A Mind That Seeks Nothing for Itself
The mother's twenty-four-stanza verse closes: her daughter's compassion for the poor, the sick, and those without refuge; her freedom from jealousy, intoxication, and anger; her diligence and pure precepts; and a wisdom without equal, devoted entirely to good and wise friends rather than to her own comfort.
Eight Stanzas: Compassion, Restraint, and a Wisdom Without Equal
「『此女修功德， 遠離女人法，
能轉眾生心， 唯願哀納受。
捨離嫉妬心， 不醉於五欲，
不起瞋恚心， 修習忍智慧。
精進持淨戒， 能辦一切事，
專求諸功德， 太子願納受。
若見諸貧窮， 老病眾苦逼，
無所歸依者， 大悲普慈念。
常欲利眾生， 不求自安樂，
功德莊嚴身， 饒益於一切。
於諸威儀中， 常修不放逸，
修習諸善法， 見者無不悅。
功德普莊嚴， 遠離染污心，
常求善知識， 恭敬樂供養。
修習大慈法， 棄捨怨結心，
智慧無與等， 唯願哀納受。』」
"This girl cultivates merit, departing far from the ways of ordinary women; she is able to turn sentient beings' own minds — I beg you, in compassion, to accept her.
She has relinquished and departed from jealousy and envy, and is not intoxicated by the five desires; she does not give rise to a mind of anger or hatred, and cultivates the wisdom of patience.
Diligent, upholding pure precepts, she is able to accomplish every task; single-mindedly seeking every merit — I beg the prince to accept her.
Whenever she beholds the poor and destitute, those pressed by old age, sickness, and every suffering, and those without any refuge, she holds them all in great compassion and universal loving-kindness.
She constantly wishes to benefit sentient beings, seeking no ease or happiness for herself; her body adorned with merit, she brings benefit to all.
In her every dignified bearing, she constantly cultivates freedom from negligence, cultivating every wholesome dharma; there is none who beholds her who is not delighted.
Universally adorned with merit, she departs far from every defiled mind, constantly seeking good and wise friends, reverently and joyfully making offerings to them.
Cultivating the dharma of great loving-kindness, she casts aside every mind of enmity and resentment; her wisdom without equal — I beg you, in compassion, to accept her."
The mother's own repeated refrain — "I beg you, in compassion, to accept her" — frames this entire twenty-four-stanza portrait as a plea offered on the girl's own behalf, yet nearly everything catalogued across it describes a mind that "seeks no ease or happiness for herself," constantly seeking good and wise friends rather than worldly attachment. The mother appears to be arguing for a marriage while describing, in exhaustive detail, someone whose entire disposition already points away from marriage and toward the bodhisattva path — a tension the account has not yet resolved, but which the prince's own answer, still to come, will address directly.
Part 164 In Progress
The mother's full verse portrait is now complete. Part 165 turns to the prince's own answer — not to the marriage proposal directly, but a declaration of his own bodhisattva vow: to give away his kingdom, his family, and even his own body across boundless kalpas to come.
Continue to Part 165 →