An Explanation of the Twelve Nidānas in the Āgama Sutras
Chapter 7: The Sūtra Spoken by the Buddha on the Old Woman
Original text:闻如是。一时佛在维耶罗国。所止处名曰乐音。时与八百比丘僧。菩萨万人俱。
Explanation: Ānanda said: This is what I personally heard the Buddha teach. When the Buddha was once staying at a place called Pleasant Sound in the country of Vairo, the Buddha was together with eight hundred bhikṣus and ten thousand bodhisattvas, teaching the Dharma to these assemblies of bhikṣus and bodhisattvas.
The assembly of bhikṣus generally refers to the constant followers who studied with the Buddha the Small Vehicle's Four Noble Truths of suffering, accumulation, cessation, and the path. Cultivating the Four Noble Truths can eradicate the view of self (satkāya-dṛṣṭi), realize the selflessness of persons, attain liberation from the suffering of birth and death in the three realms, and realize that the five aggregates and eighteen realms are suffering, empty, impermanent, and without self. Since the five aggregates and eighteen realms are suffering, what is suffering is not the self; they are empty, and what is empty is not the self; they are impermanent, and what is impermanent is not the self. The self is not suffering, the self is not empty, the self is ever-present, yet the five aggregates and eighteen realms have no real, ever-present, non-suffering self-nature; therefore the five aggregates and eighteen realms are not the self.
By accepting this principle, one eliminates the previous mistaken view that the five aggregates are the self, thereby severing the wrong view (mithyā-dṛṣṭi) that the five aggregates are the self. The three fetters that previously bound one to transmigration in birth and death are thereby severed, and one realizes the first fruit of srotāpanna. Subsequently, the afflictions of greed, hatred, and delusion become attenuated, and one realizes the second fruit of sakṛdāgāmin; after cultivating the first dhyāna, one severs the greed of the desire realm and also severs hatred, realizing the third fruit of anāgāmin; continuing to cultivate further, when conceit of self is exhausted, the manas' grasping at self is extinguished, and the afflictions of the four abodes of one thought of ignorance are exhausted, one realizes the fourth fruit of the great arhat. When the lifespan is exhausted, the arhat's manas no longer takes charge to give rise to the six consciousnesses contacting the six sense objects, and the manas has no mental activity whatsoever; thus the six faculties, six objects, and six consciousnesses are all extinguished, the functions of the five aggregates of form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness are extinguished, and one enters nirvāṇa without remainder (Anupadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa), no longer coming to the three realms. This is ending birth and death, leaving the three realms, and attaining liberation.
Bodhisattvas are of two kinds: those who have left home and those who live at home. Bodhisattvas mainly cultivate the six pāramitās of generosity (dāna), precept-keeping, patience, diligence, meditative concentration (dhyāna), and prajñā wisdom, as well as all bodhisattva practices that benefit both self and others. Passing through the fifty-two stages of the ten faiths, ten abodes, ten practices, ten dedications, ten bhūmis, and the stages of equal enlightenment and wondrous enlightenment, through cultivation spanning three great asaṃkhyeya kalpas, they finally perfectly accomplish the Buddha Way.
In the practice of the six pāramitās, generosity (dāna) includes giving of wealth, giving of Dharma, and giving of fearlessness; precept-keeping includes keeping the Small Vehicle's five precepts and the Great Vehicle bodhisattva precepts; patience mainly means softening and taming one's own disposition, cultivating patience toward all people, matters, things, and principles, according with emptiness, patiently accepting that all dharmas of the five-aggregate world are empty and without self, and persisting diligently in practice without fearing difficulty; diligence means being diligent in generosity, broadly accumulating immeasurable merit, being diligent in keeping precepts, diligent in patience, diligent in meditative concentration, and also diligent in cultivating prajñā wisdom; the fifth pāramitā is meditative concentration (dhyāna), requiring the full power of concentration of preparatory concentration (anāgamya-samādhi) or the first dhyāna, using this power of concentration to contemplate and investigate the Buddha's teachings, to contemplate the emptiness principles of the Great and Small Vehicles, and to realize the fruit of emptiness; finally there is the pāramitā of prajñā wisdom, which means being steeped in the principles of prajñā and of the tathāgatagarbha, laying the foundation for seeing the mind and seeing the nature. These practices constitute the bodhisattva's six pāramitās; when the six pāramitās are fulfilled and the conditions arrive, one will realize the patience with non-arising and the patience with the non-arising of dharmas.
