Steadying the Stance Before the Arrow Flies
The catalogue turns to two similes of skill and craft: it is like a person learning some great technique — though he has not yet mastered it fully, every other lesser, skillful craft is already unable to match him; a bodhisattva-mahāsattva is likewise, and in learning the vow of the mind of bodhi, though he has not yet mastered it fully, every other sentient being — the śrāvaka and pratyekabuddha included — is already unable to match him. It is like a person learning the skillful art of archery, who first steadies his own stance before he ever looses an arrow; a bodhisattva-mahāsattva is likewise, and in learning the ground of all-wisdom, he must first establish the mind of bodhi before he is able to attain every buddha-dharma.
A Partial Skill Already Surpassing, a Stance Steadied First
「譬如有人學大技術，雖未究竟，諸餘巧能所不能及。菩薩摩訶薩亦復如是，學菩提心願，雖未究竟，聲聞、緣覺諸餘眾生，所不能及。
「譬如有人學善射術，先自安立。菩薩摩訶薩亦復如是，學一切智地，先自安立菩提之心，必得一切佛法。
"It is like a person learning some great technique — though he has not yet brought it to its full consummation, every other lesser, skillful craft is already unable to match him. A bodhisattva-mahāsattva is likewise: in learning the vow of the mind of bodhi, though he has not yet brought it to its full consummation, every other sentient being, the śrāvaka and pratyekabuddha included, is already unable to match him.
"It is like a person learning the skillful art of archery, who first steadies and establishes his own stance before doing anything else. A bodhisattva-mahāsattva is likewise: in learning the ground of all-wisdom, he first steadies and establishes the mind of bodhi, and thereby is certain to attain every buddha-dharma."
These two similes together make a structural claim distinct from the birth-precedence similes of the preceding part: rather than claiming bodhicitta's superiority is present from the very start regardless of subsequent practice, they claim that bodhicitta functions as a necessary foundation — the archer's stance, established first, that everything skillful afterward depends on. Fazang reads the pairing as complementary rather than redundant: bodhicitta is at once already superior in its earliest, unconsummated form (as the previous similes showed) and also functionally foundational to every later attainment (as these similes show) — two related but distinct claims about the same single mind.
Part 367 Complete
Two more similes are now given in full. Part 368 turns to a master illusionist who studies his own art before ever performing it, and to the paradoxical nature of illusion itself, which manifests form from what possesses no form at all.
Continue to Part 368 →