妙法蓮華經玄義 判教相·料簡

Why is the most valuable medicine not necessarily the most useful at this moment? Because medicine has its value, a patient has particular needs, and taking medicine has its proper time. A valuable medicine that does not correspond to the illness brings no benefit when taken; an inexpensive medicine that does correspond can enable a person to turn from ordinary to noble. This does not make the inexpensive medicine superior. It shows that the good physician truly sees the person before him.

The Buddha’s prescription possesses twelve medicines, three of them especially valuable. Sharp-witted bodhisattvas can take them all, while the grave illness of the Two Vehicles calls for contraction to nine. Complete and contracted use come from the same good physician. The difference is not that one prescription is true and the other false, but how it must be used to cure. Milk and curds here express only sequence through successive arising; they do not rank teachings by richness or thinness.

The five flavors also fall upon a person’s maturation. Unchanged views and thoughts are like milk, severing delusion like curds, being rebuked and subdued like raw ghee, receiving and recognizing Dharma like refined ghee, and breaking ignorance and opening the Buddha’s knowing-and-seeing like clarified essence. The teaching does not change its substance with the person, but a person’s mind can mature. The same Avataṃsaka is therefore milk for lesser faculties and clarified essence for great faculties.

Some are like a cow eating the Forbearance herb on Snow Mountain and obtain clarified essence in one flavor. Some are like milk successively producing curds, raw ghee, refined ghee, and clarified essence and must traverse the whole course. Others are like poison placed in milk, whose power pervades all five flavors, and gain entry at the second, third, or fourth flavor. Direct attainment, gradual maturation, and entry midway are all real pathways of capacities.

Even the periods of teaching must be viewed in this way. The rising sun first illuminates the high mountains, and its afterglow still shines on the lofty ridges as it sets. One meaning may be stated explicitly at a particular time and still extend through beginning and end. The specific lets us see what was taught then; the shared lets us see that meaning is not cut off by a period.

The heart of resolving questions is to stop measuring everyone with one ruler. See how profound a Dharma is, and also how much this person can receive. See the fixed limits of a teaching, and also how its meaning extends. See clarified essence as upright and solely one, and also see sentient beings mature through one flavor, five flavors, or two, three, and four flavors. True completeness does not mean handing over everything on every occasion. It means abandoning none of the possible ways of entry.

The fifth topic is Resolving Questions. It has three meanings: first, distinguishing from the perspectives of the shared and the specific; second, distinguishing according to benefit and nonbenefit; third, distinguishing within each of the various teachings.

Distinguishing from the Perspectives of the Shared and the Specific

First come the shared and the specific. If the five flavors and half and full are discussed specifically, each has fixed limits. If they are discussed as shared, they extend through beginning and end.

The Avataṃsaka, for example, is the sudden teaching as the milk flavor. Specifically, it occurs only at the beginning. As shared, it extends all the way to the later teachings. The Sūtra of Immeasurable Meanings therefore says, “Next he taught prajñā and cultivation over successive kalpas, the oceanic emptiness of the Avataṃsaka.” The Lotus integrates all into the Buddha’s wisdom. This is the Avataṃsaka extending through these two scriptures.

The Sutra on Resolving Doubts concerning the Semblance Dharma also says: “In today’s seated assembly, innumerable beings each see differently. Some see the Tathāgata enter nirvāṇa. Some see the Tathāgata abide in the world for one eon, one eon minus a portion, or immeasurable eons. Some see the Tathāgata’s body as sixteen feet tall, some see a small body, and some see a great body. Some see the recompense-body in the ocean of worlds of the Lotus Treasury teaching the mind-ground Dharma-gate to hundreds of thousands of millions of Śākyamuni Buddhas. Some see the Dharma-body as equal to empty space, without discrimination, without marks, and unobstructed, pervading and equal to the Dharma realm. Some see this place as only mountains, forests, earth, and sand; some see the seven treasures; some see this place as where the buddhas of the past, present, and future practice the path; and some see this place as precisely the inconceivable realm of the buddhas and real Dharma.”

When the sun first rises, it illuminates the high mountains first. When the sun is about to set, its afterglow should likewise illuminate the lofty ridges. Thus the ocean of worlds of the Lotus Treasury extends even beyond nirvāṇa; how much more must it extend through the preceding teachings?

