解脫道論 義疏通講 · 冊9

At this point in the twelve chapters of the Path of Freedom, the sky changes. The preceding Chapter on Fields of Practice spent seventy-one units teaching, practice by practice, how the mind is gathered. Its final field, the perception of the unendurable in food, took even a mouthful apart. The first sentence of this chapter no longer speaks of gathering. It speaks of use.

The central observation can be stated at once: within the sevenfold inventory of transformation, the character 斷, “abandon,” occurs under only three items. It appears six times in the passage: under transformation by wisdom—“by manifesting impermanence, one abandons the perception of permanence” 〔T32 441b11〕 and “by the path of arahantship, one abandons all defilements” 〔T32 441b11–12〕; under discernment by concentration—“through the first jhāna, one abandons the hindrances” 〔T32 441b14–15〕 and “through the attainment of neither-perception-nor-non-perception, one abandons the base of nothingness” 〔T32 441b15–16〕; and under transformation by skillful means—“through renunciation, one abandons sensual desire” 〔T32 441c11–12〕 and “through the path of arahantship, one abandons all defilements” 〔T32 441c12〕. The remaining four—noble discernment, transformation born of karmic result, transformation of a person of merit, and transformation produced by a spell—do not use the character once. The first and seventh items also use the same sentence: transformation by wisdom closes with abandoning all defilements through the path of arahantship, and transformation by skillful means closes the same way. The sentence links the two ends and encloses the five intervening items. This inventory is arranged not by the magnitude of an ability but by what the transformation depends on: the power of the path at its edges, karmic result, merit, and spells in the middle. The inventory is broad; the threshold is narrow.

At the Opening: Supernormal Knowledge Is Not Another Practice

“At that time, the meditator, having thus brought concentration to mastery and abiding in the fourth jhāna, can bring forth the five direct knowledges” 〔T32 441a26–27〕. Three clauses give two qualifications. The first is “having thus brought”: “thus” points back to the work of the preceding chapter. This chapter does not repeat that work but begins from its accomplishment. The second is “abiding in the fourth jhāna”: the five direct knowledges do not arise from the first, second, or third jhāna, but from the fourth. The phrase “mastery of concentration” occurs twice in the whole treatise, here and in the divine-eye section 〔T32 444b06〕. Both instances occur in this chapter, marking the phrase as a threshold within the chapter.

In other words, the opening presents the direct knowledges as a use. They are not a sixth practice placed alongside concentration, but functions that can arise once concentration is mastered. Their position in the book speaks as well: after the Chapter on Fields of Practice and before the Chapter on the Analysis of Wisdom—at the end of concentration, not at the beginning of wisdom.

Five names are followed by five explanations: “psychic power, divine ear, knowledge of others’ minds, recollection of past lives, and divine eye” 〔T32 441a27–28〕. They are then explained as “psychic power takes the sense of transformation” 〔T32 441a28〕, “the divine ear takes the sense of surpassing the human ear” 〔T32 441a28〕, “knowledge of others’ minds takes the sense of understanding another’s intention” 〔T32 441a29〕, “recollection of past lives takes the sense of remembering former births” 〔T32 441a29〕, and “the divine eye takes the sense of seeing beyond the human eye” 〔T32 441a29–441b01〕. Pause over one small irregularity. All five names carry 通, “direct knowledge,” in the list; only the first and last retain it in the explanations. The Taishō text reads this way, and this edition neither supplies nor regularizes the character. The same alternation between full and shortened forms will recur below.

Each explanation is one sentence. The first—“psychic power takes the sense of transformation”—is the hinge of the entire passage, for over the next twenty lines the treatise no longer speaks of “psychic power”; it speaks only of “transformation.” The sense selected for direct knowledge is transformation, not nobility. That choice determines why the following inventory is so broad.

Three Transformations: Three Ways the Body Changes

“How many kinds of transformation are there? Who cultivates transformation? How should transformation be brought forth?” 〔T32 441b01–02〕. Three questions are laid out together. This unit answers the first, returns to the second at its close, and leaves the third for the next unit.

The first classification gives three: “determination-transformation, form-transformation, and mind-made transformation” 〔T32 441b02–03〕. All three definitions turn on the body, but they move it differently. Determination-transformation changes the number or measure of the same body: “making one many and many one, enlarging the body as far as the Brahmā world” 〔T32 441b03–04〕. Form-transformation changes the form of that body: “relinquishing the natural body and appearing as a boy, a nāga, or a Brahmā king” 〔T32 441b05–06〕. Mind-made transformation produces another body from this one: “from this body producing another body, made according to one’s intention, complete in all bodily parts and faculties” 〔T32 441b07–08〕. One changes number, one changes form, and one produces a second body. Later sections treat all three separately. The closing parenthesis there reads “mind-produced transformation” 〔T32 443a05〕 rather than the present “mind-made transformation”; the single-character difference between 作 and 造 is preserved rather than corrected.

Seven Transformations: A Very Wide Inventory

The second classification suddenly widens the opening: “transformation is further of seven kinds: transformation by wisdom, by concentration, noble transformation, transformation born of karmic result, transformation of a person of merit, transformation produced by a spell, and transformation by skillful means” 〔T32 441b08–10〕. These cannot be cut into “first three and last four.” Though listed seventh, transformation by skillful means still explicitly abandons defilements through renunciation and the path of arahantship. The three items born of karmic result, belonging to persons of merit, and produced by spells are what carry the list into the world of devas and birds, kings and householders, and spell-holders.

Transformation by wisdom: “by manifesting impermanence, one abandons the perception of permanence and accomplishes transformation through discernment by wisdom; by the path of arahantship, one abandons all defilements and accomplishes discernment by wisdom” 〔T32 441b11–12〕. Its support is wisdom: seeing impermanence abandons the perception of permanence, and the path of arahantship abandons all defilements. The complete sentence “by the path of arahantship, one abandons all defilements” occurs only twice in the treatise. The other occurrence is in the Chapter on the Analysis of Virtue, among the four paths that abandon defilements 〔T32 400c25〕. There it appears in a discussion of virtue; here, in a discussion of supernormal knowledge. Its use in both places shows that the phrase is an established formula of the treatise, not a phrase coined for this chapter.

Transformation through discernment by concentration: “through the first jhāna one abandons the hindrances … through the attainment of neither-perception-nor-non-perception one abandons the base of nothingness” 〔T32 441b14–16〕. Its support is concentration: a lower attainment abandons the object above it, one level at a time.

Noble discernment is the longest and most difficult item. Four statements circle around the expressions “unendurable,” “not unendurable,” and “not-not-endurable”: “if a bhikkhu delights in the unendurable, he should abide in the perception of the not unendurable” 〔T32 441b18–19〕, followed by three statements of the same form with the names changed. Four questions then ask how these perceptions are established. The first three ask how to “abide in a certain perception”; the fourth suddenly changes: “How, with respect to the unendurable and the not unendurable, does one leave both statements behind and abide in equanimity, mindfulness, and present knowing?” 〔T32 441b29–441c01〕. No new perception is established. The two preceding statements are left behind, and the meditator abides in equanimity, mindfulness, and present knowing: “Seeing a form with the eye, the bhikkhu becomes neither glad nor distressed; he establishes equanimity and abides mindful and presently knowing. It is so at every sense door. This is called noble discernment” 〔T32 441c01–03〕.

The names in the four statements and four questions do not align neatly. The second and fourth statements both establish the “perception of the unendurable,” while the four questions do not match the statements one by one. The four other editions have a major variant here. Under their reading, the fourth statement contains “leaving both statements behind” and thus aligns with the fourth question. This edition follows the Taishō base text and does not impose a pairing the text itself does not make. One feature survives the textual tangle: the first three questions change perception; the fourth does not change perception but abides in equanimity. Changing perception makes the agreeable appear disagreeable or the disagreeable agreeable; equanimity falls into neither side. The final question is where the “noble” direction of this discernment comes into view.

Look closely at the medicines given in the first three questions. They are all familiar: “at an object held dear, fulfill the perception of foulness” 〔T32 441b24–25〕, “or apprehend it as impermanent” 〔T32 441b25〕, “at objects not held dear and held dear, either fulfill loving-kindness or apprehend the elements” 〔T32 441b26–27〕, and “at objects held dear and not held dear, either fulfill the perception of foulness or apprehend impermanence” 〔T32 441b28–29〕. The four medicines are foulness, impermanence, loving-kindness, and the elements. Foulness, loving-kindness, and the elements are fields of practice taught one by one in the previous chapter: the ten foulness meditations, loving-kindness among the four immeasurables, and analysis of the four elements. Each is named in the list of thirty-eight fields in the Chapter on the Analysis of Fields of Practice 〔T32 411a09–11〕. Impermanence is not a separate item in that list; it is a way of apprehending. Noble discernment does not invent new tools. It takes several well-practiced methods from the preceding chapter and uses them differently. Previously foulness removed lust and loving-kindness removed hate; here both are used to move freely between what is held dear and what is not. The same medicine treated an illness in the earlier chapter; here it changes perception. The difference does not lie in learning another tool, but in having the existing tools ready at hand. This answers the chapter’s opening threshold: the direct knowledges are not new practices, but earlier practices mastered to the point of use.

Transformation born of karmic result: “all devas and all birds—whether human or born in a bad destination—travel through the sky and perform transformations” 〔T32 441c04–05〕. Its support is karmic result. A bird’s flight also counts as a transformation.

Transformation of a person of merit: “the wheel-turning king, the householder 樹提, the householder 闍提, and the householder 瞿師羅; it is further said that there are five great persons of merit who perform transformations” 〔T32 441c06–07〕. Four names are given, but the number is five. The fifth is not supplied by the treatise, and this edition neither adds one nor reconstructs the names into Indic forms.

Transformation produced by a spell: “a spell-holder recites a spell, travels through the sky, appears as an elephant, transforms into a horse or a chariot, produces infantry, and manifests various armies” 〔T32 441c08–10〕. Its support is the spell; the agent need not even be a meditator.

Transformation by skillful means: “through renunciation one abandons sensual desire; through the path of arahantship one abandons all defilements. Just as a potter and others become accomplished in their craft, so through the arising of right means all things can be transformed” 〔T32 441c11–13〕. Its support returns to the path and closes with an ordinary simile: a potter whose craft has been mastered. “Potter” occurs twice in the whole treatise. The other occurrence is under joy born of faith: “seeing a potter and others, joy arises” 〔T32 415c29〕. There the potter is something seen; here the potter is the vehicle of the simile.

Pause here and ask: Why does a treatise on the path to freedom include flying birds and spell-holders in an inventory of direct knowledge?

