Ninety-Eight Kinds of Form
Having explained form as not-form, the night-deva goes on to manifest form after form — ninety-eight named in the text as it survives, though Fazang notes the original count was a full hundred, two clauses lost. Every one appears within a single thought-moment, filling the ten directions, teaching and transforming sentient beings who are delivered by merely seeing her, or merely thinking of her.
Ninety-Eight Kinds of Form
所謂：種種色、清淨色、莊嚴色、放一切莊嚴色、普現色、同一切眾生色、一切世間現前色、普照色、見無厭色、相好淨色、離惡色、現勇猛色、甚深色、一切世間無能盡色、歎無盡色、種種雲色、諸形像色、顯現無量自在力色、可愛樂色、一切善起色、隨應現前色、隨應度眾生色、普照無礙色、離垢色、不壞淨身色、不思議法方便光明色、非比非無比妙絕色、非明闇色、滅一切闇色、積集一切白淨法色、功德大海之所生色、過去修行恭敬生色、淨直心生如虛空色、勝廣大色、無斷無盡色、海光明色、一切世間無所依止不可壞色、充滿一切十方無礙色、念念色、海色、令一切眾生大歡喜色、攝取一切眾生堅固色、一切毛孔中如來功德師子吼色、淨一切眾生深心色、顯現一切法義色、圓滿光明無礙色、離垢虛空等色、不依垢無著色、普照離垢法界色、不可稱色、隨眼見色、照諸方色、隨時顯現應眾生色、寂靜色、滅一切煩惱色、一切眾生功德福田光明色、見不虛色、大智光色、無礙法身滿一切色、顯現威儀不虛色、積集大慈海色、具足功德須彌山色、普照一切趣色、淨大智色、正念一切世間色、一切寶光色、淨寶藏色、不壞淨眾生色、趣薩婆若色、悅眾生眼色、一切寶莊嚴勝光明色、不取不捨一切眾生色、無決定無究竟色、顯現自在諸持力色、一切自在神足色、佛種姓色、遠離眾惡滿法界色、悉詣一切諸佛大眾照一切色、成諸海色、善行依果色、隨化授色、一切世間見無厭色、種種光明普照色、顯現三世一切色、顯現一切海色、放一切光明海色、種種光色、過一切世間一切香光色、顯現圓滿諸日雲色、持圓滿淨月雲色、放須彌山妙華雲色、出種種鬘雲色、顯現一切鉢曇摩華雲色、一切香像雲充滿法界色、散一切末香雲色、現一切佛淨願身色、一切音聲出師子吼法界海色、普賢菩薩清淨身色，於念念中現如是等色，充滿十方教化眾生。或見、或念、而得度脫；或現轉法輪；或現隨時應；或現親近；或現覺悟；或現自在神力；或現種種變化；或現不可思議自在神力變化，度脫眾生，滅不善法，安立善法，滿足大願，一切智勢力，菩薩法門勢力，具足成就大慈大悲。
Namely: manifold form, pure form, adorned form, form releasing every adornment, universally manifesting form, form identical to every sentient being, form appearing before every world, universally illumining form, form never wearied of beholding, pure form of excellent marks, form departed from evil, form manifesting valor, profound form, form that no world can exhaust, form praised as inexhaustible, form of every kind of cloud, form of every image, form manifesting boundless sovereign power, form worthy of love and joy, form from which every goodness arises, form appearing before beings according to what is fitting, form delivering sentient beings according to what is fitting, form of unobstructed universal illumination, stainless form, form of an indestructible, pure body, form of the inconceivable Dharma's own light of skillful means, form neither comparable nor incomparable, sublime beyond compare, form neither bright nor dark, form extinguishing every darkness, form accumulating every pure dharma, form born of the great ocean of merit, form born of past cultivation and reverence, form of a pure, upright mind, born like space itself, supreme, vast form, unbroken, inexhaustible form, form of the light of the ocean, form that every world depends on nothing, indestructible, form filling the ten directions entirely, unobstructed, form of every single thought-moment, oceanic form,
form causing every sentient being to rejoice greatly, firm form gathering in every sentient being, form of the Tathāgata's own merit, the lion's roar, from every pore, form purifying every sentient being's own profound mind, form manifesting the meaning of every dharma, form of perfect, unobstructed light, form equal to stainless space, form relying on no defilement, unattached, form universally illumining the stainless Dharma-realm, form beyond measure, form seen according to the eye that beholds it, form illumining every direction, form manifesting according to time, according with sentient beings, tranquil form, form extinguishing every affliction, form of the light of the field of merit for every sentient being, form never seen in vain, form of the light of great wisdom, form of the unobstructed Dharma-body filling all, form manifesting bearing never in vain, form accumulating the ocean of great loving-kindness, form fully endowed with the Mount Sumeru of merit, form universally illumining every destiny, form of pure great wisdom, form of right mindfulness of every world, form of the light of every jewel, form of the pure jeweled treasury, indestructible form purifying sentient beings, form tending toward all-wisdom, form delighting the eyes of sentient beings, form of the supreme light adorned with every jewel, form neither grasping nor abandoning any sentient being, form neither fixed nor final, form manifesting sovereign power of every retention, form of every sovereign transcendent foot-power,
