地藏菩薩本願經 忉利天宮神通品

The opening of a sūtra usually does nothing but set the scene. This chapter sets it: the Buddha is in the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, the buddhas of the ten directions have all come, the devas and nāgas and ghosts and spirits have all come.

But it writes four characters more: he taught the Dharma for his mother.

The One Who Speaks and the One Spoken Of

The bodhisattva who is to be spoken of below made his vow twice on the ground of the cause, and one of those two times was for his mother’s sake. And the buddha who is speaking at this moment is teaching the Dharma for his mother.

The one who speaks and the one spoken of are doing the same thing.

An introduction sets the scene. What those four characters set down is why this sūtra had to be spoken in this scene.

The Buddha Says: I Cannot Finish the Count

When everyone had gathered, the Buddha asked Mañjuśrī: do you know how many there are.

Mañjuśrī said: with my own spiritual power, taking the measure of it for a thousand kalpas, I still could not know.

Then the Buddha said something most unusual — because I look with the buddha-eye, the count of them is still not exhausted.

And then the Buddha explained what that number is: all these are ones whom Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva, over kalpas long past, has already delivered, is now delivering, and has yet to deliver; whom he has already brought to accomplishment, is now bringing to accomplishment, and has yet to bring to accomplishment.

What cannot be counted to the end is not the audience; it is the people one bodhisattva has delivered. The question was about a head-count. The answer was a workload.

One Mote of Dust, Counted as One Kalpa

The grasses and trees and thickets and groves of the great trichiliocosm, the rice, hemp, bamboo, and reeds, the mountains, stones, and fine motes of dust: each item counted as one number; each such number counted as one Ganges; each grain of sand in one Ganges counted as one world; each mote of dust in one world counted as one kalpa; and then the number of motes accumulated within one kalpa taken over again, all of it, as so many kalpas.

Since Kṣitigarbha realized the tenth ground, it has been a thousand times more than that.

Having said it, the Buddha added one line more: how much longer still when he was on the grounds of the śrāvaka and the pratyekabuddha.

That uncountable number above counts only the stretch after the way was accomplished. The sūtra gives no total. What it gives is a way of counting that cannot be finished.

She Saw It, and She Was Not Afraid

Of the two accounts of the causal ground, the second is the brahmin woman. Her mother believed in wrong teachings and slighted the Three Jewels; she could not be moved by exhortation, and her life ended, and her spirit fell into the Avīci Hell.

The daughter sold her house and lands, turned them into incense and flowers and offering-implements, and made a great offering at the stūpa-monastery; then she gazed up at the buddha’s image, and a thought arose in her that would arise in us as well: a buddha is complete in all wisdom — if he were still in the world, perhaps one could ask him where my mother is.

The thought had barely arisen when the air answered it.

She sat upright and recollected the Buddha for one day and one night, and suddenly she was at the shore of a sea. The sūtra writes that sea without any mercy: the waters surge and boil, the evil beasts are all of them iron-bodied, men and women in the hundreds of thousands of myriads rise and sink in the sea and are seized and devoured in the scramble, the yakṣas have many hands and many eyes, and their teeth grow outward like sword-blades.

And then the sūtra writes one line: at that time the brahmin woman, by the power of her recollection of the Buddha, was naturally without fear.

No one moved her away, and the sight did not grow any fainter. Not one part of it was taken off. Only, she was not afraid.

Three Slots

When she asked after her mother, the answer was this: that guilty woman had been born into the heavens three days ago, because her child had made offerings and cultivated blessings for her mother. And not she alone — on that day the guilty ones of the Avīci Hell all received bliss at the same time.

An offering made by one person who sold her house saved more than her own mother.

At the last the Buddha discloses it: that ghost king Poisonless is the present Bodhisattva Foremost in Riches; that brahmin woman is Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva.

And in that number the Buddha could not finish counting there are three slots: already delivered, now being delivered, not yet delivered. The first two have closed. The third is still open.

Śikṣānanda’s translation, made under the Tang, of the chapter “Spiritual Powers in the Palace of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three” in The Sūtra of the Original Vows of Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva, Taishō T13n0412, the first chapter of Fascicle One, from the title at the head of the fascicle down to “the brahmin woman was none other than Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva.” The figures in parentheses at the head of each segment give the Taishō page, register, and line.

〔1 · The title of the sūtra and its translator〕（0777c08）The Sūtra of the Original Vows of Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva, Fascicle One.（0777c10）Translated by Śikṣānanda (in the Tang tongue, Delight-in-Learning), Tripiṭaka śramaṇa of the country of Khotan under the Tang (a country of the Western Regions; the name is properly pronounced Kusatana, and in the Tang tongue means Earth-Milk).

〔2 · The title of the chapter〕（0777c11）Spiritual Powers in the Palace of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, Chapter One.

〔3 · The witness of one who heard · the time and place of the teaching〕（0777c12）Thus it was that I myself heard. At one time the Buddha was in the Heaven of the Thirty-Three (the text transcribes the name here as Daoli; further down in this chapter it uses the rendering “the Thirty-Three Heaven”), teaching the Dharma for his mother.

〔4 · The buddhas of the ten directions gather and praise〕（0777c12）At that time, out of the measureless worlds of the ten directions, all the buddhas — inexpressible, inexpressible in number — together with the great bodhisattva-mahāsattvas, came and gathered in assembly. They praised Buddha Śākyamuni (Śākya is the clan name, rendered of old as Able in Humaneness; Muni is the style-name, rendered of old as Silent and Still) for being able, in the evil world of the five turbidities (throw dust and earth into clear water and the look of it grows muddied — this is what is called turbidity; and turbidity is of five kinds: the turbidity of the kalpa, the turbidity of views, the turbidity of the afflictions, the turbidity of beings, the turbidity of lifespan), to manifest the inconceivable power of great wisdom and spiritual penetration, taming beings hard and stubborn and hard to transform, so that they might come to know the dharma of suffering and of pleasure. Each of those buddhas sent his attendant to ask after the World-Honored One’s welfare.

