Dharma-Jewel Crest, and the Ten-Storied House
Sudhana takes leave of Nectar Crown and journeys to the city Lion's Layered Pavilion, where the elder Dharma-Jewel Crest takes his hand and leads him home: "Good son, come and behold my house." Ten stories rise above eight gates, each story filled with a different order of bodhisattvas, up to the tathāgatas themselves on the very top — the fruit, the elder explains, of a single offering long ago, dedicated toward three ends. The fifth teacher of the Ten Practices.
"Come Behold My House": the Ten-Storied Mansion
時，善財童子歡喜踊躍，頭面敬禮，遶無數匝，如弟子法。作如是念：「因善知識得一切智，於善知識生無壞心，聞善知識教悉能隨順，調伏諸根。」作是念已，辭退南行。
爾時，善財童子正念如意功德寶藏法門，守護彼功德藏，淨彼功德須彌山王，得彼功德海之源底，開彼功德藏，觀彼功德藏，圓滿清淨彼功德藏，攝彼功德藏，出生長養彼功德藏力。漸漸遊行，至於彼城，周遍推求長者法寶周羅，於道遇見，頭面禮足，合掌恭敬，於一面住，白言：「大聖！我已先發阿耨多羅三藐三菩提心，而未知菩薩云何學菩薩行、修菩薩道？」
時，彼長者執善財手，將歸其家：「善男子！且觀我家。」爾時，善財遍觀舍宅，悉閻浮檀金色，七寶為牆，周匝圍遶；瑠璃莊嚴，硨磲為柱，敷赤真珠寶師子座，建師子寶幢，張瑠璃寶帳，如意珠網羅覆其上，阿僧祇寶而莊嚴之；馬碯寶池，八功德水盈滿其中；一切寶樹周匝圍遶，其宅廣大十重八門。
爾時，善財見最下重設眾肴膳，惠施一切；見第二重施雜寶衣；見第三重施惠一切寶莊嚴具；見第四重施內眷屬，悉履善行，巧於語言；見第五重乃至五住菩薩雲集其中，結集正法，離世間樂，出一切論諸陀羅尼三昧法印，分別三昧智慧光明；見第六重得般若波羅蜜菩薩充滿其中，具甚深智，得寂靜明智慧藏地無礙法門，超出三有境界無礙，念不二法，結集般若波羅蜜門，分別解說般若波羅蜜門，所謂：寂滅藏般若波羅蜜門、分別一切眾生般若波羅蜜門、不動轉般若波羅蜜門、離欲普照般若波羅蜜門、不可壞藏般若波羅蜜門、一切眾生淨眼般若波羅蜜門、海藏般若波羅蜜門、普眼般若波羅蜜門、一切無盡方便海般若波羅蜜門、隨順眾生普照無礙般若波羅蜜門、慶雲漸下般若波羅蜜門，結集如是等百萬阿僧祇般若波羅蜜門，彼菩薩眾不可說莊嚴而莊嚴之；見第七重響忍菩薩充滿其中，出方便智，悉能聞持諸佛法雲；見第八重常住菩薩充滿其中，具諸神通，遍一切剎，照一切眾生、一切法界，具足法身，詣一切佛無所障礙，悉能受持一切佛法，見第九重補處菩薩充滿其中，見第十重一切如來充滿其中，從初發心，修菩薩行，超出生死，滿足大願，神力自在，一切佛剎及其眷屬轉淨法輪，化度眾生顯現住持。
At that time Sudhana the Boy, leaping with joy, bowed his head in reverence, circled him countless times, exactly as a disciple should. He thought thus: "Through this good spiritual friend I have attained omniscience; toward this good spiritual friend I give rise to a mind that cannot be destroyed; hearing this good spiritual friend's teaching, I am able to follow it entirely, taming and subduing every faculty." Having thought this, he took his leave and journeyed on to the south.
