As the Earth Holds Every Seed
The ninth ground finishes, and with it fascicle thirty-eight. The last image given to this teacher is not eloquence or radiance but ground — everything heard is held the way soil holds every kind of seed, without sorting them and without letting any of them fall through.
Cloud, Earth, One Voice
Three similes in as many stanzas — the teaching spreading like cloud until nothing is unreached, the hair-tip assemblies, and retention like the earth beneath every seed there is.
總持三昧皆清淨，能於一念見多佛，一一佛所皆聞法，復以妙音而演暢。
若欲三千大千界，教化一切諸群生，如雲廣布無不及，隨其根欲悉令喜。
毛端佛眾無有數，眾生心樂亦無極，悉應其心與法門，一切法界皆如是。
菩薩勤加精進力，復獲功德轉增勝，聞持爾所諸法門，如地能持一切種。
十方無量諸眾生，咸來親近會中坐，一念隨心各問難，一音普對悉充足。
Their retentions and samādhis all purified, they can in a single thought behold many buddhas, and in the presence of each single buddha hear the Dharma, and set it forth again with wondrous voice. Should they wish, in a great trichiliocosm, to teach and transform every multitude of beings, they spread like cloud until nothing is unreached, and cause each, according to their faculties and desires, to be glad. At a hair-tip the buddha-assemblies are without number, and what the minds of beings delight in is likewise without end; to all of them they give a gateway of Dharma answering to that mind, and throughout the whole dharma-realm it is so. The bodhisattva applies the power of diligent effort and obtains merits more surpassing still; and all those dharma-gateways they have heard and retained, they hold as the earth is able to hold every kind of seed. Measureless beings of the ten directions all come and draw near and take their seats in the assembly, and in a single thought each raises the question their mind holds, and one voice answers them all and satisfies them completely.
住於此地為法王，隨機誨誘無厭倦，日夜見佛未曾捨，入深寂滅智解脫。
供養諸佛善益明，如王頂上妙寶冠，復使眾生煩惱滅，譬如梵王光普照。
住此多作大梵王，以三乘法化眾生，所行善業普饒益，乃至當成一切智。
一念所入諸三昧，阿僧祇剎微塵數，見佛說法亦復然，願力所作復過此。
此是第九善慧地，大智菩薩所行處，甚深微妙難可見，我為佛子已宣說。」
Abiding on this ground they are a Dharma-king, instructing and drawing others on according to their capacity, and never wearying of it; day and night they behold the buddhas and never let go of them, entering the profound liberation of quiescent wisdom. Making offerings to the buddhas, their goodness grows brighter still, like the fine jewelled crown upon a king's head; and they cause beings' afflictions to be extinguished, as the Brahmā King's light shines everywhere. Abiding here they most often become a Great Brahmā King, and with the dharma of the three vehicles they transform beings; the wholesome deeds they perform benefit all universally, on up to the accomplishing of all-knowing wisdom. The samādhis entered in a single thought are as numerous as the dust-motes of asaṃkhyeyas of lands, and their seeing buddhas and hearing the Dharma is likewise; and what is done by the power of their vows goes beyond even this. This is the ninth ground, Sādhumatī, the Ground of Excellent Wisdom, the place where a bodhisattva of great wisdom walks; most profound and subtle and hard to see — and I have set it forth for you, children of the Buddha."
聞持爾所諸法門，如地能持一切種 — all those dharma-gateways they have heard and retained, they hold as the earth is able to hold every kind of seed. 持 does double duty: the retaining of what is heard and the bearing-up that earth does. The simile also quietly answers the ninth ground's own opening, where the interiors of beings were thickets of undergrowth; the teacher's mind is the ground that all such growth comes out of, and it refuses no seed.
隨機誨誘無厭倦 — instructing and drawing others on according to their capacity, and never wearying of it. 誘 is to lead by enticement, a word with a slight edge to it; used here of a Dharma-king it means meeting people where their interest already is. The line that guarantees it is 無厭倦 — never wearying — which is the plainest thing said about this ground and perhaps the hardest.
Part 472 Complete — Fascicle 38 Complete
Sādhumatī, the Ground of Excellent Wisdom, is finished, and with it fascicle thirty-eight. Nine of the Ten Grounds are now complete. Part 473 opens fascicle thirty-nine and 十地品第二十六之六 with the last of them — Dharmameghā, the Ground of the Dharma-Cloud, where the bodhisattva receives consecration at the hands of the buddhas of the ten directions and becomes able to rain down the Dharma upon every world at once.