大方廣佛華嚴經疏 31.20

31.20

Fourth, within the dual explanation of the causes and conditions of empowerment and samādhi, there are four causes and conditions: (1) empowerment by the companion Buddhas together, (2) the fundamental vow of the host Buddha, (3) the manifestation of majesty by the host Buddha, and (4) the intellectual power of the meditator. The first of these is solely the cause of attaining samādhi, since it was only through the Buddha's prior empowerment that he was able to enter it. Hence the treatise states: "That Buddha first made this vow, and now empowers again directly." The latter three conditions pertain to both causes: because of them he could enter samādhi, and because of them he received empowerment, but they are not the actual marks of empowerment. Hence the treatise states: "Later, the other Buddhas empowered him, hence it says that he was empowered by the power of Rocana Buddha's fundamental vow." The intention of this treatise is: only in the subsequent text are the marks of empowerment by the Buddhas revealed, which is precisely due to the power of the fundamental vow here; thus this is the cause of empowerment. If considered in terms of attaining samādhi through empowerment by the host Buddha, then the vow and so forth here have already revealed the marks of empowerment, yet it was only a concealed empowerment of the mind, which is just the aforementioned relying on the Buddha's spiritual power. Thus there are four causes of samādhi and likewise four causes of empowerment: although lacking the cause of empowerment by the companion Buddhas, there is the single cause of attaining samādhi, and so there are four. For this reason, in the third assembly, the latter three causes begin with the words "furthermore it is...", while the fourth and fifth assemblies both say "it is also..."; hence one cannot take the former single cause as the direct bestowal of empowerment. If empowerment had already been bestowed here, why would the subsequent text be needed to directly reveal the marks of empowerment? The rest is as explained in the third assembly.