Two Sets of Ten Masteries

1.2 Two Sets of Ten Masteries

The last chapter held that only a Buddha fully bears the ten epithets, because only a Buddha's freedom is full to the point of nothing missing. But the moment that line is laid down, a ready counter-example rises against it.

At the eighth ground the bodhisattva, too, scripture plainly says, "attains ten masteries"—and the number is again exactly ten, each likewise called a mastery: mastery over life, over mind, over wealth, over karma, over birth, over vow, over resolve, over will, over knowledge, over dharma. Same number, same word. So the handiest picture springs up: the Tathāgata's ten masteries—might they be merely these ten of the bodhisattva, turned up a notch, magnified a round? One set of masteries, dimmer at the bodhisattva's station, brighter at the Buddha's, pushed up a brightening spectrum to its end, to the brightest—and that is the Buddha?

If it were so, the last chapter's line, "only a Buddha fully bears the ten epithets," could not be kept—for if it were only the dim and bright of one set, then a high bodhisattva ought to receive some share of a Buddha's names too. So this threshold cannot but be crossed. This chapter says: no. The bodhisattva's ten masteries and the Tathāgata's are two distinct sets, a qualitative break between fruit and cause, not the dim and bright of one mastery.

That Scene in the Heaven of Mastery-over-Others'-Creations

First, see plainly where, and by whom, the bodhisattva's ten masteries are spoken.

The Avataṃsaka's "Ten Grounds" chapter is set in the heavens—in the Maṇi-jewel hall of the palace in the Heaven of Mastery-over-Others'-Creations. A bodhisattva named Vajragarbha, by the Buddha's sustaining power, sets out the bodhisattva path ground by ground, from the first to the tenth. Coming to the eighth, the Immovable Ground, he says: this bodhisattva, having perfected a certain subtle body of knowledge—

O sons of the Buddha! The bodhisattva, having thus perfected the body of knowledge, attains mastery over life, mastery over mind, mastery over wealth, mastery over karma, mastery over birth, mastery over vow, mastery over resolve, mastery over will, mastery over knowledge, mastery over dharma. Gaining these ten masteries, he becomes one of inconceivable knowledge, of measureless knowledge, of vast knowledge, of indestructible knowledge.

The ten masteries stand plain before the eye. The eighth-ground bodhisattva's freedom, come this far, already looks much like "unobstructed."

Yet within this same "Ten Grounds" passage, hard upon it, comes a scene that weighs more than these ten masteries. Vajragarbha says: this eighth-ground bodhisattva has gained a forbearance of quiescence so deep—deep to such a degree that he might here come to rest, enter the ultimate nirvāṇa, and set down all the work of liberating beings. The scripture says it with real peril:

Were the Buddhas not to grant this bodhisattva the gate of knowledge, he would then enter ultimate nirvāṇa and forsake all the works that benefit beings.

At just this juncture, the Buddhas of the ten directions appear together before him and call him back. The first words the Buddhas speak are these:

Excellent, excellent, O son of good family! This forbearance is foremost, conformable to the dharmas of the Buddhas. Yet, O son of good family, our ten powers, fearlessnesses, and eighteen distinctive dharmas of the Buddhas—these you have not yet attained. You should, in order to accomplish these dharmas, apply yourself with diligence, and not let go of this gate of forbearance.

Hold this scene steady. To a bodhisattva who has already gained the ten masteries, who already abides in "effortless, spontaneous course"—a station very high, very high on the bodhisattva path—what the Buddhas say to his face is four words: you have not yet attained. Our ten powers, four fearlessnesses, eighteen distinctive dharmas—these, as yet, you have not got; you must, to accomplish them, press on.

The same eighth ground, the same person: on the one face, he has gained the ten masteries; on the other, the Buddhas tell him "you have not yet attained." These two do not fight—they tell you precisely what order of freedom these ten masteries are.

The Scripture Itself Sets Out Two

The weightier evidence lies in how the scripture itself arranges them.

The Avataṃsaka does not treat "the Buddha's masteries" and "the eighth-ground bodhisattva's ten masteries" as one set. The bodhisattva's ten masteries are spoken in the "Ten Grounds" chapter; and the Buddha's masteries the scripture opens a separate chapter to speak—"The Inconceivable Dharmas of the Buddhas," where it sets out a distinct list, "the ten masteries of the Buddhas, the World-Honored."

The setting of that chapter is worth seeing too. In the assembly, certain bodhisattvas raised, in silence of mind, a string of questions: how are the Buddhas' lands inconceivable? their bodies, voices, knowledges inconceivable?—and among them these two: "How is the Buddhas' mastery inconceivable? How is the Buddhas' unobstructedness inconceivable?" The Buddha, knowing the thought in their minds, sustained by His power a bodhisattva named Blue-Lotus-Treasury, that he should answer. He answered:

O sons of the Buddha! The Buddhas, the World-Honored, have ten kinds of mastery.

—this is another set of ten, the fruit-stage's ten, set apart from the eighth-ground bodhisattva's ten of the "Ten Grounds" chapter in a different chapter, under its own names, in its own order. In one and the same Avataṃsaka, one set of ten masteries is spoken at the bodhisattva's station, another set of ten at the Buddha's. The scripture itself divides them by "two sets," not by "the dim and bright of one." This is the most direct ground for "two sets of ten masteries": not one set turned brighter, but two sets set side by side.

