The subject of hell and its roots in universal human experiences of suffering has long occupied a central position in Jodo Shinshu doctrine but hasn’t received too much attention in the West. I discovered an article in a back issue of the Eastern Buddhist(Vol. X No. 1 May 1977) by Iwamoto Yasunami entitled ‘The Salvation of the Unsaveable’ that looks at the subject through the words of Shinran and the sutras accounts of Devadatta and Ajarasatru. An incident from the story of Devadatta is I think worth repeating which I would like to reflect very briefly on.

Having tried to kill the Buddha through scratching the surface of his skin with poison soaked fingernails, Devadatta is engulfed with fire that is said to have issued from his own evil karma. His cousin Ananda tries to save him by urging him to take refuge in the Buddha. Devadatta tries but it is too late and he plunges into the deepest level of hell to undergo incessant suffering for an entire kalpa.

 Taking pity on Devadatta, the Buddha dispatches Maudgalyayana down to hell to bearing a message to him. Arriving there Maudgalyayana calls out ‘Come Devadatta’ Whereupon out of the extemities of the deepest, darkest hell realm, thousands of Devadattas appear to answer the summons.

Yasunami points out here that Devadatta is shown in this incident to represent ‘the ultimate image of our own evil karma’. Devadatta is no longer a person from the past who committed various evil deeds which lead to his downfall but a figure who embodies the darkest side of mankind’s collective karma. Devadatta’s descent is simultaneously our own fall  in our very lives into the darkest recesses of the state of suffering we call ‘hell’.

The message that Buddha wished to deliver to Devadatta was that after one kalpa of suffering he would attain Buddhahood.  Having heard this news Devadatta spontaneously brought forth the mind of deep joy and profound happiness. He then declared that he could easily endure the whole of his time in the hell of incessant suffering knowing that his salvation was assured.

It can be said that at this moment Devadatta was born into the Pure Land.