The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra on the Four Factors
Translation of འཕགས་པ་ཆས་བཞ་པ་ཞས་བྱ་བ་ཐག་པ་ཆན་པའ་མད (འཕགས་པ་ཆོས་བཞི་པ་ཞེས་བྱ་བ་ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོའི་མདོ)
- Language
- English
- Translator
- Adam Pearcey
- Extent
- 32 passages, 1,543 words
- Text
- complete digital text
- Source
- 84000 · Translated by Adam Pearceyunder the patronage and supervision of 84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha… · CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha). Shown whole and unaltered, with its notes, on a…
Contents
- intro 84000's introduction — 11 parts
- 1
- 2
- notes Notes — 19 parts
Text
84000's introduction
intro.1
While residing in the Jeta’s Grove in Śrāvastī, the Buddha explains to an assembly of monks and bodhisattvas four factors of the path that bodhisattvas must not abandon even at the cost of their lives: (1) the thought of awakening, (2) the spiritual friend, (3) tolerance and lenience (which are here counted as one), and (4) dwelling in the wilderness. The sūtra concludes with two verses in which the Buddha restates the four factors and asserts that those who do not relinquish them will attain complete awakening.
intro.2
The Noble Mahāyāna Sūtra on the Four Factors (Āryacaturdharmakanāmamahāyāna sūtra) is the third of three short sūtras with similar titles (all referring to sets of four dharmas or factors of the path). In many Kangyurs (predominantly those of Tshalpa origin, including the Degé Kangyur) these sūtras are found grouped together.
intro.3
Of the other sūtras in this set, The Sūtra Teaching the Four Factors (Toh 249)¹ is concerned with the four factors necessary for the practice of confession, while The Four Factors (Toh 250)² identifies four beliefs that a wise son of a good family should not accept as true. Two further works, The Accomplishment of the Sets of Four Qualities: The Bodhisattvas’ Prātimokṣa (Toh 248)³ and The Fourfold Accomplishment (Toh 252)⁴ also concern themselves with “sets of four” (catuṣka, bzhi pa), thereby forming a larger group of five sūtras in the Degé Kangyur that lay out key elements of the practice of the path in discrete sets of four factors.
intro.4
In the present sūtra, dharma is a flexible term used to refer to a specific set or category of four important components or factors of the path that a bodhisattva, someone who aspires to achieve the perfect awakening of a buddha, should not abandon under any circumstances. These four factors are (1) the thought of awakening, (2) the spiritual friend or companion and guide in virtue, (3) tolerance and lenience, considered here as a pair, and (4) dwelling in the wilderness, that is, in a place suitably removed from the social world of the town so as to enable spiritual practice.
intro.5
The Buddha presents these four factors using this formula: “For as long as they live, bodhisattvas, great beings, should not abandon x even at the cost of their lives.” This is repeated in six successive lines, first to introduce all four factors together, then for each one in turn, and finally to refer to all four by way of recapitulation. The sūtra thus employs the rhetorical device of repetition—combining anaphora and epistrophe, repetition of the beginning and end phrases of a line—that is such a common feature of Buddhist canonical literature.
intro.6
The text concludes with two stanzas, also spoken by the Buddha, that summarize the sūtra’s message and explain the benefit of maintaining the four factors. These verses present the factors in a slightly different sequence, with tolerance and lenience preceding the factor of the spiritual friend. They also exhort the wise bodhisattva to be as fearless as a lion, “the king of beasts,” while dwelling in the wilderness.
intro.7
The Chinese Tripiṭaka contains two translations of the sūtra (Taishō 772⁵ & Taishō 773⁶), both by Divākara and dated to 680 ce and 681 ce.⁷ The sūtra and commentaries also appear in several manuscripts of the Dunhuang collection. Among those manuscripts is an annotated translation of the sūtra (IOL Tib J 69) that identifies the translators as Surendrabodhi and Yeshe Dé. This manuscript is significant not only because of the annotations to the translation itself but also because the Kangyur versions lack a translator’s colophon (’ gyur byang). The sūtra is listed in both the Denkarma⁸ and Phangthangma⁹ catalogs of translated works, indicating that the first Tibetan translation of the text was complete by the early ninth century.
intro.8
There is a short commentary on this sūtra attributed to Vasubandhu and preserved in Tibetan in the Tengyur, (*Āryacaturdharmakavyākhyāna, ’phags pa chos bzhi pa’i rnam par bshad pa, Toh 3990), which we have also translated,¹⁰ as well as a slightly longer commentary on this commentary, attributed to Jñānadatta (: *Āryacaturdharmakavyākhyānaṭīkā, ’phags pa chos bzhi pa’i rgya cher bshad pa’i rgya cher ’grel pa, Toh 3990a).
