大乘法苑義林章 7.11.2

7.11.2

[and] second, the revealing cause (vyaktikāraṇa), like a lamp illuminating an object." The Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra says, "All teachings of the buddhas emerge from this sūtra; all buddhas are born from this sūtra." Vasubandhu's commentary explains: "For the true, it is the revealing cause; it is also the producing cause for the rest. For the teachings of all buddhas alone, merit accomplishes their foremost substance." Bodhi is called the Dharma body; its substance is truly unconditioned. Upholding the sūtra and expounding it are both revealing causes, because the Dharma body of tathatā is obtained through realization as its cause and is not produced by a producing cause. The "rest" refers to the Buddha of the rewarded body adorned with major marks and minor signs and the Buddha of the transformation body with major marks and minor signs; toward these it is a producing cause, because they are produced by a producing cause. Although the ten dharmic practices are all capable of acting as causes, upholding [the sūtra] benefits oneself and expounding it benefits others; based on the preeminence of these two among the ten practices, the rest are omitted in this brief account. As for "upholding the sūtra and expounding it," it is said solely to be the cause because the two kinds of roots of good—being able to uphold and being able to expound—are precisely the cause. Producing causes are of two kinds: first, direct, and second, auxiliary. Upholding and expounding that are sāsrava are distant, auxiliary causes with respect to the enjoyment body, because their natures are contradictory. Upholding and expounding that are anāsrava are direct causes of a buddha, because being anāsrava they are concordant and directly bring it about. Thus, these two producing causes apply to both actual manifestations and seeds. Revealing causes are also like this: first, direct, and second, auxiliary. Among the anāsrava wisdoms, the non-conceptual wisdom is the direct revealing cause with respect to the svabhāvakāya. The various sāsrava wisdoms and the subsequently attained wisdom are auxiliary revealing causes; they are not the seeds, because they are not the heard conditions. This explains how a single cause can obtain two fruits: with respect to its own similar kind it is a producing cause, and with respect to an other, dissimilar kind it is a revealing cause. As for the transformation body, it is also produced by a producing cause. Herein, as for the Dharma body, before the path of seeing, during the stage of entanglement by kleśas, it is called the tathāgatagarbha. Although the two vehicles attain the tathatā of the emptiness of persons, because their cognitive hindrances are not eliminated it does not serve as the support of [buddha] virtues, and is not called the Dharma body. By repeatedly listening, reflecting on, and practicing the causes of compassion and wisdom, from the first bhūmi upward the two hindrances are gradually severed, and serving as the support of virtues it is then called the Dharma body. As stated in the Prajñāpāramitā Sūtra cited previously, on the first bhūmi one attains the equal body, up to the tenth bhūmi where one attains the wondrous-knowledge body, because the World-Honoured One himself explained that these are the Dharma body. Through the ten distinct virtues of the wisdom that realizes that principle, the realized Dharma body is also shown to be tenfold. Up until one attains buddhahood, the two hindrances are completely exhausted, the two wisdoms are fully perfected, and the virtues are complete; therefore, the realized principle-body is manifested in clear purity without any difference, and is uniformly called the Dharma body as well as the svabhāvakāya. Just as when a cataract is removed from the sky and it becomes clear, open, and pure, the sky is not newly created—the Dharma body is also like this. This is called attaining buddhahood through the Dharma body's revealing cause. That is to say, before the path of seeing, by repeatedly listening, reflecting on, and practicing the causes of great wisdom, one causes the strength of the anāsrava seeds to increase. From the first bhūmi upward, they can generate the actual manifestations of the various anāsrava wisdoms; these position-distinctions of these wisdoms are then called the ten bhūmis. Therefore the Mahāyānasaṃgraha says, "The states of the wisdom of the selflessness of dharmas are called bhūmis." After this, bodhisattvas are broadly of two types: there are those who, dreading kleśas, immediately suppress and subdue them so that none arise, receiving from after the first bhūmi onward a body of inconceivable transformation—based on this, the Laṅkāvatāra-sūtra divides the bodhisattvas of the ten bhūmis into three kinds of mind-made bodies. There are also those who only receive transformation upon approaching the culmination of the seventh bhūmi—based on this, the Śrīmālā-sūtra says that the non-learners of the two vehicles and the bodhisattvas who have attained mastery constitute the three kinds of mind-made bodies, because before the seventh bhūmi they do not dread defilements. This is as explained in the "Essay