The answer lies in the first explanation at the chapter’s opening. The treatise explains psychic power as “taking the sense of transformation” 〔T32 441a28〕. If the direct knowledge is being considered as transformation, whatever can transform belongs in the inventory; the text does not add a gate saying that the agent must be noble. The inventory is therefore broad: devas, birds, kings, householders, and spell-holders are all included. Yet the treatise immediately does something else. It raises “Who cultivates transformative discernment?” as a separate question 〔T32 441c14〕, and its answer names only one kind of person: “With respect to space, nine; or with respect to space, five: through the kasiṇas one gains mastery in the fourth jhāna; this is his cultivation of transformative discernment” 〔T32 441c14–16〕. The inventory includes birds; the practice is for meditators. The range of the term is broad, while the threshold of practice is narrow. By treating them as two questions, the text prevents “can fly” and “has cultivated” from becoming one claim.

Who Cultivates Transformative Discernment: Three Accounts, One Threshold

The final paragraph answers the second question with three accounts: “Through the kasiṇas one gains mastery in the fourth jhāna; this is his cultivation of transformative discernment. Another account says that the fourth jhāna of the form realm, because of its excellence in action, is his cultivation of transformative discernment. Another says that the four jhānas and two masteries are his cultivation of transformative discernment” 〔T32 441c15–17〕. The sentence “this is his cultivation of transformative discernment” occurs three times in three lines. The accounts are preserved side by side; the treatise selects none and ranks none.

In the first account, the punctuation and referent of “with respect to space, nine; or with respect to space, five” remain unresolved. Two textual clues can be checked. When the Chapter on the Analysis of Fields of Practice classifies the thirty-eight fields “by condition,” it says that “nine fields are conditions for direct knowledge” 〔T32 411b13〕 and explains them as “the eight kasiṇas and the discriminated space kasiṇa” 〔T32 411b14〕. The divine-eye section later has the parallel wording “light as nine, or light as five” 〔T32 444a13–14〕. These are clues, not conclusions. The final account also does not identify the two masteries in “the four jhānas and two masteries.” Both expressions are retained without supplementation.

Although the three accounts differ, the threshold they state is the same: mastery of the fourth jhāna. The broad inventory narrows here to a single line: cultivated transformation has one path.

A Reading Practice to Carry Forward

The most economical and revealing way to read this passage is: when reading an inventory of abilities, read its “through” first.

Each of the seven items is asked in turn. The answers repeatedly open with 以, “through”: through manifesting impermanence, through the path of arahantship, through the first jhāna, through the attainment of neither-perception-nor-non-perception, through renunciation, through the path of arahantship. Arrange those phrases in a column and the seven transformations divide at once. Where a path or attainment is introduced by “through,” the transformation has been cultivated. Where the answer simply names a population—devas and birds, kings and householders, spell-holders—it has been obtained by birth, acquisition, or learning. The text can make the distinction without adding a sentence of evaluation.

This method remains useful beyond the passage. When the treatise gives a series of names, the opening of each answer often states what it depends on. Read the support before the manifestation. In the Chapter on the Analysis of Wisdom and later in the Chapter on the Analysis of Truth, the same habit helps distinguish results from causes. Those watching the spectacle count the names; those learning the way count the “through.”

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Carry away three things. One observation: 斷, “abandon,” occurs six times under only three items—wisdom, concentration, and skillful means—while the first and seventh are linked by “abandon all defilements”; the inventory is ordered by support, not by magnitude. One reading practice: in an inventory of abilities, read the “through”: a path or attainment following “through” marks what is cultivated; a named population marks what comes by birth or learning. One place to pause: why include flying birds and spell-holders? Because the treatise explains direct knowledge as transformation rather than nobility; whatever transforms enters the list. But it separately asks who cultivates, and answers with the meditator established in mastery of the fourth jhāna. The inventory includes birds; the practice is for meditators.

The seventy-one units of the preceding chapter taught how to gather the mind. This chapter begins by teaching how the gathered mind is used. Its first lesson is not how to fly, but how to distinguish what was merely found along the road from what was reached by walking it.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · The Five Direct Knowledges and the Classes of Transformation · Exposition · Summer 2026

The preceding unit completed the inventory of seven transformations, then separately asked who cultivates transformative discernment and narrowed the threshold to mastery of the fourth jhāna. The third of the three opening questions—“How should transformation be brought forth?” 〔T32 441b01–02〕—is answered only here.

The central observation can be stated at once: the four bases of power are not presented here as four parallel practices, but as a case history ordered by the problems that arise. Desire-concentration comes first because one who does not wish to transform never begins. Energy-concentration takes over because once practice begins it may “fall back or remain still” 〔T32 441c29〕. Mind-concentration follows because even after that there may be slowness, regression, or fear 〔T32 442a01〕. Discernment-concentration comes last because even after fear has passed the timing may be wrong: “this is the time to cultivate” and “this quality is not to be cultivated at this time” 〔T32 442a05〕. These are not four tools lying side by side. They are four gates encountered in order. The opening list calls the fourth “wisdom-concentration” 〔T32 441c19〕, while the sequential practice calls it “discernment-concentration” 〔T32 442a05〕. This edition preserves both readings. Yet “discernment” names exactly what the fourth base is doing: distinguishing the time to cultivate from the time not to cultivate.

First the Name, Then Its Own Explanation; What Is Not Explained Remains Open

“This bhikkhu cultivates the basis of power associated with desire-concentration and dominant effort; energy-concentration, mind-concentration, and wisdom-concentration are likewise” 〔T32 441c18–19〕. One sentence establishes all four. The treatise then does something characteristic: it takes the sentence apart and accounts for its components one by one.

“Desire means delighting in performing transformation; concentration means that the mind is not scattered” 〔T32 441c19–20〕. The two terms explain themselves here.

“He undertakes four kinds of exertion: that unarisen bad and unwholesome qualities may not arise; that arisen bad and unwholesome qualities may be abandoned; that unarisen wholesome qualities may arise; and that arisen wholesome qualities may increase and not be forgotten—that they may arise further and be cultivated to fullness. This is called dominant effort” 〔T32 441c21–23〕. Dominant effort is explained through four exertions. The four acts match the announced number. Under the last act, “not be forgotten” 〔T32 441c23〕, “arise further,” and “be cultivated to fullness” are three qualifications of the same act, not three additional acts.

“A basis of power is a path made for obtaining power; that very quality is a basis of power. Further, the accomplishment of desire-concentration and dominant effort is called a basis of power” 〔T32 441c24–26〕. Two explanations coexist. One is functional: it is a path made to obtain power. The other is compositional: desire, concentration, and dominant effort are accomplished. The treatise does not merge them, and this edition retains both.

When it reaches “accomplishment,” however, the treatise gives only this: “Accomplishment: only when those three qualities are fulfilled; in words, the six parts are accomplished” 〔T32 441c24〕. It identifies neither the three qualities nor the six parts, and even the punctuation remains uncertain. Soon afterward, “one who cultivates according to the initial meaning for the sake of obtaining power” 〔T32 441c26–27〕 leaves “initial meaning” unexplained as well.

This yields a portable discipline for reading: use a term as the treatise itself explains it; where the treatise gives no explanation, leave the space open. Five technical expressions stand side by side. Three are explained and two are not. Filling in the latter would be writing on behalf of the old text. The most dangerous place in an old book is often not what is wholly obscure, but what appears one small step from completion; that missing step may be precisely what transmission has lost. Leaving space is not laziness. It is honesty.

Cultivating the Four in Order: Each Meets One Condition

After taking the compound apart, the treatise cultivates each base, and each is tied to a concrete condition.

“The meditator cultivates in this way in the present; this is his means” 〔T32 441c28–29〕. This is the opening movement, the accomplishment of the basis of power associated with desire-concentration and dominant effort 〔T32 441c27–28〕.

“If it falls back or remains still, he arouses it through energy; he accomplishes energy-concentration and dominant effort, and accomplishes the basis of power” 〔T32 441c29–442a01〕. The first condition is regression or stagnation. Its medicine is energy.

“If his means is slow, falls back, or becomes frightened: when the mind is slow, he attends to a sign of speed; when the mind falls back, he makes it concentrated; when the mind is frightened, he attends to a sign of equanimity. He accomplishes mind-concentration and dominant effort, and accomplishes the basis of power” 〔T32 442a01–03〕. Three illnesses meet three medicines one by one: slowness meets a sign of speed, regression meets concentration, and fear meets a sign of equanimity. They are not interchangeable.

“If his mind is free of defilement, he delights in discerning what is beneficial and what is not beneficial as he cultivates these qualities: this is the time to cultivate. Again, this quality is not to be cultivated at this time. He accomplishes discernment-concentration and dominant effort” 〔T32 442a03–06〕. The third condition is subtler. Defilement has gone and benefit can be distinguished from harm; the remaining problem is timing.

A reading practice is offered here: in a passage of practice instructions, count its occurrences of “if.” The present passage uses 若 seven times. Apart from the general heading “if his means is slow,” each introduces a condition: if it falls back, if fear arises, if the mind is free of defilement. The technical name stands before the “if”; the situation a practitioner will actually meet, together with its response, stands after it. Definitions tell you what a practice is called. “If” tells you what to do when something happens. This counting method remains useful beyond this unit: whenever this treatise teaches a practice at length, its practical branches often open with “if.”

Body and Mind Follow Each Other: Four Reciprocal Pairs

Once the four bases are cultivated, the syntax changes: “The meditator cultivates the four bases of power and thereby makes the mind masterful: his body follows his mind, and his mind comes to follow his body” 〔T32 442a06–07〕. Then: “He establishes the body in the mind and the mind in the body; through the body he transforms the mind and through the mind he transforms the body; through the body he sustains the mind and through the mind he sustains the body” 〔T32 442a08–09〕.

Body follows mind / mind follows body; body is established in mind / mind in body; body transforms mind / mind transforms body; body sustains mind / mind sustains body. All four pairs reverse themselves. The treatise does not explain why it writes this way, but the form carries meaning: at this point, which of body and mind commands and which follows is no longer fixed.

Then comes the simile: “Cultivating in this way, the meditator becomes exceedingly light; his body becomes exceedingly pliant and capable of being sustained, like an iron ball heated by fire that can be fashioned at will” 〔T32 442a10–12〕. Iron is hard, yet when heated through it can be formed into any implement. The same sentence recurs word for word in the later section on form-transformation 〔T32 442c11〕. Determination-transformation and form-transformation share this preparation of body and mind; it belongs to transformation as such, not to only one kind.

