Practice · NianVolume OnePart VII · The Flower Ornament VisionPaper 29 of 31

Constantly Following the Buddha in Study, Accommodating Sentient Beings, Universal Dedication

中文主題：常隨佛學・恆順眾生・普皆迴向

Author: Shi Huijing 釋慧鏡

Date: Spring 2026

Version: 1.0

ID: NIAN-P29

Abstract

This paper, the closer of Part VII (the Flower Ornament volume) within the NIAN series of Pointing at the Moon Research, completes the structural walkthrough of Samantabhadra's ten great vows by treating vows eight (constantly following the Buddha in study), nine (accommodating sentient beings), and ten (universal dedication). It argues that these three vows together compose the above-bearing-and-below-transforming dedication closure-triad: vow eight is the upward-bearing dimension (seeking enlightenment above, depending on attribute, prajñā); vow nine is the downward-transforming dimension (transforming sentient beings below, depending on function, vimukti); vow ten is the total dedication (toward the absolute, embracing both, depending on substance, dharmakāya). The closure-formula isomorphism that NIAN P26, P27, and P28 confirmed across vows one through seven is here extended through vows eight, nine, and ten — a fourth-time confirmation, vows one through ten now 100% isomorphic at the closure-formula level, with only the operator verb position varying. The paper further proposes — as its principal originality — that vows one through ten admit a retrospective totalisation along the substance-attribute-function (tǐ-xiāng-yòng 體相用) schema: vows one through three (the three-karma set, P26) constitute substance; vows four through nine (the six vows of transformation — repentance, rejoicing-along, request-to-turn, request-to-abide, study-following, and accommodation, P27 + P28 + the present paper) constitute attribute; vow ten (universal dedication) constitutes function. This reading is not a modern imposition but is articulated by the seventh- to ninth-century Huayan sub-commentators themselves: Zongmi's Detailed Sub-Commentary on the Practice-and-Vow Chapter states that "vow eight is dedication to bodhi, vow nine is dedication to sentient beings, vow ten is the proper dedication — together comprising the three locations," and Chengguan's Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary identifies "dedication toward the absolute as relying on substance, toward bodhi as relying on attribute, toward sentient beings as relying on function." The paper foregrounds Francis H. Cook's Hua-yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra (1977) for final disposal: the ten great vows are not exemplifications of a dharmadhātu metaphysics-of-totality but the operative articulation of a cosmological-ritual operative system instantiated by the substance-attribute-function schema. Concede-and-extend engagements with Paul Williams (2009) and Imre Hamar (2007) supply complementary framing. The paper closes by answering the question posed at the opener of Part VII (NIAN P25) — what is the meaning of the vow-king as a totality? — with the fully-articulated reply: the totality of the vow-king is the ritual-cosmological articulation of the three greats (substance-attribute-function), whose entire architecture finds its retrospective unification at the closure of vow ten.

I. Introduction

The previous three papers in the present series have, in turn, established three structural strata of Samantabhadra's ten great vows. NIAN P26 established that vows one, two, and three compose a three-karma set — body-karma reverencing, speech-karma praising, mind-karma offering — assembled along the from-the-buddhas-toward-self-toward-the-buddhas outward-facing whole; the three-karma set is the foundational substance stratum. NIAN P27 established that vows four and five compose the karma dyad — vow four as the decrement wing addressing one's own past unwholesome action, vow five as the increment wing drawing in the wholesome action of all others — together a karma-transformation operator. NIAN P28 established that vows six and seven compose the request-structure dyad — vow six as the event mode fixing onto the dynamic event of the dharma's being set in motion, vow seven as the state mode fixing onto the buddhas' continued abiding — together the two modes of dharma persistence. The present paper takes up vows eight, nine, and ten and shows them to compose the above-bearing-and-below-transforming dedication closure-triad: vow eight is the upward-bearing dimension (seeking the buddha-fruit, the realisation of bodhi, the perfection of wisdom — depending on attribute, in the register of prajñā); vow nine is the downward-transforming dimension (responding to the suffering of sentient beings, the activation of compassion, the giving of liberation — depending on function, in the register of vimukti); vow ten is the total dedication that simultaneously embraces and exceeds both (turning toward the absolute, dharmadhātu, the dharmakāya's thusness — depending on substance).

Two opposed misreadings dominate the Anglophone reception of vow ten and require correction at the outset. The first reduces universal dedication to a kind of merit-as-economic-transaction — meritorious conduct treated as a transferable commodity, the verb to dedicate (pariṇāmana) drained into a mercantile gesture of moving merit from one ledger to another. This misreading collapses the cosmological-ritual articulation of turning-toward into a transaction. The second reduces universal dedication to purely interior mindful presencing — the modernist-psychologising pole — in which the entire vow-king becomes an inner exercise upon the present moment of awareness, the universal dimension drained altogether. This misreading collapses the outward cosmological breadth into inward-only attention. The Chinese-patriarchal line "Samantabhadra's vow-king is not apart from the present moment of mind" (Yunqi Zhuhong's Sub-Commentary on the Amitābha Sūtra, X22n0424) does not advance the second misreading; it teaches that the outward universal architecture of vow ten is simultaneously condensed-and-gathered within the present moment of buddha-recitation — the outer is contained-in-the-inner, the inner manifesting the outer, and neither reducible to the other.

Pushed back from these two extremes, the paper's thesis can now be stated. Vows eight, nine, and ten compose the above-bearing-and-below-transforming dedication closure-triad: their shared closure formula — "my [following-in-study / accommodating / dedicating] is without end, moment-by-moment continuous, without interruption, body and speech and mind never wearying" — is, at the textual level of T0293 itself, fully isomorphic with the closure formulas of vows one through seven, with only the operator verb varying. The closure-formula isomorphism, three times confirmed across NIAN P26, P27, and P28, is here confirmed for the fourth time across vows eight, nine, and ten — vows one through ten now 100% isomorphic. Beyond this empirical confirmation, the paper develops its central originality: vows one through ten admit a retrospective totalisation along the substance-attribute-function schema — vows 1–3 as substance, vows 4–9 as attribute, vow 10 as function. This retrospective reading is not a modern critical imposition; it is articulated within the seventh- to ninth-century Huayan sub-commentary tradition itself, with Zongmi's three-direction dedication schema and Chengguan's three-direction-dependence on substance-attribute-function as its principal interpretive spine, both fully developed in §III.4 and §III.5 below.

II. Textual Sources and Recensional Configuration

The principal textual base is T0293 Mahāvaipulya-buddhāvataṃsaka-sūtra: The Practice-and-Vow Chapter of Samantabhadra Entering the Inconceivable Liberation Realm, fascicle forty, translated by Prajña (般若, c. 734 – c. 810) at Chang'an in 798 CE. One philological observation must be marked at the outset because it bears on the entire interpretive configuration: T0278 (the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, translated by Buddhabhadra in 421 CE) and T0279 (the eighty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, translated by Śikṣānanda 695–699 CE) both lack the Practice-and-Vow Chapter. Only T0293 (the Prajña recension, completed in 798 CE) contains the prose ten-vow ladder. Chengguan attests this fact himself in the opening pages of his Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary: "this chapter is not present in the principal scripture; in the Zhenyuan period a Sanskrit manuscript was obtained from Kashmir, and Prajña Tripiṭaka therefore translated it and inserted it into the present sūtra."¹ The implications are twofold. First, the ten-vow ladder is a late-eighth-century ritual-operative consolidation of the Avataṃsaka tradition's vow material, not an early result of Fazang's seventh-century metaphysics-of-totality system. Second, the present paper's retrospective substance-attribute-function reading therefore cannot be characterised as a doctrinal claim about the early Huayan consensus on Samantabhadra's vows; its proper situation is the late-Tang sub-commentary stratum, articulated through the Chengguan–Zongmi line.

The interpretive spine is supplied by two Tang sub-commentaries on the Practice-and-Vow Chapter: Chengguan's Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary (X05n0227) and Zongmi's Detailed Sub-Commentary on the Practice-and-Vow Chapter (X05n0229, also known as Bie-xing-shu-chao 別行疏鈔). Chengguan supplies the three-direction-dependence schema "toward the absolute relying on substance, toward bodhi relying on attribute, toward sentient beings relying on function" and the eight-character maxim "transforming-below-with-great-compassion, seeking-above-with-great-wisdom" (大悲下化、大智上求). Zongmi supplies the three-direction dedication schema "vow eight is dedication to bodhi, vow nine is dedication to sentient beings, vow ten is the proper dedication — together comprising the three locations," together with the self-benefit / other-benefit pairing and an articulation of "upward-uniting-with-the-buddhas' compassionate strength, downward-uniting-with-sentient-beings' lamenting plea". The two sub-commentaries are the principal seventh- to ninth-century textual evidence that the present paper's thesis is not an external imposition but a re-articulation of an interpretive schema already explicitly given in the Tang Huayan tradition.

