Welcome, Pure and Upright Mind of Wisdom
Maitreya, surveying Sudhana and pointing him out before the great assembly, praises his own qualities: this is the youth Sudhana, of pure and upright mind and wisdom, who has come seeking only the bodhisattva's own practice. Welcome, great cloud of compassion, able to rain the ambrosial Dharma; welcome, upright mind of unwearying diligence; welcome, unbroken practice, ever seeking a good friend; welcome, pure path, abiding in the treasury of merit.
Maitreya Opens a Second Hymn, Addressed to Sudhana Himself
爾時，彌勒菩薩摩訶薩觀察善財，指示大眾，歎其功德，以偈頌曰：
「善財童子者， 淨直心智慧，
專求菩薩行， 而來至我所。
善來大悲雲， 能雨甘露法，
具足三淨眼， 菩薩行無厭。
善來正直心， 精進無懈惓，
諸根悉調伏， 專求菩薩行。
善來無壞行， 常求善知識，
了達一切法， 教化諸群生。
善來清淨道， 安住功德藏，
勇猛精進力， 逮得最勝地。」
At that time, the bodhisattva-mahāsattva Maitreya, surveying Sudhana and pointing him out before the great assembly, praised his merit, speaking a verse, saying:
"This is the youth Sudhana, of pure and upright mind and wisdom,
Who has come, seeking only the bodhisattva's own practice, to where I am.
Welcome, great cloud of compassion, able to rain the ambrosial Dharma,
Endowed with the three pure eyes, unwearying in the bodhisattva's own practice.
Welcome, upright mind of unfailing diligence,
Every faculty tamed, seeking only the bodhisattva's own practice.
Welcome, unbroken practice, ever seeking a good friend,
Who has fully realized every dharma, teaching and transforming every multitude of beings.
Welcome, pure path, abiding in the treasury of merit,
Whose power of valiant diligence has attained the most supreme ground."
Maitreya's own hymn opens by naming Sudhana directly before the assembled crowd, an echo in reverse of how Sudhana's own hymn addressed Maitreya several parts earlier — the two teachers each now praise the other in extended verse, a symmetry Fazang reads as marking Sudhana's own arrival at a kind of parity with his teacher, even as he has not yet formally attained anything further. The refrain "welcome" (善來, a customary greeting also carrying the sense of "well have you come") recurs through nearly every stanza of what will prove another very long hymn, each time naming a different one of Sudhana's own accomplished qualities in turn.
Part 323 In Progress
Maitreya's second great hymn has only just begun. Part 324 continues with further stanzas of welcome, praising Sudhana as one difficult to see, one who is equanimous before gain and loss, and one whose mind is free of flattery and deceit.
Continue to Part 324 →