The meaning of patience with non-arising is to patiently accept that the five aggregates and eighteen realms have no real arising, that they are all unreal dharmas produced by the tathāgatagarbha, and are therefore empty, illusory, and false; to accept that all dharmas are unborn, without activity, without reality, and without possession; that the dharmas of the five-aggregate world have no real arising, are all empty marks and false marks, without any real self-nature. The Small Vehicle's realization from the first fruit to the fourth fruit, realizing the selflessness of persons, is also a kind of patience with non-arising. The bodhisattva's patience with non-arising is seeing the mind and seeing the nature, realizing the tathāgatagarbha, knowing the true reality dharma of the tathāgatagarbha—unborn and unceasing, real and not false—and at the same time knowing that all dharmas are produced and transformed by the tathāgatagarbha, all being illusory, arising and ceasing, unreal, and without self. Such patience is called patience with non-arising.
The wisdom of patience with the non-arising of dharmas is far greater than the wisdom of patience with non-arising; this is the wisdom cultivated and realized by bodhisattvas from the first bhūmi up to wondrous enlightenment. Bhūmi-level bodhisattvas realize that all dharmas of the three-realm world produced by the tathāgatagarbha are produced by the tathāgatagarbha, are all dharmas within the one true dharma realm, are all of true suchness nature; therefore their minds are tranquil and extinguished, able to accept without regression—this is called patience with the non-arising of dharmas. The bodhisattvas' wisdom of patience with the non-arising of dharmas advances from one bhūmi to the next, and only at the Buddha stage is it perfectly complete. Before enlightenment one must cultivate the six pāramitās; after enlightenment one must still cultivate the bodhisattva's six pāramitās from within the gate [of the true mind], and once the conditions are fulfilled one can enter the first bhūmi. On the foundation of the six pāramitās, the first-bhūmi bodhisattva adds four more: the pāramitā of expedient means, the pāramitā of vows, the pāramitā of powers, and the pāramitā of wisdom. Having cultivated the ten pāramitās to completion, one realizes the fruit of the tenth-bhūmi bodhisattva. This is the bodhisattva path cultivated by bodhisattvas.
Original text:时有贫穷老母。来到佛所。以头面着地。为佛作礼。白佛言。愿欲有所问。佛言。善哉善哉当问。老母言。人生老病死。从何所来去至何所。色痛痒思想行识。从何所来。去至何所。眼耳鼻舌身心。从何所来。去至何所。地水火风空。从何所来。去至何所。
Explanation: In this great Dharma assembly, a very poor old woman came before the World-Honored One, placed her head and face on the ground, paid homage to the World-Honored One, and said to the Buddha: I have a question I wish to ask you. The Buddha said: Excellent, excellent, you may ask. The old woman asked: Where do human birth, aging, sickness, and death come from, and where do they go? Where do form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness come from, and where do they go? Where do the eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind come from, and where do they go? Where do earth, water, fire, wind, and space come from, and where do they go?
The old woman asked these questions in succession: one about birth, aging, sickness, and death; one about the five aggregates; one about the six faculties; and finally one about the five great seeds of earth, water, fire, wind, and space. These questions are all very profound; they are fundamental questions in the practice of the Buddha's Dharma, the great questions of birth and death in the transmigration through the six destinies. From the questions the old woman asked, one can see that she was no ordinary person; her roots of goodness from past-life cultivation were very deep. If her roots of goodness were not deep, she would have asked questions about worldly benefits, such as matters of wealth, sex, fame, food, and sleep.
The old woman wanted to trace birth and death—the great question—to its root and source, and seeking the source of life involves an important dharma gate of Buddhist practice: the twelve links of dependent origination studied by the Middle Vehicle's pratyekabuddhas. The twelve links of dependent origination reveal the causes and conditions for the arising and ceasing of all dharmas of sentient beings' five-aggregate worlds, the causes and conditions for the arising and ceasing of the phenomena of sentient beings' birth, aging, sickness, and death, and the causes and conditions of the birth-and-death transmigration of sentient beings in the three realms and six destinies. The questions the old woman asked actually all belong to questions of dependent origination.
Arhats and pratyekabuddhas cultivate the Four Noble Truths and the twelve links of dependent origination, and in the end, extinguishing one thought of ignorance and exhausting grasping at self, they can enter nirvāṇa without remainder. When the material body and five aggregates are extinguished, birth, aging, sickness, death, sorrow, grief, suffering, and distress (śoka-parideva-duḥkha-daurmanasyopāyāsa) also cease; they leave suffering and attain peace, leave the birth-and-death transmigration of the three realms, end birth in the three realms, end death in the three realms, and attain liberation from the three realms. But arhats and pratyekabuddhas have not attained true bliss either; they have only left suffering. With no material body and five aggregates to experience suffering, having left the three realms, they have ended birth and death in the three realms and attained liberation from the three realms. Why have they not attained bliss? Because there is no five-aggregate body of the arhats to experience bliss; without a body and mind that experiences suffering, of course there is no body and mind that experiences bliss; both suffering and bliss are experienced by the arising-and-ceasing body and mind.
