrace of boundless compassion (Amida). Butsu corresponds to unconditional love and total acceptance because Buddha wishes all beings to be free from suffering and ceaselessly works to liberate them regardless of race, gender, class, intelligence, religion or moral status.

In addition, butsu points to a way of life, in which through devotion and practice, we can experience an open, free and natural lifestyle at the intersection of Namu and Amida. That is to say, butsu is an awakened life at the juncture of the historical and ultimate dimensions. This natural way of life is marked by freedom, love, and gratitude.

The Nexus of the Historical and Ultimate Dimensions

The nembutsu is the spiritual “buzz” or “vibe” of the cosmos. It can also be seen as the intimate calling of life itself, manifesting in our hearts and minds, transforming suffering into wholesomeness. The nembutsu is the union of all opposites, in which the limited and confused self is integrated with Boundless Life and Light. In other words, it is the union of the historical and ultimate dimensions in the very here and now. With Namu-Amida-Butsu, uncertainty and death are transformed into assurance and deathlessness. That is to say, the finite, frail and mortal individual awakens to the fact that she has always been fused within the one life, which freely and totally bequeaths itself to her through compassion and wisdom. As a result of this profound recognition, our deep seated alienation and a sense of separation are replaced by spiritual inclusion and nurturing interconnection. Shinshu Kyodan Remei captured the feeling of this inner transformation when he wrote, “Namu-Amida-Butsu is the cry of joy, when meeting my true self.”

At its root, the voicing of the nembutsu is a non-dual practice, that is, its voicing does not just originate from our volition or ego-centered will power but is really the result of the ceaseless working of Boundless Life within us, personified as Amida Buddha. It is the natural consequence of deeply hearing the cosmic “buzz” with the entirety of one’s mind, body and speech. As Muso Kimura so nicely stated, “While in a world of voices, one transcends all voices and one hears the voice that is voiceless.”  Shinran Shonin clarified this non-dual nature of the nembutsu by saying, “although I recite the nembutsu, I am not reciting. It is Amida in me that makes me recite…” The non-dual expression of Namu-Amida-Butsu, as a sign of spiritual liberation, empowers us to truly fuse our lives with reality’s deepest source and consciously partake in the Pure Land, which is the realm of eternal life.  This articulates the completion of circle of life, in which the merger of Namu (historical) with Amida (ultimate) manifests as Butsu (awakening) in the eternal now.

Through the ceaseless working of the nembutsu, we are transformed to live at the nexus of the historical and ultimate dimensions. As 20^th century Shin Buddhist philosopher Zuiken summed it up, “the essence of the Mahayana is; without severing blind passions, one attains Nirvana.” That is the say, our foolish and fictitious selves are gradually dissolved and we are gratefully brought to the realization of the natural life, in which we are no longer bounded by our self-limitations, isolated from the past, present and future but truly seeing everything arising and blending together within the boundless interplay of the Pure Land.

Nembutsu and the Eucharist

To further clarify the nembutsu for the Western mind, let’s compare it with the Catholic sacrament of the Eucharist, which is quite different from the nembutsu but shares some religious commonality with it. According to the Catholic Church, the actual living presence of Christ is within the actual wine and wafer of the Eucharist. Furthermore, this rite can only be taken at a Church service through an intermediary of an ordained priest of the Holy See. By taking the Eucharist, the worshipper is literally and biologically absorbing in the life and spirit of Christ.

The nembutsu is somewhat akin to the Eucharist, in which Namu-Amida-Butsu is experienced as the living embodiment of Amida Buddha in our minds and hearts. Unlike the Eucharist that can only be taken through official rituals, the nembutsu may be experienced at anytime or place, and has nothing to do with intermediaries. The nembutsu is the direct transmission of the sacred mind of the cosmos (the ultimate dimension) into our personal life experience, which gradually and unfailingly transforms us from our unseeing and self-centered foolish selves into the substance of enlightenment, full of gratitude, love and wisdom. The nembutsu is the way of partaking in the Sacred Story, the Pure Land and eternal life.

Furthermore, the nembutsu does not come from an external source like the Eucharist. Amida does not abide separately from us and must be literally absorb into our biological system to be experienced. On the contrary, Amida is our true nature that has always been within us and the voicing of Namu-Amida-Butsu is simply the manifestation of its full and living presence in our consciousness and life experience.