大智度論 畢定品之下Dazhidulun — Mahāprajñāpāramitā-upadeśa · Certainty, Part 2 of 2

Certainty, Last Part: The Three Dharmas Are Unfindable; All Dharmas Enter Prajñā; the Perfection of the Supernormal Powers and Teaching the Dharma according to the Occasion; the Causes and Conditions Complete and the Faults of Giving with a Clinging Mind

What Is Being Asked

The fascicle of the First Part answers, from beginning to end, a single question: is the bodhisattva assured, or unassured? The sūtra text starts from Subhūti's question, and the Buddha answers that he is assured; asked in what path he is assured, the Buddha answers not in the paths of the two vehicles but in the path of the Buddha; asked what kind of person is assured, the Buddha answers that the three kinds—the one who has first aroused intent, the avaivartika, and the one in his last body—are all without exception assured. Once it is granted that even the one of first intent is assured, the difficulty arises in its wake—does the assured person still fall into the evil destinies? The Buddha asks back, taking as his example that sages such as the person of the eight and the srota-āpanna are not born in the evil destinies, and Subhūti himself answers that they do not fall. Then the sūtra text turns to a still harder place: since the bodhisattva does not fall into the evil destinies, why is it said in the sūtras that the bodhisattva takes the body of an animal in order to deliver beings? The Buddha answers that this is a manifestation by skilful means, not something received as the retribution of deeds; and with three similes—the animal body conjured by the Buddha, the transformation body of the arhat, and the elephants, horses, men, and women conjured by a conjurer—he presses Subhūti one by one, 「是實不」 tr. "is this real or not?", and Subhūti answers one by one that it is not real. The sūtra text of the First Part ends with Subhūti's praise—that the bodhisattva, by the power of great skilful means and having obtained the noble wisdom without outflows, takes all kinds of forms according to those who are to be delivered, in order to deliver beings; below this comes the treatise-author's explanation, and fascicle 93 ends with the treatise text's answer. Since it is not a real receiving, then on what grounds can the bodhisattva manifest in this way and not be stained? That question lies in the Last Part.

The Last Part comes on from this, and the very first sentence of the sūtra text as the fascicle opens is a complete question—「世尊！菩薩摩訶薩住何等白淨法，能作如是方便力而不受染污？」 tr. "World-Honored One! Abiding in what kind of white and pure dharma is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva able to bring about such a power of skilful means, and yet not be stained?" What is asked is no longer whether he is assured or not, but where the assured person's capital lies. Everything said in the whole unit from here on grows out of this question.

The Buddha's answer has the bones of only one sentence: by means of prajñāpāramitā. But under this one sentence a cause and condition is at once laid in—「著者、著法、著處，是三法皆不可得，自性空故」 tr. "the one who clings, the dharma clung to, and the place of clinging—these three dharmas are all unfindable, because they are empty of self-nature". So not being stained is not holding oneself back from being stained; it is that the three matters—the person able to cling, the dharma clung to, and the place of clinging—do not stand at all, from the root; the three matters not standing, staining has nowhere to settle. This is the first joint of the whole unit.

Once the first joint is set up, the second difficulty follows hard upon it: if it relies only on prajñā, then do not the six perfections and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas all fall empty? The Buddha does not answer head-on, but asks back with one sentence: 「頗有法不入般若波羅蜜者不」 tr. "is there any dharma at all that does not enter prajñāpāramitā?" Subhūti presses again on this very question: since prajñā is empty of self-nature, how can there still be going out and entering within emptiness? The Buddha asks back a third time—since you grant that all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas are all empty, then all dharmas ought precisely to enter into emptiness; how is it that you say, on the contrary, that within emptiness there is no going out and no entering? When the questioning reaches this point, the sūtra text does not record Subhūti's answer, but turns directly to the next question; the treatise-author, explaining this place, says that Subhūti 「心伏受解」 tr. "was subdued in his mind and received understanding". What is subdued is not that he was beaten down; it is that he saw that his own way of asking had taken emptiness as a place with boundaries.

The mind once subdued, the topic turns. Subhūti no longer asks about emptiness, but changes to asking about matters: abiding within the emptiness of all dharmas, how can one give rise to the supernormal powers? How can one go to the lands of the ten directions to make offerings to the buddhas, hear the Dharma, and plant roots of goodness? This is the second joint of the whole unit, and also the longest passage. The Buddha's answer still plants its feet on emptiness—precisely because the lands are empty and the buddhas too are empty, and emptiness is partial to nothing, the power of the skilful means of prajñā is able to give rise to the perfection of the supernormal powers. Then the Buddha lays out the use of the supernormal powers in two layers: first, in general, that with the divine eye he sees the ten directions and flies there to enrich beings; next, setting up the teaching according to the occasion—for the stingy he speaks of giving, for those who break morality he speaks of morality, for those who hate and quarrel he speaks of kindness, for the lazy he speaks of vigour, for the distracted he speaks of meditative concentration, for the deluded he speaks of wisdom; further on come the broad marks of the six supernormal powers one by one—the divine eye sees lands and beings, the divine ear hears the Buddha-dharma and the voices of humans and non-humans, the knowledge of others' minds knows minds, the knowledge of former lives recollects former births, the supernormal power of going at will goes and comes to make offerings to the buddhas, the supernormal power of the exhaustion of outflows speaks the dharma of the exhaustion of outflows. At the end it is held fast with one simile, 「如鳥無翅不能高翔」 tr. "like a bird without wings, which cannot fly high": a bodhisattva without the supernormal powers cannot teach and transform beings at will.

The third joint comes at the end. The Buddha says that sporting in the supernormal powers can purify buddha-lands and bring beings to accomplishment, and says further that if one does not purify buddha-lands and does not bring beings to accomplishment one does not obtain awakening, because 「因緣不具足」 tr. "the causes and conditions are not complete". Subhūti thereupon asks what it is for the causes and conditions to be complete, and the Buddha answers: all wholesome dharmas; asked again what wholesome dharmas are, the Buddha lays out dānapāramitā and everything below it up to the eighteen unshared dharmas as one full ledger, and at the very first item points out the vital point—「無分別是施者、是受者，性空故」 tr. "there is no discriminating who is the giver and who is the receiver, because they are empty of nature". When the treatise-author's explanation reaches this place, he turns this one sentence into a whole passage written from the reverse side: what faults has giving with a clinging mind? The faults are threefold—if things do not accord with one's wishes, anger arises; if one craves wealth and it is seized, one commits a heavy sin; if one grasps at false and deceptive marks, the retribution is small and impure; and there is a further fault, the deepest of all: hearing of ultimate emptiness, one relinquishes the dharma one was practising and turns to cling to the mark of emptiness, 「失二種法」 tr. "losing two kinds of dharma". At the end it closes with the bodhisattva relinquishing the clinging mind, not grasping at the mark of emptiness, and dedicating to the Buddha path, and comes home to one sentence of summary: 「無所分別心，能行布施等，是名真菩薩道。」 tr. "With a mind that discriminates nothing he can practise giving and the rest: this is named the true bodhisattva path."

So what is to be read in the Last Part is the full account of the capital behind the First Part's two Chinese characters 「畢定」 tr. "assured". The First Part speaks of who the assured person is, in what path he is assured, whether or not he falls into the evil destinies—it speaks of position. The Last Part speaks of on what grounds the assured person can enter birth and death and not be stained, on what grounds he can give rise to the supernormal powers and not cling, on what grounds he can practise wholesome dharmas and not grasp at marks—it speaks of the root. Position is the mark of the fruit; the root is the causal practice. The two Chinese characters of the chapter's name, "Certainty", are complete only when the First Part and the Last Part are viewed together: being assured is not being granted a title; it is that the three dharmas are unfindable and the mind has nothing to cling to, and so there is no ground for retreat.

Passage by Passage

1. Subhūti asks about the white and pure dharma. After the continuing title of fascicle 94, the sūtra text at once raises a question: 「世尊！菩薩摩訶薩住何等白淨法，能作如是方便力而不受染污？」 tr. "World-Honored One! Abiding in what kind of white and pure dharma is the bodhisattva-mahāsattva able to bring about such a power of skilful means, and yet not be stained?" First a question: where does this question come from? At the end of the First Part's sūtra text, the Buddha, by the simile of the conjurer conjuring elephants, horses, men, and women, pressed out the two Chinese characters 「不實」 tr. "not real", and Subhūti followed with his praise of the bodhisattva's power of great skilful means; below this, separated by a long passage of the treatise-author's explanation, fascicle 93 ends with the treatise text's answer. In the sūtra being explained, the praise and the question were originally Subhūti's continuous words; once it is granted that it is not real, he naturally has to press on and ask what dharma this unreal manifestation relies on. Before reading this passage set up one preparation: what is asked about is 「白淨法」 tr. "the white and pure dharma", not the supernormal powers, not the power of vows; what is sought is the root without outflows, not a conditioned art.

2. The Buddha answers: by means of prajñā, and the three dharmas are unfindable. The Buddha said: 「菩薩用般若波羅蜜作如是方便力，於十方如恒河沙等國土中饒益眾生，亦不貪著是身。」 tr. "The bodhisattva brings about such a power of skilful means by means of prajñāpāramitā, and in lands as many as the sands of the Ganges in the ten directions he enriches beings, and yet he does not crave and cling to this body." The answer is extremely short, and at once he himself states the causes and conditions: 「著者、著法、著處，是三法皆不可得，自性空故。」 tr. "The one who clings, the dharma clung to, and the place of clinging—these three dharmas are all unfindable, because they are empty of self-nature." These three matters must be looked at separately: what is able to cling is the person, what is clung to is the dharma, where the clinging lands is the place; the three matters being set aside together, staining has nowhere to be established. The text below goes a layer further—「空不著空，空中無著者，亦無著處」 tr. "emptiness does not cling to emptiness; in emptiness there is no one who clings, nor any place of clinging"—which guards against setting up 「空」 tr. "emptiness" once again as a new thing clung to. At the end the Buddha gives it a name: 「須菩提！是名不可得空。」 tr. "Subhūti! This is called the emptiness of the unfindable." Here one slip must be guarded against: the emptiness of the unfindable does not say that emptiness is unfindable; it says that even the matter of 「得」 tr. "finding" does not, from the first, stand within emptiness; if unfindability is taken as a higher kind of thing found, then the former three matters are still there. Brought down to use, the bodhisattva's not being stained is not pressing down the craving mind; it is first seeing through the three matters—the one able to crave, what is craved, and the place of craving—as all unfindable.

3. Subhūti objects again: does he abide only in prajñā? 「世尊！菩薩但住般若波羅蜜中得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提，不住餘法中耶？」 tr. "World-Honored One! Does the bodhisattva obtain anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi only by abiding in prajñāpāramitā, and not by abiding in the other dharmas?" This question is not quibbling. Since the Buddha above took up only the one dharma of prajñā as the root, the standing of the dharmas from the six perfections downward has to be accounted for. The question is asked with great measure—with the Chinese character 「但」 tr. "only" and the two Chinese characters 「餘法」 tr. "other dharmas" the difficulty is pointed out: if he abides only in prajñā, what use are the other dharmas? If the other dharmas are used too, why speak only of prajñā?

4. The Buddha asks back: is there any dharma that does not enter prajñā? The Buddha does not answer head-on whether there is or is not; he asks back with one sentence: 「須菩提！頗有法不入般若波羅蜜者不？」 tr. "Subhūti! Is there any dharma at all that does not enter prajñāpāramitā?" The way of answering objections can be glimpsed here—he does not break the two extremes that have been set up, but asks about the premise those two extremes presuppose. The questioner first assumes that prajñā and the other dharmas are two places, and so the Buddha asks: is there one dharma outside prajñā? The premise once overturned, the difficulty of the two extremes resolves of itself.

5. Subhūti presses again on the emptiness of nature. 「世尊！若般若波羅蜜自性空，云何一切法皆入般若波羅蜜中？世尊！空中無有法若入、若不入。」 tr. "World-Honored One! If prajñāpāramitā is empty of self-nature, how then is it said that all dharmas enter into prajñāpāramitā? World-Honored One! Within emptiness there is no dharma that can be said to enter or said not to enter." This pressing presses with great precision: since it is said that all enter, there is something able to enter and something entered; since it is said that prajñā is empty of self-nature, where within emptiness is there room for the matter of going out and entering? Subhūti's last sentence passes judgement himself—「空中無有法若入、若不入」 tr. "within emptiness there is no dharma that can be said to enter or said not to enter"—negating even 「不入」 tr. "not entering" along with it, which shows that he is not trying to establish the meaning of 「不入」 tr. "not entering", but to bring out the instability of the very expression 「入」 tr. "entering".

6. The Buddha's second asking back: are the marks of all dharmas empty? The Buddha asks: 「須菩提！一切法、一切法相空不？」 tr. "Subhūti! Are all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas empty?" Subhūti answers: 「世尊！空。」 tr. "World-Honored One! They are empty." This one question and one answer look like nothing much, but in fact they take out the meaning Subhūti himself has granted and set it down in the middle. The Buddha's way of answering objections is always not to break what is set up, but to push on from what is set up; everything pushed in the text below rests on this one 「空」 tr. "empty".

