大毘盧遮那成佛經疏 3.3

3.3

The sūtra says: 'At that time, the Vajradhara Lord of Secrets addressed the Buddha, saying: "World-Honoured One! May the Savior of the World expound the marks of the mind. How many kinds of places where fearlessness is attained does a bodhisattva have, up to attaining the fearlessness of the equality of the intrinsic nature of all dharmas?"' This is still answering the preceding phrase on the marks of the mind. Because Vajrapāṇi had heard that the bodhisattvas of this teaching directly mount the mantra gateway to ascend to the bodhisattva grounds, he asked the World-Honoured One how many kinds of places where fearlessness is attained there are when these bodhisattvas practice the path. The Buddha again explains by contrasting the gradations in terms of the aforementioned three kalpas. The Sanskrit word āśvāsa should properly be translated as 'respite' (suxi). It is like a person who is seized by a powerful figure, choked by the throat, their breath cut off, on the verge of suffocating, who suddenly is released and revives. Sentient beings are also like this: bound by delusional karma and afflictions, obstructed wherever they touch conditions, upon reaching these six places they are as if reborn; hence they are called places of respite. It is also like crossing a treacherous, evil path where their mind is at peace and has nothing to fear; hence they are called places of fearlessness. The Buddha said: 'Lord of Secrets! When that foolish, childlike ordinary person cultivates good dharmas and destroys unwholesome dharmas, they shall attain the fearlessness of the wholesome.' The meaning of 'wholesome' extends to both shallow and deep. Here, the meaning clarifies the path of the ten wholesome karmas. For instance, worldly people, by the causes and conditions of the ten unwholesome paths, drift and sink in the evil destinies without end. Later, they attain the eight minds conforming to the world, gradually receive the three refuges and precepts, are born among humans and devas for immeasurable lifetimes, and later arrive at nirvāṇa. Because of being freed from the severe suffering of the three evil paths, it is called the initial place of respite. For a mantra practitioner, when first entering the samaya and cultivating offerings relying on the three mysteries, their station is equivalent to this.