大智度論 佛母品Dazhidulun — Mahāprajñāpāramitā-upadeśa · The Mother of the Buddhas

The Mother of the Buddhas: Why the Buddhas, Already Practising Quiescence, Guard Those Who Uphold the Sūtra; Why the Simile of Mother and Sons Establishes Prajñā as the Mother; Why It Is No Omission That Subhūti Asks Four and the Buddha Answers Three; Why Other Sūtras’ Saying That the Five Aggregates Are Broken and Ruined Does Not Contradict This Chapter’s Saying That They Are Neither Broken nor Ruined; Why, There Being No Mind or Mental-Factor Dharmas within Ultimate Emptiness, the Buddha Can Know the Minds of Beings; Why the Four Minds—Broad, Great, Immeasurable, and Invisible—Are All Explained by the Absence of Fixed Marks; Why the Five Eyes’ Not Seeing the Mind Becomes Instead Knowing It as It Really Is; Why Emerging, Sinking, Bending, and Stretching Gather Up All the Fourteen Difficult Questions; Why the Outside Paths’ Theories of the Nature of the World, of Atoms, of Spontaneity, and of the Lord of Heaven Are Alike Called Wrong Causes; and Why the Marks of Suchness of All Dharmas, Identical Layer upon Layer, Return in the End to One Suchness, Not Two

What Is Being Asked

The preceding chapter said that the buddhas of the ten directions and the great bodhisattvas guard prajñā and do not let Māra find an opening. The treatise-author reads out a doubt on the hearers’ behalf: the awakening of the buddhas is of the mark of quiescence, and towards dharmas and beings they have neither hatred nor love; since they have neither hatred nor love, why do they single out for guarding the people who write out, receive, and uphold prajñā? The simile of mother and sons with which this chapter opens is the answer the Buddha sets up for this doubt. A mother gives birth to five sons, ten, and so on up to a thousand; the mother falls ill, and the sons each diligently seek her cure and treatment, fearing that wind and cold and heat, mosquitoes, gadflies, snakes, and vipers might harm their mother’s body, and always seek things of comfort with which to make offerings to their mother—why? Because 「生育我等，示我世間」 tr. "she gave us birth and raised us; she showed us the world." The buddhas stand towards prajñā exactly as the sons towards their mother: prajñā can give birth to the buddhas, can give the buddhas omniscience, can show the mark of the world; therefore, though the buddhas practise quiescence, they still watch the deep prajñā constantly with the Buddha-eye, and this extends to the people who write out and uphold prajñā. The chapter’s name, 「佛母」 tr. "the Mother of the Buddhas," is established here.

Once the one simile is set up, it at once brings out the two main veins of the whole chapter. The first is 「能生諸佛」 tr. "can give birth to the buddhas": within prajñā are born the ten powers and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas and the omniscience of all kinds, and because one obtains these dharmas one is called a Buddha. The second is 「能示世間相」 tr. "can show the mark of the world": the five aggregates are the mark of the world, and prajñā shows the five aggregates as not broken and not ruined, not arising and not ceasing, not defiled and not pure, not increasing and not decreasing, not entering and not leaving, not within the three times—and this sentence at once collides with other sūtras’ 「五眾破壞，故名世間。」 tr. "The five aggregates are broken and ruined; therefore they are called the world." And so right here the treatise-author raises a question himself; the treatise-author answers it with the difference between the ways the Small Vehicle and the Great Vehicle speak the Dharma.

Following the second vein further down brings the passage of greatest weight in the whole chapter: because of prajñā the Buddha 「悉知無量無邊阿僧祇眾生心所行」 tr. "fully knows the workings of the minds of measureless, boundless, asaṃkhyeya beings." Within the deep prajñā there are no beings, no form, and so on up to no omniscience, and yet the Buddha, of all things, can know as it really is the mind of every being—the collected mind and the distracted mind, the stained mind, the hateful mind, and the deluded mind, the unstained mind, the mind without hatred, and the mind without delusion, the broad mind, the great mind, the immeasurable mind, the invisible mind, and in fascicle seventy these are continued and gathered up entirely with emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching. Subhūti asks matter by matter, and the Buddha answers matter by matter, and the answers are almost all in one and the same sentence-pattern: he does not see this, he does not see that, because the nature of the mind is non-existent. This is exactly the place in this chapter that most needs to be seen clearly—the Buddha’s 「如實知」 tr. "knowing as it really is" knows not some one mark of the mind, but the mind’s absence of fixed marks.

Fascicle seventy turns to emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching. The sūtra text, in the pattern of resting on form, resting on feeling, resting on perception, resting on constructions, resting on consciousness, sets out again, aggregate by aggregate, the four propositions that the soul and the world are permanent, impermanent, both permanent and impermanent, neither permanent nor impermanent; and further sets out the four propositions that the world has a limit or has no limit, that the soul is the body or other than the body, and the four propositions of going on thus after death—that is, the fourteen difficult questions of the outside paths. The treatise-author then sets out broadly the various schools of the outside paths: the two theories that the soul is permanent and that the soul is impermanent; the compromises of both permanent and impermanent and of neither permanent nor impermanent; the four theories of the origin of the world—the nature of the world, atoms, spontaneity, and the lord of heaven; the various theories of the eight directions and above and below having a limit or no limit; the two extremes of the soul being like a mustard seed or like a grain of rice and of the soul pervading all of space; and the four propositions of going on thus and not going on thus. They are set out with the greatest detail and gathered up with the greatest simplicity: the Buddha says that all take the five aggregates as their object and rest on the five aggregates, that there is no soul and nothing permanent. At the very end everything is gathered up with 「如」 tr. "suchness": the suchness of the five aggregates is the suchness of all dharmas; the suchness of the six perfections, the suchness of the thirty-seven limbs of the path, and so on up to the suchness of the buddhas are all one mark of suchness, not two and not different; because he obtains this mark of suchness, the Buddha is called the Tathāgata. What the opening asked was ‘how prajñā can give birth to the buddhas and can show the mark of the world’, and what the close answers is precisely this 「如」 tr. "suchness."

Passage by Passage

1. The simile of a mother who has sons—the root of the whole chapter. The Buddha does not first speak the principle; first he speaks of a mother. The sons are five, ten, and so on up to a thousand; the number keeps climbing in order to show that however many sons there are, they all come from one mother; the mother falls ill, and the sons each diligently seek her cure and treatment, and what they fear is wind and cold and heat, mosquitoes, gadflies, snakes, and vipers. The pivot of this simile is the reason the sons give in their own words: 「生育我等，示我世間。」 tr. "She gave us birth and raised us; she showed us the world." Giving birth and raising is 「能生」 tr. "can give birth"; showing the world is 「能示」 tr. "can show"—the two fulcrums of the simile are exactly the two merits of prajñā in what follows. Then the Buddha turns over to what the simile stands for: the Buddha always watches this deep prajñāpāramitā with the Buddha-eye, and the buddhas now present in the ten directions also watch it constantly with the Buddha-eye, because prajñā can give birth to the buddhas, can give the buddhas omniscience, can show the mark of the world. It is pushed one layer further: prajñā can give birth to dhyānapāramitā and so on up to dānapāramitā, can give birth to inner emptiness and so on up to the emptiness of non-existent and existent dharmas, can give birth to the four foundations of mindfulness and so on up to the eight limbs of the noble path, can give birth to the ten powers of a Buddha and so on up to the omniscience of all kinds, and so on up to being able to give birth to the srota-āpanna, the sakṛdāgāmin, the anāgāmin, the arhat, the pratyekabuddha, and the buddhas; the buddhas of the three times all obtain awakening because of the causes and conditions of the deep prajñā. Finally it comes down to persons: those who write out this deep prajñā, and so on up to those who rightly recollect it—the buddhas always watch these people with the Buddha-eye; those who seek the bodhisattva path the buddhas of the ten directions always guard, so that they do not turn back. The simile rises from the mother’s illness and ends in guarding persons—to guard the one who practises prajñā is precisely the sons saving their mother.

2. Subhūti asks four. Subhūti takes up what the Buddha has said and asks about four matters: how prajñā can give birth to the buddhas, how it can show the mark of the world, how the buddhas are born from prajñā, how the buddhas speak of the mark of the world. He asks so finely because 「能生」 tr. "can give birth" and ‘being born from’ run in two directions in the grammar, and the hearer easily takes them as two matters. These four questions are the groundwork for a passage of question and answer by the treatise-author further on.

3. The Buddha answers that it can give birth to the buddhas, and that the five aggregates are the mark of the world. The Buddha answers with the greatest economy: within the deep prajñā are born the ten powers of a Buddha and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas and the omniscience of all kinds, and because one obtains these dharmas one is called a Buddha—「佛」 tr. "Buddha" is not a person already there who then obtains prajñā; it is by obtaining these dharmas that one is called a Buddha, and therefore it is said that prajñā can give birth to the buddhas. The mark of the world is pointed out in a single sentence: the buddhas say that the five aggregates are the mark of the world. He does not speak of heaven and earth, he does not speak of beings; he speaks only of the five aggregates—the actual content of the world is just these five.

4. The question and answer about showing the mark of the five aggregates—it does not show them as broken or ruined. Subhūti asks again: within prajñā, how is the mark of the five aggregates spoken of, and how are the five aggregates shown? The Buddha’s answer is all negation: it does not show the five aggregates as broken, it does not show the five aggregates as ruined, it does not show arising and ceasing, it does not show defilement and purity, it does not show increase and decrease, it does not show entering and leaving, it does not show past, future, and present. Why is it so? The Buddha himself speaks the cause and condition: the mark of emptiness is not broken and not ruined, the mark of the signless and the mark of non-action are not broken and not ruined, the non-originating dharma, the non-arising dharma, and the nature of dharmas of the dharma without anything existent are not broken and not ruined—the mark that is shown is just so. What matters is the sentence 「相如是示」 tr. "the mark is shown thus": it is not that nothing is shown; it is that the mark shown is originally just so. When prajñā shows the world, what it shows is the world’s mark of being not broken and not ruined.