“Because of its lightness he enters the fourth jhāna. Emerging calmly and mindfully, he discerns space and sustains it with knowledge. Resolving with knowledge, ‘This body shall rise into space,’ he rises into space like a wisp of cotton blown by the wind” 〔T32 442a13–15〕. The body rises. The simile still concerns lightness: wind carrying a wisp of cotton.

Pause: Why Does a Passage on Transformation End by Speaking of Fear?

Everything has proceeded smoothly. Then the treatise suddenly brakes: “In this matter, a beginning meditator should not travel far too quickly” 〔T32 442a15–16〕.

Why does a passage teaching the arising of supernormal transformation devote its final fifth to not going far?

The treatise asks and answers its own question: “Why? When he turns to observe, fear may arise. If fear arises, his jhāna falls away” 〔T32 442a16–17〕. The answer lies not in the power but in the mind exercising it. The danger is not failure. It is succeeding and then frightening oneself. Fear arises; jhāna falls away; the practitioner is in midair. This restraint is therefore technical safety, not a moral ornament: “Therefore a beginning meditator should not travel far too quickly. He should proceed step by step” 〔T32 442a17–18〕.

The same warning occurs twice within three lines, with a question and answer between. First the warning, then the reason, then the warning again: the treatise places its explanation between identical guardrails.

Its progression is almost disarmingly concrete: “At first, by one chi, he observes gradually upward; then, relying on that sign, he exerts himself to one xun” 〔T32 442a18–19〕. One chi first, one xun next; only then, “advancing step by step through this means, he may rise as he wishes” 〔T32 442a19–20〕. The preceding unit said that the body could be enlarged as far as the Brahmā world. Here the practitioner begins one chi off the ground. A method capable of reaching the Brahmā world permits only one chi at the start. That contrast is the unit’s final instruction.

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Carry away three things. One observation: the four bases of power form a case history ordered by problems—desire (not beginning), energy (regression or stillness), mind (slowness, regression, fear), and discernment (the time to cultivate and the time not to). The heading says “wisdom-concentration” and the practice says “discernment-concentration”; the latter names the fourth base’s work. One reading practice: count the “ifs” in practice instructions. Before “if” stands the technical name; after it stands the situation and its treatment. One place to pause: why does a passage on transformation end with fear? Because the treatise says that observation may provoke fear, fear makes jhāna fall away, and the practitioner is already aloft. A method capable of reaching the Brahmā world therefore begins only one chi above the ground.

Also retain the passage’s two open spaces: the “three qualities” and “six parts,” and the “initial meaning.” The received text does not identify them, so this edition does not supply them.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · Bringing Forth Transformation and the Four Bases of Power · Exposition · Summer 2026

The first of the three transformations is unfolded only here. The preceding unit taught their common preparation—the four bases of power, body and mind following each other, and a body made pliant like iron heated through. This unit teaches what is done with that body.

The central observation is this: the point of operation throughout this method is which sign is determined, not which thing is altered, and the assignments cross. To sink into the ground as though into water, one does not cultivate the earth kasiṇa but “cultivates the water kasiṇa with the mind” 〔T32 442b13〕. To walk on water as though on land, one does not cultivate the water kasiṇa but “cultivates the earth kasiṇa with the mind” 〔T32 442b16–17〕. To make A function as B, cultivate the kasiṇa of B. One does not soften earth or harden water; one resolves earth as water and water as earth. The treatise closes the two sections respectively with “as though it had the nature of water” 〔T32 442b15〕 and “as though walking on earth by nature” 〔T32 442b19〕. It does not explain the character 性, “nature.” This edition retains it rather than replacing it with such near-synonyms as “real” or “inherent.” The checkable sequence is only this: first comes the resolution with knowledge, “Let this become water / earth”; afterward, “the nature of water / earth” closes the comparison. The passage speaks throughout of a determined sign. It never says that an external object is remodeled.

The Opening Question: Falling Comes First

A method of flight opens by asking about falling: “Question: If the meditator falls away from jhāna while in space, will he tumble from space and fall to the ground?” 〔T32 442a20–21〕.

The answer is stranger still: “No. He rose from the place where he had previously been sitting. If he has traveled far and then falls away, he returns to that earlier sitting place and sees his own body still sitting as before. For one with direct knowledge, this is his method of stopping” 〔T32 442a21–23〕.

The answer speaks not from the air, but from the sitting place. It does not explain why the body aloft does not fall. It tells us only that the practitioner rose from the earlier sitting place, returns there upon falling away, and sees his body sitting as before. The final expression, “method of stopping,” receives no further explanation. What can be checked is only the order: return to the earlier sitting place comes first; “method of stopping” closes the sentence. This edition retains the words without deciding how the two are related.

Three verbs appear: “rise” marks departure, “return” marks falling back, and “see” marks what is seen. All three attach to the “earlier sitting place.” Not one character explains how the body in space continues. That is the boundary of what this question can answer.

The very first question concerns a possible fall. It can be read beside the preceding unit’s warning that a beginner “should not travel far too quickly” 〔T32 442a15–16〕. There the beginner is given a progression from one chi to one xun; here the practitioner returns to his earlier seat when jhāna falls away. Both passages place limitations and sequence before the exercise of direct knowledge. Nothing further about a mechanism may be inferred from “method of stopping.”

The Survey: Eight Acts, Four Comparisons

“The meditator observes step by step in this way. When he comes to perform with mastery of determination, he carries out more than one kind of transformation” 〔T32 442a23–24〕. The treatise then gives them in one breath: making one many and many one; passing through walls, enclosures, and mountains; moving without obstruction as through space; sinking into and emerging from the ground as though in water; walking on water as though on land; traveling through space like a bird; and touching the sun and moon—“with such great direct knowledge and such great bodily strength, he can rise as far as the Brahmā world” 〔T32 442a28〕.

The survey contains four comparisons, though their surfaces differ: moving without obstruction as through space; entering earth as water; walking on water as on land; traveling through space like a bird. They can be read together as making one domain function as another. The four other items in the survey—making one many, making many one, passing through the obstacles, and touching the sun and moon—do not use this grammar. The eight therefore cannot all be reduced to one expression.

After the survey, the treatise gives each method. Every item corresponds to the survey. Only “sinking into and emerging from the ground” lacks a new heading and is carried forward by “What does this mean?” 〔T32 442b12〕. This is an observable linkage in this passage, not a rule imposed on the treatise as a whole.

In Sequence: One Frame Repeated Four Times

Making one many: “He makes one into many—a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, and so forth. He enters the fourth jhāna by way of transformation, emerges calmly, and resolves step by step with knowledge: ‘May I, being one, become many,’ like the arahant 小路” 〔T32 442a29–442b02〕.

Making many one: “He wishes to turn the many into one and resolves with knowledge: ‘May I turn the many into one,’ like the elder arahant 小路” 〔T32 442b02–04〕. The same person is called “the arahant 小路” first and “the elder arahant 小路” second. The titles differ and are retained. The treatise does not give his story or an Indic identity.

Passing through walls, enclosures, and mountains: “The meditator cultivates the space kasiṇa in this way, enters the fourth jhāna, and emerges calmly” 〔T32 442b05–06〕 … “he resolves with knowledge: ‘Let this become space’” 〔T32 442b07–08〕.

This section pauses to explain “appearing / not appearing” through a paired self-question: “What does appearing mean? Open. What does not appearing mean? Not open” 〔T32 442b09–10〕. It then says, “The meditator makes what is not open become open and passes through walls, enclosures, and mountains without obstruction” 〔T32 442b10–12〕. The following section separately continues with “What does this mean?” 〔T32 442b12〕, so the paired questions are not the passage’s only self-explanation.

Notice the narrow scope of the explanation. The survey has “appearing, he passes through a wall, an enclosure, or a mountain” 〔T32 442a25〕. “Appearing” might slide past as a particle, yet the treatise stops and gives one word each for “appearing” and “not appearing”: open and not open. It explains nothing else. Why the wall opens, whether it remains after opening, whether the wall or the practitioner’s determined object is open—none is stated. The text pins down two easily missed characters and continues.

This habit of explaining one small point and leaving the event untouched is characteristic, and it is itself a restraint: the treatise explains the word, not the phenomenon. Where the wording is ambiguous, it gives a key; where the event would invite invention, it does not invent. Asking “what really happened to the wall?” demands something the treatise never promised. The brevity of the answer is its honesty.

One variant belongs here. The base reads, “the meditator thus cultivates the space kasiṇa,” while the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Old Song witnesses add “with the mind” after “thus” 〔T32 442b06〕. Following those four witnesses would align this line with “cultivates the water kasiṇa with the mind” 〔T32 442b13〕 and “cultivates the earth kasiṇa with the mind” 〔T32 442b16–17〕. Under the base reading, this line alone lacks “mind.” This edition follows the base and records the variant without alteration. Surface regularity and irregularity cannot alone decide which is earlier.

Sinking into earth and walking on water use the crossed assignments described above.

All four sections share the same frame: enter the fourth jhāna → emerge calmly → resolve with knowledge → let this become something. “Resolving with knowledge: let this become …” occurs four times in this passage—space 〔T32 442b08〕, water 〔T32 442b14〕, earth 〔T32 442b18〕, and within reach of the hand 〔T32 442b27〕. The phrase “resolve with knowledge” occurs eleven times in the whole treatise and nine times here.

Pause here: if all four sections enter the same fourth jhāna and all use the same resolution with knowledge, why write each one separately?

The text itself makes the answer visible. The only real difference is the expression following “let this become”: space, water, earth, within reach. Entering and emerging from concentration are common preparation. Repeating them allows the final term alone to vary, revealing that the method has only one variable: which sign is determined. If the text merely said, “enter the fourth jhāna, emerge calmly, and resolve whatever you wish with knowledge,” a reader might attribute the variation to the power of concentration. By writing the common frame four times, the location of the variation cannot remain hidden. Repetition identifies the variable without adding a comment.

Three Modes of Travel and Touching the Sun and Moon

“He travels through space like a bird. There are three modes of travel here: walking, traveling by wind, and traveling by mind” 〔T32 442b19–20〕. Even flight has three ways, each attached to a practice. One who has attained concentration on the earth kasiṇa “resolves a road in space and travels by walking” 〔T32 442b21〕. One who has attained concentration on the air kasiṇa “resolves air like a thread of cotton and travels as wind travels” 〔T32 442b22〕. One who travels by mind “fills body and mind, attaches either a perception of ease or a perception of lightness to the body, and makes the body light; traveling by mind, he goes like a bird” 〔T32 442b22–24〕. Three modes, three methods, paired one by one. The cotton simile appeared in the preceding unit as “like a wisp of cotton blown by the wind” 〔T32 442a15〕. There it illustrated the lightness of rising; here it illustrates wind-travel. The object is shared, not the function of the simile.

