Bodhicitta as Cause, Compassion as Root, Skillful Means as Ultimate
This page opens Ru-Yi's translation of the Mahāvairocana Sūtra (大毘盧遮那成佛神變加持經), the earlier of the two root scriptures of the systematic Tang esoteric tradition. Its first chapter is the doctrinal keystone of the entire text — and arguably of Chinese esoteric Buddhism as a whole: the three-line formula that answers what bodhi actually is, a catalogue of sixty ordinary states of mind a practitioner must learn to recognize and pass beyond, six kinds of fearlessness mapped onto three incalculable kalpas compressed into a single lifetime of practice, and ten similes for what a mantra's power actually is. Read with the commentary of Yixing (一行), composed as the translation itself was being spoken aloud.
Translation Method
The Chinese source is the joint work of Śubhakarasiṃha (善無畏, 637–735), an Indian prince turned monk who reached the Tang capital in 716 after crossing Central Asia by land, and his disciple and scribe Yixing (一行, 673–727) — a monk equally renowned in his own right as the Tang dynasty's foremost astronomer and calendar-reformer. Śubhakarasiṃha explained the text orally, section by section, in 724–725; Yixing took his explanations down and shaped them into the commentary this collection draws on throughout, the Damoirushana Chengfo Jing Shu (大毘盧遮那成佛經疏, "Commentary on the Sūtra of Mahāvairocana's Attainment of Buddhahood," T1796), twenty fascicles in length. This makes T1796 an unusual case among the commentaries this site has drawn on elsewhere: rather than a later exegete returning to a settled text centuries after the fact, it preserves something closer to the translator's own real-time gloss, recorded by the one disciple present for both the translation and the explanation. Yixing states plainly, near the start of his own commentary, that Śubhakarasiṃha told him the full Sanskrit source ran to some 100,000 verses, of which the tradition of teachers before him had already distilled a working text of a little over 3,000 — the version actually rendered into Chinese here. A Tibetan translation of this same abridged recension survives complete in the Kangyur (āryamahāvairocanābhisaṃbodhi); the Sanskrit original does not survive intact, though scattered fragments — chiefly ritual and mantra portions — have been identified and edited by modern scholars.
This chapter, 入真言門住心品第一 ("The Chapter on Entering the Gateway of Mantra and Abiding in the Mind"), is traditionally read as the whole sūtra's doctrinal spine: everything that follows — the construction of the Womb Maṇḍala, the mudrās, the mantras, the initiation rites — is presented as the working-out, in ritual and symbolic form, of what this single chapter states directly. Yixing's own commentary on this one chapter runs to nearly three full fascicles of his twenty, roughly five times the length of the root text it explains; this collection's reading notes draw selectively from that material rather than reproducing all of it, following this site's standing practice of matching commentary to the passage at hand rather than translating a commentary end to end. Classical text is set in the left-hand column below, our English in the right. See also this site's note on translation method.
The Assembly, and Five Similes for All-Wisdom
如是我聞：一時薄伽梵住如來加持廣大金剛法界宮，一切持金剛者皆悉集會。
如來信解遊戲神變生大樓閣寶王，高無中邊，諸大妙寶王種種間飾，菩薩之身為師子座。其金剛名曰：虛空無垢執金剛、虛空遊步執金剛、虛空生執金剛、被雜色衣執金剛、善行步執金剛、住一切法平等執金剛、哀愍無量眾生界執金剛、那羅延力執金剛、大那羅延力執金剛、妙執金剛、勝迅執金剛、無垢執金剛、刃迅執金剛、如來甲執金剛、如來句生執金剛、住無戲論執金剛、如來十力生執金剛、無垢眼執金剛、金剛手祕密主，如是上首，十佛剎微塵數等持金剛眾俱，及普賢菩薩、慈氏菩薩、妙吉祥菩薩、除一切蓋障菩薩等諸大菩薩，前後圍繞而演說法，所謂越三時如來之日加持故，身語意平等句法門。時彼菩薩，普賢為上首；諸執金剛，祕密主為上首。毘盧遮那如來加持故，奮迅示現身無盡莊嚴藏，如是奮迅示現語意平等無盡莊嚴藏，非從毘盧遮那佛身或語或意生，一切處起滅邊際不可得。而毘盧遮那一切身業、一切語業、一切意業，一切處、一切時，於有情界宣說真言道句法。又現執金剛、普賢、蓮華手菩薩等像貌，普於十方宣說真言道清淨句法。所謂初發心乃至十地次第此生滿足，緣業生增長有情類業壽種除，復有牙種生起。
爾時執金剛祕密主於彼眾會中坐，白佛言：「世尊！云何如來、應供、正遍知得一切智智？彼得一切智智，為無量眾生廣演分布，隨種種趣、種種性欲、種種方便道宣說一切智智，或聲聞乘道、或緣覺乘道、或大乘道、或五通智道，或願生天、或生人中，及龍、夜叉、乾闥婆，乃至說生摩睺羅伽法。若有眾生應佛度者，即現佛身、或現聲聞身、或現緣覺身、或菩薩身、或梵天身、或那羅延毘沙門身，乃至摩睺羅伽人非人等身，各各同彼言音，住種種威儀。
而此一切智智道一味，所謂如來解脫味。世尊！譬如虛空界，離一切分別，無分別、無無分別。如是一切智智，離一切分別，無分別、無無分別。世尊！譬如大地，一切眾生依。如是一切智智，天、人、阿脩羅依。世尊、譬如火界，燒一切薪無厭足。如是一切智智，燒一切無智薪無厭足。世尊！譬如風界，除一切塵。如是一切智智，除去一切諸煩惱塵。世尊！喻如水界，一切眾生依之歡樂。如是一切智智，為諸天世人利樂。世尊，如是智慧，以何為因？云何為根？云何究竟？」
Thus have I heard. At one time the Bhagavān dwelt in the vast vajra dharma-realm palace of the Tathāgata's empowerment, where every vajra-holder had gathered together.
