Twenty-Four Doors, One Room
The Buddha ties six knots in a single cloth to show that liberation must be undone one knot at a time, in order — then twenty-four disciples, one after another, describe in their own words exactly how each of them personally attained perfect penetration, from Kauṇḍinya's sound to Mahāsthāmaprāpta's recollection of the Buddha.
About This Fascicle
Fascicle 4 ended by proving that the nature of hearing itself never ceases. Fascicle 5 opens with Ānanda still not understanding how to act on that insight — so the Buddha ties a series of knots into a cloth to demonstrate, physically, that untying must happen one knot at a time, in the order they were tied. This becomes the occasion for the sūtra's most quoted verse, and then for its most famous structural device: twenty-four disciples in turn, each testifying in their own words to the Buddha how they personally reached "perfect penetration" (圓通) — enlightenment entered through one particular sense-faculty or element. A twenty-fifth account, Avalokiteśvara's, and Mañjuśrī's judgment among all twenty-five, follow in fascicle 6.
This page is Ru-Yi's own translation, made directly from the Chinese text preserved by CBETA (public domain). It does not reproduce or paraphrase the Buddhist Text Translation Society's existing English edition; see the translation notes for terminology, and the companion Jiǎngyì project for Master Yuanying's commentary.
The Six Sense-Roots, One Source 六根結元同一
阿難白佛言：「世尊！如來雖說第二義門，今觀世間解結之人，若不知其所結之元，我信是人終不能解。……唯願大慈哀愍淪溺！今日身心云何是結？從何名解？」
……十方微塵如來異口同音告阿難言：「善哉！阿難！汝欲識知俱生無明，使汝輪轉生死結根，唯汝六根更無他物。汝復欲知無上菩提，令汝速證安樂解脫寂靜妙常，亦汝六根更非他物！」
……佛告阿難：「根、塵同源，縛、脫無二，識性虛妄，猶如空花。阿難！由塵發知，因根有相，相見無性同於交蘆。是故汝今，知見立知即無明本；知見無見斯即涅槃無漏真淨。云何是中更容他物？」
Ānanda said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, although the Tathāgata has explained the second decisive meaning, when I now observe people in the world who untie knots, I am convinced that anyone who does not know where the knot originates can never actually untie it. ... I beg only that you, in great compassion, take pity on those of us still adrift. In what sense is my own body and mind, this very day, knotted? And by what means is it to be untied?"
... The Tathāgatas of the ten directions, numerous as dust motes, spoke with one voice to Ānanda: "Excellent, Ānanda! If you wish to know the innate ignorance that is the very root of the knot binding you to the wheel of birth and death, it is your six sense-roots, and nothing else. And if you wish to know the unsurpassed bodhi that will swiftly bring you to peaceful, liberated, still, wondrous, ever-abiding freedom, that too is your six sense-roots, and nothing else!"
... The Buddha said to Ānanda: "The sense-root and its object share the same source; bondage and liberation are not two different things. The nature of consciousness is false, like flowers conjured in the sky. Ānanda, knowing arises dependent on the object; appearance arises dependent on the root — object and seeing have no fixed nature of their own, like two reeds leaning on each other, each holding the other up. This is why, when your knowledge and seeing set up further knowledge, this is exactly the root of ignorance; but when your knowledge and seeing are free of any further seeing imposed on them, this is exactly nirvāṇa, undefiled and truly pure. How, then, could anything else be admitted into this?"
The Verse: "The True Nature Is Empty" 真性有為空
The true nature, in its conditioned aspect, is empty —
born of conditions, and so, like an illusion.
The unconditioned has no arising or ceasing —
not truly real either, like flowers in the sky.
Speaking of falsehood reveals what is true;
but falsehood and truth alike are still both false.
It is not even that there is a "true" or a "not-true" —
so how could there be a seer, and something seen?
In between, there is no real nature of its own —
it is exactly like two leaning reeds.
Binding and untying share the same cause;
sage and ordinary being walk no different path.
