佛說無量壽經 法藏因地
先交出原來的座位
一個王聽見佛法，最初改變的不是世界，而是自己所在的位置。他不再以王位安排眾人的命運，轉身成為一名求法者，跪在佛前學習什麼才是真正的大安。
此時願心已大，能力仍在因地。經沒有遮掩這段距離。法藏敢求成佛，也敢說所問弘深、不是自己的境界；承認不會，並沒有使願縮小，反使它不落入自信的幻影。
讓一斗面對大海
大海沒有因為一人的志向而變小，斗也沒有突然變成巨器。唯一改變的，是量海者不再停止。正願不是保證一切容易，而是在難以計量的時間裡，仍守住所求方向。
法藏早已把這件事說到底：「假令身止，諸苦毒中，我行精進，忍終不悔。」〔T12n0360 0267b17〕 願能否承受不如意，比它說得多麼壯闊更早決定它的真實。
讓世界反過來教願
世自在王佛沒有只展示理想國土，也顯出天人的善惡、國土的粗妙。法藏因此見到：世界的面貌與其中所行的因彼此相應。願若只選可愛的結果，便尚未學會建土。
二百一十億國土「應其心願悉現與之」〔T12n0360 0267c04〕，並非任心挑取美景，而是讓一顆大心接受無數因果的檢驗。看過以後，願變得更深；五劫以後，熱心才沉澱成可承擔的清淨之行。
帶回來的不是想像
法藏再次回到佛前，所說的不再只是希望。他稟告：「我已攝取莊嚴佛土清淨之行。」〔T12n0360 0267c12〕 那個已字，裡面有看見、有選擇，也有長久不被看見的修習。
佛於是要他面向大眾開口。願若只收藏在一個人的內心，還不能成為眾人的道路；經過修行而公開宣說，別人才可能聞、信、學、行。法藏最後答道：「唯垂聽察，如我所願，當具說之。」〔T12n0360 0267c16〕
四十八願將從下一句開始。但願的可信，早在這一句以前，已由捨、問、見、擇、修與歸來逐層寫成。
First Give Up the Old Seat
A king hears the Buddha-Dharma. The first thing to change is not the world, but the position he himself occupies. No longer does he arrange the fates of others from a throne. He turns and becomes one who seeks the Dharma, kneeling before the Buddha to learn what true, vast peace really is.
At this point the vow-mind is already vast, while his capacity remains at the causal stage. The sūtra does not conceal that distance. Dharmākara dares to seek buddhahood, and he also dares to say that what he asks is vast and profound and lies beyond his own range. Admitting that he does not know does not make the vow smaller; it keeps the vow from falling into a mirage of self-assurance.
Let a Dipper Face the Ocean
The ocean does not become smaller because of one person’s resolve, nor does the dipper suddenly become a great vessel. The only change is that the one measuring the ocean no longer stops. A right vow does not promise that everything will be easy. It means keeping the direction of one’s quest through a span of time beyond measure.
Dharmākara has already said this without reserve: “Even if my body remains amid every kind of bitter suffering, I will practice with vigor, endure to the end, and never regret it.” Whether a vow can bear what does not go as one wishes determines its truth earlier than the grandeur of its words.
Let the Worlds Teach the Vow in Return
World-Sovereign King Tathāgata does not display only ideal lands. He also reveals the good and evil of gods and humans and the coarseness or subtlety of their lands. Dharmākara thus sees that a world’s appearance corresponds to the causes practiced within it. If a vow chooses only the result that looks attractive, it has not yet learned how to establish a land.
The two hundred and ten koṭis of lands are all displayed before him in accord with his heart’s aspiration. This does not mean that the mind is free to pick out pleasing scenes. It means that a vast mind submits itself to the test of numberless patterns of cause and effect. After he has seen them, the vow deepens; only after five kalpas does fervor settle into pure practices he can bear.
What He Brings Back Is Not an Image
Dharmākara returns once more before the Buddha. What he reports is no longer merely a hope. He says, “I have already selected and adopted the pure practices that adorn a buddha-land.” That “already” contains seeing, choosing what to select and adopt, and the long practice that no one else saw.
The Buddha then tells him to speak before the assembly. As long as a vow is kept within one person’s mind, it cannot yet become a road for others; once it has passed through practice and is proclaimed openly, others may hear, trust, learn, and practice. At the end Dharmākara replies, “May you listen and examine; in accordance with my vows, I will now set them forth in full.”
The Forty-Eight Vows begin with the next sentence. But before that sentence, the vow’s credibility has already been written layer by layer through relinquishing, asking, seeing, selecting, cultivating, and returning.
大正藏 T12n0360〔起 T12 0266c23〕。段／行首〔T12 …〕＝大正藏頁·欄·行錨。
〔T12 0266c23〕佛告阿難：「乃往過去久遠無量不可思議無央數劫，錠光如來興出於世，教化度脫無量眾生，皆令得道乃取滅度。次有如來名曰光遠、次名月光、次名栴檀香、次名善山王、次名須彌天冠、次名須彌等曜、次名月色、次名正念、次名離垢、次名無著、次名龍天、次名夜光、次名安明頂、次名不動地、次名琉璃妙華、次名琉璃金色、次名金藏、次名炎光、次名炎根、次名地種、次名月像、次名日音、次名解脫華、次名莊嚴光明、次名海覺神通、次名水光、次名大香、次名離塵垢、次名捨厭意、次名寶炎、次名妙頂、次名勇立、次名功德持慧、次名蔽日月光、次名日月琉璃光、次名無上琉璃光、次名最上首、次名菩提華、次名月明、次名日光、次名華色王、次名水月光、次名除癡冥、次名度蓋行、次名淨信、次名善宿、次名威神、次名法慧、次名鸞音、次名師子音、次名龍音、次名處世，如此諸佛皆悉已過。 〔T12 0267a14〕「爾時，次有佛名世自在王如來、應供、等正覺、明行足、善逝、世間解、無上士、調御丈夫、天人師、佛、世尊。時有國王，聞佛說法心懷悅豫，尋發無上正真道意，棄國、捐王，行作沙門，號曰法藏，高才勇哲與世超異。詣世自在王如來所，稽首佛足，右遶三匝，長跪合掌以頌讚曰： 「『光顏巍巍，威神無極，如是炎明， 無與等者。日月摩尼，珠光炎耀， 皆悉隱蔽，猶如聚墨。如來容顏， 超世無倫，正覺大音，響流十方。 戒聞精進，三昧智慧，威德無侶， 殊勝希有。深諦善念，諸佛法海， 窮深盡奧，究其崖底。無明、欲、怒， 世尊永無，人雄師子，神德無量。 功德廣大，智慧深妙，光明威相， 震動大千。願我作佛，齊聖法王， 過度生死，靡不解脫。布施、調意、 戒、忍、精進，如是三昧，智慧為上。 吾誓得佛，普行此願，一切恐懼， 為作大安。假令有佛，百千億萬， 無量大聖，數如恒沙，供養一切， 斯等諸佛，不如求道，堅正不却。 譬如恒沙，諸佛世界，復不可計， 無數剎土，光明悉照，遍此諸國， 如是精進，威神難量。令我作佛， 國土第一，其眾奇妙，道場超絕。 國如泥洹，而無等雙，我當愍哀， 度脫一切。十方來生，心悅清淨， 已到我國，快樂安隱。幸佛信明， 是我真證，發願於彼，力精所欲。 十方世尊，智慧無礙，常令此尊， 知我心行。假令身止，諸苦毒中， 我行精進，忍終不悔。』」 佛告阿難：「法藏比丘說此頌已而白佛言：『唯然，世尊！我發無上正覺之心，願佛為我廣宣經法，我當修行，攝取佛國清淨莊嚴無量妙土，令我於世速成正覺，拔諸生死勤苦之本。』」 佛語阿難：「時世自在王佛告法藏比丘：『如所修行莊嚴佛土，汝自當知。』 「比丘白佛：『斯義弘深，非我境界。唯願世尊廣為敷演諸佛如來淨土之行。我聞此已，當如說修行成滿所願。』 「爾時，世自在王佛知其高明志願深廣，即為法藏比丘而說經言：『譬如大海，一人斗量，經歷劫數尚可窮底，得其妙寶。人有至心精進，求道不止，會當剋果，何願不得？』 「於是，世自在王佛即為廣說二百一十億諸佛剎土天人之善惡、國土之粗妙，應其心願悉現與之。 「時彼比丘聞佛所說嚴淨國土，皆悉覩見。超發無上殊勝之願，其心寂靜，志無所著，一切世間無能及者。具足五劫，思惟攝取莊嚴佛國清淨之行。」 阿難白佛：「彼佛國土壽量幾何？」 佛言：「其佛壽命四十二劫。 「時法藏比丘攝取二百一十億諸佛妙土清淨之行。如是修已，詣彼佛所，稽首禮足，遶佛三匝，合掌而住，白言：『世尊！我已攝取莊嚴佛土清淨之行。』 「佛告比丘：『汝今可說，宜知是時。發起悅可一切大眾。菩薩聞已，修行此法，緣致滿足無量大願。』 「比丘白佛：『唯垂聽察，如我所願，當具說之。
The canonical text stands in Chinese only. This edition renders the essence, the plain reading, the exposition and the apparatus into English — never the sūtra itself. Switch to 漢讀本 or 並行雙語 above to read it.