Let me briefly explain the relevant concepts in the old woman's questions. The five aggregates: from the fertilized egg until death, the material body of this lifetime is the aggregate of form; the aggregate of feeling is the feelings of suffering, bliss, and neither-suffering-nor-bliss, also called the six feeling-bodies, which exist when the six faculties contact the six objects; the aggregate of perception is when the six faculties contact the six objects, the mind takes up the marks of the six objects and knows them—the discrimination of the six objects by the six consciousnesses, also called the six perception-bodies; the aggregate of volitional formations refers to the bodily, verbal, and mental actions of the six consciousnesses, including bodily actions and deeds, verbal actions and initial application and sustained examination (vitarka-vicāra), and mental actions of thoughts and views. Formation means action, operation, flowing, and change—changes of time, migrations of place and direction; the moment-to-moment changes of bodily, verbal, and mental actions are the aggregate of volitional formations, and the six consciousnesses all have the aggregate of volitional formations when discriminating the six objects. The aggregate of consciousness is the discriminating function of the six consciousnesses regarding the six objects.
The five great seeds of earth, water, fire, wind, and space that form the material body are all great seeds within the Ālayavijñāna. The earth nature is hardness, having the function of support and holding, such as external earth, mountains and rivers, trees, metals, and mineral deposits—all of these are of hard nature, with the earth element predominant; the material body also has earth nature, such as bones, muscles, sinews, vessels, and so on, with the earth element predominant. The water nature is wetness, such as rivers, oceans, and various liquids; in the body, urine, sweat, saliva, blood, tears, mucus, and so on all belong to the wet water nature. The fire nature is heat, temperature, and energy; the fire nature exists both in the external world and within the body, such as external sunlight, burning fire, and the body's internal temperature.
The wind nature is the property of floating and flowing, divided into external wind and the internal wind within the body. External wind is like the great winds, typhoons, storms, and breezes appearing in cosmic space—the winds of the external world; the winds of the body's internal realm are the breath and the various vital airs circulating within the body. Because of the wind's fluidity in the body, food can be digested, absorbed, and excreted bit by bit in the stomach and intestines, blood can flow, and the heart and pulse can beat—all these involve the function of the wind nature. Without wind, matter could not flow and the body could not operate; wind represents fluidity and is a kind of kinetic energy. The production of sentient beings' speech also cannot be separated from the wind nature's function: when thoughts and initial application and sustained examination (vitarka-vicāra) arise in the mind, wind is produced; the wind touches the navel, then touches the heart, then in sequence touches the windpipe, the tongue faculty, and the oral cavity, and sound is emitted and speech is produced—this too is the function of the wind nature.
The space element is the nature of empty space, divided into external void and space, and the gaps and spaces within the body. Because there is space in the external world, it can contain all material form; matter can move, sound, gases, and scent-objects can propagate, various energies can be transmitted, and sentient beings can survive in space. The external void is formed by the collective output of space-element seeds by all sentient beings' Ālayavijñānas, and is jointly sustained by all sentient beings' Ālayavijñānas. Various materials also have gaps and spaces within them; the differing amounts of these gaps cause differences in material structure, in density, and in the physical properties of matter. The space within matter is also jointly formed and sustained by the Ālayavijñānas of all sentient beings with shared karma.
Every tissue and structure in the body has gaps and spaces; because of these spaces, food, gases, and blood can flow. Even the smallest cellular tissues in the body have spaces, and the various molecular structures within cells also have gaps, so that molecules, ions, and other particles can move and cells can carry out metabolism. Thus the four great elements plus the space element compose sentient beings' three-realm world, and the five great seeds exist pervading all places.
The Ālayavijñāna outputs the five great seeds; when the five great seeds combine, they form various materials, including external mountains and rivers, the great earth, trees, rivers, and celestial bodies—all are combinations of the five great seeds, only with different proportions, forming different materials. The combination of earth, water, fire, wind, and space also creates sentient beings' material bodies; for example, bones contain not only earth nature but also fire, wind, and water natures. But the five great seeds of the material body are output solely by that sentient being's own Ālayavijñāna; the material body is produced and sustained solely by the individual Ālayavijñāna of a sentient being with distinct karma.