The doctrinal-treatise layer is supplied by five texts. T1666 Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna supplies the canonical articulation of the three greats — substance / attribute / function — in its opening fascicle's meaning-establishing section, the locus classicus of the schema (translation traditionally attributed to Aśvaghoṣa rendered by Paramārtha; the modern philological dispute over Indian-original-versus-late-Tang-Chinese-composition is held to a single footnote and not developed²). T1509 Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra fascicle sixty-one Rejoicing-and-Dedication chapter contributes the three-mode reverence (repentance, rejoicing-and-dedication, exhortation-request) and the three marks (designation-mark, dharma-mark, signless-mark) that supply the Indic-treatise root for the dedication schema. T1593 Mahāyāna-saṃgraha fascicle three identifies the fifth of the six supremacies as dedication-supremacy (pariṇāmana-supremacy) — the canonical-treatise placement of dedication within the perfection scheme. T1564 Mūlamadhyamakakārikā and T1585 Cheng weishi lun — both worked out at length in NIAN P28 — are referred to here only by single-line cross-reference. The Ten-Dedications Chapter in T0278 / T0279 is a separate textual tradition and, while doctrinally adjacent, is not developed in the present paper.

The Chinese ritual-practice layer is supplied by the convergence of three traditions. Zhiyi's Lotus Samādhi Repentance Liturgy (T1941) places dedication-and-vow within the seventh of its ten ritual sections (the corrected placement; an earlier draft of the present paper's pre-publication notes mis-placed it as the tenth section, an error here corrected against the original kepan division³). Shandao's Verses for the Six Times of Reverence-Praise (T1980) places dedication as the fifth of its five mind-gates. Yunqi Zhuhong's Sub-Commentary on the Amitābha Sūtra (X22n0424) supplies the most concentrated Chinese-patriarchal articulation: "Samantabhadra's vow-king is not apart from the present moment of mind." Ouyi Zhixu's Essentials of the Amitābha Sūtra (T1762) gathers Samantabhadra's myriad practices into the faith-vow-recitation framework. Yongming Yanshou's Universal Convergence of the Ten Thousand Goods (T2017) articulates the substance-function frame for the entire vow-king with the line "Samantabhadra adorns principle through practice." The Three-Time Mindfulness Service (X74n1464, traditionally attributed to the Zhongfeng line) chants the ten-vow set within a triple recitation framework. These five Chinese-tradition texts together constitute the ritual-operative anchor for the present paper's §III.6.

III. Core Argument

3.1 Closure-Formula Isomorphism, Fourth-Time Confirmed; the Retrospective Ordering of Vows One through Ten

Each of the ten great vows in T0293 fascicle forty closes with the same four-exhaustion-four-inexhaustion formula. NIAN P26 confirmed this isomorphism for vows one through three; NIAN P27 extended it through vow five; NIAN P28 extended it through vow seven. The present paper extends the empirical verification through vows eight, nine, and ten — the fourth-time confirmation:

Vow	Operator verb	Closure clause
1 reverencing all buddhas	reverencing	"my reverencing is without end, moment-by-moment continuous, without interruption, body and speech and mind never wearying"
2 praising the tathāgatas	praising	"my praising is without end ..."
3 making offerings broadly	offering	"my offering is without end ..."
4 repenting karmic obstructions	repenting	"my repenting is without end ..."
5 rejoicing along in others' merits	rejoicing	"my rejoicing is without end ..."
6 requesting the dharma-wheel be turned	exhortation-to-turn	"my exhortation is without end ..."
7 requesting the buddhas to abide	exhortation-to-abide	"my exhortation is without end ..."
8 constantly following the Buddha in study	following-in-study	"my following-in-study is without end, moment-by-moment continuous, without interruption, body and speech and mind never wearying"
9 accommodating sentient beings	accommodating	"my accommodating is without end, moment-by-moment continuous, without interruption, body and speech and mind never wearying"
10 universal dedication	dedicating	"my dedicating is without end, moment-by-moment continuous, without interruption, body and speech and mind never wearying"

The closure-formula isomorphism holds across vows one through ten at one hundred percent — the only variation is the operator verb (reverencing / praising / offering / repenting / rejoicing / exhortation-to-turn / exhortation-to-abide / following-in-study / accommodating / dedicating).⁴

A philological observation of substantive consequence must be lodged here. Vow ten's closure structure is itself isomorphic with the closure formulas of vows one through nine; the totalising function of vow ten is not encoded in the closure layer. The retrospective totalising function is encoded, instead, in vow ten's opening exposition sentence: "as for universal dedication: from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated …"⁵ That single opening sentence — "from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated" — explicitly gathers the merits of vows one through nine and dedicates them all. The retrospective totalisation of the ten-vow set is thereby a textual fact internal to T0293 itself — encoded in vow ten's prose-exposition, not retrojected by sub-commentary. The substantive implication is significant: vows one through ten compose a single integrated system, structurally articulated in four progressive strata (three-karma set → karma dyad → request-structure dyad → dedication closure-triad), self-attested at the textual level rather than imposed by later interpretation.

3.2 Vow Eight: Constantly Following the Buddha in Study — the Upward-Bearing Dimension

Vow eight's principal exposition opens: "as for constantly following the Buddha in study: of all the tathāgatas in the dust-mote-realms of all the buddha-fields throughout the entire dharmadhātu, throughout space, in the ten directions and three times — of every one of them, I take their practice as my study."⁶ The object of study is the entire practice-record of Vairocana as original master — the bodhisattva's first arousing of the bodhi-mind, the unflagging effort, the flaying of skin to make paper and the drawing of blood to make ink, the writing of scriptures piled high as Sumeru, the sacrifice of head and eyes and limbs without sparing the body, and finally the attainment of great enlightenment beneath the tree.⁷ These narratives — the body-sacrifice for the dharma cluster of Indian Mahāyāna scripture — find here their Avataṃsaka articulation, gathered into the single object of constantly following. Vow eight's closure: "as space is exhausted, as the realms of sentient beings are exhausted, as their karma is exhausted, as their afflictions are exhausted, my following-in-study is without end, moment-by-moment continuous, without interruption, body and speech and mind never wearying."⁸ Vow eight's verse-couplet: "I follow all the tathāgatas in study, cultivating the perfectly-circular practices of Samantabhadra ..."⁹

Vow eight's dimension is upward-bearing. Its directional vector points toward the buddha-fruit, the attainment of bodhi, the perfection of wisdom. This is the dimension Chengguan identifies as "toward bodhi, relying on attribute"; in the substance-attribute-function schema vow eight pairs with attribute (xiàng 相), and in the three-virtues schema it pairs with prajñā. The Lotus Sūtra's Encouragement of Samantabhadra chapter (T0262), which records the figure of Samantabhadra appearing to protect those who study the sūtra, supplies a one-line cross-reference for vow eight's narrative descendants in the wider Mahāyāna corpus, but is not developed here.

3.3 Vow Nine: Accommodating Sentient Beings — the Downward-Transforming Dimension

Vow nine's principal exposition opens: "as for accommodating sentient beings: of every kind of sentient being throughout the entire dharmadhātu, throughout space, in the buddha-realms of the ten directions … of every kind, I accommodate and turn, attending in every way, making offerings in every way, as one would revere father and mother, as one would serve teacher and elder, as one would honour an arhat or even the tathāgata, equal and without distinction."¹⁰ The line "equal and without distinction" is the doctrinal core of vow nine's exposition: in the bodhisattva's accommodation, sentient being and tathāgata are equal in the field of compassionate response.

The decisive image of vow nine is the great-tree-king simile:

"It is like a great tree-king growing in a desert wilderness of sand and gravel: when the root is watered, every branch and leaf, flower and fruit, flourishes. The bodhi-tree-king of the wilderness of birth-and-death is just so. All sentient beings are its root; all the buddhas and bodhisattvas are its flowers and fruits. When the water of great compassion benefits sentient beings, the wisdom-flowers-and-fruits of the buddhas and bodhisattvas are accomplished."¹¹

This simile is the thesis-pivot of vow nine. It articulates a structural co-dependence among bodhisattva, sentient being, and buddha across the medium of the great-compassion water: sentient beings are the root, buddhas and bodhisattvas are the flowers and fruits, the great-compassion water is the connecting flow. Without the watering of sentient beings by great compassion, the wisdom-flowers-and-fruits of the buddhas cannot be accomplished. This places the downward-transforming dimension in structural necessity to the upward-bearing dimension — not merely a moral admonition to compassion but a constitutive condition for the realisation of bodhi itself. Vow nine's closure: "my accommodating is without end ..."¹² Vow nine's verse-couplet: "I always accommodate every sentient being, to the end of every kalpa to come ..."¹³

Vow nine's dimension is downward-transforming. Its directional vector points toward the suffering of sentient beings, the activation of great compassion, the giving of liberation. This is the dimension Chengguan identifies as "toward sentient beings, relying on function"; in the substance-attribute-function schema vow nine pairs with function (yòng 用), and in the three-virtues schema it pairs with vimukti (liberation). The Vimalakīrti-nirdeśa's Bodhisattva chapter (T0475) — "there is a liberation of the buddhas and bodhisattvas called accommodating-the-desire-of-sentient-beings" — supplies a one-line cross-reference for the downward-transforming dimension's wider doctrinal anchor.