大正藏 T12n0360，自佛告阿難久遠過去諸佛至法藏將具說所願。段首（…）＝大正藏頁·欄·行錨。
〔一·久遠過去諸佛相續〕（0266c23）佛告訴阿難：往昔久遠以前，經過無量、不可思議、無法計數的劫，有錠光如來出現在世間，教化、度脫無量眾生，使他們都證得佛道，然後才入滅度。
錠光如來以後，依次又有這些如來出世：光遠、月光、栴檀香、善山王、須彌天冠、須彌等曜、月色、正念、離垢、無著、龍天、夜光、安明頂、不動地、琉璃妙華、琉璃金色、金藏、炎光、炎根、地種、月像、日音、解脫華、莊嚴光明、海覺神通、水光、大香、離塵垢、捨厭意、寶炎、妙頂、勇立、功德持慧、蔽日月光、日月琉璃光、無上琉璃光、最上首、菩提華、月明、日光、華色王、水月光、除癡冥、度蓋行、淨信、善宿、威神、法慧、鸞音、師子音、龍音、處世。以上這些佛，全都已經過去。
〔二·世自在王佛與國王出家〕（0267a14）接著有一位佛出世，名叫世自在王，具足如來、應供、等正覺、明行足、善逝、世間解、無上士、調御丈夫、天人師、佛、世尊這十種名號。
那時有一位國王，聽佛說法以後心中非常歡喜，隨即發起求無上正真佛道的心。他捨棄國土、放下王位，出家成為沙門，名號叫法藏。法藏才能高超、勇猛明哲，超越世間常人。他前往世自在王如來座前，以頭頂禮佛足，向右繞佛三圈，雙膝長跪，合掌作偈讚歎佛。
〔三·讚佛身口意三業〕（0267a21）法藏讚歎：佛的光明容顏高大明盛，威神沒有邊際，這樣熾盛的光無人能比。日、月與摩尼寶珠雖有明光，在佛光前全被遮蔽，如同墨塊一樣黯淡。佛的容貌超越世間、無可匹比；正覺者宏大的法音響遍十方。
佛的持戒、多聞、精進、三昧與智慧，威德無人可比，殊勝而稀有。佛深刻審察、善於正念，對諸佛廣大如海的法，窮究到最深最奧之處，通達它的涯底。無明、貪欲、瞋怒，在世尊心中永遠斷盡；這位人中雄傑、如獅子般無畏的覺者，神德無量，功德廣大，智慧深妙，光明威相能震動三千大千世界。
〔四·從願作佛到救一切恐懼〕（0267b01）法藏接著發願：願自己成佛，與諸佛法王齊等，使一切眾生超越生死，沒有不能解脫的。他要修布施以調伏心意，也修持戒、忍辱、精進、三昧，並以智慧為最高引導。
他誓願成佛，普遍實行這一大願；一切陷在恐懼中的眾生，他都要使他們得到廣大安穩。即使有百千億萬位佛，又有數如恒河沙的無量大聖能夠一一供養這些佛，仍不如自己堅定求道而不退縮。
諸佛世界多如恒河沙，又多得不可計數；願自己的光明全都照遍這些國土，精進與威神不可測量。願自己成佛時，國土在諸國中第一，國中大眾奇妙殊勝，道場超越其他國土；國土安樂如泥洹，無有能與它相等者。他要憐愍救度一切眾生，使從十方來生者心地喜悅清淨，到達國中以後快樂安穩。
法藏祈願佛明白並證明這是真實願心；他將在所願之處努力精進。十方世尊都具無礙智慧，願他們常使世自在王佛知道自己的心行。縱使身體停留在種種苦毒之中，他也會精進修行，忍受到最後而永不後悔。
〔五·請佛宣說淨土之行〕（0267b19）佛告訴阿難：法藏比丘說完讚頌，先回答說是，並尊稱佛為世尊；接著稟告自己已發起無上正覺心，願佛為他廣大宣說經法。他將依教修行，攝取清淨莊嚴、無量殊妙的佛國土，使自己迅速成就正覺，並拔除眾生在生死中勤苦受難的根本。
佛又告訴阿難：當時世自在王佛回答法藏，關於如何修行、如何莊嚴佛土，他自己應當知道。
法藏再次稟告：這個義理廣大幽深，不是自己現在的境界；唯願世尊為他廣泛敷演諸佛如來清淨國土的修行。他聽聞以後，必定依照佛所說去修，完成所發大願。
〔六·斗量大海之喻〕（0267b28）世自在王佛知道法藏智慧高明、志願深廣，便為他說法：譬如大海極其廣大，若有一個人用斗不斷量取海水，經過很多劫，仍可以窮盡海底並取得其中妙寶。同樣，只要一個人有至誠心而精進，求道從不停止，終究必能成就果實，所發的正願有什麼不能完成？
〔七·示現二百一十億佛土〕（0267c03）於是，世自在王佛為法藏廣說二百一十億個諸佛剎土，使他知道各國天眾、人眾行為的善與惡，也知道國土的粗劣與微妙；並順應法藏心中所願，把這一切國土全都顯現在他面前。
法藏比丘聽佛宣說嚴淨國土，也全都親眼看見。他因此更進一步發起無上殊勝大願，內心寂靜，意志不執著任何一法，一切世間無人能及。他以完整五劫的時間，思惟、選擇並修習能莊嚴佛國的清淨之行。
〔八·五劫攝取與四十二劫壽量〕（0267c08）阿難問佛：世自在王佛的國土壽量有多長？佛回答，那位佛的壽命是四十二劫。
法藏比丘在這段時間中，攝取二百一十億諸佛妙土的清淨之行。完成以後，他再次前往世自在王佛座前，以頭頂禮佛足，向右繞佛三圈，合掌站立，稟告世尊：自己已經攝取莊嚴佛土的清淨之行。
〔九·願將公開宣說〕（0267c13）佛告訴法藏比丘：現在可以宣說，正是適當時候。說出這些願，能使一切大眾發起歡喜、欣然認可；菩薩聽聞以後，也能修行這一法門，由此圓滿無量大願。
法藏比丘回答：唯願世尊垂聽、鑒察，他現在將依自己所發的願，完整地說明。
Taishō canon T12n0360, from the Buddha’s account to Ānanda of the buddhas of the distant past through Dharmākara’s announcement that he will set forth his vows in full. The figures at the head of each segment give the Taishō page, register, and line.
〔一 · The Succession of Buddhas in the Distant Past〕（0266c23）The Buddha told Ānanda: in the distant past, immeasurable, inconceivable, incalculable kalpas ago, Dingguang Tathāgata appeared in the world. He taught and delivered measureless beings, brought them all to attainment of the path, and only then entered extinction.
After Dingguang Tathāgata, the following tathāgatas appeared in succession: Far-Reaching Light, Moonlight, Sandalwood Fragrance, Good Mountain King, Sumeru Celestial Crown, Sumeru Equal Radiance, Moon Hue, Right Mindfulness, Free from Defilement, Unattached, Dragon Heaven, Night Light, Serene Bright Crown, Immovable Ground, Wondrous Beryl Flower, Beryl-Gold Hue, Gold Treasury, Blazing Light, Blazing Root, Earth Seed, Moon Image, Sun Sound, Flower of Liberation, Adornment Light, Ocean Awakening Supernormal Powers, Water Light, Great Fragrance, Free from Dust and Defilement, Mind of Renunciation, Jewel Blaze, Wondrous Crown, Courageous Standing, Merit-Holding Wisdom, Light Veiling Sun and Moon, Sun-Moon Beryl Light, Unsurpassed Beryl Light, Supreme Leader, Flower of Awakening, Moon Brightness, Sunlight, King of Flower Hue, Water-Moon Light, Dispelling Delusion’s Darkness, Practice Beyond the Hindrances, Pure Trust, Excellent Constellation, Majestic Power, Dharma Wisdom, Luan-Bird Voice, Lion Voice, Dragon Voice, and Dwelling in the World. All these buddhas had already passed away.
〔二 · World-Sovereign King Tathāgata and the King’s Renunciation〕（0267a14）Next a buddha appeared in the world named World-Sovereign King Tathāgata. He possessed the ten epithets: Tathāgata, Worthy of Offerings, Perfectly Awakened One, Perfect in Knowledge and Conduct, Well-Gone One, Knower of the World, Unsurpassed One, Tamer of Persons to Be Tamed, Teacher of Gods and Humans, and Buddha—and was the World-Honored One.
At that time there was a king who heard the Buddha teach and became deeply joyful. He immediately gave rise to the aspiration for unsurpassed perfect awakening. He abandoned his realm, relinquished his kingship, and left the household life to become a renunciant named Dharmākara. Dharmākara was extraordinarily gifted, courageous, and discerning, surpassing ordinary people in the world. He went before World-Sovereign King Tathāgata, bowed his head at the Buddha’s feet, circumambulated him three times to the right, knelt with both knees on the ground, joined his palms, and praised the Buddha in verse.
〔三 · Praise of the Buddha’s Three Activities of Body, Speech, and Mind〕（0267a21）Dharmākara praised him: the Buddha’s radiant countenance was lofty and resplendent, his majestic power without limit; no one could equal such blazing light. Although the sun, the moon, and maṇi jewels all shone brightly, before the Buddha’s radiance they were entirely obscured, dark as a mass of ink. The Buddha’s countenance surpassed the world and was beyond compare; the great Dharma-voice of the Perfectly Awakened One resounded throughout the ten directions.
The Buddha’s ethical discipline, learning, vigor, samādhi, and wisdom were unmatched in majestic virtue, supreme and rare. He examined deeply and maintained right mindfulness well. He had fathomed the deepest and most subtle reaches of the buddhas’ oceanic Dharma and penetrated to its furthest depths. Ignorance, desire, and anger were forever extinguished in the World-Honored One. This heroic one among humans, fearless as a lion, possessed measureless spiritual virtue, vast merit, profound and wondrous wisdom, and a radiant majesty that could shake the three-thousandfold great-thousand world-system.
〔四 · From the Vow to Become a Buddha to the Rescue of All Who Fear〕（0267b01）Dharmākara then vowed to become a buddha equal to the sacred Dharma Kings, so that all beings might cross beyond birth and death and none fail to attain liberation. He would cultivate the six perfections: giving to discipline the mind, ethical discipline, patience, vigor, samādhi, and wisdom as the supreme guide.
He vowed to attain buddhahood and universally carry out this great vow. For every being caught in fear, he would bring about vast peace and security. Even if there were hundreds of thousands of koṭis of buddhas, and measureless great sages as many as the sands of the Gaṅgā could make offerings to every one of those buddhas, this still would not equal his own unwavering, unretreating quest for the path.
Buddha-worlds were as numerous as the sands of the Gaṅgā and beyond all reckoning. He vowed that his light would shine throughout all these lands and that his vigor and majestic power would be immeasurable. When he became a buddha, his land would be foremost among all lands, its assembly wondrous and supreme, its site of awakening surpassing those of other lands. The land would be peaceful and blissful like nirvāṇa, without an equal. He would pity and deliver every being, so that those born there from the ten directions would have joyful and purified minds and, once they reached his land, would dwell in happiness and peace.
