Great Compassion at the Head
Part 404 described what falls away on the Ground of Joy. This one describes what is taken up. A long chain of causes — thirty of them, each ending in the same particle — sets out how the bodhisattva brings every wholesome root to completion, and the sūtra then names the whole set as the dharmas that purify and prepare the ground. With that established, the great vows begin, and each closes on the same refrain of vastness and time without end.
Thirty Causes
The list is built out of a single repeated construction — because of this, because of that — and it does not sort itself into categories. Faith sits beside not being besotted with renown; seeking much learning sits beside acting as one speaks. What holds it together is stated before the list rather than in it, in the opening clause about great compassion and an aspiration that cannot be broken down.
「佛子！此菩薩以大悲為首，廣大志樂無能沮壞，轉更勤修一切善根而得成就，所謂：信增上故，多淨信故，解清淨故，信決定故，發生悲愍故，成就大慈故，心無疲懈故，慚愧莊嚴故，成就柔和故，敬順尊重諸佛教法故，日夜修集善根無厭足故，親近善知識故，常愛樂法故，求多聞無厭足故，如所聞法正觀察故，心無依著故，不耽著利養、名聞、恭敬故，不求一切資生之物故，生如寶心無厭足故，求一切智地故，求如來力、無畏、不共佛法故，求諸波羅蜜助道法故，離諸諂誑故，如說能行故，常護實語故，不污如來家故，不捨菩薩戒故，生一切智心如山王不動故，不捨一切世間事成就出世間道故，集助菩提分法無厭足故，常求上上殊勝道故。
"Child of the Buddha! This bodhisattva takes great compassion as their head, and their vast aspiration and delight cannot be broken down; they turn to cultivate every wholesome root with still greater diligence, and bring it to accomplishment — namely: because faith is preeminent in them; because their pure faith is abundant; because their understanding is pure; because their faith is resolute; because compassion and pity arise in them; because they accomplish great loving-kindness; because their mind knows neither weariness nor sloth; because they are adorned with conscience; because they accomplish gentleness; because they revere, follow, and honor the teaching Dharma of all buddhas; because day and night they gather wholesome roots and are never satisfied; because they draw near to good spiritual friends; because they constantly love and delight in the Dharma; because they seek much learning and are never satisfied; because they rightly contemplate the Dharma just as they have heard it; because their mind depends on nothing and clings to nothing; because they are not besotted with gain, with renown, or with reverence; because they seek none of the goods that sustain a life; because they give rise to a mind like a jewel and are never satisfied; because they seek the ground of all-knowing wisdom; because they seek the Tathāgata's powers, the fearlessnesses, and the unshared buddha-dharmas; because they seek the pāramitās and the dharmas that aid the path; because they are free of all flattery and deceit; because they are able to act just as they speak; because they constantly guard truthful speech; because they do not defile the family of the Tathāgata; because they do not abandon the bodhisattva precepts; because they give rise to a mind of all-knowing wisdom, unmoving as the king of mountains; because they do not abandon the affairs of the world and yet accomplish the supramundane path; because they gather the dharmas that aid the factors of awakening and are never satisfied; because they constantly seek the ever higher and more surpassing path.
佛子！菩薩成就如是淨治地法，名為：安住菩薩歡喜地。
Child of the Buddha! A bodhisattva who accomplishes such dharmas as these, which purify and prepare the ground, is said to abide securely on the bodhisattva's Ground of Joy.
"Because they do not abandon the affairs of the world and yet accomplish the supramundane path" (不捨一切世間事成就出世間道) is the one item in the list that could have been expected to go the other way. The supramundane path is not reached by putting worldly business down. Both halves are asserted at once, as a single cause among the thirty.
Note also how many of the thirty are stated as insatiability — never satisfied with gathering wholesome roots, with learning, with the aids to awakening. Elsewhere in the sūtra, wanting more is the problem. Here the same restlessness is simply pointed somewhere it cannot exhaust, and left running.
The Great Vows Begin
Three things are said to be accomplished on this ground — great vows, great valor, and great effect — and the sūtra then spends the rest of the passage on the first. Each vow is stated, and then each is extended by the same closing refrain, so that the scale of every one is identical no matter how modest or enormous its content.
「佛子！菩薩住此歡喜地，能成就如是大誓願、如是大勇猛、如是大作用，所謂：『生廣大清淨決定解，以一切供養之具，恭敬供養一切諸佛，令無有餘；廣大如法界，究竟如虛空，盡未來際一切劫數無有休息。』
"Child of the Buddha! A bodhisattva abiding on this Ground of Joy is able to accomplish such great vows, such great valor, and such great effect as these — namely: 'May I give rise to a vast, pure, and resolute understanding, and with every kind of offering reverently make offerings to all the buddhas, leaving not one of them out; vast as the dharma-realm, ultimate as empty space, throughout all the kalpas to the very end of the future, without ever ceasing.'
又發大願：『願受一切佛法輪，願攝一切佛菩提，願護一切諸佛教，願持一切諸佛法；廣大如法界，究竟如虛空，盡未來際一切劫數無有休息。』
And they make a further great vow: 'May I receive the Dharma-wheel of every buddha; may I gather in the awakening of every buddha; may I guard the teaching of every buddha; may I uphold the Dharma of every buddha; vast as the dharma-realm, ultimate as empty space, throughout all the kalpas to the very end of the future, without ever ceasing.'
又發大願：『願一切世界佛興于世，從兜率天宮沒、入胎、住胎、初生、出家、成道說法、示現涅槃，皆悉往詣，親近供養，為眾上首，受行正法，於一切處一時而轉；廣大如法界，究竟如虛空，盡未來際一切劫數無有休息。』
And they make a further great vow: 'Wherever in any world a buddha arises in the world — passing away from the Tuṣita heaven palace, entering the womb, dwelling in the womb, being born, leaving the household life, accomplishing the path and teaching the Dharma, and manifesting nirvāṇa — may I go to every one of them, draw near and make offerings, be foremost among the assembly, receive and practice the true Dharma, and in every place at once set it turning; vast as the dharma-realm, ultimate as empty space, throughout all the kalpas to the very end of the future, without ever ceasing.'
The refrain (廣大如法界，究竟如虛空，盡未來際一切劫數無有休息) is not a flourish appended to each vow. It is doing the actual work. A vow to make offerings to the buddhas is an ordinary devotional undertaking; the same vow measured against the dharma-realm, against empty space, and against every kalpa there will ever be is something else entirely. The refrain is what converts each of these from a resolution into a vow.
The third vow is worth reading for its list, which follows a buddha's whole career from the descent out of Tuṣita to the manifestation of nirvāṇa — and the bodhisattva undertakes to be present at every stage of it, for every buddha, in every world. The final clause is the most demanding of all, and easy to skim past: 於一切處一時而轉, in every place at once.
Part 405 Complete
This continues the First Ground of the Ten Grounds chapter. Chapter 26 continues in Part 406 as the great vows go on — the vow that every bodhisattva practice be undertaken without confusion or admixture, set out through the six characteristics of totality and particularity, sameness and difference, formation and disintegration; and the vow to teach and ripen every class of being there is, however born and in whatever destiny.