The Forty-Eight Vows
四十八願
The vows themselves, in full: forty-eight conditional promises, each staking Dharmākara's own future buddhahood on whether a specific feature of his land comes true — restated in verse, and confirmed by a shaking earth.
- This part covers
- All forty-eight vows in prose; the vow restated as a devotional verse; the six-fold earthquake and celestial music confirming it; the countless aeons of practice that followed, still before Dharmākara's buddhahood.
- A version note
- Worth knowing before reading: this sūtra survives in five extant Chinese translations, and they do not agree on how many vows there are or how they are ordered — one early translation gives twenty-four, another gives thirty-six. Forty-eight is Saṃghavarman's count, translated here, and it is the count that became standard in later East Asian Pure Land practice.
11. The Forty-Eight Vows
Each vow follows the same form: "Suppose I become a buddha — if such-and-such is not so, may I not attain to true awakening." The short English names given here follow a traditional mnemonic convention used across later Pure Land literature to refer to individual vows by number; they are not part of Saṃghavarman's original translation, which gives the vows no titles at all.
| Vow | Chinese Source | Ru-Yi Translation |
|---|---|---|
| 1. No Evil Destinies | 設我得佛，國有地獄餓鬼畜生者，不取正覺。 | Suppose I become a buddha: if my land contains hell-beings, hungry ghosts, or animals, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 2. No Return to the Evil Paths | 設我得佛，國中天人壽終之後，復更三惡道者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land, after their lives there end, should fall back into the three evil paths, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 3. Bodies of True Gold | 設我得佛，國中天人不悉真金色者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land are not all the color of true gold, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 4. One Form, No High or Low | 設我得佛，國中天人形色不同有好醜者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land differ in form, some fair and some ill-favored, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 5. Knowledge of Past Lives | 設我得佛，國中天人不識宿命，下至知百千億那由他諸劫事者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land do not know their own past lives, down to the events of a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of aeons, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 6. The Divine Eye | 設我得佛，國中天人不得天眼，下至見百千億那由他諸佛國者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land do not gain the divine eye, down to seeing a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of buddha-lands, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 7. The Divine Ear | 設我得佛，國中天人不得天耳，下至聞百千億那由他諸佛所說，不悉受持者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land do not gain the divine ear, down to hearing and holding in mind the teachings of a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of buddhas, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 8. Knowing the Minds of Others | 設我得佛，國中天人不得見他心智，下至知百千億那由他諸佛國中眾生心念者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land do not attain the wisdom to perceive others' minds, down to knowing the thoughts of beings throughout a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of buddha-lands, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 9. Unobstructed Spiritual Passage | 設我得佛，國中天人不得神足於一念頃，下至不能超過百千億那由他諸佛國者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land cannot, in a single instant of thought, pass beyond a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of buddha-lands, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 10. Free of Attachment to the Body | 設我得佛，國中天人若起想念貪計身者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land give rise to any thought of greed or reckoning attached to the body, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 11. Abiding in the Assurance of Nirvāṇa | 設我得佛，國中天人不住定聚必至滅度者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land do not abide in the assembly of the rightly settled, certain to reach final nirvāṇa, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 12. Immeasurable Light | 設我得佛，光明有能限量，下至不照百千億那由他諸佛國者，不取正覺。 | If my light can be measured or limited, down to failing to illumine a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of buddha-lands, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 13. Immeasurable Life | 設我得佛，壽命有能限量，下至百千億那由他劫者，不取正覺。 | If my own lifespan can be measured or limited, even to a hundred thousand koṭis of nayutas of aeons, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 14. Countless Śrāvakas | 設我得佛，國中聲聞有能計量，乃至三千大千世界眾生悉成緣覺，於百千劫悉共計校，知其數者，不取正覺。 | If the śrāvakas in my land could be numbered — even if every being in a great trichiliocosm became a pratyekabuddha, and all of them spent a hundred thousand aeons together reckoning, and could know the number — may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 15. Life-Span at Will | 設我得佛，國中天人壽命，無能限量，除其本願修短自在。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | The lifespan of the gods and humans in my land shall be beyond measure, except where their own original vow freely determines it long or short; if it is not so, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 16. No Word of Evil Even Heard | 設我得佛，國中天人，乃至聞有不善名者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land should even hear the name of anything not good, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 17. Praised by Every Buddha | 設我得佛，十方世界無量諸佛，不悉咨嗟稱我名者，不取正覺。 | If the immeasurable buddhas of the ten directions do not all praise and proclaim my name, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 18. Rebirth Assured by Ten Recitations | 設我得佛，十方眾生，至心信樂，欲生我國，乃至十念，若不生者，不取正覺。唯除五逆，誹謗正法。 | If the beings of the ten directions, with a sincere mind, believing and rejoicing, wish to be born in my land, and call my name to mind even ten times, and are not then born there, may I not attain to true awakening — excepting only those who commit the five heinous transgressions or slander the true Dharma. |
| 19. Met at the Hour of Death | 設我得佛，十方眾生，發菩提心，修諸功德，至心發願，欲生我國。臨壽終時，假令不與大眾圍繞現其人前者，不取正覺。 | If beings of the ten directions who have given rise to the mind of awakening, cultivated every merit, and with a sincere mind vowed to be born in my land, do not, at the hour of death, find me appearing before them with a great assembly surrounding me, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 20. Every Wish to Be Born There Fulfilled | 設我得佛，眾生聞我名號，繫念我國，植眾德本。至心回向，欲生我國。不果遂者，不取正覺。 | If beings who hear my name, fix their thoughts on my land, plant every root of virtue, and dedicate it with a sincere mind, wishing to be born in my land, do not have that wish fulfilled, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 21. The Thirty-Two Marks | 設我得佛，國中天人，不悉成滿三十二大人相者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land do not all perfectly possess the thirty-two marks of a great being, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 22. One More Birth from Buddhahood | 設我得佛，他方佛土諸菩薩眾，來生我國，究竟必至一生補處。除其本願自在所化，為眾生故，被弘誓鎧，積累德本，度脫一切。游諸佛國，修菩薩行，供養十方諸佛如來，開化恆沙無量眾生，立無上正真之道，超出常倫諸地之行，現前修習普賢之德。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | Bodhisattvas from other lands who come to be born in my land shall all, without exception, reach the stage of one more birth before buddhahood — except those who, by their own free vow, for the sake of beings, don the armor of the great vow, travel every buddha-land practicing the bodhisattva conduct, and, going beyond the ordinary stages, presently practice the virtue of Samantabhadra. If it is not so, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 23. Reaching Every Buddha at a Meal's Pace | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，承佛神力，供養諸佛。一食之頃，不能遍至無量無數億那由他諸佛國者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land, relying on the Buddha's power to make offerings to the buddhas, cannot, within the time it takes to eat a single meal, reach immeasurable, countless koṭis of nayutas of buddha-lands, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 24. Offerings as the Mind Wishes | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，在諸佛前，現其德本。諸所求欲供養之具，若不如意者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land, manifesting their roots of virtue before the buddhas, do not find every offering they seek appear exactly as they wish, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 25. Expounding the Wisdom of All Things | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，不能演說一切智者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land are unable to expound the wisdom that knows all things, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 26. A Body Like Nārāyaṇa's | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，不得金剛那羅延身者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land do not attain a body as indestructible as Nārāyaṇa's, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 27. Every Thing Adorned Beyond Reckoning | 設我得佛，國中天人，一切萬物，嚴淨光麗，形色殊特，窮微極妙，無能稱量。其諸眾生，乃至逮得天眼，有能明了辨其名數者，不取正覺。 | If the myriad things of my land are not adorned and radiant beyond compare, of such subtlety that they cannot be measured — such that even a being with the divine eye could name their number — may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 28. The Towering Bodhi Tree, Seen by All | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，乃至少功德者，不能知見其道場樹無量光色高四百萬里者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land, even those of little merit, are unable to see the tree of awakening, its immeasurable light and color, rising four million li in height, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 29. Eloquence from Studying the Scriptures | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，若受讀經法，諷誦持說，而不得辯才智慧者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land, on receiving, reading, reciting, and expounding the scriptures, do not thereby gain eloquence and wisdom, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 30. Wisdom and Eloquence Without Limit | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，智慧辯才，若可限量者，不取正覺。 | If the wisdom and eloquence of the bodhisattvas of my land could be measured or limited, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 31. A Land That Mirrors the Ten Directions | 設我得佛，國土清淨，皆悉照見十方一切無量無數不可思議諸佛世界，猶如明鏡，睹其面像。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | My land shall be so pure that it shall clearly reflect all the buddha-worlds of the ten directions, exactly as a bright mirror shows a face; if it is not so, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 32. Jeweled Fragrance, Wondrously Adorned | 設我得佛，自地已上，至於虛空，宮殿樓觀，池流華樹，國中所有一切萬物，皆以無量雜寶，百千種香，而共合成。嚴飾奇妙，超諸天人。其香普熏十方世界，菩薩聞者，皆修佛行。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | From the ground up into the sky, everything in my land shall be formed together out of immeasurable jewels and a hundred thousand kinds of fragrance, pervading the ten directions, so that any bodhisattva who smells it takes up buddha-conduct; if it is not so, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 33. Touched by the Light, Made Gentle | 設我得佛，十方無量不可思議諸佛世界眾生之類，蒙我光明觸其體者，身心柔軟，超過天人。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If any being anywhere, touched upon the body by my light, does not find body and mind made gentle and soft, surpassing any deva or human, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 34. Hearing the Name, Attaining Acceptance | 設我得佛，十方無量不可思議諸佛世界眾生之類，聞我名字，不得菩薩無生法忍，諸深總持者，不取正覺。 | If any being who hears my name does not attain the bodhisattva's acceptance of the birthless nature of things, and every profound dhāraṇī, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 35. Freedom from Rebirth as a Woman | 設我得佛，十方無量不可思議諸佛世界，其有女人聞我名字，歡喜信樂，發菩提心，厭惡女身。壽終之後，復為女像者，不取正覺。 | If any woman who hears my name, rejoices with faith, gives rise to the mind of awakening, and wearies of her female body, should, after her life ends, take on a woman's form again, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 36. Pure Conduct Until Buddhahood | 設我得佛，十方無量不可思議諸佛世界諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，壽終之後，常修梵行，至成佛道。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas who hear my name do not, after their lives end, constantly practice pure conduct all the way to buddhahood, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 37. Honored by Gods and Humans | 設我得佛，十方無量不可思議諸佛世界諸天人民，聞我名字，五體投地，稽首作禮，歡喜信樂，修菩薩行。諸天世人，莫不致敬。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and people who hear my name do not throw themselves to the ground in homage, rejoice with faith, and take up the bodhisattva conduct — honored by every deva and person — may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 38. Robes That Appear at a Thought | 設我得佛，國中天人，欲得衣服，隨念即至。如佛所贊應法妙服，自然在身。若有裁縫染治浣濯者，不取正覺。 | If the gods and humans of my land, wishing for clothing, do not have wondrous, dharma-fitting robes appear naturally upon their bodies the instant they think of it — with no cutting, sewing, or washing needed — may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 39. Joy Equal to a Liberated Monk's | 設我得佛，國中天人所受快樂，不如漏盡比丘者，不取正覺。 | If the joy of the gods and humans of my land is not equal to that of a monk who has exhausted every outflow of affliction, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 40. Every Land Reflected in the Trees | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，隨意欲見十方無量嚴淨佛土，應時如意，於寶樹中，皆悉照見。猶如明鏡，睹其面像。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land, wishing to see the buddha-lands of the ten directions, cannot see them all at once, reflected in the jeweled trees like a mirror showing a face, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 41. No Deficiency in Any Faculty | 設我得佛，他方國土諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，至於得佛，諸根缺漏不具足者，不取正覺。 | If bodhisattvas of other lands who hear my name should, from then until their own buddhahood, have any faculty deficient, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 42. The Samādhi of Pure Liberation | 設我得佛，他方國土諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，皆悉逮得清淨解脫三昧。住是三昧，一發意頃，供養無量不可思議諸佛世尊，而不失定意。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If bodhisattvas who hear my name do not attain the samādhi of pure liberation, and, abiding in it, make offerings in a single thought to inconceivable buddhas without losing their settled mind, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 43. Reborn into a Noble House | 設我得佛，他方國土諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，壽終之後，生尊貴家。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If bodhisattvas who hear my name do not, after their lives end, take rebirth into a noble household, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 44. Delight That Perfects Every Virtue | 設我得佛，他方國土諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，歡喜踊躍，修菩薩行，具足德本。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If bodhisattvas who hear my name do not leap for joy, take up the bodhisattva conduct, and become fully endowed with every root of virtue, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 45. The Samādhi of Universal Equality | 設我得佛，他方國土諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，皆悉逮得普等三昧。住是三昧，至於成佛，常見到無量無邊不可思議如來。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If bodhisattvas who hear my name do not all attain the samādhi of universal equality, and, abiding in it until their own buddhahood, constantly behold immeasurable, inconceivable Tathāgatas, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 46. Hearing Whatever Teaching Is Wished | 設我得佛，國中菩薩，隨其志願所欲聞法，自然得聞。若不爾者，不取正覺。 | If the bodhisattvas of my land do not naturally hear whatever teaching they wish, according to their own resolve, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 47. Non-Retrogression on Hearing the Name | 設我得佛，他方國土諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，不即得至不退轉者，不取正覺。 | If bodhisattvas who hear my name do not at once reach the stage of non-retrogression, may I not attain to true awakening. |
| 48. Attaining the Three Kinds of Acceptance | 設我得佛，他方國土諸菩薩眾，聞我名字，不即得至第一第二第三法忍，於諸佛法，不能即得不退轉者，不取正覺。 | If bodhisattvas who hear my name do not at once reach the first, second, and third kinds of acceptance of the Dharma, and thereby attain non-retrogression regarding every buddha's teaching, may I not attain to true awakening. |
Huiyuan reads the forty-eight vows as falling into three natural groups, regardless of their numbered order: vows shaping Dharmākara's own future body and powers as a buddha (his light, his lifespan, his mastery of every dharma), vows shaping the physical land itself (its trees, its ground, its absence of evil destinies), and vows shaping the beings born there or reached by his name from elsewhere (their bodies, their faculties, what happens to anyone who merely hears "Amitābha" spoken). Reading the forty-eight this way, rather than strictly in order, makes clearer what the vows are actually doing: fewer than half concern the land at all. Most of them are vows about people — either the beings already born there, or beings anywhere in the universe who have simply heard the name.
Two vows carry disproportionate weight in the later tradition and deserve to be flagged here rather than left to blend into the list. The Eighteenth Vow — rebirth assured to anyone who calls the name to mind with sincerity even ten times, with the sole exception of the five heinous transgressions and slander of the true Dharma — became, centuries later, the single vow the Japanese Pure Land teacher Hōnen (法然, 1133–1212) singled out as "the King of Vows," the doctrinal center of an entire later tradition; this sūtra itself does not rank the vows against one another, and that later emphasis is a development well outside anything Huiyuan's own sixth-century commentary addresses. The exclusion clause in that same vow — that those guilty of the five heinous acts or slander of the Dharma are not covered by it — sits in visible tension with the sūtra's own later promise, in Part 5 of this translation, that even the lowest grade of rebirth remains open to almost anyone; commentators after Huiyuan spent considerable energy trying to reconcile the two passages, and this translation flags the tension honestly here rather than resolving it in advance.