5. Within prajñā there are no beings and no form, and so on up to its not showing the omniscience of all kinds. The Buddha goes on to say: because of the deep prajñā the buddhas fully know the workings of the minds of measureless, boundless, asaṃkhyeya beings; and yet within this deep prajñā there are no beings and no name of beings, no form and no name of form, no feeling, perception, constructions, or consciousness, nor their names, no eye and so on up to no mind, no eye-consciousness and so on up to no mind-consciousness, no eye-contact and so on up to no mind-contact, and so on up to no omniscience and no name of omniscience—in this way it can show the mark of the world. Then he goes a step further: the deep prajñā also does not show form, does not show feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness, and so on up to does not show the omniscience of all kinds, because 「是深般若波羅蜜中尚無般若波羅蜜，何況色乃至一切種智」 tr. "within this deep prajñāpāramitā there is not even prajñāpāramitā, how much less form and so on up to the omniscience of all kinds." On one side it says he fully knows; on the other it says there is nothing and that it does not show—this is not self-contradiction: because nothing is shown, there is nothing that is not shown; precisely because within prajñā even prajñā is unfindable, the mark of the world that it shows does not fall upon any single dharma.

6. Knowing as it really is the collected mind and the distracted mind—knowing by the mark of dharmas. The Buddha sets out the enumeration of beings: whether with form or without form, whether with perception, without perception, or neither with perception nor without perception, whether in this world or throughout the worlds of the ten directions; whether these beings have a collected mind or a distracted mind, the Buddha knows as it really is. How does he know? The Buddha answers himself: he knows by the mark of dharmas. He further raises a question himself—by what mark of dharmas?—and the Buddha answers: in this mark of dharmas there is not even the mark of the mark of dharmas, how much less a collected mind or a distracted mind. This is the first appearance of the fixed form of the answers of the whole chapter—the so-called ‘knowing by the mark of dharmas’ is not taking a ruler to measure the mind; that ruler itself is also markless; because it is markless, nothing hinders it from knowing all marks.

7. The six gates of exhaustion, no staining, cessation, severance, quiescence, and separation. The Buddha again takes another road in speaking of the marks by which the mind is known: he knows by the mark of exhaustion, he knows by the mark of no staining, he knows by the marks of cessation, severance, quiescence, and separation. The six gates seem to stand side by side, but in fact they are six stages of a single road—from contemplating impermanence to exhaustion, from exhaustion to not being stained, by the worldly path holding back and extinguishing, by the path without outflows severing, from severance to quiescence, from quiescence to separation. The treatise-author has his own word-by-word explanation later (see passage 23); here we first record their names.

8. Knowing as it really is the stained mind, the hateful mind, and the deluded mind. The Buddha says that because of prajñā he knows the stained minds of beings, knows the stained mind as it really is; the hateful mind and the deluded mind he likewise knows as they really are. Subhūti asks its meaning, and the Buddha answers: 「染心如實相，則無染心相。」 tr. "The stained mind, in its real mark as it is, has no mark of a stained mind." Why? Within the real mark as it is, even mind and mental-factor dharmas are unfindable, how much less could one find a stained mind or an unstained mind. Hatred and delusion are the same as this. Here one must see clearly the grammar of 「如實知染心」 tr. "knowing the stained mind as it really is": what is known is the stained mind’s real mark as it is, and within the stained mind’s real mark as it is there is no stained mind—what is known is its non-existence, not its existence.

9. The unstained mind, the mind without hatred, the mind without delusion—two minds are not together. The Buddha goes on to say that he knows as it really is the unstained mind, the mind without hatred, and the mind without delusion of beings. Subhūti asks again, and the Buddha answers: within this mind’s mark of no staining, the mark of staining and the mark of not staining are both unfindable; why? 「二心不俱故。」 tr. "Because two minds are not together." These four Chinese characters are the eye of this passage. Thoughts arise in succession, and at one time there is only one mind; when the unstained mind is present the stained mind is already gone, and since the stained mind does not exist, the unstained mind that stands in dependence on it as its counterpart does not exist either—so within the real mark of no staining, neither end, stained or unstained, can stand.

10. The broad mind. The Buddha says he knows as it really is the broad minds of beings. Subhūti asks, and the Buddha answers: he knows that the mark of the minds of beings is neither broad nor narrow, neither increases nor decreases, neither comes nor goes; because the mark of the mind is separate, this mind is not broad, and so on up to it neither comes nor goes. Why? 「是心性無故」 tr. "because the nature of this mind is non-existent," who makes it broad, who makes it narrow, and so on to coming and going? The so-called knowing the broad mind as it really is is knowing that of this mind there is from the root no broadness to speak of—broad and narrow are names that depend on their counterparts, and since the nature of the mind is non-existent, the master who could make it broad or narrow does not exist either.

11. The great mind. The same pattern is walked once more: the Buddha does not see a mark of coming or a mark of going of the minds of beings, does not see a mark of arising, a mark of ceasing, a mark of abiding, or a mark of changing. Why? Because the nature of these minds is non-existent, who comes, who goes, who arises, ceases, abides, or changes? 「大」 tr. "Great" and 「廣」 tr. "broad" are almost synonyms in ordinary speech, yet the sūtra text divides them into two passages, each matched with its own set of marks: broad is matched with broad and narrow, increase and decrease, coming and going; great is matched with coming and going, arising, ceasing, abiding, and changing. Speaking of them separately is meant to let people know that what is negated is not one word but a whole way of grasping at marks.

12. The immeasurable mind. The Buddha answers: he knows these minds of beings, and sees neither abiding nor not abiding. Why? 「是無量心相無依止故」 tr. "because the mark of this immeasurable mind has no support," who has a place of abiding or not abiding? The two preceding passages negated broad and narrow and arising and ceasing; this passage negates a place of abiding. Because there is nothing to rest on, there is no place of abiding; because there is no place of abiding, it is immeasurable—the immeasurable is not being measured as very great; it is that there is from the root no place where a measure could be set down.

13. The invisible mind—empty of specific marks; the five eyes do not see. The last mind is the most perilous: it says both that it is invisible and that he knows it as it really is. The Buddha answers on two levels: first, the minds of beings are markless, and the Buddha knows as it really is their marklessness, because they are empty of specific marks; second, the Buddha knows the minds of beings, and the five eyes cannot see them. Only when these two sentences are seen together does one see that 「如實知不可見心」 tr. "knowing the invisible mind as it really is" is not a contradiction in terms—precisely because what the five eyes see is all a seeing that grasps at marks, not seeing becomes instead knowing its reality. Sūtra ① is gathered up at this point, and Treatise ① will set up a separate question and answer on this sentence (see passages 28 and 29).

14. The treatise-author’s opening explanation—taking up the doubt from the preceding chapter, and the simile of knowing the debt of kindness. When the treatise-author opens his explanation, his first move is to link this chapter back to the preceding one: above it was said that the buddhas of the ten directions and the great bodhisattvas guard prajñā, and so on up to the one who rightly recollects it, and do not let Māra find an opening. Hearing this, a hearer in the assembly might think—the awakening of the buddhas is of the mark of quiescence, and towards dharmas and beings they have neither hatred nor love; why do they guard those who write out and uphold prajñā? Once the doubt is set up, the Buddha’s simile of mother and sons is the answer. The treatise-author states the sense of the simile more plainly than the sūtra text: 「如子知恩故，守護其母。般若是十方諸佛母故」 tr. "As sons who know their debt of kindness guard their mother—because prajñā is the mother of the buddhas of the ten directions"; if Māra and the like make hindrances wishing to spoil and ruin prajñā, then the buddhas, although they practise the mark of quiescence, out of pity for beings and because they know their share of the debt of kindness, keep them constantly in thought with a mind of kindness and compassion and constantly see them with the Buddha-eye, guarding those who practise prajñā, so that they gain increase and do not lose the path of the Buddha. Quiescence and guarding do not hinder each other—quiescence is having neither hatred nor love, guarding is knowing the debt of kindness and pity, and in the Buddha’s case both hold at the same time.

15. All the worthies and sages and the dharmas of the worthies and sages are born from prajñā. The treatise-author points out the cause and condition the Buddha himself speaks after the simile: 「諸賢聖及賢聖法皆從般若中生。」 tr. "All the worthies and sages and the dharmas of the worthies and sages are born from within prajñā." That long string in the sūtra text—‘can give birth to dhyānapāramitā and so on up to the omniscience of all kinds, can give birth to the srota-āpanna and so on up to the buddhas’—the treatise-author gathers up in one sentence: both sides, persons and dharmas, come from prajñā. This sentence is also the proof of the two Chinese characters 「佛母」 tr. "the Mother of the Buddhas": it is not an honorific; it is a relation of birth.

16. Four questions and three answers—giving birth and being born from do not differ in meaning. The treatise-author raises a question himself: Subhūti asked about four kinds of things; why does the Buddha answer only three matters and not say 「諸佛從般若中生」 tr. "the buddhas are born from within prajñā"? Answer: that prajñā gives birth to the buddhas and that the buddhas are born from prajñā do not differ in meaning. The treatise-author then distinguishes why some take them as two matters: 「有人言：諸法和合故能生般若波羅蜜，般若波羅蜜能生諸佛；有人行般若波羅蜜及眾行，得成佛。初謂作者，二謂法。」 tr. "Someone says: because dharmas come together they can give birth to prajñāpāramitā, and prajñāpāramitā can give birth to the buddhas; someone practises prajñāpāramitā and the many practices, and attains buddhahood. The first speaks of the maker, the second speaks of the dharma." One speaks from the side of the maker, one from the side of the dharma; though the ways of speaking are two, the matter itself is one. The treatise-author then settles it with another simile: whether one says 「墮枝殺人」 tr. "a falling branch killed a man" or says 「墮樹殺人」 tr. "a falling tree killed a man"—the way of speaking of branch and tree differs, but the event of killing a man is the same, and so no separate answer is needed. To say that prajñā can give birth to the buddhas is already to have said that the buddhas are born from prajñā. To answer one question fewer is not an omission in answering; it is because the meaning is not two.