The first mode deserves attention: there is no road in space, so the practitioner resolves one. One who has attained the earth kasiṇa does not make himself light; he determines earth in space. Once there is earth, he walks as usual. Of the three, this is closest to everyday action. The object determined is “road” and the mode is “walking”; no word says “fly.” The second borrows wind and the third mind, each with its own support. Their common point remains the same: the operation concerns the determined sign, not a claim about an external thing. The three are listed without ranking.

Touching the sun and moon uses the same frame: enter the fourth jhāna, emerge calmly, and resolve with knowledge, “Let this come within reach of my hand” 〔T32 442b27〕. The treatise does not explain “within reach,” but shows its use in the next sentence: “whether sitting or lying down, he touches and strokes the sun and moon with his hand” 〔T32 442b28–29〕. Attend to the posture: sitting or lying down. The person who reaches the sun and moon does not have to fly up to them. The sign determined is “near,” not bodily displacement.

The Final Section: Two of Three, but the Text Does Not Name Them

“The meditator has direct knowledge and mastery of mind and delights in traveling to the Brahmā world. Through the four bases of power and a mind cultivated in this way, he resolves the far as near and the near as far, the many as few or the few as many” 〔T32 442b29–442c03〕. Far / near and many / few reverse in two pairs, and remain acts of determination. “With the divine eye he sees Brahmā’s forms; with the divine ear he hears Brahmā’s sounds; with knowledge of others’ minds he knows Brahmā’s mind” 〔T32 442c03–04〕. Three of the five direct knowledges operate together. Their dedicated sections come later—the divine ear at 〔T32 443a12〕, knowledge of others’ minds at 〔T32 443b07〕, and the divine eye at 〔T32 444a13〕. The treatise gives their use before their method.

The final sentence leaves a space: “The meditator has three modes of travel and uses two modes to travel to the Brahmā world” 〔T32 442c04–05〕. Which two? The treatise does not say. It has just explained all three, giving enough information to guess but not enough to decide. This edition records the line without supplying the names. There are two cases in this unit in which a number and its names do not line up. The other is the survey’s “more than one kind of transformation” 〔T32 442a24〕, which gives no number before listing eight items. The received text is not governed by our desire for regularity. The method closes with the inline annotation “(determination-transformation is complete)” 〔T32 442c05〕. Each of the three transformations closes with the same kind of annotation: form-transformation at 〔T32 442c21〕 and mind-produced transformation at 〔T32 443a05〕. Each method therefore has a clear boundary.

A Reading Practice

When the treatise describes an ability, first find its sentence, “Let this become …”

That sentence is where the operation occurs. However long the preparation—which jhāna is entered, how one emerges, how light the body becomes—the action begins there. And what it acts upon is always the determined sign, not a stated alteration of an external thing. Once that sentence is found, the method discloses itself.

The practice remains useful in the next four methods—divine ear, knowledge of others’ minds, recollection of past lives, and divine eye. Each has its object and its operational verbs, whether “determine” or “advert.” Find those sentences first and one can distinguish what the treatise actually asks the practitioner to do. Whether all five methods are one kind of operation cannot be decided from this unit and is not asserted here.

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Carry away three things. One observation: the assignments cross. To make earth function as water, cultivate the water kasiṇa; to make water function as earth, cultivate the earth kasiṇa. One does not soften earth; one resolves earth as water. The treatise closes the sections with “the nature of water” and “the nature of earth,” while leaving “nature” unexplained. One reading practice: find the sentence “Let this become …”; that is the point of operation, and it acts on the sign, not on a stated external object. One place to pause: if all four sections enter the same fourth jhāna and resolve with knowledge, why repeat them? Repetition reveals that the sole variable is which sign is determined.

Two open spaces also remain: “method of stopping” is unexplained, and the two modes used to travel to the Brahmā world are unnamed. This edition retains both without supplying answers that the passage cannot establish.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · The Applications of Determination-Transformation · Exposition · Summer 2026

With the second and third of the three transformations, the treatise changes its manner. Rather than continuing to display what each can do, it first draws their boundaries.

The central observation is this: the treatise distinguishes the three transformations by one matter alone—whether form is relinquished, and whether another body is produced. Determination-transformation occupies a long paragraph and form-transformation another, but their difference is given in one sentence: “In determination-transformation one sustains without relinquishing one’s form; in form-transformation one relinquishes the form. This is called the difference” 〔T32 442c20–21〕. It is not a difference in the magnitude of the ability or the breadth of its object. It is whether that body remains. Determination-transformation makes the same body many, large, or able to cross a wall; the form remains one’s own. Form-transformation relinquishes one’s form and takes another. Mind-produced transformation goes one step further: it does not alter one’s own form but produces another body—“within the empty space of his own body he produces whatever transformation he wishes” 〔T32 442c24–25〕. The produced person coexists with the practitioner; when one strolls, the other strolls. One body changes its number, one body exchanges its form, and beside one body another body appears: three boundaries, each drawn in one sentence.

The Preparation Is Parallel, but Its Words Still Differ

The opening of form-transformation repeats the pattern read in the preceding method: “he establishes the body in the mind and the mind in the body” 〔T32 442c07〕, “he attaches either a perception of ease or a perception of lightness to the body” 〔T32 442c09〕, and “like an iron ball heated by fire that can be fashioned at will” 〔T32 442c11〕. All three recur in parallel form from the section on bringing forth transformation 〔T32 442a08·442a10·442a11–12〕. The two methods share a structural preparation, not an identical string of words. The earlier section says, “through the body he transforms the mind, and through the mind he transforms the body.” The present one says, “through the body he establishes the mind, and through the mind he establishes the body” 〔T32 442c07–08〕. One may therefore say the preparations are parallel and the distinction is not made by the preparation, but not that the wording is identical.

Precisely because the preparations are parallel, the treatise needs a separate question to distinguish the two: “Question: What is the difference between determination-transformation and form-transformation?” 〔T32 442c19〕. This is the only self-posed “what is the difference?” in the passage. Notice which two methods it asks about: determination- and form-transformation, not form- and mind-produced transformation.

Pause here: why does it ask only about this pair and not the difference between form- and mind-produced transformation?

The text makes the answer visible. Mind-produced transformation announces its boundary itself. It begins by saying that the practitioner “attends within his body as though it were an empty vessel” 〔T32 442c23–24〕, then “within the empty space of his own body he produces whatever transformation he wishes” 〔T32 442c24–25〕. Space is first made inside the body, then another is produced there. The product is a separate person: “If the practitioner with direct knowledge strolls here, the produced person strolls as well” 〔T32 442c29–443a01〕. The pronoun “that” separates the two. Two bodies are present; the boundary is self-evident and needs no separate question. Determination- and form-transformation both involve only one body—one changes number, the other form—and share a parallel preparation. They are easy to conflate, so the treatise asks about precisely that pair.

This supplies a portable reading practice: notice where the treatise itself asks “what is the difference?” It does not ask between every pair. It asks where confusion is likely. Where it asks is where it predicts the reader will err. Such a question is an old author’s circle around the point of danger. Later occurrences of “what is the difference?” or “how do they differ?” can be read as signals: the text knows this is where the reader may go wrong.

A Long List of Forms, One Closing Example

The list under form-transformation is long. It begins, “If he wishes to relinquish his own form and appear in the form of a boy” 〔T32 442c13〕, then continues with the forms of a nāga, phoenix, yakṣa, asura, Śakra, Brahmā, sea, mountain, forest, lion, tiger, leopard, elephant-and-horse, and infantry 〔T32 442c15–18〕. Living kinds lead into devas, then sea, mountain, and forest, then beasts, then an army, without internal division.

The closure repeats only the last item: “Having turned it, he resolves with knowledge: ‘May I become an infantry formation.’ Adverting in this way, he becomes an infantry formation” 〔T32 442c18–19〕. None of the preceding fourteen is restated. The textual shape can be established exactly: fifteen forms are listed, and the last alone receives the closing formula. The earlier fourteen are names only. This edition does not copy the final item’s procedure back onto them.

One variant occurs in the list. The base reads “the form of an elephant-and-horse” 〔T32 442c17–18〕, while four witnesses read “the form of an elephant, the form of a horse.” The four-witness reading regularizes the list so that every object has its own “form.” This edition follows the base and records the variant without alteration.

The Produced Person: How Far Does the Resemblance Go?

The most revealing part of mind-produced transformation is the description of the produced person. “Produced according to intention, it is complete in every bodily part and lacks no faculty” 〔T32 442c29〕. Bodily parts complete; faculties not deficient. Then comes the paired action: the practitioner strolls, the produced person strolls; the practitioner “sits or lies down, emits smoke or flame, asks or answers” 〔T32 443a02〕, and the produced person “likewise sits, lies down, emits smoke or flame, asks, and answers” 〔T32 443a03〕. Four actions follow one by one in identical syntax, then the sentence gathers them: “the produced person follows him and acts in these and similar ways” 〔T32 443a04〕.

Between them stands a difficult expression: “Adverting in this way, he accomplishes following resemblance; through this means he performs many transformations” 〔T32 442c26–27〕. The treatise gives no further explanation of “following resemblance.” What can be established is its position: after “having turned it, he resolves with knowledge: let it become accordingly” 〔T32 442c25–26〕, and before “performs many transformations.” It is thus a step after determination and before multiplication. Whether the produced person resembles the producer or the production resembles the intention is not stated; either conclusion would require material from outside the passage. The expression therefore remains open. There are two kinds of difficulty in an old translation: one we have not understood, and one the text never says. The second cannot be solved merely by achieving an interpretation.

The produced person can ask and answer. At this degree of resemblance, is it a living being?

The treatise answers among the miscellaneous statements in six characters: “As for the produced person, it has no life faculty” 〔T32 443a08〕. Everything seems present but life. Complete bodily parts are produced, faculties are produced, sitting and answering are followed; a life faculty is not something transformation can make. The line is tucked into miscellaneous statements rather than the main treatment, almost as an aside, yet it places every preceding “likewise” beneath one boundary. The four characters “produced food” follow it, but their syntactic attachment cannot be decided from the treatise. This edition marks the phrase for further study and does not impose punctuation.

