新華嚴經論 4.5

4.5

Third, the fruition achieved by ordinary beings who, at the initial mind of the ten abodes, first realize [the truth] and employ it in accord with conditions: this is the *Avataṃsaka Sūtra*. At the concluding mind of the ten faiths, one uses the samādhi of expedient means to penetrate the twelve links of existence of ignorance, turning them into the principle, wisdom, and great compassion, thereby possessing the dharmadhātu dharma-gate of the essence and function of Mañjuśrī and Samantabhadra. Furthermore, regarding the practice of teaching cause and effect taught by the nirmāṇakāya Buddha, it definitely takes three asaṃkhyeya kalpas; all the Buddha's merits are produced through cultivation: for a hundred kalpas cultivating the karma for the marks and signs—offering lamps to obtain radiance, non-killing to obtain longevity, giving to obtain wealth, patience to obtain a handsome appearance—each cause and effect corresponds proportionally and fully; one must still apply various remedial dharma-gates before finally seeing the nature and becoming a Buddha. But in the *Avataṃsaka Sūtra*, it is not like this. In a single thought, one suddenly realizes the dharmadhātu dharma-gate: the nature and characteristics of body and mind are originally nothing but the essence of the Dharma; action, function, movement, and stillness accord with reality, and exercising wisdom of non-action is itself the Buddha. For all Buddhas it must be thus; without long or short, from beginning to end it is ultimate, and all dharmas are thus. Operating naturally within the one true dharmadhātu according to the Dharma, one is fully endowed with virtues and functions as numerous as the sands of the Ganges, cause being identical with effect. Through this universal gate of the dharmadhātu of principle and wisdom, all hindrances naturally cease to exist; there are no separate remedies, separate cultivation, or separate severance; one does not see transformation, because transformation and non-transformation have no different nature or characteristics. Looking universally at everything, there is nothing that is not a dharma-gate, nothing that is not liberation. It is merely because one's own mind forcibly gives rise to attachment and is submerged in the flow of suffering through many affairs, that the Holy One is wearied into speaking of various distinctions, whereupon beings again generate attachments to what was taught. For this reason, the Holy One's teachings differ: some are gradual and some are round, responding to various capacities. As for this sūtra teaching, it suddenly reveals the perfect vehicle, which only people of the highest vehicle are capable of receiving; if someone is incapable of receiving it, they should delight in cultivating it, and ultimately they will flow into and reside in this ocean. Therefore, other teachings place cause first and effect later, unlike this teaching where cause and effect are simultaneous, because within the ocean of wisdom of the Dharma-nature, cause and effect cannot be grasped. Because they cannot be grasped, cause and effect are simultaneous without obstruction. Graspable cause and effect entails before and after; whatever can be grasped is impermanent and not the ultimate teaching. If cause comes first and effect later, then the cause is also not established, and therefore the effect is also destroyed. Because dharmas born of conditions are not continuous, they are immediately extinguished, and neither self nor other is established. Just as in counting one coin without counting subsequent coins, if there are no subsequent two, the first is also not established; because a kṣaṇa is non-continuous, the cause of that kṣaṇa is not established and the effect is also destroyed; across many kalpas there is no continuity, and across many kalpas cause and effect are destroyed—one must wait until the time of counting the subsequent coin for the previous one to be established. Cause and effect are also like this: they are only established when awaiting a single unbroken moment. If so, it is like counting two coins simultaneously: without before or after, which is one and which is two? Like holding up two fingers, which is cause and which is effect? Just like the two fingers, wherever one's mind counts first is the cause, and what is counted later is the effect. If there is a before and an after, then there is an interval between them, and there is still discontinuity from kṣaṇa to kṣaṇa; where there is discontinuity, cause and effect are not established. If they are simultaneous, like holding up two fingers without before or after, which is cause and which is effect? Neither would be established either. In the *Avataṃsaka Sūtra*, where cause and effect are simultaneous, both are free from such attachments and conceptual discriminations of before and after or simultaneity, and free from attached cause and effect regarding existence and non-existence, both or neither, permanence and impermanence, and so forth; simply understanding that the essence of the Dharma is not something constructed, and is not bound by cause and effect, is called cause and effect—not the conceptual discrimination of simultaneity and before and after established by sentiment. If this is so, how does it differ from the gradual teaching in the *Laṅkāvatāra*? It is not like that. Earlier I explained that the teacher of the doctrine is different, the