〔5 · Ten great light-clouds are sent forth〕（0777c17）At this time the Tathāgata, a smile upon his face, sent forth a hundred thousand myriad koṭis of great light-clouds — namely: the great light-cloud of Complete Fullness, the great light-cloud of Kindness and Compassion, the great light-cloud of Wisdom, the great light-cloud of Prajñā, the great light-cloud of Samādhi, the great light-cloud of Auspiciousness, the great light-cloud of Blessed Merit, the great light-cloud of Merit and Virtue, the great light-cloud of Refuge, the great light-cloud of Praise.

〔6 · Sixteen subtle and wondrous sounds come forth〕（0777c22）Having sent forth light-clouds such as these, inexpressible in number, he then gave forth every kind of subtle and wondrous sound — namely: the sound of the dāna-pāramitā (dāna: giving), the sound of the śīla-pāramitā (śīla: keeping the precepts), the sound of the kṣānti-pāramitā (patience under insult), the sound of the vīrya-pāramitā (vigor), the sound of the dhyāna-pāramitā (meditative concentration), the sound of the prajñā-pāramitā (wisdom), the sound of kindness and compassion, the sound of joy and equanimity, the sound of liberation, the sound of the uncontaminated, the sound of wisdom, the sound of great wisdom, the sound of the lion’s roar, the sound of the great lion’s roar, the sound of cloud and thunder, the sound of great cloud and thunder.

〔7 · The heavenly host gathers like clouds〕（0777c27）Having given forth sounds such as these, inexpressible, inexpressible in number, from the Sahā world and from the lands of other quarters there were measureless koṭis of devas, nāgas, ghosts, and spirits who likewise gathered to the palace of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three. Namely: the Heaven of the Four Great Kings, the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, the Suyāma Heaven, the Tuṣita Heaven, the Heaven of Delighting in Emanation, the Heaven of Mastery over Others’ Emanations (these six heavens belong to the realm of desire); the Heaven of Brahmā’s Retinue, the Heaven of Brahmā’s Ministers, the Great Brahmā Heaven, the Heaven of Lesser Light, the Heaven of Measureless Light, the Heaven of Radiant Sound, the Heaven of Lesser Purity, the Heaven of Measureless Purity, the Heaven of Universal Purity, the Heaven of Merit-Born, the Heaven of Merit-Love, the Heaven of Vast Fruit, the No-Thought Heaven, the Unafflicted Heaven, the Heaven of No Heat, the Heaven of Good Sight, the Heaven of Good Appearance, the Akaniṣṭha Heaven, the Maheśvara Heaven (these belong to the realm of form); and on up to the Heaven of the Sphere of Neither-Perception-nor-Non-Perception (the summit of the formless realm) — the whole host of devas, the host of nāgas, the host of ghosts and spirits, all came and gathered in assembly.

〔8 · The spirits gather〕（0778a06）Furthermore, from the lands of other quarters and from the Sahā world there came the sea spirits, the spirits of the great rivers, the spirits of the rivers, the tree spirits, the mountain spirits, the earth spirits, the spirits of streams and marshes, the spirits of the crops, the spirits of the day, the spirits of the night, the spirits of empty space, the spirits of the heavens, the spirits of food and drink, the spirits of grass and trees — spirits such as these all came and gathered in assembly.

〔9 · The great ghost kings assemble〕（0778a09）Furthermore, from the lands of other quarters and from the Sahā world there came the great ghost kings — namely: the ghost king Evil-Eyed, the ghost king Blood-Devourer, the ghost king Devourer of Vital Essence, the ghost king Devourer of Embryos and Eggs, the ghost king Spreader of Sickness, the ghost king Gatherer of Poison, the ghost king Kindly-Hearted, the ghost king Blessing and Benefit, the ghost king Great Love and Reverence — ghost kings such as these all came and gathered in assembly.

〔10 · The Buddha asks Mañjuśrī the number of the assembly〕（0778a13）At that time Buddha Śākyamuni said to Mañjuśrī, Prince of the Dharma, bodhisattva-mahāsattva: “Look at all these buddhas and bodhisattvas, and at the devas, nāgas, ghosts, and spirits — those of this world and those of other worlds, those of this land and those of other lands — who have come and gathered in assembly today in this way, arriving at the Heaven of the Thirty-Three: do you know their number?”

〔11 · Mañjuśrī says of himself that he cannot know it〕（0778a17）Mañjuśrī said to the Buddha: “World-Honored One! If I were to take the measure of it with my own spiritual power for a thousand kalpas, I still could not know it.”

〔12 · Even seen with the buddha-eye the number is not exhausted〕（0778a19）The Buddha said to Mañjuśrī: “Even when I look with the buddha-eye, the count of them is still not exhausted. All these are ones whom Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva, over kalpas long past, has already delivered, is now delivering, and has yet to deliver; whom he has already brought to accomplishment, is now bringing to accomplishment, and has yet to bring to accomplishment.”

〔13 · Mañjuśrī asks for the practice and vows of the causal ground〕（0778a21）Mañjuśrī said to the Buddha: “World-Honored One! I in the past have long cultivated roots of goodness and have realized unobstructed wisdom; hearing what the Buddha says, I straightway believe and accept it. But the śrāvakas of the lesser fruit, the eightfold host of devas and nāgas, and the beings of ages to come — though they hear the Tathāgata’s truthful words, they will surely harbor doubt; and even if they force themselves to receive it upon their heads, they will hardly escape giving rise to slander. I pray only that the World-Honored One will expound at length: what practice did Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva-mahāsattva perform, and what vow did he set up, on the ground of the cause, that he could accomplish a thing so inconceivable?”

〔14 · The simile of the motes and the kalpas〕（0778a27）The Buddha said to Mañjuśrī: “Suppose that all the grasses and trees and thickets and groves, the rice, hemp, bamboo, and reeds, the mountains, stones, and fine motes of dust in the great trichiliocosm were each reckoned as one item and each item as one number; and each such number reckoned as one Ganges; and every grain of sand in one Ganges reckoned as one world; and every mote of dust within one world reckoned as one kalpa; and then the number of motes accumulated within one kalpa taken in its entirety as so many kalpas over again. Since Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva realized the fruit-position of the tenth ground, it has been a thousand times longer than the above simile; and how much longer still if one counts back to when Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva was on the grounds of the śrāvaka and the pratyekabuddha. Mañjuśrī! The awesome spiritual power and the vow of this bodhisattva are inconceivable.