Next is the half-word sūtra teaching of the curds flavor. Specifically, it occurs in the second period. As shared, it also extends into the later teachings. Why? Kālodāyin directly received a prediction in the Lotus assembly. Later he entered a settlement and was killed, becoming the originating condition for establishing a precept. Śāriputra likewise served as the principal petitioner for the teaching in the Lotus assembly. After he entered extinction, Junti carried the three robes to the Buddha and asked a question; the remainder is abbreviated. Does this not show the Tripiṭaka extending into the later teachings?

The Great Treatise on the Perfection of Wisdom says: “From the initial teaching at the Deer Park through the night of nirvāṇa, the discipline, concentration, and wisdom taught were collected into the treasuries of sūtra and the others.” One should therefore know that the Tripiṭaka extends into the later teachings.

The Vaipulya teaching sets half and full against one another and is the raw-ghee teaching. Specifically, it occurs in the third period. As shared, it also extends into the later teachings. Why? The “Dhāraṇī” says that predictions were formerly given to the śrāvakas at Rājagṛha, that predictions are now again given to them in Jeta Grove in Śrāvastī, and that predictions had previously been given to them at Vārāṇasī. Śāriputra says that the World-Honored One is not false and what he says is true, and therefore can give them predictions a second and a third time. Thus it is known that Vaipulya extends beyond the Lotus.

Prajñā carries the half while discussing the full and is the refined-ghee teaching. Specifically, it occurs in the fourth period. As shared, it extends through both beginning and end. Why? From the night of attaining the path through the night of nirvāṇa, the Buddha constantly taught prajñā. The Great Treatise on the Perfection of Wisdom also says, “Subhūti asks whether they are certain or not certain.” One should therefore know that prajñā also extends into the later teachings.

Nirvāṇa is the full teaching of the clarified-essence flavor. Specifically, it occurs in the fifth period. As shared, it also extends to the beginning. Why? The Great Treatise on the Perfection of Wisdom says, “From the initial arousal of mind, one constantly contemplates nirvāṇa and practices the path.” Could the preceding teachings have contained no bodhisattva who had aroused the mind and contemplated nirvāṇa?

The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says: “I sat at the place of awakening beneath the bodhi tree and first attained right awakening. At that time, bodhisattvas from worlds measureless as asaṃkhyeyas and Ganges sands also asked me this profound meaning. The meaning and merit of the phrases they asked were likewise all just so, equal and without difference. Asking in this way can benefit immeasurable sentient beings.” This shows the meaning of nirvāṇa extending into the earlier teachings.

If the manifest side of the Lotus is discussed, it is not seen in the earlier teachings. If the secret side is discussed, principle is originally without obstruction. Śāriputra therefore says, “Formerly I heard such Dharma from the Buddha and saw the bodhisattvas receive predictions of buddhahood.” Does this not establish that texts of shared predictions already existed in the past?

A person asks: The Nirvāṇa retraces and teaches four; Vaipulya directly opens four; the Distinct Teaching again has four. How should they be distinguished?

The answer says: The Nirvāṇa “takes up the four and universally enters buddha-nature.” The Distinct Teaching proceeds in sequence and sees buddha-nature only later. This branch of Vaipulya still says, “preserving realization, two do not see the nature.” The remainder is abbreviated.

Distinguishing According to Benefit and Nonbenefit

Second is resolving questions according to whether benefit is obtained. If the Avataṃsaka is milk and the Tripiṭaka is curds, it appears that the flavor of skillful means is rich while the Great Vehicle flavor is thin. This must be explained from three perspectives.

First, consider whether there is benefit in actual use. A valuable medicine that cannot treat the present illness does not suit the patient. An inexpensive medicine that fits the illness is what the patient needs. If a valuable medicine is unsuitable, taking it in vain brings no benefit.

When the Avataṃsaka was first taught, it could not yet bring profound benefit to beginners, and gradual faculties had not yet changed. For those two conditions, it was like milk. If gradual faculties receive the Tripiṭaka, they can sever the delusions of views and thought and gradually reduce the three poisons of greed, anger, and delusion. They thereby turn from ordinary beings into noble ones, like milk turning into curds. One cannot say that an inexpensive medicine surpasses a valuable one merely because it brings practical benefit, nor that a valuable medicine is inferior merely because it brings no benefit in that situation.