3.4 Vow Ten: Universal Dedication — the Closure of Total Dedication ⭐

Vow ten's principal exposition opens immediately with the retrospective totalising sentence: "as for universal dedication: from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated to all sentient beings throughout the dharmadhātu, throughout space; may all sentient beings forever attain ease and peace, free of every illness and pain … may every evil deed they would do come to nothing, and every wholesome work they undertake be swiftly accomplished; may the gates of every evil destination be closed, and the upright path to the human, divine, and nirvāṇic states be opened wide."¹⁴ The opening sentence — "from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated" — is the textual core of vow ten: it gathers the merits of vows one through nine (from vow one's reverencing to vow nine's accommodating, through every intervening operator) and dedicates them to sentient beings and to the buddha-path. The mid-section of vow ten contains the substituting-for-the-most-grievous-suffering passage: "if sentient beings, by reason of the karma they have piled up, undergo every kind of most grievous painful fruit, I shall undergo it in their stead."¹⁵ This is the substantive other-benefitting face of dedication — the bodhisattva's bearing of others' suffering. Vow ten's closure: "my dedicating is without end ..."¹⁶ The thirty-second stanza of the verse-section is the seven-vow summary verse¹⁷, and the closing seal stanza of the entire fascicle — "these supreme practices of Samantabhadra are mine ..." — supplies vow ten's deathbed-vow ritual realisation.

⭐ Vow ten's interpretive spine is supplied jointly by Zongmi and Chengguan. Zongmi's Detailed Sub-Commentary, at X05n0229 line 5664–5667 region, articulates the self-benefit / other-benefit / three-direction dedication schema:

"Vow eight is dedication to bodhi; vow nine is dedication to sentient beings; vow ten is the proper dedication, together comprising the three locations."¹⁸

This is the strongest sub-commentarial textual anchor for the present paper's thesis. Vow eight = dedication to bodhi (the upward-bearing direction); vow nine = dedication to sentient beings (the downward-transforming direction); vow ten = the proper dedication — gathering both directions and adding the third direction toward the absolute (toward thusness, toward the dharmadhātu). The three-direction dedication schema therefore explicitly states the closure-triad structure that the present paper's thesis names. Zongmi further articulates the grammatical source of above-bearing-and-below-transforming through the line "upward-uniting-with-the-buddhas' compassionate strength; downward-uniting-with-sentient-beings' lamenting plea."¹⁹ Chengguan's Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary extends the schema by pairing the three directions with the three greats (substance-attribute-function):

"Toward the absolute, relying on substance; toward bodhi, relying on attribute; toward sentient beings, relying on function."²⁰

Chengguan's eight-character maxim — "transforming-below-with-great-compassion, seeking-above-with-great-wisdom" (大悲下化、大智上求) — formalises the structural pairing.²¹ Vow ten's "proper dedication" (toward the absolute) is thereby identified as the deepest of the three locations: turning toward the absolute, relying on substance, relying on the dharmakāya. The three-direction dedication schema together with the three-direction-dependence-on-substance-attribute-function framework constitute the interpretive base for §III.5's retrospective extension.

A philological discipline must be marked here. The named-triple "dedication-to-sentient-beings / dedication-to-bodhi / dedication-to-the-absolute" is a sub-commentary-stratum codification, not a direct sūtra-treatise canonical naming. T1509 fascicle sixty-one's Rejoicing-and-Dedication chapter contains only the operative schema (the three marks, the three modes of reverence) and does not formally name the triple; the T0220 Prajñāpāramitā corpus likewise lacks the named triple. The complete codification of "sentient beings / bodhi / absolute" as a named-triple appears to consolidate at the Zhiyi–Fazang–Chengguan–Zongmi sub-commentary stratum. The present paper accordingly cites the named-triple strictly from X05n0227 (Chengguan) and X05n0229 (Zongmi), not from T1509 (this caveat is given its full middle-way articulation at §V). Likewise, the phrase "emptiness of the threefold sphere" (三輪體空) — agent of dedication, object of dedication, recipient of dedication, all three empty — does not appear in this exact wording within T1509 or the T0220 Prajñāpāramitā strata, though its substance is canonical: T1509 articulates the same content through the three marks (designation-mark, dharma-mark, signless-mark). The present paper accordingly uses "emptiness of the three marks" (三相空, per T1509) as the audited replacement for "emptiness of the threefold sphere," avoiding citation of a phrase whose precise textual locus has not been independently verified (the full caveat appears at §V).

3.5 Vows One through Ten: The Retrospective Substance-Attribute-Function Closure ⭐⭐ — the Paper's Originality Locus

⭐⭐ This subsection develops the paper's principal originality and constitutes a retrospective extension of Chengguan's three-direction-dependence framework. Chengguan, in X05n0227, applies substance / attribute / function only to vows eight, nine, and ten. The present paper extends the schema across the whole ten-vow set:

Vows 1–3 (reverencing, praising, offering) = substance (tǐ 體) — the foundational ground of the bodhisattva-subject in the three-karma assembly. Vows 4–9 (repentance, rejoicing-along, request-to-turn, request-to-abide, study-following, accommodation) = attribute (xiàng 相) — the modes of karma-transformation, dharma-persistence, and upward-and-downward orientation. Vow 10 (universal dedication) = function (yòng 用) — the universal outward-extension of the totality of merit.

The grounds for this cross-mapping are five.

First, the basis for vows 1–3 as substance. NIAN P26 has established the three-karma assembly as Samantabhadra's constituting stratum: vow one as the foundation of body-karma (bodily reverencing), vow two as the foundation of speech-karma (oral praising), vow three as the foundation of mind-karma (mental offering). The three-karma set together establishes the bodhisattva's foundational subject in the field of thusness-equality — a position articulated in the Awakening of Faith's meaning-establishing section: "first, substance-greatness — that is, all dharmas, true thusness, equal, neither increasing nor decreasing."²² The three-karma set is thus the bodhisattva's articulation in the field of true-thusness equality; its character is foundational and not augmenting — not the activation of merit but the ground from which the activation proceeds. The purified body-karma, speech-karma, and mind-karma that NIAN P26 made central to vow one is the textual articulation of this substance-correspondence.

Second, the basis for vows 4–9 as attribute. NIAN P27 has established the karma dyad: vow four is the transformation of one's own past karma (decrement wing); vow five is the transformation of others' karma (increment wing); together they compose the karma-transformation operator. NIAN P28 has established the dharma-persistence dyad: vow six is the request for the initial-turning of the dharma; vow seven is the request for the continued-abiding of the buddha; together they compose the two modes of dharma persistence. The present paper now adds: vow eight is the upward-bearing attribute (study-following); vow nine is the downward-transforming attribute (accommodating). These six vows together unfold the bodhisattva's articulating modes — karma-transformation (4–5), dharma-persistence (6–7), upward-and-downward orientation (8–9), three pairs of attributes deployed in succession. Their character is the manifestation of the immeasurable virtues of attribute-greatness — the Awakening of Faith's "second, attribute-greatness — that is, the tathāgatagarbha fully equipped with immeasurable virtuous attributes."²² The attribute-greatness is unfolded in the six-vow transformation arc.

Third, the basis for vow 10 as function. Vow ten's textual core — "from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated" — is the universal outward-extension of the merits accumulated through vows 1–9. Its character is articulated in the Awakening of Faith's "third, function-greatness — able to give rise to all wholesome cause-and-fruit, mundane and supramundane."²² Function-greatness is the outward activation of merit, the engendering of wholesome cause-and-fruit in both worldly and world-transcending registers. Vow ten's universal (pǔ-jiē 普皆) — the universalising scope-marker — is the explicit articulation of function-greatness: the substance grounded in the three-karma assembly (vows 1–3), articulated through six modes of attribute-transformation (vows 4–9), is finally extended in its ultimate outward unfolding (vow 10) toward the dharmadhātu, toward space, toward all sentient beings and the buddha-path.

Fourth, the sub-commentary anchor for the cross-mapping is Chengguan's eight-character maxim "transforming-below-with-great-compassion, seeking-above-with-great-wisdom."²¹ This maxim, while ostensibly addressing vows eight and nine alone, supplies the grammatical structure of the entire retrospective ordering. Seeking-above-with-great-wisdom is the attribute-face of vow eight's upward-bearing; transforming-below-with-great-compassion is the function-face of vow nine's downward-transforming. The substance foundation upon which both face-actions rest is the three-karma assembly of vows 1–3. The universal-extension of the entire merit-architecture is vow 10. The maxim's eight characters thus encode, in compressed form, the substance-attribute-function-and-universal-extension structure that the present paper unfolds across the ten-vow set.

