妙法蓮華經玄贊 2.193

2.193

The Commentary says: These five verses concern giving (dāna). They are divided into three parts: the first three verses concern the giving of the four requisites; the next one verse concerns supreme and wonderful giving; and the last one verse concerns giving with resolve (āśaya). "Four requisites" refers to food and drink, medicines, clothing, and bedding. "Delicacies" (xiao 肴): food other than grain is called xiao. Xiao means food dishes, properly written with the character 肴. It means eating and chewing; vegetables and the like belong to it; it also refers to beans. "Provisions" (shan 膳) means complete meals. In contemporary usage, fine delicacies are also called precious provisions (zhenshan). Common usage interprets xiao-shan as meats. Here that is not so: since bodhisattvas prepare them to make offerings to the Buddha, the character 膳 must be used; those who write it as 餚饍 are incorrect. As for "sandalwood" (candana), red denotes goshīrṣa-candana, black denotes species of red sandalwood (padma-candana / zitan), and white denotes species of white sandalwood. In the verse on supreme and wonderful giving: father, mother, sick Dharma masters, and bodhisattvas in their final birth; even if they have not realized sagehood, the fruit of giving to them is immeasurable. It also says: if there is someone whose moral discipline is deficient, yet who is able to expound and benefit many people, one should make offerings to them as to the Buddha, the Great Master, out of love for their excellent exposition and because of their resemblance [to the Buddha]; thus one gives pure and delightful gardens and groves. Within giving with resolve, there are six resolves: first, vastness; second, inexhaustibility; third, joy; fourth, gratitude; fifth, undefiledness; sixth, excellence. In this passage there are three: first, joy; second, inexhaustibility; third, excellence. Seeking the unexcelled path and earlier giving the four requisites is giving of vastness; bearing in mind their past kindness is called giving of gratitude; feeling no regret at the three times and remaining free of defilement and admixture is called undefiled giving. Giving food and drink fulfills the Dharma-food and prevents one from falling into kalpas of famine; giving medicine ensures that one will obtain the Dharma-medicine and be free from all illnesses; giving clothing ensures that one will obtain robes of the seven precious substances, gentle, compliant, and endowed with shame and conscience; giving bedding ensures that one will possess requisite conditions and enter the abode of tranquility and the chamber of great compassion; giving gardens and groves ensures that one will dwell in the park of awakening and the park of dhāraṇī, and obtain the trees of the grove of the uncontaminated Dharma; giving flowers ensures that one will obtain the flowers of the seven limbs of awakening; giving fruits ensures that one will obtain the four fruits of sagehood; giving bathing ponds ensures that one will obtain the pool of the eight liberations that abandons defilement.