Dharmākara asked the Buddha to understand and attest that this was his true vow-mind; he would vigorously pursue all that he had vowed. The World-Honored Ones of the ten directions all possessed unobstructed wisdom, and he prayed that they would constantly enable World-Sovereign King Tathāgata to know his thoughts and conduct. Even if his body remained amid every kind of bitter suffering, he would practice with vigor, endure to the end, and never regret it.
〔五 · Asking the Buddha to Teach the Practice of a Pure Land〕（0267b19）The Buddha told Ānanda: when the bhikṣu Dharmākara had finished speaking this verse of praise, he first assented, addressing the Buddha as the World-Honored One; he then declared that he had given rise to the aspiration for unsurpassed perfect awakening and asked the Buddha to expound the scriptural Dharma for him at length. He would practice according to the teaching and select and adopt the pure adornments of measureless, wondrous buddha-lands, so that he might quickly accomplish perfect awakening in the world and uproot the source of beings’ toil and suffering in birth and death.
The Buddha further told Ānanda that World-Sovereign King Tathāgata then replied to Dharmākara: as for the practices by which one adorns a buddha-land, he should know them himself.
Dharmākara again said: this principle was vast and profound and did not lie within his present range. He asked only that the World-Honored One expound broadly for him the practices of the tathāgatas’ pure buddha-lands. Once he had heard them, he would certainly practice as the Buddha taught and bring his great vow to fulfillment.
〔六 · The Simile of Measuring the Ocean with a Dipper〕（0267b28）World-Sovereign King Tathāgata knew that Dharmākara’s wisdom was elevated and his resolve deep and vast, and so he taught him: suppose the ocean were immensely broad and a person kept measuring out its water with a dipper. After many kalpas, that person could still reach the ocean floor and obtain the wondrous treasures within it. In the same way, if a person seeks the path with utmost sincerity and vigor and never stops, he will ultimately accomplish the fruit. What right vow could fail to be fulfilled?
〔七 · The Display of Two Hundred and Ten Koṭis of Buddha-Lands〕（0267c03）World-Sovereign King Tathāgata then gave Dharmākara an extensive account of two hundred and ten koṭis of buddha-lands. He enabled him to know the good and evil conduct of the gods and humans in each land and the coarseness or subtlety of the lands themselves; in accord with Dharmākara’s heart’s aspiration, he displayed them all directly before him.
The bhikṣu Dharmākara both heard the Buddha’s teaching on the adornment and purification of lands and saw them all with his own eyes. He thereby gave rise to a still more surpassing, supreme vow. His mind was tranquil, his resolve attached to no dharma, and no one in any world could equal him. For a full five kalpas, he contemplated the pure practices that adorn a buddha-land, deciding which to select and adopt and then cultivating them.
〔八 · Five Kalpas of Selection and Adoption within a Forty-Two-Kalpa Lifespan〕（0267c08）Ānanda asked the Buddha how long the lifespan in the land of World-Sovereign King Tathāgata was. The Buddha answered that this buddha’s lifespan was forty-two kalpas.
During that time, the bhikṣu Dharmākara selected and adopted the pure practices of the two hundred and ten koṭis of wondrous buddha-lands. When he had completed this work, he again went before World-Sovereign King Tathāgata, bowed his head at the Buddha’s feet, circumambulated him three times to the right, stood with palms joined, and declared to the World-Honored One that he had already selected and adopted the pure practices that adorn a buddha-land.
〔九 · The Vows Are About to Be Proclaimed Publicly〕（0267c13）The Buddha told the bhikṣu Dharmākara that he could now speak: this was the proper time. By voicing these vows, he could awaken joy and glad assent throughout the assembly. Bodhisattvas who heard them would also be able to practice this Dharma and thereby bring measureless great vows to fulfillment.
The bhikṣu Dharmākara replied: may the World-Honored One listen and examine; he would now set forth his vows in full.
這一講以憬興《連義述文贊》的逐文科釋為主，參照慧遠《義疏》所立法藏之所行、所成、所攝，再以曇鸞《往生論註》的大悲與本願力照見後續。三家對行位與分科並非全同；我們不替古德調停，只沿本經看清一個願如何從聞法開始，經見土、擇行與長時思惟，最後才成為公開宣說。
願不是從空白處冒出來
佛向阿難說法藏因地，先沒有立刻講法藏。經把時間推到久遠不可思議劫前，從錠光如來起，一位一位列出已過諸佛，五十三位之後才別舉世自在王佛。這條長列容易被匆匆跳過，卻在結構上先回答一個根本問題：發願者從哪裡得到能發願的語言與道路？答案是從佛佛相續的教化中來。
末後一佛具足如來、應供、等正覺等十號，並非只為莊嚴名相。前面的諸佛皆已過去，世自在王佛則是法藏親自聞法、禮足、請問的老師。歷史長流至此不再只是遠方傳承，而成為眼前師資；法藏之願因此既有久遠背景，也有當下所聞。
一座淨土還沒有出現以前，先有五十三位過去佛相續出世、教化、滅度的記憶。願不是憑個人想像創造未來，而是聽見覺者長久救度眾生以後，願意把那條路繼續走下去。
心一悅豫，王位便不再是唯一世界
世自在王佛出世時，有一位國王聞法。經說他「心懷悅豫，尋發無上正真道意」〔T12n0360 0267a16〕，隨即「棄國、捐王，行作沙門」〔T12n0360 0267a17〕。這個次第極短：聞、喜、發心、捨位、出家，幾乎沒有間隔。法藏不是因厭惡統治才離開，也不是先規劃好另一個國土才捨國；是所聞之法改變了什麼值得追求。
王能施政於一國，正真道意卻把責任推向一切生死眾生。棄國不是鄙棄世間，而是放下只以一國為界的權力；作沙門也不是逃離責任，而是重新學習什麼力量能拔除生死之本。號曰法藏之後，經以高才勇哲、與世超異標其器量，卻沒有說他因此無須受教。
我們在這裡先看到的，不是願力已經成就，而是願的第一個代價：原有身份不再足以容納所發之心。真正的悅豫並非一時感動，它使人生的中心當場改向。
所讚的佛，逐句成為所願的自己
法藏到佛前，稽首、右繞三匝、長跪合掌，然後作頌。頌的前半先讚佛：光顏勝過日月摩尼，正覺大音流遍十方；戒、聞、精進、三昧、智慧無與為侶，無明、欲、怒永盡。這不是以華辭換取佛的允諾，而是把所尊崇的覺者功德一一看清。
頌到願我作佛，語氣便轉了。先求齊聖法王、過度生死，再以布施調意為檀度，與戒、忍、精進、三昧、智慧合成六度；所求之果與所修之因並列。接著誓言「吾誓得佛，普行此願，一切恐懼，為作大安」〔T12n0360 0267b04〕。成佛若只為自己的圓滿，便不能回答一切恐懼；六度若只作個人修養，也還沒有成為大安之因。
頌又從法身轉向佛土：光明遍照無數剎土，所成國土第一、眾妙、道場超絕，如泥洹而無等雙。可是國土的目的緊跟在後：度脫一切，使十方來生者清淨安隱。頌末的請證分成兩層：先請面前的世自在王佛證明願心不虛；再請十方世尊證知其行，即使身止苦毒也忍終不悔。願有證，行也有證；所讚佛德、所修行門、所建國土、所救眾生與不退之心，成為同一首願頌的五面。
願的可信，不在說得宏大，而在法藏願把所見之德變成自己要承擔的行。他甚至說，即使有數如恒沙的無量大聖供養百千億萬諸佛，仍「不如求道，堅正不却」〔T12n0360 0267b07〕；供養若不轉成求道，仍停在自己與佛之間，求道則要讓佛德在行者身上繼續發生。
佛說自知，為何還要再問
頌畢，法藏正式請佛廣宣經法。他說自己將修行、攝取清淨莊嚴妙土、速成正覺、拔除眾生生死勤苦之本。佛卻回答，如所修行莊嚴佛土，他應自知。這句不是把學生推回孤立，也不是說不必聞法；它先把責任交還發願者：淨土不能由佛替他發願、替他選擇、替他修成。
法藏隨即再請。他沒有假裝自己已知，而坦白「斯義弘深，非我境界」〔T12n0360 0267b25〕；同時也承諾聞後如說修行、成滿所願。自知與請教在這裡沒有衝突：自知是不可卸責，請教是不可自滿。若只有自知，宏願容易變成個人意志；若只有依師，修行又可能變成等候別人完成。
這兩次往返把願的主體立穩了。佛不代行，法藏不裝懂；佛給法，法藏承諾實踐。師弟之間真正傳遞的不是一張現成國土圖，而是能看、能擇、能修的道路。
一斗量海，量的不是海小
佛開始宣說以前，先設海喻：「譬如大海，一人斗量，經歷劫數尚可窮底，得其妙寶。」〔T12n0360 0267b29〕 一斗相對大海極小，人的一生相對佛道也極短；譬喻不否認尺度懸殊，反而把懸殊說到極端。它所肯定的是至心精進、求道不止，長時積累終能剋果。
因此，何願不得並不是想要什麼就會出現。海喻有斗、有量、有歷劫、有不止，最後才有窮底與得寶。願若拿走行，便只剩對大海的想像；行若拿走願，又不知道為何長時不止。小斗之所以能面對大海，是因方向不亂、工夫不斷。
我們也不必把斗換成大器才開始。經真正稱許的不是行者一開始已具佛力，而是有限之身可以用至心與精進，不讓有限成為退卻的藉口。海仍然大，路仍然長，願行相續使不可量之事進入可實踐的因果。
看見善惡粗妙，才知道攝取什麼
海喻之後，世自在王佛廣說二百一十億諸佛剎土，並把它們應心示現。經特意並列「天人之善惡、國土之粗妙」〔T12n0360 0267c04〕。前者是眾生與行業，後者是國土呈現；兩者放在一起，使法藏看的不只是漂亮景象，而是何種因行結成何種世界。
更重要的是，所見包括善惡與粗妙，不只有清淨的一端。若只展示美好結果，法藏會得到可羨慕的圖像，卻未必知道應捨什麼、修什麼。淨穢因果同時顯現，選擇才具有道德與修行內容：不是把喜歡的景物拼成一國，而是捨惡粗之因，攝善妙之行。
法藏既聞又見，才「超發無上殊勝之願」〔T12n0360 0267c06〕。超發不是無因忽然躍起；是原有願心經過多土因果的校正，變得更深、更廣、更有可行內容。願在看見之後增上，說明真正的宏願願意受事實教導。
五劫不是等待，寂靜也不是停住
見土以後，經連說其心寂靜、志無所著、一切世間無能及，並以五劫思惟攝取清淨之行。寂靜使選擇不被愛憎躁動牽引，無著使所見莊嚴不成新的貪取；五劫則使這份定慧落為種種可成國土的行。四十八願尚未出口，願的內部工夫已歷長時成熟。
經又特別交代世自在王佛壽命四十二劫，正為法藏在同一身中完成五劫修行提供時間條件，也拒絕把淨土看成短促靈感的產物。法藏完成攝取後，仍回到佛前稽首、右繞、合掌，陳明自己已攝取清淨之行；長時思惟沒有使他離開師資與大眾。
定與慧在此各有工作：心寂靜而能定，志無所著而能擇；所擇又須經五劫修習，不是一個抽象觀念。願有多門，行也不只一門；清淨國土是種種清淨行長時相應的結果。
願要讓大眾聽見，才成為共同道路
法藏回來後，佛不是私下驗收，而說「汝今可說，宜知是時」〔T12n0360 0267c13〕。宣願的時機與對象都很清楚：要使一切大眾發起悅可，使菩薩聞後修行此法，緣致滿足無量大願。願從個人心行走向法會公開，才具備教化與承衍的力量。
法藏答應具說所願，下一單元四十八願才真正開始。這個停頓很重要：在每一條願文以前，已有聞法捨位、禮讚發心、兩度請問、量海勸進、遍見諸土、五劫思惟與回眾宣說。把這些前行拿走，願文容易讀成一紙空願；保留它們，才知道每一願後面都站著一個不退、受教、能擇、肯修的生命。
我們至此也能回答篇首之問：淨土既不是單純先看見，也不是單純先發願。初願使人願意求法，見土使願得到辨別，五劫使辨別成行，公開宣說再使一人之願成為眾人可走的道路。看見與發願彼此校正，長時修行使二者同歸於眾生得安。
承衍——願心如何走到成就
憬興以略說勝行、廣說勝行貫通此段，不採把頌前判作地前、頌後判作地上的截然二分，並正面判法藏此時為十向滿位菩薩；慧遠則以前頌為地前世間行、頌後為地上出世行，又以所行、所成、所攝把全經宗綱拉開。兩家對位階與分段的判釋不同，而本經此段沒有明標其地，故古說並存，不由後人替經添判。
曇鸞把本段的悲願推向果上，說安樂淨土由大悲而生，又明三種莊嚴由清淨願心而成，所以「因淨故果淨，非無因、他因有也。」〔T40n1819 0841b08〕 再以「願以成力、力以就願」〔T40n1819 0840a14〕顯願與如來自在力互相成就。這不是把後來的他力倒寫成法藏當下已成佛，而是說今日果德能回證昔日願行不曾徒然。三面古鏡合看，法藏因地的莊嚴不在豪言，而在悲心立因、定慧擇行、久修成力，終使所願真能安立眾生。
This teaching follows above all the passage-by-passage outline in Jingxing’s Linked-Meaning Expository Praise on the Sūtra of Measureless Life. It also draws on the distinction among Dharmākara’s practice, accomplishment, and adoption established in Huiyuan’s Commentary on the Sūtra of Measureless Life, and then uses the great compassion and power of the original vow in Tanluan’s Commentary on the Treatise on Birth in That Land to illuminate what follows. The three masters do not agree in every detail about stages and divisions. We do not reconcile them on their behalf. We follow this sūtra to see clearly how a vow begins in hearing the Dharma, passes through seeing lands, selecting practices, and long contemplation, and only then becomes a public proclamation.