〔15 · The benefit of hearing the name and venerating〕（0778b04）If in ages to come there be a good man or a good woman who hears the name of this bodhisattva, and who either praises him, or gazes upon him and bows, or calls his name, or makes offerings, or even paints and draws, carves and engraves, sculpts and lacquers his image, that person shall gain the recompense of being born a hundred times over in the Thirty-Three Heaven and returning again, and shall never fall into the evil destinies.

〔16 · Past life one · the elder’s son makes his vow〕（0778b07）Mañjuśrī! This Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva-mahāsattva, in the past, kalpas long ago, inexpressible, inexpressible kalpas ago, was in his person the son of a great elder.（0778b09）At that time there was a buddha in the world whose name was the Tathāgata Lion’s Swiftness, Complete in the Myriad Practices. At that time the elder’s son, seeing the marks and excellences of that buddha and the adornment of his thousandfold blessings, asked that buddha: ”What practice, and what vow, gains one marks such as these?“ At that time the Tathāgata Lion’s Swiftness, Complete in the Myriad Practices, said to the elder’s son: ”If you would realize a body such as this, you must for a long time deliver all beings who undergo suffering.“（0778b14）Mañjuśrī! At that time the elder’s son thereupon made a vow, saying: ”From this day forth, throughout kalpas to come beyond all reckoning, for the sake of these beings of the six destinies who are guilty and suffering I shall set out every kind of skillful means, and only when they have all been brought to liberation shall I myself accomplish the way of a buddha.“ Because he set up this great vow before that buddha, to this day, through a hundred thousand myriad koṭis of nayutas of inexpressible kalpas, he is still a bodhisattva.

〔17 · Past life two · the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi, and the brahmin woman〕（0778b18）Again, in the past, inconceivable asaṃkhyeya kalpas ago, there was a buddha in the world whose name was the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi. That buddha’s lifespan was four hundred thousand myriad koṭis of asaṃkhyeya kalpas.（0778b20）In the time of the Semblance Dharma there was a brahmin woman whose blessings from former lives were deep and abundant, and whom all men revered; walking, standing, sitting, and lying down, she was guarded by the gods. Her mother believed in wrong teachings and constantly slighted the Three Jewels. At that time this holy woman set out every kind of skillful means, exhorting and drawing on her mother, so that she might give rise to right view; yet this woman’s mother did not come to complete faith, and before long her life ended, and her spirit fell into the Avīci Hell.

〔18 · She sells the house and makes offerings · the buddha’s voice in the air〕（0778b26）At that time the brahmin woman, knowing that her mother in life had not believed in cause and effect, reckoned that she must have followed her karma and been born into an evil destiny; so she sold her house and lands, sought out incense and flowers in abundance and all manner of offering-implements, and made a great offering in the stūpa-monastery of that former buddha. She saw the image of the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi, in one of the monasteries, its awesome countenance sculpted and painted, upright and dignified and complete in every part. At that time the brahmin woman gazed upon that honored countenance and bowed, and her reverence and longing grew twofold, and she thought within herself: ”A buddha’s name is Great Awakening, and he is complete in all wisdom. Had he been in the world at the time, then when my mother died, if I had come and asked the Buddha, he would surely have known where she had gone.“ At that time the brahmin woman wept and let her tears fall for a long while, gazing up and yearning toward the Tathāgata.（0778c03）Suddenly she heard a voice in the air that said: ”Weeping holy woman! Do not be so grieved; I shall now show you where your mother has gone.“ The brahmin woman joined her palms toward the empty air and said to the air: ”Whose divine virtue is this, that relieves my anxiety? Since I lost my mother, day and night I have remembered and yearned for her, and there was nowhere I could ask to learn into what realm my mother had been born.“ At that time the voice in the air answered her again: ”I am the one upon whom you gazed and bowed, the past Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi. Seeing that you remember your mother beyond the measure of an ordinary being’s feeling, I have come to tell you.“ When the brahmin woman heard this voice, she threw her whole body down upon the ground, and every limb and joint was injured. Those beside her supported her, and after a long while she revived; and again she said to the air: ”I pray that the Buddha in his compassion may pity me and quickly tell me into what realm my mother has been born. My own body and mind now will not be long before they die.“ At that time the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi, said to the holy woman: ”When you have finished your offerings, only go home early, sit upright with your body composed, and think upon my name; then you will know where your mother has been born.“

〔19 · She sits upright and recollects the buddha · her body comes to the sea of karma〕（0778c14）At that time the brahmin woman, having bowed to the Buddha, went straight back to her house. Because she remembered her mother, she sat upright with her body composed and recollected the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi, through one day and one night. Suddenly she saw her own body arrive at the shore of a sea. The waters of that sea surged and boiled, and there were many evil beasts, all of them with bodies of iron, flying and running above the sea and chasing one another east and west. She saw too a great many men and women, in the hundreds of thousands of myriads, rising and sinking in the sea, seized and devoured in the scramble by those evil beasts. She saw too yakṣas, each of a different shape — some with many hands and many eyes, many feet and many heads, the teeth of their mouths thrusting outward, keen as sword-blades — driving those guilty ones on so as to bring them near the evil beasts; and the yakṣas would also strike and seize them themselves, wrenching head and foot together. Those shapes were of ten thousand kinds, and she did not dare to look long. At that time the brahmin woman, by the power of her recollection of the Buddha, was naturally without fear.

