華嚴經 義疏通講 · 冊12Avataṃsaka Sūtra · Exposition Throughout · Vol. 12

A Dharma Gathering — Why It Spends So Long First upon the Asking

What the chapter of the ten samādhis is to expound is ten kinds of great samādhi; and yet its opening runs on and on without so much as touching the content of a single one of them: the World-Honored One enters concentration, the bodhisattvas are set out by name, Universal Eye raises his question, three times he seeks to see Samantabhadra and three times does not see him, the Tathāgata sets up a simile, he teaches the assembly how to contemplate, Samantabhadra manifests his body, the heavens rain down ten thousand kinds of cloud — and only at the very end does the Tathāgata with his own mouth entrust Samantabhadra with the expounding. To one impatient to read the ten samādhis, most of this looks like preamble.

In truth this passage is establishing three things: who is fit to ask, who is fit to expound, and on what ground this Dharma can be uttered at all. Chengguan first distinguishes the coming of the assembly. The coming of the assembly has two senses — spoken of in terms of complete interfusion, what the earlier assemblies made clear, passing through the human and heavenly stations, was the differentiated proper positions contained within the universal gate; what this assembly is to make clear is that the virtue and function that come after the stations still do not depart from the universal gate, and so the differentiated assembly enters the universal, and the return to the palace of Universal Light is for this. Spoken of in terms of sequence, the ten grounds have been expounded before, and here the two awakenings, equal and wondrous, are to be displayed. The reason for the coming of the chapter is more direct still: this chapter is in order to answer the question about the ten samādhis raised in the second assembly.

The question standing before and the answer falling here — and the one who answers is not the Buddha but Samantabhadra: this is why the opening cannot but be long. The expounder has first to be brought forth.

The First Sentence of the Opening — Why It Is “Entering the Samādhi of All Buddhas at the Limit of the Kṣaṇa”

The sūtra opens by setting out time, place, and host: the World-Honored One, in the land of Magadha at the place of awakening of the araṇya Dharma, has just then accomplished perfect awakening, and in the palace of Universal Light he enters the samādhi of all buddhas at the limit of the kṣaṇa. A reader easily takes this for a set formula and passes over it at a glance.

But why this concentration in particular, the limit of the kṣaṇa? Chengguan explains this samādhi as being the exhausting of the true source of dharmas: what is utmost brief in time is named a kṣaṇa, and when one presses that kṣaṇa to the end, the mark of its time is from the first wholly still — there is no real ‘single kṣaṇa’ standing there; and a limit that has no limit is what is called the limit of the kṣaṇa. He says further that the special marking here of ‘entering the limit of the kṣaṇa’ is in order to display that what is about to be expounded is the station of equal awakening: when the bodhisattva grounds are at their end there is still the impermanence of the encumbrance of fruition, the mark of arising is not yet stilled, and it is still called the store-consciousness; but if by uninterrupted knowledge one awakens to the first arising of mind, and mind has no first mark, being far removed from subtle thought, then there is no kṣaṇa at all. Enter this limit, and one sees that the nature of mind constantly abides — this is named ultimate awakening; and therefore the sūtra says that it is the samādhi of all buddhas.

One misreading must be guarded against here: do not read ‘the limit of the kṣaṇa’ as ‘extremely fast’. It is not speed. It is the pursuing of time to the bottom and the finding that it has no bottom. That the World-Honored One enters this concentration before expounding the ten samādhis is a showing of the root of every concentration: concentration is not the shutting of the mind inside a stretch of time, but the ceasing of time itself to stand. Brought down to the reader, this sentence governs the point of entry — if one is still counting how long one has sat, one has not yet touched the concentration this chapter speaks of.

A Hundred Names, of Which the First Thirty All Carry the One Word ‘Wisdom’

The prologue sets out the names of a hundred bodhisattvas, at very great length. Is such a roll worth reading?

It is, because the manner of the setting out is itself an exposition. The sūtra first lists thirty bodhisattvas whose names carry the word ‘wisdom’ — Vajra Wisdom, Peerless Wisdom, Wisdom of Meaningful Speech, Most Victorious Wisdom, and so on all the way to Boundless Wisdom; and only thereafter do seventy set up names of their own — Mindfulness Adornment, Reaching the Limit of Emptiness, Nature Adornment, Very Deep Object, and so on, down to the last few: Vajra Penetration, Vajra Knowledge, Vajra Flame, Vajra Wisdom, Universal Eye, Sun of the Buddha, Upholding the Secret Meaning of the Buddha’s Vajra, Adornment of the Knowledge of the Object of the Universal Eye. Chengguan glosses this, saying: that the first thirty share the name of wisdom is to display unmixed virtue; that the seventy from Mindfulness Adornment onward have names of their own is to display mixed virtue.

The misreading to be set aside is this: it is not display for its own sake. At a gathering that is to expound concentration, what comes out first is a whole rank of ‘wisdom’ — concentration is not a thing that stands apart from wisdom. And what matters more: the one who requests the Dharma, Universal Eye, has his name hidden in the tail of those seventy separate names. Chengguan points to it exactly: Universal Eye makes the request because only with a universal eye can one see the universal Dharma. The eye being named universal, what it sees can be universal — the very name of the one who requests the Dharma is itself the condition of admission to this chapter.

What It Is That Universal Eye Asks

If one glances at Universal Eye’s question only once, it looks as though he is asking after a number: the bodhisattva Samantabhadra, and the bodhisattvas who abide in the practices and vows of Samantabhadra — how many samādhis and liberations have they accomplished?

But the latter half of the question is the bone of it: what he asks is that these bodhisattvas, among the great samādhis of a bodhisattva, enter, or come forth, or at times abide therein — and he states his own reason: it is just because they can skillfully enter and skillfully come forth from the inconceivable and vast samādhis that they can transform themselves with mastery and spiritual penetration within all samādhis without rest. So what he asks is not how many kinds of concentration there are, but how the thing called ‘mastery in entering and coming forth’ is possible at all. Chengguan judges the portion of the request into four: Universal Eye makes his request, the Tathāgata permits the question, he raises the Dharma and asks directly, and the benefit of the question is praised; and the Tathāgata’s answer fastens exactly upon that benefit — it is for the benefit of the hosts of bodhisattvas past, future, and present that you ask after this meaning.

A misreading to be set aside: do not read this question as curiosity. A question about the Dharma stands only because the questioner can already see the universal Dharma, and because what is asked bears upon the deliverance of the bodhisattvas of the three times. Brought down to the ground: whether a question is rightly asked depends upon where the asker is standing — and this is also why, further on, the Tathāgata does not answer it himself but sends him to ask Samantabhadra.

The Name Is Spoken, and Yet the Man Cannot Be Found — Three Seekings Without Seeing

After permitting the question the Tathāgata does something unlooked for: he does not expound the ten samādhis, but only says that the bodhisattva Samantabhadra is here now, and bids Universal Eye go and ask him himself. The moment the assembly hears the name of Samantabhadra they obtain measureless samādhis, their minds are unobstructed, they see countless buddhas — and yet, turning to observe everywhere throughout the gathering, they can by no means see Samantabhadra, nor even the seat where he sits.

Chengguan outlines this as three seekings, in all of which they do not see: the first is the seeking of thirst and not seeing, the second is the seeking of renewed observation and not seeing, the third is the seeking by the power of samādhi and not seeing. The reason for not seeing the first time the sūtra states itself: it is sustained by the awesome power of the Tathāgata, and it is also the mastery of Samantabhadra’s spiritual penetration that makes it so; and Chengguan explains the intent of it — it is to make the great assembly thirst, so that the deep purport may be displayed. The second time Universal Eye asks straight out where Samantabhadra is now, and the Buddha answers that he is right here in this assembly at the place of awakening, dwelling close beside him, never once having moved; the assembly seeks again, and still does not see. The third time Universal Eye enters ten thousand asaṃkhyeyas of samādhis and observes everywhere by the power of concentration, and still does not see.

The misreading to be set aside is this: Samantabhadra is not hiding. The Buddha has already said plainly that he has not moved — not moving and yet not able to be seen is precisely what this passage is teaching. The reason for not seeing does not lie in the object’s having hidden itself, but in the power that sees not being of a measure with the object seen. Brought down to the ground: the commonest frustration in practice is ‘but I have truly searched so hard’, and this passage’s answer is that if the manner of searching is still a hunting outward after an object, the greater the force the less it will be seen.

The Reason the Buddha Gives: The Dwelling Place Is Very Deep

When Universal Eye seeks a second time and does not see, the Buddha gives a direct explanation: the dwelling place of the bodhisattva Samantabhadra is very deep and beyond speaking. He has obtained the boundless gates of wisdom, entered the samādhi of the lion’s stretching, obtained the unsurpassed functioning of mastery, entered the limit of purity and non-obstruction, brought forth the ten powers of a Tathāgata, taken the treasury of the Dharma realm as his body, is guarded in mind by all Tathāgatas alike, and can within a single thought enter and realize the undifferentiated knowledge of the buddhas of the three times — and therefore you do not see him.

Chengguan judges this passage very finely: the text has ten phrases, the first being the general, the eight in the middle the particular, and the last the conclusion; and the eight particular phrases make four pairs. One pair is the depth of the vast knowledge and the surpassing concentration — the gate of knowledge being boundless, how should a bounded knowledge behold the working of this concentration? The rising and sinking of the concentration is without fear, its opening out and drawing in has mastery, and it may be sought only with a supramundane concentration, and so it cannot be seen. The next two phrases are the depth of the outward function and the inward realization; the next two, the depth of the obtaining of power and the completing of the body; and the last two, the depth of the many guardings and the swift realization. By these eight depths, therefore, he cannot be seen.

A misreading to be set aside: ‘very deep’ is not an adjectival compliment but a statement of fact — Samantabhadra takes the treasury of the Dharma realm as his body, and the body being the Dharma realm, there is no position inside the Dharma realm that could be pointed out. This answers the earlier doubt as well: it is not that he is not present; it is that the very form of the question ‘where is he’ is wrong.

The Conjured Form Within the Conjuring: Even the Unspeakable Is Given a Measure

After the third failure to see, the Buddha does not go on directly with the deep meaning; he puts a question to Universal Eye: is there anyone who can say where the manifold conjured forms within a conjuring of letters dwell? Universal Eye answers: there is not.

This one question and answer is the pivot of the whole passage. The Buddha then says: if the conjured form within a conjuring cannot be spoken of, how much less the secret object of the body, of the speech, and of the mind of Samantabhadra, and the wish to enter therein and see therein. So ‘not able to be seen’ is not a matter of degree but of kind — a conjured form has no dwelling at all, and to ask where it dwells is a question that does not stand as a question. The Buddha then raises the essential of it: Samantabhadra by a vajra wisdom enters the Dharma realm universally; within all worlds he neither travels nor dwells; he knows that the bodies of all sentient beings are, just as they are, not bodies; there is neither going nor coming, nothing depended upon and nothing contrived, no stirring and no turning, and he reaches to the ultimate bound of the Dharma realm.

The misreading to be set aside is this: it is not being said that Samantabhadra is a conjuring. The simile takes only the one part, ‘having no dwelling place’. Where it comes to ground is the last passage — the Buddha says that if a person sees Samantabhadra, or serves him, or hears his name, or thinks of him, or recollects him, or gives rise to faith and understanding, or observes him diligently, or has only begun to turn toward him, or is at this moment seeking him, or raises up a vow, so long as it is unbroken and continuous, all of them gain benefit and not one passes in vain. Not to be able to see is not the same as not to be able to seek; the merit of the seeking is not wasted, only what is gained does not lie in ‘catching sight of a person’.

Teaching How Seeing Arises: Only Three Kinds of Mind Can See

Then how is he to be seen at all? The Buddha gives a definite teaching, and its sequence is clear. He bids the great assembly pay reverence to Samantabhadra once again and make request with earnestness — this is the first step; then he bids them with single-minded sincerity observe the ten directions and contemplate the body of Samantabhadra as appearing before them, thinking in this way throughout the whole Dharma realm, with a deep mind having faith and understanding, turning away from all things in weariness — this is the second step; and last he bids them vow to be of one and the same practice and vow with Samantabhadra — to enter the true Dharma that is not two, to have their body appear universally within all worlds, to know entirely the differences among the faculties of sentient beings, and to gather together the path of Samantabhadra in every place — this is the third step. The sūtra says plainly: if they are able to raise up such great vows, then they shall gain the sight of him.

Chengguan explains these three steps thus: the first is to make the preceding mind strive with diligence; next, under ‘and again you should’, he sets forth the deep contemplation separately — before this they had abandoned the object and sought elsewhere, and so did not know its substance; now they are made to observe the ten directions together, and so know that its substance is everywhere; and it is in dependence upon this contemplation that they gain the sight. Last, under ‘vow to be of one and the same practice’, the vow is raised and the aspiration to equal him. These three minds being complete, they are able to gain the sight. He also asks on the reader’s behalf a question that matters: Universal Eye’s station is already deep — why must he cultivate contemplation over again? The answer has two senses: first, because his station is not yet equal to Samantabhadra’s; second, to display the depth of the Dharma and to encourage those who come after.

A misreading to be set aside: ‘contemplating him as appearing before you’ here is not the making of an image. The weight of the second step falls on ‘throughout the whole Dharma realm’ — the changing of the direction of the seeking from ‘some one place’ to ‘all places’. Brought down to the ground: what the one who cannot see must change is not his force but his bearing; and the third step is fiercer still — the condition of truly seeing Samantabhadra is that one’s vow be the same as his, not that one’s eye meet his.

The Manifesting of the Body and of the Signs: Not Seeing Displays the Depth, Manifesting Does Not Hinder the Function

The three minds being complete, Samantabhadra straightway, by the spiritual power of liberation, manifests a form-body according to what each is fit to see: they see him drawing near to the Tathāgata and sitting upon a lotus seat within the host of bodhisattvas; they see him too in all other worlds at the place of every buddha, coming from thence one after another in succession; and they see him at those buddhas’ places expounding the practices of a bodhisattva, opening up the path of the knowledge of omniscience, setting forth clearly the spiritual penetrations of the bodhisattvas, distinguishing the awesome virtue of the bodhisattvas, and manifesting the buddhas of the three times. Chengguan sets down here one utterly spare remark: not seeing displays the depth, and manifesting does not hinder the function.

Then come the confirming signs. From the three powers joined — the great awesome spiritual power of the Buddha, the power of the faith and understanding of the bodhisattvas, and the power of Samantabhadra’s original vow — there rains down of itself ten thousand kinds of cloud: flowers, garlands, incense, powdered incense, canopies, robes, adorning gear, rare jewels, burning incense, silks; worlds beyond speaking quake in six ways, the music of the heavens is heard afar, a great light shines universally, the suffering of the three evil destinies is removed, worlds beyond speaking are purified and adorned, and bodhisattvas beyond speaking enter the practice of Samantabhadra, accomplish the practice of Samantabhadra, and bring his practices and vows to complete fullness, accomplishing unsurpassed perfect awakening.

The misreading to be set aside is this: this passage is commonly read as ‘auspicious portents’. But its cause is the three powers, and one of those three in particular is the power of the faith and understanding of the bodhisattvas — the signs are not a reward arriving from outside; the faith and understanding of those who seek the Dharma have become one part of their cause. Brought down to the ground: half the adornment of a Dharma gathering is given by those who listen to the Dharma.

The Entrusting: The One Who Expounds Is Appointed

After the signs appear, Universal Eye enumerates before the Buddha the abidings of Samantabhadra — abiding in great awesome virtue, in the peerless, in that beyond which none passes, in non-retrogression, in evenness, in the indestructible, in all differentiated dharmas, in all undifferentiated dharmas, in the dwelling place of the skillful minds of all sentient beings, in the samādhi of mastery and liberation in all dharmas; the Buddha confirms what he says and adds to it the ten kinds of pure merit of Samantabhadra. Only at this point are the qualifications of the expounder established.

Then the Tathāgata with his own mouth tells Samantabhadra: you should for Universal Eye and the hosts of bodhisattvas of this assembly expound the ten samādhis, causing them to enter skillfully and to fulfill all the practices and vows of Samantabhadra; and he states the benefit — because the bodhisattvas proclaim these ten great samādhis, bodhisattvas of the past have already gained deliverance, bodhisattvas of the present now gain it, and bodhisattvas of the future shall gain it. Then the ten names are listed: universal light, wondrous light, going in succession to the buddha-lands everywhere, the practice of the pure and deep mind, the treasury of the adornments of the past that are known, the treasury of the light of knowledge, knowing the buddha-adornments of all worlds, the differentiated bodies of sentient beings, mastery in the Dharma realm, the unobstructed wheel. Chengguan explains why all ten names are called ‘great’: because a concentration of fullness of cause is commensurate with the Dharma realm. And he explains the names one by one — of the first he says that the deeds and functions of body and mind being everywhere and wholly contained is ‘universal’, and that the illumination of knowledge having mastery is named ‘light’; of the second, that body and knowledge illuminating everywhere is ‘light’, and that surpassing functions reflecting one within another is ‘wondrous’.

A misreading to be set aside: these ten names are not ten techniques. Chengguan, explaining the ninth concentration, says that it is entering and coming forth with mastery in the eighteen elements, the eye and the rest, and further the knowing of the bound of the phenomenal Dharma realm together with unobstructed mastery in the principial Dharma realm — what the names point to is the opening and closing of a domain, not a list of methods.

The Four Rounds of Praise and the Ten Gates: How the Surpassing Virtue of Concentration Is Praised

After the listing of the names, the sūtra praises the virtue of these ten concentrations at very great length; read straight through it sounds like a string of encomia, but in fact its layers are distinct. Chengguan judges it into four rounds: first, praise with respect to the person, the person being surpassing therefore the Dharma is surpassing; second, praise with respect to cultivation, first making clear the accomplishing of the cultivation and then the benefit of it; third, praise of the Dharma directly; fourth, praise with respect to realization.

The passage of direct praise of the Dharma is the ten sentences with the word ‘gate’: the gate of the marks of dharmas, the gate of awakened knowing, the gate of the unvanquished banner of the knowledge of all modes, the gate of the practices and vows of Samantabhadra, the gate of the fierce and swift spiritual penetrations and vows, the gate of all the all-holding and eloquence, the gate of the differences among the dharmas of the three times, the gate of the manifesting of all the buddhas, the gate that establishes all sentient beings by Sarvajñā, and the gate that purifies and adorns all worlds by the spiritual power of a buddha. Chengguan judges these ten gates into five pairs — the penetrating awakening of object and knowledge, the entering and roaming of cause and fruit, the general distinguishing of coming forth and abiding, that from which the dharmas of a buddha proceed, and the adorning of lands and the gathering in of beings — and says that there is nothing that is not established by these. And upon the four sentences of universal entering — entering universally into all worlds without attachment, into all realms of sentient beings without grasping, into all bodies without hindrance, into the whole Dharma realm and knowing it has no bound — he points out one thing as the eye of it: the reason all of them say ‘universally enters’ is that each and every one of them exhausts the domain of the jeweled net of Śakra.

The misreading to be set aside is this: these words of praise are not a heaping up of rhetoric; they are an outline. Brought down to the ground, in reading a long passage of praise one may ask a single question: is this sentence praising the person, the cultivation, the Dharma, or the realization? Once that is sorted, the long passage is no longer an undifferentiated stretch of grandeur.

Receiving the Charge: The Opening Ends at Last in a Turning

At the close of the main portion the Tathāgata gathers it into one concluding exhortation: therefore, Samantabhadra, you should now distinguish and expound at length the ten great samādhis of all bodhisattvas, for the assembly of this gathering all wish to hear them. And immediately the sūtra writes but one sentence — the bodhisattva Samantabhadra, receiving the intent of the Tathāgata, observed Universal Eye and the hosts of bodhisattvas and told them, saying — and with that the prologue and request come to an end, the next sentence entering upon the first concentration.

This sentence is short enough to look like a scene-change, but it is in fact the gathering up of the whole passage. Chengguan judges the portion of the exposition into three: first the general telling upon receiving the charge, next the separate explanation of the ten concentrations, and last the general conclusion of the ten numbers; and this sentence is the head of that ‘general telling upon receiving the charge’. From the World-Honored One’s first entering the samādhi at the limit of the kṣaṇa to Samantabhadra’s here opening his mouth upon receiving the charge, there lie between them three failures to see, one simile, three minds, one manifesting of the body, and one showing of signs — and all of these are for nothing else than to hand the authority to expound from the Buddha’s hand into Samantabhadra’s, and to hand it over before the whole assembly and by name.

Brought down to the ground: this passage teaches one very plain thing — the Dharma does not come of itself. There must be one who asks rightly, one who requests sincerely, and one who is appointed to expound, and only then will the Dharma be uttered. The main text of the ten samādhis begins with the next sentence; and that it can begin at all rests wholly upon this passage.

Lineage

The explanation of this passage takes Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu as its axis: the reason for its coming, the explanation of the name, the purport, the outline into five portions, and further the ten phrases of the prologue matched to the twenty-one kinds of merit, the four divisions of the portion of the request, the six divisions of the portion of showing the expounder, the four divisions of the main portion, the four pairs and eight depths of the depth of the dwelling place, and the five pairs of the ten gates — all of these come from his hand, and it is to these that each section of this piece is fastened. Fazang’s Tanxuan ji lacks an explanation of this chapter: the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka has no chapter of the ten samādhis, and his commentary follows the order of the sixty-fascicle text, and so there is no separate section of explanation; and the collation with the parallel translation likewise fails entirely for this reason. This is a limit of the witnesses, not a choice made by the ancient worthies. Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji has no separate explanation of this chapter, and only in one remark within an outline elsewhere fastens this question of the ten samādhis upon the chapter of the ten forbearances as its answer, which stands together with Chengguan’s judgment that the chapter is in order to answer the question about the ten samādhis raised in the second assembly; the two are recorded without adjudication. Li Tongxuan’s Xin Huayan jing lun does not explain this chapter section by section, but sets it out within his general discussion as the pervading of the substance of concentration, and, on the strength of the sameness of the opening sentences of this chapter and of the Chapter on Detachment from the World, fastens the two chapters upon the first assembly that precedes — this is one track of symbolic reading, going its own way beside Chengguan’s track of the outline of assemblies and stations, and it too is recorded without adjudication. As for the compendia that set out the doctrinal classification of the Huayan house, they have no bearing upon the prologue of this chapter, and the absence is recorded in accordance with fact.

Why the First of the Ten Concentrations Must Begin by Asking ‘What Is the Samādhi of Universal Light’

The chapter of the ten concentrations does not open by teaching anyone how to enter concentration; Samantabhadra first sets up a question: “What is the samādhi of universal light of a bodhisattva-mahāsattva?” — the name is asked first, and only then is the sense explained. What this one question is meant to head off is a common misunderstanding: the notion that “concentration” means the mind coming to a stop, the objects switched off, nothing known at all. If that were so, then the deeper the concentration the less one would know, and concentration and wisdom would become two roads forking apart. Yet the first thing the scripture answers with is precisely “the inexhaustibility of wisdom” — so the very definition of this concentration comes down, at the first stroke, upon knowing. It is named “universal light”: universal means everywhere, light means illumining — this is not shutting the world outside, it is letting the illumination reach into every place. In reading this concentration, first set down the old impression that ‘concentration means closing the eyes and paying no heed’; only then will the five parts that follow read smoothly. Chengguan outlines the text explaining this concentration into five parts — the inexhaustibility of wisdom, the boundlessness of mind, mastery in concentration, the skillful manifesting by wisdom, and the transcendence of contemplation — and judges the first two to be the skillful means of the concentration, the third to be its very substance, and the last two to be its ascendant function. This is the skeleton for reading the first concentration.

The Ten Kinds of Inexhaustible Dharmas: What Exactly Is It That Is Inexhaustible

The first part says that he “has ten kinds of inexhaustible dharmas,” and lists ten clauses: the wisdom of the buddhas' appearing, the wisdom of the transformations of sentient beings, the wisdom of the worlds as reflected images, the wisdom of entering deeply into the Dharma realm, the wisdom skilled in gathering in bodhisattvas, the wisdom of bodhisattvas not turning back, the wisdom skilled in observing the meaning of all dharmas, the wisdom skilled in holding the strength of the mind, the wisdom abiding in the vast mind of awakening, the wisdom abiding in all the dharmas of the buddhas and in the power of the vow of omniscience — and every one of the ten clauses closes with “inexhaustible.” What is it that is inexhaustible? It is easily misread as ‘this person's power of concentration can never be used up.’ What the scripture speaks of is not strength; it is that the objects which wisdom faces are themselves without limit: because the appearing of the buddhas is inexhaustible, the wisdom that knows their appearing is inexhaustible; because the transformations of sentient beings are inexhaustible, the wisdom that knows those transformations is inexhaustible. The objects being inexhaustible, the wisdom that illumines them will never come to a day when it reaches the end. Chengguan explains these ten clauses as five pairs: the first two are the buddha who is served and the beings who are converted; the next two are the world where converting is done and the Dharma realm by which it is done; the next two are the beginning and the end of gathering in and guarding; the next two are the dharma that is held and the mind that holds it; the last two are the mind of awakening at the beginning and the power of the vow at the end — head and tail linked together, so that the whole course of a life of practice is contained in it. And therefore the close of this part says, “these are what are called the ten kinds of inexhaustible dharmas of a bodhisattva-mahāsattva,” a close cut clean through: this is not a list of ten meritorious items, it is one whole structure of ‘knowing that has no end.’ Brought down to use, this part is meant to cancel permanently the thought ‘I have learned all there is to learn.’

The Ten Kinds of Boundless Mind: Why the Mind Is Boundless

The second part turns to say that he “gives rise to ten kinds of boundless mind.” The part before spoke of what is known being inexhaustible; this part speaks of giving rise to mind in the face of objects. Chengguan puts it plainly: because the objects are boundless the mind is boundless — the boundlessness of the mind is no boast about the largeness of one's own capacity, it is forced out of one by boundless objects. To liberate all sentient beings; to serve, to make offerings to, and to see everywhere all the buddhas; to receive and hold the dharmas of the buddhas without forgetting; to display spiritual transformations; for the sake of gaining a buddha's power not to abandon the practices of awakening; to enter everywhere into the subtle objects of omniscience and there expound the Dharma; to enter everywhere into the inconceivable and vast objects of a buddha; to take deep delight in a buddha's eloquence and receive the dharmas of the buddhas; to display bodies of mastery and enter the assemblies at the seats of awakening of the tathāgatas — eleven clauses, and every one of them closes with “boundless mind.” Here is a place where readers commonly grow doubtful: ten clauses are announced, eleven are in fact listed, and the close still says “these are the ten” — is this a dropped graph or an intruded one? Chengguan answers without hesitation: that there are eleven clauses is a case of a number added within a ten — in the text of this scripture a set of ten often has a clause added out beyond it; it is a formal usage, not a disordered text. Brought down to use: the measure of one's aspiration is not reckoned by oneself, it is settled by the objects one faces; and since the objects are boundless, the mind is not permitted to set itself a ceiling.

Entering in Every Direction and Rising in Every Direction: Why Mastery in Concentration Is Called “Differentiation”

The third part is the very substance of the concentration. The scripture lists ten kinds of “wisdom of differentiation in entering samādhi”: he enters concentration in the east and rises from it in the west, and so on down to entering in the upper quarter and rising in the lower. Why is it called differentiation? Chengguan explains: by reason of the great wisdom and great mind that went before, he has mastery in samādhi; the quarter of entering and the quarter of rising are not one, and the entering and the rising are not the same, and so it is called differentiation. What is most easily misread here is to take it for a display of spiritual powers — as though the bodhisattva were playing a game with the compass points. In fact what these ten clauses display is a plain thing: if concentration is truly at one's mastery, then entering and rising are not bound by any quarter or place; one need not be in a certain spot in order to enter, nor stay in that same spot in order to rise. An ordinary person's concentration must be propped up by outward conditions, and scatters as soon as he changes place; but in this concentration both ends, entering and rising, are each at their own mastery, and so it is called mastery. This part is the pivot of the whole concentration: the wisdom and mind of the first two parts are the skillful means of entering, the skillfulness and transcendence of the last two are the ascendant function of rising, and this middle part alone is the substance of the concentration. Brought down to use: to test whether a concentration is genuine, do not look at how settled one is while entering; look at whether one scatters on coming out.

Body upon Body upon One Lotus Flower: The Ten Clauses of the Exposition in Terms of Dharma

The fourth part speaks of the “skillful wisdom in entering the great samādhi,” and lays it out first as an exposition in terms of dharma. The scripture begins from a proportion of the utmost hugeness: taking a three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system for a single lotus flower, he manifests a body filling that flower and sits there cross-legged; within that body he manifests again a three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system, and in it a hundred koṭis of sets of four continents; within each set of four continents he manifests a hundred koṭis of bodies; each one of those bodies enters a hundred koṭis of a hundred koṭis of three-thousandfold great-thousand world-systems; and so on down to each capacity of faculties accomplishing a hundred koṭis of a hundred koṭis of a bodhisattva's deeds that do not turn back. These ten clauses go deeper layer by layer, and the further down they go the finer they grow. The misreading to be headed off is to read this as a contest of piled-up numbers. Chengguan outlines these ten clauses as “setting forth severally how it turns ever deeper and finer,” and takes the clause that follows as “displaying as a whole the clarity that is apart from characteristics” — the scripture itself gathers it up, saying, “yet the bodies so manifested are neither one nor many, and in entering concentration and rising from it there is no confusion at all.” This one sentence is the eye of the whole passage: however many are manifested, it does not fall into a “many”; though it was one to begin with, it does not fall into a “one” either. Once a number is fixed upon it, the manifoldness becomes a pile; only when the characteristics of one and many are left behind is the manifoldness unobstructed. Brought down to use: this passage is not asking anyone to picture a scene; it is asking that, in the densest place of all, one should see the absence of confusion.

The Asura King's Conjured Body: Vast Enough to Match Sumeru, and His Own Body Not Spoiled by a Hair

Next the scripture raises a simile. Rāhu, king of the asuras, has an own body seven hundred yojanas long, and conjures a form a hundred and sixty-eight thousand yojanas long, showing half of it out of the great sea so that it stands level with Mount Sumeru. The weight of the simile does not lie in the hugeness but in the sentence that follows: although he transforms his body to such a length, still “he does not spoil the characteristics of his own body” — the aggregates, the elements, and the sense-bases are all just as they were, his mind is not confused, he does not give rise toward the conjured body to the thought that it is someone else, nor toward his own body to the thought that it is not himself; the body he was born into constantly receives every kind of pleasure, while the conjured body constantly displays every kind of masterful spiritual power and might. The four clauses of exclusion here are drawn very fine: he does not mistake the conjured body for another, and he does not mistake his own body for something that is not himself — in the conjured and in the original, he is deluded at neither end. Were he deluded, transformation would become a splitting apart. The scripture takes this simile precisely to show that the preceding ‘neither one nor many, no confusion in entering or rising’ is no airy talk: even an asura, whose anger burns fiercely, can manage a transformation of form in which the original is not spoiled — from which one may see that ‘transforming without confusion’ is not in itself a thing hard to conceive. Brought down to use: from this simile a reader may examine the several identities he takes on in different settings — to change into a different person when the setting changes, that is the real confusion.

Setting the Ascendant off against the Inferior: If Even an Asura Can Do So, How Much More a Bodhisattva

The simile once set up, the scripture makes the joining by “setting the ascendant off against the inferior.” The asura king has greed, anger, and delusion, and is furnished with arrogance in every form, and yet he can transform and manifest his body in this way; how much more a bodhisattva, who understands deeply that the dharmas of mind are like a conjuring trick, the worlds like a dream, the arising of the buddhas like a reflected image, the worlds like something conjured up, and words and sounds altogether like an echo. These five “likes” are most easily read as a nihilism: if everything is like an illusion and like a dream, need anything be taken in earnest at all? The scripture immediately blocks that road — “he sees the dharma as it truly is, and takes the dharma as it truly is for his body,” he knows that all dharmas are pure in their original nature, understands that neither body nor mind has any substantial reality, has a body abiding everywhere in measureless objects, and with the vast light of a buddha's wisdom purely cultivates all the practices of awakening. Plainly, then, what the five likenesses break is the grasping at substantial existence, not the deeds that are done; having broken the view of a substance, he takes instead the dharma as it truly is for a body, and abides instead everywhere in measureless objects while cultivating the practices of awakening. If the inferior, by the force of his afflictions, can already transform and manifest, how much more can the ascendant, by his seeing of things as they truly are. Brought down to use: if the view that things are like an illusion has made someone lazy, then he has read it in the wrong direction; the proper fruit of that view is a greater capacity to act, not a smaller one.

Passing beyond the World, Detachment from the World: What Sort of Departing Is This

The statement of the fifth part names four things: abiding in this samādhi, he passes beyond the world, departs from the world, cannot be confused, and cannot be screened off and robbed of his light. The word “departing” is most easily misread as keeping clear of things — as though once one entered concentration one had nothing more to do with the world. Yet the text below plainly says that what this concentration contemplates is “the worlds entering everywhere into his body,” from which one may see that it is not a leaving of the world but a not being deluded by it while within it. To be confused is to be pulled about by objects; to be screened off and robbed is to have one's light covered and taken away by another light. This concentration is named universal light precisely in the sense that nothing can screen it off and rob it: since the light illumines everywhere, there is nothing that can cover it. Chengguan too, in explaining the joining of this part, ties “nothing can screen it off and rob it” to the nature of dharmas embracing all and to all being seen at one time and at a stroke — because everything is illumined and seen, there is no corner in which something might hide that could rob the light. Brought down to use: the test of departing from the world is not where one's body is, but whether the mind stirs when an object comes.

The Monk's Contemplation of Impurity: A Simile of the Utmost Plainness

The part on the transcendence of contemplation has a dharma, a simile, and a joining. The simile is taken from something of the utmost plainness: just as a monk contemplates his own body within, abiding in the contemplation of impurity, and by close examination sees that his body is wholly impure. Why raise the most elementary of contemplation-gates as a simile for the highest of the great concentrations? What is taken is the phrase “examines closely” — the monk cultivating the contemplation of impurity does not merely hear that the body is impure; he examines it himself, part by part, until he sees that not one place is left out. What this simile borrows is exactly that structure of contemplative practice, ‘thorough, first-hand, nothing left out,’ and not the sense of impurity. The misreading to be headed off here is to take the content of the base of the simile for the content of its counterpart — it is not being said that the bodhisattva contemplates the dharma-body and sees the dharma-body to be impure. The simile takes only the thoroughness of the contemplating and the closeness of the seeing; the sense is settled by the joining that follows. Brought down to use: the contemplation employed by the highest concentration and the most elementary gate of contemplation share one and the same skeleton; the difference lies in the objects contemplated and the attachments left behind, not in some other, secret method.

Contemplating the Dharma-Body: Seeing All Clearly, and Attached to Nothing at All

The joining says: the bodhisattva-mahāsattva is also like this — abiding in this samādhi he contemplates the dharma-body, sees all the worlds entering everywhere into his body, and therein sees clearly all the worlds and the dharmas of the world, while toward all the worlds and the dharmas of the world he has no attachment at all. Chengguan marks a turn here: the “body” of this part differs from the manifesting by transformation of the part before, and therefore it is called the dharma-body — the part before was a body manifested filling the lotus flower, which is transformation; this part is the worlds entering everywhere into his body, which is embracing. The nature of dharmas embraces all, and therefore all is seen at one time and at a stroke, with no need to go looking for it step by step. And the most essential landing place of the whole passage lies in the last sentence: seeing clearly and being unattached go together. If one does not see because one is unattached, that is annihilation; if one grows attached because one sees clearly, that is bondage. The scripture takes neither side: the one who sees most clearly is exactly the one who sticks to nothing. This also answers the misunderstanding raised at the outset — concentration is not shutting the world outside; it is seeing the whole world clearly and not being hooked by any corner of it.

The Skillful Wisdom of the First, the Great Samādhi of Universal Light: How a Concluding Name Should Be Read

The last sentence concludes: this is what is called the skillful wisdom of the first, the great samādhi of universal light of a bodhisattva-mahāsattva. This is the first of the ten concentrations, and it is also the model for the whole chapter. Chengguan's general outline makes the ten concentrations ten sections, each having a statement, an explanation, and a conclusion — since the first concentration sets up this pattern, the nine that follow turn upon it, and so this concluding name does not conclude one concentration only; it fixes the formal usage of the whole chapter. Note that what is attached at the end of the concluding name is “skillful wisdom,” and not merely the name of a samādhi: plainly the concentration of which the scripture speaks is from first to last never apart from wisdom. From the ten inexhaustible wisdoms of the first part to the skillful wisdom here, head and tail of this one concentration are alike wisdom — and this answers exactly to the question at the opening. Brought down to use: when reading the nine concentrations that follow, if one sees the same three sections of statement, explanation, and conclusion, and the same closing of the name with wisdom, one will know that this is not repetition but ten unfoldings upon one and the same track.

Lineage

The surviving explanation of this concentration by the ancient worthies is chiefly Chengguan's Huayan jing shu. Chengguan's general outline makes the ten concentrations ten sections, each having a statement, an explanation, and a conclusion; the first concentration he divides into five parts — the inexhaustibility of wisdom, the boundlessness of mind, mastery in concentration, the skillful manifesting by wisdom, and the transcendence of contemplation — and judges the first two to be the skillful means of the concentration, the third its very substance, and the last two its ascendant function. His explanation of the ten clauses of the inexhaustibility of wisdom as five pairs, of the eleven clauses of the boundlessness of mind as a case of a number added, of the quarters not being one and entering and rising not being the same in mastery in concentration, of the exposition in terms of dharma and by simile and the setting of the ascendant against the inferior in the skillful manifesting by wisdom, and of the dharma, simile, and joining in the transcendence of contemplation, where he marks out the “dharma-body” as differing from the manifesting by transformation of the part before — the commentarial sense attached to each section of this piece comes wholly from there. Chengguan's Yanyi chao makes no broad explanation of the first concentration, passing it over with the single sentence “as for the first concentration, its text is easily known,” and within the range of this chapter there is no further passage unfolding it. Li Tongxuan's Xin Huayan jing lun explains the first concentration under four gates — explaining the name of the samādhi, making clear its substance and function, raising its realm, and explaining the sense following the text — taking the fundamental wisdom of the dharma-body for its substance and the ten inexhaustible wisdoms for its function, and reading the simile of Rāhu as the seizing of the sun's light that vexes the world. The Jin translation, the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, has no scripture set against this chapter, and so this concentration has no parallel translation with which to collate. In the books that carry the framework of the school's doctrinal classification, no passage bearing upon this concentration is found. All this is recorded as it stands, in its fullness and its brevity, without adjudicating which is better.