And that "mastery over knowledge" within the eighth-ground set—so like the Buddha's knowledge, is it not just the dim version of buddha-knowledge? Vasubandhu's Daśabhūmika-śāstra, glossing this "mastery over knowledge," says its capacity is to manifest the Tathāgata's powers, fearlessnesses, distinctive dharmas, and marks—that is, the bodhisattva, by his mastery, can manifest the appearance of these fruition-virtues of the Buddha. Bite down on the word manifest: that one can manifest the appearance of a thing shows precisely that he does not yet himself possess it. The eighth-ground bodhisattva's mastery over knowledge is the freedom to "produce the appearance of the Buddha's virtues," not the freedom to "be the Buddha's virtues himself." This squares exactly with the Buddhas' "you have not yet attained the ten powers": he can manifest the appearance of the ten powers, while the ten powers themselves are "not yet attained."

Separated by the One Step of "Walking Exhausted"

Put these together, and the break is clear.

The eighth ground's ten masteries, however high, are still freedom "bound to the cause-stage." The Buddhas say to his face, "you have not yet attained… apply yourself with diligence"—which tells you, plainly, that above the eighth ground there are fruition-virtues "not yet attained" to accomplish, a road of "diligence" yet to walk. Above the eighth ground there is the ninth, the tenth, there is equal-awakening, sublime-awakening. The bodhisattva's freedom, pushed even to the eighth ground, even to the very summit of equal-awakening, is still on this road "not yet walked exhausted"—freedom "on the way," able to increase further, not yet at the full.

The Tathāgata's freedom, by contrast, is the freedom of "walking exhausted." It is the freedom shown by that sublime-awakening of which the twin volume Equal and Sublime Awakening wrote—the cause-stage walked exhausted, the two hindrances forever ended, not a defilement left to sever, not a ground left to head for—a freedom that is fruit, with nothing left to increase. So the difference between the bodhisattva's freedom and the Tathāgata's is not the difference of "low place and high place on one road," but of "still on the road (be it the road's highest place)" and "the road already walked exhausted." Between them lies the one step of "walking exhausted"—that is, of sublime-awakening.

That step is a qualitative break, not a quantitative increment. It is not that the bodhisattva's freedom, a little brighter, becomes the Buddha's; it is that the cause-stage's freedom and the fruit-stage's freedom lie, from the first, on the two sides of that step. Carrying the last chapter's line: naming-full is being-full—only the being of "walking exhausted" (the cause-stage exhausted) fully bears the name and the freedom of "Buddha"; what has not walked exhausted, though every one of its ten masteries be complete, is still the bodhisattva's name, the bodhisattva's freedom.

Here two easy missteps must be screened off for the reader.

First, do not read the eighth ground's "effortless, spontaneous course" as already the Buddha's freedom. The eighth ground abides in the Immovable; it has set down all deliberate contrivance and abides spontaneously, and that look is indeed very near "unobstructed freedom." But it is the spontaneity of the cause-stage—forget not that it is at just this spontaneous station that the Buddhas still say to him, "you have not yet attained, apply yourself with diligence." Spontaneity, non-retrogression—none of these is warrant of the fruit-stage's fullness; the cause-stage has a spontaneity of its own. To read the eighth ground's spontaneity as the Buddha's freedom is to mistake "the freedom at the road's highest place" for "the freedom of walking exhausted."

Second, the bodhisattva's ten masteries (over life, mind, wealth…) and the Buddhas' ten kinds of mastery—the number being ten on both sides, may they be paired one to one? The scripture sets each under its own names, in its own order, and nowhere says they answer one to another. This belongs to the doctrinal collation of later hands; the scripture having no explicit text for it, this book will not force the pairing, and leaves it. Here the book acknowledges only the two things the scripture makes plain—that the scripture sets two distinct sets side by side, and that at the eighth ground, of the Buddha's virtues, "you have not yet attained"—and on these two it raises the qualitative break between cause-stage and fruit-stage; and that is enough.

Onward

Back to that signature of the last chapter. The ground on which the ten epithets are the signature exclusive to a Buddha lies just here: only the freedom of a fruit-stage walked exhausted can sign the ten epithets complete; the bodhisattva, though he bears the name of ten masteries, does not receive the name "Buddha"—because the cause-stage is unfilled. Naming-full is being-full, and only the being of walking exhausted fully bears the name of a Buddha.

For one who walks the road, this leaves a plain word. One heading for the buddha-fruit most easily takes the freedoms of the bodhisattva's stations for one and the same spectrum, "brighter and brighter, brightest of all is the Buddha," and so sets himself the measure of "one notch brighter." "Two sets of ten masteries" is the medicine for that measure: the bodhisattva's freedom, pushed even to the summit of the eighth ground or equal-awakening, is still the cause-stage's freedom (on the way, able to increase, able to manifest the Buddha's virtues yet not itself possessing them); the Buddha's freedom is the fruit-stage freedom of walking exhausted, parted from the cause-stage by a qualitative break. So what is to be done at the bodhisattva's station is not "to tune one's own freedom brighter, the better to pass for the Buddha's," but to acknowledge in plain fact that one is still in the cause-stage—taking to heart that scene of the eighth-ground bodhisattva: that even with effortless, spontaneous course gained and the ten masteries complete, the Buddhas still said to his face, "you have not yet attained." To own that "not yet" honestly, and walk on the road not yet exhausted, until it is walked exhausted; walked exhausted, the fruit-stage's freedom shows of itself—not arrived at by tuning the cause-stage's freedom a little brighter, a little brighter.

Part One ends here. We have raised the two foundation-stones of the whole volume: the ten epithets are a signature, naming-full is being-full; and the Tathāgata's freedom and the bodhisattva's are a qualitative break between cause-stage and fruit-stage.

What, then, of this freedom so full that even its names are complete—once it shows itself forth, in what manner of body? The next part looks to the three bodies.