〔20 · The questions and answers of the ghost king Poisonless〕（0778c23）There was a ghost king named Poisonless who bowed his head and came forward to meet her, and said to the holy woman: ”Excellent! Bodhisattva, by what cause have you come here?“ At that time the brahmin woman asked the ghost king: ”What place is this?“ Poisonless answered: ”This is the first of the seas on the western side of the Great Iron Ring Mountains.“ The holy woman asked: ”I have heard that within the Iron Ring the hells are to be found. Is that so in fact?“ Poisonless answered: ”There are indeed hells.“ The holy woman asked: ”How is it that I have been able to reach the place of the hells?“ Poisonless answered: ”If it is not by awesome spiritual power, then it must be by the power of karma; without one of these two things, one can never arrive.“ The holy woman asked again: ”By what cause do these waters surge and boil? And why are there so many guilty ones, and evil beasts as well?“ Poisonless answered: ”These are the beings of Jambudvīpa who have done evil and have newly died; after forty-nine days have passed, if there is no descendant after them to perform meritorious deeds on their behalf and rescue them from their suffering and hardship, and if in life they had no wholesome causes either, then according to the hell that their own karma has called forth, they naturally cross this sea first. A hundred thousand yojanas to the east of this sea there is another sea, and the suffering there is twice this one’s; and to the east of that sea there is yet another sea, and the suffering is doubled again. What the evil causes of the three kinds of karma — of body, speech, and mind — have called down upon them is together named the sea of karma, and this is that place.“ The holy woman asked the ghost king Poisonless again: ”Where are the hells?“ Poisonless answered: ”Within the three seas are the great hells, and their number is in the hundreds of thousands, each of them distinct. Of those called great, there are eighteen; next there are five hundred, whose suffering and poison are measureless; next there are a thousand and a hundred, and their suffering too is measureless.“ The holy woman asked the great ghost king again: ”My mother died not long ago; I do not know to what destiny her spirit has gone.“ The ghost king asked the holy woman: ”The bodhisattva’s mother — what deeds did she practise while she lived?“ The holy woman answered: ”My mother held wrong views and mocked and slandered the Three Jewels; and even if now and then she believed for a moment, straightway she was disrespectful again. Though the days since her death are few, I do not know where she has been born.“ Poisonless asked: ”The bodhisattva’s mother — what was the family and clan name?“ The holy woman answered: ”My father and my mother were both of the brahmin caste. My father’s name was Śīla Shanxian, my mother’s name Yuedili.“ Poisonless joined his palms and said to the bodhisattva: ”May the Holy One return to her own place; grieve and remember and pine no more. It is now three days since the guilty woman Yuedili was born into the heavens. It is said to be because a filial child made offerings for her mother and cultivated blessings, giving alms to the stūpa-monastery of the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi. Not the bodhisattva’s mother alone won release from the hells; on that day the guilty ones of the Avīci Hell should all have received bliss, and were born away together.“ The ghost king finished speaking, joined his palms, and withdrew.

〔21 · The holy woman makes her great vow〕（0779a25）The brahmin woman then returned as from a dream. Having understood this matter, she thereupon set up a great vow before the stūpa and image of the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi: “I vow that throughout kalpas to come, for whatever beings there are who are guilty and suffering, I shall set out every kind of skillful means and cause them to be liberated.””

〔22 · Past and present joined〕（0779a26）The Buddha said to Mañjuśrī: ”The ghost king Poisonless of that time is the present Bodhisattva Foremost in Riches; and the brahmin woman was none other than Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva.“

The only commentary on this sūtra now extant that runs through it phrase by phrase is the Outline and Commentary on the Sūtra of the Original Vows of Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva in six fascicles, by Lingcheng, the śramaṇa styled Qinglian, of the Qing; before it stands the Guiding Thread in one fascicle. He fixes the character of the sūtra in his opening words: 「地藏本願經者，乃我佛所說之孝經也」—“The Sūtra of the Original Vows of Kṣitigarbha is the classic of filial piety spoken by our Buddha.” 〔X21n0383 0638c08〕 The Buddha ascends to the Heaven of the Thirty-Three and teaches the Dharma for his mother 「正以示出世之大孝」—“precisely to display the great filial piety that goes beyond the world.” 〔X21n0383 0638c10〕 His division of the text is equally blunt: the whole sūtra is 「隨文演義，為三：序、正、流通」—“unfolded in sense as the text runs, in three: introduction, main exposition, and transmission.” 〔X21n0384 0653b02〕 — this chapter holds the introduction to itself alone, chapters two through ten are the main exposition, and the last three chapters are the transmission. As for the manner of glossing, he states its order himself: 「今先通釋名題，次乃總示觀法，三則別解經文」—“Now first the title is explained in general; next the method of contemplation is set forth in sum; third, the sūtra text is explained in particular.” 〔X21n0383 0639c09〕 — following the Tiantai line all the way down. What is said below still begins by watching how the sūtra itself walks.

First, the Name

If one reads a sūtra to the end and still does not know what the name of its central figure means, the reading has been wasted. And this sūtra does not explain its own name — from beginning to end it says only “Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva” and does not gloss it. The sense of the name has to be fetched from elsewhere.

The Buddha has glossed it himself. Of this same bodhisattva there is a passage of praise in another sūtra, more than twenty similes in a row, of which two lines run: 「安忍不動猶如大地，靜慮深密猶如祕藏」—“Patient and unmoving as the great earth; still in contemplation and deeply hidden as a secret store.” 〔T13n0411 0722a08〕

Earth is being patient and unmoving; store is being still in contemplation and deeply hidden. The one says that he can bear it; the other says that he keeps it deep.

The reading handed down pushes “store” one layer further in. As to what store means, 「隱故名秘，覆故名藏」—“because it is hidden it is called secret; because it is covered it is called store.” 〔X21n0383 0640b05〕 — hidden away, and so called secret; covered over, and so called store. And what is stored? The secret store of the three virtues: 「大即法身，滅即解脫，度即般若」—“the great is the dharma-body, extinction is liberation, deliverance is prajñā.” 〔X21n0383 0640b18〕 — and these three dharmas each and all possess permanence, bliss, self, and purity.

What matters is the next line: this secret store of the three virtues is 「蘊在一切眾生身心之內」—“held within the body and mind of every sentient being.” 〔X21n0383 0640b09〕

It is not that the bodhisattva is keeping some treasure in store to give to beings. It is that beings have it stored in their own body and mind already, and simply do not know it. And so the next words: 「諸佛悟之而證得，眾生迷之而流轉」—“the buddhas awaken to it and realize it; sentient beings are deluded about it and go on turning.” 〔X21n0383 0640b10〕 — one and the same thing: awake to it, and one is a buddha; deluded about it, and one turns in the six destinies. 「然此秘藏初無改移」—“Yet this secret store from the first undergoes no alteration.” 〔X21n0383 0640b11〕 — in the time of delusion it is not one part the less.