Observe the nature within this leaning-together —
both emptiness and existence are equally denied.
Confusion and obscurity are exactly ignorance;
understanding, once it dawns, is exactly liberation.
Untying the knots follows a fixed order:
once the six are solved, the "one" too disappears.
Choose among the roots for the one that is perfectly penetrating —
enter its stream, and complete awakening follows.
The subtle store-consciousness [ādāna],
with its habitual tendencies, becomes a raging torrent;
fearing that "true" and "not-true" would be misunderstood,
I have not, as a rule, expounded on it.
The mind grasping at itself
turns what is not illusion into an illusory thing;
not grasping, there is nothing that is not illusion either —
and if not-illusion does not even arise,
how could illusion itself ever be established?
This is called the wondrous lotus flower,
the vajra king's precious awareness, the illusion-like samādhi —
a snap of the fingers, and one transcends even the stage beyond training.
This Abhidharma
of all the Blessed Ones of the ten directions
is the one single road, the gate to nirvāṇa.
Reading note: This verse is chanted independently throughout Chinese Buddhism, often known simply by its opening line. Its central image — "two leaning reeds" (交蘆), each unable to stand without the other — captures the sūtra's whole diagnosis of sense-experience: the sense-root and its object are not two independent things that happen to touch, but two dependent appearances propping each other up, neither with any nature of its own. The verse also drops, almost in passing, one of only a few explicit references in the sūtra to the ādāna-consciousness (阿陀那識, closely related to the ālayavijñāna of Yogācāra thought) — the Buddha noting that he rarely teaches on it directly, for fear it will be mistaken for a fixed, essential self.
The Six-Knotted Cloth 綰巾示結
即時如來於師子座……取劫波羅天所奉花巾，於大眾前綰成一結。示阿難言：「此名何等？」阿難、大眾俱白佛言：「此名為結。」……如是倫次綰疊花巾，總成六結。
佛告阿難：「我初綰巾；汝名為結，此疊花巾先實一條，第二第三云何汝曹復名為結？」……佛告阿難：「此寶花巾，汝知此巾元止一條，我六綰時名有六結。汝審觀察，巾體是同，因結有異。……六結不同，循顧本因一巾所造，令其雜亂終不得成。則汝六根亦復如是，畢竟同中生畢竟異。」
At once the Tathāgata, seated on his lion-throne, ... took up a flowered cloth offered by the Kalāpa-heaven and, before the whole assembly, tied it into a single knot, asking Ānanda: "What is this called?" Ānanda and the assembly said to the Buddha: "This is called a knot." ... In this way, tying the cloth over and over, he made six knots in all.
The Buddha said to Ānanda: "When I tied the cloth the first time, you called it a knot; but this flowered cloth is, in truth, a single piece — why, then, did you call the second and third tying a 'knot' as well?" ... The Buddha said to Ānanda: "This precious flowered cloth — you know it is, at root, a single piece; yet when I tied it six times, you spoke of six knots. Examine this closely: the substance of the cloth is the same throughout, yet the knots differ from one another because of how they were tied. ... The six knots, though different from each other, all trace back to a single cloth from which they were made — and it will never do to let them become confused with one another. It is exactly the same with your six sense-roots: they are, in the end, born from the very same source, yet, in the end, differ from one another as well."
佛告阿難：「汝必嫌此六結不成，願樂一成復云何得？」阿難言：「此結若存，是非鋒起，於中自生此結非彼，彼結非此。如來今日若總解除，結若不生，則無彼此，尚不名一，六云何成？」佛言：「六解一亡，亦復如是……」
如來以手，將所結巾偏掣其左，問阿難言：「如是解不？」「不也，世尊！」旋復以手偏牽右邊，又問阿難：「如是解不？」「不也，世尊！」……阿難白佛言：「世尊！當於結心，解即分散。」佛告阿難：「如是，如是！若欲除結，當於結心。」
The Buddha said to Ānanda: "If you truly object to these six separate knots and wish instead for a single one, how could that be brought about?" Ānanda said: "As long as these knots exist, disputes over 'this' and 'that' arise among them — each knot naturally gives rise to the sense that it is not any of the others. But if the Tathāgata were to untie them all completely today, so that no knot remained at all, then there would be no 'this' or 'that' either — and if there is not even a single knot left, how could there be six?" The Buddha said: "It is exactly the same with 'once the six are untied, the one also disappears.' ..."
