The Ground Difficult to Conquer Opens
Between the fourth ground and the fifth the sūtra pauses for something it has not done before — a song. Celestial maidens, moved by the bodhisattva's own power, sing a verse whose repeated word is 久, long: long the vow, long the path, long since anyone heard the voice of great compassion. Then the fifth ground begins, and everything about it is stated in terms of equality.
The Song of Long Waiting
The praise comes from an unexpected quarter and in an unexpected register. These are not bodhisattvas expounding but musicians singing, and what they sing about is duration — how long it has taken for this to happen at all.
第五地
菩薩聞此勝地行，於法解悟心歡喜，空中雨華讚歎言：「善哉大士金剛藏！」
自在天王與天眾，聞法踊躍住虛空，普放種種妙光雲，供養如來喜充遍。
天諸采女奏天樂，亦以言辭歌讚佛，悉以菩薩威神故，於彼聲中發是言：
「佛願久遠今乃滿，佛道久遠今乃得，釋迦文佛至天宮，利天人者久乃見。
大海久遠今始動，佛光久遠今乃放，眾生久遠始安樂，大悲音聲久乃聞。
The Fifth Ground
The bodhisattvas, hearing of the practice of this supreme ground, understood and awoke to the Dharma and were glad in mind; they rained flowers down through the air, praising and saying: "Excellent, great being Vajragarbha!" The Sovereign Deva King together with his hosts, hearing the Dharma, leapt up in joy and stood in open space; sending out everywhere clouds of wondrous light of every kind, they made offerings to the Tathāgata, filled with gladness. The celestial maidens played heavenly music and sang the Buddha's praises in words as well; and by the awesome spiritual power of the bodhisattva, within those sounds these words came forth:
"Long has been the Buddha's vow, and only now is it fulfilled; long the buddha path, and only now is it gained; Śākyamuni Buddha has come to the heavenly palace — long has it been since one who benefits gods and humans was seen. Long, and only now does the great ocean stir; long, and only now is the Buddha's light sent forth; long, and only now do beings come to peace and ease; long has it been since the voice of great compassion was heard.
功德彼岸皆已到，憍慢黑闇皆已滅，最極清淨如虛空，不染世法猶蓮華。
大牟尼尊現於世，譬如須彌出巨海，供養能盡一切苦，供養必得諸佛智；
此應供處供無等，是故歡心供養佛。」
如是無量諸天女，發此言辭稱讚已，一切恭敬喜充滿，瞻仰如來默然住。
是時大士解脫月，復請無畏金剛藏：「第五地中諸行相，唯願佛子為宣說！」
The far shore of merit has been wholly reached; the darkness of conceit is wholly extinguished; utterly pure, like empty space; unstained by worldly dharmas, like a lotus. The great Sage, the Honored One, appears within the world as Sumeru rises out of the vast ocean; making offerings is able to exhaust all suffering, and making offerings will surely obtain the wisdom of the buddhas. Here, at a place worthy of offerings, the offering is unequalled — and so with glad hearts we make our offering to the Buddha." Thus did measureless celestial maidens send forth these words of praise; and then, all of them reverent and filled with joy, they gazed up at the Tathāgata and stood in silence. At that time the great being Vimuktacandra again made request of the fearless Vajragarbha: "The characteristics of practice within the fifth ground — we beg you, child of the Buddha, to proclaim them!"
久遠…今乃 — long, and only now. The construction repeats seven times across two stanzas, and it is the whole content of the song. What the singers are struck by is not the teaching's profundity but its lateness: that a vow made an unimaginably long time ago has only now come due, and that the sound of compassion has been absent for so long that hearing it is itself the event.
Note who is singing. 天諸采女, the celestial maidens who play the music of that heaven — not bodhisattvas, not even the deva king, but performers. And the text is careful to say that the words came out of their music 以菩薩威神故, by the bodhisattva's own spiritual power. Something is being said through them that they are not the source of, which is why the passage can end with everyone falling silent.