A simile is matched to it as well. When Maitreya becomes a buddha, four great treasure-stores appear at once — gold, silver, bright pearl, and beryl — each figuring one of the four virtues, permanence, bliss, self, and purity; and 「彼之四藏，不越乎地」—“those four stores do not go beyond the earth.” 〔X21n0383 0640b20〕 — all four are buried in the ground. The most carefully placed stroke in the simile is this: before those four stores appear, each has its dragon-spirits guarding it in secret, keeping it and not losing it; once they have been opened up there is no guardian, and those who see them raise no covetous thought. And so it is said of the treasure-store of the mind-ground that 「雖在迷時，隱而不失，正當悟處，證而不著」—“though it is in the time of delusion, it is hidden and not lost; and just at the place of awakening, it is realized and not clung to.” 〔X21n0383 0640c07〕

In the time of delusion it will not be lost; at the moment of awakening you will not grasp it.

「地藏之名，其義若此」—“The name Kṣitigarbha: such is its sense.” 〔X21n0383 0640c09〕 — the name is done, the sūtra has not yet begun to speak, and who this bodhisattva is has already been handed over: he is called by this name because beings have this store within their minds.

What Kind of Vow the Original Vow Is

The second half of the title is “original vow.” For “original,” three senses were given of old: 「本即本昔」—“original is the original past.” 〔X21n0383 0640c22〕 — that is the past; and it is also original nature, which is the root; and it is also the force and function of that original nature, the strength that issues from the root.

A vow made in the past, made upon one’s original nature, and then producing force out of that nature — the three laid one upon another are what is called an original vow. To take it merely as “a promise made a long while ago” is to have got only the first of the three.

Of old a very weighty line is set down here: 「願不依諦，名為狂願」—“A vow that does not rest on truth is called a mad vow.” 〔X21n0383 0641a05〕 — and truth that does not follow from the mind is called false truth.

A vow must rest on something. On what? On principle. And the principle must come out of one’s own mind; it is not a doctrine carted in from outside. The mind is the ground, truth is the root, the vow is the trunk; only when root and trunk stand can branch and leaf spread out.

This line may be kept in mind. To make a vow is an easy thing; what is hard is whether there is anything holding the vow up from underneath.

A Whole Chapter, Judged to Be Introduction

That a whole chapter should be judged as the introductory section has not gone unchallenged. The smile and the sending forth of light may count as the occasion for the teaching; but the questions and answers about the causal ground, the elder’s son arousing his resolve, and the holy woman saving her mother ought by rights to fall under the main exposition; the earth spirit guarding the Dharma and the benefits of seeing and hearing look like main text as well; and what truly counts as transmission is only the last chapter, on entrustment.

The reading handed down answers hard: the dividing of a text is human sentiment in the first place, and sentiment always supposes that 「序未辯道，流通歇末，不得論於因果」—“the introduction has not yet argued the Way, and the transmission is a spent tail-end, so cause and fruit may not be discussed there.” 〔X21n0384 0653b07〕 — and so it cuts the three sections dead apart. But the three are not three separated rooms: 「序本序於正通，正本正於序通，通本通於正序」—“the introduction is fundamentally an introduction to the main exposition and the transmission; the main exposition is fundamentally main with respect to the introduction and the transmission; the transmission is fundamentally a transmitting with respect to the main exposition and the introduction.” 〔X21n0384 0653b09〕 — the introduction is for the sake of the main exposition and the transmission; the main exposition is for the sake of the introduction and the transmission; the transmission too is for the sake of the main exposition and the introduction. If they really were cut apart, the introduction would become a flavorless opening remark and the transmission a closing courtesy.

This way of judging is of use when we read any sūtra. The right Dharma is already being spoken in the introductory section, and real business is still being done in the section of transmission. A sūtra has no foreplay.

Teaching the Dharma for His Mother: One Sentence, Two Identities

After the five matters of the common introduction, the sūtra writes only one sentence more: the Buddha is in the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, teaching the Dharma for his mother.

In point of form this sentence sits awkwardly. It is text belonging to the introduction that witnesses the teaching, and yet it carries the sense of the occasion that gives rise to it — the common introduction cannot contain it, and the particular introduction has not begun. For that reason a separate outline-heading was set up for it of old, with the question put to oneself: 「何故立此科」—“Why set up this heading?” 〔X21n0384 0654c03〕 The answer: this sentence is the fountainhead of the Tathāgata’s ascending to the Heaven of the Thirty-Three and of the three months’ retreat, and it is also the ground-plan for Kṣitigarbha’s making his vow for his mother; 「一以遮外道六師之疑謗」—“first, to shut off the doubt and slander of the six heterodox masters.” 〔X21n0384 0654c06〕, and second, to raise the filial thought of the fourfold assembly of later ages.

One sentence, two identities. The Buddha here is the one who teaches the Dharma, and he is also a son who has gone up to heaven for his mother’s sake. The two past lives that come later in the sūtra — the elder’s son and the brahmin woman — both grow out of this identity.

An introduction sets the scene. What this sentence sets down is why this sūtra had to be spoken in this scene.

Ten Great Light-Clouds

The Tathāgata smiles and sends forth a hundred thousand myriad koṭis of great light-clouds, ten kinds in a row: complete fullness, kindness and compassion, wisdom, prajñā, samādhi, auspiciousness, blessed merit, merit and virtue, refuge, praise.

The number ten is not made up to fill out a list. The commentator of old matches these ten lights one by one to the ten vehicles of contemplation of Tiantai — 「故約今家十乘觀法，對釋十種光雲」—“and so, taking the ten vehicles of contemplation of our own house, the ten kinds of light-cloud are explained in correspondence.” 〔X21n0384 0656c23〕; and 「大圓滿光明雲為十光之首」—“the great light-cloud of complete fullness is the head of the ten lights.” 〔X21n0384 0657a02〕, flowing out the other nine, and answering exactly to the first of the ten vehicles: contemplating the inconceivable object.