7. The Buddha's third asking back: if empty, they should enter. 「須菩提！若一切法、一切法相空，云何言一切法不入空中？」 tr. "Subhūti! If all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas are empty, how can you say that all dharmas do not enter into emptiness?" Pushed to this point, the objector has nowhere to retreat: since he grants that all dharmas are empty, then all dharmas and emptiness are not two; not being two, one may say they enter and one may say they do not enter; what one may not do is look on emptiness as an external container and ask whether dharmas can go into it. Here one misreading must be guarded against: the Buddha is not trying to set up ‘all dharmas enter emptiness’ as a fixed teaching, but to bring out that the pair of words ‘entering’ and ‘not entering’ does not, from the first, apply to emptiness.

8. Subhūti turns to ask about the supernormal powers. 「須菩提白佛言：『世尊！云何菩薩摩訶薩行般若波羅蜜時，住一切法空中，能起神通波羅蜜；住是神通波羅蜜中，到十方如恒河沙等國土，供養現在諸佛，聞諸佛說法，於諸佛所種善根？』」 tr. "Subhūti addressed the Buddha: ‘World-Honored One! When the bodhisattva-mahāsattva practises prajñāpāramitā, abiding in the emptiness of all dharmas, how can he give rise to the perfection of the supernormal powers; and, abiding in this perfection of the supernormal powers, go to lands as many as the sands of the Ganges in the ten directions, make offerings to the buddhas of the present, hear the buddhas teach the Dharma, and plant roots of goodness in the presence of the buddhas?’" At this point the topic turns. What the previous four rounds discussed was principle; what is asked from here on is matters. The question is still the other face of the same difficulty: since within emptiness there is no going out and no entering, where then are such matters as going and coming in the ten directions, making offerings to the buddhas and hearing the Dharma, to be established? Here the reader should see the structure of the whole unit—the difficulty of principle once subdued, the difficulty of matters follows; and the Buddha's answer too still plants its feet on emptiness, without changing to another set of reasons.

9. The Buddha answers: lands and buddhas are all empty of nature; emptiness is not partial. The Buddha told Subhūti: 「菩薩摩訶薩行般若波羅蜜時，觀是十方如恒河沙等國土皆空，是國土中諸佛亦性空，但假名字故，諸佛現身所假名字亦空。」 tr. "When the bodhisattva-mahāsattva practises prajñāpāramitā, he contemplates these lands as many as the sands of the Ganges in the ten directions as all empty, and the buddhas within these lands as also empty of nature; only because of provisional names, the provisional name of the bodies the buddhas manifest is also empty." First a question: since what is asked is where the supernormal powers arise from, why does the Buddha first say that the lands and the buddhas are all empty? Because the place to which the supernormal powers go is the lands, and those to whom offerings are made are the buddhas; if these two were not empty, then emptiness would have an exception. So the text below follows at once with a sentence—「若十方國土及諸佛性不空者，空為有偏；以空不偏故，一切法、一切法相空」 tr. "if the nature of the lands of the ten directions and of the buddhas were not empty, then emptiness would be partial; because emptiness is not partial, all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas are empty". The Chinese character 「偏」 tr. "partial" is the eye of this passage: if emptiness had an exception, it would not be emptiness, but a kind of partial view. Here one misreading must be guarded against: saying that the buddhas too are empty of nature is not slighting the Buddha; it is saying that the Buddha's manifested body too is a provisional name; the treatise-author below sets up a separate question on this and answers it separately—see section 38.

10. Giving rise to the perfection of the supernormal powers, and the items of the five supernormal powers. 「是故菩薩摩訶薩行般若波羅蜜，用方便力，生神通波羅蜜；住是神通波羅蜜中，起天眼、天耳、如意足、知他心智、宿命智，知眾生生死。」 tr. "Therefore the bodhisattva-mahāsattva, practising prajñāpāramitā, by the power of skilful means gives rise to the perfection of the supernormal powers; abiding in this perfection of the supernormal powers, he gives rise to the divine eye, the divine ear, the power of going at will, the knowledge of others' minds, and the knowledge of former lives, and knows the births and deaths of beings." The five matters listed here are all items this treatise has of its own, and they are now explained in present-day words: the divine eye is the power of seeing form without depending on light and regardless of barriers; the divine ear is the power of hearing sound without depending on near or far; the power of going at will is the power by which the body can go and come and manifest transformations as the mind wills; the knowledge of others' minds is the power of knowing the minds and mental factors of others; the knowledge of former lives is the power of recollecting matters in past lives. All five arise from the power of the skilful means of prajñā, and so they are named a perfection and not named a divine art. A verdict follows at once: 「若菩薩遠離神通波羅蜜，不能得饒益眾生，亦不能得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提。」 tr. "If the bodhisattva is far from the perfection of the supernormal powers, he can neither enrich beings nor obtain anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi." It can be seen that the supernormal powers here are not for the sake of the marvellous; they are for enriching.

11. The supernormal powers are precisely the path of awakening; he sees wholesome dharmas and does not cling. 「是菩薩摩訶薩神通波羅蜜，是阿耨多羅三藐三菩提道。」 tr. "This bodhisattva-mahāsattva's perfection of the supernormal powers is the path of anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi." Why is it the path? The Buddha himself explains it: 「用是天眼自見諸善法，亦教他人令得諸善法，於善法亦不著，諸善法自性空故。」 tr. "With this divine eye he himself sees the wholesome dharmas, and also teaches others and causes them to obtain the wholesome dharmas, and he does not cling to the wholesome dharmas either, because the wholesome dharmas are empty of self-nature." Three matters are raised together—seeing for himself, teaching others, not clinging. The first two are the function, the last is the root; if there were only the first two without the last, the wholesome dharmas would instead become something clung to. The text below says further: 「空無所著，若著則受味，是空中無有味。」 tr. "Emptiness clings to nothing; if one clings, one takes the taste, and within this emptiness there is no taste." The two Chinese characters 「受味」 tr. "takes the taste" deserve attention: the reason clinging becomes a sickness lies in tasting sweetness and sticking to it; within emptiness there is no taste to be tasted, and so nothing to stick to.

12. Giving rise to the supernormal powers by means of the dharma of nothing to be attained. 「是菩薩摩訶薩行般若波羅蜜時，能生如是天眼，用是眼觀一切法空；見是法空，不取相、不作業；亦為人說是法，亦不得眾生相、不得眾生名。」 tr. "When this bodhisattva-mahāsattva practises prajñāpāramitā, he is able to give rise to such a divine eye, and with this eye he contemplates all dharmas as empty; seeing this dharma as empty, he does not grasp at marks and does not make deeds; he also proclaims this dharma for others, and he does not find the mark of beings and does not find the name of beings." This passage gathers up what precedes and sets up a general rule: 「如是菩薩摩訶薩用無所得法故起神通波羅蜜，用是神通波羅蜜，神通所應作者能作。」 tr. "In this way the bodhisattva-mahāsattva, by means of the dharma of nothing to be attained, gives rise to the perfection of the supernormal powers, and with this perfection of the supernormal powers he is able to do whatever the supernormal powers ought to do." Having nothing to be attained and yet being able to act—this is the common meaning of the whole unit. One misreading must be guarded against: 「不作業」 tr. "does not make deeds" does not mean not doing things; it means not creating deeds with outflows; the treatise-author below has a sentence of his own, 「不起有漏業」 tr. "does not raise deeds with outflows", as proof—see section 46.

13. Flying to the ten directions, he enriches beings with the six perfections and the dharmas that aid the path. 「是菩薩用天眼通過於人眼，見十方國土；見已，飛到十方，饒益眾生——或以布施、或以持戒、或以忍辱、或以精進、或以禪定、或以智慧，饒益眾生……」 tr. "This bodhisattva, with the supernormal power of the divine eye surpassing the fleshly eye of humans, sees the lands of the ten directions; having seen them, he flies to the ten directions and enriches beings—whether by giving, or by morality, or by patience, or by vigour, or by meditative concentration, or by wisdom, he enriches beings …" Below this are further listed 「三十七助道法」 tr. "the thirty-seven dharmas that aid the path", 「諸禪、解脫、三昧」 tr. "the dhyānas, the liberations, and the samādhis", and the dharmas of the śrāvaka, the dharmas of the pratyekabuddha, the dharmas of the bodhisattva, and the dharmas of the Buddha. The items listed all take their meaning from this treatise's own text: the six perfections are the six kinds of practice for delivering oneself and delivering others; the thirty-seven dharmas that aid the path is the general name for the thirty-seven kinds of practice-dharma that tend toward nirvāṇa; the dhyānas are the concentrations in sequence, liberation is the realisation of parting from bonds, samādhi is abiding in the one-pointedness of the mind. The list of four dharmas is ordered by vehicle—śrāvaka, pratyekabuddha, bodhisattva, Buddha—which shows that enriching is not confined to one vehicle; he gives according to what each can bear.

14. Three passages of setting up the teaching according to the occasion: the stingy, those who break morality, those who hate and quarrel. This passage is the place in the whole sūtra that most shows the air of teaching; the Buddha drafts out, sentence by sentence, the words in which the Dharma is taught. For the stingy he speaks of the suffering of poverty and the happiness of giving, and closes with the heaviest of sentences—「莫以貧窮故共相食噉，不得離三惡道」 tr. "do not devour one another because of poverty, for then you will not get free of the three evil destinies". For those who break morality he speaks of the painful retribution of breaking morality in the three evil destinies, and warns them with the four Chinese characters 「死時有悔」 tr. "regret at the time of death". For those who hate and quarrel he says that one whose mind is disturbed by hatred does not accord with wholesome dharmas, and cuts it off with 「不應生一念瞋恚心，何況多」 tr. "you should not give rise to a single thought of anger, how much less to many". The three passages each have the same format: first saying that their dharma is suffering, next that if one cannot benefit oneself how could one benefit others, and last that therefore one should practise thus. This format must be seen—the teaching of the Dharma does not enter from doctrine; it enters from the suffering of the person concerned at this moment.

15. The three—laziness, distraction, delusion—follow the same pattern. 「為懈怠眾生說法，令得精進；散亂眾生，令得禪定；愚癡眾生，令得智慧亦如是。」 tr. "Teaching the Dharma for lazy beings so that they obtain vigour; for distracted beings, so that they obtain meditative concentration; for deluded beings, so that they obtain wisdom—it is also like this." The sūtra text here no longer drafts the words one by one, but closes with the three Chinese characters 「亦如是」 tr. "it is also like this". This is not a stroke of abbreviation; it shows people a pattern: the six obscurations set against the six perfections—the first three having been spoken of at length, the latter three can of themselves be inferred according to the pattern.

16. The remedies for the three poisons, and bringing in those who walk what is not the path. 「行婬欲者，令觀不淨；瞋恚者，令觀慈心；愚癡眾生，令觀十二因緣。」 tr. "Those who practise lust he causes to contemplate impurity; those given to anger he causes to contemplate with the mind of kindness; deluded beings he causes to contemplate the twelve links of causes and conditions." Three contemplations set against three poisons is the consistent teaching of this treatise. The twelve links of causes and conditions are the principle by which the twelve limbs, from ignorance up to old age and death, give rise to one another in turn; contemplating them one knows where delusion comes from, and so they are used to treat delusion. 「行非道眾生，令入正道，所謂聲聞道、辟支佛道、佛道」 tr. "beings who walk what is not the path he causes to enter the right path, namely the path of the śrāvaka, the path of the pratyekabuddha, and the path of the Buddha"—all three vehicles are named the right path, which shows that what is called not the path points to the wrong byways outside these three, not to the two vehicles.

17. For those who cling he teaches the emptiness of nature and non-clinging. 「為是眾生如是說法：『汝等所著是法性空，性空法中不可得著，不著相是空相。』」 tr. "For these beings he teaches the Dharma thus: ‘These dharmas that you cling to are empty of nature; within dharmas empty of nature they are unfindable, and so cannot be clung to; not clinging to marks is the mark of emptiness.’" This sentence is the last occasion of setting up the teaching according to the occasion, and also the most vital. What the earlier occasions treat are coarse sicknesses; what this occasion treats is a subtle sickness—being already within the path and still having something clung to. The last phrase, 「不著相是空相」 tr. "not clinging to marks is the mark of emptiness", must be guarded against misreading: it does not say that there is a separate mark of 「不著」 tr. "not clinging" that can be grasped; it says that emptiness, as a mark, lies precisely in its having nothing to cling to.

18. Apart from the supernormal powers one cannot teach the Dharma at will—like a bird without wings. Here the Buddha himself gathers up the preceding passage: 「須菩提！菩薩若遠離神通，不能隨眾生意善說法。」 tr. "Subhūti! If the bodhisattva is far from the supernormal powers, he cannot teach the Dharma well in accord with the minds of beings." Then he sets up a simile: 「譬如鳥無翅不能高翔；菩薩無神通，不能隨意教化眾生。」 tr. "It is like a bird without wings, which cannot fly high; a bodhisattva without the supernormal powers cannot teach and transform beings at will." This simile takes one point—wings, in relation to flying, are not a separate thing besides flying; they are what makes flying possible. The supernormal powers in relation to teaching and transforming are likewise: not an ornament outside teaching and transforming, but what makes it possible to arrive according to the occasion and speak according to the occasion. At the end he adds a further reminder, 「應起諸神通；起諸神通已，若欲饒益眾生，隨意能益」 tr. "he should give rise to the supernormal powers; having given rise to the supernormal powers, if he wishes to enrich beings, he can benefit them at will", which shows that the weight lies on the two Chinese characters 「隨意」 tr. "at will".

