釋淨土群疑論 3.9

3.9

The explanation is: The sixteen contemplations and the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi have shallow and deep [aspects]. As for the deep: one performs the sixteen contemplations and the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi within the wisdom of cultivation, in the four dhyānas, the unarrived [absorption], and the intermediate dhyāna. As for the shallow: relying on the mind of wisdom from hearing and contemplation in the desire realm, collecting one's thoughts and directing attention, one can also cultivate the sixteen marvelous contemplations and perform the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi. Therefore the Guan jing states: 'One who imagines in this way is said to roughly see the ground of the land of Sukhāvatī. If one attains samādhi, one will see the ground of that land clearly and distinctly, beyond full description.' Thus we know that when the imagination succeeds in roughly seeing, it is the mind of hearing and contemplation of the desire realm; when one attains samādhi and sees clearly, it is the mind of the wisdom of cultivation belonging to the form realm. When it says that liberation and dhyāna meditation are firm in the first two periods of five hundred years, this is said based on the meditative mind of the wisdom of cultivation belonging to the form realm. If it is the success of imagination with the mind of hearing and contemplation, it extends through the second, third, and subsequent periods of five hundred years. Were it not so, why does the third fascicle of the Bhadrapāla Sūtra say toward the end: 'Bhadrapāla! After my nirvāṇa, this samādhi sūtra will circulate widely in the world in Jambudvīpa for forty years. And in the final one hundred years of the last five hundred years, when the true Dharma is being extinguished, when the keeping of the precepts is declining, when the breaking of precepts is rampant, and when countries attack one another—at such times, this samādhi scripture will again be propagated in Jambudvīpa. Namely, through the Buddha's spiritual power, they will be caused, after hearing this sūtra following my nirvāṇa, to rejoice, copy, read, recite, uphold, and ponder its meaning, explaining it to others and practicing as taught'? Furthermore, the second fascicle says near the end: 'Bhadrapāla! These good men and good women have previously heard this samādhi before various Tathāgatas, and have read, recited, and upheld it. For this reason, in the final era after the Tathāgata's nirvāṇa, at the end of the five hundred years when the Dharma is about to be extinguished and the Dharma is going to be destroyed, they will again be able to hear such a samādhi. Upon hearing it, they will produce faith without alarm or doubt, not retrogressing and not sinking down, generating great joy that fills body and mind, reading, reciting, upholding, pondering its meaning, and explaining it to others, down to practicing this samādhi for a day and a night.' Thus we know that this 'final' refers precisely to practicing this samādhi after the end of the fifth period of five hundred years. How then can one say that after the second period of five hundred years it is not the time to study this samādhi? Yet Chan Master Xinxing, within the Compilations of the Three Stages, recklessly declared rising and falling, stating that after a thousand years one should only practice the universal and must not practice the specific, and thereupon took the buddhānusmṛti-samādhi and the like to be Buddha-Dharmas inappropriate to current capacities, in meaning amounting to teachings that should be abolished and not the time for study—how utterly erroneous!