Only Those Who Have Walked the Path Can Guide Others Correctly

Prajñā without precepts and meditation is merely prajñā of intellectual understanding. Prajñā of intellectual understanding is like an ordinary being who, through study and mental deliberation and conceptual interpretation, can expound the Dharma of the tenth-bhūmi bodhisattvas, the bodhisattvas of the stage of near-perfect enlightenment, and the attainment of buddhahood. He has never walked any part of the path, yet he can tell you a rough outline of how to traverse each section of it; but if asked to explain in detail, he absolutely cannot, unless he simply makes things up. So whether others, relying on the path to buddhahood that he describes, can travel it swiftly—or whether they can even travel it at all—remains a question.

But a person who has genuinely walked that stretch of the path needs only to point the way; others who follow his pointing can quickly reach the destination, without taking detours, without needing to circle around, without twists and turns, arriving in a straight line.