At that time Sudhana the Boy, rightly holding in mind the Dharma-gate of the Wish-Fulfilling Treasury of Merit, guarded that treasury of merit, purified that Sumeru-king of merit, reached the very source and bottom of that ocean of merit, opened that treasury of merit, contemplated that treasury of merit, made perfectly pure that treasury of merit, gathered in that treasury of merit, and gave rise to and nurtured the power of that treasury of merit. Gradually journeying on, he arrived at that city, and searched everywhere for the elder Dharma-Jewel Crest; meeting him upon the road, he bowed his head at his feet, and, joining his palms in reverence, stood to one side, and said: "Great sage! I have already raised the mind of unsurpassed, perfect, complete awakening, and I do not yet know how a bodhisattva learns the bodhisattva's own practice, cultivates the bodhisattva path?"
At that time this elder took hold of Sudhana's hand, and led him back to his own household: "Good son, come and behold my house." At that time Sudhana surveyed the whole dwelling: it was entirely the color of Jambū-river gold, its wall of seven jewels surrounding it on every side; adorned with lapis lazuli, its pillars of giant clam-shell, spread with a lion-throne of red pearls, a lion-banner of jewels raised, a canopy of lapis lazuli jewels spread wide, a net of wish-fulfilling jewels covering over it all, adorned with countless jewels; a pool of agate jewels, filled with the water of the eight excellent qualities; every kind of jeweled tree surrounded it on every side, and the house itself, vast in extent, rose ten stories high with eight gates.
At that time Sudhana beheld, on the very lowest story, every kind of food and delicacy laid out, bestowed freely upon everyone; on the second story he beheld every kind of jeweled robe given as gift; on the third story he beheld every kind of jeweled ornament given as gift; on the fourth story he beheld the household's own retinue, every one of them treading the path of goodness, skillful in speech; on the fifth story, bodhisattvas dwelling even at the fifth ground gathered there like clouds, compiling the true Dharma, forsaking worldly pleasure, bringing forth every discourse, dhāraṇī, samādhi, and Dharma-seal, discerning the light of samādhi's own wisdom; on the sixth story, bodhisattvas who had attained the perfection of wisdom filled the whole story, endowed with profound wisdom, having attained the unobstructed Dharma-gate of the tranquil, bright treasury-ground of wisdom, transcending the domain of the three states of existence without obstruction, holding in mind the non-dual Dharma, compiling the gates of the perfection of wisdom, discerning and expounding the gates of the perfection of wisdom — namely: the gate of the perfection of wisdom that is the treasury of tranquil extinction, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that discerns every sentient being, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that is unmoving and unchanging, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that is free of desire and universally illumines, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that is an indestructible treasury, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that is the pure eye of every sentient being, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that is an ocean treasury, the gate of the perfection of wisdom of the universal eye, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that is an inexhaustible ocean of skillful means, the gate of the perfection of wisdom that accords with sentient beings and illumines universally without obstruction, and the gate of the perfection of wisdom of an auspicious cloud gradually descending — compiling gates of the perfection of wisdom such as these, a million incalculables in number, that assembly of bodhisattvas adorned it with adornments beyond telling; on the seventh story, bodhisattvas who had attained the forbearance of things being like an echo filled the whole story, bringing forth the wisdom of skillful means, able to hear and uphold every cloud of every buddha's own Dharma entirely; on the eighth story, bodhisattvas abiding permanently filled the whole story, endowed with every spiritual power, pervading every land, illumining every sentient being and the whole Dharma-realm, fully endowed with the Dharma-body, going before every buddha without any obstruction, able to receive and uphold every buddha's own Dharma entirely; on the ninth story he beheld bodhisattvas bound for buddhahood in one more lifetime filling the whole story; and on the tenth story he beheld every tathāgata filling the whole story, from their very first raising of the mind, cultivating the bodhisattva's own practice, transcending birth and death, fulfilling the great vow, sovereign in spiritual power, turning the pure Dharma-wheel throughout every buddha-land and its own retinue, transforming and delivering sentient beings, manifesting their own abiding and sustaining power.