External flowers, grasses, and trees are also composed of the five great seeds of earth, water, fire, wind, and space. For example, when a tree is squeezed, water comes out, showing it contains the water element; when ignited, it burns, showing it contains the fire nature; trees are hard, showing they contain the earth element; trees can grow, showing they contain the wind nature; trees also contain the space element—having gaps, wind can circulate within and water can moisten within. Stones contain not only the earth, water, fire, and space elements: when squeezed, water comes out; when struck, sparks fly; they also have gaps—molecules have gaps between them, and because of the gaps, molecules can move and wind can flow within. When the proportions of the space element within differ, the natures and kinds of stones differ. Thus all matter is composed of earth, water, fire, wind, and space.
Original text:佛言。人生老病死。无所从来去亦无所至。色痛想行识。无所从来去亦无所至。眼耳鼻舌身心。无所从来去亦无所至。地水火风空。无所从来去亦无所至。
Explanation: The Buddha said: Human birth, aging, sickness, and death have no place of coming and no place of going; form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness have no place of coming and no place of going; eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind have no place of coming and no place of going; earth, water, fire, wind, and space have no place of coming and no place of going.
The World-Honored One spoke here from the standpoint of the empty marks of the Small and Middle Vehicles, not from the Great Vehicle's true meaning, because those receiving the teaching had the faculties of the Two Vehicles; the World-Honored One therefore accorded with sentient beings' faculties and spoke from the empty marks of dependent origination, not teaching the Great Vehicle's true meaning. The Buddha said that human birth, aging, sickness, and death have no place of coming and no place of going. If the human material body had a place of coming, we could investigate and search for that place of coming, but no matter what, we cannot find it. If we say the human body comes from parents, from the mother's womb, from the fertilized egg, we observe and investigate and find that parents and the fertilized egg have no place of coming either, so the human body has no place of coming; if we say the human body comes from empty space, yet empty space also has no place of coming, so the human body has no place of coming.
After sentient beings die and the material body perishes, the human body also has no place of going. If there were a place of going, then over life after life humans have immeasurable, boundless material bodies; the material bodies within even a small kalpa, piled up, would be taller than Mount Sumeru, and all sentient beings' material bodies piled together would fill the void, leaving no empty space. Therefore the human body comes from nowhere, and when perished has no place of going. Take sickness, for example: where does illness come from? Where are these disease symptoms stored before entering the body? Disease has no place of coming. After the illness is cured, where does it go? If we say the illness went into empty space, and if empty space stored countless diseases, all sentient beings would live amid an atmosphere of disease, and there would be no time when anyone was not ill. Therefore disease does not go into empty space, nor to any other place; it has no place of coming and no place of going. This shows that all dharmas are empty.
The aggregate of form has no place of coming or going; the aggregate of feeling is the same. For example, when listening to music one feels very happy—where does this happy feeling come from? When the happy feeling disappears, where does it go? It has no place of coming or going. The aggregate of perception also has no place of coming or going: when the eye sees form there is knowingness—where does this knowing come from? When one falls asleep, external forms are no longer known—where has this knowingness gone? It has no place of going. The aggregate of volitional formations likewise has no place of coming or going: for example, where does the action of hammering a table come from? When the action of hammering the table ceases, where does it go? It has no place of coming or going. The discriminating function and knowingness of the aggregate of consciousness—the six consciousnesses regarding the six objects—likewise has no place of coming and no place of going.
All dharmas have no place of coming and no place of going. For example, the trees in a forest—where do the trees come from? If we say they come from tree seeds, the seeds are tiny and do not have the mark of a great tree, and the tree seeds themselves have no place of coming, so the great tree even less has a place of coming; empty space also has no mark of a great tree. After the tree is destroyed, where does it go? It has no place of going. When a typhoon appears in the void, where did the typhoon come from? Where was it hidden before it came? After the typhoon subsides, where does it go? It has no place of coming and no place of going; it is inherently illusory.
When the sky is covered with dark clouds and it rains, where do the raindrops come from? If we say they come from the clouds, the sky always has clouds—why does it not rain constantly? If we say the raindrops are hidden in empty space, and empty space is ever-present, it should rain constantly. When the rain stops, the raindrops have no place of going—they cannot hide in the clouds or in empty space. When the earth is destroyed, the raindrops falling from the sky are as large as elephants, forming floods that reach all the way to the first dhyāna heaven; so much rainwater even less has a place of hiding. When the flood recedes, where did all that water go? It has no place of going. All dharmas come from nowhere and go nowhere.
When fire burns the wild grass outside, where was the fire before it burned? It was not in the hand of the person who lit it, nor in empty space; the fire has no place of coming, and when extinguished has no place of going. If there were fire in empty space, all things would be burned up and nothing would exist. If fire came from the sun, it would burn all things at all times, leaving ashes wherever it went. Another example: when a person is dizzy and sees golden flowers before the eyes, where do those golden flowers come from? If they came from empty space, others do not see them and are not dizzy; if we say they come from the eyes, one should always see golden flowers. When the head is no longer dizzy, where have those golden flowers gone? They come from nowhere and go nowhere. Observing thus, one knows that all dharmas are entirely empty, none is real; they come in emptiness and go in emptiness, like the transformations of a magician—no place of coming or going can be found; all are illusory false marks.
