四明尊者教行錄 4.106

4.106

答：眾生得悟緣熏不同，或有無師自悟，承本自然智而證之。良由本具靈明，能自推理而得解悟。故祖師云：空寂體上無師智自然能知。既知自性，而便成佛也。一人成佛之後，展轉說法化迷眾生，眾生稟教修行，是故次第成佛。若爾，何疑最初一佛無從開悟耶？

Answer: Sentient beings' attainment of awakening through the perfuming of conditions is not uniform. Some have awakening without a teacher, realizing it by drawing upon their fundamental, unconditioned wisdom. This is truly because they fundamentally possess a numinous luminosity and can naturally infer the truth to attain understanding and awakening. Therefore an ancestral master said: 'Upon the empty and quiescent substance, teacherless wisdom is naturally able to know.' Having known one's own nature, one immediately becomes a buddha. After one person becomes a buddha, he transmits the teachings to convert deluded sentient beings; sentient beings receive the teaching and cultivate practice, and are therefore successively enlightened. If so, why doubt that the very first buddha had no source from which to awaken?