This matching may be consulted; it need not be taken as a sense the sūtra text itself carries. But it points out something the sūtra text is in fact doing: the ten lights are not ten ornaments — they have an order. The first is the great and complete fullness, and the other nine flow out of it: first there is a whole, and only then the separate statements of kindness and compassion, wisdom, prajñā, and the rest.

Sixteen Sounds

After the light comes sound, sixteen kinds in a row: one sound for each of the six pāramitās, and then kindness and compassion, joy and equanimity, liberation, the uncontaminated, wisdom, great wisdom, the lion’s roar, the great lion’s roar, cloud and thunder, great cloud and thunder.

The first six are gates of practice, the latter ten are aspects of virtue. Sending forth light is a manifesting; giving forth sound is a speaking. He manifests and then speaks, and what is spoken is counted from giving onward — in the order of the six perfections, the first step is to hand something over.

The judgment set down of old upon these sixteen sounds is: 「此表地藏隨類現身，應機說法」—“This signifies that Kṣitigarbha manifests a body according to kind, and teaches the Dharma as the capacity of the hearer requires.” 〔X21n0384 0658a03〕 — since the situations are not one, the sounds too are many.

Light is sent forth ray by ray; sound comes forth kind by kind. Sending forth light can illumine everyone at once, but teaching the Dharma has to take account of who is standing opposite. And so there are ten lights and sixteen sounds — not that sound has six things more than light, but that meeting a capacity is by its nature a more intricate business than shining upon what is there.

What It Is That the Buddhas Praise

The buddhas of the ten directions have all come, and they have come in order to praise. What is it that they praise? The sūtra writes it plainly: they praise Buddha Śākyamuni for “being able, in the evil world of the five turbidities, to manifest the inconceivable power of great wisdom and spiritual penetration, taming beings hard and stubborn.”

What are the five turbidities? A very homely simile is given of old: 「譬如清水，投之塵土，容貌泪然，名之為濁」—“It is as when dust and earth are thrown into clear water and its look becomes muddied: this is what is named turbidity.” 〔X21n0384 0655c05〕 Throw a handful of earth into clear water and the water is fouled — turbidity is not another thing besides; it is something clear by nature into which something has been stirred. Turbidity is of five kinds: the turbidity of the kalpa, of views, of the afflictions, of beings, of lifespan.

And the weight of the buddhas’ praise falls not on how great the spiritual power is, but on the two characters 「能於」 — being able, in: being able to do the work in a place like this.

To throw light on this, a passage of scripture is cited of old. In the Compassionate Flower Sūtra someone asks the World-Honored One: why do you dwell in this impure evil world of the five turbidities to become a buddha and to teach the three vehicles, rather than taking a pure world? The Buddha answers directly: 「以本願故，取淨妙國」—“It is by reason of an original vow that a pure and wondrous land is taken.” 〔X21n0384 0655c13〕; and it is likewise by reason of an original vow that an impure land is taken. A bodhisattva accomplishes great compassion, and so takes this corrupt, evil, impure land.

The pure land and the defiled land are taken by one and the same original vow.

This line is worth stopping over. We readily think of a vow as “I want a good place.” What is said here is that some people’s vow is for a bad place — not that they like what is bad, but that someone there needs them.

This praise at the head of the sūtra praises exactly this. And the bodhisattva the whole sūtra goes on to speak of does exactly this too — and the place he goes to is deeper than the Sahā world.

Śākyamuni: Two Non-Abidings

A word in passing about the name of the one who is praised, since it was of old opened out as a matched pair.

Śākya is the clan name, rendered of old as “Able in Humaneness”; Muni is the style-name, rendered of old as “Silent and Still.” And the two lines that lay it most nearly to the bone are these: 「姓從慈悲利物，故不住涅槃」—“The clan name follows from benefiting beings with kindness and compassion, and therefore he does not abide in nirvāṇa.” 〔X21n0384 0655c03〕 and 「字取智慧冥理，故不住生死」—“The style-name takes its sense from wisdom merging with principle, and therefore he does not abide in birth-and-death.” 〔X21n0384 0655c04〕

Compassion walks outward, and so he does not stop inside nirvāṇa; wisdom tallies inward, and so he does not fall into birth-and-death.

One name, and he abides at neither end. This is not a play on words — the vow made by the elder’s son in this very chapter closes 「盡令解脫，而我自身，方成佛道」—“until all are wholly delivered, and only then shall I myself accomplish the buddha’s path.” 〔T13n0412 0778b16〕, and that is walking exactly the side of not abiding in nirvāṇa, and walking it to the furthest point. (The line handed down in later ages, 「地獄未空，誓不成佛」—“while the hells are not empty I vow not to become a buddha” 〔ZW06n0052 0275a18〕, comes from a Song bodhimaṇḍa rite and is not text of this sūtra.)

Three Waves of the Assembly

The audience arrives in three waves.

The first wave is the devas, nāgas, ghosts, and spirits, called by name from the Heaven of the Four Great Kings all the way to the Heaven of the Sphere of Neither-Perception-nor-Non-Perception, more than twenty tiers of heaven without one omitted. The second wave is the spirits: of the sea, of the great rivers, of the rivers, of trees, of mountains, of the earth, of streams and marshes, of the crops, of the day, of the night, of empty space, of the heavens, of food and drink, of grass and trees. The third wave is the ghost kings: Evil-Eyed, Blood-Devourer, Devourer of Vital Essence, Devourer of Embryos and Eggs, Spreader of Sickness, Gatherer of Poison — and then the tone turns all at once — Kindly-Hearted, Blessing and Benefit, Great Love and Reverence.

The order of these three waves is worth stopping over. The sūtra does not invite the upper realms alone. It writes from the heavens down to the mountains, rivers, grass, and trees, and then down to ghost kings who devour blood, vital essence, and embryos and eggs by trade; and it sets the ghost king Kindly-Hearted and the ghost king Great Love and Reverence in the same string with them, and says of them all alike that they “came and gathered in assembly.”

A sūtra that is going to speak of the hells begins by inviting the neighbors of the hells in at the door, and names them all, good and bad without distinction, as those present.