What This Samādhi Has to Answer

Samantabhadra, having finished expounding the first, the Great Samādhi of Universal Light, immediately puts the second topic as a question: “Sons of the Buddha! What is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of wondrous light?” Each of the ten samādhis has its own eye — what, then, is the eye of this one?

The answer is hidden in the shape of the whole passage. Chengguan outlines this stretch by saying, “Second, the samādhi of wondrous light. Within the explanation there are two: first the dharma, then the similes” — first it is set forth by way of the dharma, then by way of two similes; and with a single phrase he lays bare what the two similes are for: “they are similes for the foregoing sense of mutual entering without confusion.” So this samādhi is not a loose account of how vast the spiritual penetrations are. It has to answer an exceedingly sharp question: measureless worlds enter into the single body of the bodhisattva, and that single body enters into measureless worlds — why is there no crowding, no muddling, no collapse?

The place where this is most easily misread is here: taking it for a question of volume, of ‘the large containing the small’, and so imagining that the bodhisattva’s body grows enormous and packs the worlds inside it. The sūtra says exactly the opposite — it says, “he does not, because those worlds are many, thereby ruin this one world; nor does he, because this world is one, thereby ruin those many worlds.” The many are still many, the one is still one; neither has been compressed. What this samādhi has to deal with, then, is not size but the principle by which things enter one another and yet do not obstruct one another. In reading this passage the eye must stay fixed on the four words “are not thrown into confusion”; that is the needle’s eye of the whole.

The Unfolding Entry of the Cloud of Bodies: One Body Sends Out Light, and within the Light There Are Worlds Again

The sūtra opens with a startling string of numbers: the bodhisattva can enter “three-thousandfold great-thousand world-systems as many as the dust-motes of a three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system”, and within each world display as many bodies as those dust-motes, and from each body send out as many rays of light, and in each ray display as many colors, and with each color illumine as many worlds, and within each world tame as many sentient beings. Chengguan judges this to be the first of the four parts within the dharma, “the unfolding entry of the cloud of bodies” — the body is like a cloud spread everywhere, and so is called a cloud of bodies; from this body it unfolds and enters everywhere, and so is called unfolding entry.

One misunderstanding has to be cleared away here: this is not an arithmetical game of multiplying one number five times over. Notice the nesting layer within layer — body gives rise to light, light to color, color to worlds, and within the worlds there are sentient beings. Each step down is not a diminishing; each is again the full measure of a three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system. In other words, the light does not hold a ‘shrunken version of the world’ inside it; it holds the whole world. The unfolding is called unfolding because it opens out all the way without ever growing less; and it can unfold without end because the measure at each layer is from the first not bounded by the layer before it.

Brought home to the reader, this passage first sets the keynote of the whole samādhi: the bodhisattva’s functioning does not spread outward from one center — every place is itself a complete starting point. If this will not stand, there is no way to speak afterward of mutual entering without confusion.

Body and Knowing Enter Together: The Seven Gates Known in Full, and Knowing Is Itself Entering

Chengguan marks the second part as “the entering of body and knowing together”, and the sūtra’s marker for it is “these many worlds are of many kinds and are not the same, and the bodhisattva knows them all”. The question to put is this: in the part before, the body has already entered — what is it that this part enters?

Look at the seven gates the sūtra lists and it becomes plain — the defilement of a world, its purity, that upon which it depends as its cause, its setting up, the dwelling together within it, its light and color, its coming and going. What the earlier part entered was ‘place’; what this part enters is ‘principle’ — the bodhisattva has arrived not with the body alone but with knowing as well.

The sūtra then says “the bodhisattva knows them in full, the bodhisattva enters them in full”, the two clauses set down one after the other, and this is precisely why it is named the entering of body and knowing together. The misreading to be excluded is this: supposing that knowing is standing by and entering is taking part, that knowing is on the outside and entering on the inside. The sūtra has deliberately set the two side by side, and the meaning is that in this samādhi knowing as it truly is is entering in truth — not first seeing clearly and then walking in, but that when the knowing is thorough one is already within. Here the student may take up a measure by which to test himself: whoever still feels that ‘I am observing it’ has not yet entered.

The Furling Entry: The Worlds Come and Enter into His Body, and Yet the Dharmas Are Not Ruined

The third part holds the strangest sentence in the whole samādhi: “these many worlds likewise all come and enter into the bodhisattva’s body, and yet these many worlds are not thrown into confusion, nor are the many kinds of dharmas ruined.” Chengguan marks it as “the furling entry” — before, there was an unfolding outward; here there is a furling inward.

The question arises at once: if the worlds have entered into the body, are the worlds still in their own places? The sūtra fixes the matter with two negations: not thrown into confusion, not ruined. That is to say, the worlds that have entered neither interfere with one another nor lose their own dharma-nature by being gathered in. What must be cleared away here is the mistake of thinking ‘entering’ means removal — as though the worlds had been shifted from where they were. If it were truly a removal there would have to be an order of arriving, a crowding, an emptiness left behind; and then there would certainly be confusion and certainly be ruin. The sūtra says neither confusion nor ruin, and that shows precisely that this ‘entering’ is not a change of position.

What is it, then? Chengguan gives the direction of the answer further on, at the joining of the simile to the dharma: “it is because he abides in neither that they can enter one another.” Entering is possible precisely because nothing has really ‘taken up’ a position. This will be set out in the next section. For now let it be held that unfolding and furling are two faces of one thing — only what can unfold outward without growing less can furl inward without falling into confusion.

The Simile of the Light-Shadows upon the Jeweled Mountains: The Shadow between Two Mirrors

The sūtra turns to simile: “Sons of the Buddha! It is as when the sun rises and circles Mount Sumeru and shines upon the seven jeweled mountains: upon those seven jeweled mountains and between the jeweled mountains alike there are light-shadows displayed with full distinctness.” Chengguan glosses this by saying that the seven jeweled mountains are the seven golden mountains — those among the mountain names listed at the end of The Ten Grounds, save only that the two mountains Wondrously High and Snow Fragrance are excepted; that between the mountains lie the seven fragrant seas, whose waters can display the shadow of the sun, and that the mountains themselves, being of pure gold, can display shadows too. The base of this simile must be seen aright at the start: it is not one mirror facing the sun, but two ranks of mirrors, the mountains and the seas, facing one another.

And so the marvel appears: all the shadows of the sun upon the mountains are displayed within the shadows between the mountains, and all the shadows of the sun between the mountains are displayed within the shadows upon the mountains — there are shadows within the shadows, and within the shadows of those shadows there are shadows still. Chengguan divides this simile into five layers; the second is “the setting forth that the two shadows display one another — which is precisely a simile for the mutual entering of the bodhisattva and others; for those shadows are bright and pure like a mirror of the present day, and therefore can display one another”, and the fourth is “the setting forth of the reappearing again and again without end”.

The misreading to be excluded is taking it for a small piece of optics. What matters in the simile is not how fine the shadows of the sun may look, but that shadow and shadow contain one another at one and the same time. Within the first shadow is the second, and within the second is the first; it is not that the first encloses the second and then the second encloses the first in two successive acts. Why unfolding and furling could stand together at once has, only here, a model that can be looked at — two bright mirrors facing one another, accomplished in a single stroke, layer upon layer without end.

The Differing of the Naming: At the Very Moment of Entering It Is Named Issuing Forth

The third layer of the simile is the sentence most easily read into confusion in the whole passage: “it may be said that the shadow of the sun issues out from the seven jeweled mountains, or that it issues out from between the seven mountains, or that the shadow of the sun enters the seven jeweled mountains, or that it enters between the seven mountains.” One and the same event — how can it be spoken of both as issuing out and as entering?

Chengguan sets this section out with the utmost clarity. He glosses it thus: when the root shadow in the water is displayed within the shadow upon the mountain, this displayed shadow “issues out from upon the mountain and enters between the mountains”; and conversely, when the root shadow upon the mountain is displayed within the shadow in the water, this displayed shadow “issues from between the mountains and enters upon the seven golden mountains”. Hence the verdict he sets down next: “therefore, at the very moment of entering, it is named issuing forth.”

This sentence deserves chewing over. Issuing and entering can be said at once because issuing and entering are names set up in relation to the standpoint from which one observes: standing upon the mountain, the shadow has gone out; standing between the mountains, that same shadow has come in. The names are two, the matter is one. The mistake to be cleared away is supposing that the sūtra is speaking of two events, or that the Dharma is here playing with words. On the contrary — it is reminding the reader that words of position such as ‘going in’ and ‘coming out’ have already failed when used upon the state of mutual entering, and yet cannot but be borrowed. The student who reads the Avataṃsaka should remember this section whenever he meets such words as issuing, entering, inner, outer, this, and that: language is only a standpoint held for the moment; it is not the matter itself.

Reappearing without End and the Substance Apart from the Two Extremes: Neither Existent nor Nonexistent, Neither Abiding nor Departing

The fourth layer is “but these shadows of the sun shine upon and display one another, and there is no limit to be found”, which Chengguan judges straightway as “the setting forth of the reappearing again and again without end, a simile for the bodhisattva’s body and land as the net of Indra”. The fifth layer is the ground of the whole simile: “their substance-nature is not existent, and neither is it nonexistent; they do not abide upon the mountains, nor do they depart from the mountains; they do not abide within the water, nor do they depart from the water.”

Why not existent and not nonexistent? Chengguan glosses it thus: “because it cannot be grasped, it is not existent; because the shadow is displayed with full distinctness, it is not nonexistent.” Put out your hand to take it and there is no such thing as a shadow of the sun to be got hold of, so it cannot be called existent; yet there it is, plainly displayed, so it cannot be called nonexistent. Then he buckles ‘neither abiding nor departing’ back onto these two clauses: “‘not abiding’ establishes the foregoing ‘not existent’; ‘not departing’ establishes the foregoing ‘not nonexistent’.”

Most important of all is the inference he draws at the last, in the manner of a question answered: “if there were a fixed abiding, there could be no entering one another; and if there were a departing, there would be nothing that could enter another. Therefore only by neither departing nor abiding is entering one another possible.” This is the pivot of the whole samādhi. Suppose the shadow were truly nailed fast upon the mountain: then it could not get out, and there would be no mutual displaying. Suppose the shadow had nothing whatever to do with the mountain: then there would be nothing to display in the other. Only where there is neither identity nor separation is there room for entering one another.

And so the earlier doubt about ‘furling entry without ruin’ finds its answer here: the worlds have not been carried into the bodhisattva’s body — they were never nailed fast in their own positions to begin with. The misunderstanding to be cleared away is supposing that ‘neither existent nor nonexistent’ is a vague and lofty phrase. Here it has a strict function — it is precisely the condition upon which entering one another is possible, and neither side of it can be spared.

The Joining to the Dharma: Neither Ruining nor Abiding, Fact and Principle Traveling Together

The sūtra returns to the dharma: the bodhisattva, abiding in this vast samādhi of wondrous light, “does not ruin the marks by which the world is set up, nor does he annihilate the own-nature of the dharmas of the world; he does not abide within the worlds, nor does he abide outside the worlds”, and further, “he contemplates all dharmas as one mark and as markless, and yet does not ruin the own-nature of the dharmas; he abides in the nature of suchness and never forsakes it”.

Chengguan’s explanation takes these clauses apart very finely. He says the first two clauses set forth the not-ruining of nature and marks, on the ground that “were nature and marks ruined, there would be nothing that could enter another” — if you have wiped out the marks and natures of the worlds, what is left that could enter into anything else? The next two clauses set forth the not-abiding within or without, on the ground that “were he to abide within the world, he could not enfold the worlds with his body; and were he to abide outside the worlds, he could not enter the worlds throughout” — abiding inside, he cannot enfold; abiding outside, he cannot get in. So he gathers it into one sentence: “it is because he abides in neither that they can enter one another.”

And from “as regards all the worlds he makes no discrimination” onward, Chengguan says he is explaining the reason of it: “because concentration is without discrimination, he does not ruin the marks; because wisdom contemplates the one mark, he does not ruin the many; and since fact and principle travel together, therefore there is neither ruining nor abiding.” Concentration keeps him from raising discriminations, so he need not go and ruin the differing marks of the worlds; wisdom lets him contemplate the one mark, so he need not deny the several dharmas their own natures. The two wheels of concentration and wisdom run side by side, and fact and principle travel at once — this is the Avataṃsaka’s constant ‘fact and principle traveling together’. Chengguan presses it at last to the root: “and if there is neither ruining nor abiding, then he abides in suchness and never forsakes it … therefore, being the same as suchness, inner and outer enter one another.” Suchness is from the first without inner or outer; and since the bodhisattva is in accord with suchness, his own entering of inner and outer has the same shape as suchness.

The reader may carry away from here a single sentence: the complete interfusion of the Avataṃsaka is not the flattening away of differences, but differences left wholly untouched and yet without obstruction to one another. Whatever ‘one’ is got only by cancelling discriminations is not the one this samādhi speaks of.

The Simile of the Illusionist’s Skill: A Hundred Years within a Single Instant

The second simile changes the scene: “Sons of the Buddha! It is as when a man of illusion, well versed in the art of illusion, stands at the crossing where four roads meet and performs the many illusions” — within a single day, in the space of a single instant, he displays a day and a night, and on to seven days and seven nights, half a month, a month, a year, a hundred years, with cities and villages, springs and streams and rivers and seas, sun and moon and clouds and rain, palaces and dwelling houses, none of them lacking.

The simile of light-shadows was of mutual entering in space; the simile of the illusionist is of mutual entering in time — the topic changes, the import does not. The key sentence to watch is: “he does not, because what he displays has passed through years, thereby ruin the root single day and single hour; nor does he, because the root time is exceedingly brief, thereby ruin the days and months and years he displays. The marks of the illusion are displayed with full distinctness, and the root day is not annihilated.” The hundred years within the illusion do not burst the single instant of the actual, and the single instant of the actual does not crush flat the hundred years within the illusion. Chengguan outlines this simile into three: first the general setting forth of the one who is able to conjure; next the setting forth of the time and place depended upon at root and the time and place displayed in the illusion, as a simile for their entering one another; and last the setting forth that root and branch do not obstruct one another, as a simile for the not-ruining of marks.

The misreading to be cleared away is supposing that the point of the simile of illusion is that ‘it is all unreal’. The point of the sūtra lies precisely not in real and unreal but in two orders of time being able to stand together and not to trespass upon one another. If one reads out of it nothing but the word ‘unreal’, then the whole stretch of merit that follows, where the bodhisattva “displays asaṃkhyeya worlds entering into one world”, has been read into emptiness. Illusion here is not a term of disparagement; it is the name of a capacity.

The One and the Many Containing One Another: Asaṃkhyeya Worlds Entering into One World

The joining to the dharma spreads out on the grandest scale: the bodhisattva, entering this samādhi, displays asaṃkhyeya worlds entering into one world; and within those worlds are earth, water, fire, and wind, great seas and the many mountains, cities and villages, groves and gardens and dwelling houses, and on to the palaces of the gods and the palaces of the dragons and the palaces of the eight classes below them, with every kind of adornment complete; there are the three realms, small-thousand and great-thousand world-systems, the fruit and recompense of deeds performed, and dying here and being born there; there are all the divisions of time from a brief instant and day and night on to the kalpa of formation and the kalpa of destruction, and all lands defiled and pure and vast and narrow; and within them the buddhas arise in the world, bodhisattvas encircle them, spiritual penetrations teach and transform; measureless multitudes of people fill them, of differing shapes and differing destinies beyond conceiving; and measureless jewels born of the power of the pure deeds of the three times — all such things as these he displays entirely, entering into one world.

The first among Chengguan’s senses in joining this simile is precisely “the setting forth that the one and the many contain one another and yet are not the same”. The question to put is: if the many have been contained, why is it still said that they are ‘not the same’? The sūtra answers as with a knife: “he does not, because those worlds are many, thereby ruin this one world; nor does he, because this world is one, thereby ruin those many worlds.” Containing without being made the same — the many enter into the one, and the many are still many; the one contains the many, and the one is still one.

The imagining most in need of clearing away here is ‘blending’. When people of the world speak of complete interfusion they commonly picture two bowls of water poured together. The containing of the Avataṃsaka is not like that: it is two bowls of water each whole and entire, and yet each within the other. Brought down to practice, this sense unties a common anxiety — one need not first cancel one’s own station in order to accord with the Dharma realm; the station is left wholly untouched, and the according is left wholly untouched as well.

The Nine Clauses of “This Is Called”: The Reason for Mutual Entering Comes Back to No-Self

After the grandeur, the sūtra abruptly puts a question to itself: “Why is it?” — and then gives the nine clauses of “this is called”: because the bodhisattva knows that all dharmas are without self, he is named as entering the dharma of there being no living being and of there being no doer; because he diligently cultivates the dharma of no contention, he is named as one who abides in the dharma of there being no self; because he sees as it truly is that all bodies arise from conditions, he is named as one who abides in the dharma of there being no sentient being; because he knows that all dharmas of arising and ceasing are born from causes, he is named as one who abides in the dharma of there being no pudgala; because he knows that the root nature of the dharmas is equal, he is named as one who abides in the dharma of there being no mind-born one and no māṇava; because he knows that the root nature of all dharmas is still, he is named as one who abides in the dharma of stillness; because he knows that all dharmas are one mark, he is named as one who abides in the dharma of no discrimination; because he knows that the Dharma realm has no dharmas of many kinds and differences, he is named as one who abides in the inconceivable dharma; because he diligently cultivates all skillful means and is good at taming sentient beings, he is named as one who abides in the dharma of great compassion.

This passage is the ground of the whole samādhi, and yet it is often skipped by readers. Its logic must be seen clearly: after all that has been said of the unthinkable mutual entering, here is given the one and only reason — because all dharmas are without self. The living being, the doer, the self, the sentient being, the pudgala, the mind-born one, the māṇava: this string of names is the several ‘subjects’ that the old Indian schools posited, and the sūtra refutes them one by one precisely in order to show that mutual entering is unobstructed because there is fundamentally no thing occupying a place, to crowd against another. Where there is a self there are boundaries; where there are boundaries there is obstruction. Since the self cannot be got, neither can the boundaries.

Above all, note the last clause: at the very end of the refuting, the sūtra does not close upon emptiness but closes upon “the dharma of great compassion”. No-self is not having nothing to do; it is exactly the premise of “diligently cultivating all skillful means and being good at taming sentient beings”. Here the student may correct a common deviation: supposing that the breaking of self is for the sake of withdrawing from the world. This clause says plainly that the breaking of self is for the sake of being able to get in.

Here and There Are Not Different, and the Particular Simile: The First Does Not Confuse the Latter, the Latter Does Not Confuse the First

The sūtra then says that the bodhisattva sees numberless sentient beings, numberless bodhisattvas, numberless buddhas arising in the world, receives the Dharma expounded by those buddhas, and sees also his own body cultivating the practice among them; “and yet he does not forsake this place and see himself there, nor does he forsake that place and see himself here — the body there and the body here are not different.”

Then comes the particular simile of the illusionist: “it is just as when there is a man of illusion who, at whatever place he may be, performs the many arts of illusion: he does not, because of the conjured ground, ruin the root ground, nor, because of the conjured sun, ruin the root sun.” The bodhisattva is likewise — where there is no land he displays a land, and where there is a land he displays none; where there are sentient beings he displays none, and where there are none he displays sentient beings; where there is no form he displays form, and where there is form he displays no form. And the sūtra adds one sentence to hold the whole in check: “the first does not throw the latter into confusion, and the latter does not throw the first into confusion.”

The misreading to be cleared away is taking this passage for a display of spiritual powers. It is in fact stopping a gap: since existence and nonexistence, form and formlessness can all be displayed as one another, might not the earlier and the later overturn each other and cancel themselves out? The sūtra says they do not. When existence is displayed as nonexistence, ‘existence’ has not been cancelled; when nonexistence is displayed as existence, ‘nonexistence’ has not been cancelled. That the first does not confuse the latter and the latter does not confuse the first says exactly that these displayings, layer upon layer, each rest secure in their own place. The reader may take this sentence and test with it every account of ‘non-duality’: in a true non-duality, both sides are still there.

Illusion Turning upon Illusion, and Space and the World Not Different

The sūtra presses one layer deeper: “because he knows that dharmas are illusory, he knows that knowing is illusory; because he knows that knowing is illusory, he knows that deeds are illusory; and having known that knowing is illusory and deeds are illusory, he gives rise to the knowing of illusion and contemplates all deeds therewith.” This puts even the knowing that does the contemplating into the illusion.

Why press it so? Because if it were only said that ‘dharmas are illusory’, there would still be left an unillusory observer standing outside — and that is exactly the ‘self’ refuted in the section before. So the sūtra pursues it all the way: dharmas illusory, knowing illusory, deeds illusory, and at last it gives rise to the ‘knowing of illusion’ with which to contemplate deeds. This is not nihilism; it is bringing the observer too under the same rule, and not letting it slip back in as a new subject.

Then it closes with the illusionist: “it is as with a man of illusion in the world, who does not conjure his illusion outside the place where he stands, nor has any place apart, outside the illusion.” The illusionist cannot conjure from somewhere outside the ground he stands on, and the illusion has no separate place of its own. The bodhisattva is likewise — “he does not enter the world from outside space, nor does he enter space from outside the world”, the reason being that “space and the world are no different”. If space and the world were truly two places, there would be a going in and a coming out to speak of; since they are not different, to abide in the world is to abide in space.

Then follows the same conclusion in respect of time: in a single thought he knows in full the forming and destroying of numberless worlds and knows the order in which the kalpas follow one upon another; “he is able within a single thought to display numberless kalpas, and yet he does not let that single thought grow vast.” This last half-sentence is the dotting of the eye — numberless kalpas have been displayed within a single thought, and yet that single thought has not grown larger. Had the single thought been stretched out, it would still be a containing by volume; it is precisely because it does not grow larger that the mutual entering of “neither ruining nor abiding” is established.

Abiding at the Bourn of Illusion: No Different from Illusion, the Mind without Limit

Just before the concluding naming, the sūtra gives the fruit-aspect of this samādhi: the bodhisattva “gains the inconceivable knowing of illusion that is liberation and arrives at the further shore; he abides at the bourn of illusion and enters into the illusory number of the world, thinking upon all dharmas as being wholly like illusion; he does not go against the illusory world, he exhausts the knowing of illusion, and he fully knows that the three times are no different from illusion; with settled resolve he penetrates it, and his mind is without limit.”

The question to put is: having already arrived at the further shore, why does he still “abide at the bourn of illusion” and still “enter into the illusory number of the world”? This is just where the Avataṃsaka is not held in common with others. The further shore is not some other place away from this shore; the one who has arrived at the further shore still abides within the bounds of illusion, still enters into the illusory number of the world. The sūtra says expressly “he does not go against the illusory world” — he does not set himself against this world that is like illusion. The misunderstanding to be cleared away is supposing that realization means backing out of the illusion. Quite the contrary: whatever can be backed out of still has a grasper and a grasped, and has not yet arrived at the further shore.

The sūtra takes the Tathāgatas as the standard: “just as the Tathāgatas abide in the knowing that is like illusion, their minds equal and one; the bodhisattva-mahāsattva is just so, knowing that the worlds are wholly like illusion, and in all places without attachment and without the thought of anything as his own.” Equality here is not an attitude; it is that there is no ‘mine’ within the mind doing the picking and choosing.

The Concluding Naming: The Illusionist Is Not Deluded

A last simile gathers up the whole passage: “it is as with that man of illusion who performs the many illusions: although he does not dwell together with those illusions, yet as regards those illusions he is not deluded.” Chengguan records this as the third simile, that of the illusionist who is not deluded, and says the text throughout can be known. The illusionist knows that these are of his own conjuring, so he does not run off after the illusions, nor is he deceived by them. The bodhisattva is likewise: knowing all dharmas and arriving at the further shore, “in his mind not reckoning that it is ‘I’ who am able to enter into the dharmas, nor falling into error as regards the dharmas.”

This last sentence is the whole samādhi’s most essential safeguard. After so much has been said of mastery in mutual entering, the illness the reader is most liable to contract is quietly setting up an “I who am able to enter” — and then all the previous work is undone, for the moment a self is set up the boundaries come back and the mutual entering falls apart on the spot. So the sūtra marks it out expressly: even the thought “I am able to enter into the dharmas” is not reckoned. And here Samantabhadra concludes with the naming: “This is called: the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s knowing of skillful means in the second, the great samādhi of wondrous light.”

From the opening question to the concluding naming, this samādhi has walked a full circle: first it displays the aspect of mutual entering, then by two similes it displays why mutual entering is so, then by no-self it gives the ground of it, and last, by not reckoning an “I who can enter”, it seals the gap. What the knowing of skillful means is skillful in is just this sense of measure.

Lineage

What is most worth recording in this passage is a single word Chengguan sets down upon the fourth layer of the simile of light-shadows: he judges “but these shadows of the sun shine upon and display one another, and there is no limit to be found” as setting forth the reappearing again and again without end, and says outright that it is “a simile for the bodhisattva’s body and land as the net of Indra”. The Yanyi chao then records the reason of this of itself: “the ancient worthies established the sense of the net of Indra. The sūtra has the name of the net of Indra, yet has no place where it is expounded at length; for in former times the text of this chapter was not yet had. Therefore this one passage of text may truly serve as its witness.” — the sense of the net of Indra layer upon layer had long been established by the ancient worthies, and yet the whole sūtra had only the name of the net of Indra and no text expounding it at length; not until this passage of The Ten Samādhis appeared did that sense gain its scriptural witness.

There are two things to observe in this record. First, it is a plain declaration by Chengguan as to where the scriptural ground of his own house’s doctrine lies: the establishing of the sense of the net of Indra stood before and the gaining of its scriptural witness came after, and this order was written down by the master of the commentary himself, not inferred by later hands. Second, for this unit the explanations of the ancient worthies are fullest in the line of Chengguan’s Shu and Chao: Fazang’s Tanxuan ji and Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji are both commentaries on the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, and the sixty-fascicle text has no chapter of the ten samādhis, so that there is no explanation of this chapter in them; and Li Tongxuan’s Xin Huayan jing lun explains this samādhi under “the four senses as before” — its name, its substance and function, its realm, and the sense following the text — establishing the name by “the substance of the principle-wisdom of the dharma-body being pure and able to display wondrous light.” Two houses lacking the text and two furnishing an explanation — Chengguan by the outline of the text, Li Tongxuan by the purity of the substance of principle-wisdom — this is a record of the state of the documents, and no judgment of higher and lower is made. As for the doctrinal manuals of the classification of the teachings of this house that might cite this chapter, none has been found in what was examined here; the absence is marked according to the facts, and no text from elsewhere is used to fill it in.

The Question This Samādhi Must Answer

Each of the ten great samādhis has one question, and every one of them is a question Samantabhadra Bodhisattva sets himself and then answers himself. The question of the third samādhi is “What is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of the spiritual penetration that travels in due order to all buddha-lands?” — what is asked is ‘what is it called,’ not ‘how is it cultivated to completion.’ So the whole passage that follows sets out the character of this samādhi, not its stages.

The name of the samādhi has to be read open first. “Travelling in due order to all buddha-lands” is the matter carried out: he goes to them one by one, without skipping and without missing any, and that is why it is called in due order. “Spiritual penetration” is the power relied upon: it is not that the body actually goes and walks there, but that the power of penetration reaches there. “Samādhi” is the substance dwelt in: he travels without coming out of the samādhi, and so it is named a samādhi and not named a practice.

Here is the place where it is easiest to read wrongly. Hearing “travels to all buddha-lands,” one pictures a long journey, and then this samādhi turns into a display of spiritual powers. But look at the text below and you will see: not one clause of the whole passage puts its weight on the “travelling.” The weight is on the “entering” of “in all those worlds he enters this samādhi,” and on that mind after entering which gives rise to no discrimination. It is named travelling everywhere; what it actually speaks of is entering samādhi. Brought down to use: when you read a passage on spiritual penetration in the Huayan, the first step is always to ask ‘what field of samādhi does this penetration show forth,’ and never to ask ‘how many places did he get to.’

Dharma One: Entering Samādhi Throughout the Lands — What Is Travelled Is Numberless, What Is Entered Is One

The first subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘entering samādhi throughout the lands.’ The sūtra says that this bodhisattva “passes beyond numberless worlds to the east,” and must further “pass beyond as many worlds again as the dust motes of those worlds” — first a number of worlds beyond all measuring, and then those numberless worlds ground into dust motes, and by the number of those motes he passes beyond them all once more. This is the Huayan’s habitual method of doubling: a number that already cannot be measured is multiplied by itself once again, and the purpose is to drive the very business of “number” into failure.

Then comes the pivotal clause: “in all those worlds he enters this samādhi.” It is not that he enters samādhi after having passed beyond; it is in all those worlds that he enters.

One misunderstanding has to be cleared away: this is not saying that the bodhisattva divides himself into numberless bodies and that each body enters a samādhi of its own. What the sūtra says is one and the same samādhi — “this samādhi.” The lands travelled are measureless, while the samādhi entered is one alone. If it is taken as ‘many bodies, many samādhis,’ then this samādhi is no different from a spiritual transformation, and one cannot read out of the text below why “giving rise to no discrimination” should matter.

Brought down to use: when the Huayan says “everywhere,” what it is looking at is the relation of one and many — the more the object faced is broken into pieces past all counting, the more the mind shown forth must be whole. The realm in pieces and the mind not in pieces: that is entering samādhi throughout the lands.

Dharma Two: The Sequence of the Times of Entering — Laying Time Out to Its Utmost

The second subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘the sequence of the times of entering.’ From “or he enters in a kṣaṇa” the sūtra lays out the divisions of time of entering samādhi all the way along: a kṣaṇa, an instant, continuously; the three parts of the day, first, middle, and last, and the three parts of the night, first, middle, and last; one day, five days, half a month, a month; a year, a hundred years, a thousand years, a hundred thousand years, a koṭi of years, a hundred thousand koṭis of years, a hundred thousand nayutas of koṭis of years; and then it steps across into the measures of kalpas — a kalpa, a hundred kalpas, a hundred thousand kalpas, a hundred thousand nayutas of koṭis of kalpas; numberless, measureless, boundless, unequalled; uncountable, unnameable, unthinkable, immeasurable, unspeakable — on to “or he enters for unspeakably unspeakable kalpas.”

The question to ask is: why does the sūtra list them out like this? If it were only to say ‘the length of time in samādhi is not fixed,’ one clause would have been enough.

The answer is in the shape of the clauses. Every clause of this long string is built alike, with only one number changed; and by the end the number can no longer be changed at all — above “unspeakable” there is still “unspeakably unspeakable,” and language here admits defeat on its own. This is the Huayan’s way of using laying-out as negation: it is not that you are to remember how many kinds of time-measure there are, but that at the moment you grow weary with reading you are to see for yourself the pointlessness of time-measure itself.

One misreading has to be cleared away: this is not saying that the longer the samādhi the better it is. The sūtra counts from a kṣaṇa upward, and a kṣaṇa stands side by side with unspeakably unspeakable kalpas with no word of higher and lower between them. Brought down to use: the way to read this passage is to read it right through as it stands and not to skip — whoever skips it does not get what this passage really has to give.

Dharma Three: The General Summing Up of the Many Gates — Long and Short, Dharma and Time, Differing in Every Way

The third subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘the general summing up of the many gates.’ The sūtra gathers up the whole long string that came before with the one clause “whether long or short, whether by dharma or by time, in every kind of way they differ.”

This sentence is short, and yet it is the pivot on which the whole passage turns. More than thirty clauses were laid out before it, and here four “whethers” draw them all together: long and short are the two ends of time; dharma and time are the two respects with regard to which the difference is spoken — the difference may be spoken with regard to the dharma entered, or with regard to the time passed through. In one sentence the actual state of difference is granted: these differences really are there, and the four graphs “in every kind of way they differ” carry no note of denial in them.

A common misreading has to be cleared away: to suppose that when the Buddha-dharma speaks of non-discrimination it is saying that difference does not exist. The sūtra here does exactly the opposite: it first states the differences honestly and grants them to the full, and only in the next sentence says that toward these the bodhisattva gives rise to no discrimination. First grant them, then do not cling to them — the order cannot be reversed.

Brought down to use: when you read the Huayan’s sense of non-discrimination, look whether there is an honest laying-out of difference before it. If there is, that non-discrimination is alive; if there is not, it is mostly just shutting the eyes.

Dharma Four: The Mind Accords with the Substance of the Samādhi — He Makes Neither Two nor Not-Two

The fourth subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘the mind according with the substance of the samādhi.’ The sūtra says “toward these the bodhisattva gives rise to no discrimination, his mind is without defiling attachment,” and then gives four clauses: “he makes neither two nor not-two, neither the universal nor the particular.”

First a question: since he does not make “two,” why is it still necessary to say that he does not make “not-two”?

Because “not-two” is also a standing-place. To say two is to split long and short and dharma and time into two stumps; to say not-two is to set up a further “joining” to remedy that “splitting” — and once a remedy has been set up, discrimination has arisen for another round. So the sūtra negates twice over with four clauses: two and not-two are one pair, universal and particular another, and it blocks the setting-up and blocks the blocking as well. This is precisely the “substance” of this samādhi: not the flattening of difference into a single taste, but a mind that within difference comes to rest nowhere.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “giving rise to no discrimination” is not the same as not knowing long from short. The bodhisattva knows perfectly well that long is long and short is short; it is only that he does not give rise to defiling attachment upon them — the four graphs “his mind is without defiling attachment” are the sūtra’s own statement of where the measure of non-discrimination lies.

Brought down to use: to tell right from wrong and long from short clearly while the mind does not rise and fall along with them is the real ground of this clause; to be unable to tell them apart and call it non-discrimination is muddle, not samādhi.

Dharma Five: Not Abandoning the Rising of the Penetration — Discrimination Left Behind, and Not a Particle of Function the Less

The fifth subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘the not abandoning of the rising of the penetration.’ The sūtra says “though he has left this discrimination behind, he yet rises from the samādhi by skillful means of spiritual penetration, and toward all dharmas he neither forgets nor loses, on to the very last.”

This clause is there to stop a leak in the fourth subdivision. When it has been said above that he gives rise to no discrimination and makes neither two nor not-two, the reader at once has a doubt: does the bodhisattva not then become a pool of dead water, doing nothing at all?

The sūtra answers directly: the single graph “though” turns it — the leaving behind of discrimination is a real leaving behind, and the rising of the spiritual penetration is a real rising. And it is not a forced rising into function; it is “by skillful means of spiritual penetration,” freely and at ease. More important still is the latter half: “toward all dharmas he neither forgets nor loses, on to the very last.” One who has left discrimination behind has not thrown away all the dharmas he knew; not only has he not thrown them away, he keeps them on to the very last.

One misreading has to be cleared away: to suppose that deep samādhi is ‘remembering nothing at all.’ The samādhi the sūtra speaks of is exactly a neither forgetting nor losing. Brought down to use: to test whether a practice has gone astray, look at whether it has diminished one’s clarity about the dharmas of the world — if the more one cultivates the more muddled one grows and the less able one is to do anything, that is not the samādhi spoken of here. Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu takes in under this subdivision the two parts of simile and joining as well, closing them with “the text may be understood as it stands,” and does not open them out in separate detail.

The Simile: The Sun God-Son Travels His Round — Day Does Not Arise, Night Does Not Cease

The sūtra draws to a close with a simile: “It is as when the sun god-son travels his round and shines, and neither day nor night stands still; when the sun comes out it is named day, and when the sun goes down it is named night, and yet day does not arise, and night does not cease.” Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu divides the whole passage into the three parts of dharma, simile, and joining, and this is the part of the simile.

First a question: what is the simile of the sun god-son a simile for?

Look at the three layers of the simile. The first layer, “travels his round and shines, and neither day nor night stands still” — the sun does not stay still, just as the bodhisattva enters the samādhi throughout numberless worlds. The second layer, “when the sun comes out it is named day, and when the sun goes down it is named night” — the names of day and night are not the sun’s own names; they are names set up by the relative position between the sun and the one who watches. In other words, the names of difference are set up by conditions. The third layer, which is also where the eye of the simile lies: “day does not arise, and night does not cease” — the names have their rising and setting, while the substance of the sun has never arisen or ceased.

One misreading has to be cleared away: this is not saying that day and night are false while the sun is true, thereby setting up a true and a false. The sūtra says only that day does not arise and night does not cease — not even day and night themselves have ever arisen or ceased, still less is a true substance set up over against them.

Brought down to use: read it with the four graphs ‘long and short, dharma and time’ substituted in — to enter samādhi for a kṣaṇa is named short, to enter samādhi for unspeakably unspeakable kalpas is named long; the names of long and short are set up by time, while the substance of the samādhi is like the sun and has never been two. This simile is exactly what serves as the eye for the third and the fourth subdivisions.

The Joining: Entering the Samādhi He Sees Clearly Numberless Worlds, So It Is Here Too

The simile spoken, the sūtra closes with the part of the joining: “When the bodhisattva-mahāsattva enters the samādhi of spiritual penetration in numberless worlds, and having entered the samādhi sees clearly that many numberless worlds, so it is here too.”

First a question: why does the part of the joining have only this one clause, and why does it speak only of “seeing clearly”?

Because dharma and simile have here already been matched to the full, and all that is needed is a clasp to fasten them. And that the clasp falls upon the two graphs “sees clearly” is deliberate: it was said above that he gives rise to no discrimination and that his mind is without defiling attachment, and without this clause the reader would easily read this samādhi as a blur. The sūtra says, on the contrary, that after entering samādhi he “sees clearly” that many numberless worlds — without discrimination and yet seeing distinctly, just as the sun forms no thought of day and night and yet its shining is everywhere.

One misreading has to be cleared away: what “so it is here too” points to is not ‘the worlds are also like the sun,’ but ‘the bodhisattva’s entering samādhi and seeing clearly is also like the sun’s travelling its round and shining.’ What is joined is the mind that enters, not the realm that is seen.

Brought down to use: samādhi is tested in seeing, not in darkness. The deeper the samādhi the greater the clarity — that is the measuring-line this passage hands over.

The Concluding Name: The Skillful Wisdom of the Third Samādhi

The last sentence: “Sons of the Buddha! This is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s skillful wisdom of the third great samādhi of the spiritual penetration that travels in due order to all buddha-lands.” It clasps the opening question head to tail, and it is the fixed pattern common to every section of the ten samādhis — opening with “what is” as the question, closing with ‘this is …’ or ‘this is named … the skillful wisdom’ as the answer (the tenth samādhi closes in a different form; see the apparatus).

Two additions in the concluding name are worth noticing. First, at the asking it was named “the samādhi of spiritual penetration,” and at the concluding it is named “the great samādhi of spiritual penetration,” with the one graph “great” added. Second, the close is tied off with the three graphs “skillful wisdom.” These three graphs are where the whole discourse of the ten samādhis comes to rest: what is accomplished is not the field of samādhi itself, but that wisdom which is free and at ease within samādhi.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “skillful” must not be read as cleverness of method. What has been spoken of all along is travelling throughout the lands while the samādhi is one, laying time out while clinging to none of it, leaving discrimination behind while not abandoning function — to be unobstructed among these several layers is what is called skillful. Brought down to use: read the passage through and then look back at the name of the samādhi, and the four graphs “travels in due order to all” are no longer a walking about in space, but another name for this wisdom.

