大方廣佛華嚴經疏 56.3

56.3

Fourth, from "At that time, Sudhana" onward, he recollects kindness and takes leave. Rejoicing to hear of the subsequent friend, he leaps with joy; sorrowfully parting with the voice of virtue, he weeps tears of sorrow. The other good friends below can be understood by analogy with this. However, although the meaning of the latter two sections belongs to what follows, the text belongs to the preceding assembly. Question: The Great Sage had the wisdom to expound, and Sudhana had the capacity to receive; why did he not expound it all at once, but instead specifically directed him to other people to serve various friends one by one? To elucidate this profound intent, ten meanings are briefly set forth: 1. Explained generally, it serves as a model for later students, meaning that Sudhana seeks the Dharma without remissness, and good friends preach the Dharma without stinginess. 2. To show that the conditions for practice are superior, meaning that a true good friend is the complete holy life (brahmacarya), just as King Ajātaśatru met Jīvaka, or as Vimalagarbha transformed Śubhavyūha. 3. To shatter foolish clinging, meaning causing one not to take one's foolish mind as teacher, but to empty oneself and seek everywhere. 4. To shatter pride in views, meaning causing one not to look at lineage, not to be ashamed to ask inferiors, and to respect and serve everywhere. 5. To shatter clinging to pervasive emptiness, meaning not merely seeking nothing, but seeking within the absence of seeking. 6. To cause practice directly in immediate engagement with phenomena, meaning it is better to realize entry through hearing little than to fail to realize through hearing much. 7. To shatter the mindset of preachers claiming possession, thinking 'my disciples, my followers', with dualistic views of self and other. 8. To show gradual cultivation and entry assigned to stages; for if one did not yield to the subsequent, one would abide within stage after stage and there would be no superior progress. 9. To show that the Buddhadharma is extremely profound and vast; since even good friends modestly defer, how could ordinary people make arbitrary judgments? 10. To show that Sudhana and the friends form pratītyasamutpāda; because that which can enter and that which is entered lack dual marks, there is no Sudhana outside of the good friends, so the one is immediately the all, elucidating Sudhana's traversal of the stages; and because there are no good friends outside of Sudhana, the all is immediately the one, and the accomplishments of many stages are all within Sudhana, through which seeing expansion and contraction are free and unobstructed. Among these ten meanings, the first applies commonly to master and disciple; the next five pertain mostly to the disciple; the seventh pertains to the master; and the last three pertain to the teaching. This can be understood by reflecting on it.