Otherwise He Would Enter Final Nirvāṇa
The buddhas finish what they came to say — remember the vow; the dharma-nature you have realized abides whether or not a buddha appears, and the two vehicles can reach it too; now look at us, and at the ten directions. Then the chapter states, without softening it, what would happen if they had not come.
What Else the Buddhas Say
Five more admonitions, and the fourth of them is startling — the buddhas tell him that what he has attained is not what makes a buddha a buddha, and that śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas can attain it as well.
又善男子！汝當憶念本所誓願，普大饒益一切眾生，皆令得入不可思議智慧之門。又善男子！此諸法法性，若佛出世，若不出世，常住不異，諸佛不以得此法故名為如來，一切二乘亦能得此無分別法。又善男子！汝觀我等身相無量，智慧無量，國土無量，方便無量，光明無量，清淨音聲亦無有量；汝今宜應成就此事。
'Again, good man, you should call to mind the vow you originally made — to benefit all beings vastly and universally, and to cause them all to enter the gateway of inconceivable wisdom. Again, good man, this dharma-nature of all dharmas, whether a buddha appears in the world or does not appear, abides constantly and does not differ; and it is not because they have attained this dharma that the buddhas are called Tathāgatas, for all those of the two vehicles are also able to attain this undiscriminating dharma. Again, good man, look upon us — our bodily forms are measureless, our wisdom measureless, our lands measureless, our skillful means measureless, our radiance measureless, and our pure voices likewise without measure. You ought now to bring these things to accomplishment.
又善男子！汝今適得此一法明，所謂：一切法無生、無分別。善男子！如來法明，無量入，無量作，無量轉，乃至百千億那由他劫不可得知；汝應修行，成就此法。又善男子！汝觀十方無量國土、無量眾生、無量法、種種差別，悉應如實通達其事。』「佛子！諸佛世尊與此菩薩如是等無量起智門，令其能起無量無邊差別智業。佛子！若諸佛不與此菩薩起智門者，彼時即入究竟涅槃，棄捨一切利眾生業。
Again, good man, you have just now attained this one light of the Dharma — namely, that all dharmas are unarisen and undiscriminated. Good man, the Tathāgata's light of the Dharma has measureless entrances, measureless workings, measureless turnings, such that even in a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of kalpas it could not be known; you should practice and bring this dharma to accomplishment. Again, good man, look upon the ten directions — measureless lands, measureless beings, measureless dharmas, differentiated in every kind of way — and you should penetrate all these things exactly as they are.' Child of the Buddha! The buddhas, the World-Honored Ones, bestow upon this bodhisattva measureless gateways such as these that rouse wisdom, causing them to be able to raise up measureless and boundless differentiated works of wisdom. Child of the Buddha! Were the buddhas not to bestow upon this bodhisattva the gateways that rouse wisdom, they would at that very moment enter final nirvāṇa and forsake every work of benefiting beings.
若佛出世，若不出世，常住不異 — whether a buddha appears in the world or does not appear, it abides constantly and does not differ. This is the oldest formula in Buddhist literature for the objectivity of dharma-nature, and the buddhas here deploy it against their own listener: because the truth does not depend on them, realizing it is not what makes them what they are. What makes a Tathāgata is everything the admonitions go on to list, all of it measureless, all of it done for others.
彼時即入究竟涅槃，棄捨一切利眾生業 — they would at that very moment enter final nirvāṇa and forsake every work of benefiting beings. The chapter does not present this as a temptation resisted or a danger narrowly avoided. It is stated as a fact about the eighth ground: the stillness is genuinely terminal, and what prevents it is not the bodhisattva's resolve but an intervention from outside.
One Body, Now Measureless
With the wisdom-gateways bestowed, a single moment on this ground outweighs everything done from the first arousing of the mind through the seventh — and the reason given is not that the practice has improved, but that the practitioner is no longer one body.
以諸佛與如是等無量無邊起智門故，於一念頃所生智業，從初發心乃至七地所修諸行，百分不及一，乃至百千億那由他分亦不及一；如是，阿僧祇分，歌羅分，算數分，譬諭分，優波尼沙陀分，亦不及一。何以故？佛子！是菩薩先以一身起行，今住此地，得無量身、無量音聲、無量智慧、無量受生、無量淨國，教化無量眾生，供養無量諸佛，入無量法門，具無量神通，有無量眾會道場差別，住無量身、語、意業集一切菩薩行，以不動法故。
Because the buddhas bestow measureless and boundless gateways such as these that rouse wisdom, the work of wisdom produced in the space of a single thought is such that all the practices cultivated from the first arousing of the mind up through the seventh ground do not amount to one part in a hundred of it, nor to one part in a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas; and likewise not an asaṃkhyeya fraction, not a kalā fraction, not a reckoned fraction, not an analogical fraction, not even an upaniṣad fraction does it amount to. Why is this so? Child of the Buddha! This bodhisattva formerly raised up their practice with a single body; but now, abiding on this ground, they attain measureless bodies, measureless voices, measureless wisdom, measureless births, measureless pure lands; they teach and transform measureless beings, make offerings to measureless buddhas, enter measureless dharma-gateways, are complete in measureless spiritual powers, and have measureless distinctions of assembly and place of practice; and abiding in measureless works of body, speech and mind, they gather in all bodhisattva practice — and this because of the dharma of immovability.
先以一身起行 — formerly raised up their practice with a single body. The comparison of merit here is not the usual rhetorical flourish. Its stated ground is arithmetical in a strange way: seven grounds of practice were the work of one body, and what follows is the work of measureless bodies, so the earlier total cannot approach the later one no matter how it is reckoned.
以不動法故 — and this because of the dharma of immovability. The clause is placed last and explains everything before it. The multiplication of bodies and lands is not an achievement added to the stillness; it is what the stillness does, once nothing has to be exerted for it to happen.
Part 457 Complete
This continues Acalā, the Immovable Ground, the eighth of the Ten Grounds, in fascicle thirty-eight. Part 458 gives the simile of the ship that must be rowed until it reaches the open sea and then goes on the wind alone, and begins the effortless knowing that this ground exercises — the forming and dissolving of world-systems, the dust-motes of every element, and the bodies of every kind of being counted exactly as they are.