Original text:佛言。诸法亦如是。譬如两木相钻出火。火还烧木，木尽火便灭。佛问老母言。是火本从何所来。灭去至何所。老母报佛言。因缘合会便得火。因缘离散火即灭。
Explanation: The Buddha said: All dharmas are also like this—coming from nowhere and going nowhere. For example, two pieces of wood rubbed together produce fire; the fire then burns the wood, and when the wood is consumed, the fire goes out. The Buddha asked the old woman: Where did this fire originally come from, and where did it go when extinguished? The old woman replied to the Buddha: When causes and conditions come together, fire is obtained; when causes and conditions disperse, the fire is extinguished.
What are the causes and conditions for the production of fire? Two pieces of wood, placed together by a person and rubbed; when the rubbing reaches a certain degree, a sensation of warmth appears, the wood heats up, and fire is produced. Two pieces of wood, a person, and human effort—these conditions come together, plus a cause that produces fire: the fire-element seed within the Ālayavijñāna. With causes and conditions thus combined, fire is produced. It is like two hands: when rubbed together, heat is produced; the causes and conditions for the appearance of heat are the two hands coming together and being rubbed with force. But rubbing the two hands together cannot produce fire, because this condition is not a condition for producing fire.
For example, sentient beings are born into this world with cause and condition; only when causes and conditions combine can they be born into this world. What are the causes and conditions for being born into this world? First there must be the karmic seeds of the three realms that create karma, plus the conditions of parents and of desire; these conditions plus the cause of birth—the Ālayavijñāna—allow sentient beings to enter the womb and be born. When a sentient being's conditions in this world disperse, the lifespan ends. Thus all dharmas are produced by causes and conditions, and dharmas produced by causes and conditions are empty; dharmas produced depending on cause and condition lack self-mastery (avaśatā), are illusory and false.
Original text:佛言。诸法亦如是。因缘合会乃成。因缘离散即灭。诸法亦无所从来。去亦无所至。眼见好色即是意。意即是色。是二者俱空。无所有成。灭亦如是。
Explanation: The Buddha said: All dharmas are also like this: when causes and conditions come together they are formed; when causes and conditions disperse they perish. All dharmas come from nowhere and go nowhere. The eye seeing pleasant form is mind; mind is form; these two are both empty, formed of nothing; their perishing is also like this.
All dharmas include material dharmas and mental dharmas; any dharma is formed only by the combination of causes and conditions; if conditions are not complete, no dharma can be produced. The production of each dharma has its corresponding causes and conditions; when one condition disperses, the dharma is lost. Therefore, apart from any one cause or condition, the dharma cannot arise. For example, for me to teach the Dharma here requires a place, requires a computer, requires an audience, requires that I be in good health, requires light, and so on—these external conditions; lacking even one condition, the matter of teaching the Dharma will not be accomplished. So teaching the Dharma is a dharma produced by causes and conditions, empty and illusory, disappearing when causes and conditions disperse. For example, a family: when causes and conditions combine they live together; when the conditions perish, the family disperses. Therefore do not be attached to or crave for relatives; all is empty and illusory. There is no banquet that never disperses, no stage that never empties; all combine through causes and conditions, with gathering and dispersing being impermanent.
Sentient beings' minds always wish to see pleasant forms, and the forms seen are produced by mental thought; the mind that sees forms and the forms seen are both empty; both material dharmas and mental dharmas are empty; at arising there is no place where they are stored, and at perishing there is no place they go. All external material forms arise depending on various conditions; though they arise, they have no place of coming; when conditions disperse, forms vanish, and having vanished they have no place of going—coming from nowhere, going nowhere. The mind that sees forms is likewise subject to the gathering and dispersing of conditions, coming from nowhere and going nowhere—entirely false.
Original text:诸法譬如鼓。不用一事成。有人持桴捶鼓。鼓便有声。是鼓声亦空。当来声亦空。过去声亦空。是声亦不从木革桴人手出。合会诸物。乃成鼓声。声从空尽空。诸所有万物一切亦如是。我人寿命亦如是。本际皆净无所有。从无所有因作法。法亦无所有。
Explanation: All dharmas are like a drum: the drum is empty within, containing nothing; if someone strikes the drum with a wooden mallet, the drum makes a sound. The drum sound heard now is empty; the drum sound that will appear later is also empty; the drum sound that has ceased is also empty. These drum sounds do not come from the wooden mallet, do not come from the person's hand, do not come from the drum's leather; rather, the drum, the mallet, and the hand combine to form the drum sound. The drum sound goes from emptiness to emptiness; all the myriad things are likewise; self, person, and lifespan are likewise; their fundamental nature is empty and pure, possessing nothing. Dharmas produced with nothingness as cause are themselves also nothing.
