Lectures on the Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son (Pitāputrasamāgamanasūtra), Part 27

The Circumstances When the Water Kalpa Arrives

Original text: 乃至此界坏时。兴大黑云。三十二重。遍覆三千。大千世界。降霔洪雨。点大如象。昼夜倾注。相续不绝。如是时分。经五十劫。其水积满。上至梵世。大王。此外水界。从何所来。

Explanation: When the trichiliocosm (the three-thousandfold great thousand world) is about to be destroyed, thirty-two layers of great black clouds descend from the heavens, pervading and covering the entire three-thousandfold great thousand world. Then raindrops as large as elephants pour down day and night without cease. This continues for a full fifty kalpas, until the water accumulates and fills everything, rising all the way up to the Brahma world. Great King, where does this external water element come from?

The external water element refers to the water element outside the body, such as the moisture and wetness contained in cosmic space, mountains, rivers, and the great earth. For example, when the three-thousandfold great thousand world is about to be destroyed and the water kalpa arrives, great black clouds arise in the sky—thirty-two layers of them, extremely dense and heavy, wrapped layer upon layer, on the verge of pouring down a great rain. These thirty-two layers of black clouds pervade the entire three-thousandfold great thousand world. The three-thousandfold great thousand world contains one billion earths and one billion Mount Sumerus; the six heavens of the desire realm and the first dhyāna heaven each number one billion—countless celestial bodies—all covered by the black clouds. Then raindrops as large as elephants descend, pervading the whole three-thousandfold great thousand world throughout space, submerging even the heavens.

By that time we humans would long since be gone; the earth would already have been destroyed. The fire kalpa would have already annihilated humanity and the desire realm heavens. In the desire realm there would be no humans, no living beings. From the earth up through the six heavens of the desire realm, everything would be empty space—and even in that empty space, rain would be falling. The rain falls for fifty kalpas; a kalpa counted as a small kalpa is 16.8 million years, so fifty kalpas would be 840 million years. The rainwater floods even space itself, rising all the way to the first dhyāna heaven and the second dhyāna heaven. Such is the destruction of the world. All this water belongs to the external water element. When the water comes, it has no fixed abode; and when the water recedes, where does it recede to? Wherever such a vast amount of water recedes to becomes a problem—wherever it goes, it submerges that place.