12. The Vow Restated in Verse
我建超世願 必至無上道 斯願不滿足 誓不成等覺 我於無量劫 不為大施主 普濟諸貧苦 誓不成等覺 我至成佛道 名聲超十方 究竟靡不聞 誓不成等覺 離欲深正念 淨慧修梵行 志求無上尊 為諸天人師 神力演大光 普照無際土 消除三垢冥 明濟眾厄難 開彼智慧眼 滅此昏盲暗 閉塞諸惡道 通達善趣門 功祚成滿足 威曜朗十方 日月戢重暉 天光隱不現 為眾開法藏 廣施功德寶 常於大眾中 說法師子吼 供養一切佛 具足眾德本 願慧悉成滿 得為三界雄 如佛無礙智 通達靡不照 願我功德力 等此最勝尊 斯願若剋果 大千應感動 虛空諸天神 當雨珍妙華
I have established a vow that surpasses the world; I will surely reach the unsurpassed path. If this vow is not fulfilled, I swear I will not become a perfectly awakened one. Through immeasurable aeons, if I do not become a great giver, delivering fully every being in poverty and suffering, I swear I will not become a perfectly awakened one. When I reach the attainment of buddhahood, my renown shall surpass the ten directions; if it is not, in the end, heard everywhere, I swear I will not become a perfectly awakened one. Free of desire, deep in right mindfulness, with pure wisdom I shall practice pure conduct, resolved to seek the unsurpassed, honored one, to become teacher of every god and human. With spiritual power I shall send forth a great light, shining fully upon lands without limit, dispelling the darkness of the three defilements, and clearly delivering beings from every peril. I shall open for them the eye of wisdom, and dispel this dim and blinding dark; I shall close off every evil path, and open through to the gate of every good destiny. My merit and fortune shall be perfectly fulfilled, my majestic radiance bright across the ten directions; sun and moon shall fold away their doubled brightness, and the light of heaven itself will hide, unseen. For every being I shall open the treasury of the Dharma, and give freely the jewel of merit; always, in the midst of the great assembly, I shall teach the Dharma with a lion's roar. Making offerings to every buddha, I shall be fully endowed with every root of virtue; my vow and my wisdom fully perfected, I shall become hero of the three realms. Like the Buddha's unobstructed wisdom, penetrating everywhere, illumining all — may the power of my own merit equal this most supreme, honored one. If this vow should bear its fruit, let the great thousand worlds themselves be moved; let every god of the open sky rain down wondrous and precious flowers.
Two lines are worth marking for readers who only remember this sūtra as a set of forty-eight legal-sounding clauses: "sun and moon shall fold away their doubled brightness, and the light of heaven itself will hide, unseen," and "I shall teach the Dharma with a lion's roar." Huiyuan reads the verse as doing something the prose vows do not — restating the same forty-eight commitments not as conditions to be checked off but as a single continuous aspiration, sung rather than enumerated. He treats verse and prose in this sūtra as functionally paired throughout: prose sets the precise terms, verse carries the emotional weight of the same claim, a pattern this sūtra repeats several more times before it ends.
13. Confirmed by the Trembling Earth
佛告阿難：法藏比丘說此頌已，應時普地六種震動。天雨妙華以散其上。自然音樂空中讚言：決定必成無上正覺。於是法藏比丘，具足修滿如是大願，誠諦不虛超出世間深樂寂滅。
The Buddha said to Ānanda: "When the bhikṣu Dharmākara had spoken this verse, at that very moment the whole earth shook in six ways, and a rain of wondrous flowers fell from the sky and scattered down upon him; music sounded of itself in the air, praising him with these words: 'It is certain — he will surely attain unsurpassed, perfect awakening.' Thereupon the bhikṣu Dharmākara fully practiced and completely fulfilled vows such as these, true and sincere, without falsehood, and went far beyond the world into a deep joy of tranquil cessation."
A six-fold earthquake and unprompted celestial music recur at several key turning points across this sūtra — here, and again at the very end, when the whole teaching is finished. Huiyuan reads this as the sūtra's chosen sign of authentication for claims too large to be verified any other way: no listener in the assembly could confirm, on the spot, that a vow spoken by an ordinary monk would actually be fulfilled across incalculable future aeons, so the text supplies a cosmic response in its place — the same narrative function the six-fold earthquake serves at the opening of the Amitābha Sūtra's sister text, the Heart Sūtra's Prajñāpāramitā cousins, and elsewhere across the Mahāyāna canon.
