觀無量壽佛經義疏 3.223

3.223

"‘He meets a good friend who, with great compassion, immediately praises and expounds for him the ten powers and majestic virtues of Amitābha Buddha, extensively explaining that Buddha's radiant light and spiritual power, and also praises precepts, concentration, wisdom, liberation, and the knowledge and vision of liberation.’" There are three aspects in explaining the Buddha's meritorious qualities: first, the ten powers; second, the radiant light; third, the fivefold Dharma-body. Regarding the ten powers: 1. The power of knowing what is possible and impossible (the Buddha knows the causes, conditions, and retributions of expounding the Dharma; that a given result does not arise from a given cause, the Buddha completely and universally knows). 2. The power of knowing karmic retribution (the Buddha knows all sentient beings' causes, conditions, and karmic retributions across the three periods of time). 3. The power of concentrations (the Buddha knows the samādhis of all Buddhas). 4. The power of knowing faculties (the Buddha knows the superiority and inferiority of other sentient beings' faculties). 5. The power of inclinations (the Buddha knows the various desires and inclinations of sentient beings). 6. The power of temperaments (the Buddha knows the various natures in the world). 7. The power of knowing where paths lead (the Buddha knows the destination of all paths). 8. The power of former lives (the Buddha knows various former lives, from one life, two lives, up to hundreds of thousands of lives and kalpas). 9. The power of the divine eye (the Buddha's divine eye is pure, seeing sentient beings' birth and death, karmic retributions, and characteristics). 10. The power of the exhaustion of outflows (the Buddha has exhausted all outflows, hence his mind of non-outflow is liberated). Among the fivefold [Dharma-body], the first three are easily understood; cultivating causes and experiencing the fruit is called liberation; the definitive and eternal exhaustion of the five entrenchments and two types of death, and the arising of function after attaining the fruit, is called the knowledge and vision of liberation. Third, hearing the Dharma extinguishes sin.