What Kind of Life Is the Pure Land?

In a pure land similar to the Land of Bliss, if there were still daily life and work, it would be a worldly realm of laypeople just like the Saha world, and thus would not be a pure land at all. Sentient beings would inevitably have the afflictions of greed, hatred, and delusion, and would inevitably be divided into two major groups—the monastics and the laity—no different from the Saha world.

This is because in a tranquil Buddha-land, everything arises through transformation; there is no need for labor, no need to make a living or work, so that people's minds can remain tranquil and undefiled, without selfish desire, without distinctions of male and female, without family, incomparably tranquil. Hence there is no distinction between monastics and laity—all are practitioners. Only in a world similar to the Saha world, where there is the division of male and female, the burden of family, and the need to work and make a living, does the distinction between monastics and laity arise. Therefore the Buddha established that in the Saha world the monastic Sangha takes the leading role, guiding the multitude in practicing the Buddha's Dharma; Buddhism is upheld by the monastic Sangha, and the Buddha's Dharma is spread by the monastic Sangha. When the Buddha was on the verge of parinirvāṇa, the great bodhisattvas who were laypeople requested to inherit the treasury of the Dharma and spread the Dharma on behalf of the Buddha, but the Buddha did not permit it; He instead had the monastic Sangha spread the Dharma on His behalf and protect the Tripitaka and the twelve divisions of the Buddha's teachings.

In tranquil Buddha-lands and in the heavens, sentient beings are not divided into male and female, and there are no families; therefore they are all monastic practitioners, with no need to leave home. Without a family, how could there be any "leaving home"? The sentient beings in the pure lands and the great bodhisattvas, all the way up to the bodhisattvas of the highest stage (equal enlightenment), have no families, and the forms they manifest are not divided into male and female; therefore none of them need to leave home or manifest the monastic form—yet all of them are monastics, and moreover bodhisattva-monastics. Therefore none of them need to shave their heads, none need to wear monastic robes, and none need to receive or keep the monastic precepts.