The Buddha further used the example of striking a drum to say that all dharmas do not come from empty space, do not come from any thing, and do not come causelessly; empty space contains nothing and cannot produce any material form. Take a drumstick and strike a drum—the drum is made of leather; when the stick strikes it, the boom-boom-boom sound comes out. Where does that sound come from? If it came from the hand, there is no sound in the hand; if from the drumstick, there is no sound in the drumstick; there is no sound in the drum, and no sound in empty space—if there were sound, it would not be called empty space. When the drum is not struck, where has the boom-boom-boom sound gone? Did it go into the hand, into the mallet, into empty space, or into the drum? The drum sound goes nowhere; the drum sound is false, coming from nowhere and going nowhere.
All dharmas are as false as the drum sound: only when someone holds the drumstick and strikes again can the drum make a sound; thus the boom-boom-boom drum sound is a dharma produced by causes and conditions, and dharmas produced by causes and conditions are inherently empty. The drum itself is produced by causes and conditions; the act of drumming is even more a product of causes and conditions; the sound produced by the drum is also produced by causes and conditions—all dharmas are empty and without self-nature. The present drum sound is empty, the future drum sound is empty, and the sounds produced by drumming in the past are also empty; all these sounds are empty. The sound does not arise from the drum, nor from the person's hand, nor from empty space; it is when these causes and conditions combine that the drum sounds are produced. This drum sound has no place of coming and no place of going; it goes from emptiness to emptiness, coming in emptiness and going in emptiness. All dharmas are thus, all the myriad things are thus—coming in emptiness and going in emptiness, with no place of coming and no place of going.
Take another example: the arising, abiding, changing, and perishing of the earth. When the earth slowly formed, where did it come from? When the earth is destroyed, such a large celestial body—where does it go? Mount Sumeru is countless times larger than the earth; when destroyed, the entire Mount Sumeru vanishes without a trace of debris—where did Mount Sumeru go? Later a Mount Sumeru slowly forms again—where did this Mount Sumeru come from? Where did the entire universe's vessel world come from, and where does it go? It has no place of coming and no place of going.
Human lifespan is also like this. Sentient beings often think the five aggregates are the self and the person—the mark of self, the mark of person, the mark of sentient being—and within this self and person there is a lifespan of the self and person; this is the mark of lifespan, one of the four marks: the mark of self, the mark of person, the mark of sentient being, and the mark of lifespan. The mark of self is the mark of one's own five aggregates and eighteen realms; the mark of person is the mark of another's five aggregates and eighteen realms; the mark of sentient being is the mark of all sentient beings' five aggregates and eighteen realms. All four marks are false, coming from nowhere and going nowhere. The fundamental limit (本际) of these dharma-marks is empty, pure, and nothing; "fundamental limit" means the original nature, the original state. All dharmas are originally empty and nothing, with no place of coming; dharmas formed from nothingness—these new dharmas are also empty and nothing.
Original text:譬如云起。阴冥便雨。雨亦不从龙身出。亦不从龙心出。皆龙因缘所作。乃致是雨。诸法无所从来。去亦无所至。
Explanation: For example, when clouds gather in the sky, becoming very dark and heavy, rain falls. The rain does not come out of the dragon's body, nor is it produced from the dragon's mind; it is all due to the dragon's causes and conditions that the rain is brought forth. All dharmas come from nowhere, and going, go nowhere.
When clouds contain a large amount of rainwater, they become gloomy and very dark; when the cloud layers can no longer hold the rainwater, it rains. Where does the rainwater come from? It does not come out of the dragon's body. Although rainfall is under the dragon's jurisdiction, the dragon's body has no rain within it; no matter how large the dragon's body is, it cannot store all this rain. The rainwater is not produced from the dragon's mind either; the dragon's mind does not contain this rainwater; rather, because the wholesome and unwholesome karmic causes and conditions of sentient beings combine, rain is produced.
What are the causes and conditions? When sentient beings' wholesome conditions mature, and rainwater is needed to moisten the land and for drinking, the dragon will make rain, and rain is produced. When sentient beings' unwholesome karmic conditions mature, the dragon will send down excessive rain, and sentient beings will suffer floods; or it may not rain for years on end, and sentient beings will suffer drought. Therefore dharmas that appear through the gathering of causes and conditions are empty and nothing. All dharmas, like rainwater, come from nowhere, and when ceasing have no place of cessation.
