Second, perhaps these aspects of the teachings might be regarded as expedient too, designed for those unable, for the time being, to see the inseparability of saṃsāra
and nirvana. It must be noted that rebirth in the Pure Land is not the same thing as
attaining nirvana, but constitutes, as it were, a sort of stepping stone to enlightenment.
The portrayal of the Pure Land as a fabulous place—without the ordinary features of a
landscape that make life difficult, such as steep mountain paths, rough terrain, and sheer cliffs, and without dangerous animals that threaten lives and livelihood—all these may be clever devices intended to encourage practitioners to aspire to attain that state.
Perhaps they are designed for those of us who grasp at the idea of suffering as something real and truly existent in the world. This sort of belief renders us unable to see that, as expressed in the Zen tradition, ―This very place is the lotus land [i.e., the Pure Land], this very body the Buddha‖ (Hakuin Zenji; cited in Kornfield 1996, 200).