17. Other sūtras say that the five aggregates are broken and ruined, and here it is said that they are neither broken nor ruined. The second question is harder: as other sūtras say, 「五眾破壞，故名世間」 tr. "the five aggregates are broken and ruined; therefore they are called the world," why is it said here that prajñā shows the five aggregates as without breaking, ruin, arising, ceasing, and the like? The treatise-author answers with the difference of their lines of teaching: that is the matter of the Small Vehicle; this is the matter of the Great Vehicle. The Dharma of the Small Vehicle speaks much of impermanence, the Dharma of the Great Vehicle speaks much of the emptiness of dharmas; the Small Vehicle first speaks of impermanence and afterwards of the emptiness of dharmas, the Great Vehicle speaks of the emptiness of dharmas from the very start; the Small Vehicle speaks of impermanence in order to make beings fear, and the Great Vehicle is not so, and therefore it speaks of there being no breaking, ruin, and the like. And he cites as proof the cause and condition the Buddha himself speaks: 「空、無相、無作，終不破、不壞。」 tr. "Emptiness, the signless, non-action are never broken, never ruined." The two sūtras are two places to set one’s hand—one startles people from the side of ruin, one shows directly from the side where there was never any ruin; the treatise-author judges only the difference between the Small Vehicle and the Great Vehicle, and does not say whether or not the two sūtras contend with each other.

18. The five aggregates are called the world; mental factors are hard to know; by the power of skilful means he can know. The treatise-author explains further: the five aggregates are called the world; the bodies, shapes, and forms of beings are easy to know, while the other mental-factor dharmas, having no shape, are hard to know; therefore the Buddha tells Subhūti 「無量阿僧祇眾生心所行皆知」 tr. "the workings of the minds of measureless asaṃkhyeya beings he knows all." He then points out that crucial turn—within the deep prajñā, though there are no beings and no form and such dharmas, and so on up to no omniscience of all kinds, yet it is 「以般若方便力而能知眾生心所行」 tr. "by the power of the skilful means of prajñā that he can know the workings of the minds of beings"; and because within this prajñā there is ultimate emptiness, it does not show form and such dharmas, and so on up to the omniscience of all kinds. The joint where 「無」 tr. "there is nothing" meets 「能知」 tr. "he can know" lies in the three Chinese characters 「方便力」 tr. "the power of skilful means." The treatise-author further takes up the cause and condition the Buddha himself speaks: 「般若波羅蜜中尚無般若相，何況色等法！」 tr. "Within prajñāpāramitā there is not even the mark of prajñā, how much less form and such dharmas!"

19. What shows the world—the enumeration of beings distinguished item by item. The treatise-author assigns that string of the enumeration of beings in the sūtra text item by item: ‘with form’ means beings of the desire realm and the form realm; ‘without form’ means beings of the formless realm. As to ‘with perception’, apart from the Heaven of No Perception and the Heaven of Neither Perception nor Non-perception, the rest are with perception; ‘without perception’ means the beings without perception; ‘neither with perception nor without perception’ means the gods of the place of the Summit of Existence. ‘This world’ means the three-thousand great-thousand world; ‘throughout the ten directions’ means the remaining measureless, boundless, asaṃkhyeya worlds. The last sentence gathers it up: of the beings of the three times in the six destinies of these worlds, the Buddha fully knows their collected minds and distracted minds. This passage is one of the rare passages of pure distinction in the whole chapter, and in reading it one need not seek anything recondite—it only counts out clearly the extension of the four Chinese characters 「一切眾生」 tr. "all beings," so that the following 「佛悉知」 tr. "the Buddha fully knows" has a definite denominator.

20. Subhūti’s doubt, and the Buddha’s answer of the wisdom of the real mark. The treatise-author speaks out on Subhūti’s behalf the strangeness in his mind: 「諸佛常樂行寂滅諸法空，今云何遍知無始無邊眾生攝心、亂心？佛心一，眾生心無量種，云何一時知一切眾生心？」 tr. "The buddhas always delight in practising the quiescence and emptiness of dharmas; how now do they know throughout the collected minds and distracted minds of beginningless, boundless beings? The Buddha’s mind is one, the minds of beings are of measureless kinds; how does he know the minds of all beings at one time?"—the difficulty of one and the measureless the treatise-author states more plainly than the sūtra text. Hence the question 「佛云何知」 tr. "how does the Buddha know?" The Buddha answers: because of the wisdom of the real mark of all dharmas he knows the collected minds and distracted minds of beings. Subhūti asks again what the real mark of all dharmas is, and Answer: namely, ultimate emptiness; of this ultimate emptiness even the nature of ultimate emptiness is unfindable, how much less a collected mind or a distracted mind.

21. Within ultimate emptiness, how does he know the mind? The treatise-author raises a question himself once more, pressing the difficulty to its extreme: within the ultimate emptiness of the real mark of all dharmas there are no discriminating mind and mental-factor dharmas; how does the Buddha know their minds? The answer is in two parts. The first part takes as its ground what the Buddha himself says: the nature of the real mark of all dharmas is also unfindable, and with this wisdom he knows the collected minds and distracted minds of beings; why? 「若空性可得，應有難；空性不可得，云何作難？」 tr. "If the nature of emptiness were findable, there should be a difficulty; the nature of emptiness being unfindable, how can a difficulty be made?"—the difficulty is built on the premise that ‘emptiness is a findable thing’; once the premise does not hold, the difficulty naturally falls empty. The second part states positively why he knows: now the Buddha has passed beyond all the false dharmas of recollection, imagining, and discrimination, and abiding securely in the real mark, knows the minds of all beings as they really are; because the minds of beings abide within false dharmas, they cannot know other beings as they really are. The difference between the Buddha’s being able to know and beings’ not being able to know lies not in the size of the mind but in abiding in the real mark and abiding in falsity.

22. The division into first in brief and then in full. The treatise-author inserts a sentence of sectional division: first it speaks in brief of 「知他心」 tr. "knowing the minds of others," next it distinguishes the collected minds and distracted minds of beings, namely those with the three poisons and those without the three poisons, broad, great, immeasurable, invisible, emerging, sinking, bending, stretching, and so on. This sentence lists in one breath the whole table of contents of Sūtra ① and Sūtra ②, and it is the most convenient map for reading this chapter—every question and answer below falls within this table of contents.

23. The explanation of the six gates of exhaustion, no staining, cessation, severance, quiescence, and separation. The treatise-author explains the six gates word by word: Subhūti asks about matter after matter; first he is answered that it is because of the real mark of all dharmas that the Buddha knows the collected mind and the distracted mind; next, that he knows by exhaustion, no staining, cessation, severance, quiescence, and separation. 「盡者，無常慧」 tr. "Exhaustion is the wisdom of impermanence"; the bodhisattva practises this mind of the wisdom of impermanence and separates from all worldly staining—this is no staining. To use the worldly path to hold back and extinguish the fetters is called cessation. To sever with the path without outflows is therefore called severance. Having severed the fetters, one contemplates nirvāṇa’s marks of quiescence and separation—this is quiescence and separation. By these causes and conditions one obtains the real mark of all dharmas; by the real mark of all dharmas, one knows that the collected minds and distracted minds of others are all the real mark. The six gates, then, are not six kinds of knowing; they are one road that enters the real mark from impermanence, and once one has walked it through, one naturally knows the minds of others.

24. The mind arising and ceasing thought by thought cannot be known; contemplation by the gate of exhaustion; the real mark of the stained mind. The treatise-author goes on to set forth the gate of exhaustion: this mind arises and ceases thought by thought; the future does not exist and so cannot be known; the present ceases thought by thought, and because there is no time of abiding it cannot be known. Ordinary people grasp at marks and discriminate, and within the three times recollect, imagine, and see falsely, and say that they know the thoughts of the mind—what ordinary people call knowing the mind knows only the marks they themselves have made. Contemplating by the gate of exhaustion is precisely ultimate emptiness; because of ultimate emptiness there is nothing to be attached to, and at that time one obtains the path, knows the real mark of all dharmas, does not falsely think and discriminate about any dharma, and then knows the minds of others as they really are. He then turns to the stained mind: all dharmas, entering into the nature of dharmas, are pure, and therefore it says: 「染心實相，是中無染心。何以故？如實中無心無心數法，何況染心！」 tr. "The real mark of the stained mind—within it there is no stained mind. Why? Within the real as it is there is no mind and there are no mental-factor dharmas, how much less a stained mind!" The hateful mind and the deluded mind are also thus.

25. The mark of the unstained mind; two minds are not together; dharmas that depend on their counterparts do not exist. The treatise-author explains the passage on no staining: within the mark of the unstained mind there is no mark of a stained mind, because the stained mind is from the beginning non-existent; nor is there a not-stained mind, for the unstained mind is of the mark of quiescence and has nothing to discriminate. Here the Buddha himself speaks the cause and condition: 「須菩提！二心不俱故。」 tr. "Subhūti! Because two minds are not together." The treatise-author unfolds these four Chinese characters into a most lucid piece of reasoning: it is the dharma of beings that mind after mind arises in succession, and when there is the unstained mind, then there is no stained mind; the past stained mind has already ceased, the future one is not yet, and in the present there is the unstained mind, so there is no stained mind; because there is no stained mind, there is also no not-stained mind, because dharmas that depend on their counterparts do not exist. Therefore within the real mark of no staining there is neither a stained mind nor a not-stained mind. The mind without hatred and the mind without delusion are also thus. This passage is where the whole chapter speaks most plainly of ‘two dharmas depending on each other as counterparts’—break one end, and the other end falls of itself.

26. Broad and narrow, increase and decrease, have no fixed mark. The treatise-author explains the passage on broad and great: the broad and narrow, increasing and decreasing mind are all beings’ grasping at marks and discriminating; the Buddha does not know in this way. Why? This mind has no form and no shape, no place of abiding, and ceases thought by thought, so there is no difference of broad and narrow, increase and decrease. Here the Buddha himself speaks the cause and condition: 「心性相無故，廣狹等不可得。」 tr. "Because the nature and mark of the mind are non-existent, broad and narrow and the like are unfindable." The treatise-author further marks the place to consult: the meaning of broad and narrow, increase and decrease, great and small, is as spoken of among the four immeasurable minds—it is not repeated in this chapter.