Miscellaneous Statements: Appearing and Not Appearing

The first three miscellaneous statements all speak of ceasing to appear: “When the form made by transformation is discriminated at the time of arrival, it then no longer appears” 〔T32 443a06–07〕; “when it is discriminated before that time, and something is wished or said in the interval, what he has sustained becomes nonappearing” 〔T32 443a07〕; “when no discrimination is made, it fails to appear moment after moment” 〔T32 443a08〕. The times differ—at arrival, before arrival, and when no discrimination is made—but the result is nonappearance. All three are difficult to punctuate, and the treatise gives no further explanation. This edition retains them without claiming a final segmentation.

One point alone can be established: the persistence of produced form depends on discrimination. Discrimination at the time makes it cease, discrimination before the time with an intervening wish or statement makes it cease, and no discrimination means nonappearance moment after moment. The produced thing has no life belonging to itself. This and “the produced person has no life faculty” are two expressions of the same boundary, one speaking of a person and one of form.

A note on the form “miscellaneous statements” belongs here. The inline closure “(the miscellaneous statements are complete)” occurs three times in the treatise 〔T32 424c14·438b24·443a11〕. In this unit, miscellaneous statements begin after the main treatments of the three transformations and collect appearing and nonappearing, the produced person’s lack of life faculty, and the nine objects. They are not folded into the three dedicated treatments. One should not skip them: the crucial boundary, “the produced person has no life faculty,” is found here. The treatise does not say why the material is separately classified.

The unit ends with nine objects: “Knowledge of the kinds of objects of transformation comprises nine objects: small, great, indescribable, past, future, present, internal, external, and internal-and-external” 〔T32 443a09–11〕. A direct count gives nine, agreeing with the announced number. Lists of “objects” recur four more times in this chapter, each with a different number: three for the divine ear 〔T32 443b03–04〕, eight for knowledge of others’ minds 〔T32 443b27〕, seven for recollection of past lives 〔T32 444a03〕, and five for the divine eye 〔T32 444b12〕. Read together, the five lists do not use one fixed grid. This passage has “indescribable object,” while recollection has “small, great, not to be spoken, past, internal, external, internal-and-external” 〔T32 444a03–04〕. This passage has “present object,” while the divine-eye list has “current object” 〔T32 444b13〕. Differences in number and wording are preserved; they are not regularized or used to infer the scope of each knowledge.

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Carry away three things. One observation: one issue divides the three transformations. Determination-transformation does not relinquish the form; form-transformation does; mind-produced transformation makes another body beside one’s own. One sentence draws each boundary. One reading practice: attend when the treatise asks “what is the difference?” It asks only where confusion is likely; its question marks the reader’s danger. One place to pause: why ask only about determination- and form-transformation, not form- and mind-produced transformation? Because mind-produced transformation places two bodies on the scene, making the boundary obvious, while the first two share a parallel preparation and operate through one body.

Finally retain the six characters among the miscellaneous statements: “the produced person has no life faculty.” It has complete bodily parts, every faculty, can sit, lie down, ask, and answer—resemblance carried as far as possible, except for one thing. And that one thing is precisely what supernormal transformation cannot produce.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · Form-Transformation, Mind-Produced Transformation, and Miscellaneous Statements · Exposition · Summer 2026

With the three transformations complete, the second of the five direct knowledges begins. The method is short, yet contains one of the chapter’s most revealing arrangements.

The central observation is this: the treatise gives two sequences for the same practice, pointing in opposite directions, and adds not one word of adjudication. The former teachers say that the beginning meditator “first hears the sounds of beings within his own body, from there the sounds of beings outside the body, and from there the sounds of beings in the place where he lives; in this way he attends step by step and increases the range” 〔T32 443a23–25〕—from near to far. Immediately afterward: “A further account says that a beginning meditator cannot first hear the sounds of beings within his own body in this way” 〔T32 443a25–26〕, because “he cannot hear subtle sounds; they are not the object of the natural ear” 〔T32 443a26–27〕. He therefore begins with “the distant sound of a conch, drum, or the like” 〔T32 443a27–28〕—from far to near.

The two accounts turn in opposite directions. The treatise merely sets them beside each other with “a further account says.” It neither decides nor combines them. What can be verified is the starting point and the reason supplied by the second account. The former teachers begin with sounds within the body and expand step by step. The further account explicitly says that sounds within the body are subtle and outside the natural ear’s object, so it begins with a distant conch or drum. The second account explains why it avoids the subtle internal sound; the first does not say that nearness is easier and gives no abstract criterion of difficulty. This edition therefore preserves the opposite sequences and the reason actually stated in the second. It does not invent a common principle to reconcile them.

One Method Returns Four Times to the Natural Ear

This knowledge is defined as surpassing the human ear, yet the short passage explicitly names the “natural ear” four times.

“One brings forth the divine-ear element from the natural ear” 〔T32 443a13〕: its arising begins there. “Relying on the natural-ear element” 〔T32 443a17〕: practice depends on it. “That sound depends on the natural ear” 〔T32 443a28〕: the conch or drum taken as object also comes through it. Finally, “If the natural ear is lost, the divine-ear element is also lost” 〔T32 443b04〕: when the natural ear is lost, the divine-ear element follows.

The expression “natural ear” occurs four times in this small passage, joining the method from beginning to end.

Pause here: why does a method for an ear “surpassing the human ear” repeatedly name the natural ear?

The text can directly establish a fourfold connection: the divine-ear element arises from the natural ear, cultivation relies upon the natural-ear element, the object-sound depends on the natural ear, and loss of the natural ear entails loss of the divine-ear element. What can be established is that the divine-ear element does not leave the natural ear behind. The passage does not separately define how the two exist in terms of essence. The two sequences likewise unfold within the same practice based on the natural-ear element. No additional law of relative difficulty is supplied.

The opening itself gives three accounts. “Answer: The eight kasiṇas. Those two kasiṇas: gaining mastery of the fourth jhāna” 〔T32 443a12–13〕; “a further account says: what is it to gain mastery of the four jhānas in the form realm? This is what can bring it forth” 〔T32 443a14〕; and “a further account says: it also arises in the four jhānas” 〔T32 443a14–15〕. The three stand side by side, again without judgment. The punctuation of “the eight kasiṇas; those two kasiṇas” cannot be settled from the treatise and remains marked for further study. Together with the two practice sequences, this one short passage preserves five accounts without adjudicating once.

Adverting to the Sign of Sound: From Measure to Direction

The practice itself is orderly: “The beginning meditator cultivates the four bases of power in this way, gains mastery of mind, enters the fourth jhāna, emerges calmly, and step by step relies on the natural-ear element” 〔T32 443a15–17〕. Four sound-conditions follow: “if there is a distant sound, he attends to the sign of sound; if a near sound, to the sign of sound; if a loud sound, to the sign of loud sound; if a subtle sound, to the sign of subtle sound” 〔T32 443a17–19〕. Last comes direction: “if a sound in the east, he attends to the sign of sound; it is so in every direction” 〔T32 443a19–20〕.

The passage divides first by the sound’s measure—far and near, loud and subtle—then by direction, from east to every direction. From measure to direction: two levels. Loud and subtle sounds are followed by “sign of loud sound” and “sign of subtle sound,” while far and near are followed only by “sign of sound.” The wording is not regularized.

The sign of accomplishment is a single sentence: “With the ear element purified, he increases the mind’s activity” 〔T32 443a20–21〕. Then, “with the divine-ear element purified and surpassing the human ear, he hears two kinds of sound—sounds of devas and sounds of human beings—whether distant or near” 〔T32 443a21–22〕. Two sounds: deva and human. The count agrees with the heading.

Do Not Listen First to What Is Most Frightening

The method has only one explicit warning, placed prominently: “In this matter, a beginning meditator should not attend to what is most frightening” 〔T32 443b01–02〕.

The reason again appears as the treatise’s own question and answer: “Why? With a sound that can be received, sensual desire is spoken of; with a frightening sound, 驚怖耳畏智 is spoken of” 〔T32 443b02–03〕. A sound that can be received may draw sensual desire; a frightening sound may draw fear. A newly opened ear can be pulled in either direction. The five-character sequence 驚怖耳畏智 is neither explained nor securely punctuated, and is retained. The base character 受, “received,” has the variant 愛, “loved,” in four witnesses. Under the latter, “lovable → sensual love” would parallel “frightening → fear.” This edition follows the base and records the variant.

The warning recalls “a beginning meditator should not travel far too quickly” 〔T32 442a15–16〕. There, the danger is fear while the body is in space. Here, it is the mind being seized by sound after the ear has opened. Both the transformation and divine-ear methods tell the beginner what not to meet first. The objects are not condemned; the newly acquired capacity cannot yet carry the strongest object without being displaced.

Closure: Three Objects and Three Ranges

“He accomplishes three objects: a small object, a present object, and an external object” 〔T32 443b03–04〕. A direct count gives three, agreeing with the heading. This is the shortest of the five object-lists in the chapter: transformation has nine 〔T32 443a09〕, the divine ear three, knowledge of others’ minds eight 〔T32 443b27〕, recollection of past lives seven 〔T32 444a03〕, and the divine eye five 〔T32 444b12〕. What can be verified is that each method has a different number of listed objects. The passage does not explain why the divine ear has only these three, so no rationale is supplied.

The closing sentence gives the three ranges that recur across the methods: “Here a disciple who has attained mastery can hear the sounds of a thousand worlds; beyond him, a solitary buddha hears the most; a Tathāgata hears without number” 〔T32 443b04–06〕. Knowledge of others’ minds says “knows the minds of one thousand worlds” 〔T32 443c01〕; the divine eye says “sees one thousand worlds” 〔T32 444b21〕. The frame is the same and the object changes. This passage has “a thousand worlds,” while the other two explicitly have “one thousand.” The slight difference is retained.

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Carry away three things. One observation: two opposite sequences coexist. The former teachers begin with sounds within the body and expand; the further account begins with a distant conch or drum. The treatise does not decide. The second supplies a reason for avoiding subtle internal sound; the first supplies no rule of difficulty. One reading practice: when encountering “the former teachers say” or “a further account says,” first list each account’s stated sequence and reasons rather than inventing a common principle. One place to pause: why does a method for an ear surpassing the human ear return four times to the natural ear? The text establishes that arising, cultivation, object, and loss are tied to it. It does not explain the relationship further.

The divine-ear element does not leave the natural ear behind. That is the common range proved by four statements in this passage; it is not extended into a rule for the other direct knowledges.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · Who Brings Forth the Divine Ear, and How It Is Cultivated · Exposition · Summer 2026

The third of the five direct knowledges is about reading another person’s mind. Yet its method speaks almost entirely not about mind, but about form and color.

