Bodies Resembling Every God and Spirit
The clouds stop carrying doctrine and start carrying likenesses. Out of every pore come bodies that look like the inhabitants of every heaven in order from the top down, then every class of king, then the spirits of rivers and trees — and then, instead of a sermon, twenty-one noises.
Down Through the Form Realm
The list begins at the very top of the form realm and descends by meditative level — the five Pure Abodes, the fourth dhyāna, the third, the second, the first.
復於一一諸毛孔中，出無量種眾生身雲。所謂：出與色究竟天、善現天、善見天、無熱天、無煩天相似身雲，出少廣、廣果、福生、無雲天相似身雲，出遍淨、無量淨、少淨天相似身雲，出光音、無量光、少光天相似身雲，出大梵、梵輔、梵眾天相似身雲，
And further, from each and every pore she sent forth measureless kinds of body-clouds of beings. That is to say: she sent forth body-clouds resembling the Akaniṣṭha Heaven, the Heaven of Skillful Appearance, the Heaven of Skillful Vision, the Heaven Without Heat, and the Heaven Without Affliction; body-clouds resembling the Heaven of Lesser Vastness, the Bṛhatphala Heaven, the Heaven of Merit's Birth, and the Cloudless Heaven; body-clouds resembling the Śubhakṛtsna Heaven, the Heaven of Immeasurable Purity, and the Heaven of Lesser Purity; body-clouds resembling the Ābhāsvara Heaven, the Heaven of Immeasurable Light, and the Heaven of Lesser Light; and body-clouds resembling the Great Brahmā Heaven, the Heaven of Brahmā's Ministers, and the Heaven of Brahmā's Retinue.
出與色究竟天 … 相似身雲 — body-clouds resembling the Akaniṣṭha Heaven. The governing word is 相似, resembling. These are not the gods themselves and not disguises either; they are likenesses issued from a pore, so that whatever a being is, something of its own kind arrives in front of it. The cosmology is given in strict descending order, which is how the Abhidharma lists it, and the reader who knows the scheme can hear the altitude dropping.
福生、無雲天 — the Heaven of Merit's Birth, and the Cloudless Heaven. These two are among the heavens of the fourth dhyāna, and both names are plain Chinese; this translation has not had occasion to render either before, so we give their sense. 無雲, cloudless, names the lowest of that group — the level at which, in the traditional account, the cloud-layers of the world are finally left below.
The Desire Heavens, and the Four Kings
Below the Brahmā heavens the list crosses into the realm of desire, and then into the four guardian kings — each named with the class of beings he governs, and each with his sons and his daughters.
出自在天、化樂天、兜率陀天、須夜摩天、忉利天及其采女、諸天子眾相似身雲，出提頭賴吒乾闥婆王、乾闥婆子、乾闥婆女相似身雲，出毘樓勒叉、鳩槃荼王、鳩槃荼子、鳩槃荼女相似身雲，出毘樓博叉龍王、龍子、龍女相似身雲，出毘沙門夜叉王、夜叉子、夜叉女相似身雲，出大樹緊那羅王、善慧摩睺羅伽王、大速疾力迦樓羅王、羅睺阿脩羅王、閻羅法王及其子、其女相似身雲，
She sent forth body-clouds resembling the Paranirmita-vaśavartin Heaven, the Nirmāṇarati Heaven, the Tuṣita Heaven, the Suyāma Heaven, and the Trāyastriṃśa Heaven, with their attendant women and their hosts of gods; body-clouds resembling Dhṛtarāṣṭra, king of the gandharvas, and the gandharva sons and gandharva daughters; body-clouds resembling Virūḍhaka, king of the kumbhāṇḍas, and the kumbhāṇḍa sons and kumbhāṇḍa daughters; body-clouds resembling Virūpākṣa, king of the nāgas, and the nāga sons and nāga daughters; body-clouds resembling Vaiśravaṇa, king of the yakṣas, and the yakṣa sons and yakṣa daughters; and body-clouds resembling the kinnara king Great Tree, the mahoraga king Good Wisdom, the garuḍa king Great Swift Power, the asura king Rāhu, and King Yama the dharma-king, together with their sons and their daughters.