A Vow Does Not Emerge from Empty Space
When the Buddha tells Ānanda of Dharmākara’s causal ground, he does not begin with Dharmākara. The sūtra pushes time back beyond distant, inconceivable kalpas. Beginning with Dingguang Tathāgata, it lists one past buddha after another; only after fifty-three does it set World-Sovereign King Tathāgata apart. This long sequence is easy to skip in haste, yet structurally it first answers a fundamental question: where does one who makes a vow obtain the language and the road by which a vow may be made? The answer is that they come from the continuous teaching of buddha after buddha.
The last of these buddhas possesses the ten epithets, from Tathāgata and Worthy of Offerings through Buddha, and is the World-Honored One. This is not mere ornamentation with names. All the preceding buddhas have passed away; World-Sovereign King Tathāgata is the teacher whom Dharmākara personally hears, before whose feet he bows, and whom he questions. Here the long current of history ceases to be only a distant transmission and becomes a living relationship between teacher and disciple. Dharmākara’s vow thus has both a background reaching into the distant past and a teaching heard in the present.
Before a Pure Land appears, there is first the memory of fifty-three past buddhas appearing in succession, teaching beings, and entering extinction. The vow does not create a future out of personal imagination. It arises when someone hears how awakened ones have long delivered beings and resolves to continue walking that road.
Once the Heart Rejoices, a Throne Is No Longer the Only World
When World-Sovereign King Tathāgata appears, a king hears the Dharma. The sūtra says that “his heart became joyful, and he immediately gave rise to the aspiration for unsurpassed perfect awakening.” At once he “abandoned his realm, relinquished his kingship, and became a renunciant.” The sequence is extremely compressed: hearing, joy, aspiration, relinquishing the throne, and leaving the household follow with almost no interval. Dharmākara does not leave because he despises governing, nor does he first design another land and only then abandon his realm. What he has heard changes what is worth seeking.
A king can govern one realm, but the aspiration for unsurpassed perfect awakening extends responsibility to every being in birth and death. To relinquish the realm is not to disdain the world; it is to release a power bounded by a single country. To become a renunciant is not to flee responsibility; it is to learn anew what power can uproot the source of birth and death. After he receives the name Dharmākara, the sūtra marks his capacity as extraordinarily gifted, courageous, and discerning, surpassing the world. Yet it does not say that such capacity frees him from the need to be taught.
What first appears here is not the completed power of a vow, but its first cost: one’s former identity can no longer contain the mind that has arisen. True joy is not a passing emotion. It immediately gives a life a new center.
The Buddha He Praises Becomes, Line by Line, the Buddha He Vows to Be
Dharmākara goes before the Buddha, bows his head, circumambulates three times to the right, kneels, joins his palms, and then speaks a verse. Its first half praises the Buddha: his radiant countenance surpasses the sun, moon, and maṇi jewels; his great Dharma-voice flows through the ten directions; his ethical discipline, learning, vigor, samādhi, and wisdom have no peer; ignorance, desire, and anger are forever extinguished. These are not ornate words offered in exchange for the Buddha’s assent. They look closely, one by one, at the virtues of the awakened one whom Dharmākara reveres.
When the verse reaches “May I become a buddha,” its voice changes. Dharmākara first seeks to equal the sacred Dharma Kings and carry beings beyond birth and death. He then sets giving and the disciplining of the mind within the perfection of giving, joining these with ethical discipline, patience, vigor, samādhi, and wisdom as the six perfections. The result he seeks and the causes he will cultivate stand side by side. Next he vows: “I vow to attain buddhahood and universally carry out this vow; for all who are afraid, I will bring about vast peace.” If buddhahood were only his own perfection, it could not answer the fear of all beings. If the six perfections were only personal cultivation, they would not yet have become causes of vast peace.
The verse then moves from the Buddha’s Dharma-body to a buddha-land: light shining throughout numberless lands, a land foremost among all lands, a wondrous assembly, an unsurpassed site of awakening, and a realm peaceful and blissful like nirvāṇa, without an equal. Yet the land’s purpose follows immediately: to deliver all beings, so that those born there from the ten directions may become pure in heart and dwell in happiness and peace. The final request for attestation has two levels. First Dharmākara asks World-Sovereign King Tathāgata before him to attest that the vow-mind is not false. Then he asks the World-Honored Ones of the ten directions to know his practice, so that even if his body remains amid bitter suffering, he will endure to the end without regret. The vow is attested, and the practice is attested: the Buddha’s virtues praised, the practices cultivated, the land established, the beings delivered, and the mind that does not retreat become five faces of the same verse of aspiration.
A vow becomes credible not because it sounds vast, but because Dharmākara resolves to make the virtues he sees into practices he himself will bear. He even says that if measureless great sages as numerous as the sands of the Gaṅgā could make offerings to hundreds of thousands of koṭis of buddhas, this still “would not equal seeking the path, steadfast and right, without retreat.” If offering does not turn into seeking the path, it remains between oneself and the Buddha. Seeking the path asks that the Buddha’s virtues continue to occur within the practitioner.
If the Buddha Says “Know It Yourself,” Why Ask Again?
After the verse, Dharmākara formally asks the Buddha to expound the scriptural Dharma broadly. He says that he will practice, select and adopt the pure adornments of wondrous lands, swiftly accomplish perfect awakening, and uproot the source of beings’ toil and suffering in birth and death. The Buddha replies that, concerning the practices by which a buddha-land is adorned, Dharmākara should know them himself. This does not cast the student back into isolation, nor does it say that hearing the Dharma is unnecessary. It first returns responsibility to the one making the vow: the Buddha cannot vow on his behalf, choose on his behalf, or complete the practice on his behalf.
Dharmākara immediately asks again. He does not pretend that he already knows. He frankly says, “This principle is vast and profound; it is not within my range,” while promising to practice as taught and bring his vow to fulfillment once he has heard. Knowing for oneself and asking for instruction do not conflict here. Knowing for oneself means that responsibility cannot be shed; asking for instruction means that one cannot be complacent. If one insists on knowing only for oneself, a vast vow can easily become personal will. With reliance on a teacher alone, practice can become waiting for someone else to finish the work.
These two exchanges establish the subject of the vow. The Buddha does not practice in Dharmākara’s place, and Dharmākara does not pretend to understand. The Buddha gives the Dharma; Dharmākara promises to put it into practice. What passes between teacher and disciple is not a ready-made plan of a land, but a road by which one can see, select and adopt, and cultivate.