Through the Tathāgata's confident understanding and playful spiritual transformation, a great jeweled pavilion had arisen, king among jewels, its height without a midpoint or an edge, adorned all about with every kind of great and wondrous jewel-king, with the bodies of bodhisattvas themselves forming its lion throne. The vajra-holders there were named: Vajra-Holder Stainless as Space, Vajra-Holder Who Roams Space, Vajra-Holder Born of Space, Vajra-Holder Clothed in Many Colors, Vajra-Holder of Excellent Conduct, Vajra-Holder Who Abides in the Equality of All Dharmas, Vajra-Holder Who Pities the Measureless Realms of Beings, Vajra-Holder of Nārāyaṇa's Strength, Vajra-Holder of Great Nārāyaṇa's Strength, Wondrous Vajra-Holder, Vajra-Holder Swift in Victory, Stainless Vajra-Holder, Vajra-Holder Swift as a Blade, Vajra-Holder the Tathāgata's Armor, Vajra-Holder Born of the Tathāgata's Utterance, Vajra-Holder Who Abides Free of Idle Discourse, Vajra-Holder Born of the Tathāgata's Ten Powers, Stainless-Eyed Vajra-Holder, and Vajrapāṇi, Lord of Secrets — with these as foremost, an assembly of vajra-holders numbering as many as the motes of dust in ten buddha-fields, together with Samantabhadra Bodhisattva, Maitreya Bodhisattva, Mañjuśrī Bodhisattva, the Bodhisattva Who Removes Every Hindrance, and other great bodhisattvas, surrounding him on every side as he expounded the Dharma — namely, the teaching of the equal phrase of body, speech, and mind, through the empowerment of the Tathāgata's own sun, which passes beyond the three times. Among those bodhisattvas, Samantabhadra stood foremost; among the vajra-holders, the Lord of Secrets stood foremost. Through Mahāvairocana Tathāgata's empowerment, an inexhaustibly adorned treasury of body was displayed in a burst of spiritual power, and likewise an inexhaustibly adorned treasury of the equality of speech and mind was displayed in that same burst — arising neither from Mahāvairocana Buddha's body, nor from his speech, nor from his mind, its arising and ceasing nowhere to be found, in any place. And yet Mahāvairocana, through every deed of body, every deed of speech, and every deed of mind, in every place and at every time, proclaims to the realm of sentient beings the teaching of the path of mantra. He also manifests in the forms of vajra-holders, of Samantabhadra, of the lotus-handed bodhisattva, and proclaims everywhere in the ten directions the pure teaching of the path of mantra — namely, that from the first arousing of the mind up through the ten grounds, this very life may be brought to its fullness in due sequence; that the seed of the karma and lifespan of sentient beings, grown from conditioned action, may be exhausted; and that in its place a new sprout may arise.
At that time Vajrapāṇi, Lord of Secrets, seated within that assembly, said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, how does the Tathāgata, the Worthy One, the Perfectly Awakened One, attain the wisdom of all-wisdom? Having attained the wisdom of all-wisdom, he broadly proclaims and distributes it for the sake of measureless beings, expounding the wisdom of all-wisdom according to their manifold destinies, their manifold dispositions and desires, and their manifold skillful paths — whether the path of the śrāvaka vehicle, the path of the pratyekabuddha vehicle, the path of the Great Vehicle, or the path of the five superknowledges; whether they wish to be born among the gods, or among humans, or as nāgas, yakṣas, or gandharvas, and so on up to being born as a mahoraga. For any being fit to be liberated by the Buddha, he manifests at once in the body of a buddha, or a śrāvaka, or a pratyekabuddha, or a bodhisattva, or Brahmā, or Nārāyaṇa, or Vaiśravaṇa, and so on up to the bodies of mahoragas, humans, and non-humans — in every case matching their own speech, and adopting whatever bearing suits them.
"And yet this one path of the wisdom of all-wisdom has but a single taste — namely, the taste of the Tathāgata's liberation. World-Honored One, it is like the realm of space, which is free of every discrimination, without discrimination and without the absence of discrimination — just so, the wisdom of all-wisdom is free of every discrimination, without discrimination and without the absence of discrimination. World-Honored One, it is like the great earth, on which every being depends — just so, the wisdom of all-wisdom is what gods, humans, and asuras depend upon. World-Honored One, it is like the realm of fire, which burns all fuel and is never satisfied — just so, the wisdom of all-wisdom burns all the fuel of ignorance and is never satisfied. World-Honored One, it is like the realm of wind, which clears away all dust — just so, the wisdom of all-wisdom clears away the dust of every affliction. World-Honored One, it is like the realm of water, on which every being depends for joy — just so, the wisdom of all-wisdom brings benefit and happiness to the gods and to worldly people. World-Honored One, of such wisdom as this — what is its cause? What is its root? What is its ultimate end?"
Yixing reads the eighteen named vajra-holders as a single sequence, not an arbitrary list: each name marks one stage of a single bodhisattva's progress, from the bare arising of an undefiled bodhicitta (Stainless as Space) through skillful engagement with the world (Clothed in Many Colors, Excellent Conduct), the strength to actually help others (Nārāyaṇa's Strength), and on to qualities proper only to a buddha (the Tathāgata's Armor, the Tathāgata's Ten Powers). Named individually for clarity, he notes, they are "all equally the Tathāgata's own real virtue, with no difference of depth between them" — the sequence is pedagogical, not a hierarchy the assembly itself observes. He glosses Vajrapāṇi's own title, 祕密主 ("Lord of Secrets"), in two registers at once: on the surface, a yakṣa-king who guards the Buddha with a vajra club in hand; in the sūtra's own deeper sense, the Tathāgata's own body, speech, and mind, secret in the specific sense that even Maitreya cannot fully fathom them — "the secret within the secret, namely the lord of the secret of mind itself."
On why the sūtra opens by cataloguing the palace and its assembly before a word of teaching is spoken, Yixing offers a plain civic analogy: a king's decrees are always recorded together with where they were issued and who witnessed them, "so that the realm will trust and act on them without doubt" — a Dharma-king's teaching works the same way, and the assembly's own scale is itself part of what makes the teaching credible to those who later hear it reported. He treats the five similes for the wisdom of all-wisdom as building deliberately on each other: space for what has no fixed content of its own, then earth, fire, wind, and water each adding one further, specific function — support, consumption, purification, benefit — until the fivefold image adds up to something closer to a working description than a decoration.
Bodhicitta as Cause, Compassion as Root, Skillful Means as Ultimate
如是說已，毘盧遮那佛告持金剛祕密主言：「善哉善哉執金剛！善哉金剛手！汝問吾如是義。汝當諦聽，極善作意，吾今說之。」金剛手言：「如是。世尊！願樂欲聞。」佛言：「菩提心為因，悲為根本，方便為究竟。祕密主！云何菩提？謂如實知自心。祕密主！是阿耨多羅三藐三菩提乃至彼法少分，無有可得。何以故？虛空相是菩提，無知解者亦無開曉。何以故？菩提無相故。祕密主！諸法無相，謂虛空相。」
Having said this, Mahāvairocana Buddha said to Vajrapāṇi, Lord of Secrets: "Excellent, excellent, vajra-holder! Excellent, Vajrapāṇi! You have asked me a question of such import. Listen closely, and reflect on it well — I will now explain it to you." Vajrapāṇi said: "So be it, World-Honored One. I long to hear it." The Buddha said: "Bodhicitta is the cause, great compassion is the root, and skillful means is the ultimate. Lord of Secrets, what is bodhi? It is to know one's own mind as it actually is. Lord of Secrets, of this unsurpassed, perfect awakening — not even the smallest part of that dharma is to be found. Why is this so? Because bodhi has the mark of space: there is no one who knows it, and no one who awakens another to it. Why is this so? Because bodhi is without mark. Lord of Secrets, all dharmas are without mark — that is, they have the mark of space."