Original text:譬如画师。先治板素。却后调和众彩。便在所作。是画亦不从板素彩出。随其意。所为悉成。生死亦如是。各各异类。地狱禽兽。饿鬼天上。世间亦尔。有解是慧者不着。着便有。
Explanation: It is like a painter who wishes to paint: first he must prepare the painting board, then mix the needed pigments, and also have brushes. Holding the brush, dipping it into the mixed colors, he paints on the board. Whether the painter paints a landscape, a portrait, or anything else—where does the painting come from? The painting does not come from the painter's hand, nor from the pigments, nor from the board. Yet the painting appears according to the painter's intent. Birth and death are also like this, as are the various kinds of beings of the four births and twenty-five forms of existence—hell beings, animals, hungry ghosts, heavenly beings—and the world as well. One who understands this truth has wisdom and does not cling; if one clings, existence arises.
Sentient beings' birth and death are also like the painting: coming with no place of coming, going with no place of going. Hell beings, animals, hungry ghosts, heavenly beings, and humans are all like this: birth has no place of coming, and disappearance has no place of going. All dharmas are thus false, thus empty and illusory, thus impermanent—and impermanence is suffering. One with wisdom who truly understands these principles no longer clings to these false dharmas produced by causes and conditions; if there is still a mind of clinging and craving, the myriad dharmas of the world will be produced, existence in the three realms will arise, and birth and death cannot be ended.
Original text:老母闻佛言大欢喜。即自说言。蒙天中天恩得法眼。虽身老羸。今得安隐。
Explanation: Hearing the Buddha's words, the old woman was greatly delighted and said: By the grace of the God of Gods, I have attained the pure Dharma eye. Though my body is old and frail, my mind has now attained peace and security.
"God of Gods" (天中天) refers to the World-Honored One—the god among gods, more venerable than the gods. Among the sentient beings of the three realms, the gods are most venerable, and the most venerable among the gods is the World-Honored One; the Buddha is the supreme venerable of the three realms. Attaining the pure Dharma eye means the Small Vehicle's eradication of the view of self (satkāya-dṛṣṭi-prahāṇa), becoming a person of the first through fourth fruits. Having heard the World-Honored One's teaching on dependent origination, the old woman realized the emptiness and selflessness of the five aggregates and attained the pure Dharma eye; her eye for observing dharmas became pure and wise, she became a noble one, eliminated the karma leading to the three evil destinies, and her mind attained peace. Her mind attained liberation and she severed craving—this is the realm of third- and fourth-fruit persons, with the ability to enter nirvāṇa, able to leave the birth and death of the three realms, no longer to undergo suffering in future lives; therefore her mind could be at peace.
Original text:阿难正衣服。长跪白佛言。是老母闻佛言即解。何因缘智慧乃尔。佛言。大德巍巍。以是故而即解。是老母者。是我前世发菩萨意时母。阿难白佛言。佛前世时母。何因困苦贫穷如是。
Explanation: Then Ānanda straightened his robes, knelt for a long time before the Buddha, and said: This old woman, upon hearing the Buddha's words, immediately understood—what causes and conditions gave her such wisdom? The Buddha said: Her virtue is lofty and majestic; because of this she understood immediately. This old woman was my mother when I first aroused the bodhisattva resolve in a past life. Ānanda said to the Buddha: Since she was the World-Honored One's mother in a past life, what causes and conditions led her to be so poor and distressed?
Original text:佛言。乃昔拘楼秦佛时。我为菩萨道。意欲作沙门。母以恩爱故。不听我作沙门。我忧愁不食一日。以是故。前后来生世间。五百世遭厄如是。
Explanation: The Buddha said: Long ago, during the time of Buddha Krakucchanda, I was practicing the bodhisattva path and wished to become a śramaṇa and cultivate the Way. Because of her affectionate love for me, my mother would not permit me to become a śramaṇa. I was sorrowful and did not eat for a whole day. Because of this, in her successive births into the world, for five hundred lifetimes she suffered such poverty and hardship.
The above is the World-Honored One's account of the causes and effects of the old woman's poverty. The old woman made her son, who had aroused the bodhisattva resolve, feel so sad that he did not eat for a whole day, and his wish to leave home was not fulfilled; as a result she reaped the retribution of poverty and hardship for five hundred lifetimes. Cause and effect are thus inconceivable: the cause is small but the fruit is great. Sentient beings, due to ignorance, often feel the cause is small and of no consequence, when in fact the origin of a matter is significant and the consequences quite serious, without their realizing it. Therefore practitioners must vigilantly guard the three karmas of body, speech, and mind, understand causes and reach effects, and not create unwholesome karma. Do not neglect a good deed because it is small; do not commit an evil deed because it is small. An ant hole can breach a dike—especially in great matters involving the Three Jewels and birth and death, every word and action must be handled with care.