27. The four meanings of the immeasurable mind, and the simile of eye-consciousness having no place of abiding. The treatise-author explains the immeasurable and gives four meanings: the broad mind and the great mind are precisely immeasurable; because it takes measureless beings as its object it is called immeasurable; because it takes the measureless dharma of nirvāṇa as its object it is called immeasurable; because the mark of the mind cannot be grasped it is called immeasurable. The four meanings go from coarse to subtle, and only the last is the true intent. He then brings out a simile: as eye-consciousness arises from the causes and conditions of there being an eye and there being form, this consciousness is not in the eye, not in the form, not in between, not here, not there, and therefore it has no place of abiding; if it truly has no place of abiding, how can it have anything that it does? Whether fine or ugly, like things seen in a dream, one cannot seek a real, fixed mark in them. The mind is also thus: because it has no support it has no fixed mark, and so it is called 「無量」 tr. "immeasurable." The simile of eye-consciousness best repays effort—consciousness has plainly arisen, yet one cannot point out where it is; the mind’s being ‘immeasurable’ is exactly this having nowhere that can be pointed to. The last sentence adds: broad and great should also be explained in this way, distinguished according to their meaning.

28. The question and answer on the invisible mind—the false seeing of people who sit in meditation. The treatise-author asks himself: if one knows that the mind is invisible, why does the Buddha say 「如實知不可見心」 tr. "he knows the invisible mind as it really is"? The answer first sets out the marks of the sickness: there are people who sit in meditation who recollect, imagine, and discriminate, and see this mind as like a thread within a pure jewel; people who contemplate the white skeleton see the mind arising in successive continuity; or at times they see the mind as being in the body; or they see it as being in its object, as in the sphere of boundless consciousness, where one sees only consciousness as measureless and boundless. These four are all states that really occur in meditation, and all are grasping at marks. In order to break such falsity as this, the Buddha says 「如實知眾生心，眾生心自相空故無相相」 tr. "he knows the minds of beings as they really are; because the minds of beings are empty of specific marks, they are of the mark of the signless." It can be seen that the phrase 「如實知不可見」 tr. "knowing the invisible as it really is" is a word of remedy: what it remedies is precisely the kind of seeing in which the one who applies effort takes himself to have seen the mind.

29. Contemplated with the five eyes, the mind is unfindable. The treatise-author then examines with the five eyes one by one: the fleshly eye and the divine eye take form as their object and so do not see; the wisdom-eye takes nirvāṇa as its object and so does not see; the Dharma-eye, at the time of first awakening, discriminates and knows dharmas as wholesome and unwholesome, with outflows and without outflows, and so on, but on entering the real mark it has nothing to discriminate, as was said before, 「一切法無知者、無見者」 tr. "all dharmas have no knower and no seer," and therefore it should not see; the Buddha-eye contemplates the mark of quiescence and so should not see. Then comes the turning word: the minds of beings, where there is one who sees, are seen as they really are; not seen in the way ordinary people see by recollection, imagining, and discrimination. At the end he adds one more principle: the five eyes arise from the coming together of causes and conditions and are all made dharmas, false and deceptive, not real; the Buddha does not trust them and does not use them, and therefore it says 「不以五眼見」 tr. "he does not see with the five eyes." The five eyes’ not seeing is not a lack of ability; it is not using that kind of seeing—fascicle sixty-nine ends here.

30. The heading question of emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching. Fascicle seventy, after heading the chapter title again, takes up the sūtra text’s table of contents from the previous fascicle and goes on to speak of the fifth class: because of the deep prajñā the Buddha knows as it really is the emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching of the mental factors of beings. Subhūti asks according to precedent. What was spoken of before this is the substance of the mind (collected and distracted, stained and pure, broad and great, immeasurable, visible and invisible); emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching speak of the movements of the mind—the momentum by which beings rise and sink, advance and retreat, within birth and death.

31. The fourteen difficult questions rest on the five aggregates—the four propositions of permanent and impermanent set out again aggregate by aggregate. The Buddha’s answer first sets out a general rule: the emerging, sinking, bending, stretching, and so on of the mental factors of all beings all arise resting on form, feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness. Then, in the most regular pattern, it spreads them out item by item: ‘the soul and the world are permanent; this is true and the rest is false speech’—this view rests on form; impermanent, both permanent and impermanent, neither permanent nor impermanent, one item each, alike rest on form; then resting on feeling, resting on perception, resting on constructions, resting on consciousness, each walks through the four propositions once more. The sūtra text, never tiring of it, sets out twenty items, and the whole intent lies in that unchanging tail—‘this view rests on such-and-such’. However the content of wrong views may change its patterns, the place they come from is only one: the five aggregates. In reading this passage one may not skip lines; skip them and one cannot see that this repetition is itself the speaking of the Dharma.

32. The four propositions that the world has a limit or has no limit. Next it sets out: the world has a limit, has no limit, both has a limit and has no limit, neither has a limit nor has no limit—the four propositions are all views that rest on form; resting on feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness is also thus. The pattern is the same as before; only the topic is changed—from permanent and impermanent in time to having a limit and having no limit in space.

33. The soul is the body; the soul is other and the body is other. Again it sets out a pair: ‘the soul is the body’—this view rests on form; ‘the soul is other and the body is other’—this view rests on form; resting on feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness is also thus. This pair is not four propositions but two, because the sameness or difference of body and soul has only the two kinds, identical or separate.

34. The four propositions of going on thus after death. Lastly it sets out: after death there is one who goes on thus, there is not one who goes on thus, there both is and is not one who goes on thus, there neither is nor is not one who goes on thus—the four propositions are all views that rest on form; resting on feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness is also thus. What is asked about is the existence or non-existence of later lives; what they rest on is still the five aggregates.

35. Conclusion—knowing emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching as they really are. The Buddha concludes: thus, because of prajñāpāramitā, the Buddha knows as they really are the emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching of beings. After a long string of wrong views has been counted out, the conclusion is only one sentence—what the Buddha knows is not which of these views is right; what the Buddha knows is how these views arise resting on the five aggregates and how they make people sink and float.

36. The Buddha knows the mark of form, and the marks of suchness of all dharmas are identical layer upon layer. The sūtra text turns abruptly, from wrong views to 「如」 tr. "suchness." The Buddha knows the mark of form—how does he know it? As suchness is suchness and is not ruined, without discrimination, without mark, without recollection, without idle discourse, without attainment, so too is the mark of form; so too are the marks of feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness. And so the Buddha knows the mark of the suchness of beings and the mark of the suchness of the emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching of the mental factors of beings. Next comes the most famous string of identities in the whole chapter: the mark of the suchness of the five aggregates and the mark of the suchness of all formations are precisely the mark of the suchness of all dharmas; as for the mark of the suchness of all dharmas, the mark of the suchness of the six perfections is precisely the mark of the suchness of the thirty-seven limbs of the path, the mark of the suchness of the thirty-seven limbs of the path is precisely the mark of the suchness of the eighteen emptinesses, the eighteen emptinesses are precisely the eight liberations, the eight liberations are precisely the nine successive absorptions, the nine successive absorptions are precisely the ten powers of a Buddha, the ten powers of a Buddha are precisely the four fearlessnesses, the four unobstructed knowledges, great loving-kindness and great compassion, and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas, the eighteen unshared dharmas are precisely the omniscience of all kinds, the omniscience of all kinds is precisely wholesome dharmas and unwholesome dharmas, worldly dharmas and world-transcending dharmas, dharmas with outflows and dharmas without outflows, dharmas without outflows are precisely past, future, and present dharmas, the dharmas of the three times are precisely conditioned dharmas and unconditioned dharmas, the conditioned and the unconditioned are precisely the fruit of the srota-āpanna, the fruit of the srota-āpanna is precisely the fruit of the sakṛdāgāmin, the fruit of the sakṛdāgāmin is precisely the fruit of the anāgāmin, the fruit of the anāgāmin is precisely the fruit of the arhat, the fruit of the arhat is precisely the path of the pratyekabuddha, the path of the pratyekabuddha is precisely anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi, the mark of the suchness of anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi is precisely the mark of the suchness of the buddhas—the marks of the suchness of the buddhas are all one mark of suchness, not two and not different, not exhausted and not ruined; this is called the mark of the suchness of all dharmas. Because of prajñā the Buddha obtains this mark of suchness, and for this cause and condition prajñā can give birth to the buddhas and can show the mark of the world; he knows the mark of the suchness of all dharmas, the mark that is not not-such, the mark that is not different, and because he obtains this mark of suchness the Buddha is called the Tathāgata. Above it was said that the five aggregates are the mark of the world, and that it shows the five aggregates as not broken and not ruined; only here is it made clear what, in the end, is shown: what is shown is suchness.

37. The mark of suchness is very deep; who can believe and understand it? Subhūti marvels at its great depth, and asks who can believe and understand it, and answers himself: only avaivartika bodhisattvas and persons complete in right view, and arhats whose outflows are exhausted; why? Because this dharma is very deep. The Buddha answers why it is deep: 「是如無盡相故甚深。」 tr. "This suchness is very deep because it is of the mark of inexhaustibility." Subhūti asks again what dharma is very deep because it is of the mark of inexhaustibility, and the Buddha says: because all dharmas are inexhaustible; the Buddha, having obtained this suchness of all dharmas, speaks it for beings. Sūtra ② ends with this—the great depth lies not in being hard to understand but in being inexhaustible; because it is inexhaustible there is no place where it can be exhausted, and because there is no place where it can be exhausted it is not something that those who grasp at marks can believe.

38. The treatise-author’s general explanation of emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching. Treatise ② opens its explanation: the Buddha fully knows all that all beings do and practise, the various wrong views such as the sixty-two wrong views, and the various afflictions such as the ninety-eight fetters, and therefore it says 「佛知眾生心心數法出、沒、屈、申」 tr. "the Buddha knows the emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching of the mind and mental-factor dharmas of beings." With his first stroke of the brush the treatise-author places those twenty items, the four propositions, and the two propositions of the sūtra text into the old account of the sixty-two views and the ninety-eight fetters—what the sūtra text lists is not something new; it is the general register of the mental activity of all beings.