Yixing treats this three-line formula as the single sentence the entire text exists to unfold — everything else in the sūtra's thirty-one chapters, on his reading, is this one line worked out in ever greater ritual and symbolic detail. He is explicit about the order: bodhicitta is called the cause because a seed must exist before anything grows from it; compassion is the root because a root, unlike a seed, actively holds what has grown so it is not uprooted — "the mind of loving-kindness plants the good shoot, the mind of compassion weeds out what is rank," as he glosses the two terms folded into 悲 here; and skillful means is the ultimate because a harvest is not the goal in itself but what makes the whole cycle worth undertaking, "the fruit already accomplished, with nothing further to add." He compares the sequence to refining gold: bodhicitta is the pure gold already present in the ore, compassion is the smith's labor of smelting and shaping it, and skillful means is what a finished ornament can then actually do in the world — "difficult to hand to another in words," since only the one who has done the working knows it directly.
Searching for the Mind
爾時金剛手復白佛言：「世尊！誰尋求一切智？誰為菩提成正覺者？誰發起彼一切智智？」佛言：「祕密主！自心尋求菩提及一切智。何以故？本性清淨故。心不在內、不在外及兩中間，心不可得。祕密主！如來、應、正等覺，非青非黃、非赤非白、非紅紫非水精色、非長非短、非圓非方、非明非暗、非男非女非不男女。祕密主！心非欲界同性、非色界同性、非無色界同性，非天龍、夜叉、乾闥婆、阿脩羅、迦樓羅、緊那羅、摩睺羅伽、人非人趣同性。祕密主！心不住眼界、不住耳鼻舌身意界，非見非顯現。何以故？虛空相心離諸分別，無分別。所以者何？性同虛空即同於心，性同於心即同菩提。如是祕密主！心、虛空界、菩提，三種無二。
此等悲為根本，方便波羅蜜滿足。是故祕密主！我說諸法如是，令彼諸菩薩眾菩提心清淨，知識其心。祕密主！若族姓男族姓女欲識知菩提，當如是識知自心。祕密主！云何自知心？謂若分段，或顯色、或形色、或境界，若色若受想行識，若我若我所，若能執若所執，若清淨若界若處，乃至一切分段中求不可得。祕密主！此菩薩淨菩提心門，名初法明道。菩薩住此修學，不久勤苦，便得除一切蓋障三昧。若得此者，則與諸佛菩薩同等住，當發五神通，獲無量語言音陀羅尼，知眾生心行，諸佛護持。雖處生死而無染著，為法界眾生不辭勞倦，成就住無為戒，離於邪見通達正見。復次祕密主！住此除一切蓋障菩薩，信解力故，不久勤修，滿足一切佛法。
祕密主！以要言之，是善男子善女人，無量功德皆得成就。」
At that time Vajrapāṇi said again to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, who is it that searches for all-wisdom? Who is it that becomes perfectly awakened as bodhi? Who is it that arouses that wisdom of all-wisdom?" The Buddha said: "Lord of Secrets, it is one's own mind that searches for bodhi and for all-wisdom. Why is this so? Because its fundamental nature is pure. The mind is not within, not without, and not to be found in between the two — the mind cannot be apprehended. Lord of Secrets, the Tathāgata, the Worthy One, the Perfectly Awakened One, is not blue, not yellow, not red, not white, not crimson, not the color of crystal; not long, not short; not round, not square; not bright, not dark; not male, not female, and not neither male nor female. Lord of Secrets, the mind does not share its nature with the desire realm, does not share its nature with the form realm, does not share its nature with the formless realm; it does not share its nature with the destinies of gods, nāgas, yakṣas, gandharvas, asuras, garuḍas, kiṃnaras, mahoragas, humans, or non-humans. Lord of Secrets, the mind does not abide in the eye-element, does not abide in the ear-, nose-, tongue-, body-, or mind-element; it is not something seen, and it does not manifest. Why is this so? Because the mind, which bears the mark of space, is free of every discrimination — it is without discrimination. And why is that? Because a nature identical to space is identical to mind, and a nature identical to mind is identical to bodhi. Thus, Lord of Secrets, mind, the realm of space, and bodhi — these three are without duality.
"These, then, have compassion as their root, and are brought to fulfillment by the pāramitā of skillful means. Therefore, Lord of Secrets, I teach the dharmas in just this way, so that the bodhisattvas may purify their bodhicitta and come to know their own minds. Lord of Secrets, if a son or daughter of good family wishes to come to know bodhi, they should come to know their own mind in just this way. Lord of Secrets, how does one come to know one's own mind? Whether one seeks it as a segment, as visible color or shape, as a sense-object; as form, sensation, perception, formations, or consciousness; as self or as what belongs to self; as that which grasps or as that which is grasped; as purity, as an element, or as a sense-field — search through every such segment, and it cannot be found. Lord of Secrets, this gateway of the bodhisattva's pure bodhicitta is called the first path of dharma-illumination. A bodhisattva who abides in this and trains in it will, before long and without hardship, attain the samādhi that removes every hindrance. Whoever attains this dwells on equal footing with the buddhas and bodhisattvas: they will give rise to the five superknowledges, obtain measureless dhāraṇīs of language and sound, know the mental conduct of sentient beings, and be protected by the buddhas. Though dwelling amid birth-and-death, they remain undefiled by it; for the sake of the beings of the dharma-realm, they never tire of the labor; they accomplish and abide in the unconditioned precepts, leaving false views behind and penetrating through to right view. Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, the bodhisattva who dwells here, having removed every hindrance, will, through the power of faith and understanding, before long and without effortful striving, bring every buddha-dharma to fulfillment.
"Lord of Secrets, to state the essential point: such a son or daughter of good family will bring every measureless merit to accomplishment."
Yixing reads the method of this passage as deliberately different from the *Mahāprajñāpāramitā*'s own search for a self through the five aggregates, which he takes as the model it is quoting: rather than stating outright that mind is everywhere without mark — which he says would leave most listeners with nothing to hold onto — the text first walks the search through every possible "location" a mind might be thought to occupy: inside the body, outside it, between the two; as color, shape, or sense-object; as each of the five aggregates in turn; as self or what belongs to self. Only once every one of these has been searched and found empty does the text let the conclusion state itself. This, he says, is "the most essential of gateways" precisely because it does not require the practitioner to first accept an abstract thesis about mind's nature — it requires only that they actually look, in each of the twelve places suggested, and notice for themselves that nothing is there to find.
He also glosses "the first path of dharma-illumination" (初法明道) against a parable of his own: a man is bitten in the dark and, believing himself struck by a snake, is overcome with terror and a poison born entirely of the belief — until a physician brings a lamp and shows him the object was a jeweled ornament, not a snake, and the poison of fear dissolves on the spot, "not because anything was removed, but because what was never there was finally seen for what it was." The five superknowledges, dhāraṇīs, and buddha-protection that follow, on this reading, are not rewards bestowed for having searched correctly; they are simply what becomes visible once this one recognition has actually taken hold.