Ten Kinds of Equal and Pure Mind
The fifth ground is entered through a single quality applied ten times. What is notable is the range of what it is applied to — three times to the buddha-dharmas of the three times, and then to precepts, to mind, to doubt, to discernment, to practice, to the factors of awakening, and to beings.
爾時，金剛藏菩薩告解脫月菩薩言：「佛子！菩薩摩訶薩第四地所行道善圓滿已，欲入第五難勝地，當以十種平等清淨心趣入。何等為十？所謂：於過去佛法平等清淨心、未來佛法平等清淨心、現在佛法平等清淨心、戒平等清淨心、心平等清淨心、除見疑悔平等清淨心、道非道智平等清淨心、修行智見平等清淨心、於一切菩提分法上上觀察平等清淨心、教化一切眾生平等清淨心。菩薩摩訶薩以此十種平等清淨心，得入菩薩第五地。
Then Vajragarbha Bodhisattva said to Vimuktacandra Bodhisattva: "Child of the Buddha! A bodhisattva mahāsattva who has well perfected the path practiced on the fourth ground, and who wishes to enter the fifth, Sudurjayā, the Ground Difficult to Conquer, should enter it by ten kinds of equal and pure mind. What are the ten? Namely: an equal and pure mind toward the buddha-dharmas of the past; an equal and pure mind toward the buddha-dharmas of the future; an equal and pure mind toward the buddha-dharmas of the present; an equal and pure mind toward the precepts; an equal and pure mind toward mind itself; an equal and pure mind in removing views, doubt, and regret; an equal and pure mind in the knowledge of what is the path and what is not; an equal and pure mind in the knowledge and vision of practice; an equal and pure mind in contemplating all the factors of awakening ever more deeply; and an equal and pure mind in teaching and transforming all beings. By these ten kinds of equal and pure mind a bodhisattva mahāsattva gains entry into the bodhisattva's fifth ground.
「佛子！菩薩摩訶薩住此第五地已，以善修菩提分法故，善淨深心故，復轉求上勝道故，隨順真如故，願力所持故，於一切眾生慈愍不捨故，積集福智助道故，精勤修習不息故，出生善巧方便故，觀察照明上上地故，受如來護念故，念智力所持故，得不退轉心。
"Child of the Buddha! A bodhisattva mahāsattva who abides on this fifth ground attains a mind that does not turn back — because they have well cultivated the factors of awakening; because their profound mind is well purified; because they turn once more to seek the higher and more surpassing path; because they accord with suchness; because they are upheld by the power of vows; because their loving pity for all beings does not abandon them; because they accumulate merit and wisdom, the aids to the path; because they cultivate diligently and without cease; because they bring forth skillful means; because they contemplate and illuminate the grounds above; because they receive the Tathāgata's holding of them in mind; and because they are upheld by the power of mindfulness and wisdom.
平等 here is not a moral levelling but an absence of preference in seeing. The first three items make this clear: the buddha-dharmas of past, future, and present are to be regarded with the same mind, which means declining to treat what is over as more settled, or what is coming as more remote, than what is present. The same evenness is then required toward the precepts, toward one's own mind, and finally toward all beings.
The one that resists this reading is 道非道智平等清淨心, an equal and pure mind in the knowledge of what is the path and what is not. Equality is not being asked for between path and non-path; it is being asked for in the knowing of the difference — an untroubled discernment that neither flinches from the distinction nor is agitated by it. It is the same faculty the fourth ground named as the last of its ten kinds of effort.
Twelve reasons are given for the irreversible mind, and only one of them concerns the bodhisattva's own exertion. The rest are conditions: vows already made, suchness already there, the Tathāgata already holding them in mind. What cannot turn back is not held in place by will.
Part 433 Complete
This opens Sudurjayā, the Ground Difficult to Conquer, fifth of the Ten Grounds. Chapter 26 continues in Part 434 as the bodhisattva comes to know as they truly are the noble truth of suffering, of its arising, of its cessation, and of the path leading to that cessation — and then a much longer list of truths that the fifth ground knows well, from conventional truth and ultimate truth through the truths of characteristics, of difference, of establishment, and of things as they are.