What the Bodhisattvas Become
Having attained the hundred and three samādhis of Part 8, the assembled bodhisattvas are described one final time in dense, sweeping prose — then release nine kinds of light-cloud from their own bodies, thrones, and pavilions, closing the vision that began with the Buddha's own light in Part 7.
The Bodhisattvas Described, One Final Time
彼諸菩薩，一一皆有妙師子座，悉與十佛世界等，現大自在甚深智慧，悉得諸地明淨智慧；普觀一切，從智性生，專求一切智，具足成就，離癡慧眼。悉為眾生作調御師；修行諸佛平等正法，決定了知一切境界，分別了知一切世界，樂寂滅法，遠離世間，常好閑靜；遊諸佛剎，無所染著；於一切法，心無所依；安住莊嚴妙法宮殿，教化成熟一切眾生。為一切眾生，顯現佛剎，具足成就無上智門；順離欲際，得智慧身，消竭一切諸有為海；為一切眾生，顯真實際，法海慧光，具足圓滿，皆悉安住堅固三昧。以大悲心，常念眾生；解一切眾生皆悉如夢；一切如來悉如電光；一切言音皆悉如響；了一切法皆悉如化。滿足諸願，具菩薩行，普智圓滿，方便清淨，心樂寂靜，成滿一切諸陀羅尼智慧境界；具足十力，遠離恐怖，安住法界，具淨法眼；得一切法無所有門，修行無量智慧大海，究竟到於智慧彼岸，悉得般若波羅蜜力，成就神通波羅蜜，度眾生海；於三昧波羅蜜，悉得自在。善知一切智無錯謬，巧妙方便，開示法藏；具足辯才，成就大願；具足諸力，法雲無盡。於大眾中，能師子吼，而無所畏；常求正法，心無所著。以淨慧眼，滅除癡闇；智月圓滿，照世生滅，成就智慧，放大光明；照一切諦，善巧方便。智慧功德金剛之山，超出三世一切法王，覺無所畏智功德幢；滅諸魔幢，建立精進圓滿智幢；具足成就無上之身，得一切法無礙智慧；覺了無盡智真實際，安住真際，修行決定無相三昧。巧方便生諸菩薩行，無二智慧，諦見境界世間諸趣，普照佛剎，無所染著；於一切法除滅癡闇，究竟智慧，皆悉圓滿，放淨法光，照十方界。為一切眾生，作不虛福田；若見聞者，所願成滿；為一切世間，功德須彌，遠離恐怖，伏諸外道。以微妙音，遍一切剎；常見諸佛，心無厭足，成就如來自在法身，隨其所應而化度之；能以一身，滿一切剎；以少方便，具足清淨自在神力，普遊十方無所障礙，智慧圓滿，遍照法界。為一切眾耀明淨日，隨其所應，讚歎功德；了一切眾生諸根希望；於一切法，得無諍境界；分別了知諸法自性，大小相攝。決了如來甚深之地，說句、味身，諸法深義，無有窮盡；於一言中，普說一切修多羅海，究竟一切諸陀羅尼；廣智慧身，究竟無量劫陀羅尼。於一念中，決定了知不可說劫；於一念中，了達三世法陀羅尼，普照無量諸佛法海。為一切眾生，起淨智慧，轉正法輪，無能壞者；成就如來智慧境界，常入善現三昧正受，遠離障礙，深入諸法。於一切法，得勝智自在，清淨莊嚴一切境界；深入十方甚深法界，攝取十方一切法界。於一一微塵中，現成正覺；於無色性，現一切色；能以一方，攝一切方。彼諸菩薩具足成滿如是等無量功德智慧之藏，常為一切諸佛讚歎；以句、味身，說其功德，不能窮盡，皆悉雲集於祇洹林。
These bodhisattvas, each and every one having their own sublime lion-throne, equal entirely to ten buddha-worlds, manifested great sovereign mastery and profound wisdom, having attained the bright, pure wisdom of every ground; contemplating everything universally, born from the very nature of wisdom, single-mindedly seeking omniscience, fully accomplished, with an eye of wisdom free of delusion. They served as tamers and guides for every sentient being; cultivating the equal, true Dharma of every buddha, resolutely understanding every domain, discerning and understanding every world, delighting in the Dharma of tranquil extinction, remaining far from the world, constantly loving stillness and quiet; wandering through every buddha-land, stained by nothing at all; their minds resting on no dharma whatsoever; abiding securely in the adorned palace of the sublime Dharma, teaching and ripening every sentient being. For the sake of every sentient being they manifested buddha-lands, fully accomplishing the gate of unsurpassed wisdom; according with the very limit of freedom from desire, they attained the wisdom-body, exhausting entirely the ocean of every conditioned thing; for the sake of every sentient being they manifested the very limit of true reality, the light of wisdom from the ocean of Dharma fully complete, all of them abiding firmly in samādhi. Through a mind of great compassion they constantly held sentient beings in mind; understanding that every sentient being is entirely like a dream, that every tathāgata is entirely like a flash of lightning, that every sound and voice is entirely like an echo, and that every dharma is entirely like a magical transformation. Every vow fulfilled, endowed with the bodhisattva's own practice, universal wisdom perfected, skillful means made pure, their minds delighting in stillness, they accomplished fully the domain of wisdom of every dhāraṇī; fully endowed with the ten powers, forever free of fear, abiding in the Dharma-realm, endowed with the pure Dharma-eye; attaining the gate of every dharma's own non-existence, cultivating the great ocean of immeasurable wisdom, reaching at last the far shore of wisdom, they attained fully the power of the perfection of wisdom, accomplished the perfection of spiritual power, delivered the ocean of sentient beings across, and attained sovereign mastery entirely in the perfection of samādhi.