Lineage

The explanations of the ancient masters upon this passage survive in the single track of Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu alone: he judges this samādhi to have “three parts within the explanation, namely dharma, simile, and joining,” and opens five subdivisions further within the dharma — entering samādhi throughout the lands, the sequence of the times of entering, the general summing up of the many gates, the mind according with the substance of the samādhi, and the not abandoning of the rising of the penetration. The five subdivisions fit the sequence of the sūtra text closely, and this piece expounds by following that outline. The two parts of simile and joining Chengguan closes with “the text may be understood as it stands,” without opening them out in separate detail; this is recorded.

The Yanyi chao has no separate unfolding of the third samādhi within the range of this chapter — the chao by its own convention explains selectively, and this is not an oversight; the gap is recorded as it stands. What Fazang’s Tanxuan ji comments upon is the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, and the sixty has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, so there is no corresponding text to record. Li Tongxuan’s Xin Huayan jing lun explains this samādhi under three gates in outline — explaining the name, explaining its substance and function, and explaining the sense following the text — establishing the name by “the self-nature of the principle-nature pervading everywhere, so that the very substance of the functioning of wisdom pervades everywhere, and thereby spiritual penetration pervades everywhere.” The Jin translation, the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, and so this passage has no parallel translation to be collated; the forty-fascicle Avataṃsaka preserves only the last chapter and likewise does not touch it. In the Huayan school’s treatises — the Wujiao zhang, the Shixuan men, the Fajie xuanjing, the Huanyuan guan — no text directly citing this passage is found, and there is no lineage to be attached; all of this is marked as it stands.

Two tracks stand side by side — Chengguan by the outline of the text, Li Tongxuan by the pervasion of principle and wisdom — recorded together without adjudication.

The Question This Samādhi Must Answer

The question of the fourth samādhi is “What is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of the practice of the pure deep mind?” — what is asked is still ‘what is it called,’ not ‘how is it cultivated to completion.’ So the whole passage that follows sets out the character of this samādhi.

The name has three joints, and each has to be read open one by one. “Pure” does not mean that the mind has been washed clean; read the text below and you will see: the purity meant is that non-clinging by which, as to the buddhas’ appearing and their nirvāṇa, “nothing whatever is obtained.” “Deep mind” is said over against a floating mind: a floating mind turns after the marks, while the deep mind offers without end and does not turn after the marks. The graph “practice” matters most of all — this samādhi is not a sitting still and not moving; from beginning to end the whole passage is doing things: offering, paying homage, asking after the Dharma, praising the buddhas, and not one of them is left out.

Here is the place where it is easiest to read wrongly. Hearing “deep mind,” a person thinks of some very deep feeling, and then this samādhi turns into a matter of the density of an emotion. But the deep mind the sūtra gives is precisely this: within the fullest offering, the marks of the buddhas are not obtained. Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu outlines this samādhi in the two parts of “the practice of the deep mind within the samādhi” and “the practice of the deep mind on rising from the samādhi,” and both parts are tied to the one graph “practice,” which proves that the eye of this samādhi lies in practice and not in feeling. Brought down to use: when you read the two graphs “deep mind” in the Huayan, look first at what business follows them, and do not begin by guessing at what mood it is.

Raising What Is Inward: What Is Known Is Buddha-Bodies Equal in Number to Sentient Beings, What Is Seen Exceeds the Number of Dust Motes

The sūtra text begins by setting up the object faced: “he knows the bodies of the buddhas to be equal in number to sentient beings, and the measureless buddhas he sees exceed in number the dust motes of asaṃkhyeya worlds.” Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu outlines this as ‘first, the raising of what is inward’ — before the offering is raised, the buddhas to be offered to are first raised up.

The question to ask is: why are the buddha-bodies numbered by the number of sentient beings?

Because the endlessness of the offering below must first have an endless object over against it. That the number of the buddha-bodies equals the number of sentient beings is to say that wherever there is a sentient being there is a buddha-body — the buddhas offered to are not somewhere else, they are upon the very number of the beings to be delivered. And the measure of what is seen goes one layer further: not merely asaṃkhyeya worlds, but as many as the dust motes into which that many worlds have been ground. Huayan counting has always driven “number” to the point where it fails.

One misreading has to be cleared away: this is not saying that the bodhisattva has seen a great heap of buddhas, so many that it may be boasted of. The sūtra uses the two graphs “know” and “see,” and not the graph “obtain”; and below it says outright that of the buddhas’ appearing and nirvāṇa nothing is obtained. The vastness of the measure seen is there to give weight to the “nothing obtained” that comes after — if one saw a single buddha and said nothing was obtained, the words would be light; seeing more than the number of dust motes and still obtaining nothing, the words carry weight. Brought down to use: when you read the great numbers of the Huayan, do not stop at astonishment, but read on and see which clause they are gathering force for.

Offering by Outward Things: Nine Clauses of “And Makes Offering” Laid Out to the Utmost

Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu outlines the offering in two, the first being ‘the practice of offering by outward things.’ The sūtra begins from wondrous incense and passes through wondrous flowers, jeweled canopies, supremely wondrous articles of adornment, scattered jewels, the adorning of the places where the buddhas walk, maṇi treasuries, and food and drink from the heavens, and gathers all up at the last with “as for all the manner of supremely wondrous articles of offering in all the buddha-lands, he is able by his spiritual power to gather them all in everywhere and make offering of them” — the clause “and makes offering” appearing nine times in all.

The question to ask is: what is aimed at by listing them out one clause after another like this?

What is aimed at is ‘exhausting.’ Each clause changes only the thing offered, and the pattern of the clause is never altered, so that reading down it is like handing things up one after another, until at the last clause he simply gathers in by spiritual power every article of offering in every buddha-land — by then it is no longer a matter of anything being left unoffered; even the business of ‘what else is there’ has been gathered in. Li Tongxuan’s Lun sums it up as “the offering of the ten things, incense and flowers and canopies and the rest,” which, as the rubric he sets up for this passage, is a raising of it by kinds.

One misreading has to be cleared away: this passage must not be read as if the buddhas needed these things. What the sūtra lays out is the endlessness of the mind that is able to offer, not the costliness of the things offered — and among them the food and drink “that flows forth from the spiritual power of the buddhas” and the articles of offering “gathered in everywhere by his spiritual power” have their origin in the power of a buddha to begin with, so that what is offered is precisely what the buddhas gave. Brought down to use: the sense of offering lies in the mind’s being everywhere and exhausting itself, not in the many and costly things; the reader need form no thought here of reaching after what is above him.

Offering by the Three Actions: Reverence and Homage, Asking After the Dharma and Praising the Buddhas — the Business Grows More Intimate

Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu outlines the second of the offerings as ‘the practice of offering by the three actions, reverence and the rest.’ The sūtra begins again with the same clause, “at the place of each and every one of those tathāgatas,” and then speaks of being reverent and paying honor, bowing his head in homage, casting his whole body upon the ground, asking after the Buddha-dharma, praising the evenness of the buddhas, extolling their merit, on to “he enters into the great compassion into which the buddhas enter, and gains that even and unobstructed power of a buddha.”

First the question: the outward things having already been offered to the full, why must another section be set up?

Because what was offered in the former section was things, while what is carried out in this one is body, speech, and mind — bowing his head in homage and casting his whole body upon the ground are of the body; asking after the Buddha-dharma and extolling merit are of speech; being reverent and paying honor and entering the buddhas’ great compassion are of the mind. The offering of things, however exhaustive, cannot stand in place of the intimacy of body and mind; and so the sūtra leads both sections with the same clause “at the place of each and every one of those tathāgatas,” showing that the object faced is the same buddha while what is brought to him is of two layers.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “praising the evenness of the buddhas” is not praising the buddhas for being fair; it is praising the evenness that the buddhas have realized. The clause following, “he gains that even and unobstructed power of a buddha,” comes directly out of this — what is praised is precisely what is gained. Brought down to use: what this section gives is a sequence — first showing reverence by things, then paying homage with the body, then asking after the Dharma with speech, and at last entering the buddhas’ great compassion with the mind. Of these four layers, if one is missing the offering is not complete.

The Deep Mind: In a Single Thought He Diligently Seeks, and Yet of the Marks of Appearing and of Nirvāṇa Nothing Whatever Is Obtained

Here the sūtra turns: “In the space of a single thought, at the place of every buddha he diligently seeks the wondrous Dharma; and yet as to the buddhas appearing in the world and entering parinirvāṇa, of marks such as these there is nothing whatever obtained.” Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu outlines the section before as ‘the raising of practice’ and this clause as ‘the deep mind’ — the deep mind comes out of just this turn.

First the question: having offered thus and sought thus, why is it said that of the buddhas’ appearing and nirvāṇa nothing is obtained?

Because what is offered and what is sought are business, while the appearing and the nirvāṇa are marks. Business can be carried out with the whole of the mind; marks cannot be grasped and dwelt in. A buddha appears in the world, a buddha enters upon his passing away — in the business of it this is plainly so; but if upon this one sets up a fixed mark of ‘there is a buddha appearing in the world,’ ‘there is a buddha passing away,’ then the buddha offered to becomes a thing that arises and ceases. The sūtra does not deny the business; it says only that of the marks “nothing whatever is obtained” — and the single graph “yet” cuts business and marks into two layers.

One misreading has to be cleared away: obtaining nothing is not the same as being indifferent. The clause immediately above is “diligently seeks the wondrous Dharma,” and the diligence and the not-obtaining are within one and the same thought — it is not that he lets go after he has finished seeking; it is that in the very seeking he does not dwell. Brought down to use: the place where doing is at its fullest is precisely the place where clinging most easily arises; what this clause teaches is to put the whole of one’s strength into the business, and not to stake one’s mind upon the marks.

The First Simile: The Scattered and Stirring Mind Does Not Know Its Object — a Simile for According with the Real and Being Without Thought

The sūtra sets it forth with a first simile: “It is as with a scattered and stirring mind that discerns the object it takes as its support: when the mind arises it does not know upon what object it has arisen, and when the mind ceases it does not know upon what object it has ceased.” Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu establishes for it the name ‘the simile of the deluded thought that does not know,’ and judges what it sets forth to be ‘according with the real and being without thought.’

First the question: to take a scattered and deluded mind for a simile — is this not setting forth the superior by means of the inferior?

A simile does not take the whole; it takes a single point. What is taken here is the “not knowing” — a scattered and stirring mind, at the moment its object arises and ceases, has never known what it was resting upon. Its non-discriminating is an inability to discriminate. The bodhisattva’s “never discriminating the marks of the Tathāgata’s appearing in the world and of his nirvāṇa” is like it in outward shape, while the ground of the two is wholly different: the one cannot, the other does not dwell. With the two graphs “according with the real” Chengguan points out the dividing line — being without thought because of according with the real, not being without thought because of dullness.

One misreading has to be cleared away: one must not take this as saying that cultivation consists in making the mind scattered and unknowing. The joining clause that immediately follows in the sūtra is “he never discriminates,” and the graph “never” is a word of decision, not a word of vagueness. Brought down to use: with every simile that sets forth the true by means of the false, one must first ask ‘which single point is being taken’ — take the wrong point, and the simile becomes an absurdity.

The Second Simile: The Heat-Haze in the Midday Sun, Five Pairs of Twofold Negation and Yet the Mark of Water Displayed

The second simile is the most amply laid out passage of this section: the heat-haze “is not born of the clouds, it is not born of a pool, it does not rest upon the land, it does not abide in water”; then “it is neither existent nor nonexistent, neither good nor evil, neither clear nor turbid”; then, inserted in the middle, “it will not serve for drinking or rinsing, nor can it be defiled”; and then it closes with “it has neither substance nor absence of substance, neither taste nor absence of taste” — and then it turns: “only because of causes and conditions does it display the mark of water and become discerned by consciousness.” Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu establishes for it the name ‘the simile of the heat-haze that looks like water,’ and judges what it sets forth to be ‘comprehending the false as the same as the true.’

First the question: having shut it off so completely, why must it say at the last that the mark of water is displayed?

Just because what is shut off is the nature, not the mark. The four negations shut off whence it comes; the several “neithers” shut off its own substance, its qualities, its usability; and shutting off as far as “neither having substance nor lacking substance,” it will not even allow “nonexistent” to be set up. And the last clause says, on the contrary, that it displays the mark of water and is discerned by consciousness — the displaying is a real displaying, only that what is displayed has no substance. So this simile is not saying ‘the heat-haze is false’; it is saying: it is plainly displayed, and sought for it is not obtained.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “neither existent nor nonexistent” must not be read as a kind of hedging. The sūtra uses twofold negation to shut off the setting up of either side; it is not choosing a middle between the two sides. If one sets up a thing called “neither existent nor nonexistent” and stands it there, that becomes a thing once more. Brought down to use: the Huayan’s negating predication, when it has shut off everything, always leaves one graph, “display”; whoever can only negate and cannot say what is displayed has read negating predication into a dead thing.

The Joining of the Simile: Seen from Afar It Looks Like Water and Drawn Near It Is Not There; Having Marks and Being Without Marks Are Alike Discriminations of the Mind That Forms Conceptions

The end of the simile carries its own turn: “seen from afar it looks like water and the conception of water arises, and drawn near it is not there, and the conception of water goes out of itself.” And then comes the joining: “So it is with this bodhisattva-mahāsattva: he does not obtain the marks of the Tathāgata’s appearing in the world and of his nirvāṇa. The buddhas’ having marks and likewise their being without marks are alike what the mind that forms conceptions discriminates.”

First the question: why does the joining not stop at ‘the marks of appearing and nirvāṇa are not obtained,’ but add the clause “having marks and likewise being without marks”?

Because, once ‘existent’ has been broken, a person will at once fall back and settle himself upon ‘nonexistent’ — since no buddha ever truly appeared in the world, then let there be no buddha appearing in the world. The sūtra will not allow it: having marks is a discrimination of the mind that forms conceptions, and being without marks is a discrimination of that mind as well. Both extremes come out of one source, and to break the one while keeping the other is as good as breaking nothing. This is the tightest clause of the whole section, and it is where the real sense of the two graphs “pure” lies.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “are alike what the mind that forms conceptions discriminates” is not saying that the buddhas do not exist. What the sūtra says is that the two marks, “having marks” and “being without marks,” both come out of conception; it has said nothing whatever about how the substance of a buddha stands — just as, at the moment the conception of water goes out of itself, the heat-haze is still there. Brought down to use: whenever you read words like ‘it is all discrimination,’ look first at which thing is being sent away; what is sent away here is the two marks, not the buddhas.

The Naming: Having Entered It He Rises from It, and Having Risen from It He Does Not Lose It

Here the sūtra names this samādhi: “This samādhi is named: the practice of the pure deep mind.” And at once it gives the most pivotal formulaic sentence of this samādhi — “As for this samādhi, the bodhisattva-mahāsattva, having entered it, rises from it, and having risen from it, does not lose what he has gained.” Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu takes this sentence for a boundary and judges what follows it to be ‘the practice of the deep mind on rising from the samādhi.’

First the question: it being named a samādhi, why must it speak of “rising”?

Because the skill of this samādhi lies not only in being able to enter, but still more in not losing after rising. In the concentrations of the world the realm arises together with the concentration, and when one comes out of the concentration the realm perishes; what is gained in this samādhi — the buddhas seen, the Dharma heard — is still there after one has come out. Three phrases, six graphs, drawn into one line: having entered it he rises from it, which is not to be sunk in the samādhi; having risen from it he does not lose it, which is not to come out empty.

One misreading has to be cleared away: not losing does not mean that the realm of the concentration is still there before one’s eyes. The simile below says it plainly — at waking, “the realms within the dream are no longer there,” and yet the recollection is not forgotten; what is not lost is the holding in memory, not the mark of the realm. Brought down to use: to test whether a stretch of study has come down to solid ground, look at what is left after one comes out of it; if the moment one leaves the seat one is no different from before one cultivated, then one has entered and been unable to rise, or risen and already lost.

The Third Simile: Awakening Out of Sleep and Recalling the Things One Dreamed

The sense of rising from the samādhi is made clear by one simile: “It is as when a person awakens out of sleep and recalls the things he dreamed: though at waking the realms within the dream are no longer there, he is yet able to call them to mind, and in his mind they are not forgotten and lost.” Li Tongxuan’s Lun outlines this section as ‘the part of the simile in which entering the samādhi is like recalling without forgetting the realms seen within a dream, and speaking of them well for others.’

First the question: taking a dream for a simile — is it saying that what is seen within the samādhi is the same as an empty dream?

The simile still takes only a single point — it takes ‘the realm gone and the recollection remaining.’ After the dream is over, of the mountains and rivers and persons within the dream not one is left, and yet the man plainly remembers what he dreamed; memory does not perish because the realm has perished. With this the sūtra sets forth the holding in memory without forgetting, after rising from the samādhi, of the buddhas seen and the Dharma heard; and what it takes is precisely this drop between the two.

One misreading has to be cleared away: one must not take the two graphs “like a dream” and turn them about to say that the buddhas seen within the samādhi are unreal. The sūtra never sets forth the buddhas seen by means of the dream; it sets forth “rising from the concentration” only by means of “awakening out of sleep” — the vehicle of the simile and its subject answer to one another item by item: sleep answers to the concentration, waking to the rising, and recalling the things dreamed to recalling the Dharma seen. Brought down to use: in reading a simile, first align the two sides item by item, and do not force together the parts that do not align — this is the method for reading every simile in the piece, and the first two similes are the same.

The Joining of the Simile: Seeing the Buddhas and Hearing the Dharma, Rising from the Concentration, Holding It in Memory Without Forgetting

The joining clause is: “So it is with the bodhisattva-mahāsattva: he enters the samādhi, sees the buddhas and hears the Dharma, and rising from the concentration he holds it in memory without forgetting.”

First the question: it was said just above that “he does not obtain the marks of the Tathāgata’s appearing in the world and of his nirvāṇa,” and here it says “sees the buddhas and hears the Dharma” — do the two sayings contradict one another?

They do not. What is sent away is the “marks” of appearing and nirvāṇa — that discrimination which sets a buddha inside a frame of arising and ceasing; what is kept is the seeing and the hearing within the samādhi. Obtaining nothing and yet seeing plainly is just as the heat-haze is without substance while the mark of water is displayed. If, because nothing is obtained, one were to say that nothing at all is seen, that would be pushing negating predication too far, and the sūtra itself will not allow it.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “holds it in memory without forgetting” is not a matter of a good memory. What is held in memory is the Dharma, not a quantity of sentences; the text that comes next is the opening up and making clear to the assemblies, from which one may know that what is held is that clarity which can be spoken out. Brought down to use: here concentration and wisdom are joined at the seam — if what is seen within the concentration cannot be carried out beyond the concentration and cannot be spoken to others, the skill of this samādhi has not been accomplished.

Benefiting Others: Opening Up and Making Clear to the Assemblies, Adorning the Buddha-Lands, Comprehending the Sense and Bent

From here the sūtra turns to the use: “And with this Dharma he opens up and makes clear to the great assemblies gathered in every place of awakening, he adorns the lands of all the buddhas, he comes to comprehend clearly the measureless senses and bents, and all the Dharma-gates likewise become pure.” Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu judges here, within the joining, that “above, it makes clear the practice of offering that benefits oneself; here, it makes clear the practice of opening and expounding that benefits others.”

First the question: why, after the holding in memory, is the first business the opening up and making clear to the assemblies?

Because the head and the tail of this samādhi complete one another just here. The opening of the whole section is the offering to measureless buddhas — that is the practice that benefits oneself; and this is the opening and expounding to the assemblies — that is the practice that benefits others. Between them stand a “nothing obtained” and a “not lost”: just because nothing is obtained of the marks, what is expounded does not become the view of one school; just because, having risen, he has not lost it, what is expounded has something real to be said.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “he adorns the lands of all the buddhas” is not another business of going off to decorate lands; it is one thing with two faces together with the opening up and making clear to the assemblies — where the Dharma reaches, there the land is adorned. And the two clauses “he comes to comprehend clearly the measureless senses and bents” and “all the Dharma-gates likewise become pure” speak of the clarity and purity of the one who is able to expound, and do not boast of his breadth. Brought down to use: to study and not be able to share it with others leaves the latter half of this samādhi with nothing to rest on; and before sharing it with others, one should first ask oneself whether what one holds is clear and whether it is pure.

The Concluding Benefit: He Kindles the Torch of Great Wisdom and Makes the Seed of the Buddhas Grow

The sūtra concludes the benefit in four clauses: “He kindles the torch of great wisdom, makes the seed of the buddhas grow, is complete in being without fear, is unexhausted in eloquence, and reveals and expounds the profound treasury of the Dharma.”

First the question: why are these clauses tied on after the benefiting of others, and not tied on within the samādhi?

Because they are all of them things that can be seen only after they have been spoken out. Wisdom is like a torch, and it is kindled in order to give light to others; the growing of the seed of the buddhas grows within the continuum of those who hear the Dharma; being without fear and eloquence are tested only at the moment the mouth is opened and the expounding begins — of these four matters not one is a mark of enjoyment for oneself. The last clause, “reveals and expounds the profound treasury of the Dharma,” gathers all up and returns to speech, answering head to tail with “with this Dharma he opens up and makes clear to the great assemblies gathered in every place of awakening.”

One misreading has to be cleared away: “makes the seed of the buddhas grow” is not a matter of raising the number of a few more practitioners; it is the making of the lineage of the buddhas to be unbroken. The sūtra uses the one graph “grow,” which carries the sense of continuous increase, not the sense of contriving. Brought down to use: when you read the concluding clauses of benefit in the Huayan, look whether what they conclude is one’s own realization or the transforming of others — this whole section belongs to the transforming of others, from which one may know that the final bent of the fourth samādhi does not lie in the beauty of a realm of concentration.

The Concluding Name: The Skillful Wisdom of the Fourth Samādhi

The last sentence: “This is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s skillful wisdom of the fourth great samādhi of the practice of the pure deep mind.” It clasps the opening question head to tail, and it is the fixed pattern common to every section of the ten samādhis — opening with “what is” as the question, closing with ‘this is …’ or ‘this is named … the skillful wisdom’ as the answer (the tenth samādhi closes in a different form; see the apparatus).

It is worth noticing that the concluding name has two things more than the name at the asking. First, at the asking it was named “the samādhi of the practice of the pure deep mind,” and at the concluding it is “the great samādhi of the practice of the pure deep mind,” with the one graph “great” added. Second, the close is tied off with the three graphs “skillful wisdom.” These three graphs are where the whole discourse of the ten samādhis comes to rest: what is accomplished is not the realm of the concentration itself, but that wisdom which is free and at ease within the concentration.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “skillful” must not be read as cleverness of technique. What has been spoken of all along this section — offering at its very fullest while nothing is obtained of the marks, both extremes shut off while the displaying is not obstructed, entering and being able to rise and after rising not losing, the practice that benefits oneself turned into the expounding that benefits others — to come and go among these several layers without obstruction is what is called skillful. Brought down to use: read the section through and then look back at the name of the samādhi, and the five graphs “the practice of the pure deep mind” are no longer the description of a state of mind, but another name for this wisdom.

Lineage

The explanations of the ancient masters upon this passage survive in two tracks. Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu judges of this samādhi that “within it the explanation divides into two,” first making clear the practice of the deep mind within the samādhi and afterward the practice of the deep mind on rising from the samādhi; within the samādhi it divides again into the raising of practice and the deep mind, and within the raising of practice it opens the practice of offering by outward things and the practice of offering by the three actions, while within the deep mind there is first the exposition in terms of dharma and afterward the setting forth by simile, and for the setting forth by simile the names of two similes are established — the simile of the deluded thought that does not know, setting forth his according with the real and being without thought, and the simile of the heat-haze that looks like water, setting forth his comprehending the false as the same as the true — closing with “the text may be understood as it stands”; the practice of the deep mind on rising from the samādhi is then divided into the three joints of dharma, simile, and joining, and within the joining he judges that “above, it makes clear the practice of offering that benefits oneself; here, it makes clear the practice of opening and expounding that benefits others.” The present piece expounds by following that outline.

Li Tongxuan’s Xin Huayan jing lun explains it otherwise, under three gates: explaining the name, explaining the substance and function, and explaining the sense by following the text. Explaining the name, he says that the bodhisattva has already cultivated the principle-wisdom of emptiness and marklessness and, with skillful wisdom, makes offering with a deep mind in added practice, and that in whatever he offers his mind is not ruined, and it is for this that the name is established. Explaining the substance and function, he says that the fundamental wisdom of the dharma-body is the substance, and that raising up the skillful wisdom of means and setting up the offering is the function. Following the text, he outlines at length in four parts — one part in which the name of the samādhi is again raised, one part on offering with the ten things to buddhas equal in number to sentient beings, one part on the simile of the heat-haze in the midday sun, and one part on the simile of recalling without forgetting as in a dream and speaking of it well for others. At the end he further admonishes the one who would enter contemplation to enter first the concentration without thinking and without mind and to gain the principle of the dharma-body, and only then to raise the mind of offering within the fundamental wisdom and the wisdom of means, saying that if he cultivates only the markless dharma-body of emptiness he will be unable to raise up the function of wisdom, and that if he only gives rise to conceptions all along and does not see the markless dharma-body, then it is purely conditioned doing.

The frames of the two masters’ outlines differ: Chengguan takes for his frame the two parts, within the samādhi and on rising from it, and both similes belong alike to the setting forth by simile of the deep mind within the samādhi; Li Tongxuan takes four parts for his frame, so that the simile of the heat-haze and the simile of the dream are each a part of its own, and the one simile of the scattered and stirring mind is not set apart. Further, Chengguan writes the heat-haze with one graph and the base text with another; and Li Tongxuan sums up the offerings as “the ten things,” while in the base text the clause “and makes offering” appears nine times. The four matters are recorded side by side without adjudication, each kept as it stands.

The Yanyi chao has no separate text of explanation upon this passage, and the gap is marked in accordance with fact. What Fazang’s Tanxuan ji and Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji comment upon is the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, and the sixty has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, so there is no corresponding text to record. The Jin translation, the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, having no such chapter, this passage has no parallel translation to be collated; the forty-fascicle Avataṃsaka preserves only the last chapter and likewise does not touch it. In the Huayan school’s treatises — the Wujiao zhang, the Shixuan men, the Fajie xuanjing, the Huanyuan guan — no text directly citing this passage is found, and there is no lineage to be attached; all of this alike is marked as it stands.

Two tracks stand side by side, each according to its own outline — and the record of this passage stops at what is actually the case.

The Question This Samādhi Must Answer

Each of the ten great samādhis has one question, and every one of them is a question Samantabhadra Bodhisattva sets himself and then answers himself. The question of the fifth samādhi is “What is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of the treasury of knowing the adornments of the past?” — what is asked is ‘what is it called,’ not ‘how is it cultivated to completion.’ So the whole passage that follows sets out the character of this samādhi, not its stages.

The name of the samādhi has to be read open first. “Knowing the past” is the object known: it is not the recalling of one’s own bygone affairs, but the knowing of the entire course of the appearing of all the buddhas in the past. Li Tongxuan explains this name by taking as the sense of ‘treasury’ that one “adorns the fundamental wisdom of one’s own mind”; in this passage Chengguan has no rubric explaining the name — the training of name and meaning is recorded from both without forcing them into one. “Samādhi” is the substance dwelt in: he knows without coming out of the concentration, and so it is named a concentration.

Here is the place where it is easiest to read wrongly. Hearing “knowing the past,” one thinks of a recollection after the fashion of the penetration that knows former lives, and then this samādhi turns into a display of spiritual powers. But the whole passage comes to rest nowhere upon “remembering”; it rests upon that unreaching mind of the words below, “he does not take the past as object.” Brought down to use: when you read a passage on knowing and seeing in the Huayan, the first step is always to ask ‘what field of samādhi does this knowing show forth,’ and never to ask ‘how many things did he come to know.’

Discerning Wisdom in Facing the Object: One Sequence Fitted Inside Another

The first subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘discerning wisdom in facing the object.’ The sūtra says that this bodhisattva “is able to know the appearing of the buddhas of the past,” and then lays out a string of clauses linked head to tail: within the sequence of the kalpas there is the sequence of the lands, and within the sequence of the lands there is again the sequence of the kalpas; within the sequence of the kalpas there is the sequence of the appearing of the buddhas, within the appearing of the buddhas there is the preaching of the Dharma, within the preaching there is what the mind delights in, within that delight there are the faculties, within the faculties there is the taming, within the taming there are the life-spans of the buddhas, and within the life-spans there is the number and measure of those koṭis of nayutas of years.

The question to ask is: why must it be said in this way, one layer fitted inside another?

Because what is known is not a heap of isolated facts; it is a net whose meshes take one another in. Within time there is place, and within place there is again time; the appearing of a buddha is not one event standing on nothing — it is tied to the preaching of the Dharma, the preaching is tied to what the minds of beings delight in, that delight is tied to the sort of faculties they have, and the faculties are tied to the season of their taming. Know one thing, and the whole is drawn along with it.

One misunderstanding has to be cleared away: this is not saying that the bodhisattva has learned the events of the past by heart, one after another. What the sūtra speaks of is “sequence” — what is known is the ordering, not the items. Brought down to use: when you read the Huayan’s taking-in of layer within layer, the eye must be kept upon the two words “within which”; only when you can see one item holding another inside it have you read your way in.

Directly Showing Forth What the Wisdom Knows: The Boundless Wisdom of Sequence Gained, the Past Is Wholly Before the Eyes

The second subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘directly showing forth what the wisdom knows,’ judging this whole string of things known to be “all of them dharmas within the treasury of the past.” The sūtra says “because this bodhisattva-mahāsattva has gained a wisdom of sequence thus boundless,” and then runs down the list in one and the same clause-pattern: he knows the buddhas of the past · the lands · the Dharma-gates · the kalpas · the dharmas · the minds · the understandings · the sentient beings · the afflictions · the observances · the purity.

First the question: how does this string stand to the clauses of sequence in the subdivision before it?

Everything turns on the word “because.” The subdivision before said how the knowing wisdom comes to be established — by sequence within sequence it becomes the boundless wisdom of sequence; this subdivision says what falls within the scope of the knowing once the wisdom is established. The former is the gate; the latter is the whole prospect once the gate has opened. That is why there is no more need here to speak of “sequence,” but only to repeat “he knows”: the single word “then” marks a thing arrived at as water arrives at a channel, not another round of effort begun.

One misreading has to be cleared away: do not take these eleven items for eleven fields of study, as though each had to be learned in turn. The sūtra’s sense is precisely the contrary — the one wisdom being gained, all the knowings are gained with it. Brought down to use: in cultivation the question truly to be asked is not ‘which item do I still not know,’ but ‘that wisdom which knows — have I established it or not.’

The Naming of the Samādhi and the Time-Span That Is Known: A Single Thought-Moment with Room for Fourteen Layers of Kalpas

The third subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘the time-span that is known,’ counting it as having “fourteen layers,” and saying that this is the explaining of the sense of the word “past.” The sūtra first sets up a second name for this concentration — “this samādhi is named: the Pure Treasury of the Past”; then it says “within a single thought-moment,” it can enter a hundred kalpas · a thousand kalpas · a hundred thousand kalpas · a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of kalpas, numberless · measureless · boundless · unequalled, uncountable · unnameable · unthinkable · immeasurable · unspeakable, on to “it can enter unspeakably unspeakable kalpas.”

The question to ask is: why lay the measures of kalpas out until language can carry them no further?

Because the weight of this string does not fall upon the kalpas, but upon the four words that stand before them: “within a single thought-moment.” The higher the measures of kalpas are piled, the more plainly what a single thought-moment can hold is shown forth; piled up to “unspeakably unspeakable,” language concedes defeat of itself, and that one thought-moment is still only one thought-moment. This is the Huayan’s way of showing forth by laying out.

One misreading has to be cleared away: this is not saying that the bodhisattva stays in concentration for a very long while. What the sūtra speaks of is entering kalpas, not dwelling for kalpas — what enters is the wisdom of a single thought-moment, and what is entered is measureless time. Brought down to use: when you come upon a long string mounting up layer upon layer like this, do not skip it; whoever skips it will not get the weight of that “single thought-moment.”

Showing Forth the Character of This Knowing: He Does Not Extinguish the Present, He Does Not Take the Past as Object

The fourth subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘showing forth the character of this knowing.’ The sūtra has only two clauses of eight words: “he does not extinguish the present, he does not take the past as object.” Chengguan glosses them thus — “that he does not extinguish the present is not abandoning; that he does not take the past as object is not grasping” — and states their sense further: this is said only with respect to the one gate of the past, and it shows that the bodhisattva’s knowing does not reach after its object with any grasping or abandoning.

First the question: since this samādhi is precisely the knowing of the past, why should it say “he does not extinguish the present”?

Because the ailment most easily caught in knowing the past is the letting go of the present — once the mind sinks down into former days, this very thought-moment before the eyes goes dark. The sūtra stops this leak first: he enters this concentration and the present is not extinguished, and that is not abandoning. Then it says “he does not take the past as object”: he knows the past and yet does not reach after and cling to it, and that is not grasping. One clause bars abandoning and one clause bars grasping, and together they show forth precisely that this knowing is not a knowing of grasping and abandoning.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “he does not take the past as object” is not the same as not knowing the past. From the beginning of the passage down to this point everything has been about knowing; how should it suddenly turn into not knowing? What is barred is the “taking as object” — that act of sticking fast and reaching after — and not the clarity itself. Brought down to use: these eight words are the measuring-line for every dharma of practice that traces things back — to look back and yet not let the mind sink, to be clear and yet not let the thought stick fast, is what is here called concentration.

The Benefit Gained on Rising from Samādhi: Receiving Ten Dharmas of Consecration at the Rising

The fifth subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘the benefit gained on rising from samādhi,’ opening it into three parts: first, raising the number and discerning the character; second, calling forth and listing their names; third, concluding with the swiftness of the gaining. This present passage is the first part. The sūtra says that the bodhisattva “rises from this samādhi and in the presence of the Tathāgata receives ten kinds of inconceivable dharmas of consecration,” and then runs down seven clauses each with the word “and” — and he gains them · and he makes them pure · and he brings them to accomplishment · and he enters them · and he realizes them · and he fulfills them · and he holds them fast — and says at the last, “with even-mindedness he fully knows the purity of the three wheels.”

First the question: why should so many verbs be said one after another?

Chengguan, in glossing this, judges the first clause, “receiving the dharmas of consecration,” to be the general one, and says its sense is “the fruit brought to accomplishment at the ending of the stations”; the remaining clauses are the particular ones, and he assigns them one by one as belonging to oneself · purifying the hindrances · being ultimate · the first entering · the true realizing · the final fulfilling · holding them so that they are not lost · knowing without a knowing, taking “the purifying of the three wheels” to gather up all the clauses before it. Plainly, then, this string is no mere saying of one thing over again; it takes the single matter of “gaining” apart and looks at it piece by piece: gained and belonging to oneself · gained with the hindrances purified · gained to the ultimate · gained so that one can enter and can realize · gained and fulfilled and able to be held — only when not one item is wanting is it called a true gaining.

One misreading has to be cleared away: do not read “consecration” as a ceremony. Brought down to use: to test what is called ‘gaining a dharma,’ go down this string and ask item by item — does it belong to oneself? are the hindrances purified? is it held without being lost? If there is one item that cannot be answered, that gaining is not yet firm.

As for the last clause, “the purity of the three wheels,” the ancient worthies each have their own explanation: Chengguan discerns it with respect to wisdom, saying that it is “because there is no knower, nothing known, and no right knowing”; Li Tongxuan discerns it with respect to function, taking spiritual penetration · the recording of minds · right teaching to be the three wheels. The two explanations are each established according to the gate with respect to which they are made, and both are recorded here without adjudication.

Calling Forth and Listing Their Names: The Ten Dharmas of Consecration One by One

The second part of the fifth subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘calling forth and listing their names.’ The sūtra sets itself the question “which are the ten?” and then lists them: discourse that does not go against the meaning · preaching the Dharma without exhausting · words of instruction without fault · delighting in preaching without break · a mind without dread or fear · speech unfailingly truthful · being that upon which sentient beings rely · rescuing them and setting them free from the three realms · roots of goodness most surpassing · taming and guiding with the wondrous Dharma.

The question to ask is: is there an order to be traced in these ten items?

Chengguan judges them thus: the first four are the four unobstructed eloquences; the next two are the benefiting of oneself, namely not dreading the profound Dharma and being able to practice as one speaks; the next two are the benefiting of others, namely being a support to the good and a rescue to the evil; the last two make clear in general the surpassing excellence of the two benefits. Read according to this judgement, the frame of the ten items comes out plainly — first the capacity for preaching, next one’s own solid ground, then the taking of responsibility for others, and at the last the general gathering up of their excellence.

One misreading has to be cleared away: do not look upon these ten items as ten accomplishments. The first four are all tied to “the meaning” — discourse that does not go against the meaning · preaching without exhausting · words of instruction without fault · delighting in preaching without break: what is spoken of is that the dharma spoken does not go against the meaning, does not run dry, does not fall out of order, does not break off; and the sixth item says outright, “speech unfailingly truthful.” Plainly the root of these ten dharmas is sincerity and meaning, and not eloquence.

Brought down to use: whether a man preaches much or little is no measure; whether what he preaches goes against the meaning or not, whether he preaches sincerely or not — that is the measure.

Concluding with the Swiftness of the Gaining: The Kalala Enters the Womb, and in One Thought-Moment Birth Is Taken Up

The third part of the fifth subdivision, which Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu names ‘concluding with the swiftness of the gaining,’ judging it to have within it the three joints of dharma · simile · joining. The joint of dharma is “if a bodhisattva enters this samādhi and rises from the samādhi, he gains them with no interval between”; the joint of simile is “it is as when the kalala enters the womb: in a single thought-moment consciousness takes up its birth”; the joint of joining is “so it is with the bodhisattva-mahāsattva too: rising from this concentration, in the presence of the Tathāgata, in a single thought-moment he gains these ten dharmas.”

First the question: what is a kalala, and why is this taken for the simile?

Kalala — Chengguan and Li Tongxuan train the word alike as “thin curd,” the embryonic stage not yet formed at the first receiving of conception, and Li Tongxuan glosses it further, saying, “that is, at the first receiving of conception it is like thin curd.” It is taken for a simile with the eye upon the three words “in a single thought-moment”: the taking up of birth by consciousness has no stretch of preparation to pass through — the conditions once complete, it is in that very thought-moment. So it is too with the bodhisattva’s gaining of the dharmas on rising from concentration: “he gains them with no interval between,” and between the concentration and its fruit there is nothing lying in the middle.

