The Topknot, Given With the Skin
Fascicle twenty-seven opens exactly where fascicle twenty-six left off, giving turned toward the body itself. A beggar approaches, and the bodhisattva, following Jeweled-Topknot King Bodhisattva and Supreme Wondrous Body Bodhisattva, cuts away his own topknot with the skin still attached, kneeling and pressing his palms together to give it with a single, undivided mind — reflecting, as he does, that the very feeling of pain he is about to endure has no fixed mark or lasting existence at all.
A Suffering Without Fixed Mark
What makes this act possible, the passage suggests, is not fearlessness so much as insight: the bodhisattva does not grasp at the pain because he already knows that "the feeling of suffering is without mark and without arising," that every feeling "arises interdependently, with nothing at all abiding permanently." The ten dedication-vows that follow all concern hair — an object trivial in itself — yet each is transfigured into a mark of a buddha: hair like a stūpa, hair like the svastika, hair whose light fills every world in the ten directions.
「佛子！菩薩摩訶薩布施乞者連膚頂髻，如寶髻王菩薩、勝妙身菩薩，及餘無量諸菩薩等。菩薩是時見乞者來，心生歡喜而語之言：『汝今若須連膚頂髻，可就我取。我此頂髻，閻浮提中最為第一。』作是語時，心無動亂，不念餘業，捨離世間，志求寂靜，究竟清淨，精勤質直，向一切智；便執利刀割其頭上連膚頂髻，右膝著地，合十指掌，一心施與；正念三世一切諸佛菩薩所行，發大歡喜，增上志樂；於諸法中意善開解，不取於苦，了知苦受無相無生，諸受互起，無有常住：『是故我應同去、來、今一切菩薩修行大捨，發深信樂，求一切智無有退轉，不由他教善知識力。』菩薩摩訶薩作是施時，以諸善根如是迴向，所謂：『願一切眾生得無見頂，成就菩薩如塔之髻；願一切眾生得紺青髮、金剛髮、細軟髮，能滅眾生一切煩惱；願一切眾生得潤澤髮、密緻髮、不侵鬢額髮；願一切眾生得柔軟髮、盡於鬢額而生髮；願一切眾生得如卐字髮、螺文右旋髮；願一切眾生得佛相髮，永離一切煩惱結習；願一切眾生得光明髮，其光普照十方世界；願一切眾生得無亂髮、如如來髮，淨妙無雜；願一切眾生得成應供頂塔之髮，令其見者如見佛髮；願一切眾生皆得如來無染著髮，永離一切闇翳塵垢。』是為菩薩摩訶薩施連膚髻時善根迴向；為令眾生其心寂靜，皆得圓滿諸陀羅尼，究竟如來一切種智、十種力故。
"Child of the Buddha! The bodhisattva mahāsattva gives a beggar the very topknot with the skin attached, just as Jeweled-Topknot King Bodhisattva, Supreme Wondrous Body Bodhisattva, and countless other bodhisattvas have done. At that time, seeing the beggar approach, the bodhisattva's mind gives rise to joy, and they say to him: 'If you now need my topknot with the skin attached, you may take it from me. This topknot of mine is foremost among all Jambudvīpa.' Speaking these words, their mind unwavering and undisturbed, thinking of no other task, they relinquish the world, aspire toward tranquility, and are ultimately pure, diligent and upright, turning toward omniscience; they then take up a sharp blade and cut off the topknot with the skin attached from atop their own head, kneel with their right knee upon the ground, press their palms together, and give it with a single, undivided mind; mindful of the practice of every buddha and bodhisattva across the three periods of time, they give rise to great joy and ever-increasing aspiration; their mind well understanding within every dharma, they do not grasp at the suffering, knowing that the feeling of suffering is without mark and without arising, that every feeling arises interdependently, with nothing at all abiding permanently: 'For this reason I should, the same as every bodhisattva of the past, future, and present, cultivate great relinquishment, give rise to profound faith and joy, and seek omniscience without ever regressing, not by the power of another's teaching or a good spiritual friend.' When the bodhisattva mahāsattva gives in this way, with every wholesome root, they dedicate it in this way, namely: 'May all sentient beings obtain the uṣṇīṣa, accomplishing a topknot like a bodhisattva's own stūpa; may all sentient beings obtain indigo-blue hair, vajra hair, and fine, soft hair, able to destroy every affliction of sentient beings; may all sentient beings obtain lustrous hair, close-set hair, hair that never encroaches upon the temples or forehead; may all sentient beings obtain soft, supple hair, growing to cover the temples and forehead entirely; may all sentient beings obtain hair like the svastika mark, hair curling in a right-turning spiral; may all sentient beings obtain hair bearing the mark of a buddha, forever leaving behind every habitual tendency of affliction; may all sentient beings obtain luminous hair, its light universally illumining the worlds of the ten directions; may all sentient beings obtain unruffled hair, hair like a tathāgata's own, pure and wondrous and unmixed; may all sentient beings accomplish hair like the stūpa worthy of offerings upon the crown, causing whoever beholds it to behold it as though beholding a buddha's own hair; may all sentient beings all obtain the Tathāgata's own unstained hair, forever leaving behind every darkness, obscurity, and defilement.' This is the bodhisattva mahāsattva's dedication of wholesome roots when giving the topknot with the skin attached; it is so that sentient beings' minds may become tranquil, all fully perfect every dhāraṇī, and ultimately attain the Tathāgata's own wisdom of all modes and ten powers.
"Not by the power of another's teaching or a good spiritual friend" is a striking line to find at the climax of a passage that has just named two exemplar bodhisattvas by name. The resolve itself must still be the bodhisattva's own — modeled on others, perhaps inspired by them, but not borrowed from them at the moment it actually has to be enacted.
Part 288 Complete
This closes the section on giving the topknot with the skin (施連膚髻) within the sixth dedication. Chapter 25 continues in Part 289 as the bodhisattva mahāsattva gives away his own eyes to beggars who ask for them.