39. The glosses on sinking and emerging, bending and stretching. The treatise-author gives the glosses word by word. 「沒」 tr. "Sinking": householders are sunk by craving and the various afflictions; 「出」 tr. "emerging": those who go forth into the ninety-six kinds of wrong view are called emerging. Again, because one is always attached to worldly pleasure it is called sinking; or one knows impermanence, fears, and seeks the path, and so it is called emerging. Again, one receives the dharmas of the ninety-six kinds of path, and because one cannot obtain the right path one sinks back into the world. 「屈」 tr. "Bending" is not leaving the desire realm; 「申」 tr. "stretching" is leaving the desire realm; leaving and not leaving the form realm is also thus. The most important point in these glosses is this: going forth and seeking the path can also sink back—after emerging one does not necessarily not sink, and this is the foreshadowing of the fish simile in the next passage.

40. The simile of watching fish from above a clear pool. The treatise-author brings out a simile: like a person standing above a clear pool watching fish—some are always in the water, some come out for a moment and sink again, some come out and look at the four quarters, some come out wishing to cross, come near the bank, and sink again. He then applies the simile: the Buddha with the Buddha-eye contemplates the beings of the six destinies of the ten directions—there are those who are always attached to the five desires, whose minds are covered by the afflictions, and who do not seek to get out; or there are those who have a good mind, can give and can keep the precepts, but because wrong doubt covers the mind they sink again; there are those who get out of the five desires and can obtain the dharma of warmth, the dharma of the summit, and so on, and contemplate the four truths, but because they have not obtained the real dharma they sink again; there are those who leave the five desires and so on up to the sphere of nothing whatsoever, but because they do not obtain nirvāṇa they sink again. The four kinds of people go from coarse to subtle, and the last kind has already reached the sphere of nothing whatsoever and still sinks again. This simile is the mirror in the whole chapter closest to the practitioner’s own person: the higher one emerges, the more to be regretted the sinking, and the reason for sinking is in every case not yet having obtained the real dharma.

41. What are the marks of emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching?—the reckoning of a soul. The treatise-author next asks: what are the marks of emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching? Here the Buddha says, namely, 「神及世間常」 tr. "the soul and the world are permanent." He then explains the soul: as for the soul, ordinary people recollect, imagine, and discriminate, and because they grasp at marks following the mind of self, they reckon that there is a soul. And he marks the twofold division of the outside paths’ theories of the soul: first, permanent; second, impermanent. One must see clearly the order of this sentence of the treatise-author—first there is 「我心取相」 tr. "the mind of self grasping at marks," and afterwards 「計有神」 tr. "reckoning that there is a soul"; the soul is not there first and then recognised; it is made by the mind that grasps at marks.

42. The four schools: the soul is permanent, the soul is impermanent, both permanent and impermanent, neither permanent nor impermanent. The treatise-author sets out the reasons of each school in turn. Those who reckon the soul permanent always cultivate merit and virtue, because afterwards they receive its fruit and retribution, or because by practising the path the soul obtains liberation—the permanent is set up in order to set up a bearer for karmic fruit and for liberation. Those who say the soul is impermanent act for the sake of fame and gain in this life—it comes down to the reckonings of the present life. As for both permanent and impermanent, someone holds that the soul is of two kinds: first, subtle and abiding permanently; second, presently acting; that which presently acts is impermanent at the time the body dies, and the subtle soul is permanent—a compromise between the two schools. As for neither permanent nor impermanent, the treatise-author cites the reasoning they state themselves: 「有人言：神非常非無常。」 tr. "Someone says: the soul is neither permanent nor impermanent." Their reason is that in both permanent and impermanent there are faults—if the soul were impermanent, there would be no sin and merit; if permanent, there would also be no sin and merit. Why? If permanent, then suffering and pleasure would not differ, just as space cannot be wetted by rain nor dried by wind and sun; if impermanent, then suffering and pleasure would change, just as wind and rain, inside an ox-hide, make it rot and fall apart. The last sentence exposes the root of the sickness: 「以我心故，說必有神，但非常非無常。」 tr. "Because of the mind of self, they say there must be a soul, only it is neither permanent nor impermanent." However contrary the four schools’ ways of speaking, they all come from one 「我心」 tr. "mind of self."

43. The four kinds of wrong view all take the five aggregates as their object. The treatise-author cites the Buddha’s words to settle it: 「四種邪見，皆緣五眾，但於五眾謬計為神。」 tr. "The four kinds of wrong view all take the five aggregates as their object; they only mistakenly reckon the five aggregates to be a soul." The contention of the four propositions is a contention over the attributes of something that originally does not exist, and so the contention can reach no result—this sentence is also exactly the meaning of the sūtra text’s saying again and again 「是見依色」 tr. "this view rests on form" and 「依受、想、行、識亦如是」 tr. "resting on feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness is also thus."

44. The three kinds of world and the four views about the world. The treatise-author explains the ‘world’ of 「神及世間」 tr. "the soul and the world": there are three kinds of world—first, the five-aggregate world; second, the world of beings; third, the world of lands. Here two kinds are spoken of: the five-aggregate world and the world of lands; the world of beings is precisely the soul. Within the mark of the world there are also four kinds of wrong view. The merit of this distinction lies here: within the four Chinese characters of the sūtra text 「神及世間」 tr. "the soul and the world," the soul already includes the world of beings, and what remains is the five aggregates and lands.

45. The difficulty that the soul is originally non-existent while the world exists. The treatise-author sets up a question, and it is the most forceful question of this passage: because the soul has from the beginning been non-existent, it should be wrong; the world exists—how can it be the same as the wrong view of a soul? Answer: it only refutes the marks of permanence and impermanence raised upon the world; it does not refute the world. He then brings out a simile: it is like a blind man who gets hold of a snake and takes it for a necklace, and a man with eyes tells him that this is a snake, not a necklace—what is refuted is the mistaken recognition of 「以為瓔珞」 tr. "taking it for a necklace," not a denial of the snake as well. The treatise-author then sets it forth positively: the Buddha refutes the inversion of the world’s permanence; he does not refute the world; why? Because impermanence is seen directly. Nor may one say that there is no impermanence, because sin and merit are not lost, because what is done comes from past deeds. Permanent and impermanent both have faults; neither permanent nor impermanent has the fault of attachment to the world. The four propositions are each refuted for their faults, and the world remains as it is.

46. The world has a limit—seeking the origin and not finding a beginning. The treatise-author turns to having a limit and having no limit, first setting out the line of reasoning of those who hold 「有邊」 tr. "has a limit": someone seeks the root of the world and does not find its beginning; if its beginning is not found, then there is no middle and no end; if there is no beginning, middle, or end, then there is no world; therefore the world should have a beginning, and the beginning is precisely a limit. This is an inference from ‘there must be’ to ‘there certainly is’—in setting out the theories of the outside paths, this chapter never mocks; it only states their line of reasoning as it is, letting people see for themselves where the weight of the inference falls.

47. The theory of the nature of the world—awareness, self, the five subtle atoms, the four great elements, the five faculties. The treatise-author describes one school in detail. One who has obtained dhyāna, by the power of the knowledge of former lives, sees the events of eighty thousand kalpas, and beyond that can no longer know; he sees only the consciousness of the intermediate existence at the beginning of the body, and reflects to himself: 「此識不應無因無緣，必應有因緣，宿命智所不能知。」 tr. "This consciousness should not be without cause and without condition; it must have causes and conditions, which the knowledge of former lives cannot know." And so he recollects, imagines, and discriminates: there is a dharma called the nature of the world, which is not known by the five faculties, because it is extremely subtle. Within the nature of the world, awareness first arises, and awareness is precisely the consciousness of the intermediate existence; from awareness arises self; from self arise the five kinds of subtle atoms, namely form, sound, smell, taste, and touch; from the atom of sound arises the great element of space, from sound and touch arises the great element of wind, from form, sound, and touch arises the great element of fire, from form, sound, touch, and taste arises the great element of water, from form, sound, touch, taste, and smell arises the great element of earth; from space arises the ear faculty, from wind arises the body faculty, from fire arises the eye faculty, from water arises the tongue faculty, from earth arises the nose faculty—thus gradually from the subtle to the coarse. As for the nature of the world, from the nature of the world it comes to the coarse, and from the coarse it turns back to the subtle and returns to the nature of the world. He further brings out the simile of a lump of clay: just as a lump of clay contains within it the natures of pots, jars, and the like, clay is made into a pot, the pot is broken into a jar, and in such transformation nothing at all is lost; the nature of the world is also thus, transforming into the coarse. The nature of the world is a permanent dharma and comes from nowhere, as the Sāṃkhya Scripture explains at length. The treatise-author records where it comes from without adding reproach—what is to be seen is why this school sets up a nature of the world: because the knowledge of former lives reaches its end at eighty thousand kalpas, and where one cannot see the beginning, one makes a beginning.

48. Atoms are a permanent dharma. Again, someone asserts that the first limit of the world is called atoms. Atoms are a permanent dharma; they cannot be broken, cannot be burnt, cannot be rotted, cannot be destroyed, because they are subtle; only by waiting upon the coming together of the causes and conditions of sin and merit is there a body, whether of a god or of the hells and so on; because they have no father and mother, when the causes and conditions of sin and merit are exhausted, they scatter and are destroyed. It has the same sickness as the school of the nature of the world, in a different shape: one pushes the beginning to an extremely subtle 「性」 tr. "nature," the other to an extremely subtle 「塵」 tr. "atom."

49. The two theories of spontaneity and the lord of heaven; wrong causes are the limit. Two more schools: someone takes spontaneity as the beginning of the world, and poverty and wealth, nobility and baseness are not obtained by vows and practice; someone says the lord of heaven is precisely the beginning of the world, making auspiciousness and inauspiciousness, misfortune and fortune, heaven and earth and the myriad things, and when this dharma ceases, the god takes them back again. The treatise-author settles them all in one sentence: 「如是邪因，是世界邊。」 tr. "Such wrong causes are the limit of the world." The four schools—the nature of the world, atoms, spontaneity, the lord of heaven—return alike to one name: wrong causes. The so-called view of having a limit is in fact seeking a beginning for the world and seeking the wrong cause.