One misreading has to be cleared away: this is not saying that the dharmas are gained easily. What the simile shows forth is the absence of an interval, not the absence of labor; the wisdom of sequence · the fourteen layers of kalpas · the not grasping and not abandoning of the whole passage before it are the very reason why this one thought-moment can be without interval. Brought down to use: true realization was never a slow getting better; it is a being fully prepared, and then all at once — the work lies in the preparing, not in the waiting.

The Concluding Name: The Skillful Wisdom of the Fifth Samādhi

The last sentence: “Sons of the Buddha! This is what is called the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s skillful wisdom of the fifth great samādhi of the treasury of knowing the adornments of the past.” It clasps the opening question head to tail, and is the fixed pattern shared by the sections of the ten samādhis — opening with the question “what is,” closing with the answer ‘this is …’ or ‘this is named … skillful wisdom’ (the tenth samādhi closes in a different form; see the apparatus).

Two things are to be noticed, in which the concluding name has more than the name in the question. First, in the question it is named “the samādhi of the treasury of knowing the adornments of the past,” while at the close it is named “the great samādhi of the treasury of knowing the adornments of the past,” with the one word “great” added; second, at the very end the three words “skillful wisdom” are attached. These three words are where the whole of the ten samādhis comes to rest: what is brought to accomplishment is not the field of the concentration itself, but that wisdom which has mastery in the concentration.

One misreading has to be cleared away: “skillful” must not be read as skill in the sense of a device. What the sūtra has said all the way through is this — sequence within sequence and yet the wisdom is one · the measures of kalpas without end and yet the thought-moment is one · knowing the past and yet neither grasping nor abandoning · rising from concentration and gaining the dharmas with no interval between. To be unobstructed among these several layers is what is called skillful. Brought down to use: read the passage through and then look back at the name of the samādhi, and the three words “knowing the past” are no longer a recollection of former days, but another name for this wisdom.

Lineage

The explanations of the ancient worthies upon this passage run in two tracks. Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu outlines this samādhi in five — discerning wisdom in facing the object · directly showing forth what the wisdom knows · the time-span that is known · showing forth the character of this knowing · the benefit gained on rising from samādhi — and records that the first four subdivisions each open with one vocative “Sons of the Buddha,” the five subdivisions fitting closely to the sequence of the sūtra text; this present piece expounds according to that outline. The fifth subdivision he opens further into three parts: in the first part ten clauses are assigned one by one; in the second the ten names are judged as the four unobstructed eloquences · the benefiting of oneself · the benefiting of others · the general making clear of the surpassing excellence of the two benefits; the third is judged as the three joints of dharma, simile, and joining. Li Tongxuan’s Xin Huayan jing lun sets up three gates instead — explaining the name · substance and function · explaining the sense following the text — taking the fundamental wisdom to be the substance of this samādhi, and the differentiating wisdom that knows the sequence of the kalpas and the lands to be its function.

The two houses train the word “kalala” alike as “thin curd”; upon “the purity of the three wheels” they differ: Chengguan discerns it with respect to wisdom, Li Tongxuan with respect to function, taking spiritual penetration · the recording of minds · right teaching to be the three wheels. The two explanations are each established according to the gate with respect to which they are made, and are recorded without adjudication.

The Yanyi chao has no separate unfolding upon this passage — the chao explains selectively by its own convention, and this is no oversight; the absence is recorded in accordance with fact. What Fazang’s Tanxuan ji and Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji comment upon is in both cases the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, and the sixty has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, so there is no corresponding text to record. The Jin translation, the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, and this passage has no parallel translation to be collated against; the forty-fascicle Avataṃsaka preserves only the last chapter and likewise does not touch it. The Shidi jing lun is a dedicated explanation of the Chapter on the Ten Grounds and cites nothing from this chapter. In the treatises of the Huayan school — the Wujiao zhang, the Shixuan men, the Fajie xuanjing, the Huanyuan guan — no text directly citing this passage is found, and there is no lineage to be attached; this too is recorded as wanting.

Why This Samādhi Must First Ask After the Name

Samantabhadra speaks the sixth samādhi, and he begins, as before, with a question: “What is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of the treasury of the light of wisdom?” He does not first teach a method; he first sets up a name. Chengguan’s outline gives each of the ten samādhis a statement, an explanation, and a conclusion, and this is the settled track of the whole Chapter on the Ten Samādhis; the statement is just this question. The misreading to guard against is taking this question for a courteous opening flourish. In truth, to ask after the name is to fix the range: since it is named the treasury of the light of wisdom, what this samādhi treats of is not a still condition of mind but a kind of shining; and how far that shining reaches is what the text below sets out passage by passage. Li Tongxuan explains this name by saying that it means this bodhisattva is able to know all the buddhas within all the kalpas of the future, those who have already spoken the Dharma and those who have not; and he glosses the graph ‘treasury’ by saying that without leaving a single thought-moment it holds within it the wisdom of the kalpas of the three times, and is therefore named a treasury. The name being such, everything laid out later has its place to come home to. Brought down to use: in reading each of the ten samādhis, look first at which side its name falls upon, and you will not read the ten as ten repetitions of one thing.

Knowing the Buddhas of the Future and Their Names: Why the Field Known Is the Future

The first passage says that one who dwells in this samādhi “is able to know all the buddhas there are within all the worlds and all the kalpas of the future,” whether they have spoken the Dharma or not, whether they have been given a prediction or not, and that their names are each unlike the others — numberless names, measureless names, boundless names, on to unspeakable names. The doubt that most easily arises here is this: the matters of the future have not yet happened, so how can they be known? The sūtra’s answer does not lie in argument but in setting out plainly what it is that is known: already spoken is set against not yet spoken, already given a prediction against not yet given one, and this is precisely to make clear that what is known is not confined to what has already been shown, but that the not yet shown lies within the shining as well. Chengguan divides this stretch into the two subdivisions of knowing all the buddhas together and knowing their many names. The reason the names must be told out under nine kinds of name without limit (four ‘without’ and five ‘cannot’) is that the appearing of buddhas is of itself without limit, and their names are without limit accordingly; it is not that one is meant to memorize nine numbers. Brought down to use: this passage first pushes open the border of ‘knowing’ — if what is known reaches only to what is already done, it is not yet the knowing this samādhi speaks of.

The Things They Are to Do: Knowing What They Are to Do

Next the sūtra lists twelve clauses each beginning with ‘are to’: they are to appear in the world, to benefit sentient beings, to be kings among the dharmas, to raise up buddha-work, to speak the benefit of merit, to praise the meaning of goodness, to speak the meaning of the bright portion, to cleanse away the evils, to dwell in virtue, to reveal the truth of the supreme meaning, to enter the station of consecration, to accomplish omniscience. Chengguan sets this under knowing what they are to do. The misreading to guard against here is to see it as a list of predictions, as though the bodhisattva were reckoning out that a certain buddha will do a certain thing in a certain year. Look closely at these twelve clauses: not one of them is a private course of doings; every one is the common road by which a buddha is a buddha — appearing, benefiting beings, kingship in the Dharma, buddha-work, speaking of merit, praise of goodness, speaking of the pure portion, cleansing of evil, dwelling in virtue, revealing of the supreme meaning, consecration, omniscience: from the first appearing to the accomplishing of omniscience it is one complete track. What is known being a track, it is not divination. Brought down to use: to know the future is not to know the particulars, it is to know that the Dharma must be thus.

Ten Times ‘Perfect’: Fullness of Cause and Completeness of Fruit

The fourth passage sets ten clauses side by side: they cultivate perfect practice, give rise to perfect vows, enter perfect wisdom, have a perfect assembly, are furnished with perfect adornment, gather perfect merit, awaken to perfect Dharma, obtain perfect fruit, are possessed of perfect marks, accomplish perfect awakening. Chengguan sets this under making clear the knowing of the fullness of their cause and the completeness of their fruit. Why should all ten matters be hung upon the two graphs ‘perfect’? It is easily misread as a rhetorical heaping-up. In fact the first half of these ten clauses belongs to cause and the latter half to fruit: practice, vow, wisdom, assembly, adornment, and merit are the cause that is cultivated; Dharma, fruit, marks, and awakening are the fruit that is obtained. The cause being full, the fruit is therefore complete. And the reason ‘perfect’ recurs in every clause is to let one see that cause and fruit are of one and the same quality — it is not that there is first a scattering of piecemeal causes and then, all at once, a perfect fruit. Brought down to use: in examining your own cultivation, the test is not how many items there are, but whether each item is cultivated toward the perfect.

From Name, Surname, and Clan to the Entering of Nirvāṇa: Knowing What They Now Do

The fifth passage says: the names and surnames and clans of those Tathāgatas, their skillfulness in means, their spiritual penetrations and transformations, their bringing sentient beings to maturity, their entering parinirvāṇa — “all such things as these he knows clearly, every one.” Chengguan sets this under knowing what they now do. Set beside ‘what they are to do’ before it, this subdivision speaks of the actual bearing of a buddha’s shown course of teaching for one lifetime — from the surname and clan into which he takes birth, to the skillfulness and the transformations used in teaching, to the maturing of beings, to the final passing away. The misreading to guard against is supposing that, since the necessity of the Dharma is known, these particular appearances may be passed over. The sūtra goes out of its way to place even so seemingly trifling a matter as name, surname, and clan among the things known, precisely in order to show that this wisdom does not fall into vagueness: the common road must be known, and the particular appearances must be known too. Brought down to use: a wisdom that is real does not find the particulars of things too petty; only a mind that is vague needs generalities to cover itself with.

Entering Measureless Kalpas Within a Single Thought-Moment: How the Bounds Are Broken

The sixth passage begins from “this bodhisattva, within a single thought-moment,” and mounts by degrees all the way: one kalpa, a hundred kalpas, a thousand kalpas, a hundred thousand kalpas, a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of kalpas; kalpas as many as the dust motes of Jambudvīpa, kalpas as many as the dust motes of the four continents, on to kalpas as many as the dust motes of unspeakably unspeakable buddha-lands; and at last it gathers all up, saying that all the numbers of kalpas in all the worlds of the future are known clearly by wisdom. Chengguan sets this under making clear the knowing of the bounds. This passage is most easily read as a contest of quantity. In truth the point of the mounting lies in the few words at the very front — within a single thought-moment. If one thought-moment could hold only one kalpa, then the greater the number of kalpas the less the thought-moment would suffice; but the sūtra mounts to the unspeakably unspeakable and is still within a single thought-moment, which is precisely to show that between thought-moment and kalpa there is of itself no limit of capacity. When Li Tongxuan glosses ‘treasury’ as holding within a single thought-moment the wisdom of the kalpas of the three times, this is the very thing he speaks of. Chengguan appends to this subdivision one collating remark, saying that the ‘great thousand’ herein is precisely a buddha-land, and that where the sūtra says it twice over this is for the most part a matter of graphs let slip, and it ought to read ‘a hundred buddha-lands’ — this is a commentator’s inference from the sense of the text, and it is recorded without the base text being altered. Brought down to use: the gulf between a single thought-moment and a long kalpa is made by the view that sets bounds; it is not the fact itself.

The Ten Gates of Holding: Why ‘Holding’ Follows Upon ‘Knowing’

The working having been fully told, the sūtra makes its own turn: “Because of this clear knowing, his mind enters further into ten gates of holding.” Chengguan explains this turn by saying that it is because of the knowing that went before that it is held and not lost, and because it is held and not lost that the benefit of holding is gained. Here is a sequence of the first importance: knowing first and holding after. Holding is not a labour begun on a fresh hearth; it is the continuing of knowing. What the sūtra lists is the holding of the Buddha, the holding of the Dharma, the holding of practice, the holding of power, the holding of wisdom, the holding of great compassion, the holding of the clauses of skillfulness in differences, the holding of the dharma of the lion’s taking of birth, the holding of the power of wisdom, the holding of the power of the good friend, the holding of the power of non-abiding, and the holding of the power of the Dharma — it states ten kinds and lists in fact twelve, which Chengguan explains as a number added within a ten, the same precedent as the eleven clauses of the first samādhi. It is a formal usage of the text of the Avataṃsaka, not a graph dropped or intruded. Of several of these clauses Chengguan gives particular explanations: the lion’s taking of birth is not fearing the suffering of birth-and-death; to show the real nature of birth-and-death is called opening the bolt and key of the Dharma, and because one fully knows that birth-and-death is from the first empty one comes out of the mire of desire; the holding of the power of wisdom is the twin running of concentration and wisdom; and entering the holding of the power of non-abiding, the great kalpas do not leave a single thought-moment. Brought down to use: when one learns and cannot hold, it is because one did not truly know at the outset; the mending is to be done at the knowing, not by hard memorizing.

Eleven Kinds of Skillfulness: The Two Sides of Dwelling and Knowing

The dharma-portion of the second benefit runs on through eleven clauses: skillfully dwelling for unspeakably unspeakable kalpas, skillfully dwelling in unspeakably unspeakable lands — these two are ‘dwelling’; the nine that follow are ‘knowing’ — knowing the manifold kinds of sentient beings, knowing the differing appearances of beings, knowing the same and the different recompenses of deeds, knowing diligence and the habit-energies of the faculties and the manifold practices that follow one another in difference, knowing the measureless defiled and pure kinds of thinking, knowing the manifold meanings of the Dharma and its measureless letters and the words in which it is expounded, knowing the manifold appearings of buddhas, their clans, their seasons, the marks they show, the Dharma they speak, the buddha-work they carry out and their entering parinirvāṇa, knowing the boundless gates of wisdom, knowing the measureless manifestations of all the spiritual penetrations. The misreading to guard against is taking ‘skillfulness’ for cleverness of technique. Look closely and what every clause faces is a field of differences: beings have differing appearances, recompense has sameness and difference, practices follow one another in difference, thinking has the defiled and the pure, the meaning of the Dharma has measureless letters — what makes skillfulness skillful is exactly that, facing such unevenness, it is not thrown into confusion. Chengguan judges this stretch to have a dharma-portion, a simile, and a joining, and this is the one portion of dharma. Brought down to use: to be clear and unconfused just where things are most uneven is what is called skillfulness; lumping everything together is not skillfulness, it is failing to see.

The Simile of the Rising Sun: The Sun Singles Out No One for Discrimination

The simile is taken from something utterly commonplace: it is as when the sun rises, and all that there is in the world — villages and encampments, cities and towns, palaces and halls, houses and dwellings, mountains and marshes, birds and beasts, trees and groves, flowers and fruits, all things of every kind such as these — a man who has eyes sees them all plainly. Why raise up the sun? Two things are taken from it: first, that the sunlight reaches everywhere and leaves nothing out; second, that the sun has never singled out some one thing for discrimination and then shone upon it. The misreading to guard against is to put the weight upon ‘the sun is very bright.’ What the sūtra borrows is not the degree of light, but that relation between the shining and the shone-upon in which there is no discrimination and yet nothing is left unreached. And the four words ‘a man who has eyes’ must be noticed as well: though the sun shines universally, seeing or not seeing still hangs upon whether one has eyes — the simile has already laid down within itself the side of the one who receives. Brought down to use: evenness is not vagueness; it is just because the sunlight has no partiality at all that the ten thousand things each show forth their own shape.

The Substance-Nature Is Even, and Yet It Can Know Differentiated Appearances

The joining says: the light of the sun is even, without discrimination, and yet it can cause the eye to see appearances of every kind; this great samādhi is likewise: its substance-nature is even, without discrimination, and yet it can cause the bodhisattva to know unspeakably unspeakable hundreds of thousands of koṭis of nayutas of differentiated appearances. This is the eye of this samādhi. The commonest misunderstanding is to take evenness and difference as two ends: that to have evenness one may not have difference, and that to speak of difference is to lose evenness. The sūtra sets the two sentences side by side, and plainly they are one matter: it is precisely because the substance-nature is even and undiscriminating that measureless differences can be shone out; if the one who shines had discrimination first, what is shone upon would be slanted accordingly. Upon this Chengguan sets up two kinds of skillfulness: the first is skillfulness answering to particulars, and therefore the dharma-portion speaks of the unspeakable and measureless and the simile speaks of seeing things of every kind; the second is skillfulness answering to principle, and therefore it speaks of the light of the sun being even. He judges that only when the two are without obstruction to one another is it named skillfulness, and so the joining says “without discrimination he yet is able to know.” Brought down to use: when there is a standpoint in the mind beforehand, what is seen is only the standpoint; an even mind is not one that fails to tell right from wrong, it is one that does not let a preconception act in the eye’s stead.

The Ten Things Not in Vain: Why Benefiting Others Must Be Told Out One by One as ‘Not in Vain’

The third benefit lists ten things not in vain: seeing not in vain, hearing not in vain, dwelling together not in vain, rousing not in vain, practice not in vain, drawing near not in vain, vowing not in vain, the dharma of skillfulness not in vain, raining down the rain of Dharma not in vain, appearing not in vain — of the ten clauses, six close with “causing sentient beings,” “causing boundless worlds,” or “causing all sentient beings” (the first through the fifth, and the tenth); the sixth reads “because it cuts off the doubts of unspeakably unspeakable sentient beings,” and the whole clause has no ‘causing’ in it; the seventh reads “causes them to make surpassing offerings,” the eighth “causes them all to dwell,” the ninth “causes them to dwell in the way of the buddhas” — each with a pattern of its own. Chengguan judges the four benefits, saying the former two are benefit to oneself and the latter two benefit to others, and this is the first of those that benefit others. The two graphs ‘not in vain’ must be guarded against being read as ‘not emptiness’ — the emptiness here is the emptiness of being set up for nothing and falling away to nothing, and not in vain means not for nothing. To see him once, to hear one word of his, to dwell together with him, on to raining down the Dharma for him — each of these truly takes effect, and is not to no purpose. And so each of the ten clauses is tied by the graph ‘because’ to a real benefit: giving rise to roots of goodness, reaching maturity, taming of the mind, acting according to what is spoken, purity of worlds, cutting off of doubt, accomplishment of vows, dwelling in the pure wisdom of unobstructed liberation, dwelling in the way of the buddhas, and all receiving the shining. Brought down to use: benefiting others is measured not by how great the aspiration is, but by whether there is truly one measure of change in the other person.

The Reverence and Service of the Ten Kings: How This Passage Should Be Read

The last passage says that when he gains the ten kinds of what is not in vain, the hosts of the kings of the gods all come and bow their heads to him, the hosts of the dragon kings raise up great clouds of fragrance, the yakṣa kings bow their heads to his feet, the asura kings reverently make offerings, the garuḍa kings surround him before and behind, the Brahmā kings all come and exhort him to speak, the kiṃnara kings and the mahoraga kings join together in praising him, the gandharva kings constantly come and draw near, and the hosts of the kings of men serve him and make offerings. Chengguan sets this under the benefit of the reverence and service of the ten kings. The misreading to guard against is to take it for a description of honour, as though the wage of cultivating samādhi were to be bowed to by people. Li Tongxuan has one important sentence upon this: he says that the names of the kings of the eight classes and the rest were explained already in the first assembly, that here they do not stand for a doctrine, and that it is only by the dharma of making offerings and paying reverence that they draw near to the Tathāgata — meaning that this passage does not have a further symbolic doctrine assigned to it, and the reader need not go hunting for a symbol king by king. Since the appearance of reverence and service comes in the train of the benefit of what is not in vain, one can see that what is revered is the benefit and not the person. Brought down to use: an outward show of reverence was never the aim; and if it be inverted so that reverence becomes the aim, then the ten things not in vain before it are all in vain together.

The Concluding Name: The Skillful Wisdom of the Sixth Great Samādhi, the Treasury of the Light of Wisdom

The last sentence concludes: this is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s skillful wisdom of the sixth great samādhi, the treasury of the light of wisdom. As with the other samādhis among the ten, the three portions of statement, explanation, and conclusion are here brought to a close. Note that what the concluding name is tied to is still the words ‘skillful wisdom,’ and not merely the name of the samādhi — the same precedent as the concluding name of the first samādhi. A samādhi begins by asking after its name and ends by concluding upon wisdom; and in between, the six subdivisions of the working and the four benefits are, every one of them, matters of knowing and shining. Return to the doubt with which we began — how can what has not yet happened be known — and the sūtra gives no method of reckoning; it only pushes the field shone upon all the way out to all the worlds and all the kalpas of the future, and then, with the simile of the rising sun, brings it home to “the substance-nature is even, without discrimination.” Brought down to use: what this samādhi teaches is not foreknowledge; it is to bring the mind into such order that it is without discrimination, and then what can be shone upon is of itself far.

Lineage

The explanations of the ancient masters upon this samādhi survive in two houses. Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu judges the explanatory text of this samādhi to divide in two: the former makes clear the working of the samādhi, the latter sets forth the benefits of the samādhi; the working divides into six subdivisions (knowing all the buddhas together · knowing their many names · knowing what they are to do · knowing the fullness of their cause and the completeness of their fruit · knowing what they now do · making clear the knowing of the bounds), the benefits into four (the benefit of entering the holdings · the benefit of gaining skillfulness · the benefit of gaining what is not in vain · the benefit of the reverence and service of the ten kings), and he judges the former two benefits to be benefit to oneself and the latter two benefit to others. Under the subdivision of making clear the knowing of the bounds he appends one collating remark, saying that the sūtra’s ‘great thousand’ is precisely a buddha-land and that where it is said twice over this is for the most part a matter of graphs let slip, and that it ought to read ‘a hundred buddha-lands’; he judges the twelve clauses of the gates of holding to be a number added within a ten; he gives short explanations of the several clauses on the lion’s taking of birth, the opening of the bolt and key of the Dharma, the coming out of the mire of desire, the holding of the power of wisdom, and the holding of the power of non-abiding; and upon the benefit of gaining skillfulness he judges that there are the three portions of dharma, simile, and joining, and sets up the two kinds of skillfulness, answering to particulars and answering to principle, saying that only when the two are without obstruction to one another is it named skillfulness. The commentarial sense to which each section of this exposition is tied comes from here. Li Tongxuan’s Xin Huayan jing lun makes no division into subdivisions and explains only three matters: the ground of the name (that he is able to know all the buddhas within all the kalpas of the future, whether they have already spoken the Dharma or not), the gloss on the sense of ‘treasury’ (that without leaving a single thought-moment it holds within it the wisdom of the kalpas of the three times, and this is named a treasury), and the explanation of the clauses on the offerings of the kings of the eight classes (that this does not stand for a doctrine, but that by the dharma of making offerings and paying reverence they draw near to the Tathāgata), while for the remaining senses he says that they are complete in the text itself. Chengguan’s Yanyi chao has no text upon this samādhi that opens the matter out. Fazang’s Tanxuan ji and Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji are both commentaries upon the Jin translation, the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, and the sixty has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis; hence neither has a passage explaining this samādhi that could be adduced. Vasubandhu’s Shidi jing lun has no bearing upon this chapter. The Jin translation in sixty fascicles likewise has no text answering to this samādhi, and so there is no parallel translation to be collated. In the books that carry the doctrinal-classification framework of the Huayan school no text tied to this samādhi is to be seen. All this fullness and brevity is recorded as it actually stands, without judgement of higher and lower.

Why This Round of Samādhi Has to Be Asked About Twice

The ten great samādhis run through one after another, and every one of them opens with the same sentence — ‘what is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s such-and-such samādhi.’ At the seventh round, however, one question more comes out: having asked “what is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of fully knowing the buddha-adornments of all worlds,” it goes straight on to ask ‘why is this samādhi named fully knowing the buddha-adornments of all worlds.’ Two questions one after another in the same passage — at first glance the reader will take it for a repetition. Chengguan glosses this by saying that the ground of the repeated questioning lies in the difference of what is questioned: the first question questions this one samādhi in general, while the latter question questions in particular the two graphs ‘adornment.’ This distinction matters: it settles that the answer below is not describing the depth or shallowness of a state of samādhi, but laying out what the adornment that is seen actually is. So the first misreading to be guarded against, in reading this passage, is to read it as a piece of description of a meditative state. It is in fact a catalogue of ‘what is seen’: what buddhas are seen, what assemblies are seen, what body is seen, and what the mind is like at the moment of seeing. Brought down to use: whenever you ask what a gate of Dharma is called, ask along with it where the most substantial graph in its name comes to rest. In this round of samādhi the most substantial graph is ‘adornment.’

Entering the Ten Directions in Due Order: Why Only the Ten Directions Are Spoken of and Not the Three Times

The answer begins from ‘entering’ — one who dwells in this samādhi is able to enter in due order the worlds of the east, and likewise the south, the west, the north, the four intermediate points, the zenith and the nadir, all worlds he is able to enter in due order. Two words here have to be taught clearly. The first is ‘in due order’: not a single blanket covering all at once, but an entering that has sequence, and where the sequence is not confused the seeing is not confused. The second is why only the ten directions are listed and not the three times set beside them. Chengguan glosses this by saying that what is being explained is ‘all worlds,’ and worlds are a present matter, and so it says only the ten directions. This one sentence clears away a misunderstanding that arises very easily — the notion that wherever ‘all’ is said, breadth and length must both be taken in. The ‘all worlds’ here is a pervading of space, not a pervading of time; the pervading of time has its own passage further on (within the seals of the dharma below there is the clause “the contemplation of the measureless realms of the three times as all equal”). Brought down to use: when you read the word ‘all’ in the Huayan, look closely at which dimension it is measuring here.

The Ten Matters of Seeing the Buddhas: The General Rubric of Adornment

The first layer of what is seen after the entering is the buddhas. The sūtra text lists nine clauses in a row, and with “he also sees the assemblies of the buddhas gathered like clouds” they make ten: seeing the buddhas arising in the world, seeing all the spiritual powers of those buddhas, seeing all the disporting of the buddhas, seeing the vast awesome virtue of the buddhas, seeing the most surpassing sovereignty of the buddhas, seeing the great lion’s roar of the buddhas, seeing all the practices the buddhas cultivate, seeing the adornments of every kind of the buddhas, seeing the transformations wrought by the buddhas’ bases of supernormal power. These ten clauses are not a scattered list; Chengguan judges them to be ‘the general listing of ten gates, all of which are adornment’ — that is to say, all ten of these count as the Buddha’s adornment, and not only the eighth, the one that carries the two graphs ‘adornment.’ The misreading to be cleared away lies exactly here: the notion that adornment means specifically outward ornament of the sort of marks and signs and jeweled garlands. Chengguan points out expressly, under the eighth clause, that the reason that clause is separately marked ‘adornment’ is that it is spoken with respect to the two adornments, inner and outer — merit and wisdom adorning his mind, form and marks and radiance adorning his body. With this one sentence, the two very long enumerations below (the measureless light and color, the measureless shape and measure) find where they belong: they are the extended exposition of the single branch of ‘adorning the body.’ Brought down to use: when you look at the adornment of one who cultivates, look not only at what marks he displays, but at what his mind takes for its ornament.

The Ten Marks of the Assemblies: The Second Layer of What Is Seen

The second layer of what is seen is the assemblies. The sūtra text lists the assemblies gathered like clouds, pure, vast, of one mark, of many marks, their place, their dwelling, their ripening, their taming, their awesome virtue, closing with “all of these he sees clearly” (the clause ‘the assemblies gathered like clouds’ Chengguan has already counted as the last of the former ten gates; here the ten are listed as the sūtra’s own ten clauses on the assemblies). The way these ten clauses are arranged has to be seen clearly: the first three speak of the gathering of the assembly, its quality, and its extent; the pair in the middle, ‘of one mark · of many marks,’ is the most worth turning over — one and the same assembly may be seen as one and may be seen as many, and they are not two different assemblies; the four clauses after that turn to the standing of the assembly and to the degree of its being taught (ripening · taming), and the last clause comes home to awesome virtue. The misreading to be cleared away here is to read ‘assembly’ as the pomp of a Dharma gathering. It is in fact the whole condition and appearance of those who are being taught: half of a buddha’s adornment shows itself in his assembly. Chengguan judges the text below this to be ‘the marks of adornment separately displayed so as to extend the former two’ — the extended treatment of the assemblies and the extended treatment of the adornment, each a branch of its own. Brought down to use: to see whether a teaching flourishes or declines, look at what sort of people it gathers.

The Measure of the Assemblies: Why the Numbers Are Pushed to the Unspeakably Unspeakable

Next comes a long string laying out measure: the measure of the assemblies equal to Jambudvīpa, equal to the four continents, equal to a small thousand, equal to a middling thousand, equal to a three-thousandfold great thousand; then it turns to the language of ‘filling’ — filling a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of buddha-lands, asaṃkhyeya buddha-lands, on to filling as many buddha-lands as the dust motes of unspeakably unspeakable buddha-lands. The reader is most likely to skip over this place, taking it for mere hyperbole. One question has to be put: why not simply say ‘measureless’ and be done? Because ‘measureless’ is one word, whereas this string is a process. It forces the one who reads to walk up one degree at a time, and as he mounts degree by degree that boundary within him of ‘I can still picture it’ has already been burst open — which is exactly what the string is there to do. The numbers of the Huayan are not there to be remembered; they are there to exhaust the calculating mind. Chengguan judges this to be the single branch of ‘making clear the seeing of their measure,’ standing as one of three together with ‘seeing the substance and marks of the assemblies’ before it and ‘seeing the working of the buddhas’ after it. Brought down to use: if you read a great number and your mind does not open along with it, the number has been read for nothing.

The Manifestations of the Buddhas Within the Place of Awakening: The Third Layer of What Is Seen

After the seeing of the assemblies, the sūtra text returns to the buddhas — “he also sees the buddhas, within the places of awakening of those assemblies, manifesting marks of every kind, times of every kind, lands of every kind, transformations of every kind, spiritual penetrations of every kind, adornments of every kind, sovereignties of every kind, shapes and measures of every kind, and undertakings of every kind.” Chengguan judges this to be ‘seeing the working of the buddhas.’ These nine ‘of every kind’ have to teach one thing clearly: the ten matters of seeing the buddhas above spoke of the Buddha’s virtue, while here it speaks of the Buddha’s working, and working is manifested with respect to the assembly — one and the same buddha manifests, in this assembly, this mark and this time and this land, and in that assembly, that mark and that time and that land. The misreading to be cleared away is to take the Buddha’s manifesting for the Buddha’s wanting to change his dress. That the manifesting is of every kind is because those whose capacities it meets are of every kind. Brought down to use: do not take the one buddha-mark you happen to have seen for the Buddha’s fixed mark.

The Nineteen Clauses of Seeing One’s Own Body: In Seeing the Buddha One Also Sees Oneself

This section is the most peculiar: the bodhisattva does not only see buddhas and assemblies, he also sees himself. The sūtra text gives nineteen clauses in a row, saying that he also sees his own body going to those assemblies, preaching the Dharma there, receiving and upholding the words of the Buddha, well knowing dependent origination, dwelling in space, dwelling in the dharma-body, giving rise to no defiling attachment, not abiding in discrimination, without weariness, on to entering universally into all kinds of wisdom, all kinds of meaning, all the grounds, all the destinies, all kinds of skillful means, standing before the buddhas, all the powers, suchness, non-contention, all dharmas. One question has to be put: seeing one’s own body — is that not the view of a self? Look at the way it is arranged and it becomes clear — the first few clauses are still marks of action (going, preaching, receiving and upholding), the middle turns to what is dwelt in (space, the dharma-body), then it turns to what is absent (no defiling attachment, no discrimination, no weariness), and the last ten clauses make ‘entering universally’ seven times and ‘knowing universally’ and ‘dwelling universally’ three times (knowing universally all kinds of meaning · knowing universally all kinds of skillful means · dwelling universally before the buddhas). That is to say, the more this ‘own body’ is spoken of, the less it is a self standing there, and the more it is one entering after another. Chengguan here judges only ‘it makes clear the seeing of oneself, and may be understood as it stands,’ and does not explain in detail, precisely because the shape of the text is plain in itself. The misreading to be cleared away is to read it as the satisfaction of a self-visualization brought off. Brought down to use: if in cultivation you see yourself doing something, look at whether that ‘self’ is growing more solid or growing more open.

No Discrimination in the Seeing: Dharmas Do Not Say of Themselves That They Express or Are Expressed

After the nineteen clauses the sūtra text suddenly draws in: “when he sees in this way, he does not discriminate lands, he does not discriminate sentient beings, he does not discriminate buddhas, he does not discriminate dharmas; he is not attached to the body, he is not attached to the deeds of the body, he is not attached to mind, he is not attached to mentation.” Four not-discriminatings and four not-being-attacheds wash over all the ‘seeing’ that has gone before at one stroke. One question has to be put: if there is no discriminating, can there still be any seeing? The sūtra text gives its own simile — it is as with all dharmas: they do not discriminate their own nature, nor do they discriminate sound, and yet their own nature is not abandoned and their names do not perish. Chengguan glosses this by saying that this simile makes clear that which expresses and that which is expressed: dharmas do not say of themselves ‘we are that which expresses and that which is expressed,’ and yet they have never let go of that which expresses and that which is expressed, and by this it is a simile for knowing by way of non-discrimination. At the place of joining, the sūtra text puts it with the utmost precision — he does not abandon practice, he does what accords with the world, and yet toward these two he has no attachment at all. So the misreading to be cleared away is to read non-discrimination as failing to distinguish, as not knowing. Non-discrimination is not raising a reckoning of taking and rejecting upon what is seen; it is not wiping out what is seen. Brought down to use: to do a work and yet not set up a self upon what is done — this is the bottom of every graph ‘see’ in this whole passage.

The Setting Out of the Chapter-Headings: Four Kinds of Adornment Clear All at Once

From this section on, the writing turns into the single branch of ‘the extended treatment of the adornment.’ The sūtra text first sets up one sentence of general statement — “the bodhisattva-mahāsattva sees the Buddha’s measureless light and color and measureless shape and marks, perfectly accomplished, equal and pure; each and every one present before him, clearly and distinctly witnessed and known.” Chengguan judges this to be ‘first the setting out of the chapter-headings, briefly raising four kinds of adornment, all clearly witnessed and known,’ and points out that the text below explains them separately according to these four headings: first explaining the measureless light and color, second the measureless shape and marks, third the perfect accomplishment, fourth the equal purity. With this table of headings in hand, the two great enumerations below, daunting as they look, have a skeleton, and are no longer a boundless spreading-out. What has to be taught clearly here is the four graphs ‘clearly and distinctly witnessed and known’: not seen in a haze, but each and every one present before him and distinctly so. The misreading to be cleared away is the notion that what is seen in deep samādhi must be a blur. What is seen in this samādhi is on the contrary clearer than what ordinary people see. Brought down to use: the depth of samādhi is measured by how clearly one sees, not by how strangely one sees.

Measureless Light and Color and Measureless Shape and Measure: From One Fathom to the Unspeakably Unspeakable

The first heading explains the measureless light and color: or he sees radiance of every kind, the halo one fathom, the color of the sun at its height, a subtle and wondrous light and color, a pure color, the color of yellow gold, the color of adamant, a deep blue color, a boundless color, the color of a great blue maṇi jewel. The second heading explains the measureless shape and marks: from seven cubits, eight cubits, nine cubits, ten cubits, to twenty cubits, thirty cubits, on to a hundred cubits and a thousand cubits; then it turns to the measures of the krośa and the yojana; then it turns to Jambudvīpa, the four continents, the small thousand, the middling thousand, the great thousand; then it turns to a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of great-thousand world-systems, on to the measure of unspeakably unspeakable great-thousand world-systems. The teaching of these two headings lies in their ‘starting point’: the light and color start from ‘the halo one fathom’ — the length of a man’s two arms outstretched; the shape and measure start from ‘seven cubits’ — no more than a little taller than an ordinary man. One question has to be put: since the Buddha’s body can be as great as unspeakably unspeakable worlds, why start from seven cubits? Precisely because what is to be said is not how great the Buddha’s body is, but that the Buddha’s body has no fixed measure. Starting from the smallest and pushing to the greatest, neither end is the truth of the Buddha’s body, and neither is any single degree in between. The third heading explains the perfect accomplishment, and the fourth explains the equal purity — the sūtra text closes with the net of radiance equalling the Dharma realm, illumining everything without exception, and with seeing again the Buddha’s body to be without defiling attachment, without obstruction, supremely wondrous and pure. Chengguan points out that the fourth heading ‘also takes in the two inner adornments,’ answering back to the earlier sense of ‘merit and wisdom adorning his mind.’ Brought down to use: the buddha-mark that you see is your measure, not the Buddha’s measure.

The Simile of Space and the Simile of the Moon’s Orb: The Dharma-Nature Body and the Truly Constant Form-Body

The four headings having been explained, it turns to the three similes. The first simile takes space: within the hole of a mustard seed eaten by a worm space does not become the less, and within numberless worlds it does not become the broader; and the Buddha’s body is likewise, when seen as great nothing is added, when seen as small nothing is taken away. Chengguan glosses this by saying that this is a simile for the dharma-nature body’s having nothing that can be increased or decreased — the greatness or smallness of space is spoken of with respect to the world and to the mustard seed, and not that the substance of space itself has greatness or smallness, just as the dharma-nature body takes on difference according to the vessel. The second simile takes the orb of the moon: the people of Jambudvīpa see the moon’s shape as small and the moon does not decrease, those who dwell within the moon see its shape as great and the moon does not increase. Chengguan glosses this by saying that this is a simile for the substance of the truly constant form-body not altering, there being nearness and farness in the witnessing and the seeing differing according to mind; and he points out expressly that the former simile is a simile only for the Buddha’s body, while this simile is a simile also for the light and color and for the perfect accomplishment. The division of labor between the two similes has to be taught clearly: the simile of space speaks of the nature-body, the simile of the moon speaks of the form-body; the one clears away the clinging that ‘the Buddha’s body has size,’ the other clears away the doubt that ‘if what is seen differs then there must be two buddhas.’ The misreading to be cleared away is to take the two similes for a repetition. Brought down to use: of one and the same buddha, what you see and what I see differ, and there is no need to contend over whose seeing is the true one — what is contended over is mind, not the Buddha.

The Simile of the Realm Manifested According to Mind: Purity and Defilement Lie in the Mind That Sees

The third simile takes the receiving of birth: after a sentient being’s life has ended, when he is about to receive birth, what is seen is not apart from mind and what is seen is pure; the bodhisattva is not apart from this very deep samādhi, and what is seen is likewise pure. This simile is the shortest, and yet it is where the three similes come to rest. Chengguan glosses this by saying that it is a simile for the ‘purity’ above — if the bodhisattva’s mind is pure then the buddhas he sees are pure; as for the Tathāgata himself, what purity is there and what defilement? This one question turns the whole passage’s graph ‘see’ over on its bottom: after so much has been said of the adornment that is seen, here it is pointed out that the purity or impurity of the adornment hangs upon the mind that sees. The misreading to be cleared away is to read it as mind-only with no object at all — the sūtra text says ‘not apart from mind,’ it does not say that there is no buddha to be seen. Brought down to use: if one who cultivates sees the buddha-realm as coarse and poor, he need not first doubt the Buddha; let him first look at his mind.