Measuring the Ocean with a Dipper Does Not Make the Ocean Small
Before beginning his exposition, the Buddha gives the simile of the ocean: “Suppose the ocean were vast and a person measured it with a dipper. After passing through kalpas, that person could still reach its bottom and obtain its wondrous treasures.” A dipper is tiny beside the ocean, just as a human life is short beside the Buddha-path. The simile does not deny the difference in scale; it makes that difference extreme. What it affirms is that utmost sincerity, vigor, and an unceasing quest for the path can, through long accumulation, finally accomplish the fruit.
Thus “What vow could fail to be fulfilled?” does not mean that whatever one wants will simply appear. The ocean simile contains a dipper, the act of measuring, kalpas of time, and not stopping; only then are the bottom reached and the treasures obtained. Remove practice from the vow and only an image of the ocean remains. Remove the vow from practice and there is no reason to continue for so long. The small dipper can face the ocean because its direction is not confused and its work does not cease.
Nor must the dipper be replaced by a great vessel before practice can begin. What the sūtra truly commends is not that the practitioner already possesses a buddha’s power at the outset. It is that a limited body can use utmost sincerity and vigor without turning limitation into an excuse to retreat. The ocean remains vast and the road remains long; continuity between vow and practice brings what is beyond measure into a practicable sequence of cause and effect.
Only after Seeing Good and Evil, Coarseness and Subtlety, Can One Know What to Adopt
After the ocean simile, World-Sovereign King Tathāgata gives an extensive account of two hundred and ten koṭis of buddha-lands and displays them in accord with Dharmākara’s mind. The sūtra deliberately places together “the good and evil of gods and humans” and “the coarseness and subtlety of the lands.” The former concerns beings and their actions; the latter, the lands that appear. Set together, they ensure that what Dharmākara sees is not only beautiful scenery, but the kinds of causal practice that form the kinds of world.
More importantly, what he sees includes evil as well as good and coarseness as well as subtlety; it is not limited to the pure side. If only beautiful results were displayed, Dharmākara would receive images to admire but might not know what to abandon or what to cultivate. When the causes and results of purity and defilement appear together, selection acquires moral and practical content: it does not splice pleasing scenes into a single land, but abandons evil and coarse causes and selects and adopts good and subtle practices.
Only after Dharmākara has both heard and seen does he “give rise to a still more surpassing, supreme vow.” This surpassing arousal does not leap up suddenly without a cause. The vow-mind he already possessed is corrected through seeing the causal patterns of many lands and becomes deeper, broader, and more practicable. That the vow grows after seeing shows that a truly vast vow is willing to be taught by facts.
Five Kalpas Are Not Waiting, and Tranquility Is Not Stopping
After the lands have been seen, the sūtra says in sequence that Dharmākara’s mind is tranquil, his resolve attached to nothing, and no one in any world can equal him; it then gives him five kalpas to contemplate and select and adopt the pure practices. Tranquility keeps the selection from being driven by agitated attraction and aversion. Non-attachment prevents the adornments seen from becoming new objects of grasping. The five kalpas turn this concentration and wisdom into the many practices by which a land can be established. Before the Forty-Eight Vows are spoken, the vow’s inner work has already matured through a long span.
The sūtra also expressly states that the lifespan of World-Sovereign King Tathāgata is forty-two kalpas. This supplies the temporal condition in which Dharmākara can complete five kalpas of cultivation within a single life, and it refuses to let a Pure Land be treated as the product of momentary inspiration. When Dharmākara has finished selecting and adopting, he still returns before the Buddha, bows his head, circumambulates him to the right, joins his palms, and reports that he has adopted the pure practices. Long contemplation has not separated him from teacher or assembly.
Concentration and wisdom each have their work here. The mind is tranquil and thus can remain collected; the resolve is unattached and thus can discern. What is discerned must then be cultivated through five kalpas; it is not an abstract idea. The vow has many gates, and the practice is not a single gate. A pure buddha-land is the result of many pure practices brought into long accord.
A Vow Must Be Heard by the Assembly before It Becomes a Shared Road
When Dharmākara returns, the Buddha does not approve his work in private. He says, “You may now speak; know that this is the proper time.” The moment and audience for declaring the vows are both clear: the whole assembly is to give rise to joy and glad assent, while bodhisattvas who hear are to practice this Dharma and thereby bring measureless great vows to fulfillment. The vow moves from one person’s inner conduct into the open Dharma assembly; only then does it acquire the power to teach and be carried forward.
Dharmākara agrees to set forth his vows in full. The next unit is where the Forty-Eight Vows actually begin. This pause matters. Before any single vow has been stated, there have already been hearing the Dharma and relinquishing a throne, worship and praise, two requests for teaching, encouragement through the ocean simile, the seeing of many lands, five kalpas of contemplation, and a return to speak before the assembly. Remove these preparations and the vows can look like a sheet of empty wishes. Preserve them, and one sees behind every vow a life that does not retreat, receives instruction, discerns, and willingly practices.
The question in the title can now be answered. A Pure Land is not simply seen first, nor is it simply vowed first. The initial vow-mind makes one willing to seek the Dharma; seeing the lands teaches the vow to discern; five kalpas turn discernment into practice; public proclamation then makes one person’s vow into a road others can walk. Seeing and vowing correct one another, and long practice brings both to rest in the peace of beings.
Carrying Forward — How the Vow-Mind Reaches Fulfillment
Jingxing reads this passage through “the concise account of the supreme practice” and “the extensive account of the supreme practice.” He does not adopt a sharp division in which the practice before the verse belongs to stages before the grounds and the practice after it to the grounds and above; he positively identifies Dharmākara here as a bodhisattva at the consummate stage of the ten dedications. Huiyuan, by contrast, reads the part before the verse as worldly practice before the grounds and the part after it as supramundane practice on the grounds, while using the distinctions among what was practiced, what was accomplished, and what was adopted to open the governing structure of the whole sūtra. The two masters differ in their interpretations of Dharmākara’s stage and in their divisions of the passage. Since this passage of the sūtra itself does not state his stage, the ancient explanations remain side by side; later readers do not add either judgment to the sūtra.