50. Suffering and pleasure exhaust themselves and reach the limit of their own accord; the simile of the ball of thread. One more theory: beings, receiving suffering and pleasure life after life until it is exhausted, reach the limit of their own accord; as when a ball of thread is thrown from a mountain-top, it stops of itself when the thread runs out. Receiving sin and receiving merit, all come together in the end to exhaustion, and vigour and slackness make no difference. The harm of this theory the treatise-author has already made visible by means of its own statement—its conclusion is that cultivating and not cultivating are the same, and this is exactly the consequence of the view of limits coming down upon the gate of practice.

51. The various theories that the world of lands has a limit. Two more theories are set out: someone asserts that the world of lands has a limit in the eight directions and only above and below has no limit; someone asserts that down to the eighteen hells and up to the Summit of Existence, above and below have a limit, and the eight directions have no limit. The treatise-author concludes: thus in various ways they speak of the limit of the world. The two theories are exactly opposite, and alike they set the limit in some one set of directions.

52. The world of beings has a limit—the soul like a mustard seed, like a grain of rice. One more theory: the world of beings has a limit. As it is said that the soul is in the body, like a mustard seed, like a grain of rice, or, some say, one inch; in a large person the soul is large, in a small person the soul is small. The treatise-author points out the reason: they say the soul is a form dharma and has parts, and so they say the soul has a limit. When the soul is taken as something with volume, the theory of having a limit follows along.

53. No limit—the soul pervading all of space. As for 「無邊」 tr. "has no limit": someone asserts that the soul pervades all of space, is present everywhere, and where it obtains a body it can perceive suffering and pleasure; this is called the soul having no limit. With the previous theory it forms exactly the two extremes: one shrinks the soul to a mustard seed, one expands the soul to pervade all of space; alike they take the soul as an existent thing with extent.

54. The world of lands is beginningless; the ten directions have no limit. Again: someone says the world of lands is beginningless; if it had a beginning, then it would be without causes and conditions, and afterwards it would also be endless, one would always receive bodies, and this would break nirvāṇa; this is called having no limit. Again, they say the world of lands has no limit in the ten directions. In such ways as these, they say the world of the soul and the world of lands have no limit. This school’s reason for setting up beginninglessness is the fear that having a beginning would fall into being without cause—the direction of the inference is exactly opposite to that of the school of having a limit in passage 46, and alike they set up their theory on one of the two ends of existence and non-existence.

55. Both has a limit and has no limit. When 「有邊」 tr. "has a limit" and 「無邊」 tr. "has no limit" are paired, the third proposition comes out: someone says the world of the soul has no limit and the world of lands has a limit; or says the world of the soul has a limit and the world of lands has no limit, because, as said above, the soul is form; or says above and below have a limit and the eight directions have no limit. The treatise-author concludes: thus, putting together the above two dharmas, it is called 「有邊無邊」 tr. "both has a limit and has no limit." The third proposition is not a new view; it is a patching together of the first two.

56. Neither has a limit nor has no limit. The fourth proposition: someone sees that having a limit has faults and having no limit also has faults, and so does not say it has a limit and does not say it has no limit, and clings to 「非有邊非無邊」 tr. "neither has a limit nor has no limit" as the reality of the world. The treatise-author uses the word 「著」 tr. "clings"—having avoided both extremes, one still wants to set up something real, so the fourth proposition is not a way out; it is a more hidden grasping.

57. The soul is the body. It turns to the sameness or difference of body and soul. Someone says the body is precisely the soul; why is this? Because when this body is analysed, the soul is sought and cannot be found; again, receiving fine and ugly, suffering and pleasure, is all the body, and therefore they say the body is precisely the soul. This school’s ground is in fact not finding the soul—not finding it, they simply take the body as the soul.

58. The body is other and the soul is other—wrong view and extreme view. Someone says the soul is subtle, is not reached by the five faculties, and is not seen by ordinary people either; only people who collect the mind, are pure, and obtain dhyāna and concentration can see it, and therefore they say the body is other and the soul is other. The treatise-author further distinguishes the difference between the two views: if the body is precisely the soul, then when the body ceases the soul also ceases—this is wrong view; to say the body is other and the soul is other, that when the body ceases the soul remains permanently—this is extreme view. Alike they reckon a soul, but where they fall is different—one annihilation, one permanence.

59. The separate account of going on thus after death. The treatise-author heads those who hold 「死後有如去」 tr. "after death there is one who goes on thus," and then sets up a question: before, permanent, impermanent, and so on were spoken of, which is precisely later lives existing or not existing; why now speak separately of the four propositions of going on thus? Answer: above, the permanence or impermanence of the whole world was spoken of in general; because the matter of 「後世有無」 tr. "the existence or non-existence of later lives" is important, it is spoken of separately. And he explains the name ‘going on thus’: 「如去」 tr. "going on thus" means that as a person comes here and is born, so in going on to a later life it is likewise. The reason a separate gate is set up is that the existence or non-existence of later lives is of the most urgent concern to the practitioner—permanent and impermanent are a contention over principle; going on thus and not going on thus are a matter of one’s own life.

60. Going on thus and not going on thus; neither going nor not going. He sets them out school by school: someone says that in a former life one came from nowhere, and at cessation also goes nowhere; someone says that the body and the soul come together to make a person, and after death the soul goes on and the body does not go on—this is called 「如去不如去」 tr. "both going on thus and not going on thus"; as for 「非有如去非無如去」 tr. "neither is there one who goes on thus nor is there not one who goes on thus," because they see faults in going and in not going, they say neither going nor not going. The treatise-author then puts in one more needle: 「是人不能捨神，而著『非去非不去』。」 tr. "This person cannot relinquish the soul, and clings to ‘neither going nor not going’." It is the same way of judging as in passage 56—the sickness of the fourth proposition lies not in the proposition but in being unable to relinquish that soul.

61. The conclusion of the fourteen matters—wishing to emerge, one sinks. The treatise-author gathers it up: such wrong views, afflictions, and so on as these are called 「心出、沒、屈、伸」 tr. "the emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching of the mind." Why is this? Because those of wrong view seek by various paths to emerge and cannot, wishing to emerge they sink; because the power of wrong view is great and hard to dissolve, the fourteen matters of permanent, impermanent, and so on are spoken of. The four Chinese characters 「欲出而沒」 tr. "wishing to emerge, one sinks" are the verdict on the whole passage, and they also answer the fish simile of passage 40—those who emerge and sink again are precisely these views.

62. The Buddha says all take the five aggregates as their object; the suchness of the five aggregates. The treatise-author cites the Buddha’s words to settle the outside paths as a whole: although the outside paths recollect, imagine, and discriminate in every kind of way, the Buddha says they 「皆緣五眾、依止五眾，無神、無常」 tr. "all take the five aggregates as their object and rest on the five aggregates; there is no soul and nothing permanent." And he goes a layer further: the Buddha knows the five aggregates as empty, signless, of non-action, without idle discourse; he only knows the suchness of the five aggregates, not as ordinary people see, falsely, deceptively, and invertedly. The refutation of wrong views stops here, and what follows turns from 「五眾如」 tr. "the suchness of the five aggregates" to the suchness of all dharmas—the joint between refuting and establishing lies in this sentence.

63. The suchness of the five aggregates is precisely the suchness of all dharmas. The treatise-author explains the identities of the sūtra: as the suchness of the five aggregates, so too is the suchness of all dharmas. Why? Two dharmas include all dharmas, namely the conditioned and the unconditioned; the five aggregates are conditioned dharmas, and the suchness of the five aggregates is precisely an unconditioned dharma. He further brings out the reason from the side of practice: by examining, reckoning, and considering the five aggregates one can practise the six perfections, and therefore it says 「五眾如即是一切法如，一切法如即是六波羅蜜如」 tr. "the suchness of the five aggregates is precisely the suchness of all dharmas, and the suchness of all dharmas is precisely the suchness of the six perfections." The reason the treatise-author gives why that long string of identities in the sūtra text can hold is extremely simple: the two dharmas of the conditioned and the unconditioned already include everything, and the five aggregates and the suchness of the five aggregates are exactly these two dharmas.

64. The order of those who practise the six perfections, and the suchness of wholesome and unwholesome dharmas. The treatise-author goes on to explain: the bodhisattva who practises the six perfections seeks the real path, contemplates the five aggregates as impermanent and empty, and gives rise to the thirty-seven limbs of the path, the eight liberations, the nine successive absorptions, and so on—this is the śrāvaka path; knowing them, he passes straight on, and practises the eighteen emptinesses, the ten powers, and the other dharmas of the buddhas; all are right contemplation of the five aggregates and the suchness of the five aggregates, and because they are without discrimination, all are the suchness of all dharmas. Therefore it says 「善法如即是不善法如，不善法如即是善法如」 tr. "the suchness of wholesome dharmas is precisely the suchness of unwholesome dharmas; the suchness of unwholesome dharmas is precisely the suchness of wholesome dharmas." In this passage the four Chinese characters 「知已直過」 tr. "knowing them, he passes straight on" must be seen clearly—the dharmas of the śrāvaka path are not left uncultivated; they are cultivated and not dwelt in. Worldly and world-transcending dharmas are also thus.

65. One may not cling to wholesome dharmas; all are one mark of suchness. The treatise-author gives a turning word: therefore the practitioner may not cling to wholesome dharmas, and so on up to anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi; the mark of the suchness of the Buddha is also thus; all are one mark of suchness, not two and not different. Why is this? Seeking the reality of dharmas, one reaches ultimate emptiness, and there is no further difference. Not even awakening, not even the mark of the suchness of the Buddha, may be clung to—because the reason there is no difference is not that differences are smoothed away; it is that when one seeks through to the real, there is naturally no difference.

66. The conclusion that prajñā can give birth to the buddhas and can show the mark of the world. The treatise-author concludes: the suchness of all dharmas such as these the Buddha obtains because of prajñāpāramitā, and therefore it says 「般若波羅蜜能生諸佛、能示世間相」 tr. "prajñāpāramitā can give birth to the buddhas and can show the mark of the world." The words with which the whole chapter opened here receive their complete explanation—what is born is the Buddha who obtains the mark of suchness; what is shown is the suchness of all dharmas.