A Number That Cannot Be Counted

The assembly complete, the Buddha asks Mañjuśrī: do you know how many there are.

Mañjuśrī answers without hedging: with my own spiritual power, taking the measure of it for a thousand kalpas, I cannot know. The Buddha then says: even when I look with the buddha-eye, the count is still not exhausted.

This line is a pivot in the sūtra. The reading handed down points out what it is for: 「此正抑果揚因，遜己尊彼」—“This is precisely to press down the fruit and raise up the cause, to yield on one’s own part and honor the other.” 〔X21n0384 0664c19〕 — the Buddha presses his own fruition down and lifts Kṣitigarbha’s causal practice up. What is pressed down is himself; what is raised up is another.

And that number which cannot be counted to the end — what is it? The sūtra says so itself in the next breath: “All these are ones whom Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva, over kalpas long past, has already delivered, is now delivering, and has yet to deliver; has already brought to accomplishment, is now bringing to accomplishment, and has yet to bring to accomplishment.”

It is not that the audience is large; it is that the people Kṣitigarbha has delivered are many. This one question and one answer convert the head-count of the whole assembly into one bodhisattva’s workload.

Mañjuśrī then asks about the causal ground. He states his reason for asking quite frankly: he himself believes as soon as he hears, but the śrāvakas of the lesser fruit, the eight classes of devas and nāgas, and the beings of ages to come will certainly doubt when they hear a thing like this; and even if they force themselves to accept it, they will hardly escape slandering.

So this question is not one Mañjuśrī asks for himself. The sūtra has written the doubt in beforehand, here.

The Simile of the Motes and the Kalpas

The Buddha answers with a simile.

All the grasses and trees and thickets and groves of the great trichiliocosm, the rice, hemp, bamboo, and reeds, the mountains, stones, and fine motes of dust: each item counted as one number; each such number counted as one Ganges; each grain of sand in one Ganges counted as one world; each mote of dust in one world counted as one kalpa; and the number of motes accumulated within one kalpa taken over again, all of it, as so many kalpas.

The time since Kṣitigarbha realized the tenth ground is a thousand times more than that simile.

The way the simile walks is an enlarging layer upon layer: item → number → Ganges → grain of sand → world → mote → kalpa. Each layer takes the “smallest unit” of the layer above and makes it the “one” of the layer below. At the last, even the kalpa is broken down into motes and counted over again.

And when the Buddha has finished this long string he adds one line: how much longer still when Kṣitigarbha was on the grounds of the śrāvaka and the pratyekabuddha. Which is to say that what has been counted above is only the stretch after he realized the tenth ground.

The sūtra gives no total. What it gives is a way of counting that cannot be finished.

Two Past Lives: One Saw the Marks, One Saw a Mother

For the practice and the vow of the causal ground, the sūtra raises two accounts from the past.

The first: Kṣitigarbha was once the son of a great elder. He saw the marks and excellences of a buddha and the adornment of his thousandfold blessings, and asked that buddha what practice and what vow gained such marks. The buddha answered: if you would realize this body, you must for a long time deliver all beings who undergo suffering. And so he made his vow — throughout kalpas to come beyond all reckoning, for the beings of the six destinies who are guilty and suffering I shall set out every kind of skillful means, and only when they are all liberated shall I myself accomplish the way of a buddha.

The starting point of the vow is a most ordinary state of mind: to see something good and to want it — a mind we recognize as well. The sūtra does not write that he first aroused great compassion; it writes first that he saw the marks and excellences and was moved. What was sought was a buddha’s body, and the answer he got was sentient beings.

The second: the brahmin woman. Her mother believed in wrong teachings and slighted the Three Jewels; she set out every kind of skillful means to exhort her mother to give rise to right view, and her mother, without having come to complete faith, died, and her spirit fell into the Avīci Hell.

Her way of going about it was in three steps: she sold her house and lands, sought out incense and flowers and offering-implements in abundance, and made a great offering at the stūpa-monastery. Then she gazed upon that honored countenance and bowed, and a very human thought arose in her mind — a buddha’s name is Great Awakening, and he is complete in all wisdom; if he were in the world, perhaps I could ask him where my mother is.

The thought — so like one that would arise in us — had barely settled when a voice in the air answered it.

The Sea of Karma

She sat upright and recollected the Buddha for one day and one night, and suddenly she was at the shore of a sea.

The sūtra writes this sea in the most concrete way: the waters surge and boil; the evil beasts are all of them iron-bodied, flying and running above the sea, chasing one another east and west; men and women in the hundreds of thousands of myriads rise and sink in the sea and are seized and devoured in the scramble by the evil beasts; the yakṣas have many hands and many eyes, many feet and many heads, the teeth of their mouths thrusting outward, keen as sword-blades, driving the guilty ones near the beasts, and striking and seizing them themselves besides, wrenching head and foot together.

And then the sūtra writes one line: “At that time the brahmin woman, by the power of her recollection of the Buddha, was naturally without fear.”

She was not moved away, and she was not screened from it. Not one part of the sight was taken off. Only, she was not afraid.

The ghost king Poisonless tells her where this sea comes from: when beings of Jambudvīpa who have done evil have newly died, if after forty-nine days no one has performed meritorious deeds on their behalf, and if in life they had no wholesome causes either, then according to the hell their own karma has called forth, they naturally cross this sea first. A hundred thousand yojanas east of this sea is another sea, where the suffering is twice this; further east is yet another, where it doubles again. What the evil causes of the three kinds of karma have called down is together named the sea of karma.

When she asks after her mother, the ghost king first puts a question back: the bodhisattva’s mother — what deeds did she practise while she lived? The holy woman answers: wrong views; she mocked and slandered the Three Jewels; she believed for a moment and straightway was disrespectful again.

But the answer is this: it is now three days since the guilty woman Yuedili was born into the heavens. The reason: “it is said to be by the gift of a filial child, who made offerings and cultivated blessings for the mother and gave alms to the stūpa-monastery of the Tathāgata Flower of Awakening, King Sovereign in Samādhi” — and not she alone: on that day the guilty ones of the Avīci Hell “all received bliss, and were born away together.”