The central observation is this: the seven colors are a ladder, not knowledge of another’s mind. The sequence is explicit. First fill one’s own body with light and, with the divine eye, see the “form of one’s own mind and intention” 〔T32 443b11〕. Next construct a correspondence between mind and color: a mind associated with the faculty of joy appears like curds or ghee, grief like purple, equanimity like honey, sensual desire like yellow, ill will like black, ignorance like turbidity, and faith or knowledge like clarity 〔T32 443b14–19〕. Once this has been learned on one’s own body, “fill another’s body with light and, with the divine eye, see the form of that person’s mind and intention” 〔T32 443b20–21〕, discerning the change in mind through the change in form. The entire procedure appears to be a discipline of reading color. Then the treatise writes its decisive sentence: “Once knowledge of others’ minds has arisen, remove discernment through changes in form. Take only the object of mind” 〔T32 443b23〕. Once the knowledge has arisen, color is removed. The seven colors are used to climb; after climbing, the ladder is taken away.

The Only Method Brought Forth through Another Direct Knowledge

Begin with the enabling condition: “Answer: One gains mastery of the fourth jhāna through the light kasiṇa, obtains the divine eye, and brings forth knowledge of others’ minds” 〔T32 443b07–08〕.

Among the five direct knowledges, this is the only one that names another direct knowledge as the condition that brings it forth. Transformation depends on kasiṇas and mastery of the fourth jhāna; the divine ear on the eight kasiṇas and the natural ear; recollection of past lives and the divine eye each attach to kasiṇas. Only knowledge of others’ minds explicitly says “obtain the divine eye” first.

Yet the dedicated treatment of the divine eye comes later 〔T32 444a13〕. Its use comes before its explanation. This is already the chapter’s habit. At the end of determination-transformation it gives three applications together—“with the divine eye he sees Brahmā’s forms, with the divine ear he hears Brahmā’s sounds, with knowledge of others’ minds he knows Brahmā’s mind” 〔T32 442c03–04〕—while all three methods follow later. The treatise is not ordered as “explain every tool, then show its use.” It follows the sequence in which the practice is made to arise.

Why Practice First on One’s Own Body?

The first step is “he first fills his own body with light and, with the divine eye, sees the form of his own mind and intention” 〔T32 443b11〕. Only second does he “fill another’s body with light and, with the divine eye, see the form of that person’s mind and intention” 〔T32 443b20–21〕. The two sentences are identical in form; only the body being filled changes. Between them stands the table of seven colors.

Pause here: if the aim is to read another person’s mind, why practice first on oneself?

The sequence in the passage establishes the correspondence first on one’s own body. One sees one’s own intentional form 〔T32 443b11〕, lists the colors associated with joy, grief, equanimity, and the other minds, and only afterward sees another’s intentional form 〔T32 443b21〕. One may therefore read one’s own body as the prior checking surface and another’s as the later field of application. The treatise does not separately state why this must be so, and it does not call one’s own body the only possible checking sample.

One variant belongs to the table. At 443b18 the base reads, “when a mind associated with ignorance arises,” while four witnesses omit 無, “without,” yielding “a mind associated with clarity arises and becomes like a turbid color.” Under the base, the first six entries concern feeling faculties or defilements and the last alone faith and knowledge, so the sequence is coherent. This edition follows the base and records the variant without alteration.

Two Directions of Discernment, Then Their Removal

Once the color table has been established, the treatise gives two reversed sentences: “He discerns the change in form through the change in mind. Through the change in form he discerns the change in mind” 〔T32 443b21–22〕.

First know color through mind; then know mind through color. The first is work performed on oneself: I know which mind has arisen and therefore learn its color. The second is the application to another: I see that color and therefore know which mind has arisen. The same terms reversed turn practice into application.

Then comes the sentence that removes the ladder: “Once knowledge of others’ minds has arisen, remove discernment through changes in form. Take only the object of mind” 〔T32 443b23〕.

This yields a reading practice: when the treatise teaches a method, look for the sentence in which it removes the ladder. A means used for entry is often withdrawn later. Here discernment through changing color is removed so that only mind is taken. Leave the ladder in place and what is seen remains color rather than mind; the tool becomes a new object and blocks the doorway. The practice applies more broadly: whenever the treatise gives a “means,” ask where it is withdrawn. If no such sentence is found, attend carefully to whether the means has been mistaken for the destination.

After removal, the test is almost disappointingly plain: “If there is a mind with desire, he knows a mind with desire; if there is no desire, he knows a mind without desire. If there is a mind with ill will, he knows a mind with ill will; if there is no ill will, he knows a mind without ill will. In this way all can be known” 〔T32 443b24–27〕. No color, no light—only knowing presence and absence. The completed operation often looks plainer than the operation used to reach it. In the fourth statement, the base does not repeat the character 心, “mind,” after “no ill will,” while three witnesses do. Following them would regularize the four statements. This edition follows the base and does not supply the character.

Eight Objects and Two Boundaries

The closure first gives eight objects: “Knowledge of others’ minds has eight objects: small, great, path, immeasurable, past, future, present, and external” 〔T32 443b27–28〕. A direct count gives eight, agreeing with the announced number.

Two features deserve attention. The first is that “path object” and “immeasurable object” do not occur in the other lists in this chapter. The second is that this list has no internal or internal-and-external object. Transformation has nine objects with both internal and external; the divine eye has five and likewise includes both. Knowledge of another’s mind has only an external object. Its object is another’s mind, so the list remains outside. The treatise counts the reach of each method rather than forcing all of them into one prefabricated grid.

Then the method draws two explicit limits: “The undefiled mind of another is not the range of an ordinary person; the minds of beings born in the formless realm are the range of a Buddha alone” 〔T32 443b28–29〕. An ordinary person cannot know another’s undefiled mind; only a Buddha knows the minds of beings in the formless realm. The next method, recollection of past lives, has a different limit: “one cannot recollect birth as an animal, and birth in the formless realm and birth without perception cannot be conceived” 〔T32 444a01–02〕. One passage limits minds known; the other limits births remembered.

The final sentence repeats the three ranges: “A disciple who has attained mastery can know the minds of one thousand worlds; beyond him, a solitary buddha knows the most; a Tathāgata knows without measure” 〔T32 443b29–443c02〕. The divine-ear section reads merely “a thousand worlds,” while this one says “one thousand worlds.” The wording differs and is retained.

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Carry away three things. One observation: the seven colors are a ladder, not knowledge of another’s mind. Light fills the body, the divine eye sees intentional form, and seven minds correspond to seven colors only to establish the table. “Remove discernment through changes in form; take only the object of mind” pulls the ladder away. One reading practice: in any method, find the sentence that removes the ladder. If no means is withdrawn, ask whether the ladder has been mistaken for the floor above. One place to pause: why begin on one’s own body when reading another’s mind? The passage establishes only the order—see one’s own intentional form first and another’s later. One’s own body may be read as the earlier checking surface, but the reason is not supplied by the passage.

Finally remember the two limits: another’s undefiled mind is beyond an ordinary person; the mind of a being in the formless realm is a Buddha’s range alone. Even after the ladder is removed, the knowledge has an edge.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · Who Brings Forth Knowledge of Others’ Minds, and How It Is Cultivated · Exposition · Summer 2026

This is the fourth of the five direct knowledges. The first three move outward—sound toward a thousand worlds, mind toward another person’s body, the transformed body toward the Brahmā world. This method turns and walks back.

The central observation is this: among the five, only this method is cultivated in reverse, and its starting point is unexpectedly near. “Beginning from his present sitting place, he recollects everything done during this day, whether by body, intention, or speech” 〔T32 443c15–16〕. The point of departure is the place where he is sitting now; the first step is to remember what he did today. Then “in the same way what was done during the night, one day, two days, step by step to one month” 〔T32 443c17–18〕, then two months, one year, two years, three years, a hundred years, “all the way back to what was done at his first birth” 〔T32 443c20〕. Segment by segment, he retreats to birth.

The other four methods generally extend beyond the body or toward distance. This one moves from present to past, from now back to birth. Their distance is largely spatial; this one is temporal. The passage teaches a beginner to move back through day, month, and year. Its closing section separately says that a Fully Awakened One “recollects everything as he wishes” 〔T32 444a10〕, so the beginner’s sequence must not be made into an absolute law that no accomplished knower can cross.

Why One Cannot Leap

“At that time, mind and mental factors long past have a later arising; mind and mental factors arise in the present, arising in dependence on the first mind and mental factors. Through the arising of mental continuity, he presently observes conditions. Recollective consciousness flows on; both remain unbroken—arising in this world and arising in that world” 〔T32 443c20–24〕.

The punctuation is difficult and the treatise gives no further explanation, so this edition does not impose a final segmentation. Yet one matter is clear: the support is continuity, not memory as a personal faculty. Mind and mental factors long past arise in dependence on the first mind and mental factors; through mental continuity, conditions are observed, and recollective consciousness flows with “both” unbroken. Since the method follows an unbroken line, if any segment is lost the subsequent segment cannot be joined. That is why the meditator begins today and retreats through day, month, and year, taking hold of the line one piece at a time. This is not a mnemonic technique but a hand tracing an existing line backward.

When Recollection Fails, Polish the Mirror

The most revealing instruction concerns failure.

“The beginning meditator has recollected everything in this life. If he cannot recollect that previous life, he should not abandon his energy. He should bring jhāna forth again. Once jhāna has arisen, he should make it thoroughly masterful, like the method of polishing a mirror” 〔T32 443c26–28〕.

Pause here: when recollection fails, why does the treatise not tell him to try harder to remember, but to bring forth jhāna again?

The text answers with the mirror. If a mirror does not reflect clearly, the defect is not in the object reflected and not in whether the viewer strains hard enough, but on the mirror’s surface. “Like the method of polishing a mirror” occurs only here in the treatise and the polishing technique is not described. Yet its position after “bring forth jhāna again” and “make it thoroughly masterful” makes its direction plain. Recollection of past lives depends on the clarity of concentration. When the image does not appear, polish concentration, not memory.

This gives a reading practice: when a passage says “cannot,” see whether the prescribed medicine strengthens the immediate activity or returns to a preparation. Here failure to remember is treated by re-arousing jhāna and making concentration masterful. In the transformation method, slowness, regression, and fear receive respectively a sign of speed, concentration, and a sign of equanimity 〔T32 442a12–14〕. Both locate the remedy in preparation or adjustment of mind. Whether the observation applies elsewhere must be checked passage by passage.

