金剛般若論會釋 2.55

2.55

Furthermore, there is a difficulty raised here: all those who uphold, recite, and practice this sūtra ought reasonably to be revered and made offerings to by people and to attain the fruit of great wisdom; why instead are they slighted, disgraced, and suffer premature death? Why does a good retribution bring about an evil retribution in return? Therefore, this [treatise] explains that when practicing superior cultivation, being slighted is because of evil karma from past lives that would otherwise result in falling into the evil destinies; by upholding the practice of the sūtra, the heavy is turned into the light—it is not that upholding the sūtra brings about an evil retribution in return. Someone explained: 'This refers to the pinnacle stage (mūrdhan), where having previously committed evil karma one has not yet escaped the evil destinies, and now by upholding and expounding the sūtra one finally does not experience the fruit.' This reasoning is incorrect. According to the seventeenth fascicle of the Avataṃsaka-sūtra, speaking of the abode of first generating the thought [of awakening], it says: 'The unsurpassed Buddha-lineage, the family of the Dharma King of the three periods of time, all the dharmas of the Tathāgatas—from these the bodhisattva is born. The pure, wondrous dharmakāya manifests in various forms; like a great illusionist, whatever is wished for is manifested. In some places, for the sake of sentient beings, he fulfills the bodhisattva practices; or again manifests the initial birth, leaving home to practice and train in the path; or under the king of trees, spontaneously realizes right awakening; or in some places, for the sake of sentient beings, manifests entering nirvāṇa. Such true children of the Buddha have a realm that is exceedingly profound and wondrous; if sentient beings try to conceptualize it, their minds will become confused and insane'; 'Innumerable nayutas of exceedingly profound samādhis, by the bodhisattva's sovereign power, can all be entered in a single thought-moment'; 'Correctly contemplating in this way the world systems in the ten directions, adorning and purifying all lands, yet without attachment in the mind.' A beginner bodhisattva, through the eight aspects of manifesting transformation, has already adorned pure lands; if there are those whose generation of the mind does not regress, they no longer commit the five deeds of immediate retribution and do not fall into hell. Furthermore, in the fourth abode it says: 'The fourth is the truly born child of the Buddha, born from the correct Dharma of all the worthy and noble ones, having no attachment to the existent or nonexistent dharmas, abandoning saṃsāra and transcending the three realms.' Furthermore, a non-regressing person at this stage will thereafter no longer generate or commit unshared ignorance and the like, nor fall into the three evil destinies, and so forth. Furthermore, in the eighth practice one attains the ten inexhaustible treasures; in the second, the inexhaustible treasure of moral discipline, one does not accept the moral discipline of non-Buddhists, does not commit the five deeds of immediate retribution, and is complete in all precepts without violation. This refers to those who, having first generated the mind, are destined to regress, because before the sixth abode they may sever roots of goodness and commit deeds of immediate retribution. Śāriputra and others in the past generated the great mind, and after sixty kalpas regressed from the Mahāyāna, whereupon they transmigrated through the five destinies. Therefore the Lotus Sūtra says: 'abandoning his father, he ran away for more than fifty years'; the Zheng fahua [jing] says: 'saṃsāra in the five destinies'; the Yingluo jing says: 'In my first assembly, eighty thousand people regressed, such as the deva-son Viśuddhacakṣus, prince Dharmamati, Śāriputra, and others; wishing to enter the sixth abode, encountering evil conditions, they regressed into the evil and unwholesome among ordinary persons, regressed into non-Buddhist paths, adopted great wrong views and the five deeds of immediate retribution, leaving no evil uncommitted.' Only after the seventh abode is one at the stage of non-regression: one does not become [an adherent of] the two vehicles, does not commit the karma of the five deeds of immediate retribution, does not fall into hell, [though] one may enter the other evil destinies. In the seventh dedication of the Avataṃsaka, the three grades of wholesome roots are cultivated to perfection, accumulated, and nurtured, broadly opening the stages of practice; being able to abide in the power of endurance, one closes the gate of the evil destinies and from then on never again falls into the gate of the three evil destinies. Why then at the pinnacle stage should one still be subject to falling into the evil destinies? It is only that now through cultivation free from characteristics one begins not to enter them; even for persons of the two vehicles who have not yet eliminated conceptual discrimination, 'at the heat stage one does not sever wholesome roots, and at the pinnacle stage one does not fall into the evil destinies.' If cultivating for merely one, two, or three lifetimes can already accomplish this, how much more so for a bodhisattva who has reached the pinnacle stage, having completed an entire great kalpa, to still fall into the evil destinies—this is utterly impossible. However, this text was spoken for the sake of bodhisattvas who have entered the pinnacle stage, to cause them to cultivate wisdom and praise the excellence of the Dharma, and to cause those regressing bodhisattvas before the sixth abode to enter the seventh abode and achieve non-regression of abiding, and those who before the sixth dedication would enter the three evil destinies, upon hearing the Dharma and progressing in cultivation, to enter the seventh dedication and not fall into the evil destinies. Since the Dharma is like this, one should therefore cultivate and advance to accomplish superior wisdom. The Mahāyānasaṃgraha says: 'Due to the power of perfuming through hearing, an supramundane pure mind arises; although it has not yet arisen, it is already able to serve as an antidote to defilements, bonds, and the like, and among the four hindrances, it serves as an antidote that crushes all evil karma that has already been committed.' Furthermore, the Baye jing states that during the three periods of preparation, the fundamental, and the subsequent, having defilements entirely or lacking them entirely each constitute one phrase; two having them and one lacking them constitute three phrases; the first is fixed retribution, the next is karmic action, and the latter six are indeterminate. Fascicle thirty-one of the Nirvāṇa-sūtra says that all committed karma is either light or heavy, each having two kinds—namely, fixed and indeterminate—and so forth, and that there is heavy karma that can be experienced lightly, which refers to karma committed by the wise. Here, it is karma committed by the wise; therefore what was committed as heavy is experienced as light. The tenth verse of the Mahāyānasaṃgraha states: 'The realm of sentient beings is pervasive; endowed with obstacles and lacking causes; two kinds of definite transformation; the Buddhas have no sovereignty,' and so forth—these should all be collated with the text. Accordingly, based on the foregoing: if one does not regress, after first generating the mind one can manifest the eight aspects, and up to the sixth faith of the ten faiths, because of non-regression, does not sever wholesome roots; reaching the fourth abode, one does not generate conceptual discrimination, unshared ignorance, self-views, and the like, nor does one newly create karma leading to the evil destinies and fall into them. If one was originally of a regressing nature, only upon reaching the seventh abode does one achieve non-regression of abiding and not enter hell, though thereafter one may still enter the other evil destinies. In the Avataṃsaka-sūtra the ten faiths are not spoken of, hence this explanation is made. Only upon reaching the seventh dedication does one not fall into the three evil destinies anywhere at all; after entering the first bhūmi, one permanently ceases to receive the forms of egg-born and moisture-born beings, or of humans and the three evil destinies.