ལས་བརྒྱ་ཐམ་པ་པ 37.15

37.15

It is the path that leads to the city of nirvāṇa, the path by which every totally and complete awakened buddha has gone forth.’ Taking up a very sharp knife, he said, ‘An offering for your pithy teaching, my friend,’ and to Śakra, King of the Gods, in nonhuman guise he handed flesh cut from his side.

“ ‘My friend, will this satisfy you?’ he asked.

“ ‘No,’ came the reply. ‘It will not.’

“So he handed him flesh cut from his other side, and in the same way flesh cut from his shoulders and cut from all over his body, asking, ‘My friend, will this satisfy you?’

“ ‘No,’ came the reply. ‘It will not.’ Finally the Bodhisattva thought, ‘The time is here at last to completely let go of my whole body,’ and he prayed for unexcelled, total, and complete enlightenment, saying, ‘By this root of virtue, may I become a protector for the world’s blind who are without a guide, without any guide at all, without anyone to show them the way—a tathāgata, an arhat, a totally and completely awakened buddha endowed with perfect knowledge and perfect conduct, a sugata, a knower of the world, a tamer of persons, a charioteer, an unsurpassed one, a teacher of humans and gods—a blessed buddha.’ And he said in verse:

“ ‘By this great gift may I become
A self-arisen buddha for all the worlds.
May I rescue and liberate the many beings
Not liberated by the victorious lords who came before me.’

“Having thus prayed for unexcelled, total, and complete enlightenment, he said, ‘My friend, you may do as you please with my body.’²³⁷

No sooner had the Bodhisattva conceived the spirit of enlightenment than the earth quaked six different ways. The gods who lived in the sky let fall a rain of flowers and said, ‘How good, friend,