Upāli's Perfect Penetration Method among the Twenty-Five Sages in Volume Five of the *Shurangama Sutra*

Original text:优波离。即从座起。顶礼佛足。而白佛言。我亲随佛。逾城出家。亲观如来六年勤苦。亲见如来降伏诸魔。制诸外道。解脱世间贪欲诸漏。承佛教戒。如是乃至三千威仪。八万微细。性业遮业。悉皆清净。身心寂灭。成阿罗汉。我是如来众中纲纪。亲印我心。持戒修身。众推无上。佛问圆通。我以执身。身得自在。次第执心。心得通达。然后身心。一切通利。斯为第一。

Explanation: Upāli rose from his seat, paid homage at the Buddha's feet, and answered the Buddha: I personally followed the Buddha, climbing over the city wall at midnight to leave home and cultivate the Path in the Snow Mountains. With my own eyes I witnessed the Tathāgata's six years of arduous practice; with my own eyes I saw the Tathāgata subdue all māras and obstacles, subjugate all the non-Buddhist paths, and liberate Himself from the afflictive outflows of various greed and craving for the world. I received the Buddha's teaching of the precepts and strictly observed the Vinaya, down to the three thousand subtle practices of pure conduct that a monastic should fully possess, the eighty thousand subtle afflictions, the unwholesome karmas of the mental nature, and the obstructions of karmic seeds created in past lives—all were completely eliminated, the mind attained purity, body and mind attained quiescence and cessation, and I became an arhat.

Among the Tathāgata's assembly of bhikṣus, I was foremost in upholding the precepts, a model and exemplar of the bhikṣu Vinaya. The Buddha personally certified that my body and mind were pure, and in upholding the precepts and cultivating the body, the assembly esteemed me as foremost. Now the Buddha asks about the dharma gate of perfect penetration: it was because I first restrained the body that the material body attained freedom, never violating any of the bhikṣus' rules of deportment and precepts under any circumstances. After restraining bodily conduct, I then sequentially restrained mental conduct, and thus the mind penetrated the world of the five aggregates; finally, my body and mind penetrated all dharmas of the world without obstruction. I took upholding the precepts and cultivating body and mind as my foremost dharma gate of perfect penetration.

During the true Dharma age when the Buddha was in the world, perfect fulfillment of the precepts alone could bring realization of the fruits, up to becoming an arhat of the fourth fruit. In the Dharma-ending age, because sentient beings' spiritual faculties (indriya) are deficient and inferior, and because of the defilement of the living environment, the single dharma of upholding the precepts can no longer bring realization of the fruits; one must cultivate precepts, meditation (samādhi), and wisdom together, and only when all are perfected can the fruits be realized. If one does not observe the precepts, realization of the fruits is even more impossible; when the mind-ground is turbid and impure, meditative concentration and wisdom cannot arise.