The Three Realms
of Existence
The relationship between each of the Ten Worlds and the environment most of us have heard of the Buddhist principle of “three thousand realms
in a single moment of life” (Jpn ichinen sanzen). It indicates the vast
complexity and inexhaustible potential that life possesses. The term
three thousand is a product of multiplying four numbers: 10 (representing
the ten worlds) x 10 (the ten worlds again, equaling 100 to present the
mutual possession of the ten worlds) x 10 (the ten factors of lie) x 3
(the three realms of existence). This article focuses on this final “3.”
The three realms of existence are: 1) The realm of the five components,
2) the realm of living beings, and 3) the realm of the environment (or
land). Of these, the third, the “realm of the environment’ is perhaps the
easiest to explain and understand. It refers to the place where living
beings exist and carry out their activities. The natural environment, for
example, is a “realm of the environment’ as is a city in which many
people live. This concept is extremely important as it expands the
Buddhist view of life from the individual to the dynamic relationship
between the individual, society and the environment.
“Realm” here comes from the Japanese term seken, which, in Buddhism, also
means “distinction” or “difference.” For our purpose, we can also think
of it as “diversity.” Thus the term “three realms” can also be taken to
mean “three spheres of diversity” or “three kinds of distinction.”
These differences mean differences in how life’s potential conditions,
known as the Ten Worlds, express or manifest
themselves. In other words, a living being who manifests the world of
Hell is quite different or distinct from one who manifests the world of,
say, Humanity, or Learning, even if it is the very same being. Our
“angry” self is quite different from our “grateful and caring” self, or
our “inquisitive” self, for example.
Nichiren Daishonin writes in “On Attaining Buddhahood in This Lifetime”:
“If the minds of living beings are impure, their land is also impure, but
if their minds are pure, so is their land. There are not two lands, pure
of impure in themselves. The difference lies solely in the good or evil
of our minds” (The Writings of Nichiren Daishonin). The “good or
evil of our minds” here can be interpreted to mean which state of
life--which of the Ten Worlds--dominates our inner lives from moment to
moment. The “land” tends to express the same states of life as the
“living beings’ who inhabit it. We know how the different ‘selves”
mentioned above can create a completely different atmosphere around the
dinner table, for example.
People who are in depths of suffering are “living beings in the states of
Hell.” People overwhelmed with joy at some development in their lives are
“people in the state of Heaven.” And people who dwell in a condition of
absolute happiness and satisfaction are “living beings of the world of
Buddhahood.” These are distinctions in the realm of living beings.
And as I suggested above, the realm of living beings represents such
distinctions even within the same individual from one moment to the next.