67. Subhūti marvels at what has never been; who can believe? The treatise-author explains Subhūti’s marvelling: the suchness of all dharmas is very deep, accords with them and does not go against them; the suchness of the buddhas of the three times and the ten directions is precisely the suchness of all dharmas, and because they understand this suchness of all dharmas they speak the Dharma in various ways for beings. And he distinguishes the capacities that can believe: this very deep suchness is hard to understand and hard to believe; avaivartika bodhisattvas, who have entered the position of dharmas and received the prediction, can believe; 「具足正見人」 tr. "persons complete in right view" are the persons of the three paths; arhats whose outflows are exhausted can believe because they do not accept any dharma. He adds one more meaning: those who have faith, being near to the avaivartika, are all included among the avaivartika, and so are not spoken of separately—the sūtra text lists only three kinds, not because it omitted the rest, but because they are already included within them.

68. Because all dharmas are inexhaustible, suchness is inexhaustible. The treatise-author explains the Buddha’s answer: the Buddha tells Subhūti 「一切法無盡故，是如無盡」 tr. "because all dharmas are inexhaustible, this suchness is inexhaustible"; because suchness is inexhaustible, those who have obtained the noble path can believe. He further explains why the noble ones can believe and ordinary people cannot: because of differences within the unconditioned dharma there are the paths of the srota-āpanna and the rest, and because they hear the dharma they themselves have obtained, they can believe; ordinary people are attached to false, deceptive, and inverted dharmas and so cannot believe. The ground of being able to believe is not cleverness; it is having tasted it oneself—what they hear is the dharma they themselves have obtained.

69. Because they obtain this suchness of all dharmas they are called Tathāgatas. The last sentence of the whole chapter: the Buddha tells Subhūti that because the buddhas obtain this suchness of all dharmas, they are called Tathāgatas, are called the omniscient ones, and can teach beings and bring them to nirvāṇa. Three names run through in one line: because they obtain suchness they are called Tathāgatas; because suchness leaves nothing unexhausted they are called the omniscient ones; because they obtain it and can give it to others they can teach beings and bring them to nirvāṇa. The chapter begins with ‘prajñā can give birth to the buddhas’ and ends with ‘because they obtain this suchness they are called Tathāgatas’—the Buddha who is born is precisely what suchness brings to completion.

Do Not Misread

Do not read 「佛母」 tr. "the Mother of the Buddhas" as merely a reverent simile. The use to which the treatise-author puts this simile is to resolve a real doubt: the buddhas are quiescent, with neither hatred nor love; why do they guard the people who uphold the sūtra? The answer is not ‘the Buddha is very compassionate’ but 「知恩分故」 tr. "because they know their share of the debt of kindness"—prajñā gives birth to the buddhas, gives the buddhas omniscience, shows the buddhas the mark of the world, and the buddhas owe prajñā the kindness of birth; to guard those who practise prajñā is precisely the sons saving their mother. If the simile of mother and sons is read as a warm literary way of speaking, the real meaning of this 「知恩」 tr. "knowing the debt of kindness" is lost. Conversely, do not read 「母」 tr. "mother" as there being a substantial entity that gives birth either: the sūtra text goes straight on to say that within the deep prajñā there are no beings, no form, and so on up to no omniscience, and not even prajñāpāramitā itself—it can give birth and yet has no self-nature; this is the true measure of the two Chinese characters rendered here as ‘mother of the buddhas’.

Do not read ‘prajñā shows the five aggregates as not broken and not ruined’ as contradicting the sūtras that speak of impermanence. The treatise-author answers clearly: that is the matter of the Small Vehicle; this is the matter of the Great Vehicle; the Small Vehicle speaks much of impermanence, first of impermanence and afterwards of the emptiness of dharmas, and speaks of impermanence to make beings fear; the Great Vehicle speaks much of the emptiness of dharmas and speaks of the emptiness of dharmas from the very start. The capacities the two places address are different, and the gates they set up are different; it is not two positions contending with each other. Still less may one conclude from this that the Great Vehicle does not speak of impermanence—in passage 64 the treatise-author says precisely that the bodhisattva 「觀五眾無常、空」 tr. "contemplates the five aggregates as impermanent and empty" and gives rise to the thirty-seven limbs of the path; impermanence is still the place of entry, only one does not stop there.

Do not read 「如實知眾生心」 tr. "knowing the minds of beings as they really are" as some formidable power of knowing the minds of others. Every answer in the sūtra text negates: does not show, does not see, unfindable, without fixed mark, without place of abiding, the five eyes cannot see. The treatise-author further exposes what ordinary people call knowing the mind—ordinary people grasp at marks and discriminate, and within the three times recollect, imagine, and see falsely, and say that they know the thoughts of the mind. The Buddha’s knowing is knowing, while abiding in the real mark, the mind’s absence of fixed marks; if one reads it as the Buddha illuminating one by one, in the manner of recollection and grasping at marks, the contents of the minds of beings, one falls precisely on the side that the sūtra text refutes—what is refuted is the knowing that grasps at marks, not 「如實知」 tr. "knowing as it really is" and 「悉知」 tr. "fully knowing" themselves; the treatise-author says plainly later on that the Buddha fully knows what beings do and practise, their wrong views and afflictions, and both sides stand together. The four marks of seeing the mind of the people who sit in meditation cited in passage 28—seeing the mind as like a thread within a pure jewel, seeing the mind arising in successive continuity, seeing the mind as being in the body, seeing the mind as being in its object—are exactly this misreading appearing in the work of practice.

Do not read ‘the five eyes do not see’ as disparaging the five eyes. The treatise-author explains one by one what each eye takes as its object: the fleshly eye and the divine eye take form as their object and so do not see, the wisdom-eye takes nirvāṇa as its object and so does not see, the Dharma-eye on entering the real mark has nothing to discriminate and so should not see, the Buddha-eye contemplates the mark of quiescence and so should not see—each sentence is ‘not seeing because of what it takes as its object’, not ‘not seeing because it is unable’. At the end he states it clearly: the minds of beings, where there is one who sees, are seen as they really are. What does not see is the seeing that grasps at marks; seeing as it really is remains as it is.

Do not read that long string of the outside paths’ theories in Treatise ② as a miscellany. The nature of the world, atoms, spontaneity, the lord of heaven, the ball of thread, the soul like a mustard seed, the soul pervading space—however many are listed, the treatise-author’s verdicts are only a few, and each points to the same root: recollecting, imagining, and discriminating, grasping at marks following the mind of self, they reckon that there is a soul; such wrong causes are the limit of the world; this person cannot relinquish the soul. If in reading one remembers only the strangeness of each school’s theory, one misses what the treatise-author really wants people to see—however great the divergence of these views, where they arise is one and the same mind that grasps at marks. Nor, because the treatise-author sets out their theories in detail, should one suppose that he is adopting them: setting out and judging are kept quite distinct—setting out uses 「有人言」 tr. "someone says" and 「有人說」 tr. "someone asserts," judging uses 「佛言」 tr. "the Buddha says" and 「是故說」 tr. "therefore it says."

Do not read that string of identities of 「諸法如相」 tr. "the marks of suchness of all dharmas" as a declaration of equivalence. The treatise-author gives the reason: two dharmas include all dharmas, namely the conditioned and the unconditioned; the five aggregates are conditioned dharmas, and the suchness of the five aggregates is precisely an unconditioned dharma. The identities hold because what is spoken of all along is 「如」 tr. "suchness," not those dharmas themselves; and the closing sentence 「不得著善法，乃至阿耨多羅三藐三菩提」 tr. "one may not cling to wholesome dharmas, and so on up to anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi" guards precisely against people taking ‘one suchness, not two’ as a pretext for not distinguishing right from wrong. One suchness is that when one seeks the real through to ultimate emptiness there is naturally no difference; it is not a levelling out in practice.

Bearing on Practice

The first use is the sense of position that the simile of mother and sons gives. The person who practises prajñā often feels alone—the Dharma is deep, few can speak of it together, and its states are hard to tell. This chapter tells you: this one Dharma that you keep is the mother of the buddhas; the buddhas constantly watch this Dharma with the Buddha-eye, and constantly watch the person who upholds this Dharma too. The sūtra text says it most concretely: those who write out this deep prajñā, and so on up to those who rightly recollect it—the buddhas always watch these people with the Buddha-eye; those who seek the bodhisattva path the buddhas of the ten directions always guard, so that they do not turn back. These are not words of consolation; they are the first thing that this chapter, in opening its theme and setting up its simile, sets out to say.

The second use is a method of examining the mind. The marks of the mind asked about in this chapter the treatise-author himself divides as 「先略說「知他心」，次分別眾生攝心、亂心，所謂三毒、無三毒者，廣、大，無量，不可見，出、沒，屈、申等」 tr. "first it speaks in brief of ‘knowing the minds of others’, next it distinguishes the collected minds and distracted minds of beings, namely those with the three poisons and those without the three poisons, broad, great, immeasurable, invisible, emerging, sinking, bending, stretching, and so on," and the answer to each question takes one and the same approach: it does not see that mark, because the nature of the mind is non-existent. In daily life, when the mind stirs and thoughts move, one can examine by this—what I am certain of at this moment, ‘my mind is very distracted’, ‘my mind is very broad’, ‘my mind is very small’: is it a mark the mind originally has, or a mark I have taken up? The treatise-author says it clearly: the broad and narrow, increasing and decreasing mind are all beings’ grasping at marks and discriminating. See through one grasping at marks, and there is one layer less of binding oneself.

The third use lies in the four Chinese characters 「二心不俱」 tr. "two minds are not together." What is most painful for the practitioner is the standoff with the afflictions—on one side the stained mind is present, on the other one wants to set up an unstained mind to counteract it, and so two minds battle all day long. The treatise-author’s reasoning can be taken up and used directly: mind after mind arises in succession, and when there is the unstained mind, then there is no stained mind; because there is no stained mind, there is also no not-stained mind, because dharmas that depend on their counterparts do not exist. When the stained mind is present one need not make another opponent; watch it arise in succession and cease in succession, and the two ends that depend on each other fall away together of themselves.