on the Meaning of the Two Kinds of Samsāra." Since the true principle realized is called the ten Dharma bodies, the virtues that realize it are also called the ten enjoyments, because they enjoy the joy of the Dharma. However, in the past as ordinary beings they created the karma of ten kings, so after the first bhūmi they receive the fruit of ten kings. The bodily form transformed by the eighth and the five consciousnesses is sāsrava vipāka, gradually completing the major marks and supernatural powers. Relying on this, the subsequently attained [wisdom] transforms a still more excellent body with marks and signs, which is subsumed under the anāsrava. They are born in various pure lands and adorn the places of awakening (bodhimaṇḍa); at the location of a single body there are two types of transformations, whose appearances resemble each other and to the observer merge into one, collectively named enjoyment. Those who dread kleśas, after the path of seeing, are born in the Bṛhatphala heaven, using the cause of their present body to transition into receiving transformation; those who do not dread defilements are born in the Bṛhatphala heaven only upon the culmination of the seventh bhūmi, using the karma of their present body to transition into transformation, as this meaning is explained in full in the Cheng weishi lun. The enjoyments of the ten bhūmis, in accordance with what is realized, should have ten names; for them to share the names of the Dharma bodies is also completely reasonable, because the Dharma body is revealed in reliance upon the virtues that realize it. Alternatively, the names of the ten bhūmis are precisely the names of the enjoyment bodies of the ten bhūmis, because those names are established in reliance upon those bodhisattvas. In this way, across the ten bhūmis they become progressively more excellent, until when reaching the tenth bhūmi and about to attain buddhahood, an appearance of a great jeweled lotus flower appears above the Śuddhāvāsa heavens, of a quantity like the dust motes of ten asaṃkhyeya hundreds of thousands of trichiliocosms, upon which the bodhisattva sits and attains correct awakening. At the diamond-like mind stage, there is still a sāsrava and an inferior anāsrava body; when the path of liberation arises, the sāsrava is completely exhausted and the inferior anāsrava is extinguished, which is why the sūtra speaks of abandoning impermanent form and so on. The four wisdoms are fully perfected, virtues are complete, and the form bodies transformed by the anāsrava of the eight consciousnesses are also all anāsrava; wisdom, conforming to its object, pervades the Dharmadhātu. The meritorious form bodies are also all like this, continuous and serene, exhausting the limits of the future; because their original vows to benefit sentient beings exhaust the Dharmadhātu, this is called the mark of attaining buddhahood produced by the producing cause of the self-enjoyment body, having had the great compassion before the path of seeing as its fermenting cause. For the sake of lower-grade bodhisattvas on the ten bhūmis, [the Buddha] manifests the other-enjoyment body, which is transformed solely by the subsequently attained anāsrava [wisdom]. Progressively superior and larger, up to buddhahood it can pervade the ten directions, manifesting the other-enjoyment body to gradually increase in size according to what is appropriate for the assemblies on the ten bhūmis. On the first bhūmi they see the Buddha sitting on a flower of a hundred petals, which corresponds to a hundred great chiliocosms. Furthermore, Amitābha Buddha's eyes are like the waters of the four great oceans, the white curl mark between his eyebrows is like five Mount Sumerus, and his body's height is sixty trillion nayutas of Ganges sands of yojanas—this must be what the bodhisattvas of the first bhūmi see; on the second bhūmi they see the Buddha sitting on a flower of a thousand petals, and so on up to the tenth bhūmi where what is seen becomes ever larger. Although this other-enjoyment [body] has parents and also manifests receiving birth, it does not first reside in heaven before descending to attain buddhahood. The Sūtra on the King of Drum Sound says, "Amitābha Buddha's father was named Candra-uttara, his mother was named Utpalavarṇā (Shusheng Miaoyan), his son was named Candrabhāsa, the disciple who attended him was named Vimalakīrti, the māra king was named Aparājita, and Devadatta was named Śānta." The Treatise on the Sūtra of Immeasurable Life says, "Women, those with deficient faculties, and those of the two vehicle lineages are not born [there]." Since it is a rewarded land, there are no actual women; buddhas and bodhisattvas transform into mothers and so forth. Because it transforms a body of lifespan-delimited samsāra (pariccheda), it manifests this appearance; regarding the transformation of a body of inconceivable transformation, I have not seen any authoritative statement. The Lotus Sūtra says, "When Mahākāśyapa is to become a buddha, there will be no deeds of Māra; Māra and Māra's minions will all protect the Buddha's Dharma." If there is even this appearance, how could there be real deeds of Māra in a rewarded land?