The Tathāgata took the knotted cloth in hand and pulled it sharply to the left, asking Ānanda: "Is it untied this way?" "No, World-Honored One." He then pulled sharply to the right instead, and asked again: "Is it untied this way?" "No, World-Honored One." ... Ānanda said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, one must work at the very center of the knot — only then will it come undone." The Buddha said to Ānanda: "Just so, just so! To remove a knot, one must work at its very center."
佛告阿難：「吾今以手左右各牽，竟不能解，汝設方便云何成解？」……佛告阿難：「如是，如是！若欲除結，當於結心。……阿難！吾今問汝，此劫波羅巾六結現前，同時解縈得同除不？」「不也，世尊！是結本以次第綰生，今日當須次第而解。……」佛言：「六根解除，亦復如是。此根初解，先得人空；空性圓明，成法解脫；解脫法已俱空不生，是名菩薩從三摩地得無生忍。」
The Buddha said to Ānanda: "I have just pulled the cloth left and right, and it did not come undone either way — what method would you devise to actually untie it? ... Ānanda, let me ask you: with all six knots of this cloth present at once, can they be untied and removed all together, at the same time?" "No, World-Honored One. These knots were originally tied one after another, in order, so today they must likewise be untied one after another, in the same order. ..." The Buddha said: "It is exactly the same with untying the six sense-roots. As each root is first untied, one first attains the emptiness of self; once this emptiness is perfectly bright and complete, liberation from dharmas is accomplished; and once liberated from dharmas as well, both kinds of emptiness cease even to arise — this is what is called a bodhisattva, proceeding from samādhi, attaining the patient acceptance of the unborn."
Reading note: The cloth is a single, undivided piece of fabric throughout — nothing about its substance changes as it gets tied into one, two, or six knots. This is the sūtra's answer to why liberation cannot be a single instantaneous event: the six sense-roots are not six separate things needing six separate solutions, nor are they simply "one" thing that a single insight dissolves all at once — they are one substance, differentiated by how it has been "tied," and so must be worked loose one knot at a time, starting wherever the knot's own center actually is (a specific, chosen sense-faculty), not by force applied from any direction at random.
The Buddha's Question, and Twenty-Four Answers 二十五圓通（一至二十四）
The Buddha now puts a single question to the whole assembly: "At your very first resolve, awakening to the eighteen elements, which one brought you to perfect penetration, and by what means did you enter samādhi?" Twenty-four disciples answer in turn, each in their own words. A twenty-fifth account — Avalokiteśvara's, on the ear-faculty — together with Mañjuśrī's judgment among all twenty-five, follows in fascicle 6.
Ājñātakauṇḍinya and the Five Bhikṣus 憍陳那五比丘
"I witnessed the Tathāgata's first attainment of the path at Deer Park and Vulture Grove, and awakened to the Four Noble Truths through the sound of the Buddha's voice. ... I attained arhatship through sound. As I have realized it, sound is foremost."
Aupanishada 優波尼沙陀
"I too observed the Buddha's first attainment, contemplating impurity and giving rise to great renunciation, awakening to the nature of form — from impurity, to white bones, to fine dust, returning to emptiness; both emptiness and form gone, I completed the path beyond training. Form is foremost."
Gandhavyūha, the Fragrance-Adorned Youth 香嚴童子
"I saw monks burning aloeswood incense; its fragrance entered my nose in stillness. I observed that this scent was neither wood, nor space, nor smoke, nor fire — going nowhere, coming from nowhere — and by this my ordinary mind dissolved, undefiled understanding dawned. Fragrance is foremost."