Vajrapāṇi's Nine Questions, and the Buddha's Reply in Verse
爾時執金剛祕密主復以偈問佛：
「云何世尊說， 此心菩提生？
復以云何相， 知發菩提心？
願識心心勝， 自然智生說，
大勤勇幾何， 次第心續生，
心諸相與時， 願佛廣開演。
功德聚亦然， 及彼行修行，
心心有殊異， 惟大牟尼說。」
如是說已，摩訶毘盧遮那世尊告金剛手言：
「善哉佛真子， 廣大心利益。
勝上大乘句， 心續生之相，
諸佛大祕密， 外道不能識；
我今悉開示， 一心應諦聽。
越百六十心， 生廣大功德，
其性常堅固， 知彼菩提生。
無量如虛空， 不染污常住，
諸法不能動， 本來寂無相。
無量智成就， 正等覺顯現，
供養行修行， 從是初發心。」
At that time Vajrapāṇi, Lord of Secrets, again questioned the Buddha in verse:
"World-Honored One, how is it said that this mind gives rise to bodhi?
And by what mark is it known that bodhicitta has been aroused?
I wish to know the mind supreme among minds, born of self-arisen wisdom — please explain it.
Great Valiant One, how many minds, in what sequence, arise one after another?
The marks of these minds, and their timing — I beg the Buddha to fully expound them.
And also the mass of their merit, and the practice that accompanies it;
these minds, each different from the next — only the Great Silent Sage can tell of them."
Having said this, Mahāvairocana, the Great World-Honored One, said to Vajrapāṇi:
"Excellent, true child of the Buddha, whose vast mind brings such benefit!
The supreme phrase of the Great Vehicle, the mark of the mind's arising in sequence —
this is the great secret of all buddhas, which followers of other paths cannot know;
I shall now disclose it in full — listen to it with a single mind.
Passing beyond the hundred and sixty minds, vast merit is born;
its nature ever firm — know this as bodhi's own arising.
Measureless, like space itself, undefiled, ever abiding,
unmoved by any dharma, from the first, still, and without mark.
Measureless wisdom accomplished, perfect awakening manifest —
practiced through the practice of offering: from this, the mind is first aroused."
Yixing counts the questions in this verse precisely — nine of them, by his reckoning, though he notes an alternate count of ten is possible — and treats them as the organizing outline for essentially everything from here to the end of the sūtra, with each question answered somewhere later in the text rather than immediately. He observes that the Buddha does not answer in the order asked: "the Buddha, observing the assembly at the time, made sure the point was grasped rather than following the questions strictly in order" — the hundred-and-sixty-mind catalogue that follows immediately answers the first question about how bodhi arises, while the tenth-stage similes of illusion, mirage, and the rest, much later in this same chapter, answer the seventh question about practice, and the "hundred-syllable" chapters far later in the sūtra answer the eighth and ninth questions about how minds differ from one another. "Great Valiant One" (大勤勇) and "Great Silent Sage" (大牟尼) are both epithets of the Buddha rather than distinct addressees — the second, Yixing notes, marking that "the Buddha's body, speech, and mind are all, in the end, utterly still, beyond the reach of language," a stillness no comparison to the lesser silence of a śrāvaka's own quiet could capture.
Sixty Minds Beyond the World
「祕密主！無始生死愚童凡夫，執著我名我有，分別無量我分。祕密主！若彼不觀我之自性，則我我所生。餘復計有時地等變化，瑜伽我建立淨、不建立無淨，若自在天、若流出及時、若尊貴、若自然、若內我、若人量、若遍嚴、若壽者、若補特伽羅、若識、若阿賴耶、知者見者、能執所執、內知外知、社怛梵、意生、儒童、常定生、聲非聲。祕密主！如是等我分，自昔以來分別相應，希求順理解脫。
祕密主！愚童凡夫類猶如羝羊，或時有一法想生，所謂持齋。彼思惟此少分，發起歡喜，數數修習。祕密主！是初種子善業發生，復以此為因，於六齋日施與父母男女親戚，是第二牙種。復以此施授與非親識者，是第三疱種。復以此施與器量高德者，是第四葉種。復以此施歡喜授與伎樂人等及獻尊宿，是第五敷華。復以此施發親愛心而供養之，是第六成果。復次祕密主！彼護戒生天，是第七受用種子。復次祕密主！以此心生死流轉，於善友所聞如是言：『此是天大天，與一切樂者。若虔誠供養，一切所願皆滿。所謂自在天、梵天、那羅延天、商羯羅天、黑天、自在子天、日天、月天、龍尊等，及俱吠濫、毘沙門、釋迦、毘樓博叉、毘首羯磨天，閻魔閻魔后、梵天后，世所宗奉火天、迦樓羅子天、自在天后、波頭摩、德叉迦龍、和修吉、商佉、羯句啅劍、大蓮俱里劍、摩訶泮尼、阿地提婆、薩陀難陀等龍，或天仙、大圍陀論師，各各應善供養。』彼聞如是，心懷慶悅，殷重恭敬隨順修行。祕密主！是名愚童異生生死流轉無畏依第八嬰童心。祕密主！復次殊勝行，隨彼所說中殊勝住求解脫慧生，所謂常無常空，隨順如是說。祕密主！非彼知解空非空、常斷、非有非無，俱彼分別。無分別云何分別空？不知諸空，非彼能知涅槃。是故應了知空離於斷常。」
爾時金剛手復請佛言：「惟願世尊說彼心。」如是說已，佛告金剛手祕密主言：「祕密主！諦聽心相。謂貪心、無貪心、瞋心、慈心、癡心、智心、決定心、疑心、暗心、明心、積聚心、鬪心、諍心、無諍心、天心、阿修羅心、龍心、人心、女心、自在心、商人心、農夫心、河心、陂池心、井心、守護心、慳心、狗心、狸心、迦樓羅心、鼠心、歌詠心、舞心、擊鼓心、室宅心、師子心、鵂鶹心、烏心、羅剎心、刺心、窟心、風心、水心、火心、泥心、顯色心、板心、迷心、毒藥心、羂索心、械心、雲心、田心、鹽心、剃刀心、須彌等心、海等心、穴等心、受生心。祕密主！彼云何貪心？謂隨順染法。云何無貪心？謂隨順無染法。云何瞋心？謂隨順怒法。云何慈心？謂隨順修行慈法。云何癡心？謂隨順修不觀法。云何智心？謂順修殊勝增上法。云何決定心？謂尊教命如說奉行。云何疑心？謂常收持不定等事。云何闇心？謂於無疑慮法生疑慮解。云何明心？謂於不疑慮法無疑慮修行。云何積聚心？謂無量為一為性。云何鬪心？謂互相是非為性。云何諍心？謂於自己而生是非。云何無諍心？謂是非俱捨。云何天心？謂心思隨念成就。云何阿修羅心？謂樂處生死。云何龍心？謂思念廣大資財。云何人心？謂思念利他。云何女心？謂隨順欲法。云何自在心？謂思惟欲我一切如意。云何商人心？謂順修初收聚後分析法。云何農夫心？謂隨順初廣聞而後求法。云何河心？謂順修依因二邊法。云何陂池心？謂隨順渴無厭足法。云何井心？謂如是思惟深復甚深。云何守護心？謂唯此心實餘心不實。云何慳心？謂隨順為己不與他法。云何狸心？謂順修徐進法。云何狗心？謂得少分以為喜足。云何迦樓羅心？謂隨順朋黨羽翼法。云何鼠心？謂思惟斷諸繫縛。云何舞心？謂修行如是法，我當上昇種種神變。云何擊鼓心？謂修順是法，我當擊法鼓。云何室宅心？謂順修自護身法。云何師子心？謂修行一切無怯弱法。云何鵂鶹心？謂常暗夜思念。云何烏心？謂一切處驚怖思念。云何羅剎心？謂於善中發起不善。云何刺心？謂一切處發起惡作為性。云何窟心？謂順修為入窟法。云何風心？謂遍一切處發起為性。云何水心？謂順修洗濯一切不善法。云何火心？謂熾盛炎熱性。云何顯色心？謂類彼為性。云何板心？謂順修隨量法，捨棄餘善故。云何迷心？謂所執異所思異。云何毒藥心？謂順修無生分法。云何羂索心？謂一切處住於我縛為性。云何械心？謂二足止住為性。云何雲心？謂常作降雨思念。云何田心？謂常如是修事自身。云何鹽心？謂所思念彼復增加思念。云何剃刀心？謂唯如是依止剃除法。云何彌盧等心？謂常思惟心高舉為性。云何海等心？謂常如是受用自身而住。云何穴等心？謂先決定彼，後復變改為性。云何受生心？謂諸有修習行業，彼生心如是同性。祕密主！一二三四五再數，凡百六十心，越世間三妄執，出世間心生，謂如是解唯蘊無我根境界，淹留修行拔業煩惱株杌、無明種子，生十二因緣離，建立宗等。如是湛寂，一切外道所不能知。先佛宣說，離一切過。祕密主！彼出世間心住蘊中，有如是慧隨生。若於蘊等發起離著，當觀察聚沫、浮泡、芭蕉、陽焰、幻等而得解脫。謂蘊處界能執所執皆離法性，如是證寂然界，是名出世間心。祕密主！彼離違順八心相續業煩惱網，是超越一劫瑜祇行。復次祕密主！大乘行發無緣乘心、法無我性。何以故？如彼往昔如是修行者觀察蘊阿賴耶，知自性如幻、陽焰、影響、旋火輪、乾闥婆城。祕密主！彼如是捨，無我心主自在覺自心本不生。何以故？祕密主！心前後際不可得故。如是知自心性，是超越二劫瑜祇行。復次祕密主！真言門修行菩薩行諸菩薩，無量無數百千俱胝那庾多劫積集無量功德智慧，具修諸行，無量智慧方便皆悉成就，天人世間之所歸依，出過一切聲聞辟支佛地，釋提桓因等親近敬禮。所謂空性離於根境，無相無境界，越諸戲論，等虛空，無邊一切佛法依此相續生，離有為無為界、離諸造作、離眼耳鼻舌身意極無自性心生。祕密主！如是初心，佛說成佛因故，於業煩惱解脫，而業煩惱具依，世間宗奉常應供養。復次祕密主！信解行地觀察三心，無量波羅蜜多慧觀四攝法。信解地無對無量不思議，逮十心無邊智生，我一切諸有所說，皆依此而得。是故智者當思惟此一切智信解地，復越一劫昇住此地，此四分之一度於信解。」