Skillfully knowing omniscience without error, through subtle and marvelous skillful means they opened and revealed the treasury of the Dharma; endowed with eloquence, they accomplished the great vow; endowed with every strength, the cloud of Dharma inexhaustible. Within the great assembly they were able to roar the lion's roar, fearless in every way; constantly seeking the true Dharma, their minds attached to nothing at all. Through the pure eye of wisdom they extinguished the darkness of delusion; the moon of wisdom perfectly full, illumining the world's own arising and passing, they accomplished wisdom and released great light; illumining every truth through skillful and subtle means. A mountain of wisdom and merit, vajra itself, transcending every Dharma-King of the three times, awakening to the banner of fearless wisdom and merit; extinguishing every banner of Māra, raising up the banner of perfected wisdom through diligence; fully accomplishing the unsurpassed body, attaining the unobstructed wisdom of every dharma; awakening to the true limit of inexhaustible wisdom, abiding in that very true limit, cultivating the resolute samādhi free of any mark.
Through skillful means they gave rise to every bodhisattva practice, wisdom free of duality, truly seeing the domain of every path of the world, universally illumining every buddha-land, stained by nothing at all; extinguishing the darkness of delusion in every dharma, wisdom reaching its very end, entirely perfected, releasing the pure light of Dharma, illumining the ten directions. For every sentient being they became a true, unfailing field of merit; whoever sees or hears them has their every wish fulfilled; for every world they were a Sumeru of merit, forever free of fear, subduing every heterodox path. Through a subtle and marvelous voice, reaching every land; constantly beholding every buddha, their minds never once wearied of it, they accomplished the Tathāgata's own sovereign Dharma-body, transforming and delivering beings according to what each required; able, with a single body, to fill every land; through the slightest skillful means, fully endowed with pure, sovereign spiritual power, they wandered universally through the ten directions without any obstruction, their wisdom perfected, illumining the Dharma-realm everywhere. For every being they were a bright, pure sun, praising merit according to what each required; understanding the faculties and hopes of every sentient being; in every dharma, they attained a domain free of contention; discerning and understanding the own-nature of every dharma, great and small mutually contained within each other.
Resolving the Tathāgata's own profound ground, expounding the phrase-body and the flavor-body, the profound meaning of every dharma without any end; within a single word, universally expounding the entire ocean of every sūtra, reaching the very end of every dhāraṇī; a body of vast wisdom, reaching the very end of the dhāraṇī of immeasurable eons. In a single thought-moment, resolutely understanding eons beyond telling; in a single thought-moment, thoroughly comprehending the dhāraṇī of the Dharma of the three times, universally illumining the ocean of Dharma of every buddha without measure. For every sentient being they raised up pure wisdom, turning the true Dharma-wheel, which nothing could ever destroy; accomplishing the Tathāgata's own domain of wisdom, constantly entering the true absorption of the Well-Manifesting Samādhi, far removed from every hindrance, entering deeply into every dharma. In every dharma they attained sovereign mastery of supreme wisdom, purely adorning every domain; entering deeply into the profound Dharma-realm of the ten directions, gathering in the entire Dharma-realm of the ten directions. Within every single mote of dust they manifested the attainment of perfect awakening; within what has no form at all, they manifested every form; through a single direction, they gathered in every direction. These bodhisattvas, fully accomplishing and completing a treasury of merit and wisdom immeasurable such as this, were constantly praised by every buddha; though expressed through phrase-body and flavor-body, their merit could never be exhausted in the telling — and all of them gathered like clouds at Jeta's Grove.