The Avataṃsaka is likewise. For lesser faculties it is like milk, while for great faculties it is like clarified essence. A simile takes only a partial resemblance and cannot be required to correspond in every respect.

Second, consider a good physician who possesses one secret prescription with twelve medicines, three of which are especially valuable. The physician is skilled at examining the signs of illness and knows whether the medicines should be increased or reduced. The physician never misses the condition or mistakenly applies a treatment.

The Buddha is likewise. His perfect prescription and wondrous treatment possess the twelve divisions of scripture; among them, teaching without being asked, vaipulya, and prediction are the most profound. Bodhisattvas have sharp wisdom and can take all twelve in full. The Two Vehicles have grave illnesses and use nine as their dose. If the prescription were not contracted for them, it would bring their illness no benefit. The uncontracted twelve are likened to milk, while the contracted nine are likened to curds. This simile takes only sequence through successive arising; it does not take richness or thinness, shallowness or depth.

Third, consider the practitioner’s mind. When the Avataṃsaka is taught, ordinary beings’ delusions of views and thought have not changed, and so they are said to be like milk. When the Tripiṭaka is taught, the delusions of views and thought are severed, and so they are said to be like curds. By the time of Vaipulya, practitioners have been rebuked, made ashamed, and subdued; they no longer claim that their realization is true and ultimate, and so they are like raw ghee. By the time of Prajñā, they receive the teaching’s instructions and recognize the dharmas, and so they are like refined ghee. By the time of the Lotus, they break ignorance, open the Buddha’s knowing-and-seeing, receive predictions of buddhahood, and have purified minds, and so they are said to be like clarified essence.

When practitioners’ minds remain immature, the teaching itself has not changed. When practitioners’ minds mature, the teaching is named according to their maturation.

A person asks: Does one person receive all five flavors, or do five people each receive one flavor?

The answer says that there are people who receive only one flavor. Those whose disposition is purely of one kind in the Avataṃsaka assembly immediately obtain clarified essence without traversing all five flavors. The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says, “On Snow Mountain there is an herb; if a cow eats it, it immediately obtains clarified essence.”

There are also people who traverse all five flavors in sequence. Those of Lesser Vehicle disposition are like milk in relation to the sudden teaching and like curds in relation to the Tripiṭaka; they continue through clarified essence and only then reach the ultimate. The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says, “From a cow comes milk, and through successive arising clarified essence comes from ghee.”

There are also sharp-faculty bodhisattvas and śrāvakas who have not yet entered a stage. Some see the nature within the Tripiṭaka, which is traversing two flavors. Some see the nature within Vaipulya, which is traversing three flavors. Some see the nature within Prajñā, which is traversing four flavors, as with the three hundred bhikṣus. The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says, “Place poison in milk; the poison pervades the five flavors, and in each flavor it can kill a person.” This is the meaning here.

Distinguishing within the Various Teachings

Third is resolving questions by traversing the various teachings. The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says, “Ordinary beings are like milk, śrāvakas like curds, bodhisattvas like raw and refined ghee, and buddhas like clarified essence.” The present explanation first uses this simile to encompass the five periods of half and full. Ordinary beings possess no path for treating delusion and are entirely immature, like milk. Śrāvakas give rise to true wisdom and are all generally like curds. Bodhisattvas of the Shared Teaching and the Two Vehicles are like raw ghee. The Distinct Teaching is like refined ghee, and the Perfect Teaching like clarified essence.

The five flavors are now judged separately within each teaching.

First is the Tripiṭaka Teaching. The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says, “An ordinary being is like milk; a stream-enterer like curds; a once-returner like raw ghee; a non-returner like refined ghee; and an arhat, pratyekabuddha, and buddha like clarified essence.” Some leap over intermediate fruits and immediately obtain clarified essence. Others enter flavor by flavor in sequence. These are the three meanings within the Tripiṭaka Teaching.

Next are the five flavors within the Shared Teaching. Fascicle Thirty-Two of the Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says: “The buddha-nature of ordinary beings is like milk mixed with blood. Blood is all afflictions such as ignorance and formations, while milk is the five wholesome aggregates. Therefore I say that complete awakening is attained from the various afflictions and five wholesome aggregates. Just as sentient beings’ bodies are all formed from semen and blood, so too is buddha-nature. Stream-enterers and once-returners have severed a small portion of the afflictions and are like true milk. A non-returner is like curds, an arhat like raw ghee, pratyekabuddhas through bodhisattvas of the tenth ground like refined ghee, and a buddha like clarified essence.” Cases of leaping over fruits are indeterminate; the remainder is abbreviated.

