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དམ་པའ་ཆས་པད་མ་དཀར་པ་ཞས་བྱ་བ་ཐག་པ་ཆན་པའ་མད 7.3

The White Lotus of the Good Dharma 7.3

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7.3

mahāsattva does not constantly teach the Dharma to women while possessing one or another sign of attachment to them. He does not constantly desire to be looking at women. He does not approach families constantly thinking of teaching the Dharma to the women, the girls, and the wives, and does not delight in doing so. He does not teach the Dharma to paṇḍakas and does not become familiar with them, nor delight in them. He does not enter homes alone to procure alms, unless he is recollecting the Tathāgata.

“If he does teach the Dharma to a woman, he does not even teach the Dharma with desire for the Dharma, let alone with desire for the woman. He teaches the Dharma without even revealing his teeth, let alone any obvious facial expression.

“He does not associate with śrāmaṇeras or śrāmaṇerīs, bhikṣus or bhikṣuṇīs, young men or young women, and does not converse with them.⁴⁰⁰ He is someone who reveres isolation and always remains in isolation.

“Mañjuśrī, that is the first field of activity of bodhisattva mahāsattvas.

“Moreover, Mañjuśrī, bodhisattva mahāsattvas see the emptiness of all phenomena—phenomena as they are, not as they are not—as they truly are, unwavering, unshakeable, immutable, unchanging, always as they truly are, having the nature of space, beyond definition and terminology, unborn, neither existing nor not existing, not composite, not continuous, spoken of through the word nonexistence, in an unimpeded state, and manifested from erroneous conceptualization.

“Mañjuśrī, bodhisattva mahāsattvas are always seeing phenomena in that way, and by remaining in that state, they maintain the bodhisattva mahāsattvas’ field of activity.

“Mañjuśrī, that is the second field of activity of bodhisattva mahāsattvas.”

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