Fifth, the originality of the present reading lies in this: Chengguan's three-direction-dependence applies substance-attribute-function only to vows 8–10 internally. The present paper extends the schema to the full ten-vow set retrospectively. Chengguan does not explicitly state where vows 1–7 stand within the schema — his text addresses only the three directions of vows 8–10. The contribution of the present paper is therefore: vows 1–3 as the foundational substance (a retrospective consolidation of NIAN P26's three-karma thesis); vows 4–9 as the unfolding attribute (a retrospective consolidation of NIAN P27's karma-dyad and P28's dharma-persistence-dyad theses, plus the present paper's vows 8 and 9); vow 10 as the function of universal extension. This extension does not violate Chengguan's intent. Chengguan's "toward the absolute, relying on substance" identifies the depth of dedication as relying on substance-greatness in the field of true-thusness equality; the present paper's "vow 10 as function" identifies the outward-extension of dedication as the function-greatness's "giving rise to all wholesome cause-and-fruit, mundane and supramundane." The two formulations are not in opposition but two faces of the same dedication-toward-the-absolute closure: turning inward it relies on substance (Chengguan); turning outward it operates as function (the present paper's extension).²³

Within this cross-mapping framework, Paul Williams's Mahāyāna Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations (Routledge, 2nd ed. 2009) chapters five (Tathāgatagarbha) and six (Huayan) supply the Anglophone-academic articulation of the substance-attribute-function framework. Williams's framework provides the conceptual vocabulary through which Anglophone readers may approach the schema. The present paper's contribution to the Williams reception is the cross-mapping of substance / attribute / function onto vows 1–3, 4–9, and 10, a retrospective ordering Williams does not himself perform. The Williams framework is the basis of conceptual extension, not the target of pushback. Cook 1977's foregrounded final disposal is set out at §IV.

3.6 Chinese Ritual-Practice Closure: the Convergence of Three Traditions

The Chinese ritual codification of vow ten consolidates across three converging traditions.

The repentance-liturgy tradition. Zhiyi's Lotus Samādhi Repentance Liturgy (T1941) sets out a ten-section curriculum: (1) purifying the ritual platform, (2) purifying the body, (3) three-karma offering, (4) inviting the buddhas, (5) praising, (6) reverencing the buddhas, (7) clarifying-the-method-of-dedication and clarifying-the-method-of-vow-making, (8) reciting the sūtra, (9) seated meditation, (10) seated meditation upon the true mark. The corrected placement is the seventh section, not the tenth: an earlier mis-placement (correctable at the level of the original kepan division) had located dedication-and-vow at the tenth section; the original division places seated meditation upon the true mark at the tenth and dedication-and-vow at the seventh.³ Zhiyi's seventh-section codification is the mother-text of Chinese repentance-liturgy dedication; all subsequent Tiantai-line repentance liturgies derive their dedication ritual articulation from this seven-section template.

The reverence-and-praise tradition. Shandao's Verses for the Six Times of Reverence-Praise (T1980) instantiates the five mind-gates: reverencing, praising, vow-making, contemplating, dedicating. The fifth dedication-gate's textual anchor "to the limits of space and dharmadhātu, my vows are likewise so" fully echoes vow ten's "throughout the dharmadhātu, throughout space, all sentient beings" universalising scope. Shandao's five-mind-gate structure was developed at length in NIAN P26; here only the fifth dedication-gate's ritual articulation is referred to by single-line cross-reference.

The buddha-recitation tradition. Yongming Yanshou's Universal Convergence of the Ten Thousand Goods (T2017) articulates the substance-function frame through the line "Samantabhadra adorns principle through practice" — Samantabhadra's myriad practices are the phenomenal-attribute face, the buddhas and the dharma are the principle-substance face, and practice-adorning-principle is the substance-and-function unity. Yunqi Zhuhong's Sub-Commentary on the Amitābha Sūtra (X22n0424) articulates "Samantabhadra's vow-king is not apart from the present moment of mind"²⁴ — the ten-vow set is condensed and gathered in the present moment of buddha-recitation. Ouyi Zhixu's Essentials of the Amitābha Sūtra (T1762) articulates "the compass of the ten thousand practices does not exceed this" — Samantabhadra's myriad practices are all gathered into the faith-vow-recitation framework. The Three-Time Mindfulness Service (X74n1464, traditionally attributed to the Zhongfeng line) chants the full ten-vow set within its three-recitation ritual structure. The convergence forms the strongest Chinese-tradition fused-anchor:

Yunqi Zhuhong's Sub-Commentary on the Amitābha Sūtra: "Samantabhadra's vow-king is not apart from the present moment of mind."

Shandao's Verses for the Six Times of Reverence-Praise: the universalising space-and-dharmadhātu echo of the fifth dedication-gate.

Zhiyi's Lotus Samādhi Repentance Liturgy: the seventh-section clarifying-the-method-of-dedication.

⚠️ A directional caveat must be marked, carried over from NIAN P28 §V. The Pure Land system's dedication-toward-rebirth-in-the-Pure-Land and Samantabhadra's universal dedication are directionally inverse: the former is sentient-being → Pure-Land (going-to-be-reborn-there); the latter is one's own merit → all sentient beings and the buddha-path (extending to all). Yunqi's and Ouyi's gathering of Samantabhadra's myriad practices into buddha-recitation does not amount to claiming the two are identical — what is gathered is the interiorising dimension of vow ten (the not-apart-from-the-present-moment-of-mind dimension), not the conflation of Samantabhadra's outward universalising direction with the Pure Land system's interiorising-to-rebirth direction. This caveat preserves the directional integrity of both invitation cosmologies; conflation undoes both. The point receives its full middle-way articulation at §V.

IV. Anglophone Interlocutors: Cook 1977 Foregrounded for Final Disposal; Williams 2009 and Hamar 2007 Extended

Following the one-foregrounded-pushback-plus-two-extensions configuration of the present series, §IV foregrounds Francis H. Cook's Hua-yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra (1977) for final disposal — a target carried as background through NIAN P26, P27, and P28 and now brought to the front for Part VII's closer paper — and concedes-and-extends to Williams 2009 (substance-attribute-function framework alignment) and Hamar 2007 (Sudhana macro-frame extension). Faure 1991, principal pushback ally in P28, is here held to background.

4.1 Cook 1977: The Metaphysics-of-Totality Reading, Foregrounded for Final Disposal ★

Francis H. Cook's Hua-yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra (Pennsylvania State University Press, 1977) is among the foundational monographs of Anglophone Huayan studies. Cook's central thesis: Huayan = metaphysics-of-totality — the dharmadhātu understood as the perfectly mutually-interpenetrating jewel-net of Indra. Chapter eight, "Living in the Net of Indra," is the principal locus of Cook's reading of the ten great vows: the vows are read as exemplifications (exemplifications) of the metaphysics — concrete instantiations of dharmadhātu totality on the practice side. Chapters four (Identity), five (Intercausality), and six (Part and Whole) supply the metaphysical apparatus.

The present paper's pushback against Cook's reading is set out along three converging lines.

The first line is the structural fourfold-progressive reading. §III.1 through §III.6 above have textually verified the closure-formula isomorphism across vows one through ten and have articulated, retrospectively, the substance-attribute-function across the entire ladder: vows 1–3 as substance (the foundational ground of the three-karma assembly), vows 4–9 as attribute (the unfolding modes of karma-transformation, dharma-persistence, and upward-and-downward orientation), vow 10 as function (the universal outward-extension). This ordering articulates a cosmological-ritual operative system — its character is operative-and-ritual, not exemplifying. To put the matter in compressed form: the ten great vows are not demonstrations of a metaphysical claim about totality but the operative articulation system through which totality is concretely worked out in ritual practice.

The second line is the historical-philological anchor. Cook's metaphysics-of-totality reading presupposes that the ten great vows belong to the early Huayan textual core. This presupposition collides with the textual fact, attested by Chengguan in X05n0227 0192c04–09, that the Practice-and-Vow Chapter is absent from both T0278 (the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka) and T0279 (the eighty-fascicle Avataṃsaka); only T0293 (the Prajña recension, completed in 798 CE) supplies the ten-vow ladder. The systematic codification of the ten-vow ladder in Chinese is therefore a late-eighth-century ritual-operative consolidation — postdating Fazang (643–712) and his metaphysics-of-totality system construction by a full century. The temporal sequence is the inverse of what Cook's reading implicitly assumes; treating the ten great vows as exemplifications of a metaphysical system that historically antedates them by a hundred years cannot stand on the textual chronology.

