The First Six Contemplations
日想、水想、地想、樹想、寶池觀、寶樓觀
The Buddha teaches Vaidehī to build Sukhāvatī in her own mind, one layer at a time: the setting sun, water that hardens into ice and then a ground of lapis lazuli, jeweled trees, ponds of eightfold water, and finally the towers and pavilions that gather all of it into a single scene.
- This part covers
- The first six of the sixteen contemplations: the sun (初觀), water hardening into ice and then a lapis lazuli ground (第二觀), the ground of Sukhāvatī seen in full (第三觀), the jeweled trees (第四觀), the ponds of water possessing eight virtues (第五觀), and the towers and pavilions that complete what Shandao calls the "general contemplation" (總觀, 第六觀).
- Shandao's category
- All sixteen contemplations fall under what Shandao calls the "meditative good" (定善) — practice that stills a scattered mind until it can hold a single object — as distinct from the "dispersed good" (散善) of the Three Blessings taught in Part 1.
7. The First Contemplation: The Sun
佛告韋提：「汝及眾生應當專心，繫念一處，想於西方。云何作想？凡作想者，一切眾生自非生盲，有目之徒，皆見日沒。當起想念，正坐西向，諦觀於日，令心堅住，專想不移。見日欲沒，狀如懸鼓。既見日已，閉目開目皆令明了。是為日想，名曰初觀。作是觀者，名為正觀。若他觀者，名為邪觀。」
The Buddha said to Vaidehī: "You, and all beings, should hold the mind single-pointed, fix your thought upon one place, and contemplate the west. How is this contemplation made? To make it: every being — unless born blind, and possessed of sight — has seen the sun set. Give rise to this thought: sit upright, facing west, and gaze steadily at the sun, holding the mind firm and unmoved, your contemplation unwavering. Watch the sun as it is about to set, its shape like a suspended drum. Once you have seen the sun in this way, let it remain clear and distinct before you whether your eyes are open or closed. This is the contemplation of the sun, called the first contemplation. To contemplate in this way is called right contemplation; to contemplate otherwise is called wrong contemplation."
Shandao gives three reasons the Buddha begins with something as ordinary as a sunset. First, practical orientation: the sun sets due west only near the spring and autumn equinoxes, and Sukhāvatī lies, by the sūtra's own reckoning, directly west past a hundred thousand koṭis of buddha-lands — the sun gives the practitioner a fixed direction to hold in mind. Second, and more surprising, he reads the sun contemplation as a diagnostic: he gives detailed instructions for a preliminary posture (seated cross-legged, tongue against the palate, visualizing each of the body's four elements dispersed to the four directions until nothing remains but a single mirror-like awareness) after which the sun's disk may appear obscured by black, yellow, or white cloud-like film — this film is the practitioner's own karmic hindrance made visible, and Shandao prescribes a specific act of confession before the same posture is tried again. Third, only after the practitioner can hold the ordinary sun steadily in mind does he introduce the actual claim: everything Amitāyus's land contains outshines this sun by a thousand million times, so the sun is deliberately the easiest, dimmest object to start with, not the destination.
He also notes precisely who this contemplation excludes and who it does not: someone born blind, who has never had a mental image of a sunset to work from, is not taught this particular method — but someone who lost their sight later in life, and therefore still holds the memory of what a sunset looks like, can still succeed at it. The contemplation works on a remembered or imagined image, not on the eyes in the moment.