Fazang places this passage as the second of a three-part sequence describing the benefit gained from the light shown in Part 7: 初明因見得法、二「彼諸菩薩」下明因法成德、三「爾時」下明因德起用 — "first, showing how the Dharma is attained through seeing; second, from 'these bodhisattvas' onward, showing how virtue is accomplished through that Dharma; third, from 'at that time' onward, showing how function arises through that virtue." This page's dense catalogue of qualities — samādhi, the ten powers, dhāraṇī, eloquence, the roaring of the lion — is, on his reading, not a second and separate list from the hundred and three samādhis of Part 8, but that same attainment's own outward description: what it looks like, from the outside, to actually be a bodhisattva who has entered that ocean of samādhis.
Nine Kinds of Light-Cloud
爾時，彼諸菩薩深入如來功德大海。入已，於菩薩身中、及樓閣中，莊嚴具中、師子座中、以樂法力故；不可思議力故；於念念中，各放無量光明雲，普照法界，覺悟眾生。所謂：出一切寶香光明雲，讚歎三世諸佛功德，微妙音聲，充滿十方；出一切眾生雲，境界光明，說一切眾生清淨業報，微妙音聲，充滿十方；出一切菩薩願行莊嚴光雲，說一切菩薩願行功德；出一切佛變化身雲，一切如來微妙音聲，充滿十方；出一切菩薩身雲，相好莊嚴，於一切佛剎，以微妙音，讚歎諸佛，充滿十方；出三世佛莊嚴道場雲，現一切佛成等正覺，充滿十方；於一切境界中，出龍王雲，雨一切香，充滿十方；出一切佛身雲，歎普賢行，充滿十方；出一切佛剎淨光明雲，一切如來轉法輪音，充滿十方。時，諸菩薩威神力故，此法力故，出如是等不可說佛剎微塵等雲。
At that time these bodhisattvas entered deeply into the great ocean of the Tathāgata's own merit. Having entered it, within the bodhisattvas' own bodies, within the pavilions, within the ornaments, and within the lion-thrones, through the power of their own delight in the Dharma and through power beyond conceiving, in every single thought-moment, each of them released clouds of light beyond measure, universally illumining the Dharma-realm and awakening sentient beings. Namely: they released clouds of light and fragrance from every jewel, praising the merit of every buddha of the three times, their subtle and marvelous voices filling the ten directions; they released clouds manifesting every sentient being, their own domain's light expounding the pure karmic result of every sentient being, their subtle and marvelous voices filling the ten directions; they released clouds of light adorned with the vows and practice of every bodhisattva, expounding the merit of every bodhisattva's vow and practice; they released clouds of the transformation-bodies of every buddha, the subtle and marvelous voices of every tathāgata filling the ten directions; they released clouds of the bodies of every bodhisattva, adorned with every excellent mark, praising every buddha in every buddha-land with subtle and marvelous voices, filling the ten directions; they released clouds of the adorned bodhimaṇḍa of every buddha of the three times, manifesting every buddha's own attainment of perfect awakening, filling the ten directions; within every domain they released clouds of nāga-kings, raining down every kind of fragrance, filling the ten directions; they released clouds of the bodies of every buddha, praising the practice of Samantabhadra, filling the ten directions; and they released clouds of the pure light of every buddha-land, the voice of every tathāgata turning the Dharma-wheel, filling the ten directions. At that time, through the bodhisattvas' own majestic spiritual power and through the power of this very Dharma, they released clouds such as these, as numerous as motes of dust in buddha-lands beyond telling.
This passage is the third movement Fazang names above — 「爾時」下明因德起用 — "function arising from virtue." Having received the Buddha's own light in Part 7 and accomplished, in the previous section, the virtue that light made possible, these bodhisattvas now do what Part 7 already showed the Tathāgata himself doing: they become sources of light and teaching in their own right, radiating outward from their own bodies, thrones, and pavilions rather than only receiving. The nine clouds move outward from praise of the buddhas, to the sentient beings taught, to the bodhisattva path itself, to the buddhas' transformation-bodies and adorned assemblies, closing on the turning of the Dharma-wheel — tracing, in miniature, roughly the same arc this chapter's opening pages have already traced at far greater length: reception answered by transmission, in every single thought-moment, without any of it ever running dry.
Part 9 Complete
This closes Part 9: the bodhisattvas' own qualities described one final time, and the nine kinds of light-cloud they release in turn, closing the vision the Buddha's own light began in Part 7. Part 10 turns to Mañjuśrī's own hymn of praise, and to a further wave of the bodhisattvas' manifestations before the chapter's whole opening assembly finally begins to move.
Continue to Part 10 — Mañjuśrī's Hymn →