Next are the five flavors clarified within the Distinct Teaching itself. Fascicle Nine of the Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says, “Sentient beings are like a newly calved cow whose blood and milk have not yet separated.” Śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas are like curds, bodhisattvas like raw and refined ghee, and the buddhas, World-Honored Ones, like clarified essence. Cases of leaping over fruits and indeterminate sequence are likewise present; the remainder is abbreviated.

Finally comes the Perfect Teaching. The Perfect Teaching has only one flavor. The Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra says, “On Snow Mountain there is an herb named Forbearance; if a cow eats it, it immediately obtains clarified essence.” Because the teaching is upright and solely one, the five flavors are not discussed as a sequence.

If distinctions are established within nondifference, however, the five flavors may be judged as arising in sequence according to identity in name through ultimate identity. The twelve divisions of scripture emerging from the Buddha are milk emerging from the Buddha, and the new physician uses milk as medicine. The five flavors may also be judged according to the four wholesome roots and the particular point at which they develop in each person.

Why do some people attain clarified essence at first hearing while others must traverse the whole course? When classifying the teaching reaches the resolution of questions, it no longer asks only where a particular scripture should be placed. It asks why the same account of the five flavors sometimes belongs specifically to one segment and sometimes extends through beginning and end; why the most valuable medicine may bring no immediate benefit while a contracted prescription cures the illness; and why one person needs only one flavor to attain clarified essence while another must traverse them flavor by flavor.

Master Zhiyi answers through a threefold inquiry: first distinguishing shared and specific, next benefit and nonbenefit, and finally placing the five flavors back within each of the various teachings. These are not three tables that replace one another, but three changes in the position from which the matter is viewed.

Fixed Limits Make It Possible to See How Meaning Extends through Beginning and End

The specific views the fixed limit of a teaching within one set of conditions. The shared follows the same meaning to see how it extends through beginning and end. As milk, the Avataṃsaka belongs specifically to the beginning, yet as shared it can extend later. The half-word sūtra as curds belongs specifically to the second period, yet also extends later. Vaipulya and Prajñā each have a specific period, while predictions and teaching between the two nights still disclose their shared reach. Nirvāṇa belongs specifically to the end, yet contemplation of nirvāṇa at the initial arousal of mind and profound questions asked at first right awakening make it extend earlier.

The sun first illuminates high mountains at sunrise and its afterglow still shines upon lofty ridges at sunset. The picture changes neither the mountains nor the sunlight; what changes are the two times of rising and setting. The Avataṃsaka is like first illumination at the beginning and afterglow at the end. The meaning of the ocean of worlds of the Lotus Treasury can therefore be seen from the beginning through even beyond nirvāṇa. Shared does not rename every intermediate teaching as the Avataṃsaka. It says that one profound meaning is not sealed within a single period.

The Tripiṭaka extending later is shown by two personal histories and one account of compilation. Kālodāyin received a prediction in the Lotus assembly, then later entered a settlement, was killed, and became the originating condition for establishing a precept. Śāriputra requested the teaching in the Lotus assembly, then later entered extinction, after which Junti carried the three robes to the Buddha. The discipline, concentration, and wisdom taught from the Deer Park through the night of nirvāṇa were also collected into the treasuries of sūtra and the others. Although the events differ, they all establish that the half-word teaching did not disappear after the second period.

Vaipulya uses predictions at Rājagṛha, Jeta Grove in Śrāvastī, and Vārāṇasī to show that it extends beyond the Lotus. Prajñā uses both constant teaching from the night of attaining the path through the night of nirvāṇa and Subhūti’s question about certainty and uncertainty to show that it extends through beginning and end. Nirvāṇa moves in the opposite direction, from later to earlier: if those who initially aroused the mind already contemplated nirvāṇa, and if bodhisattvas already asked the profound meaning when the Buddha first attained right awakening, the meaning of nirvāṇa cannot begin only in the final assembly.