Fazang marks this as the fifth of the Ten Practices, "the Practice of Freedom from Delusion and Confusion" (離癡亂行). He glosses the city's name, 十德疊起，狀類重閣。諸佛菩薩雄猛之士處在彼位，故云師子 — "ten virtues piled up in succession, in a form resembling a layered pavilion; and because every buddha and bodhisattva, valiant and heroic, dwells in that very position, it is called 'Lion.'" On the elder's own name he adds a precision easy to miss: 周羅此云頂髻，則以法成人，寶為頂髻。天竺本云有法長者名寶周羅 — "'Crest' means the topknot at the crown of the head; thus, one who is completed as a person through the Dharma, with the jewel itself as his topknot. The Indian original in fact reads 'the elder possessed of Dharma, named Jewel Crest'" — meaning "Dharma" describes the elder's own quality, while "Jewel Crest" is properly his name alone; this page keeps the established compound rendering "Dharma-Jewel Crest" for continuity with his own referral in the previous part, while noting Fazang's own finer distinction here.
The ten-storied house is, for Fazang, the richest single image encountered in some time, and he offers three readings of it in turn. The first, from earlier masters, reads each story as one of the Ten Grounds in sequence: giving food is the first ground's practice of giving; giving jeweled robes, the second ground's robe of conscience and precept; giving jeweled ornaments, the third ground's patience adorning the body; the household's own skillful retinue, the fourth ground's practices aiding the factors of awakening; the fifth story's compiling of the true Dharma, the fifth ground's mastery of the five sciences; the sixth story's eleven prajñā-gates, the sixth ground's wisdom manifest directly; the seventh story's echo-forbearance, the seventh ground's realization that every teaching shares one meaning; the eighth story's permanently-abiding bodhisattvas, the eighth ground's Dharma-realm without increase or decrease, sovereign over all three worlds; the ninth story, the ninth ground's upholding of the Buddha-dharma; and the ninth-story bodhisattvas bound for one more lifetime together with the tenth story's tathāgatas mark, respectively, the tenth ground's reception of consecration and the stage of Sublime Awakening itself.
Fazang's second reading turns the same ten stories around entirely, mapping them instead onto the Ten Practices — this teacher's own stage — from the first story's giving of food as "the Practice of Joy" (the very practice named for the first teacher of this stage) up to the tenth story's tathāgatas as "the Practice of Truth," since a single position contains every position within it. He draws out the doubled structure explicitly: the Ten Practices, as a whole, subsume the Ten Abodes before them and the Ten Transferences and Ten Grounds after; and, having subsumed every stage this way, this fifth practice then subsumes all ten practices again within itself alone. He draws the comparison directly to an earlier teacher already met on this pilgrimage: 前海幢比丘在十住位，頂佛說法，還此以十住門攝一切位；今此長者在十行位，所居之宅，還以十行門攝一切位。是即兩處攝義齊也 — "earlier, the monk Sāgaradhvaja, standing at the position of the Ten Abodes, had buddhas crown his very head in teaching, and this too subsumed every position by the gate of the Ten Abodes; now this elder, standing at the position of the Ten Practices, does the very same through the house he dwells in. The principle of subsumption is identical in both places" — differing only in whether it is expressed through a crowning buddha or a dwelling house, a difference of relative rank, not of the underlying principle. A third reading sets rank aside altogether and simply groups the ten stories into four pairs of increasing depth — giving of goods, giving of Dharma, receiving Dharma, and manifesting excellent virtue — each pair harder or deeper than the last. On the biography that follows, Fazang maps it just as precisely: the first four stories are the fruit of the elder's ancient dedication toward ending poverty, and the fifth story and above are the fruit of his dedication toward constantly beholding buddhas and hearing the true Dharma. He records the Dharma-gate's Indian original as "attaining the bodhisattva's liberation named the Adornment of the Bodhimaṇḍa through the Unobstructed Vow" — the ten-storied house itself being the "adorned bodhimaṇḍa," and the ancient vow that built it, penetrating to its subtlest degree, the "unobstructed vow."