form of the buddha's own lineage, form departed far from every evil, filling the Dharma-realm, form going to every buddha's own great assembly, illumining all, form accomplishing every ocean, form of wholesome practice relying on its fruit, form bestowed according to transformation, form every world beholds without ever wearying, form of manifold light, universally illumining, form manifesting all of the three times, form manifesting every ocean, form releasing the whole ocean of every light, form of manifold light, form of fragrant light surpassing every world, form manifesting the perfect cloud of every sun, form upholding the perfect, pure cloud of the moon, form releasing the sublime flower-cloud of Mount Sumeru, form sending forth every kind of garland-cloud, form manifesting every cloud of padma flowers, form of clouds of fragrant images filling the Dharma-realm, form scattering every cloud of powdered incense, form manifesting every buddha's own pure vow-body, form of every sound, sending forth the lion's roar of the ocean of the Dharma-realm, and form of Samantabhadra Bodhisattva's own pure body — within every single thought-moment, she manifests forms such as these, filling the ten directions entirely, teaching and transforming sentient beings.
Some are delivered simply by seeing her, some by thinking of her; some she delivers by manifesting the turning of the Dharma-wheel; some by manifesting a response fitting the time; some by manifesting closeness; some by manifesting awakening; some by manifesting sovereign spiritual power; some by manifesting every kind of transformation; and some by manifesting inconceivable, sovereign, spiritually transformative power — delivering sentient beings, extinguishing unwholesome dharmas, establishing wholesome dharmas, fulfilling the great vow, the strength of every wisdom, and the strength of the bodhisattva's own Dharma-gate, fully accomplished in great loving-kindness and great compassion.
Fazang identifies this catalogue as answering the second of the four meanings this Dharma-gate's name carries — "according with what is fitting to transform" — and gives its own count with a rare textual caveat: 二解一切下依證現用，釋隨應化義，於中三：先無邊現色是總句...二所謂下別有一百種色，檢文欠二句 — "second, beginning with 'understand that,' reveals the function manifest through direct realization, explaining the meaning of 'according with what is fitting to transform'; within this there are three parts: first, 'manifesting boundless form' is a general statement... second, beginning with 'namely,' there are, in particular, one hundred kinds of form — though checking the text, two clauses are missing." What survives in the transmitted sūtra is ninety-eight, and this translation preserves every one of them exactly as the source gives them — an incomplete hundred, its own gap a small, honest scar left by centuries of copying rather than a deliberate abbreviation.
Fazang also connects this list to a term used elsewhere in Buddhist doctrine for the very ground this teacher occupies: 三於念念中現如是等總結，以是起信論中第八地名色自在地，此之謂也 — "third, 'within every single thought-moment, manifesting forms such as these' is a general conclusion; this is precisely what the Awakening of Faith means when it names the eighth ground 'the Ground of Mastery over Form.'" Nearly a hundred named forms are, in this reading, not an ornamental excess but the direct demonstration of what "mastery over form" actually looks like when enacted rather than merely defined — and the closing lines make clear that not one of these forms exists for its own sake: each is a means of delivering some being, whether by sight, by thought, by teaching, or by transformation too inconceivable to name.
Part 108 In Progress
Nearly a hundred kinds of form have now been named in full, each one a means of delivering sentient beings within a single thought-moment. Part 109 turns to what this whole Dharma-gate accomplishes at its widest scope, before Sudhana's deepest question yet: how long has this teacher held it at all.
Continue to Part 109 →