The First and Second of the Samādhi’s Seven Benefits: The Swift Dharmas and the Seals of the Dharma

From here on is the second great part of the whole passage, which Chengguan judges to be ‘making clear the benefits of the samādhi,’ raising seven benefits in all, each of which is set off at its head by a ‘Sons of the Buddha.’ The first benefit is the swift accomplishing of practice and vow: ten kinds of swift dharma — swiftly increasing all the practices and bringing the great vows to fullness, swiftly illumining the world with the light of the Dharma, swiftly turning the wheel of the Dharma by skillful means and delivering sentient beings, swiftly manifesting buddha-lands in accord with the deeds of sentient beings, swiftly entering into the ten powers by the wisdom of equality, swiftly dwelling together with all the Tathāgatas, swiftly crushing the armies of Māra by the power of great loving-kindness, swiftly cutting off the doubts of sentient beings and causing gladness to arise, swiftly manifesting spiritual transformations in accord with their superior understanding, swiftly purifying all the worlds with the words of wondrous dharmas. The ‘swift’ of these ten clauses has to be taught clearly: it is not haste, it is unimpededness. Since there is already no discriminating and no attachment, the practice naturally does not wait to be pushed. The second benefit is the seals of the dharma being the same as the Buddha’s: the ten clauses all open with ‘the same as all the buddhas past, future, and present’ or ‘the same as the Tathāgatas,’ and Chengguan judges them as ten clauses in five pairs — the first two are sameness in merit and wisdom (the equal roots of goodness and the dharma-body of wisdom), the next two sameness in the objects and knowledge of the two truths (dwelling in the dharma of non-duality and contemplating the realms of the three times as equal), the next two sameness in substance and function (penetrating the Dharma realm unobstructedly and the exercise of the ten powers unobstructed), the next two sameness in the two benefits (forever cutting off the two practices and dwelling in non-contention, and teaching and transforming sentient beings without ceasing), the last two sameness in skillfulness and in equality (skillfulness in wisdom and in meaning, and equality without duality with all buddhas). With these five pairs in hand, the ten clauses are no longer ten matters set side by side, but five groups standing over against each other. Brought down to use: the ‘seal’ of sealing all dharmas seals whether one is the same as the Buddha, not whether one differs from other people.

The Third of the Seven Benefits: The Ten Names of Forming the Person by Virtue

The third benefit Chengguan names ‘the benefit of forming the person by virtue.’ The sentence-pattern of the sūtra text is a string of ‘he is one who is such-and-such, because of such-and-such’ — he is one without a teacher, because he enters of himself into all the dharmas of the buddhas without being taught by another; he is a man of stature, because he can awaken all sentient beings; he is one who is pure, because he knows that the nature of mind is fundamentally pure; he is one who is foremost, because he can deliver all the worlds; he is one who comforts, because he can open the understanding of all sentient beings; he is one who dwells firmly, because he causes those who do not yet dwell in the lineage of a buddha to come to dwell there; he is one who knows what is real, because he enters the gate of omniscience; he is one without any differing thought, because what he says has no duality in it; he is one who dwells in the treasury of the Dharma, because he vows to know fully all the dharmas of the buddhas; he is one who can rain down the rain of Dharma, because he satisfies all in accord with what their minds delight in. What has to be taught clearly is where these ten names come from — every clause gives first the name and then the ground, and not one of the grounds given is ‘because he has cultivated for a long time’; all of them are what he can do. This is establishing a name by virtue, not conferring a name by station. Among them the clause ‘he is one who is pure, because he knows that the nature of mind is fundamentally pure’ matters most: purity is established not in having washed something clean, but in knowing what is fundamentally clean. The misreading to be cleared away is to read these ten clauses as words of praise. They are in fact a standard of judgement. Brought down to use: to ask whether you deserve these names is to ask whether the things after those graphs ‘because’ can be done or not.

The Fourth of the Seven Benefits: The Simile of Śakra’s Jewel and the Ten Vast Treasuries of Wisdom

The fourth benefit Chengguan names ‘the benefit of the comprehending of the wisdom-virtue,’ and it is the only one of the benefits in the whole passage that raises simile and joining together. The simile takes Śakra: the god-king sets a maṇi jewel within his topknot, and by the power of the jewel his awesome light grows the more blazing; at the first obtaining of this jewel he obtains ten dharmas — form and marks, bodily shape, manifestation, retinue, the goods that sustain life, voice, spiritual penetration, sovereignty, understanding by insight, the functioning of wisdom — all of which go beyond all the Heaven of the Thirty-Three. At the place of joining it says that at the first obtaining of this samādhi the bodhisattva obtains ten kinds of vast treasury of wisdom: the wisdom that illumines all buddha-lands, the wisdom that knows the receiving of birth by all sentient beings, the wisdom that universally works transformations throughout the three times, the wisdom that universally enters the bodies of all buddhas, the wisdom that penetrates all the dharmas of the buddhas, the wisdom that universally gathers in all pure dharmas, the wisdom that universally causes all sentient beings to enter the dharma-body, the wisdom that sees all dharmas present before it with the universal eye made pure, the wisdom of complete sovereignty that has reached the far shore, the wisdom that dwells in all vast dharmas and exhausts them universally with nothing left over. Chengguan here matches them clause by clause: first, the buddha-lands join to form and marks; second, sentient beings join to bodily shape; third, transformation joins to manifestation; fourth, entering the buddhas joins to retinue — because they are host and guest to one another as a retinue is; fifth, penetrating the Dharma of the buddhas is the goods that sustain life and aid the path; sixth, gathering in the pure dharmas universally is the perfect voice displayed to people; seventh, causing all to enter the Dharma is precisely spiritual penetration; eighth, the purity of the universal eye joins, surpassingly, to understanding by insight; ninth, sovereignty joins back to sovereignty; tenth, dwelling in the dharmas joins to the functioning of wisdom; and he points out that the eighth and ninth clauses are out of order because, though the substance of wisdom is one, it differs according to what is known. The four graphs ‘at the first obtaining he then obtains’ within the simile have to be taught clearly: it is not that after obtaining the jewel the awesome light grows slowly, but that at one obtaining he surpasses at once. The misreading to be cleared away is to read the treasuries of wisdom as learning piled up. A treasury comprehends; it does not store. Brought down to use: to truly obtain one dharma is to change one’s standing on the instant, without waiting for accumulation.

The Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh of the Seven Benefits: The Body of Awesome Virtue · Bringing Others to Fullness · Turning and Doing the Buddha’s Work

The fifth benefit is the body’s awesome power surpassing: ten kinds of body of utmost pure awesome virtue, every clause of which opens with ‘for the sake of such-and-such’ and closes with the deed done — for the sake of illumining unspeakably unspeakable worlds he sends forth wheels of light; for the sake of making the worlds all pure he sends forth wheels of light of measureless forms and marks; for the sake of taming sentient beings he sends forth wheels of light; for the sake of drawing near to the buddhas he conjures bodies; for the sake of serving and making offerings he rains down clouds of incense and flowers; for the sake of making offerings to the buddhas and taming sentient beings he conjures music within each and every pore; for the sake of ripening sentient beings he manifests sovereign spiritual transformations; for the sake of asking about the Dharma he passes beyond unspeakably unspeakable worlds in a single step; so that seeing and hearing may not be in vain he manifests a body of pure forms and marks whose crown none can see; for the sake of disclosing the secret dharmas he sends forth unspeakably unspeakable sounds and words. Note that not one of these ten clauses is for himself. The sixth benefit is the bringing of others to fullness: he can cause sentient beings to get to see the Buddha, to believe deeply in the Buddha, to hear the Dharma, to know that there are buddha-worlds, to see the spiritual transformations of the Buddha, to call to mind the deeds they have amassed, to have the mind of concentration made full, to enter the purity of the Buddha, to give rise to the mind of awakening, to bring the wisdom of a buddha to fullness. The sequence of these ten clauses is one whole path — from getting to see, to believing deeply; from hearing the Dharma, to knowing that there are buddha-lands; from seeing the spiritual transformations, to reflecting upon one’s own deeds; and then to concentration of mind, entering purity, giving rise to the mind of awakening, and fullness. The seventh benefit is the turning and doing of the Buddha’s work: doing the Buddha’s work by voice, by form and shape, by calling to mind, by shaking the worlds, by awakening through skillful means, by manifesting marks within a dream, by sending forth great radiance, by cultivating the practice of a bodhisattva, by accomplishing perfect awakening, by turning the wondrous wheel of the Dharma, by displaying a life-span spent dwelling in the world, by displaying parinirvāṇa — and every clause has attached to it a ground that is for the sake of sentient beings. The last two clauses in particular have to be taught clearly: dwelling in the world is the Buddha’s work, and nirvāṇa is the Buddha’s work too — the ground for displaying parinirvāṇa is ‘because he knows that sentient beings will give rise to weariness.’ Chengguan judges both the sixth and the seventh benefits to be ‘first taking up what precedes and raising what follows, afterward questioning and listing the names and marks,’ from which it may be seen that these three benefits issue forth layer upon layer: first there is the body, and only then can others be brought to fullness; others having been brought to fullness, only then is the doing of the Buddha’s work spoken of. The misreading to be cleared away is to read the Buddha’s work as the ritual of a Dharma assembly. Whatever can turn sentient beings about is the Buddha’s work. Brought down to use: even a leaving of the stage can be a teaching.

The Concluding Name: Skillful Wisdom

The whole passage closes with one sentence: this is what is called the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s skillful wisdom of the seventh great samādhi of fully knowing the buddha-adornments of all worlds. Looking back over the whole passage it comes clear — entering the ten directions in due order is the gate of the skillfulness, seeing the buddhas and seeing the assemblies and seeing one’s own body is the field of the skillfulness, not discriminating and not being attached in the seeing is the marrow of the skillfulness, the three similes are the showing forth of the skillfulness, and the seven benefits are the effect of the skillfulness. And that ‘fully knowing the buddha-adornments of all worlds’ can serve as the name of the samādhi is just as was pointed out at the repeated questioning: the weight lies not on ‘fully knowing all worlds’ but on the three graphs ‘the buddha-adornments’ — since the adornment that is seen runs through both the inner and the outer adornments, what this samādhi accomplishes is the power to see the whole adornment of the mind and body of every buddha, while oneself is not bound by the marks that are seen.

Lineage

Two tracks of divergent explanation stand side by side upon this passage. Chengguan, following the sequence of the sūtra text, sets up an outline of two parts — first making clear the substance and function of the samādhi, afterward making clear the benefits of the samādhi — and beneath the substance and function opens the questioning and explanation, the ten gates of adornment, the extended treatment of the assemblies (seeing others · seeing oneself · the seeing itself) and the extended treatment of the adornment (the four headings explained separately · the three similes), and beneath the benefits opens seven benefits, and under the fourth benefit matches clause by clause the ten matters within the simile with the ten wisdoms within the joining, explaining of himself the ground where the order does not follow. Li Tongxuan, on the other hand, does not enter into the outline at all but takes only the ground of the establishing of the name, explaining this samādhi thus: it makes clear that this bodhisattva can enter everywhere into all the worlds of the ten directions and see all the teaching and transforming adornment that all the buddhas possess, that he can see it all to the very end and serve and make offerings, and that the Dharma he hears he enters universally into all the destinies, and so forth, all of it to the very end — and by this the name is established; while as for the sense of the text within the passage, he declares that the sūtra itself sets it forth in full and does not explain it over again. The one judges the structure by following the text; the other explains the sense of the name by setting forth the Dharma; and the two are far apart in fullness and brevity. The two tracks run side by side; both are the settled sayings of the ancient masters, and they are recorded without adjudication.

The sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, and therefore neither Fazang’s Tanxuan ji nor Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji has any outline-explanation of this chapter; Chengguan’s Yanyi chao likewise has no text citing and explaining this passage; and in the treatises of the kind that cite the sūtra separately, such as the Shidi jing lun, this chapter is not found. In this unit, both the parallel translations and these several houses are honestly marked as lacking — and this itself is worth setting down: the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis is a chapter newly added in the eighty-fascicle text, and the weight of its commentarial explanation falls almost entirely upon Chengguan alone; one who reads this chapter should know that the foundation of its apparatus is of an altogether different kind from the layered multiplicity of houses that attends the Chapter on the Ten Grounds.

What This Round of Samādhi Is Asking

The ten great samādhis run through one after another, and every one of them opens with the same sentence — ‘what is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s such-and-such samādhi.’ At the eighth round, what Samantabhadra asks after is the samādhi of the differentiated bodies of all sentient beings. The two graphs in the name that strike the eye hardest are ‘differentiated’: the bodies of sentient beings differ by a thousand and a thousand degrees — a human body, the body of a god, the body of a dragon, the body of a yakṣa, one body, a thousand bodies, a nayuta of bodies — and these differences are exactly the wall that stands most solid when an ordinary person looks at the world. This round of samādhi takes ‘differentiated bodies’ for its name precisely because it means to display mastery at the place where the wall is thickest. Hence this passage asks its question differently from the seven rounds before it: it does not only ask ‘what is this samādhi,’ but goes straight on to ask ‘how does he enter it, and how does he rise from it.’ The weight of the whole passage does not fall upon describing a state of samādhi, but upon showing that coming and going between the samādhi and the rising from it is without obstruction. In reading this passage, keep your eye on the two words ‘enter’ and ‘rise’: they are the bone of the whole.

The Ten Kinds of Non-Attachment: The Wisdom That Enters Must First Have Empty Hands

For the first mark of dwelling in this samādhi, the sūtra text sets out not what is obtained but what is let go — ten kinds of having nothing to which one is attached. Lands, quarters, kalpas, multitudes, dharmas, bodhisattvas, the vows of bodhisattvas, samādhis, buddhas, grounds: toward each of them, nothing to which he is attached. One misunderstanding has to be cleared away first: non-attachment is not indifference; it does not mean not adorning buddha-lands, not delivering sentient beings, not making vows. Look closely at how the ten are ordered: from the outer realms (lands, quarters, kalpas, multitudes) to dharmas, then to bodhisattvas and the vows of bodhisattvas, then to samādhi itself, and last to buddhas and to the grounds — the further along, the more they are the things a practitioner can least bear to let go of. Only when even ‘the samādhi I have cultivated,’ ‘the station I have realized,’ and ‘the buddha I have seen’ are not clung to is it called non-attachment. Chengguan glosses this passage by saying that it is through obtaining the ten kinds of non-attachment that the mastery of rising and entering afterward is accomplished; and he further explains that the last clause, ‘all grounds,’ runs through both the ground of buddhahood and the grounds of the bodhisattva. This is the eye of cause and effect for the whole passage: mastery is not some trick that cultivation produces — the hands are emptied first, and only then is the coming and going unobstructed. Brought down to use: wherever you feel that some particular appearance of practice absolutely must be kept, that is precisely where you are not yet free.

Entering and Rising: The Display of Thirty-Nine Interlaced Pairs

The text that answers the question is exceedingly long: a string of paired clauses of entering and rising, linked by semicolons. First see whether their arrangement has any order. Chengguan judges them to be ten classes: the first is the several classes of the direct recompense set over against one another (inner and outer body, the same and the different body, the human body and the body of a yakṣa, on to the body of a Brahmā king and a body of the desire realm); the second is the dependent recompense of the six destinies set over against one another (entering among the gods, rising in the hells, among human beings, in the remaining destinies); the third is the one and the many set over against one another (a thousand bodies, a single body, a nayuta of bodies); the fourth is the four continents and the great seas set over against one another (Jambudvīpa, Godānīya, Uttarakuru, Pūrvavideha, the three continents, the four continents, the multitudes of sentient beings of the seas); the fifth is the great elements and the things and dharmas set over against one another (the sea-gods, the water element, the earth element, the fire element, the wind element, the four great elements, the dharma of non-arising, the Wondrously High Mountain, the seven jeweled mountains, the crops and groves and black mountains); the sixth is the several quarters set over against one another (the adornments of fragrance and flower and jewel, the places below and above where beings take birth); the seventh is the greater and lesser numbers of the multitudes set over against one another (the small thousand, the middling thousand, the great thousand, on to unspeakably unspeakable worlds); the eighth is the defiled and the pure set over against one another; the ninth is the several elements set over against one another (the six sense-fields of eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind; one’s own sense-field and another’s); and the tenth mixedly makes clear the several classes (the dust mote, the śrāvaka and the pratyekabuddha, one’s own body and the body of a buddha, the thought-moment and the kalpa, the prior and the later and the middle limit, the three times and the kṣaṇa, suchness and speech).

See these ten classes clearly and you see what the author is about: this is no random heaping up, but the raising of one example for every single boundary that an ordinary person holds to be uncrossable — the boundary of the classes of body, of the destinies, of the many and the few, of place, of matter and the dharma of non-arising, of the defiled and the pure, of faculty and faculty, of the noble and the ordinary, of the thought-moment and the kalpa, of suchness and speech — and then, upon every one of those boundaries, one performance of ‘entering at this end and rising at that.’ The last pair is the tightest of all: entering by suchness, rising by speech; entering by speech, rising by suchness. Suchness, which is apart from words, and speech, which can say — this is the last boundary of all, and it too goes through. Chengguan notes here that the sense of entering and rising in this passage may be read together with the Chapter on the Chief in Goodness.

The Simile of the Ghost Holding a Person’s Body and the Simile of the Spell Raising the Dead Corpse

The first simile speaks of a person held by a ghost: that person’s body trembles and moves and cannot be at rest, while the ghost does not manifest a body of its own. What is it teaching? That ‘the place where the working appears’ and ‘the place from which it is set going’ may be two different places. The ghost is here and the movement is there; and the joining to the dharma is that he enters the samādhi by his own body and rises by another’s. One misunderstanding has to be cleared away here: it is not that the bodhisattva’s spirit runs off into someone else’s body, but that the working of the samādhi is not walled in by the body — that which sets it going has no shape, and that which appears has a mark.

The second simile speaks of a corpse that rises and walks: the corpse is able to do its business by the power of a spell, and though the corpse and the spell are each different, together they accomplish the business. The weight of this simile lies in ‘though each is different, they are able to come together’ — entering the samādhi in the same object-realm and rising in a different one rests precisely upon the fact that differentiated dharmas can come together. Chengguan judges each of the two similes to have its own attachment: the simile of the ghost’s power holding a person is attached to the first and the fourth of the ten classes above, since these are mostly spoken with regard to body; the simile of the spell raising the dead corpse is attached to the second and to the fifth and sixth, since these are mostly spoken with regard to the object-realms of the dependent recompense. Brought down to use: practitioners often suppose that once the state of samādhi is disturbed it is ruined; these two similes say rather that the working can appear in places one would never expect, and that there is no need to hold fast to an appearance of ‘I am in samādhi.’

The Simile of the Monk’s Bodily Penetration and the Simile of the One Taste of the Great Earth

The third simile takes a monk who has obtained mastery of mind: he either makes many bodies out of one body, or makes one body out of many. The sūtra text adds a clause of exclusion on purpose — it is not that the one body has perished and then the many are born, nor that the many bodies have perished and then the one is born. That clause is the eye of the whole simile: if there is birth and perishing, it is still transformation and not mastery. Only when the one and the many appear in each other without arising and without perishing is it the realm of the samādhi. Chengguan attaches this simile to the third and the seventh classes, since these are mostly spoken with regard to number.

The fourth simile takes the great earth: the taste of the earth is of one kind only, while the shoots and crops it grows differ in taste one from another; the earth is without differentiation and yet the tastes are distinct. The joining to the dharma is that the bodhisattva has nothing that he discriminates, and yet there is entering in one kind and rising in many. This simile supplies what the first three lack: those spoke of the difference between agent and object, the difference of realms, the difference of number, while this one says outright that ‘non-discrimination’ and ‘there being differences’ do not conflict — it is exactly because the earth does not pick and choose that the shoots can each come to their own taste. Chengguan judges this simile to be attached to the last three gates together, mixedly making clear the several kinds. Brought down to use: true non-discrimination is not the flattening away of differences, but the no longer taking up and casting away on account of them.

The Ten Dharmas of Praise: The Ten Names That One Within the Samādhi Obtains

One who dwells in this samādhi obtains the praise of ten dharmas of praise. Note the sentence-pattern of these ten clauses: every one of them runs ‘because of such-and-such a sense, therefore he is named such-and-such’ — because he enters suchness he is named the Tathāgata; because he is awake to all dharmas he is named the Buddha; because he is praised by the worlds he is named the master of the Dharma; because he knows all dharmas he is named omniscience; because he is the refuge of the worlds he is named the place of reliance; because he penetrates the skillful means of dharmas he is named the guide; because he leads sentient beings into the path of omniscience he is named the great guide; because he is a lamp for the worlds he is named light; and the last two clauses name him the mastery of the ten powers and the seer of all. This is the establishing of a name by virtue, not the conferring of a name by station. The ninth clause is the longest, and Chengguan matches it phrase by phrase: ‘his heart and purpose are perfect’ is the power’s sense of benefiting oneself; ‘the profit of the meaning is accomplished’ displays the power’s benefiting of others; ‘all that is to be done is done’ manifests the power’s perfection; ‘he dwells in unobstructed wisdom’ displays in general the substance of the power; ‘he discriminates and fully knows all dharmas’ makes clear throughout the functioning of the power. One sees that a single name, ‘the mastery of the ten powers,’ holds within it five layers: self-benefit, the benefit of others, perfection, substance, and functioning. The misunderstanding to be guarded against in reading this section is to read it as a hymn of praise. What it is in fact saying is this: the depth or shallowness of a samādhi is measured at last by what name you are able to bear up under in the world.

The Ten Kinds of Shining Light: Where the Light Reaches Is Where the Way Goes Through

The second benefit is the ten kinds of light. Every clause likewise has its reason attached: he obtains the light of the buddhas, because he is equal with the buddhas; the light of the worlds, because he can adorn and purify them everywhere; the light of sentient beings, because he goes to them all and tames them; the light of fearlessness, because he takes the Dharma realm for his place of awakening and there expounds the Dharma; the light of non-differentiation, because he knows that all dharmas have no natures of this kind and that; the light of skillful means and the light of the real, both of which are fastened to ‘the verge where desire is left behind’ — the one with regard to realizing and entering, the other with regard to the mind attaining equality; the light of the spiritual transformations that pervade all the worlds, because he is upheld by the Buddha and is unceasing; the light of good pondering, because he reaches the shore of the mastery of all the buddhas; and the light of the suchness of all dharmas, because within a single pore he can well expound all things. Light here is not an appearance but a power of shining: wherever it reaches, there the way goes through. The last clause deserves particular notice — within a single pore he well expounds all things: this is the constant measure of the Huayan, the utmost small holding the utmost vast complete, and it answers exactly to the earlier clause of entering within a single dust mote and rising within the dust motes of numberless worlds.

The Ten Kinds of Doing Nothing: Acting and Yet Without Doing, That Is the Depth of the Samādhi

The third benefit is the ten kinds of doing nothing: in the deeds of body, of speech, and of mind there is nothing done; in the spiritual penetrations there is nothing done; in fully knowing that dharmas have no nature, in knowing that deeds are not destroyed, in the wisdom of non-differentiation, in the wisdom of non-arising, in knowing that dharmas do not perish, and in following the letter without destroying the meaning — in all of them, nothing done. This section is the easiest of all to misread as passivity. The misunderstanding to be cleared away is this: doing nothing is not refraining from action, but acting without any ‘I who act’ and without any ‘appearance of the deed done.’ Look at the ordering: first the three kinds of deed, then the spiritual penetrations — this runs from the coarsest activity to the finest power; then the next five clauses turn to the level of wisdom, saying that even such workings of wisdom as ‘fully knowing dharmas,’ ‘knowing deeds,’ ‘non-differentiation,’ ‘non-arising,’ and ‘knowing that dharmas do not perish’ have nothing done in them; and the last clause is the finest of all: following the letter without destroying the meaning. Even the expounding of the Dharma can be without doing. Read together with the two benefits before it, the point is plain: the obtaining of names (the ten dharmas of praise), the obtaining of shining (the ten lights), and yet in truth no doing — names and workings there are, and no doer; and this is where the benefits of the samādhi come to rest.

The Measureless Realm: Eight Pairs of Entering and Rising, and Mastery in the Contrary and the Compliant, the Present and the Absent

The fourth part again sets out entering and rising, but not as the second part did. Chengguan points out the difference: the earlier second part made clear only entering and rising, whereas here the contrary and the compliant, the present and the absent, and the rest are made clear as well, and set forth as realms of every kind. The eight pairs are these: one and many, same and different, fine and coarse, great and small, compliant and contrary, having no body and having a body, markless and marked; and the last pair is entering within rising and rising within entering. The first seven pairs are still an exchange between two ends, but the last pair cancels the exchange itself — it is not a going from this end to that, but rising that is at that very moment entering, and entering that is at that very moment rising. Here Chengguan explains the substance of the samādhi outright: ‘entering within rising’ is the stillness that is the very functioning; ‘rising within entering’ is the functioning that is the very stillness; and so the bodhisattva’s samādhi is ever entering and ever rising, ever both entering and rising, ever without entering or rising — and only this is called mastery; and it is in order to display that mastery that the text lodges the meaning in the interlacing of realms of every kind. This sentence is the pivot of the whole passage: the seventy-eight clauses in thirty-nine pairs before it and the six similes after it are all for the sake of saying this one thing — a samādhi is not a room that one has to go into and come out of; stillness and functioning are one substance from the start.

The Simile of the Conjuror and the Simile of the Asuras: Same and Different, Coarse and Fine

The fifth simile speaks of a conjuror holding a spell: the spell and the conjured appearance are two separate things, and the spell is nothing but sound, and yet it conjures up the forms known by eye-consciousness, the sounds known by ear-consciousness, on to the object-realms known by mind-consciousness. One sound manifesting the realms of six consciousnesses — this is called entering the samādhi within the same and rising within the different. Chengguan judges this simile to be attached precisely to the pair of same and different above. What has to be taught clearly here is what ‘same’ and ‘different’ point to in this place: the same is the one that manifests, the different is the many that are manifested; it is not saying that things are really identical.

The sixth simile speaks of the asura king: his body seven hundred yojanas long, his fourfold army numberless thousands of myriads, and at the moment of defeat, by the power of conjuring art, all at once entering the hole of a lotus fibre. At the joining to the dharma the sūtra text speaks with extreme weight — he has already well accomplished the grounds of illusory wisdom; the illusory wisdom is itself the bodhisattva, and the bodhisattva is itself the illusory wisdom. This clause is one of the few outright statements in the whole passage: the wisdom that conjures and the person who cultivates this samādhi are not two, and therefore the differentiated and the undifferentiated can enter into one another. Chengguan attaches this simile to the two pairs of coarse and fine and of small and great, and opens two explanations and records them: if one takes principle and fact as facing one another, then the undifferentiated is the fine and the differentiated is the coarse, since principle is fine and fact is coarse; or else the other way about, the undifferentiated is the coarse, since it is entered by the characteristic of the whole, and the differentiated is the fine, since it is entered by the characteristic of the parts; undifferentiated, it is great and encompasses the Dharma realm, and differentiated, it becomes small according to the fact; and if one speaks of great and small with regard to fact alone, then both are taken in by differentiation. The ancient master lets the two readings stand side by side here, and they are recorded without adjudication.

The Simile of the Farmer and the Simile of the Kalala: One and Many, Present and Absent

The seventh simile speaks of a farmer sowing seed: the seed is below and the fruit grows above. A sentence of the utmost brevity, and yet the joining to the dharma is entering the samādhi within the one and rising within the many. Chengguan says that this simile jointly distinguishes the one and the many with regard to above and below, and that the wording of the sūtra text is abbreviated by implication. What has to be taught clearly is how it divides the work with the simile of the monk’s bodily penetration: there the one and the many appear together at one time, while here the one and the many are cause and effect in two places — the seed here and the fruit there, the one and the many neither in the same place nor at the same time, and it goes through all the same.

The eighth simile speaks of taking birth: the red and the white of man and woman come together, a sentient being takes birth therein, and it is first named the station of the kalala; then in due order it dwells in the womb and fulfills ten months, and by the power of good deeds the limbs and parts are accomplished, the faculties are not lacking, and the mind is clear. The sūtra text points to the crux — the kalala and the six faculties differ in substance and shape, and yet by the power of deeds they are brought to be accomplished in due order. The joining to the dharma is that the bodhisattva, from the station of the kalala of omniscience, grows by degrees in the power of faith, understanding, and vow, his mind vast and moving freely without contrivance, and so he enters the samādhi within the absent and rises within the present. Chengguan judges this simile to be attached to the pair of having a body and having no body above, saying that it takes the going ‘from the absent to the present.’ Of the ten similes this one comes closest to the practitioner: what it speaks of is sequence — how a first station with no discernible shape grows into a body complete in all its faculties. The first thought of practice and the final virtue of the fruit differ in substance and shape, and the power of deeds runs through them both.

The Simile of the Dragon’s Palace and the Simile of the Brahmā Palace: Marked and Markless, and the Universal Manifesting of Every Kind

The ninth simile speaks of the dragon’s palace: the palace is established upon the earth and not upon space, the dragon dwells in the palace and is likewise not in the sky, and yet it can raise clouds that fill the whole sky; the palaces that a person sees in the sky when he looks up are in truth the city of the gandharvas and not the dragon’s palace. The sūtra text adds a sentence of its own by way of conclusion — though the dragon abides below, the clouds are spread above. The joining to the dharma is entering within the markless and rising within the marked. This simile teaches a very fine distinction: there really are clouds in the sky, and that is a true working; the palace seen in the sky is a misrecognition. The appearing of a mark is no falsehood, but the place you point to as its seat may be entirely wrong. Chengguan attaches this simile to the pair of marked and markless.

The tenth simile speaks of the palace of the great Brahmā king of Wondrous Light, named the Most Excellent Pure Treasury of All the Worlds: the palaces of the gods and of the dragons of the three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system, on to the dwellings of human beings and the three evil destinies, Sumeru and the several mountains, the great seas and the rivers, the cities and the settlements, to the very edge of the great encircling mountains, down to the fine drifting motes in the sky, there is nothing that is not displayed within the Brahmā palace, as one sees a face in a bright mirror. At the joining to the dharma the sūtra text puts ten ‘of every kind’ one after another: he knows lands of every kind, sees buddhas of every kind, delivers multitudes of every kind, realizes dharmas of every kind, accomplishes practices of every kind, fulfills understandings of every kind, enters samādhis of every kind, raises spiritual penetrations of every kind, obtains wisdoms of every kind, and dwells in the very edge of kṣaṇas of every kind. Chengguan says that this simile is a simile for the rising within entering and the entering within rising above, and for the contrary and the compliant set over against one another, and that therefore the joining gathers all up with ‘of every kind.’ To close the ten similes with a mirror is an excellent arrangement: the mirror does not move and the myriad images appear; they appear, and the mirror neither increases nor decreases — and this is the very image of what was said before, ‘ever entering and ever rising, ever without entering or rising.’

Reaching the Ten Far Shores of the Spiritual Penetrations: The Passage Gathered Up by the Far Shore

At the last the ten far shores of the spiritual penetrations are set out. The words ‘far shore’ are words of gathering up — it does not say that he obtains the spiritual penetrations, but that he reaches the far shore of them, which is to say that these penetrations have been carried to their utmost edge. The ten clauses may be seen in three layers: the first two are with regard to buddhas and bodhisattvas (exhausting space and pervading the Dharma realm · the ultimate mastery without differentiation); the middle six are with regard to working (raising up practices and vows and entering the gate of the Tathāgata to do the Buddha’s work · shaking all worlds and making them pure · knowing that the fruits of sentient beings’ deeds are as conjurings · knowing the marks of the differentiated entering and rising, coarse and fine, of the samādhis · valiantly entering the realm of the Tathāgata and giving rise to great vows · making a conjured buddha and turning a conjured wheel of the Dharma so that beings enter the Buddha-vehicle); and the last two are with regard to expounding and to time (fully knowing the unspeakable secret letters and phrases so that the gates of the Dharma become pure · without borrowing day or night or year or month or the number of kalpas, displaying the three times within a single thought-moment). Among them the clause ‘knowing the marks of the differentiated entering and rising, coarse and fine, of the samādhis’ most repays turning over — the whole passage has been about entering and rising, and here the ‘marks of the differentiation of entering and rising’ are themselves listed as an object of knowing: not only is he free in entering and rising, he knows besides every mark of entering and rising there is.

The Concluding Name: The Wisdom of Skillfulness

The whole passage is closed with a single sentence: this is named the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s eighth great samādhi of the differentiated bodies of all sentient beings, the wisdom of skillfulness. Of the ten rounds of samādhi, the first nine all conclude their names with ‘the great samādhi, the wisdom of skillfulness,’ while the tenth concludes with ‘the vast wisdom of the surpassing mind.’ Look back over the whole passage and it comes clear: the ten non-attachments are the root of skillfulness, the thirty-nine pairs and the ten similes are the marks of skillfulness, the three benefits are the effect of skillfulness, and the ten far shores of the spiritual penetrations are skillfulness at its utmost. That differentiated bodies can serve as the name of a samādhi is precisely because it is at the place of difference that skillfulness is most needed.

Lineage

Two tracks of divergent explanation stand side by side over this passage. Chengguan follows the order of the sūtra text and establishes an outline of five parts — making clear the wisdom that is able to enter, displaying the marks of entering and rising, making clear the benefits of entering the samādhi, making clear the mastery of the realm, gathering the whole up into the ultimate — and within the dharma he judges ten classes, and in the two places of simile-text he attaches the four similes and the six similes severally, and over the pair of coarse and fine he opens two readings by principle and by fact. Li Tongxuan, for his part, does not enter into the outlining of the text but takes up the sense of the establishing of the name, explaining this samādhi thus: one who enters this samādhi can manifest the body of a buddha and can match the differentiated bodies of sentient beings, all of them manifested according to their kind, and hence this name is established; and further, because he is able to enter the samādhi of the same and the different and of the compliant and the contrary, hence this name is established; as for the remaining sense, the sūtra text sets it forth in full of itself. The one follows the text and judges its structure, the other sets forth the Dharma and explains its name; the two tracks run side by side, both are the settled sayings of the ancient masters, and they are recorded without adjudication.

The sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, and therefore neither Fazang’s Tanxuan ji nor Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji has any outline-explanation of this chapter; for this passage, both the parallel translation and these two commentaries are honestly marked as lacking. This itself is worth setting down: the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis is a chapter newly added in the eighty-fascicle text, and the whole weight of its commentarial explanation falls upon Chengguan and Li Tongxuan alone. Whoever reads this chapter should know that the ground beneath its apparatus is altogether unlike the layered ranks of commentators that stand behind the Chapter on the Ten Grounds.

What This Question Is Asking

The ten great samādhis have been asked after one by one, and at the ninth Samantabhadra raises the same form of words again: what is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of mastery in the Dharma realm? The question looks like a repetition, but the point where it comes down is different every time. Each of the first eight had its own place in which mastery was gained; the point where this one comes down is in the two words ‘Dharma realm.’

One thing must be told apart first. What is asked is not ‘how does one enter this samādhi,’ but ‘what kind of samādhi is this.’ Since the name of the samādhi carries the word ‘mastery,’ the shape of the answer is announced beforehand: this samādhi is not a gathering of the mind into one place where it does not move; it is a not being caught anywhere at all. And so the text below, at its very first breath, says where the entering is done — and that place is not what most people imagine when they imagine meditation.

The Place of Entering Is the Eye, the Ear, the Nose, the Tongue, the Body, and the Mind

The sūtra says that this bodhisattva enters a samādhi at his own eye-place and so on to his own mind-place, and its name is mastery in the Dharma realm; and further, that he enters this samādhi within each single pore of his own body.

This is the easiest place to read straight past. When people picture meditation they suppose that one must first get away from the reaching-out of the six faculties: shut the eyes, stop the ears, put down every occasion of involvement. Here it is exactly the reverse: the place of entering is the six faculties, is the pores. This does not say that one need not cultivate; it says that what this samādhi cures is not the faculties, it is ‘being obstructed by the faculties.’ Chengguan explains this, saying that the general showing of the name and substance is that mastery is gained over the Dharma realm of the eye and the rest; and explaining the place of entering he says that it means entering the samādhi of the eye and the rest within the pores, showing that their mutual use is mastered — to enter samādhi in the eye and yet not lose the working of the ear, this is what is called mutual use.

The entering being in this place, what is known is thereupon without any farthest bound: he knows the manifold worlds, knows the dharmas of the manifold worlds, knows the manifold world-systems, counting on from koṭis of nayutas of world-systems all the way to world-systems as many as the dust motes of unspeakable buddha-lands, and he sees that within all world-systems there are buddhas appearing in the world with their assemblies filling them entirely. Li Tongxuan holds that this samādhi cannot be known by the reckoning of the emotive consciousness, but requires that the settled state be exhausted and the imagining perish, that there be no thinking and no mind, and that it be met with only by the seal of the wisdom that does not contrive — and it is therefore named mastery in the Dharma realm. He says further that within a single pore space has no measure of great or small, and is thus the equal of the realm of space — the reason a pore can hold the Dharma realm is that there was never a measure of great or small in it to begin with, not that something big has been forced into something small.

Now look at the sentence with which the sūtra closes this passage: because mastery has been gained over the Dharma realm, therefore he is well able to tell apart the eye, well able to tell apart the ear, and so on to the mind, the manifold differences each unlike the others, and he exhausts their farthest bound. Chengguan under this passage judges two meanings: first, that because of mastery in the principle-Dharma-realm he is able to tell apart the realms of the eye and the rest; second, that the telling apart of the eighteen realms of the eye and the rest is itself mastery in the phenomenal-Dharma-realm — and that these two are unobstructed, and further that phenomenon and phenomenon are unobstructed. The name and meaning of the four Dharma realms of the Huayan school have here, upon these few sentences of the sūtra, their verbatim place to stand — they were not spun out of abstract talk; they were read out of the four words ‘well able to tell apart the eye.’

Why the Merits Are Counted by Ten Thousand Koṭis

The samādhi being accomplished, the sūtra next spreads out a long series: he can give rise to ten thousand koṭis of lights of the dharma of dhāraṇī, accomplish ten thousand koṭis of pure practices, obtain ten thousand koṭis of faculties, fulfill ten thousand koṭis of spiritual powers — twenty-one clauses in a row, and every clause ten thousand koṭis.

Readers commonly raise two doubts here: one is impatience at the spread of it, the other is the wish to work the number out. Both go wide. Chengguan explains this, saying that this is the first of the ten benefits of the samādhi accomplished, the benefit of giving rise to many merits, in twenty-one clauses, each of them ten thousand koṭis — his counting of the clauses first is precisely a reminder to the reader that this is a ‘format,’ not an inventory. What the format is meant to convey is this: once the samādhi is accomplished, virtue is not added on one item at a time; one and the same quantity falls evenly upon every item.