The Lotus further has manifest and secret sides. On the manifest side, its present declaration of integration into the Buddha’s wisdom is not seen earlier. On the secret side, principle is without obstruction. Śāriputra’s former hearing of bodhisattvas receiving predictions of buddhahood becomes evidence for predictions extending through the past. Shared and specific therefore function like two focal lengths: one sees what was explicitly taught in that moment, while the other sees how the meaning passes through different moments.

The Boundary among Three Kinds of Four Lies in How Buddha-Nature Is Seen

After shared and specific, the root treatise poses a short question. The Nirvāṇa retraces and teaches four, Vaipulya directly opens four, and the Distinct Teaching again has four. How are the three distinguished?

The answer places each in its own position: Nirvāṇa takes up four and universally enters buddha-nature; the Distinct Teaching proceeds in sequence and sees buddha-nature later; Vaipulya preserves realization, while two do not see the nature. All three bear the same number four, but their functions are separated as universal entry, seeing later in sequence, and two not seeing the nature. Here resolving questions displays its task: it does not merge identical names immediately, but asks where each “four” takes the practitioner.

A Medicine’s Value Is Not the Same as Its Power to Cure at This Moment

The second resolution begins with a counterintuitive pairing. The Avataṃsaka is milk and the Tripiṭaka is curds: does this not make the flavor of skillful means rich and that of the Great Vehicle thin? Master Zhiyi does not use the physical properties of milk and curds to value the teachings. He first asks whether the patient actually benefits.

A valuable medicine that does not correspond to the illness brings no benefit when taken. An inexpensive medicine that corresponds to the illness can take effect. Beginners do not yet receive profound benefit from the Avataṃsaka, and gradual faculties have not yet turned; for those two conditions it is therefore called milk. When gradual faculties receive the Tripiṭaka, they can sever views and thought, gradually reduce the three poisons, and turn from ordinary to noble, like milk becoming curds.

The simile preserves both the value of the medicine and the timing of treatment. An effective inexpensive medicine does not thereby surpass the valuable medicine, and a valuable medicine that is temporarily ineffective does not thereby become inferior. For lesser faculties, the Avataṃsaka is like milk; for great faculties, it is clarified essence. The teaching has not changed. What the recipient can bear and the benefit received differ. The simile takes only this part of resemblance, preventing every physical property of milk from governing the doctrine.

Why Does the Good Physician Sometimes Use Only Nine of the Twelve Medicines?

The second medicine simile is more detailed. A good physician has a secret prescription containing twelve medicines, three of them especially valuable. The physician accurately examines the signs of illness, knows when to increase or reduce the prescription, and never misses the condition or applies a mistaken treatment.

The Buddha’s perfect prescription and wondrous treatment contain the twelve divisions of scripture. Among them, teaching without being asked, vaipulya, and prediction are the three most profound. Sharp-witted bodhisattvas can take all twelve. Because those of the Two Vehicles are gravely ill, nine are used as their dose. Giving them all twelve would leave the prescription perfect but might not benefit their illness. Complete use of twelve is likened to milk, while contracting the prescription to nine is likened to curds.

Here milk and curds carry only sequence through successive arising. The perfect prescription is first used in full and is later contracted according to illness. The before-and-after meaning lies in the physician’s diagnosis and administration, not in milk being thin and curds thick. The three most valuable medicines are not declared useless; they are temporarily withheld according to this patient’s condition. Completeness and correspondence to capacity are not competing standards. The physician’s skill lies precisely in making them correspond.

The Flavor Actually Falls upon the Practitioner’s Mind

The third explanation no longer speaks from the medicine of teaching itself, but from the practitioner’s mind. During the Avataṃsaka, ordinary beings’ views and thoughts have not changed and are therefore like milk. During the Tripiṭaka, views and thoughts are severed and are therefore like curds. During Vaipulya, practitioners are rebuked, made ashamed, and subdued, and no longer call their own attainment truly ultimate; they are therefore like raw ghee. During Prajñā, they receive the teaching and recognize the dharmas and are therefore like refined ghee. During the Lotus, they break ignorance, open the Buddha’s knowing-and-seeing, receive predictions of buddhahood, and purify the mind and are therefore like clarified essence.

The five flavors thus trace the maturation of the mind in practice. While the practitioner’s mind remains immature, the teaching has not itself turned into another teaching. When the practitioner’s mind matures, the teaching receives a name in accordance with that maturation. The earlier statement that the Avataṃsaka is milk for lesser faculties but clarified essence for great faculties is explained in the same way: one teaching illuminates different degrees of maturation and therefore displays different flavor-names.