Tanluan carries the compassionate vow of this passage forward to its result. He says that the Pure Land of Peace and Bliss is born from great compassion and that the three kinds of adornment are accomplished through the pure vow-mind; thus, “because the cause is pure, the result is pure; the result does not arise without a cause or from some other cause.” He further writes, “the vow brings the power to completion, and the power fulfills the vow,” showing how the vow and a tathāgata’s sovereign power bring each other to fulfillment. This does not project the later other-power back into Dharmākara’s causal stage as though he had already become a buddha. It says instead that the virtues of the later result attest that the earlier vow and practice were never empty. Seen through these three ancient mirrors, the adornment of Dharmākara’s causal ground lies not in grand declarations, but in establishing the cause through compassion, selecting practices through concentration and wisdom, and cultivating until the vow becomes power and can truly establish beings in peace.
考據Apparatus
全段定位 本段自過去佛次第起，至世自在王出世、國王聞法出家成法藏、以頌讚佛發願、兩度請問淨土之行、蒙示二百一十億佛土、五劫思惟攝取，最後回到佛前允將所願具說。四十八願正文尚在下一單元；本段所明，是願文宣說以前的見、擇、修與公開請證。
一、科判定位
憬興《無量壽經連義述文贊》在阿難願聞之後，以本段開啟如來廣說。其逐文先判世自在王佛十號，再判法藏勝行：
「今即還有二：初、略說勝行；後、廣說勝行。初又有三：此初、聞法發心也。」〔T37n1748 0148b06〕
略說勝行依次是聞法發心、出俗修道、歎佛起願；歎佛起願又依身禮、語歎、自誓推進。廣說勝行則由法藏請說、如來抑止、法藏重請、如來許說、辨修勝行展開。至法藏完成攝取、回到佛前，佛勸其為大眾宣說，下一單元才進四十八願本文。
慧遠《無量壽經義疏》以全經正宗先明無量壽佛本昔所行，並於其中判：「就所行中，初列多佛，明起行緣。「時有國王聞佛說」下，彰彼法藏依之起行。」〔T37n1745 0101a06〕 因此，長列過去諸佛不是獨立佛名錄，而是把法藏的發心置入佛佛相續的教化因緣；本單元的中心則是法藏如何依世自在王佛起行。
二、異譯對勘（四譯一會·異同誌錄不判）
| 位 | 康僧鎧本 T360 | 支婁迦讖本 T361 | 支謙本 T362 | 法賢本 T363 | 菩提流志會五 T310 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 行者名 | 法藏比丘 | 先作曇摩迦留，後稱法寶藏菩薩 | 曇摩迦 | 作法苾芻 | 法處比丘 |
| 出家因 | 國王聞法悅豫，發心、棄國捐王而作沙門 | 世饒王聞法開解，棄位作比丘 | 大國王聞經歡喜，棄國作沙門 | 佛法中已有作法苾芻，不敘國王出家 | 佛法中有法處比丘，不敘國王出家 |
| 所示國土 | 「二百一十億諸佛剎土」〔T12n0360 0267c03〕 | 「二百一十億佛國中」〔T12n0361 0280c27〕 | 「二百一十億佛國土中」〔T12n0362 0301a09〕 | 「八十四百千俱胝那由佛剎」〔T12n0363 0319a10〕 | 「二十一億清淨佛土」〔T11n0310 0093b01〕 |
| 示土時間 | 未標說法年數 | 未標說法年數 | 未標說法年數 | 說土經一劫 | 「說是法時經于億歲」〔T11n0310 0093b02〕 |
| 思擇與願數 | 見諸土後五劫思惟，願文開為四十八 | 選土後結二十四願，繼而久劫奉行 | 選土後結二十四願，繼而久劫奉行 | 獨處思惟五劫後說願 | 攝受諸土後滿五劫思惟修習 |
| 世自在王佛壽 | 「其佛壽命四十二劫」〔T12n0360 0267c09〕 | 在中教授四十二劫 | 壽四十二劫 | 「彼佛壽命滿四十劫」〔T12n0363 0319a14〕 | 「彼佛壽量滿四十劫」〔T11n0310 0093b06〕 |
T361、T362 與 T360 同存國王捨位的敘事；T363、T310 則從既為比丘處起。國土數量、觀看方式、說土所歷時間、二十四願或四十八願的開合，也不一致。這些差異顯示各譯自有敘事配置；考據只並列，不把一本到另一本文中補齊。
三、經論宗依（眼）
本段之眼是清淨國土何以成為菩薩行，而不是先把願目當成孤立條款。法藏的頌願以布施調意為檀度，與戒、忍、精進、三昧、智慧合成六度，所求則是令恐懼眾生得大安；其後必須看見諸土善惡、粗妙，經五劫思惟攝取，方回到佛前宣願。
曇鸞《往生論註》把此因果收在大悲與出世善根中：「安樂淨土從此大悲生故，故謂此大悲為淨土之根，故曰出世善根生。」〔T40n1819 0828c16〕 又說三種莊嚴「由本四十八願等清淨願心之所莊嚴。因淨故果淨，非無因、他因有也。」〔T40n1819 0841b07〕 所以淨土不是與救生分離的環境工程；清淨願心、大悲正因與長時修行共同構成其因。
四、本段釋要
本段依經次第可分七層：
- 佛佛相續：錠光如來以下，五十三位過去佛依次出世滅度，至世自在王佛別舉十號。慧遠合前五十三與末後一佛，說是五十四佛；末後一佛是法藏親承之師。
- 聞法出家：國王不是先有淨土藍圖才見佛，而是聞法心喜，隨即發無上正真道意，棄國捐王，行作沙門。法藏之名從出家與發心之後出現，經文以「高才勇哲與世超異」〔T12n0360 0267a18〕標其器量。
- 禮佛與讚願：法藏身以稽首、右繞、長跪禮敬；口以頌讚佛身、語、意三業；願則從求佛法身、修六度，推至救怖畏、成淨土、度一切眾生。頌末請證分為兩層：先請世自在王佛證明願心不虛，憬興判為「請世王佛證願不虛也。」〔T37n1748 0149b02〕；再請十方佛證明苦行不退，判為「十方佛證行不悔也。」〔T37n1748 0149b07〕 身禮、語歎、自誓由此相續，不把長頌拆成互不相干的讚語。
- 兩度請法：法藏先請廣宣經法，世自在王佛令他自知；法藏不以此為拒絕，承認義理弘深、非己境界，再請佛敷演諸佛淨土之行。這一進一退，顯示發願兼有自主承當與依師聞法。
- 海喻與示土：世自在王佛先以斗量大海為喻，說至心精進、求道不止終能剋果；再廣說並現二百一十億諸佛國土的天人善惡、國土粗妙。憬興解為因果並觀：「天人善惡即諸土之因，國土粗妙即諸土之果。」〔T37n1748 0149c10〕
- 見、願、定、慧、行：法藏親見嚴淨國土後，超發殊勝之願；心寂靜是定，志無所著是慧導其定，五劫則用來思惟攝取種種清淨之行。憬興明言願有四十八，所修不應只是一行：「願既四十八，行必非一故。」〔T37n1748 0150a14〕
- 由私願到公說：法藏完成攝取後再詣佛所，稽首右繞，陳明已成清淨之行。佛令其當眾宣說，使大眾悅可、菩薩依法修行；願在這一刻成為可聞、可學、可共同發起的法。
本經在此沒有明標法藏位階。憬興排除十住第六心與八地以上兩說後，正面判為：「今即法藏蓋是十向滿位菩薩故」〔T37n1748 0150a24〕；慧遠則以前頌為地前世間行、頌後為地上出世行。這是兩家位次判釋，不是 T360 自身明文，故並錄而不寫回經文。
五、諸家異釋（分欄並錄）
| 義位 | 憬興《連義述文贊》T1748 | 慧遠《義疏》T1745 | 曇鸞《往生論註》T1819 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 頌前後行位 | 不採頌前世間、頌後出世的兩截判法，改判略說勝行與廣說勝行 | 「上來明佛之起行緣，下明法藏依之起行。」〔T37n1745 0101b17〕，並於後文以世間、出世二行分疏 | 不逐句判此段行位，以法藏積集波羅蜜、發願成土為因 |
| 法藏位階 | 判為十向滿位菩薩，見目四 | 頌前判地前世間行，頌後判地上出世行：「地前所行，名為世間；地上出世。」〔T37n1745 0101b19〕 | 不逐文判定本段位階 |
| 示諸佛土 | 說淨穢諸土因果，令捨惡粗、修善妙 | 以見淨土之行、起願、修證次第疏解 | 清淨土由大悲、出世善根而生，見目三 |
| 五劫所修 | 定為本、慧導定；五劫修種種行，不是一行 | 判五劫起行，並以四十二劫壽量說明一身可修 | 不逐文解五劫，著眼四十八願的願力如何成就莊嚴 |
| 願與果 | 五劫所攝是淨土之因，願宣說後尚待久行成就 | 所行、所成、所攝分開，不把發願等同果成 | 「願以成力、力以就願」〔T40n1819 0840a14〕，願與佛力相符而不徒然 |
諸家同把淨土放在發心、行願與利生的因果中；對行位、分科及五劫所修的細判各異。此處只給出各家證據與推路，不替古德調停，也不把任一地位判釋寫回經文。
六、術語
| 名相 | 所據釋義與範圍 |
|---|---|
| 錠光如來 | 本段過去佛次第之首；異譯或作定光、然燈。各守原譯，不互改名。 |
| 世自在王 | 本段法藏親承之佛，具如來至世尊十號。T361、T362 作樓夷亘羅或世饒王，T310 作世間自在王。 |
| 法藏 | 國王出家後所得名。憬興並記早期異譯曇摩迦留、曇摩迦等名，不以現代梵本重構。 |
| 無上正真道意 | 求成正覺之心；T363、T310明作阿耨多羅三藐三菩提心。中文各守譯本。 |
| 六度 | 頌中布施、調意同屬檀度，與戒、忍、精進、三昧、智慧合為六度。慧遠明釋：「「布施調意」，是其檀度。修施治慳，名為調意。」〔T37n1745 0102a16〕；憬興亦概括：「此初、求自利因，即六度也。」〔T37n1748 0149a05〕 |
| 泥洹 | 頌以國如泥洹形容安樂第一；憬興古譯音義作：「梵云匿縛南，唐云圓寂。」〔T37n1748 0149a23〕 |
| 攝取 | 見諸土因果後選擇並修習清淨國土之行；不是從別本抄合成文。 |
| 五劫 | 法藏思惟攝取莊嚴佛國清淨行的長時段。T360 與世自在王佛四十二劫壽量相連。 |
梵語形只錄古德或古譯所傳；本段末願字的 CBETA 編校梵語腳註不作經文，也不據以另立梵形。
七、譬喻·修辭
本段的核心譬喻是量海：
「譬如大海，一人斗量，經歷劫數尚可窮底，得其妙寶。人有至心精進，求道不止，會當剋果，何願不得？」〔T12n0360 0267b29〕
譬喻有四個相連部分：海大，斗小；時間以劫計；量者不止；最後不只見底，還得妙寶。它不是用願望取代因行，恰恰把至心、精進、不止、剋果連成因果。T361、T362 同存海喻，T363、T310 則不以斗量大海展開此處。
長頌的修辭先以日月摩尼對照佛光，再由讚佛轉成願我作佛；其後六度、救怖、供佛、照土、淨國、度生、請證層層遞進。第一個恒沙形容能供養的大聖之多，而諸佛是所供養者；第二個恒沙形容無數佛土。憬興明辨主客：「佛者所供養，大聖者能供養。」〔T37n1748 0149a12〕 兩次恒沙使供養與建土互相照應。末句即使身止諸苦毒中也不悔，為海喻的求道不止預先立下誓行。
八、徵引承衍
- 大悲為土之根：曇鸞以法藏積習波羅蜜、發四十八願說安樂土之因，並直標大悲為淨土之根；這承接本段救恐懼、度一切的願心，而不把莊嚴國土從眾生苦中抽離。
- 願與力相成：後來果位之住持不只稱願，亦稱自在神力；「願不徒然、力不虛設，力願相符畢竟不差」〔T40n1819 0840a14〕。此是本段長時修願於果上的承衍，不等於法藏在發願當下已經成佛。
- 因淨故果淨：三種莊嚴由清淨願心所莊嚴，故說因淨果淨。這條因果線把本段的聞法、發心、見土、五劫修行，與後文願成、國土成就連起來。
- 異譯願數開合：T361、T362 以二十四願承接此段，T360 則以下一單元四十八願承接。願數與次第的開合須各在本經內讀，不以會集方式消除差異。
九、校本定位
本單元所對 T12n0360 原 XML，在 0266c23–0267c16 的正文錨所繫校勘層共有十九項；正文 gaiji 零、正文 inline note 零。異讀主要落在佛名與頌文用字、問答動詞及海喻量器：如地種／地動、容顏／顏容、崖／涯、功德／功勳、愍哀／哀愍、快樂安隱／快樂安穩、斗／升、粗／異體字，以及超發／起發。今文一律依大正藏底本，不據疏義或異譯改字。
本段末行願字另有 CBETA 編校腳註，附一現代羅馬字梵語形；該註在正文之外，既不納入原典層，也不作本段梵源裁定。依古德與漢譯作業規則，考據只記其存在，不用它改定願字之義。
T360 的卷端題署與歷史譯者歸屬問題已在上一單元校本定位誌錄；本單元不重作裁決。四譯一會的人名、國土數、年數與願數差異，同樣只作 witness 對勘，不以任一本改寫底本。
Placement of the passage as a whole. This passage begins with the succession of past buddhas, proceeds through the appearance of World-Sovereign King Tathāgata, the king’s hearing the Dharma and becoming the renunciant Dharmākara, and Dharmākara’s praise of the Buddha and arousal of his vow. It then records his two requests for instruction in the practice of a Pure Land, the display of two hundred and ten koṭis of buddha-lands, and five kalpas of contemplation and selection and adoption. It ends when Dharmākara returns before the Buddha and agrees to set forth his vows in full. The text of the Forty-Eight Vows begins only in the next unit. What this passage establishes is the seeing, choosing, cultivating, and public request for attestation that precede their proclamation.
I. Doctrinal-Outline Placement
After Ānanda asks to hear, Jingxing’s Linked-Meaning Expository Praise on the Sūtra of Measureless Life takes this passage as the opening of the Tathāgata’s extensive exposition. Its passage-by-passage analysis first classifies the ten epithets of World-Sovereign King Tathāgata and then classifies Dharmākara’s supreme practice:
「今即還有二：初、略說勝行；後、廣說勝行。初又有三：此初、聞法發心也。」—“Here, in turn, there are two parts: first, a concise account of the supreme practice; afterward, an extensive account of the supreme practice. The first again has three parts. This first one is hearing the Dharma and arousing the mind” 〔T37n1748 0148b06〕.