19. The broad marks of benefiting beings by the six supernormal powers. This passage is the longest; the sūtra text matches each of the six supernormal powers with its use: the divine eye sees lands as many as the sands of the Ganges and the beings within them, goes to where they are, knows their minds, and teaches the Dharma; the divine ear hears two kinds of sound, of humans and of non-humans, and also hears the Dharma taught by the buddhas of the ten directions and can receive and uphold it, and in turn proclaim it for others; the knowledge of others' minds knows the minds of beings and teaches the Dharma according to what suits them; the knowledge of former lives recollects all kinds of former births, recollecting both his own and those of others, and also recollects the names of the buddhas of the past and their assemblies of disciples, and for those who believe in and delight in former lives manifests the matters of former lives and teaches the Dharma; the supernormal power of going at will goes to immeasurable buddha-lands, makes offerings to the buddhas, plants roots of goodness, and returns to his own land; the supernormal power of the exhaustion of outflows, realised by knowledge, teaches the Dharma for beings according to what suits them. For the Dharma taught by all six, the sūtra text uses uniformly the one phrase 「或說布施乃至或說涅槃」 tr. "whether speaking of giving, and so on up to speaking of nirvāṇa" to carry it through, which shows that though the supernormal powers are six, the Dharma taught is one. At the end it closes with one sentence: 「菩薩用修是神通故，隨意受身，苦樂不染；譬如佛所化人，作一切事，苦樂不染。」 tr. "Because the bodhisattva cultivates these supernormal powers, he takes a body at will, and is stained by neither suffering nor pleasure; just as a person conjured by the Buddha does all things and is stained by neither suffering nor pleasure." This sentence returns precisely to what was discussed in the fascicle of the First Part—taking an animal's body without being stained; the two fascicles interlock here.

20. Sporting in the supernormal powers; purifying the land and bringing to accomplishment, and the causes and conditions not being complete. 「菩薩摩訶薩行般若波羅蜜時，應如是遊戲神通，能淨佛國土、成就眾生。」 tr. "When the bodhisattva-mahāsattva practises prajñāpāramitā, he should sport in the supernormal powers thus, and be able to purify buddha-lands and bring beings to accomplishment." The two Chinese characters 「遊戲」 tr. "sport" seem abrupt at first sight; the treatise-author below has a dedicated explanation of his own—see section 52. A turn follows at once: 「復次，須菩提！菩薩摩訶薩不淨佛國土、不成就眾生，不能得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提。何以故？因緣不具足故……」 tr. "Further, Subhūti, if the bodhisattva-mahāsattva does not purify buddha-lands and does not bring beings to accomplishment, he cannot obtain anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi. Why? Because the causes and conditions are not complete …" This turn pushes the use of the supernormal powers to its extreme—not that it is better to have them, but that without them it does not come about. The five Chinese characters 「因緣不具足」 tr. "the causes and conditions are not complete" are the source from which the three rounds of question and answer below arise.

21. Subhūti asks about the causes and conditions being complete. 「世尊！何等是菩薩摩訶薩因緣具足已，得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提？」 tr. "World-Honored One! What is it that, once the causes and conditions of the bodhisattva-mahāsattva are complete, he then obtains anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi?" The question is asked very concretely: since it is said that if the causes and conditions are not complete one does not obtain it, one has to know what is called complete. This question differs from the earlier questions—the earlier questions were all objections; this question seeks the items.

22. The Buddha answers: all wholesome dharmas. 「佛告須菩提：『一切善法是菩薩阿耨多羅三藐三菩提因緣。』」 tr. "The Buddha told Subhūti: ‘All wholesome dharmas are the causes and conditions of the bodhisattva's anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi.’" The answer is extremely simple and extremely broad. Simple: it is only one sentence; broad: of all wholesome dharmas none is left out. One misreading must be guarded against: here the cause of awakening is not being scattered into countless trivial pieces; it is said that every good can be a cause, and what enables it to be a cause lies in the 「無分別」 tr. "non-discrimination" pointed out in the next passage.

23. Subhūti asks again what wholesome dharmas are. 「世尊！何等是善法，以是善法故，得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提？」 tr. "World-Honored One! What are wholesome dharmas, because of which wholesome dharmas he then obtains anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi?" Since all wholesome dharmas are granted, one has to know their items. This second question is the pivot of the whole passage—precisely because there is this second question, the Buddha opens the full ledger below.

24. The Buddha opens the full ledger of wholesome dharmas. The Buddha first raises dānapāramitā as the head, and at the very first item points out its essential: 「是中無分別是施者、是受者，性空故。」 tr. "Within it there is no discriminating who is the giver and who is the receiver, because they are empty of nature." Next he speaks of its use: 「能自利益，亦能利益眾生，從生死拔出，令得涅盤。」 tr. "He can himself obtain benefit and can also benefit beings, pulling them out of birth and death and causing them to obtain nirvāṇa." Next he speaks of its running through the three times: 「過去、未來、現在諸菩薩摩訶薩得度生死——已度、今度、當度。」 tr. "The bodhisattva-mahāsattvas of the past, the future, and the present cross over birth and death—those who have already crossed, those who are now crossing, and those who will cross." Then he lists the items: the five perfections of śīla, kṣānti, vīrya, dhyāna, and prajñā; the four dhyānas, the four immeasurable minds, the four formless absorptions; the four foundations of mindfulness and so on up to the eightfold noble path; the eighteen emptinesses; the eight liberations, the nine successive absorptions; the dhāraṇī gate; the ten powers of the Buddha, the four fearlessnesses, the four unobstructed knowledges, the eighteen unshared dharmas. The items explained in present-day words: śīla is morality, kṣānti is patience, vīrya is vigour; the four dhyānas are the four levels of concentration of the form realm, the four immeasurable minds are the four kinds of mind—kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity—that take all beings universally as their object, the four formless absorptions are the four levels of concentration that go beyond form; the four foundations of mindfulness and so on up to the eightfold noble path are the head and tail of the thirty-seven dharmas that aid the path; the eighteen emptinesses are the contemplation that dismisses self-nature at eighteen places; the eight liberations are the eight kinds of concentration that in sequence relinquish and part from their objects, the nine successive absorptions are the four dhyānas and the four formless absorptions together with the absorption of the cessation of feeling and perception, in sequence and without interval; the dhāraṇī gate is the gate of total retention without loss; the ten powers of the Buddha, the four fearlessnesses, the four unobstructed knowledges, and the eighteen unshared dharmas are the virtues and functions belonging to the Buddha alone. At the end it closes with three sentences in sequence: 「具足是善法已，當得一切種智；得一切種智已，當轉法輪；轉法輪已，當度眾生。」 tr. "Having made these wholesome dharmas complete, he will obtain the omniscience of all kinds; having obtained the omniscience of all kinds, he will turn the wheel of the Dharma; having turned the wheel of the Dharma, he will deliver beings." Practising for oneself, accomplishing knowledge, teaching the Dharma, delivering beings—the four matters are of one thread, and Sūtra ② ends here.

25. The treatise-author takes up the sūtra under "Explanation", first taking up the question and answer on abiding in what roots of goodness. At its head the treatise section does not write 「問曰」 tr. "Question:" but writes 「釋曰」 tr. "The explanation:", and at once restates the gist of the sūtra text in prose: 「爾時，須菩提問：『住何等善根故能受此身？』佛答：『菩薩摩訶薩一切善法具足。』」 tr. "At that time Subhūti asked: ‘Abiding in what kind of roots of goodness is he able to take on such a body?’ The Buddha answered: ‘The bodhisattva-mahāsattva is complete in all wholesome dharmas.’" This is the treatise-author himself taking up the sūtra text, not setting up a separate question and answer; the reader must distinguish—every 「須菩提問」 tr. "Subhūti asked" and 「佛答」 tr. "the Buddha answered" in this passage is the treatise-author relaying the sūtra's words, not the treatise-author's own question and answer. Only where 「問曰：」 tr. "Question:" formally begins below is it the treatise-author's self-posed question and answer.

26. Taking up Subhūti's greatly delighted question. 「乃至須菩提大歡喜白佛言：『菩薩摩訶薩大方便成就力，住何等聖無漏法，能受此身而不為畜身所染？譬如幻師，亦如變化。住何等白淨法，能作如是方便？』」 tr. "And so on up to Subhūti, greatly delighted, addressing the Buddha: ‘By the power of the bodhisattva-mahāsattva's accomplishment in the great skilful means, abiding in what kind of noble dharma without outflows is he able to take on such a body and not be stained by the body of an animal? It is like a conjurer, or like transformation. Abiding in what kind of white and pure dharma is he able to bring about such skilful means?’" The treatise-author uses the two Chinese characters 「乃至」 tr. "and so on up to" to omit what lies between, taking it up directly to the first question of this unit. Here the treatise-author's eye in reading the sūtra can be seen—he views the praise at the end of the First Part's fascicle and the question at the head of the Last Part's fascicle as one breath.

27. Taking up the Buddha's answer: because of the power of prajñā. 「佛答：『菩薩以般若波羅蜜力故，能成就如是方便，作種種身，能利益十方國土中眾生，亦不貪是身。』」 tr. "The Buddha answered: ‘Because of the power of prajñāpāramitā, the bodhisattva is able to accomplish such skilful means, bring forth all kinds of bodies, and benefit the beings in the lands of the ten directions, and yet he does not crave this body.’" It takes up the sūtra text very closely, with slight trimming: the sūtra text has 「用般若波羅蜜作如是方便力」 tr. "brings about such a power of skilful means by means of prajñāpāramitā", while the treatise-author has 「以般若波羅蜜力故，能成就如是方便」 tr. "because of the power of prajñāpāramitā is able to accomplish such skilful means"; the word order differs slightly but the meaning is the same.

28. The explanation of the three dharmas being unfindable. 「佛此中說因緣：『是菩薩三法不可得：一者、是菩薩身，二者、所作鹿、馬，三者、所用法。』」 tr. "Here the Buddha states the causes and conditions: ‘For this bodhisattva three dharmas are unfindable: first, this bodhisattva's body; second, the deer and horse he makes himself into; third, the dharma he uses.’" The treatise-author brings the sūtra text's 「著者、著法、著處」 tr. "the one who clings, the dharma clung to, the place of clinging" down onto the matters of this chapter: the one who clings is the bodhisattva's body, the place of clinging is the deer and horse made, the dharma clung to is the dharma used. The two Chinese characters 「鹿、馬」 tr. "deer, horse" carry on from the animal manifestations raised in the fascicle of the First Part, which shows how tightly the two fascicles interlock. The text below pushes a layer further: 「法無故眾生無，眾生無故法亦無。」 tr. "Because there is no dharma there are no beings; because there are no beings there is no dharma either." Person and dharma depend on each other; set one aside and both are set aside. Here a misreading must be guarded against: it is not that first the dharma is set aside and afterwards the person; the two have, from the first, no before and after.

29. The emptiness within emptiness is unfindable. 「此中佛說因緣：『空中空不可得。』不可得故，菩薩云何貪是智慧？」 tr. "Here the Buddha states the causes and conditions: ‘The emptiness within emptiness is unfindable.’ Because it is unfindable, how could the bodhisattva crave this wisdom?" This question is extremely vital—what it guards against is the last layer of craving: craving prajñā itself. Since even emptiness is unfindable, there is no wisdom to crave. The last sentence, 「是名無所得空般若波羅蜜，菩薩住是中，能得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提。以無障礙故易得」 tr. "this is called the prajñāpāramitā of the emptiness of nothing to be attained; the bodhisattva abiding in it is able to obtain anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi. Because there is no obstruction, it is easy to obtain"—here the two Chinese characters 「易得」 tr. "easy to obtain" are especially worth savouring: having nothing to be attained, it is on the contrary easy to obtain, precisely because one who has nothing to be attained has no obstruction.

30. Subhūti asks why only abiding in prajñā is spoken of. 「須菩提問：『菩薩住六波羅蜜乃至十八不共法，今何以但說住無所得般若波羅蜜中得？』」 tr. "Subhūti asked: ‘The bodhisattva abides in the six perfections and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas; why is it now said only that he obtains it by abiding in the prajñāpāramitā of nothing to be attained?’" This is the treatise-author taking up the second question of Sūtra ② and making it slightly more explicit: the sūtra text only says 「菩薩但住般若波羅蜜中得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提，不住餘法中耶？」 tr. "does the bodhisattva obtain anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi only by abiding in prajñāpāramitā, and not by abiding in the other dharmas?", while the treatise-author lists 「餘法」 tr. "the other dharmas" explicitly as the six perfections and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas, making the difficulty clearer.

31. The Buddha answers: all dharmas enter prajñā. 「佛答：『須菩提！何法不入般若中？』一切法皆入般若波羅蜜中；若住般若波羅蜜，則住一切法。」 tr. "The Buddha answered: ‘Subhūti! Which dharma does not enter prajñā?’ All dharmas enter into prajñāpāramitā; if he abides in prajñāpāramitā, he is abiding in all dharmas." The first half takes up the sūtra; the second half is the treatise-author's own verdict. This verdict is the essential of this passage—abiding in prajñā is abiding in all dharmas, so 「但住」 tr. "abiding only" is not abandoning the other dharmas, but gathering in the other dharmas entirely.