One Person or Five People Is Not a Choice with Only One Side

A person asks whether one person receives all five flavors or five persons each receive one flavor. The answer does not retain only one route.

First there is one person who receives only one flavor. Those whose disposition is purely of one kind within the Avataṃsaka immediately attain clarified essence and need not traverse the five flavors. On Snow Mountain there is an herb, and when the cow eats it, clarified essence is obtained. The herb, cow, and clarified essence disclose direct attainment upon first hearing.

There is also one person who traverses all five flavors in sequence. A person of Lesser Vehicle disposition is like milk when facing the sudden teaching and like curds upon receiving the Tripiṭaka, then passes through raw ghee and refined ghee before reaching the ultimate only at clarified essence. From the cow comes milk and, successively, curds, both ghees, and clarified essence. Cow, milk, curds, the two ghees, and clarified essence reveal one person’s maturation through time.

There are also sharp-faculty bodhisattvas and śrāvakas who have not yet entered a stage but see the nature at different points. Seeing the nature within the Tripiṭaka is called traversing two flavors. Seeing it within Vaipulya is traversing three. Seeing it within Prajñā is traversing four, with the three hundred bhikṣus given as the example. The number is counted from the flavor in which the nature is seen; two, three, and four each record the point of arrival.

Finally there is poison placed in milk. The poison pervades all five flavors, and each flavor can kill. The poison does not wait until clarified essence to become effective, just as a faculty capable of entry need not always proceed to the final flavor before receiving benefit. The three pictures—immediate clarified essence from the Forbearance herb, flavors arising successively from milk, and poison pervading every flavor—stand together. Direct attainment, sequential maturation, and entry midway all have a place.

How Does the Same Set of Five Flavors Appear within Each Teaching?

The third resolution first gives a general judgment: ordinary beings are like milk, śrāvakas like curds, bodhisattvas like raw and refined ghee, and buddhas like clarified essence. As a general statement of the five periods of half and full, ordinary beings have no path to treat delusion and are like untransformed milk; śrāvakas give rise to true wisdom and are like curds; bodhisattvas of the Shared Teaching and the Two Vehicles are like raw ghee; the Distinct Teaching is like refined ghee; and the Perfect Teaching is like clarified essence. This is a general view across different classes.

The perspective next moves inside each teaching. In the Tripiṭaka Teaching, ordinary beings, stream-enterers, once-returners, non-returners, and arhats together with pratyekabuddhas and buddhas are represented in sequence by milk, curds, raw ghee, refined ghee, and clarified essence. Some leap over intermediate fruits and obtain clarified essence directly, while others enter flavor by flavor. Sequential stages, sudden attainment, and differences of entry are all present.

Within the Shared Teaching, the buddha-nature of ordinary beings is like milk mixed with blood. Blood represents all afflictions such as ignorance and formations, while milk represents the five wholesome aggregates. Afflictions and the five wholesome aggregates jointly form the conditions for proceeding toward complete awakening, just as the body of a sentient being is formed from semen and blood. Stream-enterers and once-returners who have severed a small portion of the afflictions are like true milk; a non-returner like curds; an arhat like raw ghee; pratyekabuddhas through bodhisattvas of the tenth ground like refined ghee; and a buddha like clarified essence. Leaping over fruits is again indeterminate.

Within the Distinct Teaching, sentient beings are like a newly calved cow whose blood and milk have not separated. Śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas are like curds, bodhisattvas like raw and refined ghee, and buddhas like clarified essence. Here too, leaping over fruits can be indeterminate. Each correlation follows the names, stages, and flavor-sequence actually listed in its own passage. The five flavors are therefore not only one general chronology; they can also illuminate a course within one teaching.

The Perfect Teaching first speaks of only one flavor. On Snow Mountain there is an herb called Forbearance; when the cow eats it, it immediately obtains clarified essence. Because the teaching is upright and solely one, sequence through the five flavors is not placed first. If distinctions are established within nondifference, identity in name through ultimate identity may still be judged through five flavors arising in sequence. The twelve divisions emerging from the Buddha become milk emerging, and the new physician uses milk. The five flavors can also be distinguished according to the four wholesome roots and the point at which each person develops.

