A Kalpa of Six Billion Buddhas
A second, still vaster kalpa opens — the kalpa of Sunlight, in which six billion buddhas arise. Across ten more rebirths — king, great minister, merchant, and the rulers of one heaven of desire after another — ten of these buddhas are met and named directly, before the whole account closes with a single sweeping offering made to all six billion at once.
Ten Rebirths, Ten Buddhas, Six Billion Offered To
「次復有劫名曰日光，六十億佛出興于世。時，我為王名大智慧；值最初相好功德山佛，復值妙音聲佛，次為大臣值離垢童子佛，次為阿脩羅王值勇猛精進佛，復值究竟相好佛，次為商人值離垢臂佛，次為城天值師子行佛，次為毘沙門天王值天周羅佛，次為乾闥婆王值法上名稱佛，次為鳩槃荼王值光明天冠佛，恭敬供養。佛子！我諸趣受身供養如是等六十億佛；於一一佛所，教化無量無邊眾生；我於一一佛所，得種種三昧門，種種陀羅尼門，具足諸辯，種種智慧，種種法光，照十方海，諸佛剎海，見諸佛海如一劫中；值遇諸佛，恭敬供養；於世界微塵等劫一切世界中，諸佛興世，我悉值遇恭敬供養，聞法受持，守護正法，亦復如是，於諸佛所，修此法門。」
"Next there was a further kalpa, named Sunlight, in which six billion buddhas arose in the world. At that time, I became a king named Great Wisdom, and met the buddha Mountain of Merit of the Very First Marks, and again met the buddha Sublime Sound; next I became a great minister, and met the buddha the Stainless Youth; next I became King of the Asuras, and met the buddha Valiant Diligence, and again met the buddha Ultimate Marks; next I became a merchant, and met the buddha the Stainless Arm; next I became a deva of the city, and met the buddha Lion's Conduct; next I became the heavenly king Vaiśravaṇa, and met the buddha the Heavenly Crest; next I became King of the Gandharvas, and met the buddha Renown Supreme in the Dharma; next I became King of the Kumbhāṇḍas, and met the buddha the Light of the Heavenly Crown — reverently making offerings to every one of them. Child of the Buddha, in every one of these destinies I took a body and made offerings to these six billion buddhas such as these; at the presence of each and every buddha, I taught and transformed boundless, measureless sentient beings; at the presence of each and every buddha, I attained every kind of samādhi-gate, every kind of dhāraṇī-gate, was fully endowed with every eloquence, every kind of wisdom, and every kind of Dharma-light, illumining the ocean of the ten directions and the ocean of every buddha-land, beholding the ocean of every buddha as though within a single kalpa; meeting every buddha, I reverently made offerings to them; and throughout every world, in kalpas as numerous as motes of dust in every world, wherever buddhas arose in the world, I met and reverently made offerings to every one of them in just the same way, hearing the Dharma and upholding it, guarding the true Dharma — cultivating this very Dharma-gate at the presence of every buddha."
Fazang divides this whole passage into three exact movements: 先總舉數、二別列十佛及轉受十生、三總結六十億佛一一得法 — "first, a general statement of the number; second, individually listing ten buddhas and the ten rebirths undergone in turn; third, a general conclusion that the Dharma was attained at every one of the sixty koṭis of buddhas." The ten rebirths he counts do not each carry a distinct social role of their own — the account names only eight roles in all, since the king Great Wisdom and the asura king each remain in place long enough to meet two buddhas in succession — but Fazang's own tally still counts ten, matching the ten buddhas one for one, since each encounter is itself counted as its own occasion of taking rebirth to meet a buddha. Six billion is, by any reckoning, a number no single life could offer to one by one; the text does not attempt it, closing instead with the same gesture used throughout this teacher's whole testimony — naming a precise few, then folding the vast remainder into a single, general act of homage.
Part 117 In Progress
Two kalpas — Virtuous Light and Sunlight — are now both complete, along with a final general vow to have met and honored buddhas across kalpas beyond counting. Part 118 turns from prose to verse, as this same night-deva retells the entire account from its very beginning in thirty-six stanzas.
Continue to Part 118 →