"Lord of Secrets, from beginningless birth-and-death, the ignorant, childish common person clings to the name 'self' and to the notion 'I have a self,' discriminating a self in countless different ways. Lord of Secrets, it is because such a person does not examine the true nature of this self that the notions of 'self' and 'what belongs to self' arise. Some further posit a self as Time; as the transformations of earth and the other elements; as the self of yogic union; as what is established as pure, or as unestablished and so without purity; as Īśvara, the Lord; as what flows forth, and as Time again; as the Venerable One; as the spontaneous; as an inner self; as a self the measure of the body; as the all-pervading and adorned; as the possessor of life; as the transmigrating person; as consciousness; as the store-consciousness; as the knower and the seer; as the grasper and the grasped; as inward knowing and outward knowing; as Sattvarāma; as mind-born; as the young scholar; as the eternally-abiding-and-arisen; and as sound, or as no-sound. Lord of Secrets, notions of self such as these have, since time without beginning, arisen in mutual accord, all seeking release in conformity with what each takes to be reason.
"Lord of Secrets, beings of the ignorant, childish kind are like a ram — but at times a single thought of dharma arises in them, that of observing a fast. Reflecting on this small measure of practice, joy arises in them, and they take it up again and again. Lord of Secrets, this is the first seed of wholesome karma, once it has sprouted. Taking this as a cause, they then give to their parents, sons, daughters, and relatives on the six fast-days — this is the second, the sprout. Giving this same gift further to those they do not know is the third, the blister-bud. Giving it to those of great capacity and virtue is the fourth, the leaf. Giving it joyfully to musicians and performers, and offering it to the venerable and the aged, is the fifth, the opened flower. Giving it while arousing a heart of affection is the sixth, the ripened fruit. Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, guarding the precepts so as to be born in the heavens is the seventh, the seed put to use. Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, while still turning in this mind through birth-and-death, such a person hears from a good friend words such as these: 'This is a great god, a giver of every happiness; if you reverently make offerings, every wish will be fulfilled' — namely Īśvara, Brahmā, Nārāyaṇa, Śaṃkara, Kṛṣṇa, Śiva's son, the Sun-god, the Moon-god, the Nāga-lord, and Kubera, Vaiśravaṇa, Śakra, Virūpākṣa, Viśvakarman, Yama and Yama's queen, Brahmā's queen, the world-honored Fire-god, Garuḍa's son the god, Īśvara's queen, and the nāgas Padma, Takṣaka, Vāsuki, Śaṅkha, and Karkoṭaka, the Great Lotus nāga, Mahāpadma, Aditideva, and Sāgara and Nanda, and other such nāgas, or the heavenly sages and the great teachers of the Veda — each of these, they are told, should be well worshipped. On hearing this, they are filled with delight, and reverently and devotedly follow this teaching in practice. Lord of Secrets, this is called the eighth, the mind of a child, the refuge from fear sought by the ignorant common being still turning through birth-and-death. Lord of Secrets, further still, there is surpassing practice: within what has thus been taught, one dwells in what is more excellent, and the wisdom that seeks liberation arises — namely, discourse on permanence, impermanence, and emptiness, which one then follows and conforms to. Lord of Secrets, those who hold to this do not truly understand emptiness as against non-emptiness, or permanence as against annihilation, or being as against non-being — all of this remains their own discrimination. Without discrimination — how could one discriminate emptiness at all? Not to know true emptiness is not to be able to know nirvāṇa. Therefore, one should understand emptiness as free from both annihilation and permanence."