The third line is the convergence of the Chinese ritual traditions. As §III.6 has set out, the Chinese codification of vow ten consolidates across three independent traditions: the repentance-liturgy tradition (Zhiyi, T1941, seventh section); the reverence-and-praise tradition (Shandao, T1980, fifth gate); the buddha-recitation tradition (Yongming, T2017; Yunqi, X22n0424; Ouyi, T1762; the Zhongfeng-attributed Three-Time Mindfulness Service, X74n1464). The character of this triple convergence is ritual-operative articulation, not metaphysical exemplification. The eighth-to-twelfth-century Chinese reading of Samantabhadra's vow-king is, on the practice side, a codification of ritual operations — not the illustration of a metaphysical totality.

A concession is required. Cook's dharmadhātu metaphysics-of-totality framework has its own textual ground in the Avataṃsaka sūtras themselves — the Manifestation of the Tathāgata chapter, the Detachment from the World chapter, the Ten Stages chapter all carry passages with metaphysical purchase. Cook's framework, on the metaphysical-Huayan side, is not in error; the present paper's pushback is not against the framework but against the specific reading-direction that treats the ten great vows as exemplifications of that framework. The ten great vows as a systematic textual unit consolidate only in the late eighth century; their character is that of a cosmological-ritual operative system, not an exemplification of dharmadhātu totality.

4.2 Williams 2009: Substance-Attribute-Function Framework, Conceded-and-Extended

Paul Williams, in Mahāyāna Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations (Routledge, 2nd ed. 2009), supplies the Anglophone-academic articulation of the substance-attribute-function framework in chapters five (Tathāgatagarbha) and six (Huayan). Williams's framework is the principal Anglophone vocabulary-channel through which the three greats (substance, attribute, function) become accessible to Western academic readers. The present paper's concession to Williams is full: the framework as Williams articulates it correctly renders the conceptual content of the Awakening of Faith's three greats and correctly identifies the schema's central position within the Huayan tradition. The present paper's extension is: the framework is cross-mapped retrospectively onto the ten-vow ladder — vows 1–3 (substance) / vows 4–9 (attribute) / vow 10 (function) — a step Williams does not take. The Williams framework supplies the conceptual ground; the present paper's §III.5 supplies the cross-mapping. The framework is the basis of extension, not the target of pushback.

4.3 Hamar 2007: Sudhana Macro-Frame, Conceded-and-Extended

Imre Hamar, ed., Reflecting Mirrors: Perspectives on Huayan Buddhism (Harrassowitz Verlag, 2007) is among the more important recent collections in Anglophone Huayan studies. The volume's treatment of Huayan includes the Sudhana macro-frame — the structural reading according to which Sudhana's pilgrimage in the Gaṇḍavyūha (Entering the Dharma-Realm Chapter) takes a specific narrative shape: from the arousal of the bodhi-mind under Mañjuśrī, through visits to the fifty-three good spiritual friends, ending with Samantabhadra at the chapter's close. The present paper's concession to Hamar's macro-frame is full: the Sudhana arc is the narrative ground of the Entering the Dharma-Realm Chapter and the narrative anchor for the figure of Samantabhadra's vow-practice. The present paper's extension is: vow ten's retrospective gathering — "from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated" — is the ritual closure of the Sudhana narrative-pilgrimage articulation of vows one through ten. Sudhana's pilgrimage finds its ritual gathering in the practice of Samantabhadra's vow-king; Samantabhadra's vow-king finds its narrative completion at the dedication-closure of vow ten. ⚠️ The full table of contents of the Hamar 2007 volume has not been independently verified online for every relevant section; the present paper accordingly handles the extension via paraphrase rather than direct citation in the Hamar-specific points where verification remains pending.

4.4 Faure 1991 Held to Background

Bernard Faure's The Rhetoric of Immediacy (Princeton University Press, 1991), the principal pushback ally for performative cosmology in NIAN P28, is here held to background. Faure's framework remains the implicit ground of §IV — vow ten's universal-dedication ritual is a performative-cosmological field-construction: the dedication's verbal-and-bodily act itself constructs the cosmological field within which the universal of universal dedication operates. McMahan 2002 Empty Vision's visionary-imagery reading is gestured at within §VI's cultivation guidance as a single-line cameo and is not engaged at §IV. Cleary's three-volume Flower Ornament Scripture (Shambhala, 1984–1987) is the primary English translation reference and appears in the bibliography.

V. Middle-Way Corrections

This section, following the Pointing at the Moon methodology's two-marker convention (❌ for misreadings to be rejected, ⚠️ for cross-disciplinary or philological caveats), addresses five corrections specific to the closure-triad of vows eight, nine, and ten. Earlier middle-way corrections (P26's vow-king-totality-and-not-pantheism, P27's repentance-and-not-self-punishment, P28's request-as-not-theistic-petition and as-not-modernist-psychologising) are referred to only by single-line cross-reference where vow ten requires continuity.

❌ Misreading 1: Reading vow ten's universal dedication as merit-as-economic-transaction. This misreading — the commodification pole — treats bodhisattva merit as a transferable commodity and dedication as the transactional gesture of moving merit from one ledger to another. The error: dedication's grammatical core (pariṇāmana, turning-toward, inclining-toward) is a ritual-cosmological articulation, not an economic transfer. Its character is the turning-toward of the emptiness of the three marks (per T1509 fascicle sixty-one's three marks: designation-mark, dharma-mark, signless-mark); when the three marks are without distinction, no transferable commodity is constituted in the first place. The commodification reading reduces dedication to economic transfer, draining it of its ritual-cosmological articulation. Yunqi Zhuhong's "Samantabhadra's vow-king is not apart from the present moment of mind" is the Chinese-tradition articulation of this middle-way correction: when, within the present moment of mind, there is no distinction-among-the-three-marks (no agent of dedication, commodity dedicated, recipient of dedication), then universal dedication operates in its proper register.

❌ Misreading 2: Reducing vow ten to purely interior mindful presencing. This misreading — the modernist-psychologising pole — reduces the entire vow-king to an inward training of mindful attention, draining the universal (pǔ-jiē 普皆) dimension altogether. The error: universal dedication's universal is the explicit cosmological universalising scope-marker — throughout the dharmadhātu, throughout space, all sentient beings — not assimilable to inward-only attention. Yunqi's and Ouyi's gathering of Samantabhadra's myriad practices into buddha-recitation does not advance the claim that vow ten is purely interior mindfulness; their reading is that the universal-outward-architecture is condensed-and-gathered in the present moment of buddha-recitation — the outer is contained-in-the-inner, the inner manifesting the outer. Misreadings 1 and 2 are the two extremes between which the middle-way reading must thread: the first over-objectifies (dedication-as-commodity); the second over-interiorises (dedication-as-inner-attention-only). The middle-way reading is outward ritual-cosmological articulation — neither transfer of objects nor purely inner mindfulness.

⚠️ Philological caveat: the absence of the Practice-and-Vow Chapter in T0278 and T0279. The historical-philological fact established by Chengguan's own statement at X05n0227 0192c04–09¹ precludes any claim that the ten-vow ladder is part of the early Huayan consensus. The systematic ten-vow ladder is a late-eighth-century ritual-operative consolidation of the Avataṃsaka tradition's vow material. The present paper's retrospective substance-attribute-function reading therefore cannot be characterised as a doctrinal claim from the early Huayan stratum; its proper situation is the late-Tang sub-commentary stratum, and the textual articulation belongs to the Chengguan-Zongmi line.

⚠️ Directional discrimination: Pure Land dedication-toward-rebirth and Samantabhadra's universal dedication are directionally inverse. The two are members of the same family of dedication-cosmologies but structurally inverse — the former is sentient-being → Pure-Land (going-to-be-reborn-there); the latter is one's own merit → all sentient beings and the buddha-path (extending to all). Yunqi's and Ouyi's gathering of Samantabhadra's myriad practices into buddha-recitation does not assert an identity between the two; their reading interiorises the not-apart-from-the-present-moment-of-mind dimension of vow ten without conflating its outward universalising direction with the Pure Land's inward-bound direction. This caveat is carried over from NIAN P28 §V and re-articulated here so that the cross-tradition gathering of patriarchal lines is not misread as a directional unification of two inverse dedication-cosmologies.

