四明尊者教行錄 4.32

4.32

七問：〈分別功德品〉疏云：或可一人有八番增，或可一世、或八世、或無量世，或一念、或八念、或無量念（云云）。疑者云：疏第四云：三周聲聞未斷無明，有三根利鈍。若真修體顯，則無差降。初住已上更起緣修，無復勝負，真修體融寧得有異耶（云云）？今何有一念八念乃至無量世差降耶？若爾，云何論父母所生身證妙覺耶？若許證者，經以龍女為速疾證，而大師判為初住八相。既有速疾證理，何故龍女不是證妙覺耶？況復《起信》和會諸經長短兩說，唯以三祇為證理，天台不可違馬鳴也。若不許者，既有一念八番增損，何不許一生四十二番耶？圓頓速疾之道，豈必經爾許劫耶？

Question 7: The commentary on the chapter 'Discrimination of Merits' says: Or perhaps one person has eight turns of increase; or perhaps one life, or eight lives, or countless lives; or one thought, or eight thoughts, or countless thoughts (and so on). Doubters say: The fourth fascicle of the commentary says: The śrāvakas of the three cycles have not yet severed ignorance, and have three faculties of sharpness and dullness. If genuine cultivation and the essence are revealed, then there is no disparity. From the first abode upward, when conditional cultivation is further aroused, there is no longer superiority or inferiority; when genuine cultivation and the essence interfuse, how could there be differences? (and so on). Now why is there a disparity of one thought, eight thoughts, and even countless lives? If so, how can one discuss attaining wondrous awakening in the body born of father and mother? If you accept that it is attained, the sūtra regards the dragon girl as attaining it swiftly, yet the Great Master determined it as the eight aspects at the first abode. Since there is a principle of swift attainment, why did the dragon girl not attain wondrous awakening? Moreover, the Awakening of Faith harmonizes the two accounts of length and brevity across the various sūtras, taking three asaṃkhyeya kalpas alone as the realization of principle; Tiantai must not contradict Aśvaghoṣa. If you do not accept it, since there are eight turns of increase and decrease in a single thought, why not accept forty-two turns in a single lifetime? How must the swift path of the perfect and sudden necessarily pass through so many kalpas?