8. The Second Contemplation: Water, Ice, and Lapis Lazuli
佛告阿難及韋提希：「初觀成已，次作水想。想見西方一切皆是大水，見水澄清，亦令明了，無分散意。既見水已，當起氷想。見氷映徹，作琉璃想。此想成已，見琉璃地，內外映徹。下有金剛七寶金幢，擎琉璃地。其幢八方，八楞具足，一一方面，百寶所成，一一寶珠，有千光明，一一光明，八萬四千色，映琉璃地，如億千日，不可具見。琉璃地上，以黃金繩，雜廁間錯，以七寶界，分齊分明，一一寶中，有五百色光。其光如花，又似星月，懸處虛空，成光明臺。樓閣千萬，百寶合成，於臺兩邊，各有百億花幢，無量樂器，以為莊嚴。八種清風從光明出，鼓此樂器，演說苦、空、無常、無我之音，是為水想，名第二觀。此想成時，一一觀之，極令了了。閉目開目，不令散失，唯除食時，恒憶此事。作此觀者，名為正觀。若他觀者，名為邪觀。」
The Buddha said to Ānanda and Vaidehī: "Once the first contemplation is complete, next make the contemplation of water. Picture the whole of the west as nothing but a great expanse of water; see the water clear and still, and let it too remain distinct, without letting your mind wander. Once you have seen this water, next give rise to a contemplation of ice: see the ice, transparent through and through, and from it form a contemplation of lapis lazuli. When this contemplation is complete, you will see a ground of lapis lazuli, radiant and transparent both within and without. Beneath it are vajra banners of the seven treasures, upholding the lapis lazuli ground; these banners have eight sides, each fully formed with eight edges, and each of the eight faces is made of a hundred kinds of jewels, and each jewel has a thousand rays of light, and each ray of light has eighty-four thousand colors, which shine upon the lapis lazuli ground like a billion suns at once, too bright to look upon directly. Upon the lapis lazuli ground, ropes of yellow gold are woven crosswise, marking out boundaries of the seven treasures, each division sharp and distinct, and within each jewel there are five hundred colors of light. That light takes the shape of flowers, or resembles stars and the moon, suspended in the open sky, forming platforms of radiance. Upon these, a thousand myriad pavilions, made of a hundred kinds of jewels, stand — and on either side of each platform there are a hundred koṭis of flower banners, adorned with immeasurable musical instruments. Eight kinds of pure wind blow forth from this radiance, and as they stir these instruments, they proclaim the sounds of suffering, emptiness, impermanence, and no-self. This is the water contemplation, called the second contemplation. When this contemplation is complete, examine each part of it until it is utterly distinct — whether your eyes are open or closed, do not let it scatter and be lost; hold this scene in mind constantly, except while eating. To contemplate in this way is called right contemplation; to contemplate otherwise is called wrong contemplation."
Why water, right after the sun? Shandao's answer turns on a simple observation about this world: ordinary ground is uneven, full of hills and hollows, and water is the one thing in the practitioner's experience that settles perfectly level — it is chosen here as the nearest available image of Sukhāvatī's ground, not because that ground is literally made of water, but because water is how an ordinary mind can first grasp the idea of a surface without a single irregularity. The subsequent transformation — water hardening into ice, ice becoming transparent lapis lazuli — mirrors, on his reading, Amitāyus's own causal history: a bodhisattva's practice carried out across immeasurable aeons without the slightest unevenness or partiality, so that what it produces has no unevenness either.
For readers who find "picture an entire ocean, then freeze it, then turn it to jewel" difficult to actually do, Shandao offers a concrete beginner's exercise: set a bowl full of water on the ground before your seat, place a small white object like a bean between your eyebrows, and look down at your own reflection in the water's surface. At first the water's surface will not hold still and no reflection appears; do not force it — simply keep watching. As the mind settles, the water's ripples settle with it, and the reflection grows clear. He is explicit that this is not a side exercise but the same exercise in miniature: the water's stillness or agitation in the bowl directly mirrors the practitioner's own mind, so that learning to watch the one is learning to watch the other.
9. The Third Contemplation: The Ground of Sukhāvatī
佛告阿難及韋提希：「水想成已，名為粗見極樂國地。若得三昧，見彼國地，了了分明，不可具說。是為地想，名第三觀。」 佛告阿難：「汝持佛語，為未來世一切大眾欲脫苦者，說是觀地法。若觀是地者，除八十億劫生死之罪。捨身他世，必生淨國，心得無疑。作是觀者，名為正觀。若他觀者，名為邪觀。」
The Buddha said to Ānanda and Vaidehī: "When the water contemplation is complete, this is called a rough sighting of the ground of Sukhāvatī. If one attains samādhi, one sees that land's ground utterly clear and distinct, beyond what words can fully describe. This is the contemplation of the ground, called the third contemplation." The Buddha said to Ānanda: "You must uphold the Buddha's words, and for the sake of all the multitudes of future ages who wish to be freed from suffering, teach this method of contemplating the ground. Whoever contemplates this ground removes the karmic offenses of eighty koṭis of aeons of birth and death. When they set this body aside in a future life, they will certainly be born in the pure land, their mind free of doubt. To contemplate in this way is called right contemplation; to contemplate otherwise is called wrong contemplation."
Shandao draws attention to a word easy to pass over: even a "rough" (麁) sighting of the ground — not the full clarity of samādhi, just what emerges once the water contemplation is complete — is enough to call this third contemplation accomplished, and the sūtra's promised benefit, the removal of eighty koṭis of aeons of karmic offense, is attached to that same rough seeing, not only to the rare practitioner who reaches full absorption. He reads this as the sūtra's own reassurance to anyone worried that they have not seen the scene clearly enough: partial success at this stage is still real success, not a failure to be corrected before moving on.