32. He asks again how, if empty of nature, all enter. 「復問：『若般若波羅蜜性空，云何一切法皆入中？』」 tr. "He asked again: ‘If prajñāpāramitā is empty of nature, how is it said that all dharmas enter into it?’" This 「復問」 tr. "asked again" is still the treatise-author taking up Subhūti's renewed objection in the sūtra, not the treatise-author asking himself. The reader should note the format of the first half of the treatise section: every 「須菩提問」 tr. "Subhūti asked", 「復問」 tr. "asked again", and 「佛答」 tr. "the Buddha answered" is words taken up from the sūtra.

33. Subhūti himself states the causes and conditions. 「此中須菩提自說因緣：『一切法性空中，無有法出、無有法入。』」 tr. "Here Subhūti himself states the causes and conditions: ‘Within the emptiness of the nature of all dharmas, there is no dharma going out and no dharma entering.’" The treatise-author pointedly brings out the four Chinese characters 「自說因緣」 tr. "himself states the causes and conditions", to show that Subhūti's objection has its grounds and is not forced argument. The sūtra text originally has 「空中無有法若入、若不入」 tr. "within emptiness there is no dharma that can be said to enter or said not to enter", and the treatise-author has 「無有法出、無有法入」 tr. "there is no dharma going out and no dharma entering", setting going out and entering against each other to show that it is a view of emptiness as a place.

34. The Buddha questions back and forth, and Subhūti grants emptiness. 「佛告須菩提：『一切法、一切法相空耶？』『世尊！空。』『須菩提！若一切法、一切法相空，一切法應入空中，汝云何言空中無有法出入？』」 tr. "The Buddha told Subhūti: ‘Are all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas empty?’ ‘World-Honored One! They are empty.’ ‘Subhūti! If all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas are empty, all dharmas should then enter into emptiness; how can you say that within emptiness there is no dharma going out or entering?’" The treatise-author takes up these three utterances without adding an explanation, presumably because the sūtra text is clear of itself. One should see the Buddha's way of questioning: first take what the other grants, then use what he grants to challenge what he sets up.

35. Subdued in mind and receiving understanding, he turns to ask about the supernormal powers. 「爾時，須菩提心伏受解；聞是菩薩化身度眾生，今問：『世尊！菩薩云何住一切法空中，能起神通波羅蜜，到十方如恒河沙國土供養佛、聽法、種甚深善根？』」 tr. "At that time Subhūti was subdued in his mind and received understanding; having heard that this bodhisattva delivers beings by transformation bodies, he now asks: ‘World-Honored One! How can the bodhisattva, abiding in the emptiness of all dharmas, give rise to the perfection of the supernormal powers, go to lands as many as the sands of the Ganges in the ten directions, make offerings to the buddhas, hear the Dharma, and plant very deep roots of goodness?’" The four Chinese characters 「心伏受解」 tr. "subdued in his mind and received understanding" are added by the treatise-author and are not originally in the sūtra text; this is the treatise-author's judgement in reading the sūtra, saying that only at this point was Subhūti won over. Then the treatise-author explains the word 「善根」 tr. "roots of goodness": 「善根者，諸陀羅尼、三昧門、無礙解脫之根本。」 tr. "Roots of goodness are the root of the dhāraṇīs, of the gates of samādhi, and of unobstructed liberation." This explanation should be remembered—the roots of goodness of this passage do not refer broadly to all good, but specifically to what can give rise to total retention, samādhi, and liberation.

36. The treatise-author points out Subhūti's meaning. 「須菩提意：般若波羅蜜性空，云何菩薩安住性空波羅蜜中能行是神通有法？」 tr. "Subhūti's meaning: prajñāpāramitā is empty of nature; how can the bodhisattva, abiding in a perfection that is empty of nature, practise an existent dharma such as these supernormal powers?" The treatise-author breaks open the presupposition unspoken in the questioner's mind: he regards the supernormal powers as 「有法」 tr. "an existent dharma", and regards prajñā as 「空」 tr. "empty"; since emptiness and existence are cut off from each other, abiding in emptiness while practising existence cannot be understood. Why the difficulty is difficult lies precisely in this one separation.

37. The Buddha answers: because of emptiness he can practise. 「佛言：『空故能行。所以者何？須菩提！菩薩行般若時，觀十方如恒河沙國土皆空，是國土諸佛亦空。』」 tr. "The Buddha said: ‘It is because of emptiness that he can practise. Why is that? Subhūti! When the bodhisattva practises prajñā, he contemplates the lands as many as the sands of the Ganges in the ten directions as all empty, and the buddhas within these lands as also empty.’" The four Chinese characters 「空故能行」 tr. "because of emptiness he can practise" are the answer of the whole passage, and also the pivot of the whole unit. It is not that though it is empty he can practise; it is that precisely because it is empty he can practise—if each thing really existed, they would obstruct one another, and going and coming and manifesting transformations would all be impossible.

38. The treatise-author poses his own question and answer: if the lands are empty the Buddha too should be empty—why speak of them separately? Here for the first time the formal 「問曰：」 tr. "Question:" and 「答曰：」 tr. "Answer:" appear, the treatise-author asking and answering himself. Question: 「若國土空，佛亦應空，何以別說？」 tr. "If the lands are empty, the Buddha too should be empty; why speak of them separately?" Answer: 「佛以無量阿僧祇實功德得是身，能以一足指動十方如恒河沙國土；又菩薩世世來深愛重佛，不能疾觀使空。是故不共國土合說。」 tr. "The Buddha obtained this body by immeasurable asaṃkhyeyas of real merit, and with a single toe can shake lands as many as the sands of the Ganges in the ten directions; moreover, bodhisattvas, life after life, have deeply loved and revered the Buddha, and cannot quickly contemplate him so as to make him empty. For this reason he is not spoken of together with the lands." There are two intentions in the answer: one is spoken from the Buddha's side—the Buddha's body is made by immeasurable real merits, and its mark is not of the same kind as the lands; the other is spoken from the bodhisattva's side—the bodhisattva has a love and reverence for the Buddha over life after life, and it is hard for him to make the contemplation of emptiness all at once. One misreading must be guarded against: the treatise-author is not saying that the Buddha is not empty—the sūtra text plainly says 「是國土中諸佛亦性空」 tr. "the buddhas within these lands are also empty of nature"; what the treatise-author explains is why they are spoken of separately, not why he is not empty.

39. The Buddha himself states the causes and conditions: emptiness would be partial. 「此中佛自說因緣：『若十方國土及諸佛不空者，空為有偏。有偏名有空、不空處。今實不偏，故一切法、一切法相空。』」 tr. "Here the Buddha himself states the causes and conditions: ‘If the lands of the ten directions and the buddhas were not empty, then emptiness would be partial. To be partial is called having places that are empty and places that are not empty. Now it is really not partial, and so all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas are empty.’" The treatise-author adds to the two Chinese characters 「有偏」 tr. "would be partial" a gloss—「有偏名有空、不空處」 tr. "to be partial is called having places that are empty and places that are not empty"—explaining the word partial as having places of exception. This gloss is extremely vital: emptiness is pervasive precisely in having no exception; if one place were kept back as not empty, what is called emptiness would be only a kind of partial view.

40. Because the fleshly eye's power is small, he seeks the divine eye. 「菩薩行般若波羅蜜，一切法無礙；以肉眼觀色不通：見上、不見下，見前、不見後，通見、障不見，晝見、夜不見；知肉眼力少故，以方便更求天眼。」 tr. "The bodhisattva practising prajñāpāramitā is without obstruction toward all dharmas; yet contemplating form with the fleshly eye he does not penetrate it: seeing above, he does not see below; seeing in front, he does not see behind; where it is open he sees, where there is a barrier he does not see; by day he sees, at night he does not see. Knowing that the power of the fleshly eye is slight, he uses skilful means to seek the divine eye besides." Four pairs, eight matters—each pair is a limit of the fleshly eye. The treatise-author further explains what is called skilful means: 「方便力者，令他界四大來在身中。」 tr. "The power of skilful means is to cause the four elements of another realm to come into his body." This is this treatise's own account of how the divine eye comes to be accomplished, and it is recorded as it is. Brought down to the reader: the reason for seeking the divine eye is not curiosity; it is being aware that one's own power is insufficient and seeking further.

41. The other supernormal powers are as said before. 「用天眼義，如先說。生天耳、如意足、他心智、宿命智，知眾生生死所趣等。」 tr. "The meaning of using the divine eye is as was said before. He gives rise to the divine ear, the power of going at will, the knowledge of others' minds, and the knowledge of former lives, and knows the places toward which beings tend in birth and death, and so forth." The treatise-author does not explain again here, but points to what was said before. This is a constant practice of this treatise—what has been explained is not explained again, and the reader should take it from the earlier text himself.

42. Without the supernormal powers he cannot enrich beings. 「菩薩若無神通，不能得饒益眾生。何以故？若無神通，云何能令多眾生發心？菩薩有神通，猶尚不能盡令眾生發心，何況無！」 tr. "If the bodhisattva has no supernormal powers, he cannot enrich beings. Why? If he has no supernormal powers, how can he cause many beings to arouse the mind? Even a bodhisattva who has the supernormal powers cannot cause all beings to arouse the mind; how much less one who has none!" The force of this passage lies in one 「猶尚」 tr. "even": having the supernormal powers one still cannot deliver all, how much less without them; it shows their necessity by words that step back a pace. The last sentence, 「是故神通波羅蜜是菩薩所行道」 tr. "for this reason the perfection of the supernormal powers is the path the bodhisattva walks", corresponds to the sūtra text's 「是阿耨多羅三藐三菩提道」 tr. "is the path of anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi".

43. He himself sees wholesome dharmas and also does not cling. 「菩薩自見善法，亦令他人得見善法，亦不著是善法。何以故？是法性皆空故。」 tr. "The bodhisattva himself sees wholesome dharmas, and also causes others to see wholesome dharmas, and yet does not cling to these wholesome dharmas. Why? Because the nature of these dharmas is entirely empty." The treatise-author takes up the sūtra in abbreviation, and the three matters are as before—seeing for himself, causing others to see, not clinging. The order of these three matters should be remembered: not clinging comes last, which says that not clinging does not obstruct seeing for oneself and causing others to see; if one takes not clinging as a reason to abandon the first two as well, it is an error.

44. The treatise-author poses his own question and answer: how does the divine eye see wholesome dharmas? Question: 「天眼可見色，云何見善法？又言見一切法性空？」 tr. "The divine eye can see form; how can it see wholesome dharmas? And it is further said that it sees all dharmas as empty of nature?" This question is asked extremely well—what the divine eye sees is form; wholesome dharmas are not form, and the emptiness of nature is still less form; how can it be said to see them? Answer: 「因中說果。以天眼見，自見己身及見十方眾生，然後用他心智、宿命智求其今世、後世善根；是善根及果報，久皆磨滅，磨滅故見空。」 tr. "This is speaking of the result in the cause. Seeing with the divine eye, he sees his own body and sees the beings of the ten directions, and then with the knowledge of others' minds and the knowledge of former lives he seeks out their roots of goodness of this life and later lives; these roots of goodness, together with their retribution, will in time all be worn away, and because they are worn away he sees them as empty." The joint of the answer lies in the four Chinese characters 「因中說果」 tr. "speaking of the result in the cause": the divine eye is the cause, the knowing accomplished is the result; the matter of the result is spoken of under the name of the cause, and so it is said that the divine eye sees wholesome dharmas. In fact what sees wholesome dharmas is the knowledge of others' minds and the knowledge of former lives, and the seeing of emptiness is known from the wearing away of retribution. This passage is one of the places in the whole unit that most shows the treatise-author's fineness.

45. Roots of goodness have no self-nature; the simile of the fly that does not settle on a flame. 「是善根皆是有為法、無自性，無自性故空，空故不可著，亦不可受味，不可受味故不著。」 tr. "These roots of goodness are all conditioned dharmas, without self-nature; because they are without self-nature they are empty; because they are empty they cannot be clung to, nor can their taste be taken; because their taste cannot be taken, he does not cling." Four layers advance one upon another—conditioned, therefore without self-nature; without self-nature, therefore empty; empty, therefore not to be clung to; not to be clung to, therefore the taste is not taken. Then he sets up a simile: 「譬如蠅無處不著，唯不著火焰。」 tr. "It is like a fly, which settles everywhere, only it does not settle on a flame." What the simile takes is extremely precise: the reason the fly can settle everywhere is that what it settles on are things that can be settled on; the flame cannot be settled on—not that the fly does not wish to settle, but that it cannot get a hold. The treatise-author at once explains the simile: 「眾生愛著亦如是，善、不善法中皆著，乃至非有想非無想著故，不能入涅槃；唯不能著般若波羅蜜性空火。」 tr. "The craving and clinging of beings is also like this: they cling within both wholesome and unwholesome dharmas, and so on even up to the sphere of neither perception nor non-perception, where because of clinging they cannot enter nirvāṇa; the only thing they cannot cling to is the fire of prajñāpāramitā's emptiness of nature." At the end he further explains the reason himself: 「般若波羅蜜、般若波羅蜜相空；若般若波羅蜜不空，即是味，是可著處。」 tr. "Prajñāpāramitā and the mark of prajñāpāramitā are empty; if prajñāpāramitā were not empty, it would be a taste, and a place that could be clung to." With this simile one misreading must be guarded against: it does not say that prajñā can burn away clinging; it says that prajñā has no face that can be clung to; the simile of the flame takes its being impossible to cling to, not its being able to burn.

