Vasubandhu · 5th Century · 無量壽經優波提舍願生偈

The Rebirth Treatise.

A twenty-four-stanza verse and its own prose commentary, composed by Vasubandhu after he took up Pure Land practice late in a career spent mostly refuting it — the "one treatise" that completes the traditional "five sūtras and one treatise" (五經一論) of the Pure Land canon. This collection carries the full treatise across seven parts, read throughout with Tanluan's 6th-century commentary, the single most influential work of Chinese Pure Land doctrine after the sūtras themselves — a commentary Shinran, founder of Japan's Jōdo Shinshū school, personally annotated by hand in 1256, at eighty-four years old.

Browse the 7 parts → Translation notes →

How to read this collection

This is a mid-length treatise — 3,110 Chinese characters, a twenty-four-stanza verse followed by a prose commentary written by the same author to explain it — read across seven parts, split at the treatise's own structural seams rather than at even intervals. Part 1 carries the verse in full; Parts 2 through 7 carry the prose commentary's own ten-part outline, condensed into six pages around its natural groupings: the five gates of mindfulness, the land's seventeen adornments, the Buddha's eight, the bodhisattvas' four, the treatise's philosophical center on the "one Dharma-phrase," and its closing account of five gates of practice leading a bodhisattva in and back out again.

Each page carries the Chinese source text beside Ru-Yi's English translation, with reading notes drawn from Tanluan's Wangsheng Lun Zhu (往生論註, T1819) — a two-fascicle commentary that does far more than explain the treatise line by line: it introduces the distinction between the "hard path" and the "easy path," between self-power and other-power, that would become the master framework for nearly all later Chinese and Japanese Pure Land thought, including the Treatise on Ten Doubts already translated on this site, which draws on nearly identical arguments.

What each page includes

The Chinese source text beside our English translation, verified against the base text for full coverage.
Reading notes — "after Tanluan" throughout, drawn from his 6th-century commentary on this treatise.
Cross-references to this site's other Pure Land pages wherever Tanluan's own argument anticipates or echoes a passage already translated here.
A closing note on this manuscript's own transmission history — including its personal annotation, in 1256, by Shinran, the founder of Japan's largest Pure Land school.

7 of 7 parts translated — complete

3,110 Chinese characters of root text translated in full

T1819 Tanluan's two-fascicle commentary, the source for every reading note

The Treatise's Own Structure

Tanluan divides the treatise into two parts, matching the treatise's own division: a "general statement" (總說分), which is the twenty-four-stanza verse itself, and an "explanation of meaning" (解義分), the prose that follows it — which Tanluan further divides into ten movements, from the treatise's own opening statement of intent through to its closing claim that this fivefold practice brings a bodhisattva to buddhahood faster than any other path.

總說分 · The Verse

The Verse of Aspiration for Rebirth

Twenty-four stanzas taking refuge in Amitābha, describing the Land of Peace and Bliss, and vowing rebirth there alongside every sentient being — the "total holding" (總持) of the entire treatise's argument in verse form.

Part 1 · complete

解義分 1–2 · 願偈大意・起觀生信

The Five Gates of Mindfulness

The prose commentary opens by naming the five practices — worship, praise, aspiration, contemplation, and dedication — that structure everything the verse has already said.

Part 2 · complete

解義分 3a · 觀察體相：國土莊嚴

The Land's Seventeen Adornments

Seventeen features of Sukhāvatī itself, each traced back to the specific line of verse that first named it — purity, measure, nature, form, texture, light, sound, and more.

Part 3 · complete

解義分 3b · 觀察體相：佛莊嚴

The Buddha's Eight Adornments

Eight features of Amitābha himself — his throne, body, speech, mind, assembly, foremost rank, lordship, and the "unfailing power" of his own vow.

Part 4 · complete

解義分 3c · 觀察體相：菩薩莊嚴

The Bodhisattvas' Four Adornments

Four ways the bodhisattvas of that land act throughout the ten directions without their bodies ever once leaving it — closing Tanluan's third movement, "the substance of contemplative practice."

Part 5 · complete

解義分 4–8 · 淨入願心・善巧攝化・障∕順菩提門

The One Dharma-Phrase

The treatise's philosophical center: how twenty-nine lines of verse fold into a single phrase, "true and real wisdom, the uncreated Dharma-body," and the three things a bodhisattva must leave behind to enter the gate of bodhi.

Part 6 · complete

解義分 9–10 · 願事成就・利行滿足

The Five Approach-Gates

Five gates — near, great-assembly, house, room, and garden-grove — the first four leading a practitioner in, the fifth leading back out to teach; and the treatise's own closing claim about why this path is swift.

Part 7 · complete

Read by Part

All seven parts are translated. Each links to the full bilingual text with reading notes after Tanluan.

Part 1 The Verse of Aspiration for Rebirth Part 2 The Five Gates of Mindfulness Part 3 The Land's Seventeen Adornments Part 4 The Buddha's Eight Adornments Part 5 The Bodhisattvas' Four Adornments Part 6 The One Dharma-Phrase Part 7 The Five Approach-Gates

Translation Notes

Recurring terms, kept consistent across all seven parts. Where a term already has an established rendering elsewhere on this site's Pure Land pages, we reuse it; where this treatise's own vocabulary has no site precedent, we coin one here. See the full translation notes for the complete glossary, and also this site's note on translation method.

優婆提舍 — upadeśaKept transliterated rather than translated as "treatise" or "commentary" — Tanluan himself explains this Sanskrit genre-term has no exact Chinese equivalent, and this site follows his own reasoning in leaving it untranslated in the title.

無礙光如來 — the Tathāgata of Unobstructed LightOne of Amitābha's own names, used throughout the verse itself in place of "Amitābha" — kept literal to preserve the treatise's own opening image of light that nothing can block.

五念門 — the five gates of mindfulnessWorship, praise, aspiration, contemplation, and dedication — kept as a fixed, numbered set throughout, matching this site's convention for enumerated practice-lists.

莊嚴 — adornmentKept literal rather than translated as "glory" or "splendor" — the treatise's own analysis treats each of the twenty-nine adornments as a specific, causally produced feature, not a vague honorific.

自力 / 他力 — self-power / other-powerKept as a literal pairing, matching the rendering already established on this site's Ten Doubts pages — Tanluan's own use of this pair, in his commentary's opening lines, is the earliest occurrence of the distinction on this site.

清淨句 / 真實智慧無為法身 — the phrase of purity / true and real wisdom, the uncreated Dharma-bodyKept as a fixed technical phrase throughout Part 6 — the treatise's own single-sentence definition of ultimate reality, into which all twenty-nine other adornments are said to fold.