The fourth use is turning the simile of watching fish from above a clear pool upon oneself. The four kinds of people: those who do not seek to get out at all; those who can give and keep the precepts but, because wrong doubt covers the mind, sink again; those who obtain warmth and the summit and contemplate the four truths but, not having obtained the real dharma, sink again; those who leave the five desires and so on up to the sphere of nothing whatsoever but, not obtaining nirvāṇa, sink again. The further along, the more they resemble people who have gained something by their effort, and yet they are still 「還沒」 tr. "sinking again." This simile should be kept always in mind: emerging is not a matter of once only, and the reason for sinking is in every case not yet having obtained the real dharma; the ease that comes at some stage of one’s effort is exactly when it is easiest to come near the bank and sink again.

The fifth use is the admonition about seeing the mind in sitting meditation. Seeing the mind as like a thread within a jewel, seeing the mind arising in continuity, seeing the mind as being in the body, seeing the mind as being in its object—the treatise-author lists these four marks so concretely that it can be seen they are states that really occur in meditation. If one who applies effort, in stillness, sees some shape of the mind and gives rise to delight, this passage can serve as an examination on the spot: it is precisely to break such falsity that the Buddha says 「如實知眾生心，眾生心自相空故無相相」 tr. "he knows the minds of beings as they really are; because the minds of beings are empty of specific marks, they are of the mark of the signless." What is seen is never it.

The sixth use lies in the spur of the phrase 「欲出而沒」 tr. "wishing to emerge, one sinks." The treatise-author says that those of wrong view seek by various paths to emerge and cannot, and wishing to emerge, they sink. Seeking to emerge is itself good; the reason one cannot get out lies in view—if view is not right, then the greater the strength the deeper the sinking, and this is also why the schools of the outside paths, the more finely they reason, the further they stray. Here the practitioner should know that choosing one’s view matters more than the diligence of one’s effort.

The seventh use is the pair 「知已直過」 tr. "knowing them, he passes straight on" and 「不得著善法」 tr. "one may not cling to wholesome dharmas." The bodhisattva contemplates the five aggregates as impermanent and empty and gives rise to the thirty-seven limbs of the path, the eight liberations, the nine successive absorptions; these dharmas must be cultivated; they are cultivated and not dwelt in, and so it is said, knowing them, he passes straight on. Going further up, not even awakening, not even the mark of the suchness of the Buddha, may be clung to. The use in daily life is this: in all the good one cultivates, give it one’s full strength while cultivating it, and do not keep it once it is past—if kept, the wholesome dharma itself becomes a new attainment.

Further Resonances

The backbone of this chapter is two passages of sūtra and two passages of treatise explanation. Sūtra ① begins from the simile of a mother who has sons, establishes that prajñā can give birth to the buddhas and can show the mark of the world, and that the buddhas constantly watch the deep prajñā with the Buddha-eye, extending to those who write out and uphold it; Subhūti asks four, the Buddha answers three matters, marking out that the five aggregates are the mark of the world; next it says that prajñā shows the five aggregates as not broken and not ruined, not arising and not ceasing, and so on up to not within the three times; next it says that within the deep prajñā there are no beings and no form, and so on up to no omniscience, and yet the Buddha fully knows the workings of the minds of beings; then it shows one by one knowing as it really is the collected mind and the distracted mind, knowing by the mark of dharmas, knowing by the six gates of exhaustion, no staining, cessation, severance, quiescence, and separation, knowing the stained mind, the hateful mind, and the deluded mind, knowing the unstained mind, the mind without hatred, and the mind without delusion, knowing the broad mind, the great mind, the immeasurable mind, and the invisible mind, and gathers them up at the end with the five eyes being unable to see. Treatise ① first sets up the doubt on the hearers’ behalf—the buddhas being quiescent, why do they guard the people who uphold the sūtra?—and answers it with the simile of guarding the mother out of knowing the debt of kindness; next it cites what the Buddha himself says, 「諸賢聖及賢聖法皆從般若中生」 tr. "all the worthies and sages and the dharmas of the worthies and sages are born from within prajñā"; it answers the difficulty of four questions and three answers, bringing out the simile of the falling branch and the falling tree; it answers the difficulty that other sūtras speak of the five aggregates as broken and ruined, judging the difference between the ways the Small Vehicle and the Great Vehicle speak the Dharma; it explains that the five aggregates are called the world, that mental factors are hard to know, that by the power of skilful means he can know, and distinguishes the enumeration of beings; it speaks out on Subhūti’s behalf the doubt of the one and the measureless, answering with the wisdom of the real mark of all dharmas, and answers again how, within ultimate emptiness, he knows the mind; it sets up the division into first in brief and then in full; it explains the six gates word by word, explains arising and ceasing thought by thought and contemplation by the gate of exhaustion, explains the real mark of the stained mind, the mark of the unstained mind and two minds not being together, dharmas that depend on their counterparts not existing, explains broad and narrow, increase and decrease having no fixed mark, explains the four meanings of the immeasurable mind and brings out the simile of eye-consciousness having no place of abiding; at the end it sets up the question and answer on the invisible mind, cites the four kinds of false seeing of people who sit in meditation, examines with the five eyes one by one, and makes clear that not seeing is precisely seeing as it really is. Fascicle sixty-nine ends here, and fascicle seventy heads the chapter title again for the remainder. Sūtra ② goes on to speak of the emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching of the mental factors, setting out item by item, in the pattern of resting on form, feeling, perception, constructions, and consciousness, the four propositions of the soul and the world being permanent or impermanent, the four propositions of the world having a limit or having no limit, the two propositions of the soul being the body or other than the body, and the four propositions of going on thus after death, concluding with knowing as it really is; next it says that the Buddha knows the mark of form, as suchness is suchness and is not ruined, and so on up to the marks of suchness of all dharmas being identical layer upon layer, all one mark of suchness, not two and not different, and that because he obtains this mark of suchness the Buddha is called the Tathāgata; at the end Subhūti marvels at its great depth, and the Buddha answers that suchness is very deep because of its mark of inexhaustibility. Treatise ② explains emerging, sinking, bending, and stretching, ties them to the sixty-two views and the ninety-eight fetters, gives the glosses of sinking and emerging, bending and stretching, sets up the simile of watching fish from above a clear pool and applies it to the four kinds of beings; it explains the reckoning of a soul and the outside paths’ twofold theory, sets out in turn the four schools of the soul being permanent, impermanent, both permanent and impermanent, and neither permanent nor impermanent, and cites the Buddha’s words to settle that all take the five aggregates as their object; it divides the three kinds of world, answers the difficulty of ‘the soul being originally non-existent while the world exists’, and brings out the simile of the blind man taking a snake for a necklace; it sets out broadly the various theories of having a limit and having no limit—seeking the origin and not finding a beginning, the nature of the world and the simile of the lump of clay, atoms, spontaneity, the lord of heaven, the simile of the ball of thread, the various theories of the eight directions and above and below, the soul like a mustard seed and the soul pervading all of space, the world of lands being beginningless—and judges that wrong causes are the limit; it explains the wrong view and the extreme view of the soul being the body and the body being other and the soul other, explains separately the four propositions of going on thus after death, and concludes with wishing to emerge and sinking, and so speaking of the fourteen matters; at the end it turns from the suchness of the five aggregates into the suchness of all dharmas, makes clear that the two dharmas of the conditioned and the unconditioned include everything, explains that the suchness of wholesome dharmas is precisely the suchness of unwholesome dharmas, admonishes that one may not cling to wholesome dharmas and so on up to awakening, and concludes that prajñā can give birth to the buddhas and can show the mark of the world, and that because they obtain this suchness of all dharmas they are called Tathāgatas.

In the vein of meaning linking this chapter with the chapters before and after it, three lines can be seen. First, the treatise-author at the very opening marks for himself what he carries on from: above it was said that the buddhas of the ten directions and the great bodhisattvas guard prajñā, and so on up to the one who rightly recollects it, and do not let Māra find an opening—that is exactly the meaning of guarding in the preceding chapter; what this chapter answers is the question ‘being already quiescent, why do they guard?’, and so the simile of mother and sons is not starting a new fire; it continues speaking on from the guarding of the preceding chapter. Second, this chapter’s axis of ‘prajñā can give birth to the buddhas’ runs through with the meaning, set forth again and again in the preceding chapters, that prajñā gathers up all the perfections and gives birth to all the worthies and sages; and the sūtra text, setting 「能生」 tr. "can give birth" side by side with 「能示」 tr. "can show," also gives a turning word on the mark of the world and the meaning of the five aggregates spoken of in the chapters before this—what is shown is not the breaking and ruin of the five aggregates but the suchness of the five aggregates. Third, the 「如」 tr. "suchness" established at the end of this chapter is developed further in the chapters that follow: since Sūtra ② has said that the marks of suchness of all dharmas are not two and not different, and that because he obtains this mark of suchness he is called the Tathāgata, the teaching of asking about marks later on comes on from this; the reader may view the preceding and following chapters together, to see the single continuity of the meaning of the mother of the buddhas and the teaching of the mark of suchness.

On the ancient masters’ sectional division of this chapter there is one further line that may be recorded. Jizang, in his Commentary on the Larger Sūtra, explaining this chapter, divides it by three meanings—first, being able to give birth; second, guarding in repayment of practice; third, being able to bring to completion—and, to make clear the meaning of wisdom as father and mother, compares the Vimalakīrti Sūtra’s 「智度菩薩母，方便以為父」 tr. "the perfection of wisdom is the bodhisattva’s mother, skilful means is taken as the father" with what he cites, 「大論云：般若以為母，般舟三昧以為父」 tr. "The Great Treatise says: prajñā is taken as the mother, the pratyutpanna samādhi is taken as the father" (the original text of the treatise, in fascicle one hundred, reads 「佛以般若為母、般舟三昧為父」 tr. "the Buddha has prajñā as mother and the pratyutpanna samādhi as father"; Jizang cites it in abridged form); he divides the next chapter, "Asking about Marks," into three, the second division being precisely 「明佛知般若恩故報恩」 tr. "making clear that the Buddha, knowing the kindness of prajñā, therefore repays the kindness," and the meaning of repaying kindness in this chapter is continued there. This division of 「報恩」 tr. "repaying kindness" corresponds to the variant name 「報恩品」 tr. "Chapter of Repaying Kindness" under which one line of this chapter’s transmitted texts titles it; this exposition records them side by side without judging which is correct; the full account of the variant chapter titles, of the division of fascicles in the transmitted texts, and of the witnesses on both sides is detailed in the Apparatus.