⚠️ Vocabulary discipline for the named-triple and the threefold-sphere-emptiness phrase. Two related caveats are gathered here. First: the named-triple "dedication-to-sentient-beings / dedication-to-bodhi / dedication-to-the-absolute" is a sub-commentary-stratum codification, not a sūtra-treatise canonical naming. T1509 Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra fascicle sixty-one and the T0220 Prajñāpāramitā corpus contain only operative schemas (the three marks, the three modes of reverence) without the named triple. The complete codification appears to consolidate in the Zhiyi–Fazang–Chengguan–Zongmi sub-commentary line. The present paper accordingly cites the named-triple from X05n0227 (Chengguan) and X05n0229 (Zongmi) only, not from T1509. Second: the precise phrase "emptiness of the threefold sphere" (三輪體空) — agent of dedication, object of dedication, recipient of dedication, all three empty — does not appear in this exact wording within T1509 or the T0220 Prajñāpāramitā strata; the substantive content is canonical (T1509 articulates the same content through the three marks: designation-mark, dharma-mark, signless-mark), but the verbal formula's complete consolidation appears to be later. The present paper accordingly uses "emptiness of the three marks" (三相空, per T1509) as the audited replacement, ensuring that the philological locus of every cited phrase is verifiable. This vocabulary discipline allows the paper's citations to be fully auditable.

VI. Conclusion

Essence Restated

Samantabhadra's vows eight (constantly following the Buddha in study), nine (accommodating sentient beings), and ten (universal dedication) compose the above-bearing-and-below-transforming dedication closure-triad: vow eight is the upward-bearing dimension (seeking enlightenment, depending on attribute, prajñā); vow nine is the downward-transforming dimension (transforming sentient beings, depending on function, vimukti); vow ten is the total dedication (toward the absolute, embracing both, depending on substance, dharmakāya). The closure-formula isomorphism is now confirmed for the fourth time across vows one through ten, 100% across the entire ten-vow set, with only the operator verb varying. Vow ten's totalising function is not encoded in the closure layer — vow ten's closure structure is itself isomorphic with that of vows one through nine; the totalising function is encoded, instead, in vow ten's opening retrospective sentence: "from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated."

The paper's central originality unfolds as a retrospective totalisation of the entire ten-vow set along the substance-attribute-function schema: vows 1–3 (the three-karma set, P26) constitute substance; vows 4–9 (the karma dyad of P27 + the dharma-persistence dyad of P28 + the upward-and-downward orientation of the present paper's vows 8 and 9) constitute attribute; vow 10 (universal dedication) constitutes function. This reading is articulated within the seventh- to ninth-century Huayan sub-commentary tradition itself: Zongmi's "vow eight is dedication to bodhi, vow nine is dedication to sentient beings, vow ten is the proper dedication — together comprising the three locations" (X05n0229) and Chengguan's "toward the absolute relying on substance, toward bodhi relying on attribute, toward sentient beings relying on function" (X05n0227) supply the interpretive spine. Chengguan's eight-character maxim — "transforming-below-with-great-compassion, seeking-above-with-great-wisdom" (大悲下化、大智上求) — encodes, in compressed form, the substance-attribute-function structure that the present paper unfolds across the full ten-vow set.

The paper's three-stratum conclusion can be stated as follows. First, the closure-formula 100% isomorphism across vows one through ten — the textual evidence at the level of T0293 itself for the integrated ten-vow system. Second, Zongmi's three-direction dedication schema and Chengguan's three-direction-dependence on substance-attribute-function — the seventh- to ninth-century sub-commentarial articulation of the schema, supplying the present paper's interpretive spine. Third, the retrospective cross-mapping of substance-attribute-function onto vows 1–3, 4–9, and 10 — the present paper's originality, a retrospective extension of Chengguan's three-direction-dependence schema (which addresses only vows 8–10 internally) onto the full ten-vow set.

Cultivation Guidance

For modern Anglophone practitioners, the closing dedicatory cluster of T0293 fascicle forty — the thirty-two-stanza verse-section, opening with "that I may purify the practice of Samantabhadra in every place" and reaching, via "when the time of my death is at hand," to "I, having been reborn in that buddha-realm" and culminating in the closing seal "swiftly proceed to the buddha-realm of Infinite Light" — supplies the principal practice-source. The cluster is the concrete ritual form of vow ten's deathbed-vow ritual realisation: the deathbed vow and universal dedication are gathered into a single ritual articulation. The closing seal stanza is taken here as the paper's closing frame device:

"These supreme practices of Samantabhadra are mine, and the boundless surpassing merits — every one of them — are dedicated. May all sentient beings drowning in saṃsāra swiftly reach the buddha-realm of Infinite Light."²⁵

The paper's first-and-last frame is now closed: the opening epigraph is the thirty-second stanza (the seven-vow summary verse), framing the ten-vow set's totalising verse-anchor; the closing epigraph is the closing seal stanza (the deathbed-vow ritual realisation of vow ten). Read together, the two stanzas frame Part VII's closer paper.

First-and-Last Echo to NIAN P25

Within the same first-and-last frame, the present paper answers the question posed at the opener of Part VII (NIAN P25): what is the meaning of the vow-king as a totality? P25 raised that question as the framing entry-point to Part VII; the present paper, as the closer, supplies the answer: the totality of the vow-king = the ritual-cosmological articulation of the three greats (substance-attribute-function). The vow-king's entire architecture finds its retrospective unification at the closure of vow ten; its character as a cosmological-ritual operative system is the explicit landing-place of the vow-king's full articulation. Part VII's five papers are now complete: P25 raised the question of totalisation; P26 articulated the three-karma assembly of vows 1–3; P27 articulated the karma dyad of vows 4–5; P28 articulated the request-structure dyad of vows 6–7; and P29 — as Part VII's closer — articulates the dedication closure-triad of vows 8–10 and completes the retrospective substance-attribute-function totalisation of vows one through ten.

Open Questions

Two open questions are offered to the reader as forward-references.

Open Question 1. Does the retrospective substance-attribute-function ordering of vows one through ten, identified in the present paper for Samantabhadra's ten great vows, recur outside Samantabhadra in other Mahāyāna vow-structures — Amitābha's forty-eight vows, Bhaiṣajyaguru's twelve great vows, Maitreya's thirteen great vows? If the substance-attribute-function ordering is not Samantabhadra-specific but a general feature of Mahāyāna vow-architecture, it would suggest a wider hypothesis about Mahāyāna vow-structure as such — a hypothesis to be tested in subsequent volumes of the series. This is a forward-reference toward Part VIII's gathering coda (NIAN P30 and P31).

Open Question 2. Vow ten's function-greatness character — "giving rise to all wholesome cause-and-fruit, mundane and supramundane" — and the contemporary reader's framework: how is universal dedication practised in modern Chinese-and-Anglophone reception without falling into the commodification misreading (Misreading 1 of §V)? The question concerns how, within the present moment of buddha-recitation grounded in the emptiness of the three marks, the practitioner enacts the outward universalising scope of vow ten without reducing dedication to economic transfer. This question also points toward the framework concerns of Part VIII.

The paper rests here. Vows one through ten compose the cosmological-ritual articulation of the three greats — substance, attribute, function — and the above-bearing-and-below-transforming dedication closure-triad of vows eight, nine, and ten constitutes the closure-segment of that articulation. The full architecture of Samantabhadra's vow-king is the ritual-operative landing of the three greats.

References

I. Primary Buddhist Sources

T0262. Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtra (the Lotus Sūtra). Translated by Kumārajīva. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 9. Encouragement of Samantabhadra chapter and Conjured-City chapter.

T0278. Mahāvaipulya-buddhāvataṃsaka-sūtra (the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka). Translated by Buddhabhadra (421 CE). Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 9.

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T0293. Mahāvaipulya-buddhāvataṃsaka-sūtra: The Practice-and-Vow Chapter of Samantabhadra Entering the Inconceivable Liberation Realm (the forty-fascicle recension). Translated by Prajña (798 CE). Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 10. Principal text.

T0475. Vimalakīrti-nirdeśa (the Vimalakīrti Sūtra). Translated by Kumārajīva. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 14. Bodhisattva chapter.

T1509. Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra (Dà zhìdù lùn). Composed by Nāgārjuna; translated by Kumārajīva. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 25. Fascicle sixty-one, Rejoicing-and-Dedication chapter.

T1564. Mūlamadhyamakakārikā. Composed by Nāgārjuna; translated by Kumārajīva. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 30.

T1585. Cheng weishi lun (Vijñaptimātratā-siddhi). Composed by Dharmapāla and others; translated by Xuanzang. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 31.

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T1666. Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna (Dà shèng qǐxìn lùn). Attributed to Aśvaghoṣa; translated by Paramārtha. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 32. Meaning-establishing section.

T1735. Commentary on the Avataṃsaka Sūtra. Composed by Chengguan. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 35.

T1762. Essentials of the Amitābha Sūtra (Mítuó yàojiě). Composed by Ouyi Zhixu. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 37.

T1941. Lotus Samādhi Repentance Liturgy. Composed by Zhiyi. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 46. The seventh section clarifying-the-method-of-dedication and clarifying-the-method-of-vow-making.

T1980. Verses for the Six Times of Reverence-Praise. Composed by Shandao. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 47. The fifth dedication-gate.