intro.9
Several independent treatises found within the Tengyur also make reference to this sūtra. Śāntideva’s Compendium of Training (Śikṣāsamuccaya, Toh 3940), for instance, refers to the second of the four factors when discussing the importance of the teacher.¹¹ Prajñākaramati also cites the same line in his Commentary on the Difficult Points of the Bodhicaryāvatāra (Bodhicaryāvatārapañjikā; byang chub kyi spyod pa la ’jug pa’i dka’ ’grel, Toh 3872). ¹² Vimalamitra refers to the fourth factor on the importance of dwelling in the wilderness in The Meaning of the Gradual Cultivation (rim gyis ’jug pa’i sgom don, Toh 3938). ¹³ The sūtra has also been cited in works by Tibetan authors. To give just one example, the celebrated Nyingma master Longchen Rabjam (1308–64) quotes the sūtra’s line about the importance of the spiritual friend in the eighth chapter of The White Lotus Autocommentary on the Wish-Fulfilling Treasury (yid bzhin mdzod kyi ’grel pa pad ma dkar po).¹⁴
intro.10
A French translation of the sūtra by Léon Feer was first published in 1866 (and reprinted in 1883).¹⁵ Peter Skilling has included a fine English translation along with some helpful notes under the title “Four Dharmas Never to Be Abandoned” in his recent collection Questioning the Buddha: A Selection of Twenty-Five Sutras.¹⁶
intro.11
The following translation was made primarily on the basis of the Degé block print with reference to the Comparative Edition (dpe bsdur ma), the Stok Palace Kangyur, IOL Tib J 69, and the commentaries ascribed to Vasubandhu and Jñānadatta.
1
Homage to all the buddhas and bodhisattvas!
Thus did I hear at one time. The Buddha was residing in Śrāvastī, in Jeta’s Grove, Anāthapiṇḍada’s park, together with a great community of monks, consisting of 1,250 monks, and a great assembly of bodhisattvas. At that time, the Blessed One addressed the monks:
“Monks, for as long as they live, bodhisattvas, great beings, should not abandon four factors even at the cost of their lives. What are these four?
“Monks, for as long as they live, bodhisattvas, great beings, should not abandon the thought of awakening even at the cost of their lives.
“Monks, for as long as they live, bodhisattvas, great beings, should not abandon the spiritual friend even at the cost of their lives.
“Monks, for as long as they live, bodhisattvas, great beings, should not abandon tolerance and lenience even at the cost of their lives.¹⁷
“Monks, for as long as they live, bodhisattvas, great beings, should not abandon dwelling in the wilderness¹⁸ even at the cost of their lives.
“Monks, for as long as they live, bodhisattvas, great beings, should not abandon these four factors even at the cost of their lives.”
The Blessed One spoke these words, and once the Sugata had spoken in this way, he, the Teacher, also said the following:
“Let the wise conceive the thought of perfect awakening,
And not cast aside the thought of omniscience;¹⁹
Let them maintain the strength of tolerance and lenience,
And never forsake the spiritual friend.
“If the wise, like the king of beasts, abandon fear,
2
Always remain dwelling in the wilderness,
And constantly maintain these factors,
They will conquer the māras and attain awakening.”
When the Blessed One had said this, the monks and bodhisattvas, together with the entire assembly, rejoiced and praised the words of the Blessed One.
Notes
notes.1
1. Pearcey, Adam. trans. (2019), The Sūtra Teaching the Four Factors , Toh 249 (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2019).
notes.2
2. Pearcey, Adam. trans. (2023a), The Four Factors , Toh 250 (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2023).
notes.3
3. Dharmachakra Translation Committee, trans., The Accomplishment of the Sets of Four Qualities: The Bodhisattvas’ Prātimokṣa , Toh 248 (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2024).
notes.4
4. Dharmachakra Translation Committee, trans., The Fourfold Accomplishment , Toh 252 (84000: Translating the Words of the Buddha, 2020).
notes.5
5. Dasheng si fa jing 大乘四法經 (Caturdharmakasūtra), Taishō 772 (CBETA; SAT).
notes.6
6. Fo shuo pusa xiuxing si fa jing 佛說菩薩修行四法經 (Caturdharmakasūtra), Taishō 773 (CBETA; SAT).
notes.7
7. See Skilling (2021), pp. 200–1.
notes.8
8. See Denkarma, F.300.a.2. See also Herrmann-Pfandt (2008), pp. 125–26, no. 238.
notes.9
9. dkar chag ’ phang thang ma, p. 18.
notes.10
10. See Pearcey (2023b), An Explanation of The Noble Sūtra on the Four Factors .
notes.11
11. Śāntideva, 29a.4. Translations appear in Bendall & Rouse (1922), p. 43, and Goodman (2016), p. 44.
notes.12
12. Prajñākaramati, 107a.5.
notes.13
13. Vimalamitra, 353a.3.
notes.14
14. See Longchen Rabjam (2009), vol. 13, 249–50.
notes.15
15. Feer (1866), pp. 299–302.
notes.16
16. Skilling (2021), pp. 199–205.
notes.17
17. According to Jñānadatta’s commentary, tolerance (kṣanti; bzod pa) means bearing the harm done to one by others (pha rol gyi gnod pa byas pa la bzod pa), and lenience (sauratya; des pa) means refraining from harming them (pha rol la gnod pa mi byed pa).
notes.18
18. Dwelling in the wilderness is also one of the twelve ascetic practices (dhūtaguṇa). Note that related to (and sometimes conflated with) the Sanskrit araṇya in the compound araṇyavāsa—attested for dgon pa la gnas pa not in this text but in the Sanskrit of the Rāṣṭrapālaparipṛcchā (Toh 62)—is another term, araṇa, in the compound araṇavihāra, of which the Tibetan rendering is nyon mongs pa med par gnas pa (Mvy 6366), with the more “inner” meaning of “dwelling free of afflicted mental states.” See Edgerton s.v. araṇya and araṇya.
notes.19
19. The translation here follows the Degé and IOL Tib J 69 editions, which have sems skyed cig. The Stok Palace Kangyur version reads sems dpa’ cig.