10. The Fourth Contemplation: The Jeweled Trees
佛告阿難及韋提希：「地想成已，次觀寶樹。觀寶樹者，一一觀之，作七重行樹想。一一樹高八千由旬，其諸寶樹，七寶花葉無不具足。一一華葉，作異寶色。琉璃色中出金色光；頗梨色中出紅色光；馬腦色中出車璩光；車璩色中出綠真珠光；珊瑚琥珀一切眾寶以為映飾。妙真珠網彌覆樹上，一一樹上有七重網，一一網間有五百億妙華宮殿，如梵王宮。諸天童子自然在中，一一童子有五百億釋迦毘楞伽摩尼寶以為瓔珞；其摩尼光照百由旬，猶如和合百億日月，不可具名，眾寶間錯色中上者。此諸寶樹，行行相當，葉葉相次，於眾葉間生諸妙花，花上自然有七寶果。一一樹葉，縱廣正等二十五由旬；其葉千色有百種畫，如天纓珞；有眾妙華，作閻浮檀金色；如旋火輪，宛轉葉間，踊生諸果，如帝釋瓶；有大光明，化成幢幡無量寶蓋。是寶蓋中，映現三千大千世界一切佛事；十方佛國亦於中現。見此樹已，亦當次第一一觀之，觀見樹莖、枝葉、華果，皆令分明。是為樹想，名第四觀。作是觀者，名為正觀。若他觀者，名為邪觀。」
The Buddha said to Ānanda and Vaidehī: "When the ground contemplation is complete, next contemplate the jeweled trees. To contemplate the jeweled trees: contemplate them one by one, forming the image of rows of trees, seven deep. Each tree is eight thousand yojanas tall, and every one of these jeweled trees is fully adorned with flowers and leaves of the seven treasures — each flower and leaf a different jeweled color. From lapis lazuli color streams golden light; from crystal color streams red light; from agate color streams the light of giant clam-shell; from giant-clam-shell color streams the light of green pearl; and coral, amber, and every kind of jewel add further adornment and reflection. Wondrous pearl nets cover the trees entirely — each tree has seven layers of netting, and between each layer are five hundred koṭis of wondrous flower-palaces, like the palaces of Brahmā. Divine children dwell there of themselves, and each child wears five hundred koṭis of maṇi jewels of Śakra-abhilagna as ornaments; the light of these maṇi jewels shines a hundred yojanas, as if a hundred koṭis of suns and moons had merged into one — a brilliance beyond any name, the finest among all the interwoven colors of every jewel. These jeweled trees stand row upon row, each aligned with the next, leaf answering leaf, and among the leaves grow wondrous flowers, and upon the flowers grow, of themselves, fruits of the seven treasures. Each leaf of these trees measures exactly twenty-five yojanas in length and breadth; each leaf has a thousand colors, worked with a hundred kinds of patterns like a celestial necklace; among them are wondrous flowers the color of Jāmbūnada gold, turning like wheels of fire amid the leaves, and fruits springing forth like the vessels of Śakra, radiating great light that transforms into banners and canopies without number. Within these jeweled canopies appear, reflected, all the buddha-deeds of an entire great trichiliocosm, and the buddha-lands of the ten directions appear there as well. Having seen these trees, one should contemplate them again in order, one by one, seeing clearly the trunk, the branches, the leaves, and the fruit of each. This is the contemplation of the trees, called the fourth contemplation. To contemplate in this way is called right contemplation; to contemplate otherwise is called wrong contemplation."
Shandao's central point about these trees is that they flow directly out of Amitāyus Buddha's own mind, and because that mind is free of every outflow of affliction (無漏), the trees that arise from it are free of outflow as well — which is why, on his reading, no tree in Sukhāvatī is ever described as young, old, growing, or dying. Every tree in that land, he says explicitly, arises all at once, already at its full eight-thousand-yojana measure — because that land knows nothing of the ordinary process of birth, aging, and decay that governs trees, or anything else, in this one.
He also draws out the contemplation's own prescribed order, easy to miss inside such a dense single paragraph: root, then trunk, then branches and leaves, then flowers and fruit, then the netting and palaces above, then the light and canopies — a fixed sequence, moving from the ground upward, meant to be followed exactly rather than taken in all at once. Attempting to hold the whole tree in mind simultaneously, on this reading, is precisely the "mixed contemplation" the sūtra elsewhere warns against; the discipline is in the ordering, not only in the content.
