菩薩戒本疏 2.53

2.53

"Disciples of the Buddha! One should, with a good mind, first learn the Mahāyāna scriptures and vinaya on deportment, extensively opening up and understanding their doctrines and flavors. When one sees later, newly learned bodhisattvas coming from a hundred or a thousand li away seeking the Mahāyāna scriptures and vinaya, one should according to the Dharma explain to them all austerities, such as burning one's body, burning one's arm, or burning one's fingers. If one does not burn one's body, arm, or fingers to make offerings to the Buddhas, one is not a renitent bodhisattva. Even [down to] hungry tigers, wolves, lions, and all hungry ghosts, one should give up one's bodily flesh, hands, and feet to make offerings to them. Only thereafter should one, step by step in sequence, expound the true Dharma for them, causing their minds to open and their understanding to unfold. If, for the sake of profit and sustenance, a bodhisattva fails to answer what ought to be answered, inverts the text of the scriptures and vinaya, puts what is before behind and what is behind before, and speaks so as to slander the Three Jewels, they commit a duṣkṛta offense."