There is another story of cause and effect concerning the Buddha's son Rāhula. In a past life while cultivating the Way, Rāhula, annoyed that a mouse was making noise and disturbing his meditation, blocked the mouse's hole for six days, suffocating the mouse to death. His retribution was to be trapped in his mother's womb for a full six years—how much suffering must those six years have contained! Humans cannot bear staying in the womb more than a few months, coming out at eight or nine months, but Rāhula stayed six years; his five-aggregate body had long since matured, and the feeling was far more agonizing than being in prison—squeezed inside the mother's body, unable to move.
The old woman's five hundred lifetimes refer to five hundred lifetimes as a human, and besides these there were times when she was not human; all together, the eons involved are extremely long. Being human is like briefly surfacing from the ocean; failing to be a good human, one falls back into the sea into the three evil destinies. The old woman's five hundred successive human lifetimes were all spent in such poverty and hardship. A tiny karmic act can bring enormous retribution; there are even people who fell into the Avīci hell over a single sentence. Cause and effect are thus fearsome; therefore body, speech, and mind must be pure, committing not the slightest fault as far as possible.
Original text:佛语阿难。是老母寿终。当生阿弥陀佛国中。供养诸佛。却后六十八亿劫。当得作佛。字扶波健。其国名化作。所有被服饮食。如忉利天上。其国中人民皆寿一劫。
Explanation: The Buddha said to Ānanda: When this old woman's life ends, she will be reborn in the land of Amitābha Buddha, the land of bliss (sukhāvatī), where she will make offerings to all the Buddhas. Sixty-eight hundred million kalpas thereafter, she will become a Buddha named Fubojian, and his land will be named Huazuo (Transformation). The clothing and food of the people of that land will be like those of the Trāyastriṃśa heaven, and the people of that land will all have lifespans of one kalpa.
Because the old woman had already realized the fruit, at the lowest she would be reborn in the land of bliss (sukhāvatī) in the middle grade, upper level, or perhaps the highest grade (agra-agra-varga/uttamottamavarga); she would not need to stay inside a lotus palace, but could roam freely through the land of bliss like a deva, freely traveling to other Buddha lands and making offerings to the Buddhas of the ten directions. Offerings include bodily, verbal, and mental actions, offerings of food and bedding, and the offering of Dharma by studying alongside the Buddha. In the old woman's future Buddha land, the people's food and livelihood necessities will all be like those of the Trāyastriṃśa heaven, all arising by transformation: the moment the thought of food arises, foods of a hundred flavors all appear, and after one sniff they are eaten. The people of that land all have lifespans of one kalpa; whether a great kalpa or a small kalpa is not specified—a small kalpa is 16.8 million years, and a great kalpa is that multiplied by eighty. The people of that land have such long lifespans, so Buddha Fubojian's lifespan is at least that long, perhaps even longer.
When the World-Honored One predicted the old woman's future buddhahood, the time was sixty-eight hundred million kalpas hence—though very distant, it is still a finite number. Becoming a Buddha requires three immeasurable kalpas; reaching the eighth bhūmi takes two immeasurable kalpas, with one more immeasurable kalpa to buddhahood. Sixty-eight hundred million kalpas falls within the last immeasurable kalpa, meaning she would be a bodhisattva of the eighth bhūmi or above, indicating that the fruit the old woman realized was that of a fourth-fruit great arhat or a pratyekabuddha. The Buddha's predictions of buddhahood for bodhisattvas generally come when they reach the eighth bhūmi. This old woman had already attained liberation, so she should have been a fourth-fruit arhat; when reborn in the land of bliss, she would turn her mind toward the Great Vehicle, hear the Buddha's teaching, and realize the fruit of an eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva, at most one immeasurable kalpa from buddhahood. This is the extraordinarily splendid retribution the old woman's cultivation brought about.
Original text:佛说此经已。老母及阿难等。菩萨比丘僧。诸天龙鬼神阿须伦皆大欢喜。前以头面着地。为佛作礼而去。
Explanation: After the Buddha finished speaking this sūtra, the old woman, Ānanda, the bodhisattvas, the bhikṣus, and also the devas, dragons, spirits, and asuras were all greatly delighted. They came forward, placed their heads and faces on the ground, paid homage to the World-Honored One, and departed, signifying their faith, acceptance, and practice; thus the Dharma assembly concluded.
