The lotus rises above the mud and muck, breaks the surface of the water, and blooms. It signifies our symbolic fight and effort to rise above filth, temptation, and generally all the evil to attain Nirvana (the blooming).
There's a story about the Buddha holding up a lotus flower to try and demonstrate an idea to his followers. The idea is this: the flower could never have been without everything that came before it. Even though it is only a simple flower, it is the cumulation of every event that is transpired before it to the beginning of time. Everything before this moment has contributed to the present circumstances. The present is built on the past. The tip of the mountain cannot exist without the entirety of the slope leading up to it. This also means that the past and present, the slope of the mountain and the tip, the yin and the yang, are not seperate. But they are not the same either. Those are two extremes. The middle way between these is understanding that you cannot have one without the other. They are interdependent. One is built on another, and without one you cannot have another. So in holding up this Lotus, the Buddha was drawing attention not only to that flower, but the entirety of circumstances and time that came before which allowed that flower to flourish.
The mud represents ordinary cyclic existence or the impure state of ordinary beings. The lotus represents Nirvana that grows out of the mud of ordinary samsaric existence. One interesting idea that comes out of this metaphor is that the muck and mire give birth to Nirvana. We don't attain Nirvana simply by discarding the problems of cyclic existence. The problems of cyclic existence give rise to Nirvana. You have to work with the problems of cyclic existence in order to give rise to Nirvana.
There's a story about the Buddha holding up a lotus flower to try and demonstrate an idea to his followers. The idea is this: the flower could never have been without everything that came before it. Even though it is only a simple flower, it is the cumulation of every event that is transpired before it to the beginning of time. Everything before this moment has contributed to the present circumstances. The present is built on the past. The tip of the mountain cannot exist without the entirety of the slope leading up to it. This also means that the past and present, the slope of the mountain and the tip, the yin and the yang, are not seperate. But they are not the same either. Those are two extremes. The middle way between these is understanding that you cannot have one without the other. They are interdependent. One is built on another, and without one you cannot have another. So in holding up this Lotus, the Buddha was drawing attention not only to that flower, but the entirety of circumstances and time that came before which allowed that flower to flourish.
Buddha applied the same simile to himself:
"Just like a red, blue, or white lotus—born in the water, grown in the water, rising up above the water—stands unsmeared by the water, in the same way I—born in the world, grown in the world, having overcome the world—live unsmeared by the world. Remember me, brahman, as 'awakened.
The mud represents ordinary cyclic existence or the impure state of ordinary beings. The lotus represents Nirvana that grows out of the mud of ordinary samsaric existence. One interesting idea that comes out of this metaphor is that the muck and mire give birth to Nirvana. We don't attain Nirvana simply by discarding the problems of cyclic existence. The problems of cyclic existence give rise to Nirvana. You have to work with the problems of cyclic existence in order to give rise to Nirvana.
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