At that time Vajrapāṇi asked the Buddha once more: "I beg only that the World-Honored One expound those minds." Having said this, the Buddha said to Vajrapāṇi, Lord of Secrets: "Lord of Secrets, listen closely to the marks of these minds" — namely, the mind of greed, the mind free of greed, the mind of anger, the mind of loving-kindness, the mind of delusion, the mind of wisdom, the resolved mind, the doubting mind, the darkened mind, the illumined mind, the accumulating mind, the contentious mind, the quarrelsome mind, the mind free of quarrel, the mind of a god, the mind of an asura, the mind of a nāga, the mind of a human, the mind of a woman, the mind of the self-mastering, the merchant's mind, the farmer's mind, the mind of a river, the mind of a marsh, the mind of a well, the guarding mind, the miserly mind, the leopard-cat's mind, the garuḍa's mind, the mouse's mind, the singing mind, the dancing mind, the drum-beating mind, the household mind, the lion's mind, the owl's mind, the crow's mind, the rākṣasa's mind, the thorn mind, the cave mind, the wind mind, the water mind, the fire mind, the mud mind, the mind that takes on color, the plank mind, the confused mind, the poison mind, the snare mind, the shackle mind, the cloud mind, the field mind, the salt mind, the razor mind, the mind like Mount Sumeru, the mind like the ocean, the mind like a hollow, and the mind of rebirth. Lord of Secrets, what is the mind of greed? It is that which conforms to defiled dharmas. What is the mind free of greed? It is that which conforms to undefiled dharmas. What is the mind of anger? It is that which conforms to the dharma of rage. What is the mind of loving-kindness? It is that which conforms to the practice of loving-kindness. What is the mind of delusion? It is that which conforms to the dharma of not observing. What is the mind of wisdom? It is that which conforms to the practice of what is excellent and superior. What is the resolved mind? It is to revere a teaching and carry it out exactly as taught. What is the doubting mind? It is to hold constantly to matters left undecided. What is the darkened mind? It is to give rise to doubt and hesitation regarding a dharma about which there should be none. What is the illumined mind? It is to practice, free of doubt and hesitation, a dharma about which there should be none. What is the accumulating mind? It is to take the measureless as one, as its very nature. What is the contentious mind? It is to hold mutual right and wrong as its very nature. What is the quarrelsome mind? It is to generate right and wrong regarding oneself. What is the mind free of quarrel? It is to abandon both right and wrong. What is the mind of a god? It is for the mind to accomplish whatever it thinks of. What is the mind of an asura? It is to delight in dwelling in birth-and-death. What is the mind of a nāga? It is to think constantly of vast wealth and resources. What is the mind of a human? It is to think of benefiting others. What is the mind of a woman? It is to conform to the dharma of desire. What is the mind of the self-mastering? It is to think, 'May I have my every wish, exactly as I will it.' What is the merchant's mind? It is to conform to the practice of first accumulating goods and only afterward sorting them out. What is the farmer's mind? It is to conform to first hearing broadly, and only afterward seeking the teaching. What is the mind of a river? It is to conform to the dharma of depending on two banks at once. What is the mind of a marsh? It is to conform to a thirst that knows no satisfaction. What is the mind of a well? It is to reflect thus: deep, and deeper still. What is the guarding mind? It is to think: only this mind is real, every other mind is not. What is the miserly mind? It is to conform to keeping for oneself and not giving to others. What is the leopard-cat's mind? It is to conform to the practice of advancing slowly. What is the dog's mind? It is to be satisfied with obtaining only the smallest portion. What is the garuḍa's mind? It is to conform to the dharma of forming factions and enlisting followers. What is the mouse's mind? It is to think of severing every bond. What is the dancing mind? It is to practice a dharma while thinking, 'I shall now rise up and perform every kind of miraculous transformation.' What is the drum-beating mind? It is to practice a dharma while thinking, 'I shall now beat the drum of the Dharma.' What is the household mind? It is to conform to the dharma of guarding one's own body. What is the lion's mind? It is to practice every dharma entirely free of timidity. What is the owl's mind? It is to think constantly in the dark of night. What is the crow's mind? It is to think with fear and alarm in every circumstance. What is the rākṣasa's mind? It is to give rise to what is unwholesome from the midst of what is wholesome. What is the thorn mind? It is to give rise to regret as its very nature, in every circumstance. What is the cave mind? It is to conform to the dharma of entering a cave. What is the wind mind? It is to arise everywhere as its very nature. What is the water mind? It is to conform to washing away every unwholesome dharma. What is the fire mind? It is to blaze and burn as its very nature. What is the mind that takes on color? It is to take on the nature of whatever it touches. What is the plank mind? It is to conform to the dharma of measuring only by one's own capacity, and so abandoning every other wholesome practice. What is the confused mind? It is for what one grasps to differ from what one intends. What is the poison mind? It is to conform to the dharma in which nothing further can arise. What is the snare mind? It is to dwell, in every circumstance, bound by the fetter of a self, as its very nature. What is the shackle mind? It is for both feet to remain fixed in place, as its very nature. What is the cloud mind? It is to think constantly of bringing down rain. What is the field mind? It is to constantly cultivate one's own body in just this way. What is the salt mind? It is for whatever is thought of to draw yet more thought to itself. What is the razor mind? It is to rely solely on the dharma of shaving away, in just this manner. What is the mind like Mount Sumeru? It is to think constantly with arrogance as its very nature. What is the mind like the ocean? It is to constantly make use of oneself and dwell in just this way. What is the mind like a hollow? It is first to decide upon something, and then afterward to change it, as its very nature. What is the mind of rebirth? It is for whatever karma one has cultivated to give rise to a mind of just that same nature.
"Lord of Secrets, one, two, three, four, five, doubled again and again — in all, one hundred and sixty minds. Passing beyond the world's three baseless graspings, the transcendent mind arises: understanding thus that the aggregates alone are without self, they dwell where roots and objects meet, cultivating the path further, uprooting the stumps of karma and affliction and the seeds of ignorance, leaving behind the arising of the twelve links of dependent origination, and the establishing of doctrinal systems and the like. Such stillness as this, no follower of another path can know. The buddhas of the past have proclaimed it, free of every fault.