14. Aeons of Practice, Vow Fulfilled
阿難。法藏比丘於其佛所，諸天魔梵龍神八部大眾之中，發斯弘誓建此願已，一向專志莊嚴妙土。所修佛國開廓廣大，超勝獨妙。建立常然，無衰無變。於不可思議兆載永劫，積殖菩薩無量德行。不生欲覺、瞋覺、害覺。不起欲想、瞋想、害想。不著色、聲、香、味、觸法。忍力成就，不計眾苦。少欲知足，無染恚癡。三昧常寂，智慧無礙。無有虛偽、諂曲之心。和顏軟語，先意承問。勇猛精進，志願無倦，專求清白之法。以慧利群生，恭敬三寶，奉事師長。以大莊嚴，具足眾行。令諸眾生，功德成就。住空、無相、無願之法。無作、無起，觀法如化。遠離麤言、自害、害彼、彼此俱害。修習善語、自利、利人、彼我兼利。棄國捐王，絕去財色。自行六波羅蜜。教人令行。無央數劫積功累德。隨其生處在意所欲。無量寶藏自然發應。教化安立無數眾生。住於無上正真之道。或為長者、居士、豪姓、尊貴。或為剎利國君、轉輪聖帝。或為六欲天主、乃至梵王。常以四事供養恭敬一切諸佛。如是功德不可稱說。口氣香潔如優鉢羅華。身諸毛孔出栴檀香。其香普熏無量世界。容色端正相好殊妙。其手常出無盡之寶。衣服飲食珍妙華香。諸蓋幢幡莊嚴之具。如是等事超諸天人，於一切法而得自在。
Ānanda, the bhikṣu Dharmākara, there before that buddha, in the midst of the devas, māras, brahmās, nāgas, spirits, and the eightfold host of beings, having set forth this great vow and established this resolve, turned single-mindedly to adorning his wondrous land. The buddha-land he cultivated was vast and expansive, surpassing and uniquely wondrous, established forever as it was, without decline and without change. Across inconceivable koṭis of long aeons, he accumulated and planted the bodhisattva's immeasurable virtuous conduct. He gave rise to no thought of desire, no thought of anger, no thought of harm; he raised no notion of desire, no notion of anger, no notion of harm. He did not cling to form, sound, smell, taste, touch, or mental objects. The power of his patience was accomplished, and he took no account of any suffering. Wanting little and knowing contentment, he was free of defilement, hatred, and delusion. His meditative concentration was constantly still, his wisdom unobstructed. He held no falsehood, no flattery, no crookedness of mind. With a gentle countenance and soft words, he anticipated others and attended to their questions before they were even asked. Courageous and diligent, his resolve never wearied, and he sought single-mindedly the pure and undefiled Dharma. With wisdom he benefited every being; he revered the Three Jewels and served his teachers and elders. With great adornment he was fully endowed with every practice, and brought about the accomplishment of merit in every being. He abided in the Dharma of emptiness, signlessness, and wishlessness, in what neither acts nor arises, beholding every dharma as a mere transformation. He kept far from coarse speech, from harming himself, from harming others, and from harming both at once; he practiced good speech, benefiting himself, benefiting others, and benefiting both together. He gave up his kingdom and renounced his throne, cutting himself off entirely from wealth and desire. He himself practiced the six perfections, and taught others to practice them as well. Across countless aeons he accumulated merit and stored up virtue. Wherever he took birth, whatever he wished for arose spontaneously of itself, and immeasurable treasuries answered his need without being sought. He taught, transformed, and firmly established countless beings, settling them in the unsurpassed, true, and right path. He appeared, as needed, as an elder, a householder, one of noble family or high rank; or as a kṣatriya lord, or a wheel-turning sage-king; or as one of the six lords of the desire heavens, or even as a Brahmā king. He constantly made offerings, with the four kinds of support, to every buddha, reverently and respectfully; and such merit as this cannot be told in full. The breath of his mouth was pure and fragrant like the utpala flower; from every pore of his body came the fragrance of sandalwood, and that fragrance pervaded worlds beyond number. His countenance was upright and fine, his features rare and wondrous. From his hands there came forth, without end, an inexhaustible store of treasures — robes, food and drink, rare flowers and incense, canopies, banners, and every kind of adornment. Things such as these surpassed anything among gods or humans, and in every dharma he had attained complete mastery and freedom.
It would be easy to read the vows and the six-fold earthquake as the story's climax and this closing passage as an afterthought; Huiyuan's commentary treats it the other way around. The vow is a statement of intent — this section is the sūtra's account of the actual cause that made the vow's fulfillment possible, describing not supernatural gifts but a specific, extended ethical discipline: no anger, no attachment to sense-objects, no falsehood or flattery, patience under any suffering, generosity practiced across countless lifetimes in countless social roles. On Huiyuan's reading, the sūtra is being deliberate about sequencing cause and effect in this order — the wondrous land described in the next part of this translation is not a reward granted from outside but the direct, causal outcome of conduct exactly this exacting, sustained across a length of time the text does not ask the reader to take metaphorically.