The Buddha Teaches Reincarnation (Four Fruits of the Shramana Edition)

There are still people who confidently say, "The Buddha did not teach reincarnation," but they are believing in hopelessly outdated and incorrect information.
You should upgrade your knowledge based on the Agama Sutras immediately.

The Buddha does teach reincarnation.
There are two types of human reincarnation.

1. Divided (Bundan) Birth and Death

2. Transformed (Hennyaku) Birth and Death

1. Divided birth and death is the cycle of reincarnation for ordinary people. If one dies while evil causes, evil karma, and craving (tanha) remain, they act as the driving force to be reborn as a human who again possesses evil causes, evil karma, and craving. This is written in the Sanni Sutra, for example, so I will post a link to a separate note at the end.

This note is about 2. Transformed birth and death.
If you work hard at Buddhist practice, break through the boundaries of an ordinary person, and enter the realm of the Four Fruits of the Shramana, the type of rebirth changes.
It is a reincarnation, but it is not the "cycle of rebirth" of an ordinary person.
The founder of Agon Shu calls it "the rebirth of a saint," but becoming one of the Four Fruits of the Shramana essentially means entering the world of gods and Buddhas.

Regarding this transformed birth and death, I would like to introduce a note where someone has used machine translation technology to translate into modern Japanese an Agama Sutra with mysterious content, in which a Buddhist disciple who reached Srotapanna, the first fruit (first stage) of the Four Fruits of the Shramana, conveys the state of the higher spiritual realms to the Buddha.

I am explaining this without confirming with the person who published the note, but please forgive me, as I am currently the only person in the note community who can provide additional commentary on this content from the perspective of an Agon Shu member who understands doctrine and teaching at a high level.

Four Bases of Psychic Power: The Buddha is performing empowerment (kaji) on his disciples.

The person who published this note might have wanted to know the specific content and practice methods of the "Four Bases of Psychic Power," which is one of the thirty-seven factors of enlightenment.
However, from the perspective of an Agon Shu member, it says, "Wait? Is that how you use the Four Bases of Psychic Power?"
This was a great discovery even for me personally.

1. The Buddha exercised the power of the four bases of psychic power upon his disciples.
2. The Buddha taught the Shravaka teachings to his disciples.
As a result, the disciples severed the three obstacles and reached Srotapanna (the fruit of Srotapanna).
The three obstacles refer to the three fetters (view of self, doubt, and attachment to rites and rituals).

This snippet alone might not convey it, but it is the Buddha who is exerting the power of the four bases of psychic power, not the disciples. The content of "this" in "this power of the four bases of psychic power" is in the stage preceding the citation, so please check the linked content if you are interested.

This part will be fatally painful for those who explain that practicing meditation on one's own is the Buddhist method of practice.
The Buddha was guiding his disciples with "this power of the four bases of psychic power"after all.
If so, we who live in the modern age should also need to receive "this power of the four bases of psychic power" to practice, but we need to think about where exactly "this power of the four bases of psychic power" exists in the modern world.
By the way, receiving "this power of the four bases of psychic power" can be rephrased as receiving the empowerment (kaji) of the Tathagata.

"Upasaka" refers to a lay Buddhist practitioner.
As you can see from this text, it states that the Upasaka, a lay practitioner, escaped the boundaries of an ordinary person and reached Srotapanna.
Because it has long been said that the Agama Sutras are Hinayana and monastic Buddhism, there is a reality that the Agama Sutras have been buried in East Asian Buddhism, but this is a sutra that clearly shows that this is a complete mistake.

The aftermath of a saint who has become a Srotapanna

I will quote the continuation.

Upon reaching Srotapanna, one repeats the cycle of birth and death between the heavenly realm and the human realm seven times.
According to the spiritual vision of the founder of Agon Shu, one generally reaches the next stage of Sakadagami or Anagami within three times, so one does not actually go back and forth seven times.

When born as a physical human, because they are originally the souls of highly virtuous saints, they are born into families with the virtue and ability to save many people, and they accomplish great holy works and deeds that save many.

Sometimes they come to this world as spirits, in which case they may serve as someone's guardian spirit, work as a local guardian deity, help people as the "person inside" a Buddhist statue or one of the Three Sacred Treasures, or perform some function as an attendant to gods and Buddhas. This scripture explains this through stories about the Paranirmita-vasavartin heaven and so on. In the first place, the one who comes to tell the story to Shakyamuni Buddha in this scripture is a former disciple of the Buddha who has reached Srotapanna and is working as an attendant to Vaisravana.

The Agon Sutras explain that when one reaches the state of the Four Fruits of Asceticism, which is Srotapanna or higher, and meets death, one reaches the spiritual world where gods and Buddhas reside, and a new life, or rather, a new stage of training, begins.
If you see self-proclaimed intellectuals explaining that "Shakyamuni Buddha did not teach reincarnation," you should be able to judge that their insight is completely incorrect!

Past notes

Reincarnation of ordinary people: The cycle of birth and death (Senni Sutra)

About the Four Fruits of Asceticism