So ‘ten thousand koṭis’ is not a statistic; it is a rhetorical quantity. What it is meant to shut out is a misunderstanding of this kind — the supposing that what is gained by cultivating samādhi is a certain number of countable accomplishments. The sūtra presses one and the same number down upon twenty-one different categories precisely so that the reader may see: what is gained is not twenty-one things, it is one strength reaching through twenty-one places. Brought down to use, it comes to this: do not ask ‘how many have I gained,’ ask ‘is every one of my places threaded through by one and the same thing.’

Made Ready, Gathered In, Purified — Merit in the Perfect Tense

The sūtra then changes its manner of speaking: this bodhisattva has besides numberless merits, measureless merits, boundless merits, on to inexhaustible merits; and toward these merits, he has made them all ready, gathered them all in, adorned them all, purified them all, burnished them all clear, taken them all up, is able to bring them all forth, may be praised for them all, has made them all firm, has accomplished them all.

The former ten clauses speak of the multitude of what is possessed, the latter ten of the manner of the possessing — Chengguan explains this, saying that within it there are twenty clauses, the former ten the multitude of what is possessed and the latter ten the manner of the possessing; and he explains two of the graphs, saying that ‘purified’ is because the stain is removed, and ‘burnished clear’ is because the light of the original wisdom is sent forth. These two graphs are worth pausing over: removing stain is a subtraction, sending forth light is an addition — but the light sent forth is not a light from outside; it is the light of the original wisdom. One sees, then, that ‘purified’ and ‘burnished clear’ are not synonyms doubled, but two faces of one matter.

The misunderstanding to be shut out is taking this passage for a heaping-up of praise. It is in fact saying something quite definite: at this station, merit is entirely in the perfect tense, not the progressive. Brought down to practice, this is a test: is the good one has cultivated still ‘in course of being gathered,’ or has it come to the point where it appears the moment it is used?

What It Is That the Buddhas, Appearing Before Him, Speak

Next comes the taking-in by the buddhas. The sūtra says that this bodhisattva is taken in by the buddhas of the east, whose names are as many as ten thousand asaṃkhyeyas of dust motes of buddha-lands, and that under each single name there are again buddhas of the same number, each unlike the rest; as it is with the east, so with the south, west, and north, with the four intermediate quarters, the zenith, and the nadir. All those buddhas appear before him: for him they display the pure lands, for him they speak the buddhas’ measureless body, the eyes past thought, the measureless ears, the pure nose, the pure tongue, the non-abiding mind, on to causing him to enter the boundless secret of the Tathāgata and to know that his own mind is like an illusion, like a conjuring.

One thing must be told apart here: this passage is prose narration, not verses of offering; nor is it the bodhisattva going to make offerings to the buddhas — it is the buddhas coming and appearing before him to speak. Chengguan explains this, saying that this is the third benefit, the taking-in by the buddhas, and that within it there are three: first the making clear of the taking-in, next the manifesting of the body and the speaking of the Dharma, and last the causing of him to cultivate and realize — the order of it is plain. What is spoken is also worth noticing: what the buddhas speak is for the most part the buddhas’ own eye, ear, nose, tongue, and mind. This joins up exactly with the earlier ‘well able to tell apart the eye, well able to tell apart the ear’ — the bodhisattva has gained mastery over his own six places, and so the buddhas take the six places of a buddha for what they speak. Here is where it comes to ground: what one cultivates is what one calls forth.

The Ten Things the Buddhas of the Ten Directions Keep in Mind at Once

Keeping in mind is not the same as taking in. Chengguan explains this, saying that taking in gathers him in, while what belongs to the buddhas’ keeping in mind is the strength of a buddha coming to lend its aid — taking in is a gathering into the buddhas’ holding, whereas keeping in mind is the strength of a buddha lending aid so that the thing is brought about.

What is kept in mind is ten things: causing him to gain a boundless body; to gain an unobstructed mind; to gain toward all dharmas a mindfulness that does not forget; to gain toward all dharmas a wisdom that is decided; to grow ever more quick of understanding so that toward all dharmas he can receive them; to understand clearly all dharmas; to have keen faculties so that in the dharma of spiritual powers he is skilled in every part; to have a field of experience unobstructed so that he moves everywhere through the Dharma realm and never rests; to gain unobstructed wisdom pure to the very last; and by the strength of spiritual power to display the becoming of a buddha within all world-systems.

Set them out in a row and the order is plain to see: first body and mind (a boundless body, an unobstructed mind), next holding in memory and deciding (mindfulness that does not forget, wisdom that is decided), next receiving and understanding clearly, next keen faculties and spiritual powers, next moving everywhere unobstructed, and at the last the displaying of the becoming of a buddha. The misunderstanding to be shut out is reading ‘lending aid’ as substituting: among the ten things there is not one that a buddha does in his stead — all of them are ‘they cause this bodhisattva’ to be thus and thus, and what the aid brings about is his own capacity. Brought down to practice: a true response is not being carried in someone’s arms, it is walking more steadily.

The Ten Oceans: Why an Ocean Is the Figure

Deeper still, the sūtra says that abiding in this samādhi he gains ten kinds of ocean — the ocean of the buddhas, of sentient beings, of the dharmas, of the lands, of merit, of spiritual powers, of the faculties, of minds, of practices, of vows; and each ocean carries with it the reason why, as the gaining of the ocean of the buddhas is ‘for he beholds them all’ and the gaining of the ocean of sentient beings is ‘for he tames them all.’

Why an ocean? As a figure, an ocean is taken for its breadth, for its depth, and for its being able to receive the many streams without overflowing. The four kinds of eloquence earlier came home to an ocean, and what is gained here is an ocean too — one sees, then, that what this samādhi gains is in its nature all of the ‘receiving’ sort, not of the ‘possessing’ sort. This is one misunderstanding to be shut out: supposing that to gain an ocean is to put the ocean in one’s pocket. The sūtra itself explains the ground of the gaining, and clause by clause it is ‘beholds,’ ‘tames,’ ‘knows,’ ‘goes to,’ ‘fulfills’ — what is gained is the capacity that answers to the thing, not the ownership of it. Where it comes to ground: to test whether one has truly gained a dharma, the mark is not whether one can talk about it, it is whether one can stand before it without being drowned.

The Ten Preeminences: Standing Out Without Being Stained

After the oceans he gains ten kinds of preeminence: among all sentient beings he is foremost; among all the gods he is most excellent; among all the Brahmā-kings he is master in the highest degree; toward the worlds he is nowhere stained or attached; nothing in any world can overshadow him; no demons can bewilder him; he enters everywhere into the destinies without hindrance; wherever he takes birth he knows it is not firm; in all the dharmas of a buddha he gains mastery; all spiritual powers he can display.

The first three clauses speak of the height of his station, the latter seven of the unobstructedness of his practice. What matters most here is the fourth clause and the eighth: nowhere stained or attached, and knowing it is not firm — these two pull the ‘foremost’ of the first three clauses back into place. Without these two, the first three clauses would become a worldly mind for coming out on top. With these two, the sense of ‘preeminence’ is settled: it is not overtopping the crowd, it is standing among the crowd without being stuck anywhere. Brought down to use, this is a very solid test — if a station makes a man stick to it, then that station is not the preeminence spoken of here.

The Ten Powers, and That Long String of Names of Powers

Then he gains ten kinds of power, and within the realm of sentient beings cultivates the practices: the power of valor (to tame the world), the power of vigor (never turning back), the power of non-attachment (far from every stain), the power of stillness (no dispute toward any dharma), the power of the adverse and the favorable (toward all dharmas the mind has gained mastery), the power of the nature of dharmas (mastery among the meanings), the power of the unobstructed (wisdom vast), the power of fearlessness (able to speak the dharmas), the power of eloquence (able to hold the dharmas), the power of revealing (wisdom boundless). Among the ten powers, the power of the adverse and the favorable most repays turning over — to be master in the favorable and in the adverse alike, not to have strength only where things go one’s way.

The sūtra then lists more than thirty names of powers, from the vast power and the most excellent power on to the power that no sentient being can overshadow. This is not the setting up of a second set of powers. Chengguan explains this, saying that within it he first lists the ten powers and afterward shows their surpassing excellence, and that following upon each single one of the former, every one is furnished with these thirty-eight powers — which is to say that the long string is the depth of each single power, not a horizontal row beginning from an eleventh. Misread as a horizontal row, one goes off to count them; read as depth, the sense of the sūtra comes out: within one power all the powers are complete.

Able to Give Rise, to Accomplish, to Fulfill — and Not to Be Told to the End

The sūtra then gathers it up with eleven graphs of ‘can’: toward measureless dharmas of merit such as these, he can give rise to them, can accomplish them, can fulfill them, can illumine them, can be furnished with them, can be furnished with them throughout, can make them vast, can make them firm, can increase them, can purify them, can purify them throughout. Chengguan explains this, saying that this is the eighth benefit, the benefit of the fulfillment of what he is able to do.

Then it turns to the other face: the farthest bound of this bodhisattva’s merit, of his wisdom, of his practice, of his dharma-gates, of his mastery, of his austerity, of his accomplishment, of his purity, of his going forth, of his mastery in the Dharma — none can tell them; and what he has obtained, accomplished, entered upon, and brought before him, all his dharma-gates, cannot be told to the end in unspeakable kalpas. Chengguan judges this to be the ninth benefit: since his own virtue is boundless, others cannot tell it.

On the one face ‘can,’ on the other ‘cannot be told to the end’ — the two faces must be looked at together. ‘Can’ speaks of his working; ‘cannot be told to the end’ speaks of his weight. The misunderstanding to be shut out is reading ‘none can tell them to the end’ as a passive putting-off. It is not an unwillingness to speak; it is that the measure of the virtue was never bounded by speech to begin with. Where it comes to ground: whatever has truly come to its full measure is for the most part plain in the describing, because it does not stand upon description.

Of All Samādhis There Is None Not Clearly Seen

The tenth benefit says that the samādhis are boundless and yet there is nothing of them he does not understand: he is able to know all samādhis, numberless on to unspeakably unspeakable; and of each single one of those samādhis the field of experience is measureless and vast, and within it, whether he enters, rises, or abides, all its aspects, displays, courses, outflows, own-nature, ceasing, and going forth — of all this there is nothing not clearly seen.

This item gathers up all the benefits before it. Those spoke of the virtue and power he has gained; this one speaks of his having seen the whole of the matter of ‘samādhi’ itself through and through — even how other samādhis are entered, abided in, come out of, and laid to rest lies within his sight. This is why it is named mastery: it is not that this one samādhi of his own is smoothly handled, it is that of all samādhis there is none he does not understand. Where it comes to ground is a distinction: to be able to use one kind of samādhi, and to see clearly the aspects of all samādhis, are two different levels; only the latter keeps a man from being shut in by the state of his own samādhi.

The Four Rivers of the Lake of No Heat: Where the Figure Lies

Here the sūtra turns to the great simile. Out of the palace of the great dragon king Free of Heat and Vexation four rivers flow forth, with nothing turbid and nothing mixed in them, their light and color pure as space; on the four sides of the lake there is one mouth apiece, and from the elephant’s mouth issues the Gaṅgā flowing sand of silver, from the lion’s mouth the Sītā flowing sands of adamant, from the ox’s mouth the Sindhu flowing sand of gold, from the horse’s mouth the Vakṣu flowing sand of beryl; the four rivers circle the lake seven times round and then divide toward the four quarters and enter the great ocean. Sand is spread on the lake’s bed, jewels adorn its banks, candana is scattered through it, four kinds of jeweled flower fill it entirely, and trees of jewels encircle it; and the moment the sunlight comes forth, all the manifold things within and without the lake and the rivers show the image of the sun, while the jewels in their turn show one another’s images, neither increasing nor decreasing, neither joined nor scattered.

Chengguan explains this, saying that in the third division, the showing by simile, what is shown directly is the substance and working and the benefits set out before, and that it also makes clear what was not shown before, so that it is not wholly like the text above — this one sentence is the key to reading the great simile. The division of simile is not a saying over again of what came before; it has something in it that the earlier text never brought out. He judges this simile to open into thirteen gates, each with the simile first and the joining after; and he records further that if the general and the particular of the four kinds of eloquence are opened out into five, then there are seventeen gates.

Li Tongxuan goes another way: relying upon what another scripture says, he matches the four rivers with the quarters and with the lands they enter — on the east the Sītā entering Cīnasthāna and coming home to the eastern sea, on the south the Gaṅgā entering southern India and coming home to the southern sea, on the west the Sindhu entering the land of Sindhu and coming home to the western sea, on the north the Vakṣu entering the lands of Persia and Fulin and coming home to the northern sea; and as for what the figures stand for, in two places he says that the sūtra itself sets it out fully, and lets the text speak for itself. The sūtra itself ties only the mouths and the sands together, and does not match them with quarters. The one of the two masters is detailed upon the opening and joining of the text, the other upon what the geography stands for; both are recorded.

The Four Kinds of Eloquence Send Forth Practices and Enter the Ocean of Wisdom Together

The simile once set up, the sūtra joins it itself. The first joining is the general one: as the great Lake of No Heat sends four rivers out of four mouths into the great ocean, so the bodhisattva out of four kinds of eloquence sends forth the practices and to the very last enters the ocean of omniscience. Chengguan explains this, saying that although four rivers are raised, the intent lies in the four mouths that send out the sands — the eye of the simile is not in the rivers, it is in the mouths and the sands.

Thereupon the four kinds of eloquence are joined severally: by the eloquence of meaning he speaks all the gates of meaning that all the Tathāgatas have spoken, brings forth pure and bright dharmas, and enters the ocean of unobstructed wisdom; by the eloquence of dharma he speaks for beings the adamantine sayings of the buddhas, draws forth adamantine wisdom, and enters the ocean of unobstructed wisdom; by the eloquence of instructing speech he speaks the skillful means of dependent arising in accord with the world, awakens beings and makes them all glad, and enters the ocean of the skillful means of dependent arising; by inexhaustible eloquence he rains down a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of unspeakable rains of Dharma, so that those who hear are made moist, and enters the ocean of the dharmas of the buddhas.

Each of the four kinds of eloquence has its own ocean to enter, and the gates differ without taking anything from one another. The misunderstanding to be shut out here is reading eloquence as a gift of the tongue. What the four kinds of eloquence send forth is ‘the practices,’ not merely words; and every one of them closes with ‘to the very last enters such and such an ocean’ — eloquence is not the end of the road, it is the watercourse. Where it comes to ground: if a capacity to speak the Dharma does not run through to the ocean of wisdom, then it is only a handsome river-mouth with no sand flowing out.

The Circling, the Four Quarters, and the Flowers and Jewels Within the Lake

For the gates that follow, the sūtra makes each joining itself. The four rivers circle the lake and afterward enter the ocean from the four quarters, and what is joined to this is the three kinds of action in accord and the three kinds of action with wisdom going before; Chengguan explains this, saying that the wisdom of the mind of awakening is what is named the lake, and that the three kinds of action being in accord with wisdom is precisely the sense of circling — first circling and then flowing out, which is to say that the three kinds of action must first turn about the mind of awakening before there can be any talk of pouring forth. The sūtra then asks and answers for itself what the bodhisattva’s four quarters are: to see all the buddhas and be awakened, to hear all the dharmas and hold them without forgetting, to fulfill the practice of all the perfections, and to speak the Dharma with great compassion and satisfy sentient beings.

Next, the four flowers filling the lake are joined to not abandoning sentient beings in the space within the mind of awakening and to speaking the Dharma and taming them; Chengguan explains this, saying that speaking the Dharma has the sense of opening into blossom, and samādhi the capacity to bring on fruit. The trees of jewels encircling it are joined to displaying the adornment of the buddha-lands and causing beings to turn toward awakening. The lake fifty yojanas broad, pure and unturbid, is joined to the mind of awakening being boundless in its measure and filled full with roots of goodness. The measureless jewels adorning the banks and the candana scattered everywhere are joined to adorning with the ten kinds of jewel of wisdom the bank that is the great vow of the mind of awakening — and here Chengguan records that the ten kinds of jewel of wisdom bear two senses, one being the ten kinds of jewel-like wisdom in the chapter on leaving the world behind, the other the ten kinds of wisdom such as the knowing of others’ minds, and he lets the two stand without judging between them. The sand of gold on the lake’s bed with maṇi jewels set among it is joined to contemplating everywhere with subtle wisdom and to the manifold jewels of the Dharma set among one another as adornment; and Chengguan makes the joining thing by thing, saying that subtle wisdom is joined to the sand of gold, liberation to the maṇi, unobstructed light to the two kinds of light sent forth, and abiding where the buddhas abide and entering the deep to the spreading across its bed.

Next again, the dragon king forever apart from heat and vexation is joined to the bodhisattva being forever apart from the sorrow and vexation of the world, and though he displays a taking of birth being unstained by it — Chengguan explains this, saying that this is the joining of the lake’s own name, since the name is had from the dragon. The four rivers moistening Jambudvīpa are joined to moistening gods, humans, śramaṇas, and brahmins with four rivers of wisdom, and the sūtra itself lists the four rivers of wisdom as the river of the wisdom of vows, the river of the wisdom of the perfections, the river of the wisdom of the bodhisattva samādhis, and the river of the wisdom of great compassion. Of the three gates after this, the rivers’ inexhaustibility is joined to cultivating by the strength of great vows a knowing and seeing without exhaustion; their entering the ocean unobstructed to ever cultivating the practices and vows of Samantabhadra and entering the wisdom of the Tathāgata without obstruction; and their entering the ocean without weariness to cultivating with the practices and vows of Samantabhadra to the exhaustion of the kalpas to come and not giving rise to weariness.

The Sun’s Images Appearing in One Another: Why the Buddhas Are Seen Within a Pore

The end of the great simile is the sun’s image. When the sun comes forth, the sand of gold, sand of silver, sands of adamant, sand of beryl and every jeweled thing within the lake all show the image of the sun, and the jewels in their turn show one another’s images, shining clear through one another without hindrance. The joining says: the bodhisattva abiding in this samādhi sees, within each single pore of his own body, buddhas and Tathāgatas as many as the dust motes of unspeakably unspeakable buddha-lands, and sees too their lands, their sites of awakening, and their assemblies; and in the presence of each buddha he hears the Dharma, holds it, believes and understands it, and makes offerings, each time through unspeakably unspeakable koṭis of nayutas of kalpas, and yet he does not think of the length or shortness of the season, nor are those assemblies crowded and pressed for room.

The four words ‘nor are the assemblies pressed for room’ are the eye of the whole passage — many and yet not crowded, long and yet not felt as long. What most needs to be shut out here is reading it as a spiritual power that has stretched the space out. The sūtra puts the question to itself, ‘why is this so,’ and answers at once with ten clauses, the first of which is ‘because with a subtle mind he enters the boundless Dharma realm,’ and below it the entering of the unequalled and differing fruits of action, of the field of samādhi past conceiving, of the field of pondering past conceiving, of the field of the mastery of all the buddhas, and then the gaining of what all the buddhas keep in mind, of their great spiritual transformations, of the ten powers hard to gain and hard to know, the entering of the field of the fulfilled practice of the bodhisattva Samantabhadra, and last the gaining of the spiritual power of all the buddhas that never tires. Chengguan explains this, saying that within the joining there is first the direct joining and afterward the asking and explaining of the ground of the mutual entering — the reason for the reason, the sūtra sets out itself.

One sees, then, that the not being crowded is not space enlarged, it is a mind that does not discriminate upon quantity. Where it comes to ground is thoroughly practical: when a man feels busy, feels pressed, it is for the most part not that his affairs are many, it is that his mind has first drawn them up in a queue.

Though He Enters Samādhi He Does Not Lay It Aside; Though He Transforms Beings He Is Apart from the Notion of Beings

The last division is the general conclusion, the twin practice. First it is said in terms of dharma: though he can enter and come out within a single thought-moment, yet he does not lay aside the long abiding in samādhi and grasps at nothing; though he takes no lodging in the fields of experience, yet he does not abandon any object of attention; though he enters well the very instant, yet for the benefit of beings he displays the spiritual powers of a buddha with no satiety; though he enters the Dharma realm equally, yet he does not gain its farthest bound; though he has nowhere to abide and no place, yet he ever turns toward the path of omniscience; though he is far from the upside-down discriminations of the world and has passed beyond every ground of discrimination, yet he does not abandon the manifold aspects; though he can be furnished with skillful means, yet he is pure to the very last; though he makes no discrimination among the bodhisattva grounds, yet the grounds are all well entered. Chengguan explains this, saying that the general conclusion of the twin practice means that the provisional and the real, samādhi and dispersion, are without obstruction to one another.

Next it is said in terms of simile: it is as with space, which though able to receive all things is yet apart from being and non-being. The figure of space is used with great exactness — it is not a nothing-at-all, for it receives everything; and it is not a being-full-of-something, for it is apart from being and non-being.

Last it is said in terms of the joining, a dozen or more clauses of twin illumination in a row: though he enters everywhere into all the worlds, he is apart from the notion of world; though he diligently delivers all beings, he is apart from the notion of a being; though he knows all dharmas deeply, he is apart from the notion of dharmas; though he delights to see all buddhas, he is apart from the notion of buddhas; though he enters well the manifold samādhis, he knows that the own-nature of all dharmas is just as it is and is nowhere stained; though with boundless eloquence he expounds inexhaustible sayings of the Dharma, his mind ever abides in the dharma apart from letters; though he delights to contemplate the dharma without speech, he ever displays a pure voice; though he abides in the border of all dharmas where words are left behind, he ever displays the manifold forms and marks; though he teaches and transforms beings, he knows that all dharmas are in their very nature empty; though he diligently cultivates great compassion to deliver beings, he knows that the realm of beings is inexhaustible and does not scatter; though he understands through and through that the Dharma realm abides constantly without change, he tames beings with the three wheels and never rests; though he ever abides where the Tathāgata abides, his wisdom is pure, his mind without fear, and he tells apart and expounds the manifold dharmas and turns the Dharma-wheel without rest.

Chengguan sets down here a very fine remark, saying that in the dharma-statement what is made clear is working from within stillness, while in the simile and its joining what is made clear is stillness from within working, and that the texts abbreviate by casting light on one another — the dharma-statement speaks from the still side out to the working, the simile and joining speak from the working side back to the stillness, the two faces seen in one another with each text sparing half. The misunderstanding to be shut out is reading ‘though … yet …’ as a compromise or a concession. It is not each side giving way a step; it is both wholly at once: the entering of the world is a whole entering, and the being apart from the notion of world is a whole apartness. Here is where it comes to ground — at a certain station of practice, one does not reconcile two things into a single tepid thing; both things go to their own bottom without obstructing each other.

Gathered Up in One Sentence

The sūtra closes very briefly: this is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s skillful wisdom of the ninth great samādhi, mastery in the Dharma realm.

Ten times over the samādhis are asked, and every one of them closes with ‘skillful wisdom.’ Looking back from here, what the four words ‘mastery in the Dharma realm’ point to is not that there is somewhere else, called the Dharma realm, in which one may roam at liberty; it is that between eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind, within a single pore, and between entering samādhi and coming out of it and speaking the Dharma and delivering beings, one is no longer caught. That the samādhi is named mastery is on this account.

Lineage

The ancient masters relied upon for this unit are two only. Chengguan’s Huayan jing shu is the track of the outline: the whole passage is judged into four divisions — the showing of the substance and working of the samādhi, the making clear of the benefits of the samādhi accomplished, the showing by simile, and the general conclusion of the twin practice — the benefits opening into ten sections and the simile into thirteen gates; and at the substance of the samādhi he judges mastery in the principle-Dharma-realm, mastery in the phenomenal-Dharma-realm, the unobstructedness of the two, and further the unobstructedness of phenomenon and phenomenon — so that the meaning of the four Dharma realms of the Huayan school has upon this passage its verbatim commentarial ground. Li Tongxuan’s Xin Huayan jing lun makes no outline, but explains the name of the samādhi directly by the wisdom that does not contrive, saying that this cannot be reckoned by the emotive consciousness but requires that the settled state be exhausted and the imagining perish, without thinking and without mind, before it can be met; and he further matches the four rivers, by what the geography stands for, with their quarters and the lands they enter, while twice letting the sūtra itself make plain what the figures stand for. What the two masters treat in detail is not the same; both are recorded, and no judgment is passed between them.

The sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, and therefore Fazang’s Tanxuan ji and Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji have no text of explanation citing this passage; the counterpart in the sixty is a structural absence, not a divergence of wording. The treatises of the Huayan school likewise have no explanation citing this passage; their words ‘mastery in the Dharma realm’ belong to the classifying of the teachings and the setting up of the school’s position, and are not an explanation of this text of the sūtra. This is recorded without judgment.

As for what the meaning of this passage carries on and what it hands forward: the four unobstructed kinds of eloquence are elsewhere mostly set out as a list of terms, whereas this passage takes samādhi for their source and the ocean of wisdom for their homecoming, and so establishes the order of ‘eloquence issues from samādhi, eloquence ends by entering the ocean’; and in the passage of the sun’s images appearing in one another, the ground that the sūtra itself gives is the two matters of entering the boundless Dharma realm and the buddhas’ lending of aid. The speaker of this chapter is Samantabhadra, and twice within the joining of the simile the text ties itself to the practices and vows of Samantabhadra, running through with the practice of Samantabhadra in one thread — this is the tie of this unit outward, a tie of name held ready for cross-reading, and it is not carried beyond this passage into argument.

One Question, Held Back Until Nine Samādhis Had Gone By

By the time the ten great samādhis reach the tenth, what Samantabhadra says sounds more and more like a description of a buddha. In the middle of this round the sūtra text says it outright: this bodhisattva obtains ten kinds of dharma that are ‘the same as the buddhas’ — the marks and signs the same as the buddhas, the light the same as the buddhas, the spiritual penetrations the same as the buddhas, the body of form and the perfect voice the same as the buddhas — ten ‘the same as the buddhas’ one after another, bearing down in a row. Whereupon the bodhisattva Universal Eye, seated in the same assembly, can hold back no longer, and asks the one and only question in the whole direct exposition of the ten samādhis.

The weight of this question is worth seeing clearly first. From the first samādhi to the tenth, the speaker throughout the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis is Samantabhadra alone, and the hearers throughout make no sound; only here does Universal Eye open his mouth and Samantabhadra answer — the one stretch of dialogue in the direct exposition falls exactly at the point where『the virtue is already the same as a buddha’s』. One can see that the sūtra text knows it itself: having come this far, the reader will certainly be caught. Caught on what? On the name. Since everything is now the same as a buddha’s, why is he still called a bodhisattva? And if he is still called a bodhisattva, were those ten ‘the same as the buddhas’ said too fully? What this round has to answer is precisely this.

Let the direction of the conclusion be said first: the name of this samādhi is ‘the unobstructed wheel.’ Chengguan, explaining the name of this samādhi, judges that both senses of the name lie within the first twenty-two clauses on entering — the first eleven clauses speak of ‘the unobstructedness of the working of the cause,’ which is the sense of ‘unobstructed’; the latter eleven clauses speak of ‘the fullness of the dwelling in the fruit,’ which is the sense of ‘wheel.’ Cause and fruit — just that pair of contraries which Universal Eye asks about. The answer was already hidden away inside the name.

The Sentence That Raises the Question: First Setting Up a ‘What Is’

At the opening the sūtra text has but one sentence: Sons of the Buddha! What is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s samādhi of the unobstructed wheel?

A single sentence of questioning, which looks like nothing but a form. Yet every one of the Huayan’s ten samādhis begins with ‘what is,’ and this ‘what is’ is no mere figure of speech. Chengguan judges that the tenth samādhi ‘is too first the questioning, next the explanation, afterward the conclusion’ — questioning, explanation, conclusion in three parts, one and the same pattern with the nine samādhis before it. And what does a pattern mean? It means the reader is required to read the ten samādhis as one set: the manner of asking the same, the manner of answering the same, only the content deepening all the way along. So when one comes to the questioning of the tenth samādhi, it should not be taken as yet another opening, but as the tenth time the same knock is given — the nine times before have answered nine layers, and this time what must be answered is the last layer.

Then one misreading must be guarded against: taking the ‘what is’ for a question of Universal Eye’s. It is not so here. The request for the Dharma for the whole chapter stands at the chapter’s head; the questioning here is Samantabhadra’s own manner of narration, setting up his own question and answering it himself. The question that truly issues from Universal Eye does not come until the latter part of this round, and what it asks is not『what is this samādhi』but『why are you not yet a buddha.』The two questions are on different levels, and in reading they must not be confounded.

The Twenty-Two Clauses: Unobstructedness in the Cause, the Wheel in the Fruit

The first stretch of the answer is the appearance of entering the samādhi, twenty-two clauses in a row. The first eleven clauses: dwelling in deeds of body without obstruction, deeds of speech without obstruction, deeds of mind without obstruction; dwelling in buddha-lands without obstruction; obtaining the wisdom that perfects sentient beings without obstruction; gaining the wisdom that tames sentient beings without obstruction; sending forth light without obstruction; manifesting a net of light without obstruction; displaying vast transformations without obstruction; turning a pure wheel of the Dharma without obstruction; obtaining a bodhisattva’s sovereignty without obstruction. The latter eleven clauses begin from ‘he enters universally the powers of the buddhas’: he enters universally the powers of the buddhas, he dwells universally in the wisdom of the buddhas, he does what the buddhas do, he purifies what the buddhas purify, he manifests the spiritual penetrations of a buddha, he causes the buddhas to rejoice, he practices what the Tathāgatas practice, he dwells in the path of the Tathāgatas, he is constantly able to draw near to measureless buddhas, he does the work of the buddhas, he continues the lineage of the buddhas.

Why divide them so? Chengguan glosses this by saying that the first eleven clauses are the unobstructedness of the working of the cause, which is the sense of ‘unobstructed’; and the latter eleven clauses are the fullness of the dwelling in the fruit, which is the sense of ‘wheel.’ He further cuts the first eleven clauses into four sorts: the first three clauses are the unobstructedness of the three kinds of deed, the next single clause is the unobstructedness of the world as vessel, the two after that are the unobstructedness of the world of sentient beings, and the remainder are the unobstructedness of the wisdom of perfect awakening. This division is very useful: it brings ‘unobstructed’ down into four definite fields — one’s own body, speech, and mind; the land one depends upon; the sentient beings one transforms; and the buddha-wisdom one witnesses — and so makes clear that unobstructedness is not one undivided lump of sovereignty, but a going through on all four sides.

A misunderstanding must be set aside: taking ‘wheel’ for a mere epithet, pleasant to the ear and no more. Li Tongxuan does not think so; he explains the sense of the wheel by the thousand-spoked adamantine wheel of a wheel-turning king: hub, spokes, rim, and chock, every one of them complete — only then is it called a wheel; and a wheel is a wheel in that, being complete, it can turn and can crush. So ‘wheel’ here is the mark of the fullness of the fruit-virtue, and not an ornament. Taken together: ‘unobstructed’ is spoken with respect to the cause, ‘wheel’ with respect to the fruit, and within one name of a samādhi cause and fruit stand side by side — which is exactly the matter the whole round is about to speak of.

Brought down upon the reader: these twenty-two clauses are not a list to be memorized, but one by which to examine oneself. Whoever feels his practice caught at every turn is caught, more likely than not, at one or another of these four sorts: either body, speech, and mind will not obey; or his circumstances do not permit; or sentient beings are hard to tame; or his view is not clear. That the sūtra text sets them all out together is meant to let a man know that unobstructedness is not a matter of one place having been opened up and that being the end of it.

The Maṇi Jewel Put into a Colored Garment: The General Pattern of This Round

After the entering, the sūtra text first writes a string of ‘contemplating omniscience’: contemplating as a whole, contemplating in parts, following in accord, making manifest, taking as object, and so on to seeing, seeing as a whole, seeing in parts omniscience; and then toward Samantabhadra’s ten vastnesses — vow, mind, practice, destination, entering, light, appearing, guarding and keeping in mind, transformation, path — neither breaking off nor retrogressing, neither resting nor exchanging, neither tiring nor abandoning, neither scattering nor falling into disorder. The former string is the fullness of the wisdom, the latter string the unbrokenness of the practice.

Then the sūtra text gives a simile: it is as when a man puts a maṇi jewel into a garment that has color; the jewel, though it is mirrored as of one color with the garment, does not abandon its own nature. The bodhisattva too is like this: he accomplishes wisdom and makes of it the jewel within his mind, and contemplating omniscience he makes it all clearly manifest, and yet he does not abandon the several practices of a bodhisattva.

Chengguan joins this simile, saying: the maṇi jewel set within a colored garment is the general simile for the bodhisattva’s mind-wisdom being set within the Buddha’s wisdom; ‘though it takes on the color of the garment’ is a simile for that former string on the fullness of wisdom, and ‘it does not abandon its own nature’ is a simile for that latter string on the constancy of practice. This joining is of the first importance — it tells us that this simile is no offhand comparison, but the general pattern of the whole round. What general pattern? That the wisdom is already the same as a buddha’s, and yet the practice does not abandon the cause. That grand and stirring simile of the elephant-king that comes later is in truth only this one maṇi jewel told over again, told on a larger scale.

A misreading must be set aside: taking ‘of one color with the garment’ to mean that it is stained. It is not. That the jewel manifests the color of the garment is not that the nature of the jewel has altered; it is that the nature of the jewel is so bright and clean that it can mirror it in full. Just so, that the bodhisattva’s wisdom is the same as a buddha’s wisdom is not that he has been replaced by a buddha; it is that his mind-wisdom is clean enough to mirror the buddha’s wisdom in full. If this layer is read wrongly, the whole passage on ‘not destroying the cause and yet manifesting the fruit’ that comes later will be read as a contradiction.

Three Similes of Unweariedness: The Unweariedness of the Vow Is What the Dharma Is of Itself

Then three similes come down in a row: space upholds the forming and abiding of measureless worlds, without weariness and without fatigue, neither altering nor differing, and it does not abandon its own nature either — why? Such is the own-nature of space; the dharma is thus of itself. Nirvāṇa receives the passing into extinction of measureless sentient beings within it and is from first to last unwearied — why? All dharmas are in their original nature pure, and this is called nirvāṇa; then where within it would any weariness be? Sarvajñā can cause all bodhisattvas of the three times to be born in the house of the buddhas — already born, now being born, to be born — and even to accomplish unsurpassed awakening, and is from first to last neither tired nor wearied — why? Omniscience and the Dharma realm are not two, and toward all dharmas there is no grasping.

Chengguan, explaining these three similes, says that all three are similes for being unwearied in benefiting beings, each having its dharma and its joining; and he judges the first two to be similes for compassion and the third for wisdom, saying that since the third is not a compassion of affection and views, where would there be any weariness? This judgement is finely made. It answers a real question of practice: over long kalpas of delivering beings, will one not grow tired?

The sūtra text’s way of answering is not『you must bear it,』but『this matter has in itself no ground for tiredness.』Space upholding the worlds is not tired, because that is what space is of itself; nirvāṇa receiving those who pass into extinction is not tired, because the place where they are delivered is of itself originally pure; omniscience perfecting bodhisattvas is not tired, because wisdom and the Dharma realm are not two, and that which acts and that which is acted upon are not held apart. The three reasons turn deeper layer by layer: the first layer is what the dharma is of itself, the second is that the place delivered is originally pure, the third is that deliverer and delivered are not two. By the third layer, the very notion of ‘tiredness’ has nowhere at all to be set up — it is not that one has borne up under it and is not tired; it is that the structure which could be tired is nowhere to be found.

Set aside a misunderstanding: do not read this as『therefore no effort is needed.』The sūtra text goes on immediately to say that the bodhisattva sets up a great oath and vow, enters deeply the ocean of the Dharma, manifests great sovereignty, and gives to sentient beings. Unweariedness is not inaction; it is exerting oneself without the thought of fatigue arising.

One Lotus and Twenty Layers of Light: Why the Pomp of the Fruit-Virtue Has to Be Written So Full

Then the sūtra text suddenly spreads out a scene of the utmost splendor: this bodhisattva has a lotus flower, vast to the limit of the ten directions, adorned with unspeakable petals, unspeakable jewels, unspeakable fragrances; true gold for its net, and jeweled bells giving forth a subtle sound, and within that sound the dharma of omniscience is set forth at length; the bodhisattva sits cross-legged upon the flower, the size of his body answering to the flower. Then, sustained by the power of the buddhas, from every single pore there go forth lights as many as the dust motes of a million koṭis of nayutas of unspeakable buddha-lands; the light manifests maṇi jewels, the jewels manifest storied pavilions, the pavilions manifest lion thrones, the thrones manifest light, the light manifests colors and marks, the colors and marks manifest wheels of light … twenty layers all the way, layer giving rise to layer, until at last sentient beings within the Buddha-Dharma are tamed.

Chengguan divides this passage into the dependent fruit and the proper recompense: the flower is the surpassingness of the dependent fruit, the body is the sovereignty of the proper recompense; and he says that this flower, observed from within, has a measure that encompasses the Dharma realm, and observed from without, lets sentient beings see it — this is what is called the great that is just the small.

Why must it be written so full? Because what this round has to establish is『the fruit-virtue is already accomplished.』If the fruit-virtue were not written to the full, Universal Eye’s question below could not be raised at all, and Samantabhadra’s answer would carry no weight. The sūtra text’s twenty layers of ascending series are not a parade of marvels; they use quantity to drive ‘the inconceivable’ out past the reader’s power to imagine — that one cannot imagine it is precisely the effect wanted. And one must notice where the last layer comes to rest: it rests upon ‘sentient beings, who within the Buddha-Dharma are tamed.’ All the spreading out of the nineteen layers before is for the sake of this one clause. The pomp of the fruit-virtue has for its terminus the delivering of beings.

Penetrating the Markless Dharma: All These Adornments, He Himself Knows, Are Illusion

The pomp having been written to the full, the sūtra text at once turns it over: the bodhisattva, dwelling in this samādhi, manifests such realms of spiritual penetration and measureless transformations, and yet knows them wholly to be as illusions and is not stained by them, and dwells in boundless unspeakable dharmas. These dharmas are pure in their own nature, are the true mark of the Dharma realm, are the lineage-nature of the Tathāgata; within the limit that is without obstruction there is no going and no coming, nothing before and nothing after, and they are so deep as to have no bottom; they are obtained by direct perception, entered by one’s own wisdom, and one is not awakened to them by another.

This turning is of the greatest importance. Without this passage, the passage before would be an exhibition of spiritual penetrations; with it, the passage before is Dharma. Chengguan judges this passage to be ‘making clear the penetration of the markless dharma, which is the same as the Tathāgatas, and the merit of being able to enter the utterly pure suchness’; and he glosses the phrase ‘the lineage-nature of the Tathāgata’ by saying that the buddhas take natureless suchness for their nature.

