法華玄贊義決 1.73

1.73

Regarding the section on titles of the scriptures: In the commentary, it says, "Conforming to reality, moderate, cause, and supramundane retribution." According to the Commentary on the Zonglun (Samayabhedoparacanacakra), each has four types, namely teaching, principle, practice, and fruit, which are summarized into three each. First, that teaching has three types: 1. Senseless words, such as the treatises of the four Vedas, which Brahmins recite, with very elegant and respectable sounds, but when one seeks their meaning there is no rational sense whatsoever, as when that treatise says, "I have already drunk the nectar, achieved [immortality], and shall never die again," and so forth. 2. Perverse and erroneous words, such as the ninety-five kinds of non-Buddhist traditions, which also speak of cause and effect but only expound what is heterodox and perverted, hence called perverse and erroneous. 3. Words in accord with the Dharma, such as the principle of cause and effect taught by the Buddha, stating that suffering and origination are mundane cause and effect, while cessation and the path are supramundane cause and effect; because the principle is congruent and not perverted, they are called words in accord with the Dharma. That principle has three types: 1. The sense of superimposition, as when the various non-Buddhists falsely impute a self and phenomena onto phenomena that lack a self. 2. The sense of deprecation, such as the various wrong views and the view of annihilationism. 3. The sense of conforming to reality, such as the Buddhist teachings, which state existence when there is existence, and non-existence when there is non-existence, free from the views of annihilationism and eternalism, hence called conforming to reality. That practice has three types: 1. Causes conforming to the world, such as in secular life serving one's sovereign with loyalty and serving one's father with filial piety; 2. Heterodox and perverted causes, which refers to falsely grasping various wrongful precepts and ascetic prohibitions; 3. Moderate causes, such as the Buddhist Dharma-gates that are free from the extremes of pain and pleasure and free from improper quests. That fruit has three types: 1. Sycophantic and deceptive fruit, such as obsequiously complying with commands to seek glory and emolument; 2. Vain and erroneous fruit, such as the various non-Buddhists falsely grasping non-conception as nirvāṇa; 3. Supramundane fruit, such as the Buddhist teachings being able to cause sentient beings to emerge from birth-and-death and realize nirvāṇa. Because teaching, principle, practice, and fruit possess the heterodox and the orthodox, such names are established to make one abandon the heterodox and return to the orthodox.