“When mastery has been well gained, he recollects in the present as at the beginning, and recollection is accomplished” 〔T32 443c28–29〕. Once the mirror is polished, look again and the image appears. The next sentence gives a concrete threshold: “If he emerges from one life and his mind accomplishes recollection, he experiences the greatest ease and has seen the means” 〔T32 443c29–444a01〕. The difficulty is not how far one remembers, but crossing the first boundary between lives. Cross it once and the means has been seen; fail to cross and recollection back to birth remains recollection of this present life. This also explains why the method retreats one segment at a time. Birth is not the destination but the boundary at which the method is discovered.

Three Accounts of What Brings It Forth, in a Familiar Form

The opening answer likewise gives three accounts: “Through the eight kasiṇas and the two kasiṇas, one gains mastery of mind in the fourth jhāna. This is what can bring forth knowledge recollecting past lives” 〔T32 443c04–05〕; “a further account asks: what about the form-realm base? Answer: one gains mastery of mind in the fourth jhāna; this is what can bring it forth” 〔T32 443c05–06〕; “a further account says: it arises in the four jhānas” 〔T32 443c06–07〕.

Three accounts stand side by side without one word of judgment, in a form close to the three accounts opening the divine-ear method 〔T32 443a12–15〕. In these two passages a further account is given without choosing among them, so this edition preserves rather than fuses them. The observation is limited to these passages; it does not assert that every “a further account says” in the treatise has the same function. The punctuation of “the eight kasiṇas and the two kasiṇas” cannot be settled from the treatise and remains marked for further study.

Three Kinds of Recollection, One without a Number

The earlier paragraph divides recollection into three: “first, many-retained birth; second, made by birth; third, accomplished through cultivation” 〔T32 443c07–08〕.

One of many-retained birth recollects in four ways: “because that sign has been well grasped, because its portion-sign has been seen, because the faculties are clear, and because its nature has been gathered” 〔T32 443c09–10〕. A direct count gives four, and every item closes with “because.” One foremost in this kind “recollects seven past lives” 〔T32 443c11〕. Devas, nāgas, and phoenixes belong to what the explanation calls “accomplished by birth” 〔T32 443c11–12〕, and one foremost among them “recollects fourteen past lives” 〔T32 443c12–13〕. The third kind is simply, “one accomplished through cultivation cultivates the bases of power” 〔T32 443c13〕.

The first two kinds each receive a number—seven and fourteen. The third, the kind actually cultivated by the meditator, receives none. The treatise does not say how many births cultivated recollection can remember. Later it gives eons for different classes of practitioner, but that is a separate table. The blank here remains blank: the method does not measure itself by the number of lives remembered.

The heading calls the second kind “made by birth,” while the explanation calls it “accomplished by birth.” The wording differs and is retained without correction.

What Cannot Be Recollected, and the Longest Scale

“Birth as an animal cannot be recollected, nor birth in the formless realm; birth without perception cannot be conceived because it has the nature of being without perception” 〔T32 444a01–02〕. Three cases are listed. Only the final one supplies its own reason; no reason is given for the first two. The four witnesses read 憶, “recollect,” for the base’s 想, “conceive.” Following them would align the verb with the earlier “cannot recollect birth as an animal.” Under the base, “cannot conceive” accords with the reason “because it has the nature of being without perception.” Both are recorded; the base is followed.

The verbs therefore remain distinct. The base first says that animal birth “cannot be recollected,” then says that formless birth and birth without perception “cannot be conceived.” Only the witnesses turn the latter into “recollect.” This edition does not silently harmonize the verbs merely because the three items stand together, nor infer reasons for the first two from the reason supplied for the third.

The seven-kind list reads “small, great, not to be spoken, past, internal, external, and internal-and-external” 〔T32 444a03–04〕. A direct count gives seven, agreeing with the heading. It is the chapter’s second-longest object-list, after transformation’s nine and knowledge of others’ minds’ eight, and alone among the five lists none of its entries carries the word “object.” Its “not to be spoken” also differs from transformation’s “indescribable object” 〔T32 443a09–10〕. The wording is not harmonized.

Two Easily Missed Sentences

After the seven kinds come two short lines easy to skim as connective material: “One should recollect path and fruit attained in the past, or a country or village. That becomes knowledge recollecting past lives through the perception of the past” 〔T32 444a04–05〕; and “recollecting the continuity of the aggregates through knowledge is knowledge recollecting past lives” 〔T32 444a05–06〕.

The first names what is remembered—path and fruit previously attained, as well as places such as country and village. Recollecting these becomes recollection through perception of the past. The second is more decisive: “recollecting the continuity of the aggregates through knowledge.” What is remembered is not merely a chain of incidents, but the continuity of the aggregates. Recollection in this treatise is not leafing through an old album. It follows the line along which the five aggregates continued, segment after segment. This restates the earlier “mind arises in continuity; conditions are presently observed; recollective consciousness flows; both remain unbroken” 〔T32 443c22–23〕 with the word “aggregates.”

The position of these two sentences is instructive: first the text says what is recollected, and only afterward how far recollection reaches. Reverse the order and the practice becomes a contest of duration. Read in the text’s order, distance is the final consideration; content—path, fruit, place, and continuity of aggregates—is why recollection belongs within a path of freedom.

The scale of reach is the chapter’s longest: “From here, non-Buddhist practitioners can recollect forty eons; beyond that they cannot recollect because the body lacks strength. A noble disciple can recollect ten thousand eons; beyond this is a chief disciple; beyond him a chief solitary buddha; beyond him a Tathāgata, the Fully Awakened One, who recollects all of his own and others’ past lives, actions, and places” 〔T32 444a06–09〕.

Five levels, and the first is a non-Buddhist practitioner. The divine ear, knowledge of others’ minds, and divine eye each give only disciple, solitary buddha, and Tathāgata. Only recollection includes a non-Buddhist practitioner, and assigns forty eons. The treatise adds no evaluative comment, stating only why he stops there: “because the body lacks strength.”

This at least establishes that long memory is not by itself sufficient evidence of nobility, because the same scale includes a non-Buddhist practitioner at forty eons and a noble disciple at ten thousand. Nor is quantity the only distinction. The later levels also differ through chief disciple and chief solitary buddha, the Fully Awakened One’s recollection of his own and others’ lives, actions, and places, and whether samādhi is required. The scale cannot be flattened into amount alone.

The final sentence adds another contrast: “A Fully Awakened One recollects whether entering samādhi or not; when not entering samādhi, he still recollects continually. Others recollect only after entering samādhi” 〔T32 444a10–12〕. The preceding line pairs “a Fully Awakened One recollects everything as he wishes” with “others recollect in sequence” 〔T32 444a10〕. The checkable contrasts are as one wishes / in sequence and continual recollection outside samādhi / recollection only in samādhi. The treatise does not say that sequentiality belongs to the essence of recollection itself.

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Carry away three things. One observation: only this method proceeds backward, beginning with the present sitting place and today’s actions. Its support is continuity of mind and mental factors, not personal memory, so segments cannot simply be skipped. One reading practice: where a passage says “cannot,” look at whether its medicine strengthens the immediate act or returns to preparation. Here it returns to jhāna and mastery of concentration. One place to pause: why return to jhāna when recollection fails? Because the simile is polishing a mirror. When the image is unclear, polish the mirror rather than stare harder.

Remember also that a non-Buddhist practitioner stands on this scale and can recollect forty eons. The treatise says only that he cannot go beyond because the body lacks strength. The later levels differ not only in reach but in actions, places, and dependence on samādhi, so the table must not be reduced to a single quantitative measure.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · The Kinds and Cultivation of Knowledge Recollecting Past Lives · Exposition · Summer 2026

This is the last of the five direct knowledges and the close of the chapter. It gathers the clues planted by the preceding four methods and places at the center of its practice a sentence that almost trips the reader.

The central observation is this: when the light has been cultivated to fullness, the treatise says, “That is not yet the divine eye.” The method proceeds through entering the fourth jhāna, attending to the perceptions of light and sun, “this day is as night; this night is as day” 〔T32 444a21–22〕, a mind become luminous “without the obstruction of darkness, surpassing the light of the sun” 〔T32 444a23–24〕, and finally “filling the interior with light, attending to the forms of visible things, and filling the light through knowledge” 〔T32 444a24–25〕. The light is full and visible forms are illuminated. Any reader might think the method complete. Then: “That is not yet the divine eye. Seeing the internally luminous forms through knowledge—this is called the divine eye” 〔T32 444a25–26〕.

Light is what is seen, not the seeing. Lighting a lamp is not the same as seeing. Only the “seeing through knowledge” is the divine eye. The sentence is the hinge of the method. The passage first denies that the manifested luminosity itself is the divine eye, then establishes seeing internally luminous form through knowledge. The checkable boundary is that luminous form and divine eye are not identical; nothing further needs to be added.

Two Kinds of Divine Eye, and One Example of Hidden Treasure

Begin with the classification: “Answer: There are two kinds of divine eye, one accomplished through karmic result and one accomplished through cultivation” 〔T32 444a16〕.

For that accomplished through karmic result, the treatise gives a concrete example: “The treasure-store divine eye is accomplished through result and therefore can see treasure, whether it contains jewels or not” 〔T32 444a17–18〕. The treatise does not explain “treasure-store,” so this edition leaves it unidentified. The statement belongs with the earlier transformation of persons of merit, where wheel-turning king and householders are named 〔T32 441c06–07〕. The treatise does not hide that some capacities are obtained through result rather than cultivation. Only the cultivated kind continues with “cultivates the four bases of power” 〔T32 444a18〕.

As for what can bring it forth, the text reads: “Light as nine, or light as five, or an object of the light kasiṇa: one gains mastery of the fourth jhāna and possesses the nature of an eye; this is what can bring it forth” 〔T32 444a13–15〕. The punctuation and referent of “light as nine, or light as five” remain unresolved. One clue can be checked: the section on cultivating transformative discernment has the parallel “with respect to space, nine; or with respect to space, five” 〔T32 441c14–15〕. The construction is the same and only its object changes. Two obscure instances together attest a formula already present in the treatise, while giving no key to its meaning.

What the Divine Eye Sees Is Not Scenery

Once light is full and seeing established, the treatise immediately tells us what the eye sees: “With the divine eye purified and surpassing the human eye, the meditator sees beings dying and being born” 〔T32 444a26–27〕, “coarse and refined, of good appearance and bad appearance” 〔T32 444a27–28〕, “born in good destinations and bad destinations, according to their actions” 〔T32 444a28–29〕, “in this way all beings” 〔T32 444a29〕.

Read the sentence carefully. The objects are beings, not mountains or scenery. Their condition is dying and being born. The closure is four characters: “according to their actions.”