The concise account of the supreme practice proceeds through hearing the Dharma and arousing the mind, leaving the household life to cultivate the path, and praising the Buddha and giving rise to the vow. The praise and vow in turn unfold through bodily homage, verbal praise, and personal resolve. The extensive account begins when Dharmākara requests a teaching, continues through the Tathāgata’s initial restraint, Dharmākara’s second request, the Tathāgata’s consent to teach, and the explanation of the practice, and ends with Dharmākara’s return before the Buddha after completing what he had selected and adopted. The Buddha then urges him to proclaim his vows to the assembly. The next unit, not this one, enters the text of the Forty-Eight Vows.
Huiyuan’s Commentary on the Sūtra of Measureless Life first identifies the past practices of the Buddha of Measureless Life within the main body of the whole sūtra. Within those practices it states:
「就所行中，初列多佛，明起行緣。「時有國王聞佛說」下，彰彼法藏依之起行。」—“Within what he practiced, first many buddhas are listed to clarify the conditions that gave rise to the practice. From ‘At that time there was a king who heard the Buddha teach’ onward, it reveals that Dharmākara relied upon this to initiate his practice” 〔T37n1745 0101a06〕.
The long succession of past buddhas is therefore not an independent catalog of buddha-names. It places Dharmākara’s arousal of the mind within the teaching conditions formed by buddha after buddha. The center of this unit is how Dharmākara begins his practice in reliance upon World-Sovereign King Tathāgata.
II. Collation with the Alternate Translations (Four Translations and One Assembly) — recorded without adjudication
| Position | Kang Sengkai recension, T360 | Lokakṣema recension, T361 | Zhi Qian recension, T362 | Faxian recension, T363 | Bodhiruci, Assembly Five, T310 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name of the practitioner | Bhikṣu Dharmākara | First Tanmojialiu, later Bodhisattva Dharma-Jewel Treasury | Tanmojia | Bhikṣu Zuofa | Bhikṣu Fachu |
| Cause of renunciation | A king hears the Dharma with joy, arouses the mind, relinquishes his realm and kingship, and becomes a renunciant | King World-Abundance hears the Dharma, awakens to its meaning, and relinquishes his throne to become a bhikṣu | A king of a great realm hears the sūtra with joy, abandons the realm, and becomes a renunciant | Bhikṣu Zuofa already exists within the Buddha-Dharma; no account of a king’s renunciation is given | Bhikṣu Fachu already exists within the Buddha-Dharma; no account of a king’s renunciation is given |
| Lands displayed | 「二百一十億諸佛剎土」—“two hundred and ten koṭis of buddha-lands” 〔T12n0360 0267c03〕 | 「二百一十億佛國中」—“among two hundred and ten koṭis of buddha-realms” 〔T12n0361 0280c27〕 | 「二百一十億佛國土中」—“among two hundred and ten koṭis of buddha-lands” 〔T12n0362 0301a09〕 | 「八十四百千俱胝那由佛剎」—“eighty-four hundred-thousand koṭi-nayutas of buddha-fields” 〔T12n0363 0319a10〕 | 「二十一億清淨佛土」—“twenty-one koṭis of pure buddha-lands” 〔T11n0310 0093b01〕 |
| Time spent displaying the lands | No number of years is stated | No number of years is stated | No number of years is stated | The exposition of the lands lasts one kalpa | 「說是法時經于億歲」—“the teaching of this Dharma lasted a koṭi of years” 〔T11n0310 0093b02〕 |
| Selection and number of vows | After seeing the lands, he contemplates for five kalpas; the text then opens the vows into forty-eight | After selecting a land, he forms twenty-four vows and then practices them for long kalpas | After selecting a land, he forms twenty-four vows and then practices them for long kalpas | After contemplating alone for five kalpas, he speaks the vows | After embracing the lands, he completes five kalpas of contemplation and cultivation |
| Lifespan of World-Sovereign King Buddha | 「其佛壽命四十二劫」—“that buddha’s lifespan was forty-two kalpas” 〔T12n0360 0267c09〕 | He teaches in that world for forty-two kalpas | His lifespan is forty-two kalpas | 「彼佛壽命滿四十劫」—“that buddha’s lifespan extended to a full forty kalpas” 〔T12n0363 0319a14〕 | 「彼佛壽量滿四十劫」—“that buddha’s lifespan extended to a full forty kalpas” 〔T11n0310 0093b06〕 |
T361, T362, and T360 all preserve the account of a king relinquishing his throne. T363 and T310 begin after the practitioner is already a bhikṣu. The number of lands, the manner in which they are seen, the duration of the exposition, and the division into twenty-four or forty-eight vows also differ. These differences show that each translation has its own narrative arrangement. The apparatus places them side by side without filling one recension from another.
III. Scriptural and Treatise Grounding (the “eye”)
The “eye” of this passage is how a Pure Land becomes bodhisattva practice, not how a list of vows may be isolated as a set of clauses. In Dharmākara’s verse, giving and disciplining the mind form the perfection of giving; together with ethical discipline, patience, vigor, samādhi, and wisdom, they make the six perfections. Their purpose is to bring vast peace to beings in fear. Dharmākara must then see the good and evil and the coarseness and subtlety of the many lands, contemplate for five kalpas, and select and adopt before he returns to the Buddha to proclaim his vows.
Tanluan’s Commentary on the Treatise on Birth in That Land gathers this causal sequence into great compassion and supramundane roots of goodness:
「安樂淨土從此大悲生故，故謂此大悲為淨土之根，故曰出世善根生。」—“Because the Pure Land of Peace and Bliss is born from this great compassion, this great compassion is called the root of the Pure Land; therefore the Pure Land is said to arise from supramundane roots of goodness” 〔T40n1819 0828c16〕.
It further says of the three adornments:
「由本四十八願等清淨願心之所莊嚴。因淨故果淨，非無因、他因有也。」—“They are adorned by the pure vow-mind of the original Forty-Eight Vows and the like. Because the cause is pure, the result is pure; the result does not arise without a cause or from some other cause” 〔T40n1819 0841b07〕.
A Pure Land is thus not an environmental construction separated from the rescue of beings. The pure vow-mind, the right cause of great compassion, and long cultivation together constitute its cause.
IV. Essentials of the Commentary on This Passage
The sequence of this passage can be read in seven layers:
- Succession from buddha to buddha. Beginning with Dingguang Tathāgata, fifty-three past buddhas appear and enter extinction in sequence; World-Sovereign King Tathāgata is then named separately with his ten epithets. Huiyuan counts the preceding fifty-three together with the last buddha as fifty-four. The last is the teacher from whom Dharmākara personally receives the Dharma.
- Hearing the Dharma and renouncing kingship. The king does not first possess a plan for a Pure Land and then meet the Buddha. He hears the Dharma with joy, immediately gives rise to the aspiration for unsurpassed perfect awakening, relinquishes his realm and kingship, and becomes a renunciant. The name Dharmākara appears only after the renunciation and arousal of the mind; the sūtra marks his capacity with 「高才勇哲與世超異」—“extraordinarily gifted, courageous, and discerning, surpassing the world” 〔T12n0360 0267a18〕.
- Homage, praise, and vow. Dharmākara pays bodily homage by bowing his head, circumambulating to the right, and kneeling; verbally, he praises the Buddha’s activities of body, speech, and mind; in his vow, he proceeds from seeking the Buddha’s Dharma-body and cultivating the six perfections to rescuing beings from fear, establishing a Pure Land, and delivering all. The request for attestation at the end of the verse has two levels. First he asks World-Sovereign King Tathāgata to attest that his vow is not false. Jingxing classifies this as 「請世王佛證願不虛也。」—“asking World-Sovereign King Buddha to attest that the vow is not false” 〔T37n1748 0149b02〕. He then asks the buddhas of the ten directions to attest that he will not regret the hardship of his practice, classified as 「十方佛證行不悔也。」—“the buddhas of the ten directions attesting that he will not regret the practice” 〔T37n1748 0149b07〕. Bodily homage, verbal praise, and personal resolve therefore continue one another; the long verse is not split into unrelated phrases of praise.
- Two requests for the Dharma. Dharmākara first asks for a broad exposition of the scriptural Dharma. World-Sovereign King Tathāgata tells him to know for himself. Dharmākara does not treat this as a refusal. He acknowledges that the principle is vast and profound and beyond his own range, then again asks the Buddha to expound the practices of the tathāgatas’ pure lands. This advance and withdrawal show that making a vow includes both taking responsibility oneself and hearing the Dharma from a teacher.
- The ocean simile and the display of lands. World-Sovereign King Tathāgata first uses the simile of measuring the ocean with a dipper to teach that utmost sincerity, vigor, and an unceasing quest for the path will finally accomplish the fruit. He then extensively describes and displays the good and evil of gods and humans in two hundred and ten koṭis of buddha-lands and the coarseness and subtlety of the lands. Jingxing explains the two as cause and result viewed together: 「天人善惡即諸土之因，國土粗妙即諸土之果。」—“The good and evil of gods and humans are the causes of the various lands; the coarseness and subtlety of the lands are their results” 〔T37n1748 0149c10〕.
- Seeing, vowing, concentration, wisdom, and practice. After Dharmākara personally sees the adorned and purified lands, he gives rise to a surpassing vow. The tranquility of his mind is concentration; his resolve is unattached, which is wisdom directing that concentration; the five kalpas are devoted to contemplating and selecting and adopting the many pure practices. Jingxing states that since the vows are forty-eight, the practice should not be reduced to a single practice: 「願既四十八，行必非一故。」—“Since the vows are forty-eight, the practices necessarily are not one” 〔T37n1748 0150a14〕.
- From a private vow to public proclamation. When Dharmākara has completed his selection and adoption, he returns before the Buddha, bows his head, circumambulates to the right, and declares that he has completed the pure practices. The Buddha tells him to proclaim them before the assembly so that the assembly may rejoice and assent and bodhisattvas may practice the Dharma. At this point the vow becomes something that can be heard, learned, and jointly aroused.
