請觀音經疏闡義鈔 3.3

3.3

Regarding "To the west from here..." and so forth: these words come from the Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra. That text refers to the Akṣobhya world in the east, pointing toward this Sahā world and saying: "To the west, twenty Ganges sands away from here..." If discussing Sukhāvatī, it is as the Short Amitābha Sūtra says, "past a hundred thousand kotis of Buddha lands." Here it merely borrows that rhetorical momentum to pose an objection. From "Why?" below is the question. From "One explanation" below is the answer. Other explanations interpret it in terms of response and thus lose the capacity of beings, so they are not adopted. Our present explanation is not like that: based on the Buddha's addressing the elder that it is not far from here, it is based on the capacity and conditions, unlike others who discuss "not far" in terms of response. "Although near, it is far": just as the three hundred million of Śrāvastī neither saw nor heard [the Buddha], it is like the eight sounds being extremely close, yet the deaf cannot hear them. "Although far, there must be a response": just as now when Candraprabha prays, the three sages descend. It is like the celestial moon being extremely far, yet appearing as soon as the water is clear. "Time" means the seasons and periods. "Direction" means location. "Number" means numerical reckonings. The principle expounded in the Buddha's teaching is profoundly transcendent, devoid of time, direction, or number; therefore, the phenomena of the five aggregates, the eighteen fundamental supports (dhātus), and the twelve sense bases cannot encompass it. If in non-Buddhist teachings they posit the existence of time and so forth, they are encompassed by the three categories. When An Shigao translated sūtras in the Later Han, he called the eighteen realms (dhātus) "fundamental supports."