新華嚴經論 23.3

23.3

The third assembly takes place at the summit of Mount Sumeru to expound the ten abodes. This represents entering principle and according with wisdom, for it cannot be reached by a mind of arising and ceasing. Just as Mount Sumeru sits in the great ocean, eighty-four thousand yojanas high, unreachable by climbing with hands and feet, this clarifies that the eighty-four thousand mountains of afflictive toil dwell within the great ocean of defilements; when one is free of thought and free of contrivance regarding all phenomena, then the ocean of defilements dries up, the mountains of afflictive toil immediately become the mountain of all-knowledge, and the ocean of defilements immediately becomes the nature-ocean. If one gives rise to intentional thought, all one's grasping causes the mountains of afflictive toil to grow ever higher and the ocean of defilements ever deeper, making it impossible to reach the summit of wisdom. This clarifies using concentration as an expedient means; hence the Bodhisattva Dharmamati enters an expedient samādhi before expounding this Dharma gate. One should know that when thought is forgotten, wisdom manifests; when one remains in conceptualization, delusion persists. Stagnating in quiescence, wisdom is hidden; when feelings are empty, wisdom emerges. This is the beginning of the path of vision, the start of being born into the house of the Buddha's wisdom; it metaphorically represents emerging from the ordinary and transcending the world, being at ease like the gods, and attaining the summit of the mountain of wisdom. Furthermore, because taking expedient concentration to stop the mind from distraction is the essence of the mountain—as [the hexagram] Gen represents a mountain as stopping—this is the stage of the ten abodes: newly born into the house of the Buddha's wisdom, dwelling where the Buddhas dwell, clarifying that wisdom arises in reliance on concentration, just as Mount Sumeru exemplifies.