One flavor and five flavors no longer conflict. One flavor speaks of what is entered as upright and solely one. Five flavors speak of sequence in practitioners’ development and maturation. Direct attainment at first hearing, entry flavor by flavor, and leaping over levels can all be seen within one teaching.

Resolving Questions Does Not Break Apart; It Returns Each Explanation to Its Own Measure

The question of shared and specific separates the fixed limits of a particular teaching from the extension of its meaning. The question of benefit and nonbenefit separates the Dharma-medicine’s own value from its actual effect upon this patient. The question traversing the teachings separates the five flavors as a general framework from the five flavors within each individual teaching.

These three separations do not fragment doctrine. They allow sunlight to illuminate only the mountains actually present in the simile, the good physician to expand or contract the prescription according to the illness before him, milk and curds to bear only the meaning of successive arising, and the practitioner’s mind to bear immaturity and maturity. Each simile keeps its own power. Together they answer the initial difficulty: a teaching has fixed limits while its meaning can extend; a Dharma-medicine can be valuable while awaiting the corresponding capacity; and clarified essence can be solely one while sentient beings still mature by one, five, two, three, or four flavors.

Through the Eye of the Shiqian

Zhanran first illuminates shared and specific in two directions: the first four flavors extend from earlier to later, while Nirvāṇa and the Lotus extend from later to earlier. The two scriptures mentioned by the root treatise are identified as Prajñā and the Lotus. Because the high mountains illuminated at sunrise and sunset do not differ and the substance of the illumination is not separate, the Avataṃsaka’s extension through beginning and end receives a clear hinge.

The sūtra passage is further divided into brief establishment, establishment through two events, establishment through compilation, and general conclusion. Kālodāyin’s killing and the resulting precept and the three robes after Śāriputra’s extinction are supplemented by the Mirror; their source attributions still remain with their respective works. The three Vaipulya predictions are judged through Rājagṛha corresponding to the Lotus and Śrāvastī occurring after the Lotus. The two Prajñā proofs are one scriptural citation and one event; the first is not supplied with an additional title.

The answer on the three kinds of four is unfolded in the Mirror as the four levels of the Distinct Teaching’s ten abodes, ten practices, ten dedications, and entry into the grounds. Its subsequent question about training in eight in the abodes and sixteen in the practices is a further difficulty posed by Zhanran. This illumination allows Master Zhiyi’s original answer and the commentator’s development to follow one another without being merged.

Concerning benefit and nonbenefit, the Shiqian says the Avataṃsaka is milk only in the two respects that a capacity is not yet able to enter the great and that it is taught first. The Avataṃsaka’s other dimensions remain outside the partial simile. The good-physician simile then fixes complete use as first and contracted use as next. Milk and curds stand for sequence through successive arising rather than thickness and thinness.

One flavor, five flavors, and two, three, or four flavors are judged as three routes of sudden, gradual, and indeterminate. Two, three, and four are counted by seeing the nature upon reaching that flavor. This does not create three new practices; it answers how many flavors one person receives.

The passage traversing the teachings first gives a general judgment and then shows that every teaching can contain sudden, gradual, and indeterminate. The Mirror expressly separates the path of teaching from the path of realization: the path of teaching proceeds sequentially, while realization can leap over stages. Indeterminate leaping over fruits therefore does not destroy the establishment of stages in the teaching.

The final Perfect-Teaching passage is likewise illuminated as three meanings. Immediate clarified essence from the Forbearance herb is sudden; distinction within nondifference is gradual; and the twelve divisions emerging from the Buddha are the development of the indeterminate. Master Zhiyi says only identity in name through ultimate identity and the four wholesome roots. Correlating the first faith through wondrous awakening with particular flavors is Zhanran’s further stage-judgment.

The Mirror also uses the levels of severing delusion to explain the depth of development, placing the five-flavor stage-judgment in the practitioner’s actual progress rather than leaving it as only an arrangement of names.

Viewed through this Mirror, the heart of resolving questions is not to add another fixed table for the five flavors. It distinguishes the different work performed by one simile in relation to time, faculties, benefit, mind, and realization. The shared does not erase the specific, one flavor does not erase sequence, and leaping into realization does not erase the path of teaching. The threefold inquiry thus becomes the living eye of the preceding classification.