"Lord of Secrets, that transcendent mind, while still dwelling within the aggregates, has wisdom of just this kind arising within it. If one gives rise to freedom from attachment regarding the aggregates and the rest, one should contemplate them as a mass of foam, a bubble, a plantain trunk, a mirage, an illusion, and thereby attain liberation — realizing that the aggregates, the sense-fields, and the elements, the grasper and the grasped, are all free of any nature of their own, and thus bearing witness to the still and quiet realm. This is called the transcendent mind. Lord of Secrets, that mind, free from the net of karma and affliction bound up in the eight minds of aversion and attraction, has passed beyond a single kalpa of yogic practice.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, Great Vehicle practice gives rise to the mind of the unconditioned vehicle, and to the selflessness of dharmas. Why is this so? Because, just as those who practiced in this way in ages past, one contemplates the aggregates and the store-consciousness, and knows their own nature to be like an illusion, a mirage, a reflection, an echo, a whirling firebrand, a city of gandharvas. Lord of Secrets, having thus relinquished self, the sovereign lord of mind awakens of itself to the fact that one's own mind is fundamentally unborn. Why is this so? Lord of Secrets, because the mind's beginning and end cannot be apprehended. To know the nature of one's own mind in this way is to pass beyond two kalpas of yogic practice.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, bodhisattvas who practice the bodhisattva conduct within the gateway of mantra, over measureless, countless hundreds of thousands of koṭis of nayutas of kalpas, accumulate measureless merit and wisdom, and completely fulfill every practice, every measureless wisdom, and every skillful means; they become the refuge of gods, humans, and the whole world; they pass beyond the ground of every śrāvaka and pratyekabuddha, and even Śakra, lord of the gods, draws near to revere them. Namely: emptiness, free of roots and objects, without mark and without any objective sphere; passing beyond every kind of idle discourse; equal to space; every buddha-dharma without limit arising in continuous succession dependent on this; free of the conditioned and unconditioned realms alike, free of all fabrication, free of eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind — the mind utterly without intrinsic nature is born. Lord of Secrets, this first mind of this kind, the Buddha says, is itself the cause of buddhahood: it is liberated from karma and affliction, and yet karma and affliction remain fully present within it — it is what the whole world honors and reveres, and to which constant offering should be made.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, the ground of faith and understanding contemplates three minds, and through measureless pāramitās of wisdom contemplates the four means of gathering beings. This ground of faith and understanding is beyond compare, measureless, and inconceivable; ten minds of boundless wisdom arise from it, and everything I have ever taught is obtained in dependence on this. Therefore the wise should reflect on this ground of faith and understanding of all-wisdom, and, passing beyond yet one more kalpa, ascend and abide in this ground — this being one quarter of the crossing over into faith and understanding."
Two items are conspicuously undefined in the source Yixing worked from: the thirty-second mind, "the singing mind," and the forty-fifth, "the mud mind," both marked in his commentary as missing their gloss in the Sanskrit manuscript Śubhakarasiṃha brought — "the Sanskrit text lacks this passage," he notes at each, before supplying what his teacher told him orally rather than what the written text actually preserved. The sixtieth item is missing outright, name and all; Yixing records Śubhakarasiṃha's own account that it was "the monkey mind, restless and unable to stay still for even a moment, snatching at one thing after releasing the last, exactly like a monkey" — reconstructed from oral tradition rather than read off the page in front of them. Reading notes on this site rarely have occasion to show a translation's own manuscript gaps this directly; here, Yixing's practice of naming exactly what was and wasn't in the text he was working from is preserved rather than smoothed over.
Yixing reads the catalogue as a diagnostic instrument, not a moral taxonomy to be memorized and judged by: each of the sixty is paired, in his commentary, with a specific antidote — the leopard-cat's mind (delaying action while waiting for a "better moment" that never quite arrives) is met by remembering that gratitude and good instruction, once received, should be acted on "the instant it is heard, not stored up for later"; the dog's mind (satisfaction with the smallest portion of a teaching, no further inquiry sought) is met by cultivating a mind "vast as the ocean, which the smallest offering does not fill and the greatest does not overflow"; the merchant's mind (stockpiling knowledge before ever putting it to use) is met by cultivating a swifter wisdom that acts the moment a teaching is heard, "rather than waiting, like a farmer's whole season, to see what use it might someday have." He is explicit that a practitioner will typically find several of the sixty active at once, or in rapid succession, rather than one at a time in the order listed — the catalogue exists to be recognized in real time, "at every moment," not worked through sequentially like a checklist.
The passage's real weight, on Yixing's reading, falls on what happens after all sixty are named: the sūtra reinterprets the classical three incalculable kalpas (asaṃkhyeya-kalpa) that other schools teach a bodhisattva must traverse before buddhahood, reading each "kalpa" instead as one layer of habitual grasping shed within a single lifetime of practice. The first kalpa is passed by seeing that the five aggregates have no self within them (observed through the five similes of foam, bubble, plantain-trunk, mirage, and illusion); the second is passed by seeing that even the store-consciousness underlying those aggregates is itself only appearance (observed through six similes — illusion, mirage, reflection, echo, firebrand-wheel, and gandharva-city — repeated with a different object of contemplation, "the same illusion, aimed now at a deeper mark"); the third is passed on reaching the "mind utterly without intrinsic nature," at which point one enters the bodhisattva grounds proper. "If one crosses these three baseless graspings within a single lifetime," Yixing writes, "then buddhahood is attained within a single lifetime — why speak of aeons at all?" This reframing of what "three incalculable kalpas" actually names — psychological depth rather than literal cosmic duration — is the doctrinal foundation later Japanese Shingon teaching would call sokushin jōbutsu, "attaining buddhahood in this very body."
Six Kinds of Fearlessness
爾時執金剛祕密主白佛言：「世尊！願救世者演說心相，菩薩有幾種得無畏處？」如是說已，摩訶毘盧遮那世尊告金剛手言：「諦聽，極善思念。祕密主！彼愚童凡夫修諸善業、害不善業，當得善無畏。若如實知我，當得身無畏。若於取蘊所集我身捨自色像觀，當得無我無畏。若害蘊住法攀緣，當得法無畏。若害法住無緣，當得法無我無畏。若復一切蘊界處、能執所執、我壽命等及法無緣空、自性無性，此空智生，當得一切法自性平等無畏。」
At that time Vajrapāṇi, Lord of Secrets, said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, I beg the Savior of the World to expound the marks of mind: in how many stages does a bodhisattva attain the ground of fearlessness?" Having said this, Mahāvairocana, the Great World-Honored One, said to Vajrapāṇi: "Listen closely, and reflect on this well. Lord of Secrets, when the ignorant, childish common person cultivates every wholesome deed and eliminates unwholesome deeds, they attain the fearlessness of the wholesome. When one truly knows the self as it is, one attains the fearlessness of the body. When one, regarding this self assembled out of the grasped aggregates, abandons the contemplation of one's own visible form, one attains the fearlessness of no-self. When one eliminates the aggregates yet still dwells clinging to dharmas, one attains the fearlessness regarding dharmas. When one eliminates dharmas and dwells free of any object of clinging, one attains the fearlessness of the selflessness of dharmas. And when, further, regarding all the aggregates, elements, and sense-fields, the grasper and the grasped, the self, the life-span, and the rest, and dharmas themselves, one realizes they are empty of any object of clinging, empty of intrinsic nature — when this wisdom of emptiness arises, one attains the fearlessness of the intrinsic equality of all dharmas."
Yixing glosses "fearlessness" (無畏, Sanskrit āśvāsa) with an image of resuscitation rather than of courage in the ordinary sense: someone throttled nearly to unconsciousness, released, and finally able to breathe again — each of the six stages is a place a practitioner can, for the first time, exhale. He maps all six directly onto the sequence just given: the first fearlessness matches the eight worldly minds and the refuge-seeking eighth mind; the second and third match the observation of the five aggregate-similes crossing the first kalpa; the fourth and fifth match the six ālaya-similes crossing the second kalpa; and the sixth matches the "mind utterly without intrinsic nature" that opens the third. Framed this way, the whole apparatus of sixty minds, three kalpas, and six fearlessnesses is one continuous path described four separate times, at four separate levels of resolution — Yixing's explicit reason for walking through it so many ways in a single chapter is that "having already seen smoke, one can infer the fire" only once the shape of the fire has actually been shown from more than one angle.