principals in questions and answers are different, and so forth, precisely to clarify that the essence, function, host, and companion of the three virtues of Mañjuśrī, Samantabhadra, and the Buddha are unobstructed. In the *Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra*, the nirmāṇakāya Buddha and the Bodhisattva Mahāmati engage in questions and answers to refute characteristics, only aiming to reveal the principle without attachment, and do not discuss the dharmadhātu of pratītyasamutpāda. In the dharmadhātu of pratītyasamutpāda, the dharmadhātu is neither established nor destroyed; it merely recognizes that dharmas are just as they are. Therefore the *Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra* says: 'First show a resemblance, and later impart the real.' It also says: 'Grasping characteristics is consciousness; not grasping characteristics is wisdom.' This explains establishment and destruction. In this sūtra's meaning, the true has no unreal dharmas; all dharmas are entirely true, purely true without unreality, and there is no longer any preserving the true and preserving the unreal as resemblances. The sūtra says: 'The realm of sentient beings is itself the realm of Buddhas.' In this sūtra, Mañjuśrī integrates practice with principle, and Samantabhadra integrates principle with practice; the essence and function of both thoroughly penetrate each other to form the one true dharmadhātu, mutually encompassing before and after. The forty chapters of the sūtra mutually subsume one another, thoroughly penetrating from beginning to end, their texts and meanings mutually embracing; within one dharma-gate, many dharmas are contained. Therefore the sūtra says: 'Within many dharmas, it is one dharma; within one dharma, it is many.' In the gradual teaching, even if a small fraction of the meaning is the same, the majority does not resemble this. Just as the ten bodhisattvas headed by Bodhisattva Bodhiśīrṣa each expound one dharma to establish the ten faiths, within the ten faiths together they establish one faith; because the ten stages of faith mutually establish each other's essence and are not established in isolation, through the ten faiths one faith is established, and through one faith the ten faiths are established; one who understands must not lean exclusively on a single gate. The ten bodhisattvas of wisdom, the ten of forest, the ten of banners, and the ten of treasures, as well as the expositions of the ten samādhis, ten superknowledges, and ten acceptances—all these individual stages and dharma-gates are mutually established in this way, like Indra's net thoroughly interpenetrating: the immeasurable within the one, and the one within the immeasurable. The essence and function of all Buddhas and bodhisattvas mutually establish each other, and cause and effect interpenetrate, simultaneously non-dual. As the sūtra says: when Bodhisattva Dharmamati enters samādhi, then Buddhas across the worlds of the ten directions with the same name Dharmamati come; when Bodhisattva Guṇavana enters samādhi, then Buddhas across the worlds of the ten directions with the same name Guṇavana come; when Bodhisattva Vajradhvaja enters samādhi, then Buddhas across the worlds of the ten directions with the same name Vajradhvaja come; when Bodhisattva Vajragarbha enters samādhi, then Buddhas across the worlds of the ten directions with the same name Vajragarbha come to rub his crown. In this manner, within each stage and upon each ground, the Buddha and the bodhisattva mutually establish cause and effect, and their essence and function thoroughly penetrate each other. The Buddhas who arrive clearly represent the fruition; the bodhisattvas who enter samādhi clearly represent the cause; this is because cause and effect are non-dual. Upon the essence of wisdom of the Buddha's dharmakāya, the behavioral marks of the ten abodes, ten practices, ten dedications of merit, ten grounds, eleventh ground, and so forth are established as the gate to guide and transform ordinary mortals: all stages are the Buddha, and the Buddha is all stages. If people of the highest faculties generate faith in this teaching, they will, relying on this Dharma, at the initial mind of the ten abodes directly realize the Dharma of the wisdom of the Tathāgata's Buddha-fruition, and only then perform all the myriad bodhisattva practices, because the head of the initial realization is knowing the nature of the essence of wisdom of the Dharma. Even if they engage in activities like ordinary beings and pass through kalpas of practice, their fundamental self-view never shifts; at the time of the initial generation of the mind, they realize equal and correct awakening simultaneously with the Buddhas of the three periods of time, because there are no boundaries of before and after and because the Dharma is thus—one should know it in this way. This is not like the provisional teaching, where one achieves the Buddha fruition only after passing through three asaṃkhyeya kalpas; therefore it is said here that obtaining the fruition is different from the Three Vehicles. Furthermore, because in this sūtra one attains the Buddha fruition by boarding the Tathāgata's vehicle of all-knowledge, there are no people of the two vehicles obtaining the four fruits of asceticism, nor are there the behavioral marks of the grounds of provisional-teaching bodhisattvas where the cause precedes the effect.