Every Bodhisattva a True Child of the Buddha
Having warned against turning emptiness itself into a possession, the Buddha turns to a gentler claim: a bodhisattva's own dharma arises from within the world's affliction, never apart from it, the way grain grows only from soil mixed with filth and the lotus only from mud. From there, a parable of royal birth explains why every bodhisattva, however newly arisen, is a true child of the Buddha in a sense no śrāvaka ever is.
A Bodhisattva's Dharma Arises From Within Affliction
「譬如空中不生五穀；菩薩如是，不從無為而生佛法。譬如大地眾穢雜糅而生五穀；菩薩如是，於世雜糅結縛之中乃生佛法。譬如陸地不生蓮花；菩薩如是，不從無為出生佛法。譬如淤泥之水生雜蓮花；菩薩如是，從邪眾生結縛之中乃生佛法。譬如醍醐，滿於四海；當知菩薩造作善根，亦復如是。譬如一毛破為百分，以一分毛取四大海一渧之水；當知聲聞造作善根，亦復如是。譬如迦葉！芥子中空；當知聲聞造作善根，亦復如是。譬如十方虛空；當知菩薩造作善根，亦復如是。」
"It is like how the empty sky does not grow the five grains; just so a bodhisattva does not give rise to the buddha-dharma from the unconditioned. It is like how the great earth, mixed together with every kind of filth, is what actually grows the five grains; just so, Kāśyapa, it is from within the world's own mixture of bonds and afflictions that a bodhisattva actually gives rise to the buddha-dharma. It is like how dry land does not grow the lotus; just so a bodhisattva does not bring forth the buddha-dharma from the unconditioned. It is like how muddy water gives rise to a mingled abundance of lotus flowers; just so, Kāśyapa, it is from within the bonds of beings gone astray that a bodhisattva actually brings forth the buddha-dharma. It is like ghee filling the four seas — know that a bodhisattva's cultivated root of goodness is exactly the same. It is like splitting a single hair into a hundred parts, and using one part of that hair to draw up a single drop of water from the four great seas — know that a śrāvaka's cultivated root of goodness is exactly the same. It is like this, Kāśyapa: the emptiness contained within a single mustard seed — know that a śrāvaka's cultivated root of goodness is exactly the same. It is like the empty space of the ten directions — know that a bodhisattva's cultivated root of goodness is exactly the same."
The claim here is stronger than it first appears: it is not merely that a bodhisattva happens to encounter the buddha-dharma while living amid affliction, but that the unconditioned (無為) is flatly incapable of producing it at all — empty sky grows no grain, dry land grows no lotus, no matter how long either is given. This quietly inverts the usual hierarchy in which the unconditioned ranks above the conditioned as the higher, purer term: here the unconditioned is sterile precisely because it cannot mix with anything, while the conditioned world's own "filth" and "mud" — its bonds and afflictions — are the one substrate rich enough to grow something in. The two quantity-similes that follow are worth reading as a pair rather than separately: ghee filling every ocean against a single hair-tip's drop, then a mustard seed's own interior emptiness against the emptiness of the ten directions. Both pairs make the identical comparison from two different angles — abundance against scarcity, then scarcity against abundance — reinforcing a claim about scale of accumulated merit rather than adding a second, different point.
A Prince Born of a Servant Woman Is Still a Prince
「譬如剎利頂生皇后賤人共會，若後生子。於意云何？當言此子是王子耶？」答曰：「非也。世尊！」「如是迦葉！此諸聲聞從我法界生，然彼一切非世尊子。譬如剎利頂生大王賤女共會，若後生子，於意云何？賤人所生，當言此子非王子耶？」答曰：「不也。世尊！此是王子。」
「如是迦葉！雖從賤生而是王子，菩薩如是，初發道心，住於生死、教化眾生，而彼一切是如來子。譬如聖王，雖有千子無聖王相，聖王之意起無子想；如是迦葉！如來雖有百千聲聞弟子之眾，無菩薩者，如來之意起無子想。譬如迦葉！聖王皇后持齋七日，生一童子具聖王相，三十三天咸共嘆之，而不稱說其餘大者。所以者何？童子雖小而不斷於聖王種故。菩薩如是，初發道心，諸根未具彼諸天眾，曾見佛者咸共嘆之，而不稱說諸阿羅漢具八解脫。所以者何？雖初發菩薩心、諸根未具，不斷諸佛如來種故。
「譬如有小摩尼真珠，勝於水精如須彌山；菩薩如是，初發道心，出過一切聲聞之上。譬如迦葉！聖王皇后初生童子，一切臣屬皆為作禮；菩薩如是，初發道心，一切天人皆為作禮。譬如須彌山王出諸良藥，為一切人療治苦患，無所適莫；菩薩如是，學智慧藥、為一切人療生死患，亦無適莫。譬如禮敬初生之月，非後盛滿；如是迦葉！禮初發意菩薩者勝，非復得成如來、至真、等正覺也。所以者何？諸佛如來從菩薩生故。譬如迦葉！無有捨月禮星宿者；如是無有捨具戒德智慧菩薩，而禮聲聞。譬如迦葉！一切天人不能以水精為摩尼真珠；聲聞如是，成就一切戒清淨行，不能坐佛樹下成於無上正真之道。譬如得摩尼真珠者，獲餘無量百千財寶；菩薩如是，出於世者，則有無量聲聞緣覺現於世間。」
"It is like a kṣatriya of anointed royal birth who unites with a servant woman, and a child is later born of it. What do you think — should this child be called a prince?" He answered: "No, World-Honored One!" "Just so, Kāśyapa: these śrāvakas are born from my own dharma-realm, and yet not one of them is a true child of the World-Honored One. It is like a great king of anointed royal birth who unites with a servant woman, and a child is later born of it — what do you think? Born though he is of a servant woman, should this child be said not to be a prince?" He answered: "No, World-Honored One — this is a prince."