Here one graph that is easily slipped over must be taught clearly: lineage-nature. Whenever ‘lineage-nature’ is spoken of, a man readily thinks of some special material, some qualification. Neither the sūtra text nor Chengguan permits it to be read so — the lineage-nature is just natureless suchness. That is to say, the ‘seed’ of becoming a buddha is not a thing; it is the very fact that dharmas have of themselves no own-nature. Since it is natureless, it is nobody’s private property, nor is it something newly added by cultivation. This one sentence being set up, all the adornment of the twenty layers before is set entirely upon ‘illusion’ — not that it is called false, but that it is said to be present and yet without nature, and so it can be manifested, and need not be grasped at.

Brought down upon the reader: if in practice some realm appears before one, this passage is the measure. That a realm appears and one knows it as illusion is the path; that a realm appears and one is stained by it is an obstruction. The difference does not lie in the realm itself.

The Twenty-One Merits Down to ‘Of All His Great Vows There Is None Not Accomplished’: The Roster of Virtue Equal to a Buddha’s

From ‘his substance and nature are as they truly are’ onward, the sūtra text has one long dense stretch of items of virtue: witnessing before him with a pure eye, seeing universally with the eye of insight, accomplishing the buddha-eye, moving in the realm of the eye of wisdom, revealing wondrous gates of the Dharma; accomplishing the mind of awakening, going toward the surpassing ground of a great man, entering the lineage-nature of wisdom, departing from the birth-dharmas of the world and yet manifesting the receiving of birth; his merit and aspiration wholly pure, his wisdom vast like space; what he practices being still, and toward the dharmas of the buddhas ultimately without obstruction; obtaining the awesome spirit of the buddhas, accomplishing the dharma-body of a buddha, the power of his recollection hard to conceive; taking the Dharma realm for his body and yet without discrimination, seeing the limit of the merits of all the buddhas; being a bright lamp for the world, entering the number of the buddhas of the future; being furnished with great awesome virtue, dwelling in a higher aspiration; dwelling in the wheel of the true limit and toward all dharmas his mind without obstruction; not destroying the several existences and yet being born within them; though following in accord with the conventional he expounds measureless letters, yet constantly not destroying the dharma that is apart from letters; knowing that all dharmas are but borrowed names; penetrating that all dharmas are empty and without anything at all; entering deeply the Dharma realm and expounding it following in accord, within a single gate of objects putting forth omniscience; contemplating the ground of the ten powers, with wisdom for a bridge reaching Sarvajñā, well entering the several grounds and knowing the several meanings — and at last it is gathered into a single clause: of all his great vows there is none that is not accomplished.

Chengguan, explaining this one long stretch, says that this is the gathering in of the twenty-one kinds of surpassing merit of the Tathāgata, because in this station the virtue is equal to a buddha’s. Note this: the sūtra text does not itself set out this number ‘twenty-one’; the number is what Chengguan’s outline draws out. So in reading there is no need to count; what should be read is the character of this stretch — it is a roster of『the virtue is already equal to a buddha’s.』

The clause that closes the roster is especially to be looked at: of all his great vows there is none that is not accomplished. The twenty virtues before all speak of『what has been witnessed』; the last virtue says『the vows are all accomplished.』Why is the vow put last? Because a vow is a matter of the station of the cause. To close the virtues with the vow is, at the end of the roster of virtue equal to a buddha’s, to set with one’s own hand a seal of the station of the cause. That Universal Eye’s question can be forced out at all owes to this arrangement as its foreshadowing.

Set aside a misunderstanding: do not read ‘the virtue is equal to a buddha’s’ as『he is already a buddha.’ The graphs Chengguan uses are ‘the virtue is equal’; what is equal is the virtue, not the station. This difference of a single graph is the very seam wherein all the answers below lie.

The Forty-One Clauses of ‘Though He Knows, Yet He Expounds’: Being Does Not Obstruct Non-Being, Non-Being Does Not Obstruct Being

Then comes the densest stretch of writing in the whole round. The sūtra text says that the bodhisattva by this reveals the undifferentiated nature of all the Tathāgatas, and then brings down forty-odd clauses in a row of one and the same pattern: though he knows that all dharmas are without any doing, yet he can manifest every kind of deed; though he knows there is no form, yet he expounds the several forms; though he knows that dharmas have no arising, yet he constantly turns the wheel of the Dharma; though he knows that dharmas have no turning, yet he turns the wheel of the Dharma; though he knows that dharmas cannot be spoken of, yet he can expound pure words; though he knows that dharmas are from the origin constantly abiding, yet he proclaims all dharmas that flow and turn …

Chengguan judges the clause-pattern here, saying: the first clause is being not obstructing non-being, because being is the being of non-being; the latter forty clauses are non-being not obstructing being, because non-being is the non-being of being; and he says further that the former is two and yet not two, the latter is not two and yet two.

These words are worth reading slowly, for they are the densest scriptural ground for the Huayan sense of ‘mutual identity.’ What must be taught clearly is this: the ‘though … yet …’ here is not a concession, but a simultaneity. If it be read as『though he clearly knows it to be empty, he still forces himself to speak of being,』then it becomes two separate pieces — first a view of emptiness, then an act of being, joined in the middle by strength of will. That is not what the sūtra text means. ‘Being is the being of non-being’ means: just because it has no own-nature, it can be; ‘non-being is the non-being of being’ means: the non-being spoken of is spoken with respect to these very beings. The two are not before and after; they are two faces of one and the same thing.

Brought down upon the reader: does expounding the Dharma and delivering beings conflict with the sense of emptiness? By this stretch, not only is there no conflict — only the sense of emptiness can make room for it. If dharmas had settled natures, speaking would not move them; just because they are natureless, they can be spoken, can be turned, can deliver.

Twenty-Eight ‘Enterings’: How One Samādhi Can Obtain Many Fruits

After the forty-odd clauses, the sūtra text says that when the bodhisattva enters such a wheel of samādhi-wisdom of great awesome virtue, he is then able to witness all the dharmas of the buddhas, to go toward them, to accomplish, to make full, to gather together, to purify, to dwell, to penetrate, and to answer to the own-nature of all dharmas; and yet this bodhisattva does not give rise to any such thought — that there are so many bodhisattvas, so many dharmas of a bodhisattva, so many ultimates, so many accomplishings of spiritual penetration, so many witnessings and enterings, so many realms. Why? Because such is the substance and nature of a bodhisattva’s samādhi, such its boundlessness, such its surpassingness.

There are three hidden questions here, and the sūtra text answers them all. The first: having witnessed, why is there still no thought? The answer: the substance and nature are apart from thought. The second: how can one samādhi obtain so many fruits? The answer: the substance of the samādhi is one, and yet its working is boundless. The third: how can a samādhi at the station of the cause obtain the dharmas of the fruit? The answer: because it is surpassing. After the three answers, the sūtra text expounds it at length in twenty-eight clauses with the graph ‘enter’: entering the unspeakable gates of wisdom, entering the several adornments apart from discrimination, entering the boundless surpassing perfections, entering the numberless meditations, entering the excellent and wondrous treasury of seeing boundless buddhas, entering the realms without resting, entering the great spiritual penetrations with faculties sharp and keen, entering the equal eye that sees all the buddhas, entering the gathering together of the surpassing resolve and practice of Samantabhadra, entering the dwelling in the body of the wondrous wisdom of Nārāyaṇa, entering the expounding of the great ocean of the Tathāgatas’ wisdom, entering the gate that puts forth the inexhaustible wisdom of all the buddhas, entering the purifying of the sovereign wisdom of the bodhisattva Samantabhadra, entering the revealing of the universal-gate wisdom to which nothing may be likened, entering the universal knowing of all the subtle realms of the Dharma realm, entering the body of wisdom that pervades the Dharma realm, entering the samādhi that well dwells in all differences — and the last clause closes upon ‘entering the knowing of the minds of all the buddhas.’

The misunderstanding to be set aside is this: taking ‘enter’ for going into some place. The entering here is witnessing and answering to. The twenty-eight gates are not twenty-eight locations; they are twenty-eight workings manifested by one and the same substance of samādhi. The last clause, ‘entering the knowing of the minds of all the buddhas,’ closes it excellently — entering all the way to the last, what is entered is the mind of a buddha. And the mind of a buddha is nowhere else: it is right there where the substance and nature of this samādhi is apart from thought.

Thought after Thought Entering a Hundred Koṭis of Samādhis and Yet Seeing No Prior Limit: Inexhaustible Is Not the Same as Very Many

Further down, the sūtra text says that this bodhisattva dwells in the practice of Samantabhadra and thought after thought enters a hundred koṭis of unspeakable samādhis, and yet does not see the prior limit of Samantabhadra’s samādhis or of the adornment of the realm of the buddhas. Why? The sūtra text gives ten clauses of ‘because he knows …’: because he knows that all dharmas are ultimately inexhaustible, that all buddha-lands are boundless, that all realms of sentient beings are inconceivable, that the prior limit has no beginning, that the future has no end, that the present exhausts space and pervades the Dharma realm and is boundless, that the realms of the buddhas are inconceivable, that the practices of the bodhisattvas are numberless, that the realms spoken of by the eloquence of all the buddhas are unspeakable and boundless, that the dharmas taken as objects by all illusion-like minds are measureless.

This stretch must teach one dividing line: inexhaustible is not the same as very many. Very many is a question of number, and a number, however great, still has an edge; inexhaustible is a question of structure, in which even a ‘prior limit’ cannot be found. That the sūtra text says ‘he does not see the prior limit’ does not mean that he cannot see it clearly; it means that there simply is no such starting point to be seen. So thought after thought entering a hundred koṭis of samādhis is not taking things without stopping out of a storehouse astonishingly large; it is, within a Dharma realm that has no edge, being itself without stopping.

Thereupon three similes fasten upon this: the wish-fulfilling jewel gives whatever is sought and yet the power of the jewel is never wanting — a simile for the mind of samādhi putting forth dharmas as they are called for, without end, while its substance neither increases nor decreases; ordinary persons severally give rise to thoughts that follow on unbroken past conceiving — a simile for the limitlessness of entering the samādhi of the gate of universal illusion; the dragon kings Nanda, Upananda, Manasvin and the rest send down rain with drops like cart-axles and yet the clouds are never exhausted — a simile for the inexhaustibility of entering the gates of the Dharma. The second simile is especially striking — it takes for its simile the deluded thoughts of ordinary persons. If deluded thoughts follow on beginninglessly and endlessly, how much more the practice-wisdom of Samantabhadra. It takes the structure of ‘following on without end,’ not the defilement or purity; in reading, do not mistake it for praise or blame.

The Simile of the Kindled Fire and That Long String of ‘Should’: How This Round Comes Down to Today

The inexhaustible having been said to the end, the sūtra text asks: why can it be so? And answers: it is as with a kindled fire, according to whatever conditions there are, for just so long does the fire arise and not cease. Where there is fuel the fire continues; where the conditions are, the practice continues — it is not held up by a burst of force.

Then the sūtra text turns to urging cultivation, and the tone suddenly grows very near: therefore bodhisattvas ought within such a samādhi to cultivate diligently, to depart from every burning affliction, to be without fatigue and weariness, unretrogressing in mind, setting up a deep and earnest resolve, courageous and without timidity. Not relying upon letters, not clinging to the world, not grasping at dharmas, not giving rise to discrimination. Then a long string of clauses with ‘should’: one should constantly observe the nature of all dharmas, without for a moment letting it go; one should know that one’s own body and the nature of all dharmas are universally equal; one should be constantly vigorous, without rest; one should observe that one’s own roots of goodness are still few; one should diligently increase the several roots of goodness of others; one should delight in drawing near to the good friends; one should not cast away mindfulness; one should know that all mind and consciousness are like illusions; one should know that the several practices of the world are like a dream; one should know that speech is in every case like an echo; one should, in order to tame all sentient beings, know the time and expound the Dharma without resting.

This stretch is the one place in the whole round where the text speaks straight to the reader. Everything before speaks of that bodhisattva; here it speaks of what one ‘should.’ And one clause among them is to be noticed, the one least like what a bodhisattva of high station ought to say: one should observe that one’s own roots of goodness are still few. A man whose virtue is already equal to a buddha’s must still observe that his own roots of goodness are few? Just so. This clause is the fixed pole-star of the whole exhortation — it presses all the fruit-virtue before back into the posture of the causal ground. Whoever, having read the pomp before, gives rise to longing or to a low opinion of himself, this clause is the way back: that bodhisattva himself observes in this very way.

The Ten Great Treasuries of the Dharma: Where the Mind Dwells Constantly

The part on the samādhi being full and the benefit accomplished first writes of the buddhas of the ten directions appearing before him and giving him ten things — giving him the Tathāgatas’ power of recollection, the ultimate insight, the decisive insight, the unsurpassed awakening of a buddha, a bodhisattva’s ultimate insight, the unretrogressing wisdom, the unobstructed eloquence, the power of spiritual penetrations and transformations, the full and perfect voice, and the power that is not spent in vain; and the last gift is the most substantial of all: causing all sentient beings, whether they see his form or hear him expound the Dharma, to be brought to accomplishment, with none of it passing away empty.

Thereupon the sūtra text says that this bodhisattva’s mind dwells constantly in ten great treasuries of the Dharma: dwelling in the calling to mind of all the buddhas, dwelling in the calling to mind of all the buddha-dharmas, dwelling in the great compassion that tames all sentient beings, dwelling in the wisdom that manifests inconceivable pure lands, dwelling in the decisive understanding that enters deeply the realms of the buddhas, dwelling in the awakening that is the equal mark of all the buddhas of the three times, dwelling in the limit that is unobstructed and unattached, dwelling in the markless nature of all dharmas, dwelling in the equal roots of goodness of all the buddhas of the three times, dwelling in the wisdom that goes before the undifferentiated deeds of body, speech, and mind in the Dharma realm of all the Tathāgatas of the three times; and dwelling in the observing of the receiving of birth, the leaving of the household life, the going to the place of awakening, the accomplishing of perfect awakening, the turning of the wheel of the Dharma, and the parinirvāṇa of the buddhas of the three times, all of them entering the limit of a single kṣaṇa.

The two graphs ‘treasury’ and ‘dwelling’ must be taught clearly. A treasury is what can contain and can hold; dwelling is what constantly does not depart. So the ten great treasuries of the Dharma are not ten precious things stored away in a vault; they are ten places wherein the mind rests — this bodhisattva’s mind, at whatever time, is in one or another of these ten places, and will not come to rest elsewhere. From the calling of the buddhas to mind, on to the equal roots of goodness and the wisdom that goes before, it comes home at last to ‘all entering the limit of a single kṣaṇa’: the whole business of the buddhas of the three times, from birth to the accomplishing of the path, is gathered into a single kṣaṇa. This agrees exactly with Li Tongxuan’s general judgement upon the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis — he holds that the ten sections of textual sense of the ten samādhis take, in sum, the limit of the kṣaṇa for their substance.

Set aside a misunderstanding: the limit of the kṣaṇa is not an extremely short time. If one still takes it for a unit of time, one falls upon ‘shortness.’ Since the sūtra text says that the receiving of birth and even the nirvāṇa of the buddhas of the three times all enter within it, one may see that what it speaks of is that time itself is without own-nature, and therefore long and short are not held apart.

The Concluding Praise of the Ten Great Treasuries: Why Worldly Wisdom Cannot Tell Them Out

The sūtra text then uses but a single sentence to close: these ten great treasuries of the Dharma are vast and measureless, uncountable, unnameable, unthinkable, unspeakable, without end, and hard to bear, and the wisdom of all the world can in no way tell them out.

This sentence is short, and yet may not be passed over. Six negations and one general judgement say one and the same thing: the wisdom of the world fails here. Why does it fail? Not because the thing is too great and the wisdom too small — were that so, a somewhat greater wisdom would suffice. It is because the way worldly wisdom works is by counting, by naming, by thinking, by speaking, while these ten treasuries do not fall within the format of counting, naming, thinking, and speaking. A ruler cannot measure weight, and it is not that the ruler is not long enough.

The three graphs ‘hard to bear’ are especially to be marked. The five negations before speak of what cannot be reached; this one speaks of what cannot be borne — the dharma is too vast, and an ordinary mind cannot take it. This is not a threat; it is honesty. That the sūtra text is willing to write this clause is an acknowledgment of where the reader stands at this moment. Brought down upon the reader: that one cannot read on, cannot take it in, is normal; the sūtra text said so first.

Ten ‘At No Time Apart From’: The Name Is Earned by the Practice

Further down, the sūtra text sets up one general judgement: the bodhisattva-mahāsattva has no speaking at variance and no doing at variance, but a speaking that is as it is and a doing that is as it is — what is said and what is done are not two things. Why? There follow ten similes, much the same in clause-pattern: adamant is named from its unbreakableness, and at no time is it apart from unbreakableness; true gold is named from its excellent color, and at no time is it apart from its excellent color; the sun god-son is named from his wheel of light; the king of the mountain Sumeru is named from its four jeweled peaks standing within the great ocean and towering high; the great earth is named from its upholding of all things; the great sea is named from its holding of the many waters; the general of an army is named from his being practiced in the dharma of battle; the wheel-turning king rules the four continents and is constantly diligent in guarding; the seed planted in the ground makes stalk and leaf increase; the great cloud in the hot months of summer sends down a great rain and makes the seeds increase. And the bodhisattva is named from the dharmas of the several practices, and at no time is he apart from the dharmas of the several practices; named from the several good deeds, and at no time apart from the several good deeds; named from the light of wisdom; named from the several roots of goodness; named from delivering all beings, and never casting off great compassion; named from the several great vows, and never for a moment casting off the vow to deliver sentient beings; named from being practiced in such a samādhi, and even until he accomplishes the wisdom of omniscience, at no time casting off this practice.

These ten similes are the direct foreshadowing of Universal Eye’s question. They say one thing over and over: a name is not a title, it is the appearance of a practice. Adamant is called adamant only because it does not break; the day it breaks, the name no longer holds. Just so, a bodhisattva is called a bodhisattva only because he is practicing; it is not that he is not yet qualified to be called a buddha, it is that he is practicing now, and the name of one who practices is bodhisattva.

Brought down upon the reader: this stretch may be taken as a mirror in which to look at one’s own name. Whatever a man calls himself, let him look whether that thing is going on in him. Between name and reality the sūtra text allows no seam.

The Last Two of the Ten Similes and the Eight Matters He Can Purify: The Pomp of Becoming a Buddha Comes Down upon Seeds and Clouds

The last two of the ten similes are notably plain: a seed planted in the ground makes stalk and leaf increase; a great cloud in the hot months of summer sends down a great rain and makes the seeds increase. The bodhisattva, entering such great samādhis and cultivating the practice of a bodhisattva, rains down a great rain of Dharma, and even is able to make all sentient beings ultimately pure, ultimately in nirvāṇa, ultimately at peace and rest, ultimately upon the further shore, ultimately joyful, ultimately cut off from doubt; he acts for sentient beings as an ultimate field of merit, makes their deeds of giving all pure, makes them all dwell in the unretrogressing path, makes them all alike obtain the wisdom of omniscience, makes them all come forth from the three realms, and sets sentient beings within the place of omniscience.

Before this were written the lotus reaching to the limit of the ten directions and the light of twenty layers; here it comes down suddenly upon seeds and rain. This turn is the sūtra text’s own self-awareness: all the pomp of the fruit-virtue must in the end come down upon the most ordinary things — rain falling, sprouts coming up. Delivering beings has no other look about it.

Thereupon the sūtra text speaks of ‘being able to purify’ in eight clauses: he can purify wisdom of every kind, because he seeks omniscience; can purify sentient beings, because he causes them to be tamed; can purify lands, because he constantly dedicates and directs; can purify all dharmas, because he knows them universally; can purify fearlessness, because he has no timidity; can purify unobstructed eloquence, because he expounds with skill; can purify dhāraṇī, because toward all dharmas he obtains sovereignty; can purify the practice of drawing near, because he constantly sees all the buddhas arise in the world. Every clause is『what he can do — because of what,』pasting the fruit back upon the cause. Immediately after, ten clauses of ‘by the power of’ are listed — by the power of obtaining sovereignty within the realm of the samādhi, by the buddhas’ sustaining, by what flows forth from the power of his own roots of goodness, by the great awesome power of entering the ground of wisdom, by the power of the good friends’ leading, by the power that crushes the several Māras, by the power of roots of goodness of the same share being pure and unmixed, by the power of vast oath and vow and aspiration, by the power of the roots of goodness he has planted being accomplished, by the power of inexhaustible merit surpassing the several worlds and having nothing to be set against it. Pure merit is not obtained out of the void; these ten powers are where it comes from.

Ten ‘The Same as the Buddhas’: Forcing the Question Out into the Open

Then come those ten clauses: he obtains the marks and signs, adorned in every kind of way, the same as the buddhas; he can send forth a pure great net of light, the same as the buddhas; his spiritual penetrations and transformations tame sentient beings, the same as the buddhas; his boundless body of form and pure perfect voice, the same as the buddhas; he manifests pure buddha-lands according to the deeds of sentient beings, the same as the buddhas; all the speech that sentient beings have he can take in and uphold, forgetting none and losing none, the same as the buddhas; with inexhaustible eloquence he turns the wheel of the Dharma according to the minds of sentient beings and causes wisdom to arise, the same as the buddhas; he makes the great lion’s roar without timidity and with measureless dharmas awakens the multitudes, the same as the buddhas; within a single thought, with great spiritual penetration he enters universally into the three times, the same as the buddhas; he is universally able to display to all sentient beings the adornment of the buddhas, the awesome power of the buddhas, the realm of the buddhas, the same as the buddhas.

The ten clauses set out, Universal Eye’s question can be held down no longer. The narration of the sūtra text here bears down on purpose: it does not say ‘like,’ it says ‘the same as’; it is not the same in one or two places, but the same in ten. The function of this stretch is not to add virtue, but to set a question — it casts the reader’s vaguely felt misgiving into a question that must be answered.

Notice the change of speaker here. Down to this point the direct exposition of the ten samādhis has been Samantabhadra narrating in one direction, with Universal Eye all along a hearer; the ten clauses of ‘the same as the buddhas’ being spoken, Universal Eye opens his mouth for the first time. That the one stretch of dialogue in the direct exposition is set here is itself a judgement of the sūtra text: this question is worth stopping for.

The Eleven Questions of Universal Eye: Not a Challenge, but Asking on the Reader’s Behalf

Universal Eye asks eleven questions in one breath: having obtained such dharmas, the same as the Tathāgatas, why is he not named a buddha? Why not named the Ten Powers? Why not named omniscience? Why not named one who has obtained awakening within all dharmas? Why does he not obtain the name Universal Eye? Why is he not named one who sees without obstruction within all realms? Why not named one who has awakened to all dharmas? Why not named one who dwells without duality with the buddhas of the three times? Why not named one who dwells in the true limit? Why does he still not rest from cultivating the practices and vows of Samantabhadra? Why can he not reach the Dharma realm to its end and cast off the path of the bodhisattva?

The eleven questions divide into two lengths. The first nine ask『why is he not given the names of a buddha』; the last two ask『why does he still not stop.’ The last two are the sharper: since he has reached the end, why do the practices and vows of Samantabhadra still not rest? Since the Dharma realm has been reached to its end, why is the path of the bodhisattva still not cast off? In ordinary thinking, accomplishment is cessation — the work being done, one ought to stop. Universal Eye has asked that thought out loud.

The misunderstanding to be set aside is to read Universal Eye as a challenger. At the very opening Samantabhadra answers, “It is good, Sons of the Buddha! It is as you have said” — this is approval, not refutation. What Universal Eye asks is exactly what is in the mind of everyone who reads to this point; it is not that he does not understand, it is that he asks the question clearly on the hearers’ behalf. This is the pattern of question and answer in the Huayan assembly: the questioner too is a great being, and the question is asked so that the answer may have a place to come down.

The Eleven Answers of Samantabhadra: One Person and Two Names, Each with Its Gate

The clause-pattern of the answer is as regular as a matched couplet, eleven pairs, two clauses to a pair: having been able to cultivate the practices and vows of every kind of all the bodhisattvas of the three times, and having entered the realm of wisdom, he is named a buddha; since in the Tathāgata’s presence the bodhisattva practice he cultivates has no rest, he is said to be named a bodhisattva. The powers of the Tathāgatas he has all already entered, and he is named the Ten Powers; though he has accomplished the ten powers, he practices the practice of Samantabhadra without rest, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva. He knows all dharmas and is able to expound them, and is named omniscience; though he is able to expound them, toward every single dharma he ponders with skill and has never left off, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva. He knows that all dharmas have no two marks, and is said to be named one who has awakened to all dharmas; and toward the path of the differences of all dharmas, dual and non-dual, he observes with skill, going forward from strength to strength without rest, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva. He has already been able to see clearly the realm of the Universal Eye, and is said to be named Universal Eye; though he is able to witness it, thought after thought he increases and has never rested, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva. Toward all dharmas he is able to shine clearly and departs from the several dark obstructions, and is named one who sees without obstruction; and he is constantly diligent in calling to mind one who sees without obstruction, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva. He has already obtained the eye of the wisdom of the buddhas, and is said to be named one who has awakened to all dharmas; and he observes the eye of the wisdom of the perfect awakening of the Tathāgatas and is not heedless, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva. He dwells where the buddhas dwell and is without duality with the buddhas, and is said to be named one who dwells without duality with the buddhas; and he is taken in by the buddhas and cultivates wisdoms of every kind, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva. He constantly observes the true limit of all the world, and is said to be named one who dwells in the true limit; though he constantly observes the true limit of dharmas, he neither witnesses and enters it nor abandons it, and he is said to be named a bodhisattva.

The last two pairs answer the last two questions: neither coming nor going, without sameness and without difference, all these discriminations having forever ceased, he is said to be named one who has rested from his vow; and cultivating vastly, fulfilling and not retrogressing, he is then named one who has not rested from the vow of Samantabhadra. Fully knowing that the Dharma realm has no limit and that all dharmas are of one mark and markless, he is said to be named one who has reached the Dharma realm to its end and cast off the path of the bodhisattva; and though he knows that the Dharma realm has no limit, he knows all the marks of difference of every kind, gives rise to a mind of great compassion and delivers sentient beings, and to the very end of the future is without fatigue and weariness — and this is what is meant by being named the bodhisattva Samantabhadra.

The bone of these eleven pairs of answers is a single sentence: the name is set up according to the sense, and the sense has two gates. Spoken with respect to the side of what is witnessed, every one of the names of a buddha is his by right; spoken with respect to the side of what is still being practiced, the name bodhisattva is one he cannot lay down. The two names are not before and after, but at once; they are not a compromise, but each has its own gate of meaning.

Two misunderstandings must be set aside. The first: do not read it as『something is still lacking.』In the answer there is not one clause that says he wants for anything — the first half of every pair is a full affirmation. The second: neither is it to be read as『only a matter of names.』The name here is not a label; it is the doorway of a gate of meaning. To ask after the name is to ask from which side this matter should be looked at.

The most moving is the last pair. In the first ten pairs the second clause always says ‘he is said to be named a bodhisattva’; only in the last does the wording change to ‘he is said to be named the bodhisattva Samantabhadra.’ Why? Because by this point what is being answered is no longer『why is he still called a bodhisattva,』but『why is he called Samantabhadra』— knowing the Dharma realm to be without limit and yet knowing all the marks of difference, giving rise to great compassion and delivering beings, to the very end of the future without fatigue and weariness: this is the definition of the two graphs ‘Samantabhadra.’ The answer of the whole round comes to rest upon a name.

The Elephant-King Does Not Abandon His Elephant Body: The Three Parts of the Simile

The answer given, Samantabhadra raises a simile. The simile divides into three parts.

The first part is his own shape: the elephant-king Airāvaṇa dwells within the cave of seven jewels on the Golden-Flank Mountain; the cave is fenced about with railings of the seven jewels, jeweled tāla trees stand in ranks in order, and a net of true gold spreads over it above; the elephant’s body is white and clean like polished snow, upon it stands a golden banner, gold is its necklace, a jeweled net covers its trunk, jeweled bells hang down, its seven limbs are accomplished and its six tusks complete, upright and fully formed; those who see it are glad, and it is well trained and gentle, with a mind that goes contrary to nothing. Chengguan, glossing the name of the elephant-king, says that Airāvaṇa here means ‘fragrant leaf,’ and that it dwells always on the flank of the first golden mountain. Li Tongxuan sets up other grounds: because beside the jeweled cave there are many fragrant-leaf trees, and again because the leaves of the lotus flowers he conjures are fragrant and clean, it is named from this. The two accounts stand side by side and are recorded without adjudication.

The second part is the spiritual transformation: when the god-lord Śakra is about to go abroad, the elephant-king at once knows his intent, and within the jeweled cave hides his shape and comes before the lord of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, and by the power of spiritual penetration causes his body to have thirty-three heads, upon every single head conjuring seven tusks, upon every single tusk conjuring seven pools, within every single pool seven lotus flowers, within every single flower seven maidens, and all at once they strike up a hundred thousand heavenly musics. Śakra mounts the elephant and goes to the flower garden, wherein puṇḍarīka flowers fill it everywhere. The elephant-king again hides the elephant’s shape and manifests a god’s body, and with the Thirty-Three gods and the maidens takes his joy and sports within the garden; and the bodily marks he manifests, the light and the garments, the going and coming and the standing still, the speech and the laughter and the looking about, are all as those gods, equal and without difference, and none is able to tell apart — this is the elephant, this is the god; the elephant and the god are like one another turn and turn about. Chengguan makes plain the intent here, saying that the ‘none is able to tell apart this elephant, this god’ is taken with the true intent of being a simile for the sense of the bodhisattva being equal to a buddha. As for the conjuring of seven tusks upon every single head while his own shape has only six, Chengguan records the unevenness and settles upon no single reading, saying that it may be that the translator, following the threes and sevens that come after, said seven; and that if it be taken as setting forth a meaning, that too is not inadmissible. The differing accounts are both recorded, without adjudication.

The third part is the key: that elephant-king Airāvaṇa, within the cave of seven jewels on the Golden-Flank Mountain, has undergone no transformation at all; and yet, having reached the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, wishing to make offerings to Śakra Devānām Indra, he conjures up delightful things of every kind, receives the pleasures of the heavens, and is without difference from the gods. On the one side, without difference from the gods in the heavens; on the other side, in the cave untouched — this is the vital point of the whole simile. It is not that the elephant went away and there is now in the heavens one more god transformed from an elephant; it is that the elephant is still in the cave, and yet in the heavens his body truly is.

The Joining to the Dharma: Not Destroying the Cause and Yet Manifesting the Fruit

The simile ended, it is at once joined. The sūtra text sets a bodhisattva’s practice against it point by point: cultivating the practices and vows of Samantabhadra and the several samādhis and making of them his many-jeweled adornments; the seven factors of awakening for the body of a bodhisattva; the light he sends forth made into a net; setting up the great banner of the Dharma; sounding the great bell of the Dharma; great compassion for his cave; firm great vows for his tusks; wisdom and fearlessness like a lion’s; silk of the Dharma binding his head; revealing the secret; reaching the further shore of the practices and vows of the bodhisattvas — this stretch joins to the surpassing adornment of the dependent and proper recompense before. The cave joins to great compassion, the tusks join to the great vow: the elephant-king’s dependence is his cave, the bodhisattva’s dependence is compassion; the elephant-king’s reliance is his tusks, the bodhisattva’s reliance is his vow.

Next it joins to the sovereignty in spiritual transformation: in order to be seated upon the seat of awakening, to accomplish omniscience, and to obtain the most perfect awakening, he increases the vast practices and vows of Samantabhadra, unretrogressing and unresting, unbroken and unabandoned; not abandoning the path of Samantabhadra, he manifests the accomplishing of the most perfect awakening, manifests unspeakably unspeakable gates of accomplishing perfect awakening, of turning the wheel of the Dharma, of dwelling in the deep mind, of the transformation of nirvāṇa; within unspeakably unspeakable worlds of difference he manifests the receiving of birth and cultivates the practice of Samantabhadra; whether within the space of a single thought he cultivates the practice of Samantabhadra and accomplishes perfect awakening, or within a moment, or a day, or half a month, or a month, or a year, or a kalpa, and so on even to unspeakably unspeakable kalpas.

Then comes the most essential clause: the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s own body is not extinguished, and by the power of his practices and vows he transforms and manifests in every place after this manner. Chengguan joins this, saying that the own body’s not being destroyed is the cause’s not being destroyed, joining to his being in the cave without transformation; and that the transforming and manifesting in every place is the being able to manifest the fruit, joining to his spiritual transformation in the heaven. Li Tongxuan too takes this simile to say that the bodhisattva, though he has already accomplished the station of a buddha, does not destroy the practice of skillful means, just as that elephant-king, though he can transform his body into a god, never loses the elephant’s original station.

Last comes the questioning and explanation that joins them over again. The sūtra text answers『why must he manifest in this way』with ten clauses of ‘because’: because he would with the sovereign spiritual power of Samantabhadra tame all sentient beings; because he would cause sentient beings unspeakably unspeakable to be pure; because he would cause them forever to cut off the wheel of birth and death; because he would adorn and purify vast worlds; because he would constantly see all the Tathāgatas; because he would enter deeply the stream of all the buddha-dharmas; because he would call to mind the lineage of the buddhas of the three times; because he would call to mind all the buddha-dharmas and the dharma-body of the ten directions; because he would universally cultivate all the practices of a bodhisattva and make them full; because he would enter the stream of Samantabhadra and with sovereignty be able to witness omniscience. Chengguan points out the sense of the questioning here: cause and fruit are contrary to one another; how can the gate of the cause manifest the fruit, and the fruit serve again as cause? And he shows the sense of the explanation: the dharma of taming sentient beings ought to be thus.

With this, Universal Eye’s question is answered through and through. Why can cause and fruit be at once? Not by some abstruse principle, but by one plain matter — sentient beings are to be delivered. If, the moment the causal station accomplished the fruit, it were withdrawn, the delivering of beings would be broken off. So not destroying the cause and yet manifesting the fruit is not a theoretical having-it-both-ways; it is a necessity of great compassion.

You Ought to Observe This One: Handing the Seeing Back to the Reader

At the closing of the answer, Samantabhadra suddenly turns to Universal Eye and says: Sons of the Buddha! You ought to observe this bodhisattva-mahāsattva, who does not abandon the practice of Samantabhadra, does not break off the path of the bodhisattva, sees all the buddhas, witnesses omniscience, and with sovereignty receives and uses the dharmas of omniscience. Just as the elephant-king Airāvaṇa does not abandon his elephant body and yet goes to the Heaven of the Thirty-Three, is ridden by the gods, receives the pleasures of the heavens, makes the sports of the heavens, serves the lord of the gods, and takes his joy together with the maidens of the heavens, being the same as the gods and without difference.

The one sentence ‘you ought to observe this’ pulls the whole stretch back from reasoning to contemplative practice. So much having been said before, at the last a man is to go and look. Look at what? Look at that ‘not abandoning’ — not abandoning the practice of Samantabhadra, not breaking off the path of the bodhisattva.

Then it joins once more: the bodhisattva does not abandon the several practices of the Great Vehicle of Samantabhadra, does not retrogress from the several vows, obtains the sovereignty of a buddha, is furnished with omniscience, witnesses the liberation of a buddha, without hindrance and without obstruction, and accomplishes purity; toward the several lands he is stained by nothing, and toward the Buddha-Dharma he discriminates nothing; though he knows that all dharmas are universally equal and have no two marks, yet he constantly sees clearly all buddha-lands; though he is already equal to all the buddhas of the three times, yet he cultivates the practice of a bodhisattva in unbroken succession. The last clause is the settled conclusion of the whole round: being equal to all the buddhas of the three times, and cultivating the practice of a bodhisattva in unbroken succession, hold good at one and the same time, and do not obstruct one another.

The Concluding of the Name: The Mind Has Obtained Purity

At the end of the answer the sūtra text concludes, saying: when the bodhisattva-mahāsattva dwells in such a vast dharma of the practices and vows of Samantabhadra, you should know that this person’s mind has obtained purity. Sons of the Buddha! This is the surpassing mind and vast wisdom of the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s tenth great samādhi of the unobstructed wheel.

Chengguan says only three graphs here: the concluding of the name, may be understood. Indeed it may be understood — questioning, explanation, conclusion in three parts, and here it is concluded. But one clause may not be passed over: you should know that this person’s mind has obtained purity. So much has been said of fruit-virtue, of spiritual transformation, of the debate over name and sense, and it is gathered into the four graphs ‘the mind has obtained purity.’ This is the last measure that the whole round gives to the reader. It does not ask whether you have light of twenty layers; it asks whether the mind is pure or not.

The six graphs ‘the surpassing mind and vast wisdom’ are also to be marked. The surpassingness lies in the mind, the vastness in the wisdom; the mind is the side that does not abandon, the wisdom the side that is the same as a buddha’s. The name of the samādhi is the unobstructed wheel, and the concluding name is the surpassing mind and vast wisdom — head and tail alike raise cause and fruit together.

The Concluding Praise at the Close of the Chapter: The Ten Samādhis Gathered into One Wheel

The last sentence, Samantabhadra says: Sons of the Buddha! This is the wheel of the ten great samādhis of the practice of Samantabhadra wherein the bodhisattva-mahāsattva dwells.

One sentence gathers up the ten samādhis. Chengguan attaches this sentence to the main text of the whole sūtra and judges it the third general conclusion of the ten numbers; Li Tongxuan too here judges generally the ten sections of textual sense of the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, saying that from the first arousing of the mind to the accomplishing of the path, the coming forth into birth and the entering into nirvāṇa, they take, in sum, the limit of the kṣaṇa for their substance.

The wording of this sentence must be seen clearly: it does not say ‘the ten great samādhis,’ it says ‘the wheel of the ten great samādhis’; it does not say ‘what is witnessed,’ it says ‘the practice of Samantabhadra wherein he dwells.’ The ten samādhis are not ten skills; they are ten faces of the practice of Samantabhadra, and the ten faces together make one wheel — a wheel being what is complete and can turn, as Li Tongxuan explains the sense of the wheel by the thousand-spoked adamantine wheel of a wheel-turning king, wherein hub, spokes, rim, and chock, lacking one, make no wheel. The tenth samādhi is named the unobstructed wheel, and the concluding praise at the close of the chapter also closes with a wheel; head and tail lock together.

Here the whole chapter comes to an end. From the first samādhi, universal light, to the tenth, the unobstructed wheel, what is spoken of is in truth one thing: concentration is not going away from the world to sit, it is being in the world and yet not obstructed. By this last round, even that greatest of oppositions, ‘becoming a buddha’ and ‘acting as a bodhisattva,’ is said to be unobstructed — and then what is there that obstructs? This is the weight of the three graphs ‘the unobstructed wheel.’