T2016. Mirror of the Source-Record (Zōng jìng lù). Composed by Yongming Yanshou. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 48.

T2017. Universal Convergence of the Ten Thousand Goods (Wàn shàn tóng guī jí). Composed by Yongming Yanshou. Taishō Tripiṭaka vol. 48.

X05n0227. Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary. Composed by Chengguan. Wàn xùzàng vol. 5. Core sub-commentary.

X05n0229. Detailed Sub-Commentary on the Practice-and-Vow Chapter (Bie-xing-shu-chao 別行疏鈔). Composed by Zongmi. Wàn xùzàng vol. 5. Core sub-commentary.

X22n0424. Sub-Commentary on the Amitābha Sūtra. Composed by Yunqi Zhuhong. Wàn xùzàng vol. 22.

X74n1464. Three-Time Mindfulness Service. Traditionally attributed to the Zhongfeng line. Wàn xùzàng vol. 74.

3. Modern Scholarship

Cleary, Thomas, trans. The Flower Ornament Scripture: A Translation of the Avatamsaka Sutra. 3 vols. Boston: Shambhala, 1984–1987.

Cook, Francis H. Hua-yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1977.

Faure, Bernard. The Rhetoric of Immediacy: A Cultural Critique of Chan/Zen Buddhism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991.

Hamar, Imre, ed. Reflecting Mirrors: Perspectives on Huayan Buddhism. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2007.

McMahan, David L. Empty Vision: Metaphor and Visionary Imagery in Mahāyāna Buddhism. London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2002.

Williams, Paul. Mahāyāna Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, 2009.

II. Patriarchal Commentaries

Chengguan. Huayan-jing Xingyuan-pin Shu (Commentary on the Practice-and-Vow Chapter). X05n0227, Wàn xùzàng vol. 5. 體相用三方向、大悲下化大智上求.
Zongmi. Huayan-jing Xingyuan-pin Bie-xing Shuchao (Detailed Sub-Commentary on the Practice-and-Vow Chapter). X05n0229, Wàn xùzàng vol. 5. 三處迴向圖式.
Zhiyi. Fahua Sanmei Chan Yi (Lotus Samādhi Repentance Liturgy). T1941, Taishō vol. 46. 十科儀軌之迴向發願定型.
Shandao. Wangsheng Lizan Ge (Verses for the Six Times of Reverence-Praise). T1980, Taishō vol. 47. 五念門中第五迴向門.
Yongming Yanshou. Wanshan Tonggui Ji (Universal Convergence of the Ten Thousand Goods). T2017, Taishō vol. 48. 普賢以行嚴理.
Yongming Yanshou. Zongjing lu (Mirror of the Source-Record). T2016, Taishō vol. 48.
Yunqi Zhuhong. * Amituo Jing Shuchao* (Sub-Commentary on the Amitābha Sūtra). X22n0424, Wàn xùzàng vol. 22. 普賢願王不離當念.
Ouyi Zhixu. * Amituo Jing Yaojie* (Essentials of the Amitābha Sūtra). T1762, Taishō vol. 37. 萬行司南.
Zhongfeng Mingben. Sishi Xiinian (Three-Time Mindfulness Service). X74n1464, Wàn xùzàng vol. 74. 十願全套.

4. Cross-Reference to Series Papers

P25 Samantabhadra's Ten Great Vows: An Introduction: the vow-king (願王) as the收攝 operator;愿8-10 as体/相/用三方向.
P26 Reverencing Buddhas, Praising Tathāgatas, Cultivating Offerings:愿1-3三業合構.
P27 Repenting Karmic Obstructions, Rejoicing in Merit:愿4-5业之雙翼.
P28 Requesting the Turning of the Dharma-wheel, Requesting the Buddhas to Abide:愿6-7法之久住雙模.
P24 The Synthesis from Yongming through Yunqi to Ouyi: Pure Land-Huayan confluence;普賢願王導歸極樂.
P17 Hearts of All Buddhas First: Śūraṅgama sūtra's pure recollection as the operational pivot.
P22 The Pure Land Patriarchs II: Shandao's Settling of the Name: 善導's name-settling as the ultimate dedication.
NIAN P25 (Part VII opener): the framing entry-point question — what is the meaning of Samantabhadra's vow-king as a totality? The present paper's §VI first-and-last echo answers this question.
NIAN P26 (vows 1–3): the three-karma assembly thesis. Retrospectively paired with substance in the present paper's §III.5.
NIAN P27 (vows 4–5): the karma dyad thesis. Retrospectively paired with the first of three sub-pairs of attribute in the present paper's §III.5.
NIAN P28 (vows 6–7): the dharma-persistence dyad thesis. Retrospectively paired with the second of three sub-pairs of attribute in the present paper's §III.5.
NIAN P29 (vows 8–10, the present paper): the above-bearing-and-below-transforming dedication closure-triad and the retrospective substance-attribute-function closure of vows one through ten. Part VII closer.
Part VIII coda (NIAN P30 and P31): forward-references from the present paper's §VI open questions — the wider hypothesis about Mahāyāna vow-architecture and the contemporary reader's framework concerns.

V. Sūtra & Śāstra Index

簡稱	全名	造／譯者	T／X 編號	冊數
法華經	《妙法蓮華經》	鳩摩羅什譯	T262	9
六十華嚴	《大方廣佛華嚴經》（六十華嚴）	佛馱跋陀羅譯	T0278	9
八十華嚴	《大方廣佛華嚴經》（八十華嚴）	實叉難陀譯	T0279	10
行願品	《大方廣佛華嚴經·普賢行願品》	般若譯	T0293	10
維摩詰經	《維摩詰所說經》	鳩摩羅什譯	T0475	14
大智度論	《大智度論》	龍樹造、鳩摩羅什譯	T1509	25
中論	《中論》	龍樹造、鳩摩羅什譯	T1564	30
成唯識論	《成唯識論》	護法等造、玄奘譯	T1585	31
攝大乘論	《攝大乘論釋》	世親造、玄奘譯	T1593	31
起信論	《大乘起信論》	傳馬鳴造、真諦譯	T1666	32
華嚴經疏	《大方廣佛華嚴經疏》	澄觀撰	T1735	35
阿弥陀經要解	《阿彌陀經要解》	蕅益智旭撰	T1762	37
法華懺儀	《法華三昧懺儀》	智顗撰	T1941	46
往生禮讚偈	《往生禮讚偈》	善導集記	T1980	47
宗鏡錄	《宗鏡錄》	永明延壽集	T2016	48
万善同歸集	《萬善同歸集》	永明延壽撰	T2017	48
行願品疏	《華嚴經行願品疏》	澄觀撰	X0227	卍續 5
行願品疏鈔	《華嚴經行願品疏鈔》（別行疏鈔）	宗密述	X0229	卍續 5
阿弥陀經疏鈔	《阿彌陀經疏鈔》	雲棲祩宏撰	X0424	卍續 22
三時繫念	《三時繫念佛事》	中峰明本	X1464	卍續 74

Pointing at the Moon Research · Six Practice Gates, Volume One: Mindful of the Buddha · Part VII The Flower Ornament Vision · 7.5 Part VII complete: P25 + P26 + P27 + P28 + P29 (5/5). Shi Huijing (釋慧鏡) First draft, May 2026 This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

4. Sutra & Śāstra Index

Abbrev.	Full Name	Author/Translator	Taisho
大方廣佛	大方廣佛華嚴經	unknown	T0278
大方廣佛	大方廣佛華嚴經	unknown	T0279
大方廣佛	大方廣佛華嚴經·普賢行願品	unknown	T0293
維摩詰所	維摩詰所說經	unknown	T0475
大智度論	大智度論	unknown	T1509
中論	中論	unknown	T1564
成唯識論	成唯識論	unknown	T1585
攝大乘論	攝大乘論釋	unknown	T1593
大乘起信	大乘起信論	unknown	T1666
大方廣佛	大方廣佛華嚴經疏	unknown	T1735
阿彌陀經	阿彌陀經要解	unknown	T1762
法華三昧	法華三昧懺儀	unknown	T1941
往生禮讚	往生禮讚偈	unknown	T1980
宗鏡錄	宗鏡錄	unknown	T2016
萬善同歸	萬善同歸集	unknown	T2017

