The Ninth Grade Begins
The final and gravest of the nine grades opens without any softening of what this being has done: the five heinous crimes, fully committed, weighed here with unflinching precision — no karma without its own retribution, no cause without its own effect, and a debt of suffering not yet exhausted.
The Five Heinous Crimes, Weighed Without Flinching
次就下品下生位中，亦先舉，次辨，後結。即有其七。一、從佛告阿難已下，總明告命。二、從下品下生者，正明辨定其位，即是具造五逆等重罪凡夫人也。三、從或有眾生下至受苦無窮已來，正明第五第六門中簡機造惡輕重之相。即有其七。一明造惡之機。二明總舉不善之名。三明簡罪輕重。四明總結眾惡，非智人之業。五明造惡既多罪亦非輕。六明非業不受其報，非因不受其果，因業既非是樂，果報焉能不苦也。七明造惡之因既具酬報之劫未窮。
Next, within the position of the lowest rebirth of the lower rank, the text likewise first raises the matter, next distinguishes it in detail, and finally concludes it. There are seven points in all.
First, from "the Buddha told Ānanda" onward, this generally makes plain the issuing of this command.
Second, as for "the lowest rebirth of the lower rank": this makes plain the distinguishing and fixing of this grade's own position — this is itself the ordinary being who has fully committed the five heinous crimes and other offenses of the gravest weight.
Third, from "should there be sentient beings" down through "suffers without end," this makes plain, within the fifth and sixth gates, the distinguishing of capacity, and the mark of the offenses, light or heavy, this being has committed. There are seven points within it. First, this makes plain the capacity for committing evil. Second, this makes plain the general raising up of the name of this unwholesome conduct. Third, this makes plain the distinguishing of these offenses, light and heavy. Fourth, this makes plain gathering all these evils together as conduct unfit for one of wisdom. Fifth, this makes plain that, the evil committed being so extensive, the offense too is far from slight. Sixth, this makes plain that there is no karma without its own retribution, and no cause without its own effect — since the cause, this karma, was never itself joy, how could its effect, this retribution, fail to be suffering? Seventh, this makes plain that, the cause of this committed evil being now complete, the kalpas owed in recompense for it are not yet exhausted.
Shandao's own sixth point — "no karma without its own retribution, and no cause without its own effect" — refuses in advance any reading of what follows as karma simply erased or waived. Whatever rebirth this grade goes on to receive will not be a suspension of cause and effect; it will have to be accounted for within that same law, not outside it. This is the ground the commentary's most difficult question, taken up in the next part, will have to answer.
Part 100 Complete
This closes Part 100 — one hundred parts into this translation. Part 101 takes up this commentary's second great historically significant question: why does Amitābha's forty-eight vows explicitly exclude those who commit the five heinous crimes or slander the true Dharma from rebirth, while this very sūtra now describes exactly such a being attaining it?
Continue to Part 101 — The Gate of Restraint →