The Medicine King and Medicine Superior Bodhisattvas 藥王、藥上二法王子
"Through beginningless kalpas I was a fine physician of the world, tasting with my own mouth the 108,000 herbs, minerals, and substances of this Sahā world, knowing bitter, sour, salty, bland, sweet, and pungent thoroughly. Discerning the cause of each taste, I awakened from this. The cause of taste is foremost."
Bhadrapāla and Sixteen Companions 跋陀婆羅并十六開士
"Entering the bathhouse in turn with the monks, I suddenly awakened to the nature of water: it washes neither the dust nor the body itself; in between, at ease, I attained a state of nothing to grasp. The cause of touch is foremost."
Mahākāśyapa and Bhikṣuṇī Golden-Light 摩訶迦葉及紫金光比丘尼
"Observing that the six sense-objects of the world all decay and perish, I cultivated only through emptiness and stillness, extinguishing all activity, so that body and mind could pass through a hundred thousand kalpas as quickly as a finger-snap. I attained arhatship through the dharma of emptiness; the World-Honored One named me foremost in austere practice. The cause of dharmas is foremost."
Aniruddha 阿那律陀
"Rebuked by the Buddha for excessive sleep, I wept, vowed never to sleep again, and lost my eyesight after seven days. The Buddha then taught me the vajra samādhi of joyful, luminous seeing — I no longer see the ten directions by means of the physical eye at all, but with a pure clarity like viewing a fruit in my own palm. Reverting seeing to its very source is foremost."
Kṣudrapanthaka 周利槃特迦
"Lacking the capacity for broad learning, I could not even keep one verse in mind without forgetting the start as I reached the end. The Buddha, taking pity, taught me instead to regulate my in-and-out breath. Observing the breath down to its subtlest arising, abiding, changing, and ceasing, my mind opened vastly, without obstruction, until my outflows were exhausted. Turning the breath back to its emptiness is foremost."
Gavāmpati 憍梵鉢提
"Having once mocked a monk in a past life, I was born, life after life, with a cow's habit of chewing the cud. The Tathāgata taught me the single-flavor, pure gate of mind: I extinguished the discriminating mind and entered samādhi, observing that the knowledge of taste is neither a substance nor a thing. Reverting taste to its knowing is foremost."
Pilindavatsa 畢陵伽婆蹉
"Begging in the city, I stepped on a poisonous thorn, and my whole body ached. I reflected: there is an awareness that knows this deep pain — though it feels the pain, this pure awareness itself has no painful sensation at all. I further reflected: how could a single body have two awarenesses? Gathering this thought, body and mind suddenly became empty. Pure awareness leaving the body behind is foremost."
Subhūti 須菩提
"Through boundless kalpas my mind has been free of obstruction; I recall my own births as numerous as the sands of the Ganges. Even in the womb I already knew emptiness and stillness — extending this until the ten directions themselves became empty, I also brought sentient beings to realize the nature of emptiness. Turning all appearances into 'not,' exhausting even 'not,' and returning the Dharma to nothing at all, is foremost."
Śāriputra 舍利弗
"Through boundless kalpas my mind-seeing has been pure; wherever I encountered the various transformations of worldly and transcendent things, one glance and I understood them completely, without obstruction. Meeting the Kāśyapa brothers on the road, hearing them expound on causation, I awakened to the boundlessness of mind, and left home under the Buddha. Mind and seeing giving forth their own light, this light reaching its limit as knowledge and vision, is foremost."
Samantabhadra Bodhisattva 普賢菩薩
"I use the mind's own hearing to discern the knowledge and views held by all sentient beings. Even beyond a world as distant as the sands of the Ganges, if a single being's mind gives rise to the practice of Samantabhadra, I ride my six-tusked elephant, dividing my body a hundred thousandfold, to arrive at that very place at once. The mind's hearing giving rise to understanding, discerning freely, is foremost."