Footnotes

Chengguan, Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary, X05n0227, 0192c04–09 region. "This chapter is not present in the principal scripture; in the Zhenyuan period a Sanskrit manuscript was obtained from Kashmir, and Prajña Tripiṭaka therefore translated it and inserted it into the present sūtra." Chengguan's own attestation of the philological fact that the Practice-and-Vow Chapter was a late addition supplied by the 798 CE Prajña recension; absent from T0278 (Buddhabhadra, 421 CE) and T0279 (Śikṣānanda, 695–699 CE). ↩ ↩²
T1666 Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna's authorship and recension status are subject to a long-standing modern philological dispute. Traditional attribution is to Aśvaghoṣa, with translation by Paramārtha; modern philological work, beginning with Walter Liebenthal and elaborated by subsequent scholarship, has raised the alternative hypothesis of late-Tang Chinese composition. The present paper cites the three-greats passage on the basis of its canonical placement in the Chinese textual tradition; the philological dispute is not within the scope of the present paper. ↩
T46n1941 Lotus Samādhi Repentance Liturgy (composed by Zhiyi). The ten-section kepan division is: (1) purifying the ritual platform; (2) purifying the body; (3) three-karma offering; (4) inviting the buddhas; (5) praising; (6) reverencing the buddhas; (7) clarifying-the-method-of-dedication and clarifying-the-method-of-vow-making; (8) reciting the sūtra; (9) seated meditation; (10) seated meditation upon the true mark. Dedication-and-vow is therefore the seventh section, not the tenth. The standard Chinese-tradition dedication-verse — "with this merit may all be benefited; together with all sentient beings, may we attain the buddha-path" — has its scriptural locus at T0262 Saddharmapuṇḍarīka-sūtra fascicle three, Conjured-City chapter; it does not derive from T1509 Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra (a frequent mis-attribution). ↩ ↩²
T10n0293 fascicle forty, the closure formulas of vows eight, nine, and ten at 0846a region (vow 8), 0846b region (vow 9), and 0846c region (vow 10). The four-exhaustion-four-inexhaustion structure ("as space is exhausted, as the realms of sentient beings are exhausted, as their karma is exhausted, as their afflictions are exhausted — my [operator-verb] is without end ...") holds at one hundred percent across all ten vows. The fourth-time confirmation of the closure-formula isomorphism, combined with NIAN P26 (vows 1–3), P27 (vows 4–5), and P28 (vows 6–7), establishes the textual fact that the ten-vow ladder is a single integrated system. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846b region. Vow ten's principal exposition's opening sentence — "as for universal dedication: from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating, all merits whatsoever are entirely dedicated" — is the textual core of the retrospective totalisation, the only one of the ten vow-openings that explicitly references the preceding vows by name. The phrase "from the initial reverencing through to the accommodating" (從初禮拜乃至隨順) maps onto vow 1 (reverencing) → vow 9 (accommodating) and, implicitly, onto every vow in between. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0845c region. Vow eight's principal exposition. The object of constantly following is the entire practice-record of every tathāgata throughout the dharmadhātu; the body-sacrifice cluster of narratives (flaying skin, drawing blood, offering body) is named here as the practice-content to be followed. ↩
The body-sacrifice cluster within vow eight's exposition gathers the Indian Mahāyāna body-for-the-dharma narrative tradition — narratives whose Pāli and Sanskrit antecedents include the jātaka and avadāna traditions of bodhisattva-self-sacrifice. Within the Avataṃsaka tradition the cluster finds Avataṃsaka-specific articulation through Vairocana as original master. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846a region. Vow eight's closure formula. Verb-position: "my following-in-study is without end" (我此隨學無有窮盡). ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0848a region. Vow eight's verse-couplet, opening with "I follow all the tathāgatas in study". ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846a region. Vow nine's principal exposition. The line "equal and without distinction" (等無有異) is the doctrinal core: in the bodhisattva's compassionate response, sentient being and tathāgata are equal in the field of accommodation. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846a–b region. The great-tree-king simile, the thesis-pivot of vow nine. The simile encodes the structural co-dependence among bodhisattva, sentient being, and buddha across the medium of the great-compassion water. Sentient beings as root, buddhas and bodhisattvas as flowers and fruits, great-compassion water as the connecting flow. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846b region. Vow nine's closure formula. Verb-position: "my accommodating is without end" (我此隨順無有窮盡). ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0848a region. Vow nine's verse-couplet, opening with "I always accommodate every sentient being". ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846b–c region. Vow ten's principal exposition. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846c region. Vow ten's substituting-for-the-most-grievous-suffering passage — the substantive other-benefitting articulation of dedication. The passage forms part of the seven-mind-intentions of substituting for suffering elaborated in the Tang sub-commentaries. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0846c region. Vow ten's closure formula. Verb-position: "my dedicating is without end" (我此迴向無有窮盡). ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, 0848a region. The thirty-second stanza of the verse-section is the seven-vow summary verse, condensing vows one through seven — "reverencing, praising, and offering" (vows 1–3); "requesting the buddhas to abide and turn the dharma-wheel" (vows 6 + 7, with vow 7 placed first); "rejoicing-along, repenting, and every wholesome root" (vows 5 + 4); "all are dedicated to sentient beings and the buddha-path" (vow 10) — into four lines, supplying the verse-anchor for the ten-vow set's totalising structure. ↩
Zongmi, Detailed Sub-Commentary on the Practice-and-Vow Chapter, X05n0229, line 5664–5667 region. The single line "vow eight is dedication to bodhi; vow nine is dedication to sentient beings; vow ten is the proper dedication, together comprising the three locations" (八即回向菩提，九即回向眾生，十正云回向，即總該三處) is the strongest sub-commentarial textual anchor for the closure-triad thesis of the present paper. ↩
Zongmi, X05n0229. The line "upward-uniting-with-the-buddhas' compassionate strength; downward-uniting-with-sentient-beings' lamenting plea" (上合諸佛慈力，下合眾生悲仰) supplies the grammatical source of the above-bearing-and-below-transforming phrasing of the present paper's thesis. ↩
Chengguan, Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary, X05n0227. The single line "toward the absolute, relying on substance; toward bodhi, relying on attribute; toward sentient beings, relying on function" (向實際依體，向菩提依相，向眾生依用) supplies the substance-attribute-function dependence schema for the three directions of dedication. ↩
Chengguan, X05n0227. The eight-character maxim "transforming-below-with-great-compassion, seeking-above-with-great-wisdom" (大悲下化、大智上求) is, in compressed form, the encoding of the substance-attribute-function-and-universal-extension structure across the full ten-vow set. ↩ ↩²
T1666 Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna, meaning-establishing section. The three greats: "first, substance-greatness — that is, all dharmas, true thusness, equal, neither increasing nor decreasing; second, attribute-greatness — that is, the tathāgatagarbha fully equipped with immeasurable virtuous attributes; third, function-greatness — able to give rise to all wholesome cause-and-fruit, mundane and supramundane." This passage is the locus classicus of the substance-attribute-function schema; the philological dispute over the text's authorship is held to footnote 4. ↩ ↩² ↩³
The present paper's retrospective cross-mapping is a retrospective extension of Chengguan's Practice-and-Vow Chapter Commentary's three-direction-dependence schema. Chengguan applies substance / attribute / function internally to vows 8 (attribute / prajñā), 9 (function / vimukti), and 10 (substance / dharmakāya); he does not specify the placement of vows 1 through 7 within the schema. The present paper's contribution is the retrospective integration of the theses of NIAN P26 (vows 1–3 as the three-karma assembly), P27 (vows 4–5 as the karma dyad), and P28 (vows 6–7 as the dharma-persistence dyad) into the substance-attribute-function ordering: vows 1–3 as substance (the foundational ground retrospectively paired with substance-greatness); vows 4–9 as attribute (six vows of transformation paired retrospectively with attribute-greatness); vow 10 as function (paired with function-greatness's "giving rise to all wholesome cause-and-fruit, mundane and supramundane"). This extension does not violate Chengguan's intent: Chengguan's "toward the absolute, relying on substance" identifies the inward depth of dedication as relying on substance-greatness in the field of true-thusness equality; the present paper's "vow 10 as function" identifies the outward extension of dedication as function-greatness's universal generation of wholesome cause-and-fruit. The two formulations are inward and outward faces of the same dedication-toward-the-absolute closure. ↩
Yunqi Zhuhong, Sub-Commentary on the Amitābha Sūtra, X22n0424. The line "Samantabhadra's vow-king is not apart from the present moment of mind" (普賢願王不離當念) is the most concentrated Chinese-patriarchal articulation of the gathering of the ten-vow set into the present moment of buddha-recitation. The line is the textual basis of §III.6's buddha-recitation tradition closure and is the Chinese-tradition middle-way correction of misreading 1 (commodification) at §V. ↩
T10n0293 fascicle forty, the closing seal stanza of the verse-section, the final stanza of the Practice-and-Vow Chapter. The stanza is the textual instantiation of vow ten's deathbed-vow ritual realisation: "when the time of my death is at hand" (an earlier stanza in the same closing dedicatory cluster) finds its closing-seal articulation in "swiftly reach the buddha-realm of Infinite Light." The phrase "buddha-realm of Infinite Light" (Amitābha's Pure Land) is one of the textual loci where the late-eighth-century Avataṃsaka tradition and the Pure Land scriptural tradition are explicitly co-located; the directional inversion-caveat of §V applies here as well — this co-location is not a directional unification. ↩

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