Although a panoramic view of world religions reveals their great diversity, two features all religions share make them resemble each other: Each tries to guide its adherents to the greatest "good" and to divert them away from what is perceived as "evil" according to their respective traditions.

What we believe or have faith in depends on what we know and how deep our understanding is; our choice is determined by what we deem reasonable.  Genuine, deep faith is invariable rooted in one's true understanding rather than being the outcome of tradition, feelings or attitudes.  It is never rooted in superstition of any kind.  Genuine faith is always accompanied by a deep understanding.  Since all of us can be said to possess a certain amount of innate wisdom as well as the ability to understand the meaning of truth, we are well advised to adopt a religious tradition in accordance with our propensities in order to develop our spiritual potential the same way students study those subjects which maximize theirs.  The quest for truth can lead us to the most profound understanding accessible to humanity.

These thoughts reflect the considered views of Elder Yuan Chin Lee who studied religions for many years and eventually settled for the direct approach of Buddhadharma.  He kept a written record of his experiences, insights and comments for future reference and for the purpose of sharing them with those interested in the quest for truth.  His observations are astute and rational.  His approach to the subject of religion is as open as if it were any other subject, such as philosophy, literature or any other of the humanities.

A view based on the findings of modern science, attractive as it may seem, is inconclusive partly because modern science is a field of human knowledge which expands rapidly and also because there are disagreements among reputable scientists on just about all the fundamental issues.  Perfect peace, it would appear, can only be obtained through one's own intuitive understanding.  Only then can one be wide awake, clear-headed and joyful, smiling brightly.

In the text which follows, Elder Yuan Chin Lee presents existence as the product of causes and conditions.  What is a cause, and what is a condition?  Let us consider, for example, a seed: If we merely place it on the table and pray to it, reciting "seed, seed, tree, tree," the seed is not going to turn into a tree no matter how long we recite to it.  Why?  Because the seed is only a cause or a potential and requires certain conditions for its potential to bring results.  What are the conditions requisite for its development?  That soil, air, water, light, and time are all indispensable; furthermore, each of these must be in the appropriate quantity for the seed to become a tree.  Let us consider another example: The materials used for the construction of a house are the causes.  They require certain conditions such as a plan, a piece of land, a workman and his tools, if they are to produce jointly a house.  Only when the requisite causes and conditions converge can the house materialize.  Furthermore, within any given cause and condition there are further causes and conditions.  In the example of the house, the bricks have brick-causes and conditions and beams have beam-causes and conditions, the same applies to the tools, windows, the doors, the nails, and so on.

By analogy, people have their causes and conditions and so do animals, plants and all the rest:  Mountains have mountain-causes and conditions, oceans have ocean-causes and conditions; there are family-causes and conditions, nation-causes and conditions, and world-causes and conditions.  There are also the universe-causes and conditions.  No part of existence has been created by a supernatural being.  All that exists is and has always been the outcome of causes and conditions.  When this is understood, mind is freed from doubt and delusion and brightens and expands as the result of it.

Now that we understand how causes and conditions are jointly at the root of all existence we are able to understand to doctrine of cause and effect.  It is easy to see that no part of all that exists can be viewed as separate.  However, numerous distant causes are concealed and therefore rather difficult to discern.  The proximate causes are always evident, but the more remote ones are not.  Causes and effects manifesting as forms are self-evident, but those related to the formless plane tend to be elusive.  Some causes and effects have shallow roots, while others are deep-rooted.  Evil or good, the causes and their effects follow one another in the same way a shadow follows the foot.  Thus it becomes obvious that one reaps as one has sown.  When we plant an apple-seed, we should not expect to harvest peaches and, by the same token, good causes produce good effects and evil causes evil ones.  Evil generated by people is in proportion to how well they understand this foolproof doctrine.

