龍舒增廣淨土文 3.18

3.18

Moreover, if someone gives a meal to a starving person or a garment to a freezing person, that is already great kindness. How much more so when those who are sinking in the six destinies have no time of release, and I point out this Dharma door to them, enabling them to directly escape transmigration and receive boundless and limitless lifespan and bliss—how could such kindness be exhausted? The Diamond Sūtra says: 'If someone were to give away their body as many times as the sands of the Ganges, doing so for immeasurable hundreds of thousands of myriads of koṭis of kalpas, it would not equal someone hearing this scripture with non-retrogressing faith; that person's blessings surpass the former.' This is because giving inevitably results in worldly blessed rewards that at times run out; whereas if one has faith in this scripture, one gradually awakens to the true nature, and such blessings never run out; that is why it surpasses the former. In my view, it is not only those who have faith in the Diamond Sūtra who are like this; if one exhorts people with the Pure Land, the blessed reward is also the same. Why? In the Pure Land there is no further transmigration, and one has already attained non-retrogression, persisting straight until becoming a Buddha. Although those born there have not yet become Buddhas, it is the stepping stone to becoming a Buddha; thus, to exhort a single person to cultivate the Pure Land is to bring a single sentient being to completion as a Buddha. Whenever one becomes a Buddha, one must deliver immeasurable sentient beings; since the sentient beings delivered by that person all originated from me, how could such blessed reward not surpass giving away bodies as many as the sands of the Ganges for immeasurable hundreds of thousands of myriads of koṭis of kalpas?