Ten Similes for Mantra Practice
「祕密主！若真言門修菩薩行諸菩薩，深修觀察十緣生句，當於真言行通達作證。云何為十？謂如幻、陽焰、夢、影、乾闥婆城、響、水月、浮泡、虛空華、旋火輪。祕密主！彼真言門修菩薩行諸菩薩，當如是觀察。云何為幻？謂如呪術藥力能造所造種種色像，惑自眼故，見希有事展轉相生、往來十方，然彼非去非不去。何以故？本性淨故。如是真言幻持誦成就，能生一切。復次祕密主！陽焰性空，彼依世人妄想成立有所談議，如是真言想唯是假名。復次祕密主！如夢中所見晝日牟呼栗多，剎那歲時等住，種種異類受諸苦樂，覺已都無所見。如是夢真言行，應知亦爾。復次祕密主！以影喻解了真言能發悉地，如面緣於鏡而現面像，彼真言悉地當如是知。復次祕密主！以乾闥婆城譬解了成就悉地宮。復次祕密主！以響喻解了真言聲，如緣聲有響，彼真言者當如是解。復次祕密主！如因月出故照於淨水而現月影像，如是真言水月喻，彼持明者當如是說。復次祕密主！如天降雨生泡，彼真言悉地種種變化，當知亦爾。復次祕密主！如空中無眾生、無壽命，彼作者不可得；以心迷亂故，而生如是種種妄見。復次祕密主！譬如火燼，若人執持在手，而以旋轉空中，有輪像生。祕密主，應如是了知大乘句、心句、無等等句、必定句、正等覺句、漸次大乘生句，當得具足法財、出生種種工巧大智，如實遍知一切心想。」
"Lord of Secrets, if bodhisattvas who practice the bodhisattva conduct within the gateway of mantra deeply cultivate the contemplation of the ten similes for conditioned arising, they will penetrate to realization within mantra practice. What are these ten? They are: illusion, mirage, dream, reflection, the city of gandharvas, echo, the moon in water, a bubble, a flower in the sky, and a whirling firebrand. Lord of Secrets, bodhisattvas who practice the bodhisattva conduct within the gateway of mantra should contemplate them in this way.
"What is illusion? It is like the power of spells and drugs, which can conjure forth every kind of image, deceiving the eye so that one sees marvelous events arising one from another, coming and going in the ten directions — and yet they neither truly go, nor truly do not go. Why is this so? Because their fundamental nature is pure. Just so, when a mantra's magic is accomplished through recitation, it too can bring forth anything at all.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, a mirage is empty by nature; it is only because worldly people rely on false imagining that they debate and dispute over it. Just so, the notions produced by mantras are mere names, nothing more.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, it is like what is seen in a dream: a day, a muhūrta, an instant, a year — one dwells in it as though it truly lasted that long, undergoing every kind of pleasure and pain among different kinds of beings, and yet on waking nothing whatsoever is seen. Mantra practice as a dream should be understood in just the same way.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, by the simile of a reflection, one comes to understand how a mantra can bring forth siddhi — just as a face, meeting a mirror, causes a reflected face to appear, so too should the siddhi of mantras be understood.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, by the simile of the city of gandharvas, one comes to understand the palace of accomplished siddhi.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, by the simile of an echo, one comes to understand the sound of mantras — just as an echo arises depending on a sound, so too should one who recites mantras understand this.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, just as the moon, having risen, illumines clear water and causes the moon's own reflection to appear there, so too should the holder of mantras understand and speak of this simile of the moon in water.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, just as rain falling from the sky gives rise to bubbles, so too should one understand the manifold transformations of mantra siddhi.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, just as in space there is no being and no life to be found, and no maker to be apprehended there, so too, because the mind is confused, all manner of false views such as these arise.
"Furthermore, Lord of Secrets, it is like a firebrand: when a person holds it in hand and whirls it through the air, the image of a wheel appears. Lord of Secrets, one should understand in just this way the phrase of the Great Vehicle, the phrase of mind, the phrase of the unequaled equal, the phrase of certainty, the phrase of perfect awakening, and the phrase of the Great Vehicle's gradual arising — and thereby attain the complete treasury of the Dharma, bring forth every manner of skillful great wisdom, and truly and fully know every thought in the minds of all beings."
Yixing distinguishes this set of ten similes sharply from the two sets already used earlier in this same chapter for the five aggregates and the store-consciousness, even though several images (illusion, mirage, echo, firebrand) recur across all three sets: those earlier similes serve to dissolve a practitioner's clinging to something taken as too solid; this final set serves the opposite risk — a practitioner who has correctly seen that ritual, mantra, and siddhi are empty of inherent existence, and concludes from this that they therefore accomplish nothing at all. Nāgārjuna's own ten similes in the Mahāprajñāpāramitopadeśa — the source Yixing quotes at length for several of these images, and a text this site's Mūlamadhyamakakārikā collection draws on for the same author's other central arguments — make exactly this point for ordinary phenomena generally; this sūtra narrows the same device specifically onto ritual efficacy, where the stakes of getting the balance wrong are highest, since a practitioner who has just spent this whole chapter dissolving every fixed self and every fixed dharma might reasonably conclude that a mantra recited into emptiness can accomplish nothing whatsoever. Each simile blocks that conclusion from a different angle: illusion and the firebrand-wheel show that a real effect need not require anything solid at its base; the mirror-reflection and moon-in-water show that an effect can arise without anything passing between two agents; the dream and mirage show that vividness and even efficacy are compatible with there being, on analysis, nothing there — "not devoid of function," as Yixing puts it, "only devoid of the fixed, self-existing thing an ordinary person mistakenly looks for underneath the function." A mantra recited by an accomplished practitioner works, on this account, in exactly the way a reflection genuinely shows a face — not despite there being no substantial thing called "mantra power," but because that is what genuinely efficacious, dependently-arisen action has always actually been.
Part 1 Complete
This closes Part 1, the doctrinal foundation for everything that follows in this sūtra: bodhicitta as cause, compassion as root, and skillful means as ultimate; the search for a mind that cannot be found in any of twelve places; sixty ordinary states of mind a practitioner learns to recognize rather than judge; the reframing of three incalculable kalpas as three layers of grasping shed within a single lifetime; six kinds of fearlessness; and ten similes guarding against the two opposite errors a practitioner of emptiness can fall into. Part 2 turns to the sūtra's second chapter, 入漫荼羅具緣真言品第二 — the causes and conditions for entering the maṇḍala, and the first installment of the sūtra's account of the Womb Maṇḍala itself, the ritual and symbolic working-out of everything this chapter has stated directly.
Continue to Part 2 — Entering the Maṇḍala →