The Fire at the End of an Aeon
The catalogue continues through a stretch of jewels, plants, and cosmic imagery: a wondrous flower every world delights in; white sandalwood, removing the feverish sicknesses of the five desires; a musical instrument, its sound heard throughout the dharma-realm; a valiant hero; tweezers pulling out every thorn of the afflictions; a sovereign lord surpassed by nothing; the heavenly king Vaiśravaṇa, casting away every poverty; a wondrous virtue and an ornament; the fire at the end of an aeon, burning away every conditioned dharma; the root of an indestructible medicine-tree; a nāga-pearl, a water-clarifying pearl, and a wish-fulfilling pearl; a heavenly vase of virtue; the tree of the aeon's beginning; a robe untouched by any dust; right action, whose own nature is pure; and a sharp plow, cultivating the field of every sentient being.
Nāga-Pearl, Water-Clarifying Pearl, and Wish-Fulfilling Pearl
菩提心者，則為妙華，一切世間所愛樂故；菩提心者，則為白栴檀，除滅五欲諸熱病故；菩提心者，則為樂器，微妙音聲聞法界故；菩提心者，則為勇健，摧滅煩惱諸怨敵故；菩提心者，則為善鑷，拔出一切煩惱刺故；菩提心者，則為尊主，於餘一切莫能勝故；菩提心者，則為毘沙門天王，捨離一切諸貧苦故；菩提心者，則為妙德，莊嚴一切諸功德故；菩提心者，則為莊嚴具，嚴飾一切諸菩薩故；菩提心者，則為火災，焚燒一切有為法故；菩提心者，則為無壞藥王樹根，長養一切諸佛法故；菩提心者，則為龍珠，除滅無量煩惱毒故；菩提心者，則為水珠，淨諸心垢煩惱濁故；菩提心者，則為如意珠，具足一切功德利故；菩提心者，則為天德瓶，滿足一切所欲樂故；菩提心者，則為劫初樹，出生一切莊嚴具故；菩提心者，則為恒娑衣，不受一切諸塵垢故；菩提心者，則為正業，本性淨故；菩提心者，則為利犁，修治一切眾生田故；
"…the mind of bodhi is a wondrous flower, for every world delights in and loves it; the mind of bodhi is white sandalwood, for it removes the feverish sicknesses of the five desires; the mind of bodhi is a musical instrument, for its subtle and wondrous sound is heard throughout the dharma-realm; the mind of bodhi is a valiant hero, for it subdues and destroys every enemy of the afflictions; the mind of bodhi is good tweezers, for they pull out every thorn of the afflictions; the mind of bodhi is a sovereign lord, for nothing else at all can surpass it; the mind of bodhi is the heavenly king Vaiśravaṇa, for it casts away every poverty and hardship; the mind of bodhi is a wondrous virtue, for it adorns every merit; the mind of bodhi is an ornament, for it adorns and beautifies every bodhisattva; the mind of bodhi is the fire at the end of an aeon, for it burns away every conditioned dharma; the mind of bodhi is the root of the indestructible king-of-medicine tree, for it nurtures every buddha-dharma; the mind of bodhi is a nāga-pearl, for it removes the poison of boundless afflictions; the mind of bodhi is a water-clarifying pearl, for it purifies the defilement and turbidity of the afflicted mind; the mind of bodhi is a wish-fulfilling pearl, for it is endowed with the benefit of every merit; the mind of bodhi is a heavenly vase of virtue, for it satisfies every wish and joy; the mind of bodhi is the tree of the aeon's beginning, for it brings forth every ornament; the mind of bodhi is a robe untouched by any dust, for it takes on no defilement at all; the mind of bodhi is right action, for its own nature is pure; the mind of bodhi is a sharp plow, for it cultivates and clears the field of every sentient being;"
"The fire at the end of an aeon" (火災, one of the three great conflagrations Buddhist cosmology holds will eventually consume a world-system) is an unusually severe image for bodhicitta — not a gentle purifying flame but a total, cosmic-scale destruction, applied here to the mind of bodhi's capacity to burn away every conditioned dharma without remainder. Fazang reads its placement beside gentler images (a wondrous flower, an ornament) as characteristic of this catalogue's method throughout: no single register of imagery is allowed to dominate for long, so that bodhicitta is shown capable of both the tenderest nurturing and the most total, irreversible transformation.
Part 338 In Progress
The catalogue's martial and medicinal imagery is only beginning. Part 339 turns to the Nārāyaṇa arrow, renunciation, a spear, an ambrosial rain, a sword, a hammer, a blade, and a banner that topples every banner of every māra.
Continue to Part 339 →