Lineage

Of the text of this samādhi, there are three places that were inherited by the later doctrine of the Huayan school. The first is the unobstructedness of cause and fruit. Where the sūtra text joins the simile to the dharma it sets up of itself ‘his own body is not extinguished, and by the power of his practices and vows he transforms and manifests in every place after this manner,’ and Chengguan further sets a questioning, saying that cause and fruit are contrary to one another, and how then does the gate of the cause manifest the fruit and the fruit serve again as cause, and explains it with ‘the dharma of taming sentient beings ought to be thus’ — what the school of Xianshou speaks of as the interpenetration of cause and fruit and the mutual containing of station within station has its scriptural ground just in this passage. The second is the mutual identity of being and non-being. Of the forty-odd clauses of ‘though he knows … yet …,’ Chengguan judges the first clause to be being not obstructing non-being and the latter forty clauses to be non-being not obstructing being, and judges further that the former is two and yet not two and the latter is not two and yet two — the sense of mutual identity and mutual entering is densest in this passage. The third is naturelessness taken for nature. The phrase ‘the lineage-nature of the Tathāgata’ in the sūtra text Chengguan explains as the buddhas taking natureless suchness for their nature; and this saying is the ground upon which the Huayan speaks of nature-origination and of the dependent origination of the Dharma realm.

The divergent interpretations of the ancient masters this section records as follows, recording both without adjudication. Of the name of the elephant-king, Chengguan takes ‘here it means fragrant leaf’ and attaches it to its dwelling always on the flank of the first golden mountain; Li Tongxuan takes the same gloss of fragrant leaf but sets up two other grounds for it, the one that beside the jeweled cave there are many fragrant-leaf trees, the other that the leaves of the lotus flowers he conjures are fragrant and clean. Of the number of the elephant-king’s tusks, the sūtra text in his own shape reads ‘his six tusks complete,’ while in the transformation seven tusks are conjured upon every single head; Chengguan records the unevenness and keeps the two readings, ‘it may be that the translator followed the threes and sevens that come after’ and ‘if it be taken as setting forth a meaning, wherein would it be inadmissible,’ settling upon neither. Of the explanation of the name of the samādhi, Chengguan assigns the two senses by the number of the clauses, while Li Tongxuan takes the sense from the shape of the thousand-spoked adamantine wheel of a wheel-turning king as an implement. Of the judgement upon the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, Li Tongxuan holds that the ten sections of textual sense take, in sum, the limit of the kṣaṇa for their substance, and that this chapter gathers in the years and kalpas of the three times; Chengguan, for his part, judges and explains section by section with the phrases of his outline, closing at the last with ‘thus far the separate explanation of the ten samādhis is finished.’ All are the settled sayings of the ancient masters; they are recorded here, without adjudication of higher and lower.

Neither Fazang’s Tanxuan ji nor Zhiyan’s Souxuan ji has any outline-explanation of this chapter — the two commentaries make their outlines upon the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka, and the sixty has no Chapter on the Ten Samādhis; hence the want is honestly marked, and no text from elsewhere that speaks of it only in general is used to fill it out. The collation with the parallel translation in the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka is wanting in the same way.

Why the Ten Penetrations Follow the Ten Samādhis

When a sūtra sets aside a whole chapter for ‘spiritual penetration,’ the doubt a reader most readily falls into is this: is not cultivation supposed to be a departing from craving and seeking? How then does it turn about and get up a display of these strange knacks? That doubt is in fact asking in the wrong place. Look at where the chapter is set, and the matter becomes plain — the chapter before it is the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, and this one is the Chapter on the Ten Spiritual Penetrations. Chengguan judges the reason for this chapter’s coming, and says it straight out: both chapters make clear that ‘the working is vast’; the former speaks of concentration and this one of penetration, and that is the order of precedence in the doctrine — and moreover ‘it is also because penetration is issued in dependence upon concentration.’ Li Tongxuan judges it in exactly the same way: before there was the Chapter on the Ten Samādhis, and this makes clear the raising of function out of concentration.

So the standing of spiritual penetration here is that of function, not of substance. Concentration is the going deep; penetration is the reaching out everywhere. Without the depth of the chapter before, the reaching of this chapter would be a shallow thing. To take spiritual penetration for an ability that can be hunted after on its own is to peel the function off the substance and look at it apart — and by setting the two chapters side by side the sūtra is precisely forbidding anyone to read it so. Brought down to oneself: if a person has no mind that can rest settled, then what he calls ‘knowing a great deal’ is only the spreading out of distraction, and not penetration at all.

‘Penetration’ and ‘Clarity’: The Doctrine Inside a Quarrel over a Rendering

Of the very same passage, the sixty-fascicle Avataṃsaka renders the title as the Chapter on the Ten Clarities and says there are ‘ten kinds of clarity’; the eighty-fascicle Avataṃsaka renders it as the Chapter on the Ten Spiritual Penetrations and says there are ‘ten kinds of penetration.’ This is no casual change of a graph by the translator; the ancient masters set up a distinction over it.

Chengguan first glosses the two graphs: “penetration is spiritual penetration — a wondrous functioning hard to fathom is called ‘spiritual,’ and being sovereign without any blockage is called ‘penetration.’” The wondrous functioning cannot be fathomed, and so it is called spiritual; there is sovereignty without blockage, and so it is called penetration. Then he says why the Jin rendering calls it clarity: “that the Jin scripture and the Benye alike call them the ten clarities is because the illumining is thorough and leaves nothing out” — clarity is illumining to the very bottom, with nothing left out. Where then do the two names divide? He cites the Zhi lun: “to know directly the affairs of past lives is penetration; to know the causes and conditions and the deeds and practices of the past is clarity” — to know only that such and such happened in a certain past life is penetration; to know as well the causes and conditions and the deeds of that life is clarity. From this Chengguan reconciles them: the penetration this sūtra speaks of is of itself a thorough illumining, and so it too may be called clarity.

Fazang, over on the side of the sixty-fascicle text, sets up the name directly as ‘clarity,’ saying that “the wondrous functioning is sovereign, and being a thorough illumining it is called clarity; and since the functioning of clarity is without limit, ten are set out in order to lodge the perfect within them — which is to say, an explanation that carries a number” — the ten are not a real count, but ten lodged so as to display the perfect. Guard here against a common misreading: do not suppose that because the two recensions diverge one of them must be wrong. The ancient masters’ way with it is to let each state the ground it stands on and let both stand, without judging which is higher; and it is just this way of reading that the reader ought to learn.

Where the Ten Penetrations Come From: Opening the Six Penetrations Out into Ten

How does the number ten arise? Chengguan gives a reckoning of the utmost clarity. He first lists the ten names: first, others’ minds; second, the divine eye; third, knowing the abodes of former lives throughout the kalpas of the past; fourth, all the kalpas to the limit of the future; fifth, the unobstructed and pure divine ear; sixth, dwelling in no substance-nature and without motion going to all the buddha-lands; seventh, well discriminating all speech; eighth, numberless form-bodies; ninth, the knowledge of all dharmas; tenth, entering the samādhi of the extinction of all dharmas. Then he says: “these ten are also an opening out of those six penetrations, since the divine eye, the divine ear, the spiritual bases, and the exhaustion of the outflows are each divided into two.” The divine eye divides into seeing the present (the second) and seeing the future (the fourth); the divine ear divides into hearing sounds (the fifth) and distinguishing speech (the seventh); the spiritual bases divide into the working of going forth (the sixth) and the displaying of form-bodies (the eighth); the exhaustion of the outflows divides into wisdom (the ninth) and concentration (the tenth); others’ minds and past lives, two of them, are not divided — and so six is opened out into ten.

Are the ten penetrations, then, no more than a rearrangement of the six? Chengguan denies that notion: “yet the six penetrations of the Lesser Vehicle have a functioning of wisdom that is bounded, and the level pervading of the three vehicles is likewise not exhaustive; now, in the One Vehicle, the functioning of wisdom of the ten penetrations pervades the Dharma realm layer upon layer, as the net of Indra fuses thought and instant into roundness.” The Yanyi chao puts ‘bounded’ still more concretely: the knowledge of past lives knows only the affairs of eighty thousand kalpas; the divine eye sees only the three-thousandfold world-system; the divine ear, others’ minds, and the spiritual bases are all confined within the three thousand. Where the measure has an edge, that is called bounded.

The Ten Penetrations Alike Have Great Wisdom for Their Substance

Ask one further question: as to these ten penetrations, is their substance-nature one or ten? Chengguan answers: “that these ten all say ‘the knowledge of penetration’ is because they all have great wisdom for their substance-nature.” All ten names hang a single graph, ‘knowledge,’ upon themselves, and that is a marking of the substance. If they are discriminated according to the aspects of affairs, then “the first eight are the wisdom that measures and the last two are the wisdom of principle; but taken as they really are, there is only one unobstructed great wisdom” — the first eight are the measuring wisdom that knows differentiated affairs, and the last two are the wisdom of principle that realizes the level principle; yet spoken of as they really are, they are only one unobstructed great wisdom. Fazang, over on the side of the sixty-fascicle text, judges it exactly the same, and adds a sentence: the last two clarities do not obstruct the raising of function either, and the first eight clarities do not set aside quiescence either.

This one sentence is the key to the whole chapter. Guard against a misunderstanding: do not imagine spiritual penetration as ten different pieces of apparatus. The apparatus is ten, but the place from which they are set going is one — wisdom. If a person’s wisdom has truly arrived, the penetration is there; if the wisdom has not arrived, then imitating ten kinds of knack is only ten kinds of illusion.

The First, the Penetration of the Knowledge of Others’ Minds: What Is Known Is the Difference of Minds, Not the Contents of a Mind

The first penetration says: the bodhisattva, by the penetration of the knowledge of others’ minds, “knows the differences among the minds of the sentient beings of one three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system.” Ask first: if it speaks of knowing others’ minds, why is the name not set up as ‘knowing the affairs of others’ minds’? Chengguan answers: “that the marking says ‘others’ minds’ is because the wisdom takes others’ minds for its object.” The name is set up from the object taken; and if it were set up directly from what is known, it ought to be called ‘the penetration of the differences of minds,’ since the manifold kinds of mind-king and mental factors can all be known.

The scriptural text then lists nearly thirty kinds of mind: good minds, minds not good, vast minds, narrow minds, great minds, small minds, minds that go along with birth-and-death, minds that turn away from birth-and-death, and on to the minds of the gods and dragons and the eight classes, the minds of humans and nonhumans, the minds of the beings of the hells and the animals and the hungry ghosts, and the minds of sentient beings in the many difficult conditions. Chengguan divides this long string: the first ten display the whole in terms of aspect, and the latter twenty display it severally in terms of persons (reckoned on the thirty kinds that include ‘the indeterminate’; the eighty-fascicle text lacks that item, and so has twenty-nine); and the earlier ones stand two by two in pairs — the first two in terms of nature, the next two in terms of conduct, the next two in terms of retribution, and the next two in terms of turning toward and turning away. He also sets down a difference between the recensions: the third item, ‘the indeterminate,’ is wanting here, whereas the Jin rendering has it.

The concluding sentence says, “this is called: the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s first spiritual penetration of the wisdom that well knows the minds of others,” and it has first laid down a layer of measure: as with the sentient beings of one world, so with the minds of the sentient beings of a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of worlds and on to as many worlds as the dust motes of unspeakably unspeakable buddha-lands, all of them he can know discriminately. Brought down to a way of reading: the point of the penetration of others’ minds is not the peeping into what is private, it is knowing differences — only when one knows how many ways the minds of sentient beings can run does one know how the Dharma is to be spoken.

The Second, the Penetration of the Knowledge of the Unobstructed and Pure Divine Eye: From Seeing the Aspect to Seeing the Cause

Why must the four graphs ‘unobstructed and pure’ be added to the name of the second penetration? Chengguan glosses them one by one: “that the marking says ‘unobstructed’ is because the seeing is sovereign; ‘pure’ is because it is apart from hindrances; and the divine eye is the penetration itself.”

The scriptural text says that what is seen is sentient beings “dying here and taking birth there, good destinies and evil destinies, marks of merit and marks of offense, comely or ugly, defiled or pure,” and it lists the gods and dragons and the eight classes and on to sentient beings of every kind, minutely fine of body and vast of body. But this is only the aspect of what is seen. The real watershed lies in the latter half: “according to the deeds they have gathered up, according to the pleasure and pain they undergo, according to their minds, according to their discriminations, according to their views, according to their speech, according to their causes, according to their deeds, according to the objects they take, according to all that arises in them — all of it he sees, without the least error.” Chengguan breaks it open here: the earlier part is only the seeing of present aspects, while here is the illumining of causes and conditions, and moreover “the rubric of the ten clarities is set up from this” — the ground on which the Jin rendering calls them clarities comes to rest just at this layer.

Guarding against a misreading: the divine eye is not better eyesight. However good the eyesight, what it sees is still an aspect; to see why the aspect is as it is — that is penetration. Where it comes down to the ground is the concluding words “without the least error”: the reliability of a judgement comes not from seeing far, but from seeing the cause. This is the second spiritual penetration of the knowledge of the unobstructed divine eye.

The Third, the Penetration of the Knowledge of the Recollection of Former Abodes: If the Past Has Already Perished, How Can It Be Known

The name of the third penetration has to be taken apart. Chengguan glosses it: “affairs that have gone by are called former abodes; to remember them clearly in the past is called recollection.” Affairs of the past that have already fallen away are called former abodes, and to remember them distinctly is called recollection.

The scriptural text divides into two layers: first, knowing common affairs — born in such a place, with such a name and clan and race, such food and drink and pleasure and pain, and from the beginningless past “by causes and by conditions, turning about and growing on, one following another in unbroken succession, revolving without a break”; afterward, knowing the affairs of the buddhas — recollecting the names of the buddhas of the past, their arising in the world, their assemblies, their fathers and mothers, their attendants, their śrāvakas and their two great disciples, and on to their accomplishing perfect awakening, their speaking of scriptures, their parinirvāṇa, and the longer or shorter abiding of the Dharma, all of which he can recollect one by one.

Here there is a real difficulty, and Chengguan raises it himself: if a dharma of the past has not yet fallen away, it is not called past; and if it has already fallen away, then there is no dharma there to be known — on what ground, then, is it said that he can recollect and know? And if it be said that there is merely a seed-image left in the mind and now present before it, then he would see only his own mind and not that dharma, and moreover affairs he has never passed through ought to be unrecollectable (yet the sūtra says that even the affairs of others through measureless kalpas can be known). His answer is: “it is all because the bodhisattva has gained the eye of the nine times and sees them as though present.” It is not a searching of the memory; it is that the three times stand present before him within a single thought. The concluding sentence calls this the third spiritual penetration of the wisdom of the abodes of former lives that knows the kalpas to the limit of the past. Brought down to oneself: the ordinary man’s ‘recalling’ is a turning over of shadows, while the sage’s recollective knowing is an illumining here and now — the difference lies in the eye, not in the memory.

The Fourth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of All the Kalpas to the Limit of the Future: The Future Is Not Yet, So How Is It Known

The fourth penetration is symmetrical with the third, the one facing backward and the other forward, and the difficulty for the one facing forward is harder still. The scriptural text says that he can know how, within each single kalpa of the future, sentient beings “at the ending of their lives take birth, how the several existences follow one on another, and their deeds and their fruits of retribution” — good and not good, issuing forth and not issuing forth, fixed and not fixed, wrongly fixed and rightly fixed, roots of goodness together with the afflictive latencies or not together with them, complete or not complete, gathered in or not gathered in, heaped up or not heaped up, and on to whether dharmas of offense are heaped up or not — all of it he knows fully; and he also knows the names of the buddhas of the future and the affairs from their first arising of the mind down to the longer or shorter abiding of the Dharma.

Chengguan sets the difficulty out at once: “yet in the tenet of the Great Vehicle, the dharmas of a future age are without substance and without function alike; how then is this knowing?” He answers in two layers. Spoken according to the teaching of skillful means: it is only that he sees the causal seeds in the present and thereby knows the aspect of the fruit to come, and not that he really sees the substance of a future dharma. Spoken according to the tenet of the One Vehicle: within the nine times, within the future there is a present that has substance and function alike, and so the knowing is according to the real; only, that is not the present of the present, and hence it is still called future.

What is easiest to go astray over here is the taking of foreknowledge for fatalism. The scriptural text supplies its own line of defence: what is known is entirely the stations of deeds and their retributions — fixed and unfixed are set side by side, rightly fixed and wrongly fixed are set side by side. To know the future is to know how the principle of cause and effect unfolds, not to know an unalterable list. The concluding sentence: the fourth spiritual penetration of the wisdom that knows all the kalpas to the limit of the future.

The Fifth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of the Unobstructed and Pure Divine Ear: To Hear or Not to Hear, Sovereign at Will

The scriptural text of the fifth penetration first gives nine clauses of description: full, vast, keen and penetrating, apart from hindrances, comprehending and unobstructed, complete and accomplished; and then it comes to rest upon “toward all sounds whatsoever, he hears when he wishes and does not hear when he does not wish, sovereign according to his own mind.” Chengguan says that the marking of the name above is the general clause, and that these nine clauses “all set out the virtue in terms of function,” and he matches them one by one with their senses: fullness is that the faculties can be used interchangeably; vastness is hearing everywhere throughout the ten directions and the nine times; keenness is taking it in at one moment and penetrating to its source; apartness from hindrances is being apart from the two hindrances; comprehension is a clear knowing of what is known … and the last clause is the weightiest of all: “that is, when he wishes to hear, nothing subtle or distant escapes him; when he wishes not to hear, nothing near or loud disturbs him — and therefore it is called sovereign.”

This one sentence brings out the character of spiritual penetration. What the world imagines a divine ear to be is ‘hearing everything,’ but that in fact is not being sovereign — it is being chased about by sounds. The sovereignty the sūtra speaks of runs both ways: when he wishes to hear, nothing however subtle or however distant can escape; when he wishes not to hear, nothing however near or however loud can stir him.

The latter half raises the dharmas spoken by the buddhas of unspeakably many buddha-lands in the east, “all of which he is able to receive and hold fast,” and the meaning and the letter, the one person and the multitude, the sound and diction and the wisdom, the realm and what is relied upon and the way of issuing forth — “all of which he is able to remember and hold fast, not forgetting and not losing, not breaking off and not falling back, not confused and not perplexed” — and he can further expound them for others and “from first to last never let fall a single letter or a single phrase”; and as it is in the east, so also in the south, the west, the north, the four intermediate points, the zenith and the nadir. Clearly the penetration of the divine ear does not stop at hearing: hearing and holding fast and turning about to speak are one continuous thing. The concluding sentence: the fifth spiritual penetration of the knowledge of the unobstructed and pure divine ear.

The Sixth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of Dwelling in No Substance-Nature: Reaching Everywhere in the Ten Directions Without Moving from His Own Place

The name of the sixth penetration is the longest, and it is also the one in which the tenet of the Huayan is most to be seen. In one breath the scriptural text lists fourteen names: no substance-nature, no doing, sameness, vastness, measurelessness, no reliance, following upon thought, arising, not arising, not falling back, not breaking off, not being ruined, increase and growth, and going wherever he will. Chengguan says that “the first one is the general penetration, that is, no substance-nature, and the rest are all particular,” and he matches them one by one with their senses: no doing is being without effortful function; sameness is being one in principle; vastness is the being able to pervade; measurelessness is that the measure is hard to know; no reliance is that the function is raised not from a substance relied upon; following upon thought is taking shape as soon as thought follows; arising is that there is a present functioning; not arising is not moving from one’s own place; not falling back is that what is done is carried to the utmost; not breaking off is that the function has no interval and also that the lineage of the buddhas is not broken off; not being ruined is that others cannot ruin it; increase and growth is the being able to give rise to roots of goodness; and going wherever he will is going according to wherever he goes. He further points out that among them the four — no doing, sameness, no reliance, and not arising — are the sense of no substance-nature, while the rest are the sense of spiritual penetration, and “because these two do not obstruct one another, it receives this name.”

And so the key sentence of this penetration is established: “as soon as this bodhisattva hears the names of those tathāgatas, without moving from his own place he sees his own body in the presence of that buddha” — the body has not shifted from here to there, and yet it is really there doing homage and serving, asking after the Dharma and entering into wisdom. The scriptural text then adds a sentence harder still: “he reaches everywhere throughout the ten directions and yet there is no going anywhere.”

Why can it be so? Because there is no substance-nature. If the body were a solid piece of something, coming and going would have to take up a stretch of road; since substance-nature is of itself empty, displaying oneself everywhere requires no moving. Guarding against a misreading: this is not to say that spiritual penetration is an illusion, for the sūtra plainly says that “he comprehends in every case the lands of the buddhas, their seats of awakening, their assemblies, and the Dharma they speak” — the working is real; it is only that the reality is not built upon a solid substance. The concluding sentence: the sixth spiritual penetration of the wisdom of dwelling in no substance-nature and without motion going to all the buddha-lands.

The Seventh, the Penetration of the Knowledge That Well Discriminates All Speech: Like the Light of the Sun Shining Everywhere on All Colors

What the seventh penetration asks is this: how is the Dharma to enter into sentient beings of measureless and differing capacities? The scriptural text answers: the bodhisattva fully knows the manifold speech of the sentient beings within unspeakably many worlds — the speech of the noble ones, the speech of those not noble, of gods, dragons, yakṣas, gandharvas, asuras, garuḍas, kiṃnaras, mahoragas, humans and nonhumans, and on to all the speech that all sentient beings possess, “each severally signifying something other, manifold in their differences, and all such things as these he is able to know.”

But merely to understand what is heard is not yet enough. The scriptural text goes on: the bodhisattva, according to the world he enters, “is able to know the natures and desires of all the sentient beings within it, and according to their natures and desires puts forth speech, causing them all to understand and be without doubt.” First to know their disposition and what they delight in, and then to put forth speech in accordance with it — this is the order of the speaking of Dharma: not putting out what one happens to have, but saying what the other can receive.

Then comes one of the only two similes of the scriptural text in this chapter: “just as when the light of the sun appears it shines everywhere upon all colors, so that all who have eyes see clearly.” Chengguan judges this passage to have dharma, simile, and joining. The deftness of the simile lies in the four graphs ‘shines everywhere upon all colors’: the sunlight is one and the colors it shines upon are ten thousand; it is not that the sunlight turns blue or yellow or red or white to accommodate them, but that one light lets ten thousand colors each display itself. The joining the scriptural text states itself: the bodhisattva “enters deeply into the cloud of all speech, and all speech is such that he can cause the wise in the world to understand it.” The concluding sentence: the seventh spiritual penetration of the wisdom that well discriminates all speech.

The Eighth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of Numberless Form-Bodies: Only by First Knowing There Is No Form Can Form Be Displayed

The structure of the eighth penetration is the one most to be watched. It does not begin from ‘how many bodies he can conjure up,’ but from “knowing that all dharmas are far removed from the marks of form” — without mark of difference, without mark of manifoldness, without mark of measurelessness, without mark of discrimination, without mark of blue or yellow or red or white. Chengguan divides this penetration into three passages: first, knowing that there is no form, since form is itself emptiness; next, making clear the being able to display form, since emptiness is itself form; afterward, making clear both together, no form and the displaying of form, since what it is done for does not obstruct compassion.

Why must it be turned about so as to speak of formlessness first? Chengguan answers cleanly: it is by comprehending that the Dharma realm has no fixed and solid form, and that in its whole substance it is emptiness — and this emptiness is not an emptiness of annihilation, for “within emptiness there is no form, and it does not obstruct form; keeping and losing, hiding and displaying, are all sovereign; and only so can he display manifold forms according to what is delighted in, and therefore it is made clear first.” If form were solid, it could only be as it already is, and no second kind could be conjured from it; it is just because there is nothing fixed and solid that he can display according to those he transforms.

And so the scriptural text lets go a hundred and more names of form: boundless form, measureless form, pure form, adorned form … all the way to the form that brings forth the treasury of all the tathāgatas and the form complete in all the practice of Samantabhadra. Chengguan says that these names are “either set up from the aspect of form, or given from the virtue and function,” and moreover that they “are all forms that accord with the Dharma realm, unlike the form that alters and obstructs; the names of form are set up merely according to what is displayed” — they are not colors in the material sense, but names for the shapes in which the virtues of the Dharma realm appear. The last passage comes down entirely upon “those he transforms”: causing them to see, causing them to recollect, turning the wheel of the Dharma for them, according to the season, according to the shape, causing them to draw near, causing them to awaken, raising up spiritual penetrations, displaying sovereign powers, performing capable deeds — the reason for displaying form is, from first to last, one only: to deliver sentient beings. And the concluding sentence writes that reason into the name itself: the eighth spiritual penetration of the knowledge of numberless form-bodies, diligently cultivated and accomplished for the sake of delivering all sentient beings.

The Ninth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of All Dharmas (i): Apartness from Words, and the Two Emptinesses

From the ninth penetration onward it turns from the wisdom that measures into the wisdom of principle. The scriptural text uses a long string of doubly-negating clauses to write what is known: all dharmas have no name, have no lineage of nature, do not come and do not go, are not other and not not other, are not manifold and not not manifold, are not two and not not two, have no self and nothing to compare with, are not born and do not cease, do not move and are not ruined, are not real and are not unreal, are one mark and are without mark, are not nonexistent and not existent, are not dharmas and not non-dharmas, do not follow along with the worldly and yet do not not follow along with it … and on to being not according with principle and not other than according with principle.

Chengguan divides this into two gates: “the first is in terms of displaying the real by apartness from words; the second, from ‘no self’ onward, is in terms of displaying the real by the two emptinesses.” The first three clauses of the former gate display the real straight out — a name is “without the power to get hold of the thing,” a lineage of nature is “made by conditions and hence without nature,” and coming and going are “a substance in which going and coming are cut off.” The paired clauses that follow, however, must be read in three ways: first, purely in terms of displaying the real, that they are empty in their mutual dependence, so that since the marks of otherness are each absent to the other one says ‘not other,’ and then, having blocked ‘other,’ one says ‘not other’ and finds that even ‘not other’ cannot be got hold of, and so one says ‘not not other’; second, in terms of displaying both aspects of the substance; third, in terms of blocking both and their being mutually identical.

The illness most easily fallen into here is the reading of these ‘nots’ as nothingness. Chengguan gives a particular warning: “therefore he departs from the two extremes and does not dwell in the middle way.” Not even the middle way is allowed to be grasped as a footing. As for the phrase ‘nothing to compare with,’ he glosses it as there being no mine that can be set over against a self. This passage is not abstruse talk; it is the loosening, one by one, of every handhold in the language of ordinary men.

The Ninth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of All Dharmas (ii): Not Grasping the Two Truths and Yet Speaking the Dharma Inexhaustibly

If all dharmas are thus unspeakable, is the Dharma still to be spoken or not? The scriptural text’s answer is the most beautiful turn in the whole chapter: “this bodhisattva does not grasp the conventional truth and does not dwell in the highest, does not discriminate dharmas and does not set up letters, goes along with the nature of quiescent cessation and yet does not cast away all his vows” — he does not set up letters, and yet does not cast away his great vows; and so “he sees the meaning and knows the dharmas, spreads out the cloud of the Dharma and pours down the rain of Dharma.”

Chengguan judges this latter half to be “the benefiting of others by expounding the Dharma,” and divides it into three sections: first taking up the wisdom accomplished above as that upon which the raising of function depends; next properly making clear the expounding of the Dharma; afterward making clear that quiescence and function do not obstruct one another — and this last is further divided into three lesser sections: first, quiescence not obstructing function; next, from “though he has words” onward, function not obstructing quiescence; afterward, from “within the not-two” onward, quiescence and function being not two. The scriptural text itself has spoken the matter out to the end: “though he knows that the real mark cannot be spoken, yet with skillful means and inexhaustible eloquence he opens it up in due order, following the dharma and following the meaning,” “he is able to bring forth letters within all the dharmas that are apart from letters,” “though he has words yet he grasps at nothing.”

Brought down to a way of reading: to be unable to say a thing and to refrain from saying it are two different matters. To know that it cannot be said to the end and yet to say it, and in the saying to grasp at nothing said — this is the ninth spiritual penetration of the knowledge of all dharmas. So the concluding sentence sets up the name.

The Tenth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of the Samādhi of the Extinction of All Dharmas (i): What Is Extinguished Is Principle, Not the Activity of Mind

The tenth penetration is where the whole chapter is gathered up, and it is also where the division between the Huayan and other houses is most apparent. The scriptural text says that the bodhisattva “in thought after thought enters the samādhi of the extinction of all dharmas, and yet does not fall back from the bodhisattva way, does not cast away the affairs of a bodhisattva, does not cast away the mind of great kindness and great compassion,” cultivating the perfections without resting, contemplating the buddha-lands without wearying, not casting away the vow to deliver beings, not breaking off the turning of the wheel of the Dharma.

The doubt comes at once: in the samādhi of extinction the mind and its factors do not arise at all; how then can so many things be done at the same time? Chengguan’s answer lies in what the graph ‘extinction’ points to: “that it says the extinction of all dharmas means that the dharmas of the five groups are of their very substance quiescently ceased, and this is the extinction of principle — unlike the samādhi of extinction in the other houses, which makes clear only the extinction of affairs, extinguishing only the mind and mental factors of the sixth and seventh and not extinguishing the eighth and the rest.” The extinction the other houses speak of is the extinction of affairs, extinguishing the mind and mental factors of the sixth and seventh consciousnesses; the extinction this sūtra speaks of is the extinction of principle, all dharmas being of their very substance from the first quiescent. He then gives the ground of it: “because it is only the extinction of affairs, it cannot function in the very concentration; because he realizes the extinction of principle, concentration and dispersion are unobstructed — since affairs are themselves principle it does not obstruct extinction, and since principle is itself affairs it does not obstruct function.” The extinction of affairs can only bring things to a halt; only the extinction of principle can leave concentration and dispersion both unhindered. He further cites, as attestation, this sūtra’s own Chapter on the Ten Grounds, the seventh ground: “though he practises the real limit he does not make realization of it, and can enter in thought after thought and also rise in thought after thought”; and the Jingming: “without rising from the samādhi of extinction, he displays all the deportments.”

The Yanyi chao further marks out layer by layer whom Chengguan is setting off against: to say “this is the extinction of principle” is to mark the house’s own tenet; from “unlike” onward is to set off the Dharma-Characteristics house; and again, the clause “nor is it merely making clear that concentration and dispersion are both cut off” is to block the Chan house’s doing away with both calming and contemplation. Fazang, over on the side of the sixty-fascicle text, judges the same question by the five teachings: in the Lesser Vehicle the samādhi of extinction has no working at all; in the initial teaching it is by the power of the compassionate vow of the prior added practice striking upon the eighth consciousness that the deportments are had; in the final teaching, contemplating affairs as principle, it does not obstruct the functioning in affairs; and in the perfect teaching “to sit cross-legged in the samādhi of extinction is itself the going and coming and preaching of the Dharma.” What the several houses judge is recorded side by side, without judging which is higher.

The Tenth, the Penetration of the Knowledge of the Samādhi of the Extinction of All Dharmas (ii): Sovereign over the Measure of Time in Which He Dwells, Like a Light-Shadow Displayed Everywhere

The latter half speaks of sovereignty over the measure of time in the entering of concentration. The scriptural text sets out, from one kalpa, a hundred kalpas, a thousand kalpas, a koṭi of kalpas, and on to nayutas of koṭis of kalpas, numberless kalpas, measureless kalpas, all the way to unspeakably unspeakable kalpas, that he dwells “according to what his mind delights in.” Chengguan divides this into three: first, length and shortness according to mind; next, the deportments not going amiss; afterward, the not obstructing of the raising of function, concentration and dispersion practised together.

The deportments not going amiss points to this sentence: “though he has passed through so many kalpas dwelling therein, yet his body does not fall apart, does not waste away, does not alter; it is not seen and not not seen, it does not cease and is not ruined, it does not weary and does not slacken, and it cannot be used up.” However long the time, the bodily aspect is not ruined — and this is precisely the difference between the extinction of principle and the extinction of affairs, borne out upon the body.

Last comes the second simile of this chapter: “just as a light-shadow is displayed everywhere in every place, while within the samādhi he is quiescent and unmoving.” Chengguan explains the simile thus: “the light-shadow is displayed everywhere, quiescent and without mind; it waxes or wanes according to the vessel, while its substance neither comes nor goes.” The light-shadow falls upon the surface of the water in a thousand vessels — where the water is full it shows full, where the water is wanting it shows wanting — and the light itself has no mind, and no coming and going either. So it is with the bodhisattva’s benefiting of beings: the capacities of sentient beings are uneven, and what is displayed to each is unlike the rest, while the substance of the concentration has never moved by a hair’s breadth. And here the scriptural text concludes with the name: the spiritual penetration of the knowledge of entering the samādhi of the extinction of all dharmas.

The General Praise of Their Surpassing Power: What Is Inconceivable Is Known Only by the Buddhas and by Those Who Have Gained the Same

The ten penetrations having been spoken, the scriptural text gathers them up with a passage of general praise: as for one who dwells in these ten spiritual penetrations, “all gods and humans cannot conceive of it, all sentient beings cannot conceive of it,” and all śrāvakas, all pratyekabuddhas, and all the remaining hosts of bodhisattvas are alike unable to conceive of it; this bodhisattva’s deeds of body, of speech, and of mind are inconceivable, his sovereignty in samādhi is inconceivable, and the realm of his wisdom is inconceivable.

Chengguan judges this passage to have two layers: the first is “displaying the surpassing by the inferior,” raising up those who cannot fathom it so as to display how surpassing it is; the second, from “save only” onward, is “displaying the surpassing by the surpassing,” meaning that the buddhas and their like alone can fathom it. Fazang, over on the side of the sixty-fascicle text, divides it more finely: passing beyond humans and gods, going beyond the world, surpassing the two vehicles, and overstepping the lower grounds — these four set out the surpassing by the inferior; raising the three deeds in general, raising concentration in particular, and displaying the functioning of wisdom — these three set out the surpassing in its own aspect; and at the last, only a buddha can exhaust it.

What is worth noticing is one opening-out here between the eighty-fascicle text and the sixty: the sixty says that only a tathāgata can declare this man’s merit, while the eighty has “save only the buddhas, and those bodhisattvas who have gained this spiritual penetration” — one class more, ‘bodhisattvas who have already gained this penetration.’ The two recensions are recorded side by side, without adjudication. Brought down to a way of reading: the inconceivable is not a label for the mysterious; it says that the thing lies beyond the field of what thought can measure, and that those who can know it are only those within the same realm.

Concluding the Number and Setting Forth the Fruit: Dwelling in These Penetrations, He Gains the Unobstructed Wisdom of the Three Times

The last sentence of the whole chapter is the fruit Samantabhadra concludes for the ten penetrations: “Sons of the Buddha! These are the bodhisattva-mahāsattva’s ten spiritual penetrations. If a bodhisattva-mahāsattva dwells in these spiritual penetrations, he gains entirely the spiritual penetration of all unobstructed wisdom of the three times.” Chengguan judges only that “the text is plain and can be known,” because the structure has already been made clear — the fourth of the great divisions, concluding the number and setting forth the fruit.

But there is still one thing in this sentence that has to be sorted out. Fazang, at the concluding praise of the sixty-fascicle text, declares it expressly: what is gained is the clarity of the buddhas’ wisdom of the three times, and “it does not mean that these are the three clarities” — it is not to be confounded with the Lesser Vehicle’s three clarities of past lives, of the divine eye, and of the exhaustion of the outflows. The ten penetrations, come to their end, are not a summing of the three clarities; they are one wisdom that runs through the three times unobstructed.

Look back over the whole chapter: the ten penetrations have great wisdom for their substance, they are the six penetrations opened out into ten, the first eight are the wisdom that measures and the last two the wisdom of principle, and at the last all come home to one unobstructed wisdom of the three times. Read straight through, one finds that from beginning to end this chapter has not a single sentence boasting of a knack; what it speaks of throughout is how far wisdom reaches, and for whose sake it is used once it has reached.

Lineage

The doctrine of this chapter was carried on by three tracks of later ages, recorded side by side without adjudication. The line of Chengguan: following the method of outlining and explaining that comes down from the Shidi jing lun, he divides the text passage by passage, setting up the three gates of the reason for its coming, the explanation of the name, and the tenet and aim, together with the four divisions of raising the number and declaring it, questioning the number and listing the explanations, the general praise of their surpassing power, and concluding the number and setting forth the fruit; and he judges the measure of the ten penetrations by the opening out of the six penetrations and by the net of Indra layer upon layer. In explaining the tenth penetration he sets off the Dharma-Characteristics house’s extinction of affairs and blocks the Chan house’s cutting off of both concentration and dispersion — and this is where the Huayan house’s doctrine of the non-obstruction of principle and phenomena comes to rest in this chapter. The line of Fazang: upon the sixty-fascicle text’s Chapter on the Ten Clarities he sets up the name as an explanation that carries a number, treats the reason for the coming of five chapters together, distinguishes how this chapter’s ten clarities are mutually taken in with the ten clarities of the Chapter on Detachment from the World and with the ten penetrations there, and judges by the five layers of the Lesser Vehicle, the initial teaching, the final teaching, the sudden teaching, and the perfect teaching the ground on which function is raised in the samādhi of extinction — the doctrinal classification by five teachings has here in this chapter one complete application. The line of Li Tongxuan: he reads the ten penetrations by an inconceivable wisdom that is without doing and unobstructed, judges them to be an “entering of the gate of Dharma of sovereignty layer upon layer within the realm of the net of Indra,” and glosses the two graphs ‘spiritual penetration’ as “by wisdom penetrating everywhere, being one in nature with things and thereby knowing things, it is named spiritual penetration; it is not a going and coming between self and other”; and he further judges that the ten samādhis, the ten penetrations, and the ten forbearances do not belong to the stage after the grounds alone, but are “cultivated in common by the five stations of the ten abodes, the ten practices, the ten dedications, the ten grounds, and the eleventh ground” — this judgement differs from the reading that goes by the order of the stations, but the ancients had this saying, and it is recorded.

As for the books that are the guiding outlines of the Huayan house, the Wujiao zhang in two places raises the ten penetrations as a rubric setting the six penetrations of the three vehicles over against the ten penetrations of the One Vehicle; both are a listing of names for a comparison of teachings, and not an explanation of this chapter’s scriptural text, and they too are recorded without adjudication. Outside this chapter, for the affairs upon which the fourth penetration depends Chengguan points to “the sense is as set out in the Ten Grounds,” and for the attestation of the tenth penetration he cites from afar the seventh ground of the Chapter on the Ten Grounds and the Jingming — the root of the ten penetrations lies truly in the practice-stations upon the grounds, and what this chapter opens out is the function that grows from that root.