The Five Fears Fall Away
Having named the Ground of Joy, the sūtra now says what it consists of — ten kinds of abundance, then twenty recollections that each end in the same phrase, joy arising. And then the text does something more precise than praise. It names five specific fears, and shows each one dissolving for the same reason, so that the joy of this ground turns out to be describable not as a feeling but as a subtraction.
Ten Abundances, Ten Recollections
The list of ten abundances is worth reading slowly, because its last three are stated as absences — no quarreling, no doing harm, no anger. Joy here is not being added on top of an unchanged person; some of what it consists of is simply things that are no longer happening. The ten recollections that follow all have the same shape, and not one of them recollects anything about oneself.
「佛子！菩薩住歡喜地，成就多歡喜、多淨信、多愛樂、多適悅、多欣慶、多踊躍、多勇猛、多無鬪諍、多無惱害、多無瞋恨。佛子！菩薩住此歡喜地，念諸佛故生歡喜，念諸佛法故生歡喜，念諸菩薩故生歡喜，念諸菩薩行故生歡喜，念清淨諸波羅蜜故生歡喜，念諸菩薩地殊勝故生歡喜，念菩薩不可壞故生歡喜，念如來教化眾生故生歡喜，念能令眾生得利益故生歡喜，念入一切如來智方便故生歡喜；
"Child of the Buddha! A bodhisattva abiding on the Ground of Joy accomplishes an abundance of joy, an abundance of pure faith, an abundance of love and delight, an abundance of contentment, an abundance of gladness, an abundance of exultation, an abundance of valor, an abundance of freedom from quarreling, an abundance of freedom from doing harm, an abundance of freedom from anger and resentment. Child of the Buddha! A bodhisattva abiding on this Ground of Joy gives rise to joy through recollecting the buddhas; gives rise to joy through recollecting the Dharma of the buddhas; gives rise to joy through recollecting the bodhisattvas; gives rise to joy through recollecting the practice of the bodhisattvas; gives rise to joy through recollecting the purity of the pāramitās; gives rise to joy through recollecting the surpassing excellence of the bodhisattva grounds; gives rise to joy through recollecting that a bodhisattva cannot be destroyed; gives rise to joy through recollecting the Tathāgata's teaching and transforming of beings; gives rise to joy through recollecting that beings can be brought to gain benefit; gives rise to joy through recollecting the entry into the skillful means of every tathāgata's wisdom;
復作是念：『我轉離一切世間境界故生歡喜，親近一切佛故生歡喜，遠離凡夫地故生歡喜，近智慧地故生歡喜，永斷一切惡趣故生歡喜，與一切眾生作依止處故生歡喜，見一切如來故生歡喜，生佛境界中故生歡喜，入一切菩薩平等性中故生歡喜，遠離一切怖畏毛豎等事故生歡喜。』
and they think further in this way: 'I have turned away from every worldly object-realm — through this joy arises; I have drawn near to every buddha — through this joy arises; I am far removed from the ground of the ordinary person — through this joy arises; I have drawn near to the ground of wisdom — through this joy arises; I have cut off every evil destiny forever — through this joy arises; I have become a place of reliance for all sentient beings — through this joy arises; I behold every tathāgata — through this joy arises; I am born within the domain of the buddhas — through this joy arises; I have entered into the sameness of every bodhisattva — through this joy arises; I am far removed from every fear, from the standing of hair on end, and all such things — through this joy arises.'
The second set of ten shifts into the first person, and the sūtra marks the shift by putting them in quotation — these are things the bodhisattva says to themselves. It is the difference between what is true of them and what they have noticed is true of them. The joy of this ground is not simply a change of condition; it includes recognizing the change.
Note where the last of the twenty lands. Freedom from fear is given as a cause of joy, in the same form as all the rest — and it is the one the text will now stop and account for in detail. Everything that follows is an unpacking of this single line.
The Five Fears
The sūtra asks its own question — why is this? — and answers by naming five fears exactly. They are not a miscellany. They run from the most material to the most social, covering the ways a life can be threatened, and between them they account for most of what people are actually afraid of.
何以故？此菩薩得歡喜地已，所有怖畏悉得遠離，所謂：不活畏、惡名畏、死畏、惡道畏、大眾威德畏，如是怖畏皆得永離。
Why is this? Because once this bodhisattva has attained the Ground of Joy, every fear they had is left far behind — namely, the fear of not surviving, the fear of a bad reputation, the fear of death, the fear of falling into an evil destiny, and the fear of an assembly's awesome majesty. Every such fear is forever departed.
何以故？此菩薩離我想故，尚不愛自身，何況資財，是故無有不活畏；不於他所希求供養，唯專給施一切眾生，是故無有惡名畏；遠離我見，無有我想，是故無有死畏；自知死已，決定不離諸佛菩薩，是故無有惡道畏；我所志樂，一切世間無與等者，何況有勝！是故無有大眾威德畏。菩薩如是遠離驚怖毛豎等事。
Why is this? Because this bodhisattva, being free of the notion of a self, does not even cherish their own body, still less their goods and resources — and so there is no fear of not surviving. They seek no offerings from anyone else, but devote themselves solely to giving to all sentient beings — and so there is no fear of a bad reputation. Far removed from the view of a self, having no notion of a self, there is no fear of death. They know for themselves that once dead they will assuredly not be parted from the buddhas and bodhisattvas — and so there is no fear of falling into an evil destiny. In what they aspire to and delight in, there is nothing in all the world that is its equal, still less anything that surpasses it — and so there is no fear of an assembly's awesome majesty. Thus does the bodhisattva stand far removed from terror, from the standing of hair on end, and all such things.
Every one of the five is traced to the same root, and the argument is subtractive rather than heroic. The bodhisattva is not braver than other people. The notion of a self (我想) is what gives each fear something to be about, and once it is gone the fear has no object left to attach to — not because the danger has been faced down, but because the thing it threatened is not there to be threatened.
The last of the five is the most easily overlooked and the most familiar. 大眾威德畏 is the fear of standing before an assembly whose regard has weight — stage fright, in its broadest sense, the dread of being measured by a room. It is answered not by confidence but by a change in what is at stake: someone whose deepest aspiration nothing in the world can equal is not in a position to be outranked by the room.
Note too the reasoning behind the fear of death, which is stated twice in different registers. First it goes through no-self — no view of a self, so nothing to lose. Then the fear of an evil destiny is answered quite differently, by simple confidence about what comes next. The text does not insist on a single argument where two are true.
Part 404 Complete
This continues the First Ground of the Ten Grounds chapter. Chapter 26 continues in Part 405 as the sūtra turns from what falls away to what is taken up — the bodhisattva, with great compassion at the head, grows unshakable in aspiration and cultivates every wholesome root, and the text sets out at length the long series of causes by which that cultivation is brought to completion.