46. Abiding in this wisdom, he makes complete the matters of the supernormal powers. 「菩薩住是智慧中，不起有漏業，為眾生說法，亦知眾生假名不可得。安住是無所得般若波羅蜜中，而能具足神通事；若菩薩不得是無障礙般若，則不能得無礙神通。」 tr. "The bodhisattva abiding in this wisdom does not raise deeds with outflows, teaches the Dharma for beings, and also knows that beings are a provisional name and unfindable. Abiding peacefully in this prajñāpāramitā of nothing to be attained, he is able to make complete the matters of the supernormal powers; if the bodhisattva does not obtain this unobstructed prajñā, he cannot obtain the unobstructed supernormal powers." This passage clasps the earlier and later halves together: the knowledge of nothing to be attained is the cause, the unobstructed supernormal powers are the result. The last sentence sets it up from the reverse side—if unobstructed prajñā is not obtained, the unobstructed supernormal powers are not obtained either. It can be seen that whether the supernormal powers are obstructed or unobstructed hangs on whether knowledge has something attained or nothing to be attained.

47. Having obtained the unobstructed supernormal powers of emptiness, he benefits beings. 「菩薩得是無障礙空神通，飛到十方國土，利益眾生，如經中廣說，或以布施、或以持戒等。慳者為說布施等六波羅蜜義，如此中佛自廣說。」 tr. "Having obtained these unobstructed supernormal powers of emptiness, the bodhisattva flies to the lands of the ten directions and benefits beings, as is spoken of at length in the sūtra, whether by giving, or by morality, and so forth. For the stingy he proclaims the meaning of the six perfections, giving and the rest, as the Buddha himself here speaks of at length." The treatise-author does not restate what the sūtra text speaks of at length, but only points to it with the two phrases 「如經中廣說」 tr. "as is spoken of at length in the sūtra" and 「如此中佛自廣說」 tr. "as the Buddha himself here speaks of at length". This is the format of a treatise's explanation: what the sūtra text has made clear, the treatise does not repeat.

48. The simile of the bird without wings. 「如此中說譬喻：如鳥無翅不能飛翔；菩薩亦如是，無神通波羅蜜，不能教化眾生。」 tr. "As the simile spoken of here has it: just as a bird without wings cannot fly; so it is with the bodhisattva too: without the perfection of the supernormal powers he cannot teach and transform beings." The treatise-author takes up the sūtra's simile without explaining it further, presumably because the meaning of the simile is clear of itself. Here the reader can see a place where sūtra and treatise interlock—the sūtra sets up the simile, and the treatise only points to it.

49. The broad marks of benefiting beings by the six supernormal powers. In this passage the treatise-author restates the use of the six supernormal powers in the sūtra text and makes it more fine-grained: the divine eye sees the lands of the ten directions, the buddhas, and all beings; the divine ear hears the Dharma from the buddhas; the supernormal power of going at will 「放大光明，或現水火作種種變化，現奇特事，令眾生發希有尊重心」 tr. "emits a great light, or manifests water and fire and works all kinds of transformations, manifesting wondrous matters, causing beings to give rise to a mind of wonder and reverence"; the knowledge of others' minds 「知他心心數法所著、所厭，可度、不可度，是利、是鈍，是善根成就、是未成就」 tr. "knows what the minds and mental-factor dharmas of others cling to and what they are weary of; who can be delivered and who cannot be delivered; who is keen and who is dull; whose roots of goodness are accomplished and whose are not yet accomplished"; the knowledge of former lives and the knowledge of birth and death 「觀其本末」 tr. "contemplate his roots and branches", and the items contemplated are drafted out—「何所從來？種何善根？所好何行？從此終當生何所？何時當得解脫？」 tr. "Where has he come from? What roots of goodness has he planted? What kind of practice does he delight in? When his life ends here, where will he be born? When will he obtain liberation?"—five questions one by one, showing the fineness of his contemplation. Further, by the supernormal powers he manifests the hells or the heavenly halls, delivering by terror or by delight according to what suits each; at the end, by the supernormal power of the exhaustion of outflows he proclaims the dharma of the exhaustion of outflows, 「破其著心，以三乘而得涅槃」 tr. "breaking their clinging minds, so that by the three vehicles they obtain nirvāṇa". In this passage one thread must be seen: the supernormal powers are the means, teaching the Dharma is the business, breaking the clinging mind is the target. If one sees only the divine transformations and not the breaking of clinging, one has read it with something left out.

50. The simile of the white egret taking a fish. 「譬如白鷺欲取魚時，籌量進止，不失期會，知其可得，即便取之，終不空也。」 tr. "It is like a white egret about to take a fish: it measures its advance and halt, does not miss the moment, and knowing the fish can be had, takes it at once, and in the end does not come away empty." What the simile takes lies in the two matters of 「籌量」 tr. "measuring" and 「不失期會」 tr. "not missing the moment", not in the taking of the fish itself. The treatise-author at once explains it: 「菩薩亦如是，以神通力故，觀眾生本末，應度因緣、國土、時節，知其信等諸根增利、諸因緣具足而為說法，則不空也。」 tr. "The bodhisattva is also like this: because of the power of the supernormal powers, he contemplates the roots and branches of beings, and the causes and conditions, the land, and the season for their deliverance, and knows that their faculties of faith and the rest have grown keen and that the causes and conditions are complete, and then teaches them the Dharma; so it does not come to nothing." That delivering beings does not come to nothing hangs on discerning the season and the causes and conditions; that this discernment is possible hangs on the contemplation of the supernormal powers. At the end he cites a sentence as conclusion: 「是故說：『菩薩離神通，不能饒益眾生；如鳥無翅。』」 tr. "Therefore it is said: ‘The bodhisattva apart from the supernormal powers cannot enrich beings; he is like a bird without wings.’", which answers back and forth to the simile of section 48.

51. The rest of the supernormal powers, and taking a body without being stained. The treatise-author cites the words the Buddha himself spoke: 「以天眼見十方眾生生死，亦知眾生心，隨意說法。乃至善修神通力，而為眾生受身，不為苦樂所污。」 tr. "With the divine eye he sees the births and deaths of the beings of the ten directions, and also knows the minds of beings, and teaches the Dharma according to their minds. And so on up to: well cultivating the power of the supernormal powers, he takes a body for the sake of beings, and is not stained by suffering or pleasure." Then he lays out the items of taking a body: 「或為父、或為子，或為師、或為弟子，或為主、或為奴，或為象馬、或為乘象馬者，或時富貴力勢、或時貧賤……」 tr. "sometimes a father and sometimes a son; sometimes a teacher and sometimes a disciple; sometimes a master and sometimes a slave; sometimes an elephant or horse and sometimes one who rides an elephant or horse; at times rich, noble, and powerful, and at times poor and lowly …" The list of five pairs reaches across the honoured and the humble, the near and the far, and uniformly 「不為染污」 tr. "he is not stained". The treatise-author further explains two phrases himself: 「一切事者，如先作種種阿僧祇身度眾生」 tr. "what is called all things is as was said before: bringing forth all kinds of asaṃkhyeyas of bodies to deliver beings"; 「苦樂不染者，樂中不生愛，苦中不生瞋；不如生死眾生隨處起煩惱。」 tr. "Not stained by suffering or pleasure means that within pleasure he does not give rise to love, and within suffering he does not give rise to anger; he is not like the beings within birth and death, who give rise to afflictions wherever they are." The last sentence is the most vital—the criterion of not being stained lies not in the suffering or pleasure of the circumstance, but in whether love and anger arise or do not arise when meeting the circumstance.

52. The treatise-author poses his own question and answer: why is it named sport? Question: 「菩薩神通力有所作，何以名遊戲？」 tr. "The bodhisattva's power of the supernormal powers has something it does; why is it named sport?" This question is asked most naturally—since it is a matter of doing something, why use a word close to child's play? Answer: 「戲名如幻師種種現變；菩薩神通種種現化，名之為戲。」 tr. "What is called sport is like a conjurer's manifesting all kinds of transformations; the bodhisattva's supernormal powers manifest all kinds of transformations, and so they are called sport." What the answer takes lies only in the two Chinese characters 「現變」 tr. "manifesting transformations": what the conjurer manifests is not real, and what the bodhisattva transforms is also not real; not real and yet able to act—therefore it is named sport. One misreading must be guarded against: sport is not carelessness; it is being unreal and yet able to act.

53. Among the three samādhi, emptiness is named the upper practice. 「復次，佛法中三三昧，空名為上行。何以故？似如涅槃無所著、無所得故。諸餘行法，皆名為下下，如小兒。」 tr. "Further, among the three samādhi within the Buddha-dharma, emptiness is named the upper practice. Why? Because, like nirvāṇa, it clings to nothing and has nothing to be attained. The other practices are all named the lowest of the low, like a little child." The three samādhi are the three kinds of samādhi—the emptiness samādhi, the signless samādhi, and the non-action samādhi—the consistent items of this treatise; here emptiness is taken as upper because it is closest to nirvāṇa's having no clinging and nothing attained. The treatise-author further describes the other practices with 「如小兒」 tr. "like a little child", speaking in comparison with emptiness, not saying that the other practices are useless. The last sentence brings it back to the topic: 「是故說神通力名為遊戲，於成就眾生、淨佛土中，最為要用。」 tr. "For this reason it is said that the power of the supernormal powers is named sport, and in bringing beings to accomplishment and purifying buddha-lands it is of the most essential use." He also cites a sentence: 「成就眾生，如是中說：『淨佛土，共修善根。』」 tr. "Bringing beings to accomplishment is as is said here: ‘Purifying buddha-lands, they cultivate roots of goodness together.’"

54. The treatise-author poses his own question and answer: why must one use bringing beings to accomplishment and purifying buddha-lands? Question: 「何必要用成就眾生、淨佛國土？」 tr. "Why must one necessarily use bringing beings to accomplishment and purifying buddha-lands?" Answer: 「佛自說因緣：『不成就眾生、淨佛國土，不能得無上道。何以故？因緣不具足，則不能得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提。』因緣者，所謂一切善法。」 tr. "The Buddha himself states the causes and conditions: ‘If one does not bring beings to accomplishment and does not purify buddha-lands, one cannot obtain the unsurpassed path. Why? Because the causes and conditions are not complete, one cannot obtain anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi.’ The causes and conditions are namely all wholesome dharmas." The treatise-author's answer does not set up a meaning of its own, but directly cites the Buddha's words as its ground, and the last sentence fixes the explanation of the two Chinese characters 「因緣」 tr. "causes and conditions" as all wholesome dharmas—connecting precisely with the Buddha's answer to Subhūti in Sūtra ②. Here the treatise-author's strictness can be seen: where the sūtra has explicit text, the treatise does not make up another.

55. The causes and conditions are precisely all wholesome dharmas, without recollection, imagining, and discrimination. 「從初發意行檀波羅蜜乃至十八不共法，於是行法中，無憶想分別：是施者、是財物、是受者；乃至十八不共法亦如是。」 tr. "From the first arousing of intent, practising dānapāramitā and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas, within these practices there is no recollection, imagining, and discrimination: this is the giver, this is the wealth, this is the receiver; and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas, it is also like this." The list of three matters has one more item than the sūtra text, 「財物」 tr. "wealth", dividing the matter of giving into three faces: the one who gives, the thing given, and the one who receives the giving. At the end he sets up a general rule: 「若菩薩不著心、無所分別行六波羅蜜乃至十八不共法，是為阿耨多羅三藐三菩提因緣。以是道得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提，亦能自度，又能度眾生。」 tr. "If the bodhisattva practises the six perfections and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas without a clinging mind and without discriminating anything, this is the cause and condition of anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi. Obtaining anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi by this path, he can both deliver himself and deliver beings." It can be seen that what enables something to be the cause and condition of awakening lies not in how much or how little is practised, but in whether the practice clings or does not cling.

56. The treatise-author poses his own question and answer: what faults has giving with a clinging mind? Question: 「菩薩若著心布施，有何等過而不名具足？著心布施，受者恩重。」 tr. "If the bodhisattva gives with a clinging mind, what faults are there such that it is not called complete? When one gives with a clinging mind, the kindness the receiver owes is heavy." The question carries a reason within itself—giving with a clinging mind, the feeling is on the contrary deeper, and the kindness the receiver feels is on the contrary heavier. This is the view of ordinary feeling, and the question is asked very truly. Answer: 「雖有小利而有大過；如美食雜毒，雖有美利而自喪命。」 tr. "Though it has a small benefit, it has a great fault; it is like fine food mixed with poison: though there is the benefit of its fineness, one loses one's own life." The answer first establishes the overall situation with a simile: the benefit is a real benefit, and the poison too is real poison; it does not deny the small benefit, it only states the great fault. What the simile takes lies in the Chinese character 「雜」 tr. "mixed"—the poison is not outside the food; it is in the food.

