釋淨土群疑論 2.33

2.33

I explain: The intentions of these two texts each rely on a different meaning, and do not contradict each other. In point of fact, all Buddhas completely possess all superior and wondrous vows without increase or decrease. If a single vow were not perfected or a single practice were not fulfilled, one could not attain the Way and achieve correct awakening, being called an omniscient person; and there would be the fault that the merits of the Buddhas are unequal. The Vimalakīrtinirdeśa Sūtra states: 'The merits of the Buddha-Tathāgatas are all completely equal.' Yet the Bhaiṣajyaguru Sūtra speaks of twelve vows and the Sukhāvatīvyūha Sūtra speaks of forty-eight vows because this is spoken in response to the capacities to be converted. The Buddhas' teaching and transforming of sentient beings is always conducted by drawing them in according to affinities; and sentient beings having an affinity with a Buddha necessarily depends on the Tathāgata's original vows. When the Tathāgata guides the various classes of beings, he always relies on his vast vows to transform beings. When the Buddhas originally generate the bodhicitta, they dwell in a vast mind: 'In all realms of sentient beings, I will cause them all to enter nirvāṇa without remainder and be saved.' However, the realms of sentient beings are boundless in number; and from the bodhisattva's first generation of the mind up to the attainment of buddhahood across asaṃkhyeya kalpas, there is a beginning and an end. In the midst of practicing the bodhisattva conduct and achieving equal and correct awakening, it is impossible for all sentient beings everywhere to see the bodhisattva's cultivation of practice and make offerings; nor can the bodhisattva teach and benefit the realm of sentient beings universally. Before the realm of sentient beings is exhausted, the bodhisattva has already achieved buddhahood; though the mind is vast, the actual work is difficult to encompass comprehensively. However, while on the causal ground, when sentient beings directed utmost sincerity and earnestness toward the twelve great vows made by Bhaiṣajyaguru-vaiḍūryaprabha Buddha, those vows have now matured; when they directed utmost sincerity and earnestness toward the forty-eight vast vows originally made by Amitābha Buddha, those vows have also matured. Although both Buddhas completely possess vows as numerous as dust motes and sands, in response to the capacities to be converted they specifically illuminate particular vows. For sentient beings whose faculties have matured through the twelve great vows of Bhaiṣajyaguru Buddha, although Bhaiṣajyaguru Buddha possesses forty-eight vast vows, because their capacity has not matured, the Buddha specifically brings up the twelve vows. With Amitābha Buddha's forty-eight vows, the capacity is specifically matured; although he possesses twelve vows and so on, the Buddha does not speak of them. This is like the medicine storehouse of a king of physicians: although it completely contains all medicinal herbs, when treating patients who suffer from differing conditions of cold, heat, vomiting, or diarrhea, the prescriptions and compounding of medicines are different. From all the medicinal herbs, he specifically takes three or five flavors appropriate to the particular illness, pounds, sifts, and compounds them, or makes them into pills to give to the patient to take. One cannot, because the number of medicines used is small, disbelieve that the physician king's medicine storehouse contains all medicines; nor can one, because all medicines exist, give them all to a single patient, much less compound a medicinal decoction using all cold and hot medicines together. The Buddhas are also like this: as in the Avataṃsaka Sūtra, they actually possess all vows and are all entirely equal, just like the medicines in that physician king's medicine storehouse. Whether speaking of that Buddha's twelve vows or this Buddha's forty-eight vows, it is like dispensing and compounding medicines and decoctions according to the patient; therefore these two sūtras do not contradict each other.