提頭賴吒乾闥婆王 … 毘樓勒叉鳩槃荼王 … 毘樓博叉龍王 … 毘沙門夜叉王 — Dhṛtarāṣṭra of the gandharvas, Virūḍhaka of the kumbhāṇḍas, Virūpākṣa of the nāgas, Vaiśravaṇa of the yakṣas. These are the Four Heavenly Kings of the four quarters, each listed with the non-human class under his command. All four names are pure transliteration in the Chinese and all four are secure; this translation has used these forms since the sūtra's opening assembly.
及其子、其女 — together with their sons and their daughters. Appended to every king in the list, and it is the detail that makes the passage strange and domestic: what issues from her pores is not a pantheon of rulers but families.
Kings, Buddhas, and the Spirits of Rivers
The descent ends among the local powers — earth, water, fire, wind, rivers, sea, mountains, trees — with the assemblies of the buddhas slipped in just above them.
出諸人王及其子、其女相似身雲，出聲聞、獨覺及諸佛眾相似身雲，出地神、水神、火神、風神、河神、海神、山神、樹神乃至晝、夜、主方神等相似身雲。周遍十方，充滿法界。
She sent forth body-clouds resembling the kings of men, together with their sons and their daughters; body-clouds resembling the śrāvakas, the pratyekabuddhas, and the assemblies of the buddhas; and body-clouds resembling the spirits of earth, of water, of fire, of wind, of rivers, of the sea, of mountains, and of trees, and on to the spirits presiding over day, over night, and over the directions. These spread throughout the ten directions and filled the dharma-realm.
出聲聞、獨覺及諸佛眾相似身雲 — body-clouds resembling the śrāvakas, the pratyekabuddhas, and the assemblies of the buddhas. Placed between human kings and river spirits, with no change of register. The list is not graded by rank; it is graded by whom a being might recognize, and a buddha is on it for the same reason a tree spirit is.
乃至晝、夜、主方神等 — and on to the spirits presiding over day, over night, and over the directions. She is herself a spirit presiding over night, and the last item on her own list of likenesses is her own kind. The sūtra does not remark on it.
Twenty-One Sounds
Eight of them are not voices at all. The list begins with the wind-wheel that holds up the world and ends with a jewel, and only in the middle does anyone speak.
於彼一切眾生之前，現種種聲。所謂：風輪聲、水輪聲、火焰聲、海潮聲、地震聲、大山相擊聲、天城震動聲、摩尼相擊聲、天王聲、龍王聲、夜叉王聲、乾闥婆王聲、阿脩羅王聲、迦樓羅王聲、緊那羅王聲、摩睺羅伽王聲、人王聲、梵王聲、天女歌詠聲、諸天音樂聲、摩尼寶王聲。以如是等種種音聲，說喜目觀察眾生夜神從初發心所集功德。
Before all those beings she manifested every kind of sound. That is to say: the sound of the wind-wheel, the sound of the water-wheel, the sound of flames, the sound of the ocean tide, the sound of the earth quaking, the sound of great mountains striking one another, the sound of a heavenly city shaking, the sound of maṇi jewels striking one another, the sound of a heavenly king, the sound of a nāga king, the sound of a yakṣa king, the sound of a gandharva king, the sound of an asura king, the sound of a garuḍa king, the sound of a kinnara king, the sound of a mahoraga king, the sound of a human king, the sound of a Brahmā king, the sound of goddesses singing, the sound of the music of the gods, and the sound of the maṇi-jewel king. With every such sound as these, she told of the merit that the night-spirit Joyful Eye Observing Beings had gathered since first giving rise to the aspiration.
風輪聲、水輪聲、火焰聲、海潮聲、地震聲 — the sound of the wind-wheel, of the water-wheel, of flames, of the ocean tide, of the earth quaking. The first five are the noises of the world's own structure — the wind-wheel and water-wheel are the cosmological layers that hold a world-system up. What she uses to tell her story is, to begin with, not language.
以如是等種種音聲，說 … 從初發心所集功德 — with every such sound as these, she told of the merit gathered since first giving rise to the aspiration. And the content of all twenty-one sounds is autobiography — or rather, it is spoken about her rather than by her, since the subject of 說 is the clouds issuing from her body. Her own account of herself is delivered by quaking earth and singing goddesses at the same time.
Part 1091 Complete
This continues chapter thirty-nine, 入法界品, in fascicle sixty-nine. Part 1092 gives what those sounds actually said — her merit told pāramitā by pāramitā, from giving up a throne for the sake of moral discipline through to the perfections of skillful means, vows, power and knowledge.