"If You Are Able to Accept This"
The prince restates his vow in verse — purifying every defiled land, delivering every assembly through skillful means, relinquishing everything, within and without — and closes with the condition itself made explicit: that his own wife and children will one day be given away to whoever comes seeking them. Only if she can accept this, he says, will he accept her.
Eight Stanzas: A Vow Restated, and a Direct Condition
「爾時，太子重為彼女而說偈言：
「『哀愍眾生故， 我發菩提心，
無量無數劫， 積集智功德。
無量劫海中， 修習諸大願，
廣修菩薩行， 具足一切地。
三世諸佛所， 學六波羅蜜，
聞法能修行， 專求菩薩道。
十方垢濁剎， 我悉令嚴淨，
除滅諸群生， 三惡道苦患。
以諸方便力， 廣度一切眾，
除滅愚癡闇， 住一切智道。
供養諸佛海， 淨修一切地，
發起大慈悲， 內外一切捨。
若我施來求， 妻子諸眷屬，
在家及出家， 汝莫作障礙。
若能如是者， 我則納受汝。』」
At that time, the prince spoke a further verse to that girl, saying:
"Out of compassion for sentient beings, I raised the mind of awakening; throughout boundless, countless kalpas, I accumulate wisdom and merit.
Throughout the ocean of boundless kalpas, I cultivate every great vow, broadly practicing the bodhisattva's own practice, becoming fully endowed with every ground.
At the presence of the buddhas of the three times, I study the six pāramitās; hearing the Dharma, I am able to practice it, single-mindedly seeking the bodhisattva's own path.
Every defiled and turbid land of the ten directions, I shall cause to become entirely adorned and pure, extinguishing the suffering and affliction of the sprouting multitudes in the three evil destinies.
Through the power of every skillful means, I broadly deliver every assembly, extinguishing the darkness of folly and delusion, abiding in the path of omniscience.
Making offerings to the ocean of every buddha, purely cultivating every ground, raising great loving-kindness and compassion, relinquishing everything, within and without.
If, when I give to those who come seeking, my own wife, children, and every one of my retinue — whether as a householder or after leaving the household life — you must not become an obstruction.
If you are able to accept this, then I shall accept you."
The prince's own verse widens his vow to the scale this collection has used for its bodhisattvas throughout — purifying "every defiled and turbid land of the ten directions," delivering "every assembly" — before narrowing, in its final two stanzas, back to the single, brutally specific condition his prose already named: that she herself, and any children they have together, may one day be given away as an act of the very generosity he has just described in cosmic terms. The proposal, restated a second time in verse, is now explicit rather than implied, and the final line — "if you are able to accept this, then I shall accept you" — makes her own answer, not his desire, the deciding factor.
Part 166 In Progress
The prince's condition is now stated plainly, twice over. Part 167 turns to the girl's own answer — an unconditional acceptance, offered in verse, of every hardship his vow might one day bring her.
Continue to Part 167 →