Sundarananda 孫陀羅難陀
"Though I kept the precepts fully, my mind in samādhi remained constantly scattered, without attaining freedom from outflows. The World-Honored One taught me to contemplate the white tip of the breath at the nose. After twenty-one days I saw the breath, entering and leaving, like smoke; body and mind became inwardly bright, the whole world appearing pure and clear, like lapis lazuli. The smoke-appearance gradually dissolved, and the breath itself turned to pure white light. Dissolving the breath until, over time, understanding dawns and, made perfectly bright, outflows are extinguished, is foremost."
Pūrṇa 富樓那彌多羅尼子
"Through boundless kalpas my eloquence has been unobstructed, proclaiming suffering and emptiness and penetrating deeply into true reality — expounding even the secret Dharma-gates of Buddhas numerous as the sands of the Ganges, without fear. Knowing my great eloquence, the World-Honored One taught me to develop it through the very turning of sound itself. Subduing demons and enemies through the sound of the Dharma, extinguishing all outflows, is foremost."
Upāli 優波離
"I personally accompanied the Buddha when he left the city to go forth, personally witnessed his six years of arduous practice, and personally saw him subdue every demon and every non-Buddhist teacher, becoming free of every worldly outflow of greed and desire. Receiving the Buddha's precepts and discipline down to the finest detail — three thousand dignified deportments, eighty-four thousand subtle rules of conduct and restraint — all became pure in me. Disciplining the body until the body itself gains freedom, then disciplining the mind in turn until the mind gains understanding, and finally body and mind both become fully unobstructed, is foremost."
Mahāmaudgalyāyana 大目犍連
"Begging on the road, I met the three Kāśyapa brothers, who expounded the profound meaning of the Tathāgata's teaching on causation. I resolved on the path at once and attained great penetration. Traveling the ten directions without obstruction, my supernatural power was declared foremost by every buddha of the ten directions, not the World-Honored One alone. Turning the calm light of mind back on itself, letting it shine forth, as a turbid stream, over time, becomes clear and bright, is foremost."
Ucchuṣma 烏芻瑟摩
"Long ago, being of a lustful nature, I was taught by the buddha Emptiness-King that a person consumed by lust becomes a raging mass of fire; he taught me to observe the warmth and coolness throughout my whole body, and my inner spiritual light condensed, transforming this very mind of lust into the fire of wisdom. Ever since, all buddhas have called me by the name Fire-Head. Contemplating the warmth of body and mind flowing without obstruction, until the outflows are dissolved and a great treasure-flame arises, is foremost."
Dharaṇiṃdhara Bodhisattva 持地菩薩
"As a monk in the age of the buddha Universal Light, I constantly leveled dangerous roads, built bridges, and carried sand and earth to make travel safe — through the ages of countless buddhas. When the buddha Viśvabhū touched my crown and told me, 'level the ground of the mind, and the ground of the whole world levels with it,' my mind opened: I saw that the fine dust of my own body and the fine dust that composes the whole world are, without difference, the same. Observing that the fine dust of the body and of the world are, without difference, the same — originally the tathāgatagarbha, dust arising only through delusion — until the dust dissolves and wisdom is complete, is foremost."
Candraprabha, the Moonlight Youth 月光童子
"In the age of the buddha Water-Deva, I was taught to cultivate the essence of water and enter samādhi, observing that the water-nature within my own body — from saliva down to blood and bodily fluids — is one and the same, no different from the fragrant seas surrounding the world-systems outside. [Once, a student, seeing only clear water filling my meditation room, threw a tile into it out of childish curiosity — and I, on rising from samādhi, felt sudden pain, as if struck; only by re-entering samādhi and removing the tile did the pain resolve.] I only came to fully forget the body itself in the age of the buddha Unobstructed Sovereign King of the Mountains and Seas. The single flavor of the water-nature flowing without obstruction, attaining the patient acceptance of the unborn, is foremost."