The doctrine of rebirth is yet another essential part of Buddhaharma.  People in Asia are completely familiar with it, but those in the western world have discovered it relatively recently.  The doctrine of rebirth is completely consistent with the teaching of cause and effect, and the present commentary deals with causes and their effects and how these influence one's rebirth by means of karma.  Supramundane causes yield supramundane results, and the practice of ten virtues is a cause that will have rebirth in heaven for a result.  When the ten evil causes are present, rebirth in hell automatically follows.  Most of us neither have the virtue requisite for a rebirth in the heavenly realm, nor the evil necessary for rebirth in hell, and therefore we have to endure this world countless times over, reborn according to the karma we have accumulated so far; the retribution we receive is exactly proportionate to it.  There is no supreme being rewarding or punishing us.  Merely one's own karma, good or bad, is taking its course in the form of result or effect.

The doctrine of rebirth as understood by Buddhists does not automatically imply that one will be reborn as a human being.   There are, according to Buddhadharma, six kinds of beings and their six respective realms in the wheel of existence.  Retribution takes the form of rebirth in any one of these realms, and is determined by one's karmic causes.  What beings inhabit these six realms?  The first realm is the heavenly one, consisting of twenty-eight varieties of heavens and is inhabited by devas.  The second one is that of human beings, and it includes all people living in this world at present.  The third one belongs to the asuras, characterized by jealousy and envy.  These three realms are considered fortunate.   The animal realm, the fourth of the six, is a realm characterized by ignorance and confusion.  The denizens of the fifth realm are characterized by insatiable craving and miserliness, and the sixth contains the hell reams; there, the hell dwellers must endure underscribable suffering.  The last three are termed woeful.  One's rebirth in any of these six realms is determined solely by one's karmic causes accumulated in one's lives up to the present.

Closely related to the doctrine of rebirth in the six realms is the important matter of abstention from taking life.  I have met many people who are afraid to face this matter and yet, as long as we shun this issue, we remain confused.  In each of our countless lives we had parents.  Where are they now?  We know that people are sentient beings, and furthermore, that the mind of sentient beings changes constantly.  Their actions follow the same pattern and, amidst all that change, the many varied thoughts and actions result in wide range of retribution.  Since our subsequent rebirths depend on present causes, we can safely assume that our parents are, likewise, still in the samsara or cyclic existence.  But where, and in what form, we have no way of knowing; the same is true regarding friends and relatives from previous existences.  When we participate in taking lives in the present, eating the flesh of living beings, it may be that we are consuming someone who was very close to us in one of our previous existences.  When we consider this point carefully, can we still go on participating mercilessly in the continuous taking of lives?  The Buddha advised us to establish this mind and this contemplation when eating meat.  I would like to introduce countless friends to Buddhadharma in order to help them leave the wheel of life.

Elder Yuan Chin Lee's lucid commentary explains the Four Noble Truths, the Twelve Links in the Chain of Existence and the six kinds of Perfection.  In addition, he makes available to us the guidelines for study and practice of the Buddha's teaching, thereby enabling us to transcend this world, the cycle of birth and death and the three woeful reams, and to attain complete enlightenment.  Elder Yuan Chin Lee emphasizes the approach promulgated by the Pure Land sect, because in his view it is the most expedient, leading to rebirth in Pure Land.  He explains it clearly enough in the following commentary and there is no need for me to expand on his topic any further.

On Zen and Pure Land 
(from Awakening of the Faith Treatise)

Suppose there is a man who learns this [Mahayana] teaching [of meditation] for the first time and wishes to seek the correct faith but lacks courage and strength.  Because he lives in this world of suffering, he fears that he will not always be able to meet the Buddhas and honor them personally, and that faith being difficult to perfect, he will be inclined to fall back.

He should know that the Tathagathas have an excellent expedient means by which they can protect his faith : that is, through the strength of wholehearted meditation-recitation on the Buddha [Amitabha], he will in fulfillment of his wishes be able to be born in the Buddha-land beyond, to see the Buddha always, and to be forever separated from the evil states of existence.

[If a cultivator follows this path], he will be able to be born there in the end because he abides in the correct samadhi. 
/ s. Yoshito Hakeda, tr., p. 102./