57. The treatise-author asks again what the faults are, and answers with three matters. Question: 「何者是過？」 tr. "What are the faults?" Answer: 「若著心布施，有不稱意事，則生恚怒；若受者不感其恩，即成怨嫌。若著心供養善人，有少凶衰，則嫌布施無應，悔惜所施；若布施心悔，所受果報則不清淨。」 tr. "If one gives with a clinging mind, on meeting with something that does not accord with one's wishes, one gives rise to anger; if the receiver does not feel grateful for the kindness, it becomes resentment. If one makes offerings to good people with a clinging mind, on meeting with some slight misfortune, one resents that the giving had no corresponding reward, and regrets and grudges what was given; if one gives and regrets it in one's mind, then the retribution received is not pure." The three matters one by one: first, anger when things do not accord with one's wishes; second, resentment when the receiver does not feel grateful; third, regret when meeting misfortune after giving. All three arise from one 「著」 tr. "clinging"—because a reward one is due to obtain has been stored in the mind in advance. The last sentence is the target of this passage: 「若布施心悔，所受果報則不清淨。」 tr. "If one gives and regrets it in one's mind, then the retribution received is not pure." It can be seen that the fault lies not in giving but in regret; regret does not come of itself, it comes from clinging.

58. Craving and clinging to wealth, when it is seized he does harm. 「復次，著心布施者，深心貪著財物，若有侵奪，則便加害；自念：『我為福德好事集財，汝何故侵奪？』」 tr. "Further, one who gives with a clinging mind deeply craves and clings to wealth; if someone seizes it, he does him harm, thinking to himself: ‘I gathered this wealth for the good matter of merit; why do you seize it?’" This passage most shows the subtleties of human feeling—the one who does harm has his own righteous indignation, and the reason he holds to is precisely 「我為福德好事」 tr. "I did it for the good matter of merit". The treatise-author further traces why it runs so deep: 「先貪財物，為今世事而作布施，為後世事，愛惜轉深；以染著故，若有侵奪，能為重罪；重罪因緣故，受三惡道苦。」 tr. "Formerly he craved wealth, and gave for the sake of the matters of this life; for the sake of the matters of later lives, his grudging becomes in turn deeper; because of being stained and clinging, if someone seizes it, he can commit a heavy sin; because of the causes and conditions of the heavy sin, he undergoes the suffering of the three evil destinies." Gathering wealth for the sake of merit, the grudging is on the contrary deeper than before he trained; this is a sickness peculiar to those who do good, and must not go unknown.

59. Craving and clinging give rise to anger; anger gives rise to knives and staves. 「復次，貪著因緣故生瞋恚，瞋恚因緣故加刀杖；刀杖殺害，受諸苦惱。」 tr. "Further, because of the causes and conditions of craving and clinging, anger arises; because of the causes and conditions of anger, one takes up knives and staves; with knives and staves one kills and harms, and undergoes all kinds of suffering and vexation." The three matters give rise to one another in descent; the words are extremely simple and the momentum extremely steep. This passage carries on from the previous one: the previous passage spoke of the causes and conditions of the heavy sin; this passage speaks of the road it travels—craving, anger, killing, in clear sequence.

60. Grasping at false and deceptive marks, the retribution is small and impure. 「復次，人起愚癡業，大不安隱，行此虛誑不實事故，後必致大患。」 tr. "Further, a person who raises deeds of delusion is greatly without peace and security; because he practises these false, deceptive, and unreal matters, afterwards he will surely bring on great calamity." The treatise-author at once cites a ground: 「十方諸佛皆說無相解脫門，諸法無相相是為實。」 tr. "The buddhas of the ten directions all speak of the signless gate of liberation; the mark of the signless of all dharmas is what is real." Since the signless is taken as real, all that the one who grasps at marks grasps is false. The text below speaks of how his mind works: 「若人取是財物虛誑不實相，然後心著；心著故，期大果報而能施與。」 tr. "If a person grasps at the false, deceptive, and unreal mark of this wealth, the mind then clings; because the mind clings, he expects a great retribution and so is able to give." Further he sets up a simile: 「譬如人欲求多收故，大用穀子。」 tr. "It is like a person who, wishing to reap a large harvest, uses a great deal of seed." What the simile takes lies in the three Chinese characters 「求多收」 tr. "wishing to reap a large harvest"—though much seed is used, the mind is on the harvest; though the giving is great, the mind is on the reward. At the end he judges it: 「如是著心布施，果報少而不淨，終歸於盡，受諸憂惱，不可稱說，皆由取相故，有如是過。」 tr. "Giving with a clinging mind in this way, the retribution is both small and impure, and in the end comes to exhaustion, and one undergoes all kinds of sorrow and vexation beyond telling—all because of grasping at marks there are such faults." And he closes with a sentence from the positive side: 「若以如實相行布施，無有如是過；無量阿僧祇生死中，受諸福樂而亦不盡，乃至得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提。」 tr. "If one practises giving with the mark as it truly is, there are none of these faults; within immeasurable asaṃkhyeyas of births and deaths one receives all kinds of merit and happiness and they are not exhausted, and so on up to obtaining anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi." Small and impure against not exhausted—set side by side, the greatness of the fault comes to be seen.

61. Losing two kinds of dharma: clinging to emptiness and falling into wrong view. 「復次，若人以著心行善法，是人若聞諸法畢竟空，即時捨所行法，著是空法取相，以此為實，先者為虛誑；是人則失二種法：失先善法，而墮邪見。」 tr. "Further, if a person practises wholesome dharmas with a clinging mind, should this person hear that all dharmas are ultimately empty, he at once abandons the dharma he was practising, clings to this dharma of emptiness and grasps at its mark, takes this as real and what came before as false and deceptive; this person then loses two kinds of dharma: he loses his former wholesome dharmas, and falls into wrong view." This is the deepest fault of the whole passage, and also the place in the whole unit most in need of attention: the earlier faults are faults of clinging to existence; this fault is the fault of hearing emptiness and turning to cling to emptiness. What is lost is twofold—the wholesome dharmas formerly practised are lost, and a further layer of wrong view is added. The treatise-author's simile is extremely apt: 「譬如重病之人，雖有眾藥，療之無損，藥復作病。」 tr. "It is like a person gravely ill: though there are many medicines, treating him does no good, and the medicine in turn becomes the disease." Emptiness is originally a medicine; clinging to emptiness, the medicine becomes a disease. This passage clasps with section 17's 「不著相是空相」 tr. "not clinging to marks is the mark of emptiness": what the sūtra text guards against, the treatise-author here says to the end.

62. A general gathering-up of the faults and offences of practising merit with a clinging mind. 「著心行諸功德，有如是等過罪。」 tr. "Practising the various merits with a clinging mind has all these kinds of faults and offences." One sentence gathers up the preceding six passages. The treatise-author here no longer gives examples, but concludes with a general sentence; this is where the structure of the whole passage lies.

63. The bodhisattva relinquishes the clinging mind and does not grasp at the mark of emptiness. 「菩薩捨於著心，不取空相；如如、法性、實際，於布施等法亦如是見。為一切眾生迴向阿耨多羅三藐三菩提。」 tr. "The bodhisattva relinquishes the clinging mind and does not grasp at the mark of emptiness; as toward suchness, the nature of dharmas, and the limit of reality, so too he sees giving and the other dharmas. For the sake of all beings he dedicates it to anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi." Two relinquishings are raised together—relinquishing the clinging mind, and also not grasping at the mark of emptiness; precisely the remedy for the two faults of the preceding passages. The three names 「如如、法性、實際」 tr. "suchness, the nature of dharmas, and the limit of reality" are used throughout this treatise for three faces of the one real mark: suchness is said of its not being different, the nature of dharmas is said of its being the nature of all dharmas, the limit of reality is said of its being the ultimate limit. Seeing giving too in this way, the giving falls neither into existence nor into emptiness. The last phrase, 「為一切眾生迴向」 tr. "for the sake of all beings he dedicates it", connects the view that falls into neither extreme to practice.

64. The dedication according to the pure wisdom of the buddhas. 「復次，菩薩布施時，作是念：『如十方三世諸佛畢竟清淨智慧，知諸法實相，亦知是布施相；我亦以是性迴向。』」 tr. "Further, when the bodhisattva gives, he has this thought: ‘Just as the ultimately pure wisdom of the buddhas of the ten directions and the three times knows the real mark of all dharmas and also knows this mark of giving, I too dedicate it with this nature.’" What the dedication relies on is not one's own discrimination, but the real mark the buddhas know. The teaching of this passage lies in the five Chinese characters 「我亦以是性」 tr. "I too with this nature"—one dedicates not with the emptiness one has understood oneself, but with the nature of the real mark the buddhas know.

65. Not using and not practising within the five sense-faculties and mental factors, he enters the truth of the highest meaning. 「復次，是菩薩一切五情、心心數法中不用不行，不能知諸法相故。」 tr. "Further, this bodhisattva does not use and does not practise within all the five sense-faculties and mind and mental-factor dharmas, because they cannot know the marks of dharmas." The five sense-faculties are the sense-faculties of the five faculties of eye, ear, nose, tongue, and body; mind and mental-factor dharmas are mind and mental factors; these two are both insufficient to know the marks of dharmas, and so he does not use them and does not practise in them. The treatise-author himself explains why: 「是法皆是因緣邊生，虛誑，無有自性故……」 tr. "These dharmas all arise from the side of causes and conditions; they are false and deceptive, because they are without self-nature …" Then he speaks of the bodhisattva's vow: 「我今欲知諸法實相迴向，是諸虛誑入實相中，皆無有異。」 tr. "I now wish to know the real mark of all dharmas and dedicate; these false and deceptive things, entering into the real mark, are all without difference." And he honestly states his own present position: 「我今未能得諸法清淨實智慧故，有所分別是虛、是實。」 tr. "Because I am not yet able to obtain the real wisdom of the purity of dharmas, I discriminate this as false and this as real." At the end he speaks of its ultimate: 「以清淨智慧知之，則皆作第一義諦；入第一義諦中，皆為清淨，無有別異。」 tr. "If one knows it with pure wisdom, then one makes it all the truth of the highest meaning; entering into the truth of the highest meaning, all becomes pure, without distinction or difference." The layers of this passage are extremely clear—first stating that the instruments relied on are insufficient, next the vow, next the insufficiency of the present position, and last the ultimate absence of difference.

66. The concluding sentence: a mind that discriminates nothing is the true bodhisattva path. 「如是布施等，迴向，直至佛道。是故說：『無所分別心，能行布施等，是名真菩薩道。』」 tr. "Giving and the rest in this way, he dedicates, all the way to the Buddha path. Therefore it is said: ‘With a mind that discriminates nothing he can practise giving and the rest: this is named the true bodhisattva path.’" The whole unit closes with this sentence. One should see how head and tail join: this unit's first question is 「住何等白淨法，能作如是方便力而不受染污」 tr. "abiding in what kind of white and pure dharma is he able to bring about such a power of skilful means and yet not be stained", and its last answer is 「無所分別心，能行布施等」 tr. "with a mind that discriminates nothing he can practise giving and the rest". What is asked is the root, and what is answered is the root too; the three dharmas being unfindable, all dharmas entering prajñā, being able to practise the supernormal powers because of emptiness, the causes and conditions being complete in all wholesome dharmas, and the faults of giving with a clinging mind, which lie in between, are all the unfolding of this one sentence. The Last Part, as one unit, ends here.

Do Not Misread

Do not read 「三法皆不可得」 tr. "these three dharmas are all unfindable" as there being nothing at all. The sūtra text follows at once with the sentence 「菩薩住是空中，能得阿耨多羅三藐三菩提」 tr. "the bodhisattva abiding in this emptiness is able to obtain anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi"—if there were nothing at all, the one matter of obtaining awakening would have nothing to hang on. What is unfindable is the self-nature of the three matters—the one able to cling, what is clung to, and the place of clinging—not the matter-marks of practice and fruit. The treatise-author's explanation makes it clearer: 「法無故眾生無，眾生無故法亦無」 tr. "because there is no dharma there are no beings; because there are no beings there is no dharma either"—what is set aside is the view of self-nature in which the two prop each other up, not giving, keeping morality, and delivering beings.

Do not read 「空不著空」 tr. "emptiness does not cling to emptiness" as setting up yet another emptiness of non-clinging. This phrase is there precisely to guard against a person, after breaking what is clung to, setting up 「空」 tr. "emptiness" as a new thing clung to; so the Buddha at once says 「空中空相不可得」 tr. "the mark of emptiness within emptiness is unfindable", dismissing even the mark of emptiness along with it. If it is read as there being another, subtler emptiness one can abide in, it runs directly counter to the 「不可得空」 tr. "emptiness of the unfindable" that the sūtra text sets up.

Do not take 「空中無有法若入、若不入」 tr. "within emptiness there is no dharma that can be said to enter or said not to enter" as Subhūti's settled teaching. These are the words with which Subhūti sets up an objection, and the Buddha then breaks it with two rounds of asking back—since you grant that all dharmas and the marks of all dharmas are empty, then all dharmas ought precisely to enter into emptiness. The treatise-author, explaining this passage, plainly says that Subhūti at this point 「心伏受解」 tr. "was subdued in his mind and received understanding". So these words are the difficulty, not the conclusion; if the words of the difficulty are taken as the conclusion, the answer of the whole passage below has nowhere to land.