A Vow Made to a Single Buddha, Long Ago
爾時，善財見如是等奇特事已，白言：「大聖！我未曾見如是清淨大眾，昔於何處種諸善根，今得如是勝妙果報？」
「善男子！我憶過去無量光明法界普莊嚴王如來、應供、等正覺、明行足、善逝、世間解、無上士、調御丈夫、天人師、佛、世尊，出興于世。彼佛入城，我以香華妓樂而供養之；供養已，持此善根迴向三處，謂：滅除貧苦、常見諸佛菩薩及善知識、恒聞正法故獲斯報。善男子！我唯知此滿足大願法門，諸大寶海菩薩得不可壞清淨法身、不可壞法雲普覆一切、具足成就不可壞功德、不可壞大功德網普覆一切、入不可壞三昧境界、具足菩薩不可壞善根、住不可壞如來所住不可壞智慧究竟三世、住一切劫而無疲倦、住不可壞普眼境界地、我當云何能知、能說彼功德行？善男子！於此南方，有一國土名實利根，城名普門，彼有長者名普眼妙香；汝詣彼問云何菩薩學菩薩行、修菩薩道。」
At that time Sudhana, having beheld wonders such as these, said: "Great sage! Never before have I beheld so pure a great assembly — in what place, in ages past, did you plant such roots of goodness, that you have now attained a fruit and recompense as excellent as this?"
"Good son, I recall that, in ages past, there arose in the world the Tathāgata Boundless Light Universally Adorning the Dharma-Realm's King — Worthy of Offerings, Perfectly and Fully Awakened, Perfect in Wisdom and Conduct, Well-Gone, Knower of the World, Unsurpassed, Tamer of Beings, Teacher of Gods and Humans, Buddha, World-Honored One. When that buddha entered the city, I made offering to him with incense, flowers, and music; having made this offering, I dedicated this root of goodness toward three ends — namely, the extinguishing of poverty and suffering, the constant beholding of every buddha, bodhisattva, and good spiritual friend, and the ceaseless hearing of the true Dharma — and it is for this reason that I have obtained this very recompense. Good son, I know only this Dharma-gate of the Fulfillment of the Great Vow; the great bodhisattvas of the ocean of great jewels attain an indestructible, pure Dharma-body, an indestructible cloud of Dharma universally covering everyone, fully accomplished, indestructible merit, an indestructible great net of merit universally covering everyone, entry into the domain of indestructible samādhi, the bodhisattva's own indestructible roots of goodness fully endowed, abiding in the indestructible abode of the Tathāgata, indestructible wisdom reaching to the very end of the three times, abiding through every eon without ever growing weary, and abiding in the ground of the indestructible domain of the universal eye. How could I possibly know, how could I possibly speak of, such merit and practice as this? Good son, to the south of here there is a land, named Truly Sharp Faculties; its city is named Universal Gate; there is an elder there, named Universal Eye, Sublime Fragrance. Go to him and ask how a bodhisattva learns the bodhisattva's own practice, cultivates the bodhisattva path."
Fazang reads the closing list of ten "indestructible" qualities as united by a single reason given three times over: 皆云不可壞者，德窮滿故、無進昇故、不為緣動故 — "every one of them is called 'indestructible' because his virtue is utterly complete, because there is no further ascent still needed, and because it cannot be moved by any condition whatsoever." He notes that the Sanskrit original phrases the closing humility slightly differently from the Chinese as it stands: 依梵本云：我當云何能知彼功德、能說彼行 — "according to the Sanskrit original, it reads: 'how could I possibly know that merit, how could I possibly speak of that practice' " — a small variant in phrasing that changes nothing in sense, but one he records anyway, in keeping with his habit of noting even minor divergences between the Chinese translation before him and the Indian text it renders.
Part 35 Complete
This closes Part 35: Sudhana's arrival at Lion's Layered Pavilion, and the elder Dharma-Jewel Crest, fifth teacher of the Ten Practices, whose ten-storied house — the fruit of a single ancient offering dedicated toward three ends — Fazang reads at once as the Ten Grounds, as the Ten Practices folded within themselves, and as four pairs of ever-deepening generosity. Sudhana is sent onward, to the city Universal Gate, and the elder named Universal Eye, Sublime Fragrance.
Continue to Part 36 — Universal Eye, Sublime Fragrance, and Every Illness Healed →