An offering made by one person who sold her house saved more than her own mother.

Past and Present Joined

Having understood this matter, the holy woman set up a great vow before the stūpa and image: I vow that throughout kalpas to come, for whatever beings there are who are guilty and suffering, I shall set out every kind of skillful means and cause them to be liberated.

At the last the Buddha discloses it: the ghost king Poisonless of that time is the present Bodhisattva Foremost in Riches; the brahmin woman is Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva.

The introductory section ends here. Looking back at this chapter, what it hands over is more than a scene: a number that cannot be counted, showing how much Kṣitigarbha has done; two past lives, showing why he began to do it; and a sea of karma, showing what sort of place it is that he is going to.

And that one sentence the sūtra left at the very front — that he taught the Dharma for his mother — only here shows its weight. The Buddha goes up to heaven and teaches the Dharma for his mother, and what he teaches is a bodhisattva who made his vow because he saved his mother: the one who speaks and the one spoken of are doing the same thing.

Transmission — A Classic of Filial Piety, and a Tiantai Mirror

The above is the sense of this chapter itself. Below, one eye casts its light from the side — the mirror is not the sūtra, only the same passage seen through another way of reading.

The Outline and Commentary on the Sūtra of the Original Vows of Kṣitigarbha Bodhisattva, in six fascicles, was compiled by Lingcheng of the Qing, styled Qinglian, with the Guiding Thread in one fascicle placed before it. The outline and the glosses cited above come from it in their whole frame: the threefold outline with its self-posed question and answer, the separate heading for “he taught the Dharma for his mother,” the division of the three introductions, the matching of the ten lights to the ten vehicles, and the judgment of pressing down the fruit and raising up the cause.

The Dharma-lineage he signs for himself is written plainly: 「嗣興天台教觀正宗第五世」—“fifth in the line succeeding to the orthodox school of the Tiantai teaching and contemplation.” 〔X21n0383 0639a22〕 The manner of glossing likewise states its own standard: 「準智者大師釋經方軌，先明五重玄義」—“Following the rule of Great Master Zhizhe for glossing sūtras, the fivefold profound meaning is first made clear.” 〔X21n0383 0639c10〕 — name, substance, theme, function, and doctrinal classification: he fills in all five for this sūtra: 「今以不思議人法為名」—“now the inconceivable person and dharma are taken as its name.” 〔X21n0383 0639c15〕, the inconceivable nature-consciousness as its substance, practice and vow as its theme, skillful means as its function, and 「開顯無上醍醐為教相」—“the disclosing of the unsurpassed ghee is taken as its doctrinal classification.” 〔X21n0383 0639c17〕 The books he cites show his house at a glance: the Fahua Xuanyi, the Words and Phrases of the Lotus, the Fuxing, Nanyue, and Siming. Reading this sūtra of original vows with a Tiantai eye is where this mirror comes from.

He also explains why he took up the brush. Since this sūtra was translated in the Tang, 「迨今尚無撰集法門，殊為闕典」—“down to the present no compilation of its Dharma-gate has been made; it is a marked gap among the standard works.” 〔X21n0383 0639a05〕 — in a thousand years no one had glossed it phrase by phrase. He divides the form of the work in two: 「遂綜綸貫而釋題」—“and so the guiding thread is drawn together and the title explained.” 〔X21n0383 0639a12〕, and then the outline and commentary are compiled to resolve the sentences. The first fascicle treats the profound meaning; the six that follow run phrase by phrase.

He often carries this eye into the glossing of the sūtra text as well. On the passage of the sending forth of light, he says first that the Tathāgata’s light flows out of the mind of wisdom, and that a single thought of a person inherently possesses the three thousand natures and marks and the hundred realms and thousand suchnesses, so that the two are “not two and not different.” The sixteen kinds of sound he judges thus: 「此表地藏隨類現身，應機說法」—“This signifies that Kṣitigarbha manifests a body according to kind, and teaches the Dharma as the capacity of the hearer requires.” 〔X21n0384 0658a03〕 — since the situations are not one, the sounds too are many. In glossing the elder’s son he cites the ten virtues of an elder set out in the Words and Phrases of the Lotus 〔X21n0384 0667b01〕, reading a worldly title of address as a set of virtues.

He looks for scriptural witness for the two words “original vow” as well. Glossing the evil world of the five turbidities, he cites the question of the bodhisattva Quiet Mind in the Compassionate Flower Sūtra: why does the World-Honored One dwell in this impure evil world of the five turbidities to realize awakening, rather than taking a pure world? The Buddha answers: 「以本願故，取淨妙國」—“It is by reason of an original vow that a pure and wondrous land is taken.” 〔X21n0384 0655c13〕; and it is likewise by reason of an original vow that an impure land is taken. A bodhisattva accomplishes great compassion, and so takes this corrupt, evil, impure land. He cites the Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom too: 「諸佛大悲，徹於骨髓」—“The great compassion of the buddhas penetrates to the very marrow.” 〔X21n0384 0655c16〕 — it does not go by whether a world is fair or foul, but teaches and transforms according to who is to be delivered; as a loving mother loves her child, and though the child has fallen into a privy still labors to pull him out, and does not think it foul.

The pure land and the defiled land are taken by one and the same original vow. This light cast from the side illumines exactly that line of praise at the head of the sūtra — what the buddhas praise is that Śākyamuni is “able, in the evil world of the five turbidities,” to manifest the power of great wisdom and spiritual penetration and to tame beings hard and stubborn.

At the end of the Guiding Thread stands the date 「皇清康熙二十二年」—“the twenty-second year of Kangxi of the Imperial Qing.” 〔X21n0383 0652b02〕; while of the several prefaces placed at the head of the work, two are dated to the fifth year of Jōkyō in Japan, and one records besides that the book was carried from Zhejiang to Nagasaki and printed there. The composition was here, the printed edition there; both facts are set down.

And the sūtra’s own number that cannot be counted is bound to no mirror at all. What is not exhausted in the count even when looked at with the buddha-eye is the beings one bodhisattva has already delivered, is now delivering, and has yet to deliver — and that “yet to deliver” is still open today.