Do not read 「諸佛亦性空」 tr. "the buddhas too are empty of nature" as the Buddha and the lands being without difference. The treatise-author poses a question himself precisely to guard against this sickness: 「若國土空，佛亦應空，何以別說？」 tr. "If the lands are empty, the Buddha too should be empty; why speak of them separately?"; and he answers 「佛以無量阿僧祇實功德得是身」 tr. "the Buddha obtained this body by immeasurable asaṃkhyeyas of real merit", and further says that the bodhisattva 「深愛重佛，不能疾觀使空」 tr. "deeply loves and reveres the Buddha, and cannot quickly contemplate him so as to make him empty". So what the sūtra text speaks of is the emptiness of nature, and what the treatise-author distinguishes is why they are spoken of separately; the emptiness of nature does not obstruct the Buddha's being made by immeasurable merits, and speaking separately does not obstruct their sharing the one emptiness of nature.

Do not read 「空故能行」 tr. "because of emptiness he can practise" as: because there is nothing at all, anything goes. What these words of the treatise-author answer is the difficulty ‘how can one, abiding within the emptiness of nature, practise the supernormal powers’; the intent of the answer lies in non-obstruction—if every dharma really had self-nature, they would be cut off from one another, and going and coming and manifesting transformations would all be impossible. So emptiness is the reason one can practise, not an indifference about practice. The text below, 「若菩薩不得是無障礙般若，則不能得無礙神通」 tr. "if the bodhisattva does not obtain this unobstructed prajñā, he cannot obtain the unobstructed supernormal powers", is precisely this meaning stated from the reverse side.

Do not read the supernormal powers as the master of this chapter. The sūtra text speaks of the supernormal powers at greatest length, yet at the end of every passage it comes home to enriching and teaching the Dharma: 「若菩薩遠離神通波羅蜜，不能得饒益眾生」 tr. "if the bodhisattva is far from the perfection of the supernormal powers, he cannot enrich beings", 「菩薩若遠離神通，不能隨眾生意善說法」 tr. "if the bodhisattva is far from the supernormal powers, he cannot teach the Dharma well in accord with the minds of beings". The treatise-author's passage gathering up the broad marks of the six supernormal powers also comes home to 「破其著心，以三乘而得涅槃」 tr. "breaking their clinging minds, so that by the three vehicles they obtain nirvāṇa". So the supernormal powers are the instrument by which one can act, and what is acted on is breaking the clinging mind; if one sees only the divine transformations and not the breaking of clinging, one has read root and branch the wrong way round.

Do not read 「遊戲」 tr. "sport" as carelessness. The treatise-author's own question and answer has already fixed its meaning: 「戲名如幻師種種現變；菩薩神通種種現化，名之為戲。」 tr. "What is called sport is like a conjurer's manifesting all kinds of transformations; the bodhisattva's supernormal powers manifest all kinds of transformations, and so they are called sport." What it takes is being unreal and yet able to act, not being unserious. A sentence following at once says further that it is 「於成就眾生、淨佛土中，最為要用」 tr. "in bringing beings to accomplishment and purifying buddha-lands, of the most essential use"—since it is of essential use, it is not an idle matter.

Do not read 「一切善法是菩薩阿耨多羅三藐三菩提因緣」 tr. "all wholesome dharmas are the causes and conditions of the bodhisattva's anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi" as: doing good is enough. At the head of the full ledger the Buddha points out 「無分別是施者、是受者，性空故」 tr. "there is no discriminating who is the giver and who is the receiver, because they are empty of nature"; the treatise-author too sets up a general rule in 「若菩薩不著心、無所分別行六波羅蜜乃至十八不共法，是為阿耨多羅三藐三菩提因緣」 tr. "if the bodhisattva practises the six perfections and so on up to the eighteen unshared dharmas without a clinging mind and without discriminating anything, this is the cause and condition of anuttarā samyaksaṃbodhi". It can be seen that what enables them to be causes and conditions hangs on non-discrimination; the same giving, with a clinging mind, has a retribution small and impure, and without a clinging mind receives merit that is not exhausted through immeasurable lives.

Do not read the faults of giving with a clinging mind as advising people not to give. The first sentence of the treatise-author's answer is 「雖有小利而有大過」 tr. "though it has a small benefit, it has a great fault"—the small benefit is acknowledged. What is broken is the clinging mixed into the giving, not the giving; the sentence from the positive side at the end says it clearly: 「若以如實相行布施，無有如是過……」 tr. "If one practises giving with the mark as it truly is, there are none of these faults …" If, for fear of clinging, one does not give, one commits precisely the 「失二種法」 tr. "losing two kinds of dharma" spoken of below.

Do not read 「聞諸法畢竟空，即時捨所行法」 tr. "hearing that all dharmas are ultimately empty, he at once abandons the dharma he was practising" as a fault of the dharma of emptiness. The treatise-author's simile for it is 「藥復作病」 tr. "the medicine in turn becomes the disease"—the sickness is not in the medicine, but in the person taking the medicine who makes the medicine in turn a thing clung to. What is lost is twofold: the wholesome dharmas formerly practised are lost, and he falls into wrong view. This is this unit's most pressing admonition to the reader: to hear emptiness and make light of practice is more perilous than not to have heard emptiness.

Do not read 「五情、心心數法中不用不行」 tr. "does not use and does not practise within the five sense-faculties and mind and mental-factor dharmas" as abandoning seeing, hearing, sensing, and knowing. The treatise-author himself explains its reason as 「不能知諸法相故」 tr. "because they cannot know the marks of dharmas"—what is set aside is taking the five sense-faculties and mental factors as the instrument for knowing the real mark, not their daily use. The bodhisattva's own words that follow at once, 「我今未能得諸法清淨實智慧故，有所分別是虛、是實」 tr. "because I am not yet able to obtain the real wisdom of the purity of dharmas, I discriminate this as false and this as real", show that this person is still within discrimination and knows it as discrimination; to know it as discrimination is precisely the meaning of not using and not practising.

Bearing on Practice

Take 「著者、著法、著處，是三法皆不可得」 tr. "the one who clings, the dharma clung to, and the place of clinging—these three dharmas are all unfindable" as the root of not being stained in daily life. On meeting a circumstance one sticks to, do not first press down the craving; first ask three things: who is the one able to crave, what is it that is craved, where does the craving land. Looking at the three places one by one, from the first one cannot find a real thing; not finding it, the craving naturally has nowhere to take root. Pressing it down is wrestling with it; looking is drawing the firewood from under the cauldron.

Take 「空不著空」 tr. "emptiness does not cling to emptiness" to check one's own lopsidedness in effort. After practising long, it is easiest of all to set up the few words 「空」 tr. "emptiness", 「無所得」 tr. "nothing to be attained", and 「放下」 tr. "letting go" as a new place to abide in, and on meeting matters to use them as a cover. Covering is not breaking. What really not clinging to emptiness looks like is still doing things honestly when they come, and while doing them not keeping in the mind a further self-approval, ‘I have already let go.’

Take 「若著則受味，是空中無有味」 tr. "if one clings, one takes the taste, and within this emptiness there is no taste" to examine whether one's practice is tasting sweetness. States, lightness and ease, the respect of others—all are tastes that can be tasted; once tasted, they stick. This sentence does not forbid anything pleasant; it makes one know: whatever yields a flavour to be tasted is a place that can be clung to, and so is not the ultimate support.

Take 「用是天眼自見諸善法，亦教他人令得諸善法，於善法亦不著」 tr. "with this divine eye he himself sees the wholesome dharmas, and also teaches others and causes them to obtain the wholesome dharmas, and he does not cling to the wholesome dharmas either" as the way to regard the good one does. The three matters must be complete: practising oneself, teaching others to practise, not clinging. Lacking the third matter, the first two slowly turn into bargaining chips; with the third, the first two do not give rise to resentment.

Take the phrase 「因中說果」 tr. "speaking of the result in the cause" to practise distinguishing where one's own knowing and seeing comes from. The treatise-author plainly says that what sees wholesome dharmas is in fact the knowledge of others' minds and the knowledge of former lives, and that the seeing of emptiness is in fact known from the wearing away of retribution; it is only by their cause that they are called what the divine eye sees. Daily life is likewise: what one takes to be what one has 「看見」 tr. "seen" oneself is often inferred by another road. Once the source is distinguished, one's words will not exceed the facts.

Take 「蠅無處不著，唯不著火焰」 tr. "the fly settles everywhere, only it does not settle on a flame" to look at the range of one's own clinging. Wholesome and unwholesome dharmas can both be clung to, and even the subtlest states of concentration are clung to; knowing oneself to be such a fly, one will not suppose that on reaching a certain point of practice one will naturally cease to cling. The only thing one cannot cling to is the fire of the emptiness of nature—so the key to effort lies not in exchanging for a better thing to cling to, but in walking to the place where clinging cannot take hold.

Take 「知其信等諸根增利、諸因緣具足而為說法，則不空也」 tr. "knows that their faculties of faith and the rest have grown keen and that the causes and conditions are complete, and then teaches them the Dharma; so it does not come to nothing" to weigh the timing of one's teaching the Dharma to others. What the simile of the white egret taking a fish takes lies in measuring and not missing the moment. To press one's words on a person before his time has come mostly earns only a refusal; not to speak when the time has come is to let it slip by. So the difficulty of teaching the Dharma to others lies not in what to say, but in knowing the time.

Take 「樂中不生愛，苦中不生瞋」 tr. "within pleasure he does not give rise to love, and within suffering he does not give rise to anger" as the measure of taking a body without being stained. Not being stained is not failing to feel suffering and pleasure; it is feeling them and not following them. Within a single day there is much to examine: when a favourable circumstance arises, see whether one wants to keep it; when an adverse circumstance arises, see whether one wants to push it away; the moment of keeping or pushing is where love and anger arise.

Take 「若著心布施，有不稱意事，則生恚怒；若受者不感其恩，即成怨嫌」 tr. "if one gives with a clinging mind, on meeting with something that does not accord with one's wishes, one gives rise to anger; if the receiver does not feel grateful for the kindness, it becomes resentment" to observe one's mind after giving. If after giving one waits in one's heart for a word of thanks, or reckons how the other will repay in future, this waiting and this reckoning are the clinging mind. At such a time there is no need to be vexed; only see through the reward stored in advance as one's due, and the giving is still good giving.

Take the phrase 「我為福德好事集財，汝何故侵奪」 tr. "I gathered this wealth for the good matter of merit; why do you seize it?" to warn oneself of the sickness peculiar to those who do good. Accumulating for good matters, one's grudging is on the contrary deeper than when it was for oneself, because a layer of righteousness has been added. Righteous grudging is hardest to perceive, and once it is touched, the anger it raises is also the heaviest. There is only one way to perceive it: see whether what one is guarding is the matter, or that ‘I am doing it for this matter.’

Take 「聞諸法畢竟空，即時捨所行法」 tr. "hearing that all dharmas are ultimately empty, he at once abandons the dharma he was practising" to check one's conduct after learning emptiness. Those whose practice grows slacker after learning emptiness are mostly not those who have learned emptiness too deeply, but those who have taken emptiness as a new thing grasped. The test is extremely simple: after learning emptiness, have keeping morality, giving, and reverent worship in daily use become finer, or looser? Finer is gaining strength; looser is clinging to emptiness.

Take 「我今未能得諸法清淨實智慧故，有所分別是虛、是實」 tr. "because I am not yet able to obtain the real wisdom of the purity of dharmas, I discriminate this as false and this as real" to settle one's own discriminating mind. There is no need to reproach oneself for still having discrimination; the bodhisattva in the treatise-author's writing says this of himself too. What matters is to know that this discrimination is an expedient of the present position, not the ultimate; knowing this, discrimination does not become an obstacle, and the road of dedication still runs straight to the Buddha path.

Further Resonances

The thread by which the Last Part carries on from the First Part is turning the capital of the two Chinese characters 「畢定」 tr. "assured" over from position to root. What the First Part discusses is all position: the question of assured and unassured, being assured not in the paths of the two vehicles but in the path of the Buddha, the three kinds—the one of first intent, the avaivartika, and the one in his last body—all being assured, the assured person not falling into the evil destinies, not being born among the heavens of long life, not being born in a border land or in a family of evil wrong views; at the end, by the jātaka of the six-tusked white elephant it says that the bodhisattva, even in the body of an animal, can still have kindly pity on enemies and thieves, and by the three similes of the animal body conjured by the Buddha, the transformation body of the arhat, and the elephants and horses conjured by a conjurer it presses out the two Chinese characters 「不實」 tr. "not real". The Last Part then turns to ask about the root: manifesting in this way and not being stained, what is the white and pure dharma relied on? The Buddha answers by means of prajñā, and takes the three dharmas being unfindable as its cause and condition; from this three difficulties are pressed out—if he abides only in prajñā, what use are the other dharmas; if prajñā is empty of nature, going out and entering have nowhere to settle; if he abides in the emptiness of all dharmas, the supernormal powers have nowhere to arise from. The answers to the three difficulties each have their one sentence: for the difficulty of the other dharmas, 「何法不入般若中」 tr. "which dharma does not enter prajñā?"; for the difficulty of going out and entering, the questioning-back 「一切法應入空中」 tr. "all dharmas should enter into emptiness"; for the difficulty of the supernormal powers, 「空故能行」 tr. "because of emptiness he can practise". The three answers once set up, the sūtra text then lays out the broad marks of the six supernormal powers benefiting beings, and at the end with 「因緣不具足」 tr. "the causes and conditions are not complete" presses out the full ledger of all wholesome dharmas; and the treatise-author, from the first item of the full ledger, 「無分別是施者、是受者」 tr. "there is no discriminating who is the giver and who is the receiver", turns out the threefold fault of giving with a clinging mind and the deep fault of losing two kinds of dharma, coming home to 「無所分別心，能行布施等，是名真菩薩道」 tr. "with a mind that discriminates nothing he can practise giving and the rest: this is named the true bodhisattva path". Viewing the First and Last Parts together, the chapter's name is complete: the assured one is not someone who has a portion of title and position to rely on; it is that the three dharmas are unfindable and so there is no retreat possible.