The sūtra itself does not explicitly state Dharmākara’s stage here. After rejecting the views that place him at the sixth mind of the ten abodes or above the eighth ground, Jingxing judges positively:
「今即法藏蓋是十向滿位菩薩故」—“Here Dharmākara was probably a bodhisattva at the consummate stage of the ten dedications” 〔T37n1748 0150a24〕.
Huiyuan, by contrast, takes the practice before the verse as worldly practice before the grounds and the practice after the verse as supramundane practice on the grounds. These are two commentators’ interpretations of his stage, not an explicit statement in T360. They are therefore recorded side by side and not written back into the sūtra.
V. Divergent Readings of the Commentators — recorded without adjudication
| Doctrinal position | Jingxing, Linked-Meaning Expository Praise, T1748 | Huiyuan, Commentary, T1745 | Tanluan, Commentary on the Treatise on Birth in That Land, T1819 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stages before and after the verse | Does not adopt a two-part reading of worldly practice before the verse and supramundane practice after it; instead classifies a concise and an extensive account of the supreme practice | 「上來明佛之起行緣，下明法藏依之起行。」—“What precedes explains the Buddha as the condition for the arising of practice; what follows explains how Dharmākara relied on him to begin practicing” 〔T37n1745 0101b17〕, and later divides the exposition into worldly and supramundane practices | Does not assign a stage passage by passage; treats Dharmākara’s accumulation of the perfections and his vow to establish the land as the cause |
| Dharmākara’s stage | Judges him to be a bodhisattva at the consummate stage of the ten dedications; see Topic IV | Reads the part before the verse as worldly practice before the grounds and the part after it as supramundane practice on the grounds: 「地前所行，名為世間；地上出世。」—“Practice before the grounds is called worldly; on the grounds it is supramundane” 〔T37n1745 0101b19〕 | Does not determine his stage in a passage-by-passage reading |
| Display of the buddha-lands | Explains the causes and results of pure and defiled lands so that evil and coarse causes may be abandoned and good and subtle ones cultivated | Explains in sequence the practices of seeing pure lands, arousing the vow, and cultivating toward realization | Says that the Pure Land is born from great compassion and supramundane roots of goodness; see Topic III |
| Practice during the five kalpas | Concentration is the basis and wisdom directs it; the five kalpas cultivate many practices, not one | Reads the five kalpas as the arousal and cultivation of practices and uses the forty-two-kalpa lifespan to show that they can be cultivated within a single life | Does not comment on the five kalpas passage by passage; focuses on how the power of the Forty-Eight Vows accomplishes the adornments |
| Vow and result | What is selected and adopted in the five kalpas is the cause of the Pure Land; after the vows are proclaimed, they still require long practice before fulfillment | Keeps what was practiced, accomplished, and adopted distinct; making the vow is not identical with accomplishing the result | 「願以成力、力以就願」—“The vow brings the power to completion, and the power fulfills the vow” 〔T40n1819 0840a14〕; vow and buddha-power correspond and are not empty |
All three masters place the Pure Land within the causal sequence of arousing the mind, vow and practice, and benefiting beings. Their finer judgments concerning stages, divisions, and the practice of the five kalpas differ. This apparatus gives the evidence and course of reasoning of each without reconciling the ancient masters or inserting any one of their stage judgments into the sūtra.
VI. Terms
| Term | Grounded sense and range |
|---|---|
| Dingguang Tathāgata | The first in the succession of past buddhas in this passage. Alternate translations use Dingguang (定光) and Randeng (然燈); the Chinese graphs distinguish 定光 from the base text’s 錠光. Each translation retains its own name; the names are not substituted for one another. |
| World-Sovereign King Tathāgata | The buddha from whom Dharmākara personally receives the Dharma in this passage; he possesses the ten epithets from Tathāgata through Buddha and is also called the World-Honored One. T361 and T362 use the forms Louyihengluo and World-Abundance King; T310 has World-Sovereign King of the World. |
| Dharmākara | The name received by the king after leaving the household life. Jingxing also records the names Tanmojialiu and Tanmojia from the early translations; no modern Sanskrit reconstruction is used to override the ancient transmissions. |
| Aspiration for unsurpassed perfect awakening | The mind that seeks to attain perfect awakening. T363 and T310 expressly give the equivalent formula “the mind of unsurpassed perfect awakening.” Each Chinese translation retains its own wording. |
| Six perfections | In the verse, giving and disciplining the mind both belong to the perfection of giving; with ethical discipline, patience, vigor, samādhi, and wisdom, they make the six perfections. Huiyuan explains: 「「布施調意」，是其檀度。修施治慳，名為調意。」—“‘Giving and disciplining the mind’ is his perfection of giving. Cultivating giving to remedy stinginess is called disciplining the mind” 〔T37n1745 0102a16〕. Jingxing likewise summarizes: 「此初、求自利因，即六度也。」—“This first part seeks the causes of one’s own benefit; these are the six perfections” 〔T37n1748 0149a05〕. |
| Nirvāṇa | The verse describes the land as peaceful and blissful like nirvāṇa, foremost and without an equal. Jingxing gives the ancient transmitted sound and sense: 「梵云匿縛南，唐云圓寂。」—“In the Indic language it is called Ni-fu-nan; in Tang Chinese, perfect quiescence” 〔T37n1748 0149a23〕. |
| Select and adopt | After seeing the causes and results of the many lands, to choose and cultivate the pure practices of a buddha-land. It does not mean compiling a text from other recensions. |
| Five kalpas | The long span during which Dharmākara contemplates and selects and adopts the pure practices that adorn a buddha-land. In T360 it stands within the forty-two-kalpa lifespan of World-Sovereign King Tathāgata. |
Indic forms are recorded only as transmitted by the ancient masters or the ancient translations. The editorial Sanskrit footnote attached in the source edition to the character for “vow” at the end of this passage is not part of the scriptural text and is not used to establish another Sanskrit form.
VII. Similes and Rhetoric
The central simile of this passage is measuring the ocean:
「譬如大海，一人斗量，經歷劫數尚可窮底，得其妙寶。人有至心精進，求道不止，會當剋果，何願不得？」—“Suppose the ocean were vast and a person measured it with a dipper. After passing through kalpas, that person could still reach its bottom and obtain its wondrous treasures. If a person seeks the path with utmost sincerity and vigor and never stops, that person will ultimately accomplish the fruit. What vow could fail to be fulfilled?” 〔T12n0360 0267b29〕
The simile has four connected parts: the ocean is vast and the dipper small; the time is measured in kalpas; the one who measures does not stop; and in the end that person not only sees the bottom but obtains the wondrous treasures. It does not replace causal practice with wishing. On the contrary, it joins utmost sincerity, vigor, not stopping, and accomplishment of the fruit into a causal sequence. T361 and T362 also preserve the ocean simile; T363 and T310 do not develop this point through measuring the ocean with a dipper.
The rhetoric of the long verse first contrasts the light of the Buddha with the sun, moon, and maṇi jewels, then turns from praise of the Buddha to the vow that Dharmākara himself become a buddha. The six perfections, rescue from fear, offerings to buddhas, illumination of lands, purification of a land, delivery of beings, and request for attestation then advance layer by layer. The first comparison with the sands of the Gaṅgā describes the multitude of great sages able to make offerings, while the buddhas are those to whom offerings are made; the second comparison describes the innumerable buddha-lands. Jingxing distinguishes subject from object:
「佛者所供養，大聖者能供養。」—“The buddhas are those who receive the offerings; the great sages are those able to make them” 〔T37n1748 0149a12〕.
The two comparisons with the sands of the Gaṅgā make offering to buddhas and establishing a land answer one another. The final line, in which Dharmākara will not regret his practice even if his body remains amid bitter suffering, anticipates the unceasing quest for the path in the ocean simile.
VIII. Citation and Carrying Forward
- Great compassion is the root of the land. Tanluan explains the cause of the land of Peace and Bliss through Dharmākara’s accumulation of the perfections and arousal of the Forty-Eight Vows, and directly calls great compassion the root of the Pure Land. This carries forward the vow in the present passage to rescue those in fear and deliver all beings; it does not detach the adornment of a land from the sufferings of beings.
- Vow and power complete one another. The sustaining activity of the later result is called not only vow but sovereign spiritual power: 「願不徒然、力不虛設，力願相符畢竟不差」—“The vow is not in vain, and the power is not exercised in vain; power and vow accord, never diverging in the end” 〔T40n1819 0840a14〕. This carries the long cultivation of the vow in this passage forward into its result. It does not mean that Dharmākara was already a buddha at the moment he made the vow.
- A pure cause, therefore a pure result. The three kinds of adornment are adorned by the pure vow-mind; hence the cause is pure and the result is pure. This causal line joins the hearing of the Dharma, arousal of the mind, seeing of the lands, and five kalpas of cultivation in this passage to the later fulfillment of the vows and accomplishment of the land.
- Different divisions of the vows in the alternate translations. T361 and T362 continue from this passage with twenty-four vows; T360 continues in the next unit with forty-eight. The different numbers and sequences of vows must be read within their respective sūtras and not erased through conflation.
IX. Placement Among the Recensions
Within the scriptural domain of this unit, from 0266c23 through 0267c16 in the source XML of T12n0360, the collation layer tied to the body contains nineteen entries. There are no gaiji in the body and no inline notes in the body. Most variants concern buddha-names, wording in the verse, verbs in the dialogue, and the vessel in the ocean simile: Earth Seed against Earth Moving; the two graphs in “countenance” in one order or the reverse; cliff-edge against shore; merit against meritorious achievement; pity and sorrow against sorrow and pity; happiness and secure peace against happiness and stable peace; a dipper against a sheng measure; the base form of “coarse” against a variant graph; and surpassing arousal against initiating arousal. The present text follows the Taishō base text throughout and does not alter its characters on the authority of a commentary or an alternate translation.
The final line of this passage has an editorial Sanskrit footnote attached to the character for “vow.” That note stands outside the body. It is neither included in the source layer nor used to decide the Sanskrit ground of the term “vow” in this passage. Under the rule governing ancient transmission and Chinese translation, the apparatus records that the note exists but does not use it to redefine the term.
The fascicle-front title and attribution in T360 and the historical question of translator attribution were recorded under placement among the recensions in the preceding unit. This unit does not adjudicate them again. The differences in personal names, numbers of lands, spans of time, and numbers of vows among the four translations and one assembly likewise remain witness-level comparisons; none is used to rewrite the base text.