No Beginning to What Has No Beginning
Having entered the wheel of wisdom in this samādhi, the bodhisattva refuses to count what he has attained — no tally of bodhisattvas or dharmas or realms — before the text opens twenty-eight gates this samādhi enters, and closes on ten reasons why none of it has a first moment.
Not So Many, Not So Few
The section that follows the forty-one paradoxes of Part 534 opens with a bodhisattva who attains everything and then declines to count any of it.
佛子！菩薩摩訶薩入如是大威德三昧智輪，則能證得一切佛法，則能趣入一切佛法，則能成就，則能圓滿，則能積集，則能清淨，則能安住，則能了達，與一切法自性相應，而此菩薩摩訶薩不作是念：『有若干諸菩薩、若干菩薩法、若干菩薩究竟、若干幻究竟、若干化究竟、若干神通成就、若干智成就、若干思惟、若干證入、若干趣向、若干境界。』何以故？菩薩三昧，如是體性，如是無邊，如是殊勝故。
Sons of the Buddha! When the bodhisattva-mahāsattva enters such a wheel of wisdom in this great and awesome samādhi, he is then able to attain every buddha-dharma, then able to enter into every buddha-dharma, then able to accomplish them, then able to perfect them, then able to gather them, then able to purify them, then able to abide securely in them, then able to fully comprehend them, in accord with the self-nature of every dharma — and yet this bodhisattva-mahāsattva gives rise to no such thought as: "There are so many bodhisattvas, so many bodhisattva-dharmas, so many bodhisattva ultimates, so many ultimates of illusion, so many ultimates of transformation, so many accomplishments of spiritual powers, so many accomplishments of wisdom, so many contemplations, so many realizations entered, so many directions gone toward, so many realms." Why is this so? Because the bodhisattva's samādhi has such an essential nature, is boundless in just this way, and is supreme in just this way.
有若干諸菩薩、若干菩薩法… — "there are so many bodhisattvas, so many bodhisattva-dharmas…" 若干, repeated eleven times, is the very shape this sūtra uses everywhere else to count: dust-motes of buddha-lands, nayutas of jewels, koṭis of transformations. Here the bodhisattva is shown declining to think in that shape at all, immediately before the text itself goes on to list twenty-eight gates.
Twenty-Eight Gates
Having refused the count, the text names what the samādhi actually holds — not a number, but a list of what it opens onto.
此三昧種種境界、種種威力、種種深入，所謂：入不可說智門、入離分別諸莊嚴、入無邊殊勝波羅蜜、入無數禪定、入百千億那由他不可說廣大智、入見無邊佛勝妙藏、入於境界不休息、入清淨信解助道法、入諸根猛利大神通、入於境界心無礙、入見一切佛平等眼、入積集普賢勝志行、入住那羅延妙智身、入說如來智慧海、
This samādhi's manifold realms, manifold might, and manifold profound entries are these: entering the gate of ineffable wisdom; entering ornaments free of discrimination; entering boundless and supreme pāramitās; entering countless dhyāna-concentrations; entering the vast wisdom of a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas, ineffably many; entering the treasury of seeing boundless buddhas, sublime and wondrous; entering realms without respite; entering the pure faith and understanding that assists the path; entering the great spiritual powers of keen faculties; entering a mind unobstructed toward every realm; entering the eye that sees all buddhas equally; entering the gathering of Samantabhadra's supreme resolve and practice; entering the wondrous body of wisdom, abiding like Nārāyaṇa; entering the ocean of the tathāgata's wisdom as it is spoken;
入起無量種自在神變、入生一切佛無盡智門、入住一切佛現前境界、入淨普賢菩薩自在智、入開示無比普門智、入普知法界一切微細境界、入普現法界一切微細境界、入一切殊勝智光明、入一切自在邊際、入一切辯才法門際、入遍法界智慧身、入成就一切處遍行道、入善住一切差別三昧、入知一切諸佛心。
entering the arising of measureless kinds of sovereign spiritual transformation; entering the gate of every buddha's inexhaustible wisdom as it is born; entering the realm present before every buddha, abiding there; entering the sovereign wisdom that purifies bodhisattva Samantabhadra; entering the peerless wisdom of the universal gate, revealed; entering the universal knowing of every subtle realm throughout the dharma-realm; entering the universal manifesting of every subtle realm throughout the dharma-realm; entering the light of every supreme wisdom; entering the limit of every sovereign freedom; entering the limit of every gateway of eloquence; entering the body of wisdom pervading the dharma-realm; entering the accomplishment of the path that moves everywhere, in every place; entering the skillful abiding in every distinct samādhi; entering the knowing of every buddha's mind.
那羅延 — Nārāyaṇa, kept transliterated rather than translated, matching Part 02 and Part 09's treatment of the same name among the Vajra-Wielding Spirits. There it named a being; here it names a quality of body — strength borrowed as a simile for a wisdom that nothing can move.
入見一切佛平等眼 — entering the eye that sees all buddhas equally. Twenty-eight named gates and no two alike, yet the twelfth one is specifically about seeing without distinction. The list does not flatten its own variety to make the point; it simply includes both.
No Beginning to What Has No Beginning
The passage closes on ten reasons, each one a different way of saying the same thing: nothing here can be traced back to a starting point, because nothing here has an edge to start from.
「佛子！此菩薩摩訶薩住普賢行，念念入百億不可說三昧，然不見普賢菩薩三昧及佛境界莊嚴前際。何以故？知一切法究竟無盡故，知一切佛剎無邊故，知一切眾生界不思議故，知前際無始故，知未來無窮故，知現在盡虛空遍法界無邊故，知一切諸佛境界不可思議故，知一切菩薩行無數故，知一切諸佛辯才所說境界不可說無邊故，知一切幻心所緣法無量故。
"Sons of the Buddha! This bodhisattva-mahāsattva abides in the practice of Samantabhadra; in thought after thought he enters a hundred koṭis of ineffably many samādhis, and yet he does not see any prior limit to bodhisattva Samantabhadra's samādhi or to the adorned realm of the buddhas. Why is this so? Because he knows all dharmas are ultimately inexhaustible; because he knows all buddha-lands are boundless; because he knows the realm of all beings is inconceivable; because he knows the prior limit has no beginning; because he knows the future is without end; because he knows the present, filling empty space and pervading the dharma-realm, is boundless; because he knows the realm of all buddhas is inconceivable; because he knows the practices of all bodhisattvas are countless; because he knows the realm spoken by the eloquence of all buddhas is ineffably boundless; because he knows the dharmas conditioned by every illusory mind are measureless.
知前際無始故 — because he knows the prior limit has no beginning. The fourth of ten reasons, and the pivot of the whole list: dharmas, lands, beings, past, future, and present, the buddhas' realm, bodhisattva practice, eloquence, and the illusory mind — ten different kinds of thing, each shown boundless by the same single fact, that nothing here has an edge for a search to reach.
Part 535 Complete
This continues chapter twenty-seven, 十定品, The Ten Concentrations, in fascicle forty-three. Part 536 turns to a wish-fulfilling jewel — 如如意珠，隨有所求一切皆得，求者無盡，意皆滿足，而珠勢力終不匱 — the same 如意 that names this site, offered here as the sūtra's own image for a power that gives without running out.