Ratnaprabha, the Vaiḍūrya-Light Dharma-Prince 瑠璃光法王子
"In the age of the buddha Boundless Sound, I observed that this world and the bodies of sentient beings are all turned by the force of a deluded wind, and that the movement of worlds, the movement of bodies, and the movement of thoughts in the mind are, without difference, all the same single movement. I realized that these countless movements come from nowhere and go nowhere — that all beings throughout the ten directions, however numerous, are exactly the same single falseness, like a hundred mosquitoes buzzing madly inside a single sealed jar. Observing that the force of wind has nothing to depend on, and thereby awakening the mind of bodhi, is foremost."
Ākāśagarbha Bodhisattva 虛空藏菩薩
"In the presence of the buddha Dīpaṃkara, I attained a boundless body, holding four great jewels in hand that illuminated the buddha-lands of the ten directions, transforming them into emptiness. A great, round mirror also appeared within my own mind, its ten kinds of subtle, jeweled light flowing throughout the ten directions to the very edge of space, drawing every banner-topped land into the mirror and into my own body — my body the same as empty space, without the slightest obstruction between them. Observing the boundlessness of empty space and entering samādhi through it is foremost."
Maitreya Bodhisattva 彌勒菩薩
"In the age of the buddha Sun-Moon-Lamp-Brightness, I went forth under him, but my heart still valued worldly reputation and loved to move among noble families. The World-Honored One taught me to cultivate the samādhi of mind-only, consciousness-only. Through kalpas of serving buddhas numerous as the sands of the Ganges with this samādhi, my craving for worldly reputation was finally extinguished. By the time of the buddha Dīpaṃkara, I had perfected this wondrous, complete samādhi of consciousness — and came to know that every land of every buddha, pure or defiled, existent or not, is entirely a transformation manifested by my own mind. Observing that the ten directions are consciousness-only, and thereby entering the perfect accomplishment of true reality, far removed from dependent and imagined natures, attaining the patient acceptance of the unborn, is foremost."
Mahāsthāmaprāpta and Fifty-Two Companion Bodhisattvas 大勢至法王子
"In the age of the buddha Boundless Light — and eleven more buddhas after him in succession within a single kalpa, the last named Light Surpassing Sun and Moon — that final buddha taught me the samādhi of recollecting the Buddha: 'It is like one person single-mindedly remembering another, while that other person constantly forgets — such two people may meet, or may not meet; may see each other, or may not. But if both people remember each other, and this mutual remembrance grows deep, then, life after life, they stay together like a form and its shadow, never parting. The Tathāgatas of the ten directions have compassion for sentient beings the way a mother remembers her child; but if the child runs away, what use is the mother's remembering? If the child remembers the mother the way the mother remembers the child, then mother and child, through every life, are never far apart. If sentient beings' minds recollect the Buddha and are mindful of the Buddha, then, whether now or in the future, they will surely see the Buddha — never far from the Buddha, and needing no other skillful means for their own minds to open. It is like a person handling perfumed things: their very body takes on the fragrance. This is called being adorned by the fragrance and light [of the Buddha].' My own causal-ground practice was this: taking the mind that recollects the Buddha as the very gate into the patient acceptance of the unborn. Now, in this world, I gather in those who recollect the Buddha and lead them home to the Pure Land. Without any need for further selection, simply gathering in all six sense-roots at once, with pure mindfulness continuing unbroken, and thereby attaining samādhi, is foremost."
大佛頂萬行首楞嚴經卷第五 — End of Fascicle Five
Reading note: Read as a set, these twenty-four accounts amount to a survey of nearly every classical meditation object in the Buddhist tradition — each of the six sense-faculties, each of the seven great elements, mind-only contemplation, and, in Mahāsthāmaprāpta's testimony, the recollection of the Buddha's name that underlies the entire Pure Land tradition. Notice that this list is not ranked in the text itself — each speaker simply calls their own method "foremost" from their own experience, without contradicting the others. The actual ranking is still to come: fascicle 6 adds a twenty-fifth account (Avalokiteśvara's, on the ear-faculty) and then has Mañjuśrī judge among all twenty-five which is genuinely best suited to beings in this particular world — the whole point of the demonstration being that the "best" method is not universal, but the one that best matches a given audience's actual conditions.