11. The Fifth Contemplation: The Water of Eight Merits
佛告阿難及韋提希：「樹想成已，次當想水。欲想水者，極樂國土有八池水。一一池水七寶所成；其寶柔軟從如意珠王生，分為十四支；一一支作七寶色。黃金為渠，渠下皆以雜色金剛以為底沙。一一水中有六十億七寶蓮花，一一蓮華團圓正等十二由旬。其摩尼水流注華間，尋樹上下。其聲微妙，演說苦、空、無常、無我、諸波羅蜜，復有讚歎諸佛相好者。從如意珠王踊出金色微妙光明，其光化為百寶色鳥，和鳴哀雅，常讚念佛、念法、念僧，是為八功德水想，名第五觀。作是觀者，名為正觀。若他觀者，名為邪觀。」
The Buddha said to Ānanda and Vaidehī: "When the contemplation of the trees is complete, next contemplate the water. To contemplate the water: the land of Sukhāvatī has eight ponds of water. Each pond is made of the seven treasures, and this treasure-substance is soft and pliant, springing from wish-fulfilling jewel-kings; it divides into fourteen channels, each channel taking on a color of the seven treasures. The channels are lined with yellow gold, and beneath them the streambed is paved with sand of every color of vajra. In each pond there are sixty koṭis of lotus flowers of the seven treasures, each lotus perfectly round and exactly twelve yojanas across. The maṇi-jewel water flows among the flowers, rising and falling along the trees. Its sound is subtle and wondrous, proclaiming suffering, emptiness, impermanence, no-self, and the various perfections, and also praising the excellent marks of every buddha. From the wish-fulfilling jewel-kings springs a fine golden light, which transforms into birds of every jeweled color, whose harmonious and elegant song constantly praises mindfulness of the Buddha, mindfulness of the Dharma, and mindfulness of the Saṅgha. This is the contemplation of the water of eight merits, called the fifth contemplation. To contemplate in this way is called right contemplation; to contemplate otherwise is called wrong contemplation."
The "eight merits" of this water, which the sūtra names only in its title without listing them, are drawn out in full by Shandao from the wider Pure Land canon he is working within: the water is clean and lustrous, free of any foul smell, light, cool, soft, sweet-tasting, settling to a comfortable measure when drunk, and leaving no ill effect afterward. He groups these eight as covering every relevant sense faculty at once — sight, smell, touch, and taste — so that the water is, in effect, a single object that satisfies the whole body without excess or deficiency in any one respect.
He also notes what the water's sound actually does, which is easy to read as mere decoration: the ripple of water among the lotus flowers is described as itself preaching — suffering, emptiness, impermanence, no-self, the perfections — and the birdsong that follows praises the Three Jewels directly. The environment does not merely surround the practitioner in that land; on Shandao's reading, every sound that reaches the ear there is already teaching, so that even the ambient noise of water and birdsong is a form of exposition suited to whoever is listening.
12. The Sixth Contemplation: The Towers and Pavilions, Seen as One
佛告阿難及韋提希：「眾寶國土，一一界上有五百億寶樓，其樓閣中有無量諸天，作天伎樂。又有樂器懸處虛空，如天寶幢不鼓自鳴。此眾音中，皆說念佛、念法、念比丘僧。此想成已，名為粗見極樂世界寶樹、寶地、寶池，是為總觀想，名第六觀。若見此者，除無量億劫極重惡業，命終之後必生彼國。作是觀者，名為正觀。若他觀者，名為邪觀。」
The Buddha said to Ānanda and Vaidehī: "Throughout this land of every treasure, upon every region of ground there stand five hundred koṭis of jeweled towers, and within these towers are countless devas, making heavenly music. There are also musical instruments suspended in the open sky, which, like celestial jeweled banners, sound of themselves without being struck. Within all this sound is proclaimed mindfulness of the Buddha, mindfulness of the Dharma, mindfulness of the community of monks. When this contemplation is complete, it is called a rough sighting of the jeweled trees, the jeweled ground, and the jeweled ponds of Sukhāvatī all at once — this is the general contemplation, called the sixth contemplation. Whoever sees this removes the extremely heavy evil karma of immeasurable koṭis of aeons, and after this life ends, will certainly be born in that land. To contemplate in this way is called right contemplation; to contemplate otherwise is called wrong contemplation."
Shandao is precise about what makes this sixth contemplation different from the five before it: it does not introduce any new object. The towers and pavilions are new, but the sūtra itself calls the achievement of this stage "a rough sighting of the jeweled trees, the jeweled ground, and the jeweled ponds all at once" — this is the "general contemplation" (總觀) because it is the moment the five separate exercises just practiced, ground, trees, and ponds, resolve into a single unified scene held in mind together, rather than one object considered at a time. The towers, with their unstruck instruments endlessly sounding the names of the Three Jewels, are what a mind holding all five prior contemplations at once actually perceives layered above the rest.
He treats the scale of the promised benefit — the removal of "immeasurable koṭis of aeons" of extremely heavy evil karma, larger than any figure attached to the first five contemplations individually — as following directly from this integration: the merit is not additive, one contemplation's benefit stacked onto the next, but belongs to the achievement of holding the whole composite scene together, which is a qualitatively different accomplishment from any of its parts alone.