"Just so, Kāśyapa: though born of a servant woman, he is still a prince. Just so a bodhisattva, from the moment he first arouses the mind for the path, dwells within birth-and-death and teaches and transforms beings — and every one of them, all the same, is a true child of the Tathāgata. It is like a sage-king who, though he has a thousand sons, none bearing the marks of a sage-king, feels in his own mind as though he had no son at all. Just so, Kāśyapa: though the Tathāgata has an assembly of hundreds of thousands of śrāvaka disciples, if there is no bodhisattva among them, the Tathāgata's own mind feels as though he had no child at all. It is like this, Kāśyapa: when a sage-king's queen keeps a seven-day fast and gives birth to a boy bearing the very marks of a sage-king, the gods of the Heaven of the Thirty-Three all together praise him, and do not speak in the same way even of the other, grown princes. Why is this? Because although the boy is small, he does not break the sage-king's own lineage. Just so a bodhisattva, from the moment he first arouses the mind for the path, though his faculties are not yet complete, is praised together by all the host of gods who have ever beheld a buddha, and they do not speak in the same way even of the arhats who have accomplished the eight liberations. Why is this? Because, though the bodhisattva mind has only just been aroused and the faculties are not yet complete, it does not break the lineage of every buddha and tathāgata.
"It is like a small, genuine wish-fulfilling pearl, which surpasses a mountain of crystal as vast as Sumeru; just so a bodhisattva, from the moment he first arouses the mind for the path, surpasses every śrāvaka there is. It is like this, Kāśyapa: when a sage-king's queen first gives birth to her boy, every minister and servant of the court bows to him; just so, when a bodhisattva first arouses the mind for the path, every god and human bows to him. It is like Sumeru, king of mountains, which brings forth every fine medicine, treating every person's suffering and affliction with no favor and no aversion; just so a bodhisattva studies the medicine of wisdom, treating every person's affliction of birth-and-death, likewise with no favor and no aversion. It is like how people revere the moon at its very first rising, not only once it is full; just so, Kāśyapa, revering a bodhisattva who has newly aroused the mind is itself the superior act — not something reserved only for once he has already become a Tathāgata, Truly Perfected, Fully and Rightly Awakened One. Why is this? Because every buddha, every tathāgata, is born from a bodhisattva. It is like this, Kāśyapa: no one abandons the moon to bow instead to the stars; just so, no one abandons a bodhisattva complete in the virtue of precepts and wisdom, to bow instead to a śrāvaka. It is like this, Kāśyapa: no god or human is able to turn crystal into a genuine wish-fulfilling pearl; just so a śrāvaka, however completely he accomplishes every pure precept and practice, is unable to sit beneath the buddha-tree and accomplish the unsurpassed, true path. It is like how one who obtains a genuine wish-fulfilling pearl thereby gains countless further hundreds of thousands of other treasures besides; just so, when a bodhisattva appears in the world, countless śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas appear in the world along with him."
The parable is told twice with deliberately opposite verdicts, and the second telling is the argument: a child born of a king and a servant woman is, on the first asking, judged not a prince — but on the second asking, the identical circumstance yields the opposite answer, "this is a prince." Nothing about the mother's status changes between the two tellings; what changes is which parent supplies the lineage that actually counts. Śrāvakas, the sūtra says, are "born from my own dharma-realm" exactly as bodhisattvas are, yet only the bodhisattva inherits the Buddha's own succession — because what makes a child a true heir was never the circumstance of birth (arising from within the world's affliction, which both share) but the vow that carries a lineage forward, which only the bodhisattva mind supplies. This sūtra's own logic here runs in close parallel to this site's Śrīmālādevī Sūtra, whose own "true child" chapter makes a structurally identical claim: inheritance in the Buddha's family is a matter of what one holds and transmits, not of formal standing.
The claim that a newly-arisen bodhisattva outranks even an arhat who has "accomplished the eight liberations" is not softened anywhere in this passage — if anything it is repeated four separate times, through the newborn prince, the small pearl against a mountain of crystal, the first crescent moon, and the flat assertion that no one abandons the moon to bow to the stars. This site's Sumatidārikā-paripṛcchā, translated earlier in this same project, dramatizes the identical claim through an eight-year-old girl whose bodhi-resolve predates the Buddha's own and outranks Mañjuśrī's realization — two separate early Mahāyāna sūtras converging on the same counterintuitive ranking: origin and intention outweigh seniority and formal attainment, every time the two are placed in competition.
Part 6 Complete
This closes Part 6: a bodhisattva's dharma growing only from within the world's own affliction, and the parable of royal birth that makes every bodhisattva, however newly arisen, a true child of the Buddha. Part 7 turns to a physician who treats according to the actual illness, and from there to an extended investigation into what the mind itself actually is.
Continue to Part 7 — The Physician, and the True Nature of Mind →