A Garden That Never Crowds
The Garden of Sunlight is set out in full — its pools and their eightfold water, the six kinds of lion seat beneath its trees, a ground so soft it takes the shape of a foot and lets it go again — and then the sūtra explains where all of it came from, and why no crowd can fill it.
Pools of the Eightfold Water
After the trees come the waters, and after the waters what has been laid out beneath every tree — the garden turning out to be furnished, not merely planted.
園中復有泉流陂池，一切皆以七寶莊嚴，黑栴檀泥凝積其中，上妙金沙彌布其底，八功德水具足盈滿，優鉢羅華、波頭摩華、拘物頭華、芬陀利華遍覆其上，無量寶樹周遍行列。
In the garden there were also flowing springs and standing pools, all of them adorned with the seven jewels, with black sandalwood paste settled thick within them and the finest golden sand spread across their beds, brimful with water complete in the eight excellent qualities, utpala flowers, padma flowers, kumuda flowers, and puṇḍarīka flowers covering their surfaces throughout, and measureless jewelled trees ranked in rows all around them.
諸寶樹下敷師子座，種種妙寶以為莊嚴，布以天衣，熏諸妙香，垂諸寶繒，施諸寶帳，閻浮金網彌覆其上，寶鐸徐搖出妙音聲。
Beneath every jewelled tree a lion seat was spread, adorned with every kind of wondrous jewel, draped with heavenly garments, perfumed with every wondrous incense, hung with jewelled silks, fitted with jewelled curtains, and covered over with nets of Jambū-river gold, while jewelled bells swayed slowly and sent forth wondrous sounds.
Six Kinds of Lion Seat
The seats are not identical. The sūtra names six kinds, each one the center of a hundred thousand more — and then names what the ground itself is made of.
或有樹下敷蓮華藏師子之座，或有樹下敷香王摩尼藏師子之座，或有樹下敷龍莊嚴摩尼王藏師子之座，或有樹下敷寶師子聚摩尼王藏師子之座，或有樹下敷毘盧遮那摩尼王藏師子之座，或有樹下敷十方毘盧遮那摩尼王藏師子之座；其一一座各有十萬寶師子座周匝圍遶，一一皆具無量莊嚴。
Beneath some trees a Lotus Treasury lion seat was spread; beneath some trees a Fragrance-King Maṇi Treasury lion seat was spread; beneath some trees a Dragon Adornment Maṇi-King Treasury lion seat was spread; beneath some trees a Jewel Lion Assembly Maṇi-King Treasury lion seat was spread; beneath some trees a Vairocana Maṇi-King Treasury lion seat was spread; and beneath some trees a Ten-Direction Vairocana Maṇi-King Treasury lion seat was spread. Each single seat had a hundred thousand jewelled lion seats encircling it all around, and every one of them was complete in measureless adornment.
此大園中眾寶遍滿，猶如大海寶洲之上。迦隣陀衣以布其地，柔軟妙好，能生樂觸，蹈則沒足，舉則還復；
Throughout this great garden a multitude of jewels lay everywhere, as though upon a jewel island in the great ocean. Kalinda cloth was spread across its ground, soft and fine and wondrous, able to give rise to pleasant touch — tread on it and the foot sinks in; lift the foot and it rises back again.
蹈則沒足，舉則還復 — tread on it and the foot sinks in; lift the foot and it rises back again. Of every marvel in this garden, this is the smallest and the most physical, and the sūtra spends a whole clause on it. It is the one detail a visitor would feel rather than see, and it is given in the grammar of ordinary experience — two verbs, two consequences — with no jewels and no light in it at all.
迦隣陀衣 — Kalinda cloth, a transliterated name for a legendary fabric prized in Indian literature for its softness. We keep the transliteration rather than translate it, since the Chinese itself is only carrying the sound across.
As Śakra's Own Gardens Are
Having furnished the garden, the sūtra reaches for comparisons — and every one of them is drawn from the heavens, as though the only fair measure of the place were another god's residence.
無量諸鳥出和雅音，寶栴檀林上妙莊嚴，種種妙華常雨無盡，猶如帝釋雜華之園。無比香王普熏一切，猶如帝釋善法之堂。諸音樂樹、寶多羅樹、眾寶鈴網出妙音聲，如自在天善口天女所出歌音。諸如意樹，種種妙衣垂布莊嚴，猶如大海。有無量色百千樓閣，眾寶莊嚴，如忉利天宮善見大城。寶蓋遐張，如須彌峯。光明普照，如梵王宮。
Measureless birds sent forth harmonious and refined sounds; groves of jewelled sandalwood were adorned with the finest of adornments; and wondrous flowers of every kind rained down constantly without ever running out, just as in Śakra's own garden of mingled flowers. An incomparable king of fragrances perfumed everything universally, just as in Śakra's own Sudharma hall. The music-trees, the jewelled tāla-palm trees, and the nets of massed jewelled bells sent forth wondrous sounds, like the singing voice of Skillful Voice, the heavenly woman of the sovereign heaven. The wish-fulfilling trees were hung and draped with wondrous garments of every kind as adornment, vast as the great ocean. There were a hundred thousand towers of measureless colors, adorned with a multitude of jewels, like the great city Sudarśana in the palace-heaven of the Trāyastriṃśa. Jewelled canopies stretched far overhead, like the peak of Sumeru. And a radiance shone out universally, like the palace of the Brahmā King.
Where All of It Came From
Only now does the sūtra say whose garden this is — and the answer is not the king who gave it away, but the woman who has not yet spoken a word in it.
爾時，善財童子見此大園無量功德、種種莊嚴，皆是菩薩業報成就，出世善根之所生起，供養諸佛功德所流，一切世間無與等者，如是皆從師子頻申比丘尼了法如幻集廣大清淨福德善業之所成就。三千大千世界天龍八部、無量眾生，皆入此園而不迫窄。何以故？此比丘尼不可思議威神力故。
At that time, Good-Wealth saw that the measureless merit and every kind of adornment of this great garden were all accomplished by a bodhisattva's own karmic recompense, arisen out of world-transcending roots of goodness, flowing from the merit of making offerings to every buddha, with nothing in any world its equal — and that all of it had been accomplished out of the vast, pure, meritorious good karma gathered by the bhikṣuṇī Lion's Roar through her own understanding that dharmas are like a conjuring. The gods, dragons, and eight classes of beings of the great trichiliocosm, and measureless beings besides, all entered this garden, and it was never cramped. Why was this? Because of this bhikṣuṇī's own inconceivable majestic spiritual power.
了法如幻 — her own understanding that dharmas are like a conjuring. The whole garden, down to the softness of its ground, is traced back to one insight, and it is an insight into unreality. The most solid and furnished place in Good-Wealth's pilgrimage so far is built out of knowing that nothing is solid.
皆入此園而不迫窄 — all entered this garden, and it was never cramped. The sūtra puts the question plainly — 何以故, why was this — and gives a plain answer: her power. Nothing about the garden's dimensions is offered as the explanation, which is the point; the capacity belongs to the teacher, not to the ground.
Part 1055 Complete
This continues chapter thirty-nine, 入法界品, in fascicle sixty-seven. Part 1056 brings Good-Wealth his first sight of Lion's Roar herself, seated at once beneath every jewelled tree in the garden, in a run of similes that compare her to an elephant king, a clear pool, a lotus, a lion, and Mount Sumeru.