The divine eye in this treatise is therefore not merely a telescope that sees farther. It sees an interface of cause and result. Coarse and refined, attractive and unattractive, good and bad destinations are not ends in themselves. They are seen “according to their actions.” The result is seen, and karma is read from it. This anticipates the four knowledges. Three concern karma—karma performed by oneself, karma as practiced, and karmic result—while only one concerns a future form. The distribution discloses the method’s center: the eye gives form; knowledge reads karma and destination from form.

One Sentence That Cannot Be Decided

After the list of defilements and the discussion of mastery, the treatise inserts a startlingly short line: “In this matter, for a beginning meditator: not lovable forms; not frightening forms” 〔T32 444b11–12〕.

Its punctuation cannot be decided. It may be an instruction—the beginning meditator should not take lovable or frightening forms—or a description—the forms manifest to a beginning meditator are neither lovable nor frightening. The treatise gives no further explanation, and this edition does not settle it.

One clue can be checked. The divine-ear method has a similar warning, “In this matter, a beginning meditator should not attend to what is most frightening” 〔T32 443b01–02〕, likewise beginning with “in this matter, a beginning meditator.” The two can be read beside each other, but parallel grammar cannot establish identical reference. When the text is insufficient, retain the question rather than supplying a smooth answer.

One Needle Can Puncture the Whole Net

After accomplishment, the treatise lists defilements to abandon: “doubt, incorrect recollection, laziness, sleep, conceit, wrong joy, and bad speech” 〔T32 444b01–02〕, then “overly rapid effort, sluggish effort, much talk, varied perceptions, and utmost observation of form” 〔T32 444b02–03〕. It gives no total, and this edition does not supply one.

The list itself is revealing. Overly rapid and sluggish effort are both illnesses; too fast and too slow equally obstruct. Much talk appears alongside faults that seem more directly connected to vision. But the decisive sentence follows: “If any one of these defilements is brought to fulfillment while he is trying to bring forth the divine eye, his concentration falls away” 〔T32 444b03–04〕.

Any single item is enough to make concentration fall. They need not all be present. Then comes the chain of three losses: “If concentration falls away, the light is lost and the seeing of forms is lost” 〔T32 444b04–05〕. Concentration falls, light goes out, seeing disappears. Therefore “those defilements should indeed be abandoned” 〔T32 444b05〕.

Pause here: once these defilements are abandoned, does the divine eye become great?

The treatise immediately closes that route: “Even if these defilements have been abandoned, if mastery of concentration has not been gained, the divine eye remains small because of that lack of mastery” 〔T32 444b05–06〕. “With a small divine eye the meditator knows little light, and the forms he sees are also small” 〔T32 444b07〕. Abandoning defilements and attaining mastery are two matters. The former removes obstruction; the latter develops strength. Removing an obstruction is not already possessing strength.

The treatise then calls the Blessed One’s own words as witness: “Therefore the Blessed One said” 〔T32 444b07–08〕. “At that time my concentration was small and my eye was small. With my small eye I knew little light and saw small forms” 〔T32 444b08–09〕; “at that time my divine eye was immeasurable; with that immeasurable divine eye” 〔T32 444b10〕; “I saw immeasurable forms” 〔T32 444b11〕. Small concentration / small eye / little light / small form contrast one by one with immeasurable samādhi / immeasurable divine eye / immeasurable light / immeasurable form. This is the method’s sole citation, and it proves precisely the point: what measures the range of seeing is concentration, not the eye.

Four Knowledges: The Chapter’s Only Fully Explained List

The divine eye sees more than form. “Four knowledges arise in dependence on the divine eye: knowledge discriminating the future, knowledge of karma performed by oneself, knowledge of karma as practiced, and knowledge of karmic result” 〔T32 444b13–15〕. Each is then explained. The first knows a form that will arise in the future. The second “sees karma made by another person and knows: through this karma, this person will go to that destination” 〔T32 444b16–17〕. The third “sees the destination in which a person has been born and knows: through this karma, this person was previously born here” 〔T32 444b17–18〕. The fourth knows “this karma should ripen or should not ripen; this karma should be experienced greatly or should be experienced little” 〔T32 444b19–20〕.

The chapter contains many enumerations—three transformations, seven transformations, three modes of travel, four sound conditions, seven colors, three kinds of recollection, and five object-lists. Only this list has all three: an announced number, named items, and an explanation of every item. Its placement accords with its content. The four knowledges are no longer a list of what is seen, but of what is known from what is seen. The eye supplies form; knowledge supplies karma and destination. The fullest explanation is given to knowledge, not merely to the eye.

Four critical notes belong to the passage. Three concern the interchange of 知, “know,” and 智, “knowledge.” At 444b18 the base reads “this person was previously born here—know this,” while three witnesses have “knowledge”; in the same line the base has “knowledge of karmic result,” while the Old Song witness has “know”; at 444b20 the base has “this karma should be experienced little—know this,” while the Ming witness has “knowledge.” The fourth note occurs in the miscellaneous statements: the base’s “hear sounds” at 444b24 has a source-copy variant “disciple.” The first three form one know/knowledge cluster; the fourth does not. Each is recorded separately. Variants establish a difference of characters; they do not license a new conceptual distinction or an account of scribal cause.

As for the five objects: “As said at the beginning, the surpassing divine eye has five objects: small, current, internal, external, and internal-and-external” 〔T32 444b12–13〕. A direct count gives five. This is the last of the chapter’s five object-lists: transformation nine 〔T32 443a09〕, knowledge of others’ minds eight 〔T32 443b27〕, recollection seven 〔T32 444a03〕, divine eye five, and divine ear three 〔T32 443b03–04〕. The divine eye has “current object,” while transformation has “present object.” The wording is retained without harmonization.

Miscellaneous Statements: Six Steps from Partial to Complete

After the boundary of the divine-eye method come the miscellaneous statements for the chapter. Six sentences build one upon another. “When cultivating concentration in one way for seeing form through the divine eye, one sees forms only and does not hear sounds” 〔T32 444b23–24〕. “When cultivating concentration in one way for hearing sounds through the divine ear, one hears sounds only and does not see forms” 〔T32 444b24–25〕. “If concentration is cultivated for both seeing and hearing, one both sees and hears” 〔T32 444b25–26〕. “If concentration is cultivated for seeing, hearing, and knowing others’ minds, one sees, hears, and knows others’ minds” 〔T32 444b26–27〕. “If concentration is cultivated for seeing in one direction, one does not see other directions, does not hear, and does not know others’ minds” 〔T32 444b27–28〕. Last: “If concentration is cultivated not a little, in every direction one sees, hears, and knows others’ minds” 〔T32 444b28–29〕.

The six sentences have one variable: what was included when concentration was cultivated. Cultivate for one capacity and one is gained. Cultivate for two and two are gained. Limit cultivation to one direction and outside that direction none is available. The passage compresses the chapter into one operational rule: the reach of what is gained equals the reach included in cultivation. Direct knowledge is not a universal organ obtained once and then moved anywhere at will. Its boundary was drawn at the beginning. The phrase “if concentration is cultivated not a little” in the final sentence receives no further explanation and remains marked for study.

This gives another reading practice: after finishing a method, return to its miscellaneous statements. Here they do not repeat the procedure of cultivating light and seeing form. They add limitations and classifications that the main treatment did not gather in one place. Whether miscellaneous statements always serve this function throughout the treatise must be checked case by case.

The six sentences 〔T32 444b23–29〕 also contain a less obvious arrangement. The first four add kinds: seeing, hearing, seeing-and-hearing, then seeing-and-hearing plus knowledge of another’s mind. The final two shift to range: one direction and every direction. The first four add kinds; the last two add breadth. Together they form a two-dimensional table. Which capacities are included in cultivating concentration determines which are gained; how wide a field is included determines how far they extend. Both are decided at the beginning, not after attainment.

This also explains why the chapter repeatedly asks about supports. Its opening seven transformations are arranged by what supports them; bringing forth transformation is organized like a case history of problems; determination-transformation by “let this become what?”; knowledge of another’s mind by a table practiced on oneself; recollection by unbroken continuity; the divine eye by the measure of concentration. Six units and six idioms say one thing: the boundary of an ability lies in its cause, not its result. The miscellaneous statements turn that into the chapter’s final practical rule.

The rule stands at the chapter’s end, immediately before the Chapter on the Analysis of Wisdom. Most of fascicle nine has spoken about direct knowledge. It closes not with a list of marvels but with a restraint: ask what was included in cultivation before asking what has been attained. Once asked correctly, supernormal knowledge ceases to be merely an object of desire and becomes something whose range can be measured.

Closure: Returning Direct Knowledge to Its Place

The chapter’s final three statements are severe: “The five direct knowledges are worldly direct knowledges: tainted, bound to the form realm, and shared with ordinary people” 〔T32 444b29–444c01〕; “if wholesome direct knowledge: it is shared by trainees and ordinary people; or an arahant’s direct knowledge is indeterminate” 〔T32 444c01–02〕; and “the five direct knowledges do not arise in the formless realm” 〔T32 444c02–03〕.

Worldly, tainted, bound to the form realm, shared with ordinary people: four judgments fall together, then one further boundary—they do not arise in the formless realm. Most of the fascicle has described touching the sun and moon, producing a person who asks and answers, and remembering vast eons. The ending restores the scale: these capacities are extraordinary, and they are worldly.

This joins the chapter’s end to its beginning. At the opening, flying birds and spell-holders entered the inventory of transformation. At the close, all five direct knowledges are judged worldly, tainted, and shared with ordinary people. Beginning and end state the same restraint: transformation, vision, and recollection are not evidence of nobility. The chapter closes with “the Path of Freedom has completed its explanation of the path of direct knowledge” 〔T32 444c03〕. Immediately afterward wisdom begins. Direct knowledge ends; wisdom opens. The sequence itself is the chapter’s final sentence.

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Carry away three things. One observation: when light is full the treatise still says, “that is not yet the divine eye.” Light is the seen, not the seeing; the seeing of internally luminous form through knowledge is the divine eye. A cultivated experience is not identical with the capacity that knows it. One reading practice: after reading the main method, return to the miscellaneous statements. The main passage teaches cultivation; the miscellaneous statements disclose its boundaries. What is gained extends only as far as what cultivation included. One place to pause: once defilements are abandoned, does the divine eye become great? The treatise says no. Without mastery of concentration it remains small. Removing obstruction and developing strength are different.

The Blessed One’s words should remain: small concentration, small eye; immeasurable samādhi, immeasurable divine eye. What measures the range of seeing is concentration, not the eye.

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Shi Huijing · Waken · The Path of Freedom · The Divine Eye and Miscellaneous Statements on the Five Direct Knowledges · Exposition · Summer 2026