The continuing title at the head of this unit's fascicle is handed down differently in the various editions; they are recorded side by side below without forcing a judgement. The base text titles it 「大智度論釋畢定品第八十三之餘」 tr. "The Mahāprajñāpāramitā-upadeśa's explanation of the Chapter on Certainty, the eighty-third: the remainder", and for the two Chinese characters 「之餘」 tr. "the remainder", the Song, Yuan, and Palace editions have 「下」 tr. "lower", and the Ming edition has 「之下」 tr. "the lower part"; for the character 「畢」 tr. "final", the Yuan and Ming editions have 「必」 tr. "surely". All three are words customary for a continued fascicle, the same in meaning but differing in the choice of characters. The fascicle title of the Shōgozō manuscript is of a different form, recording with ‘explanation of chapter so-and-so, lower part, through to chapter so-and-so’ what one fascicle spans across chapters; it is titled 「大智度經論卷第九十四釋第八十二品下訖第八十三品」 tr. "Great Wisdom-Crossing Sūtra-Treatise, fascicle ninety-four: explanation of the eighty-second chapter, lower part, through to the eighty-third chapter", and its end-of-fascicle title of fascicle 93 likewise reads 「大智度經論卷第九十三釋第八十一品下訖第八十二品上」 tr. "Great Wisdom-Crossing Sūtra-Treatise, fascicle ninety-three: explanation of the eighty-first chapter, lower part, through to the eighty-second chapter, upper part"; this is the Shōgozō manuscript's way of recording fascicle titles. Compared with what the base text's two fascicles span—fascicle 93 spans the remainder of chapter eighty-two and the First Part of this chapter, fascicle 94 spans the Last Part of this chapter and chapter eighty-four—the numbers recorded in the Shōgozō manuscript are all one less than the base text (eighty-one and eighty-two, each plus one, are eighty-two and eighty-three; eighty-two and eighty-three, each plus one, are eighty-three and eighty-four), while its fascicle numbers correspond to the base text. At the boundary at the chapter's end, the Ishiyama-dera manuscript has 「道釋八十二品竟大智度經卷第九十四」 tr. "‘… path.’ The explanation of the eighty-second chapter ends. Great Wisdom-Crossing Sūtra, fascicle ninety-four", taking this chapter as the eighty-second, one less than the base text, which corresponds to what its chapter title records; the Ishiyama-dera manuscript further sets out a separate line, 「卷第九十四終」 tr. "end of fascicle ninety-four". The Shōgozō manuscript at the same place has 「道釋八十三品」 tr. "‘… path.’ Explanation of the eighty-third chapter", without the character 「竟」 tr. "ends"; by the numbers of its fascicle titles, the Shōgozō manuscript's eighty-third chapter is the base text's chapter eighty-four, so this is the opening mark of the Shōgozō manuscript's next chapter, not the closing record of this chapter. So the chapter numbers recorded by the Shōgozō and Ishiyama lines are both one less than the base text—the Shōgozō manuscript shows it in its fascicle titles, the Ishiyama-dera manuscript in its chapter title and at the chapter's end. Each edition has its own way of recording; they are kept side by side and recorded as they are, and choosing between them belongs to the translator.

Jizang's Commentary on the Larger Sūtra, explaining this chapter, sets up a great division at the chapter's beginning, judging this chapter to be 「明自他行成位階不退」 tr. "making clear that, the practice for self and others being accomplished, the stages do not retreat", and within it dividing two: 「第一明自德成；第二明化他德成。」 tr. "First, making clear the accomplishment of one's own virtue; second, making clear the accomplishment of the virtue of transforming others." What the fascicle of the First Part explains belongs to the former section; what this unit explains belongs wholly to the latter. His division of the text of this unit says: 「世尊！菩薩如說自在本生下，第二、如化他位成。為二：初、正明自位既成故能化物無染；第二、出其化本。」 tr. "From ‘World-Honored One! As the bodhisattva's sovereign jātakas are told’ on: second, the stage of transforming others is accomplished. It is in two: first, making clear directly that since his own stage is accomplished he can transform beings without stain; second, bringing out the root of his transforming." And at the place of this unit's first question he divides it into three layers, saying: 「白佛：菩薩住何等善根下，第二、出其化本。為三：初、以般若方便力故現生惡道惡道不染；二、以般若方便力起神通；三、以神通力化眾生淨佛土滿菩提。」 tr. "From ‘He addressed the Buddha: abiding in what roots of goodness does the bodhisattva’ on: second, bringing out the root of his transforming. It is in three: first, by the power of the skilful means of prajñā he manifests birth in the evil destinies and is not stained by the evil destinies; second, by the power of the skilful means of prajñā he gives rise to the supernormal powers; third, by the power of the supernormal powers he transforms beings, purifies buddha-lands, and fulfils awakening." These three divisions correspond exactly to the three sections of this unit—the section on the three dharmas being unfindable, the section on giving rise to the supernormal powers, and the section on purifying buddha-lands and bringing beings to accomplishment.

On the three dharmas being unfindable, what Jizang cites is wholly the same as the treatise-author: 「論云：一者、菩薩身，二者、所作鹿馬，三者、所用法，此三皆性空。」 tr. "The treatise says: first, the bodhisattva's body; second, the deer and horse he makes himself into; third, the dharma he uses—these three are all empty of nature." On the section on giving rise to the supernormal powers, Jizang first points out the intent of Subhūti's question, saying: 「須菩提問意：神通是有，有般若是空，云何住般若中起神通？」 tr. "The intent of Subhūti's question: the supernormal powers are existent—existent, while prajñā is empty; how does one, abiding in prajñā, give rise to the supernormal powers?" This and what the treatise-author points out, 「須菩提意：般若波羅蜜性空，云何菩薩安住性空波羅蜜中能行是神通有法」 tr. "Subhūti's meaning: prajñāpāramitā is empty of nature; how can the bodhisattva, abiding in a perfection that is empty of nature, practise an existent dharma such as these supernormal powers", are precisely one meaning. His explanation of the Buddha's answer says: 「佛答以空無礙故得起通，此是空有不二觀故能爾也。」 tr. "The Buddha answers that because emptiness is without obstruction one is able to give rise to the supernormal powers; this is possible because of the contemplation in which emptiness and existence are not two." To sum up with the four Chinese characters 「空有不二」 tr. "emptiness and existence are not two" the treatise-author's 「空故能行」 tr. "because of emptiness he can practise" is Jizang's own interpretive judgement; it is recorded without being set up as the treatise-author's teaching.

On the division of the supernormal powers' benefiting beings into brief and broad, Jizang's division says: 「菩薩用天眼通人眼下，第二、明以神通成化他行」 tr. "From ‘the bodhisattva with the divine eye penetrating beyond the human eye’ on: second, making clear the accomplishment of the practice of transforming others by the supernormal powers", and further says: 「是菩薩用天眼見如恒沙下，第二、廣明神通利物。上但用天眼故略，今具用六通利物為廣。」 tr. "From ‘this bodhisattva with the divine eye sees as many as the sands of the Ganges’ on: second, making clear at length the supernormal powers benefiting beings. Above, only the divine eye is used, and so it is brief; now all six supernormal powers are used to benefit beings, and that is the broad." The division into brief and broad hangs on one eye against six supernormal powers, and agrees with the order of the sūtra text. On the section on taking a body without being stained, Jizang explains: 「次歎苦樂不法者，不因苦生瞋、受樂生貪也」 tr. "Next, the praise of ‘suffering and pleasure, not …’ means not giving rise to anger because of suffering, nor to greed on receiving pleasure"—which has the same purport as the treatise-author's phrase 「樂中不生愛，苦中不生瞋」 tr. "within pleasure he does not give rise to love, and within suffering he does not give rise to anger".

On the last section, Jizang's division says: 「菩薩應如是遊戲神通淨佛土下，第三、以神通力化眾生淨佛土滿菩提願也」 tr. "From ‘the bodhisattva should thus sport in the supernormal powers and purify buddha-lands’ on: third, by the power of the supernormal powers he transforms beings, purifies buddha-lands, and fulfils the vow of awakening", and divides it into the two practices of self and others, saying: 「論土成就眾生是他行，淨佛土具自行……」 tr. "As to the land: bringing beings to accomplishment is the practice for others; purifying buddha-lands is complete with the practice for oneself …" On the faults of clinging, what Jizang lists is simpler than the treatise-author's, but the order corresponds: 「論云著之所行故多過：一者、既著三事便失出世間道，若破三事便著空，則世出世俱失也」 tr. "The treatise says that because of what clinging does there are many faults: first, since one clings to the three matters one loses the world-transcending path; if one breaks the three matters and then clings to emptiness, then both the worldly and the world-transcending are lost"—this item is precisely the 「失二種法」 tr. "losing two kinds of dharma" the treatise-author speaks of, and Jizang further sums it up with 「世出世俱失」 tr. "both the worldly and the world-transcending are lost". The text of the several items after this has, as transmitted in the Supplement to the Canon, wording that is corrupt or missing and hard to make sense of; it is not forced into an explanation, but left as a gap and not recorded. At the end he closes with one sentence: 「是故菩薩忘三事行施，具足菩薩行故得佛，餘事亦爾也。」 tr. "Therefore the bodhisattva forgets the three matters in practising giving, and because he makes the bodhisattva's practice complete he obtains Buddhahood; the other matters are likewise." To sum up with 「忘三事」 tr. "forgets the three matters" the text 「無憶想分別：是施者、是財物、是受者」 tr. "there is no recollection, imagining, and discrimination: this is the giver, this is the wealth, this is the receiver" agrees with the treatise-author's text.

Zhanran's Supporting Practice and Broad Resolution of Calming and Contemplation, explaining the phrase 「遊戲神通淨佛國土」 tr. "sporting in the supernormal powers and purifying buddha-lands", directly cites as ground the question and answer of this unit of this treatise; his text is an abridged citation and not word for word, and it is recorded below with its being an abridged citation made clear: 「大論九十三問云。神通所作何名遊戲。答。猶如幻師種種變現。菩薩亦爾。故名為戲。復次三三昧中空名為上。諸餘行法皆名為下。下如兒戲。故名為戲。」 tr. "Fascicle ninety-three of the Great Treatise asks: what the supernormal powers do—why is it named sport? The answer: just as a conjurer manifests all kinds of transformations, so is the bodhisattva; therefore it is named sport. Further, among the three samādhi, emptiness is named the upper; the other practices are all named lower—lower like a child's play; therefore it is named sport." What is cited is precisely the two sections of question and answer that the treatise-author poses himself in this unit—this treatise's original text has 「戲名如幻師種種現變；菩薩神通種種現化，名之為戲」 tr. "what is called sport is like a conjurer's manifesting all kinds of transformations; the bodhisattva's supernormal powers manifest all kinds of transformations, and so they are called sport" and 「佛法中三三昧，空名為上行」 tr. "among the three samādhi within the Buddha-dharma, emptiness is named the upper practice", 「諸餘行法，皆名為下下，如小兒」 tr. "the other practices are all named the lowest of the low, like a little child". Zhanran abridges the text and keeps the meaning; with the four Chinese characters 「下如兒戲」 tr. "lower like a child's play" he sums up together this treatise's 「下下，如小兒」 tr. "the lowest of the low, like a little child"; this is the form of abridged citation, not a variant reading; the reader should take this treatise's original text as the standard, and by this see the traces of the Tiantai house's use of it.

Huiying's Commentary lacks an explanation of this chapter. The extant text of his book stops at fascicle 24, and what it explains does not reach this chapter; although the phrase 「畢定品」 tr. "the Certainty chapter" appears once in the book, it is a plan of sectional division made in an earlier chapter, anticipating that this chapter will have three parts making clear the stage of assurance, and not commentary text on this chapter, and so it is not entered into the Further Resonances. What the word 「畢定」 tr. "assured" in Junzheng's Profound Meaning of the Four Mahāyāna Treatises cites is the text of the "Adornment" chapter of the Larger Sūtra, not this chapter, and it too is not attached here. Zhiyi's Profound Meaning of the Lotus cites this chapter, but what it takes is the treatise-author's text of the First Part, already noted in the Further Resonances of the First Part, and it is not given again here.