- being the verse summary of the Perfection of Wisdom in 8000 lines.
Homage to all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas!
Thereupon the Lord, in order to
gladden the four assemblies,
and to further lighten up this perfection of
wisdom,
preached at the time the following verses:
Call forth as much as you can of love, of respect and of faith!
Remove the
obstructing defilements, and clear away all your taints!
Listen to the
Perfect Wisdom of the gentle Buddhas
Taught for the weal of the world, for
heroic spirits intended!
The rivers of this Roseapple Island,
Which cause the flowers to grow, the
fruits, the herbs and trees,
They all derive from the might of the king of
the Nagäs,
From the dragon residing in Lake Anopatapta, his magical
power.
Just so, whatever Dharmas the Jina’s disciples establish,
Whatever they
teach, whatever adroitly explain -
Concerning the work of the holy which
leads to the fullness of bliss,
And also the fruit of this work - it is the
Tathagata’s doing.
For whatever the Jina has taught, the Guide to the Dharma,
His pupils, if
genuine, have been well trained in it.
From direct experience, derived from
their training, they teach it,
Their teaching stems from the might of the
Buddhas, and not their own power.
No wisdom can we get hold of, no highest perfection,
No Bodhisattva, no
thought of enlightenment either.
When told of this, if not bewildered and in
no way anxious,
A Bodhisattva courses in the Well-Gone’s wisdom.
In form, in feeling, will, perception and consciousness
Nowhere in them
they find a place to rest on.
Without a home they wander, dharmas never hold
them,
Nor do they grasp at them - the Jina’s Bodhi they are bound to
gain.
The wanderer Srenika in his gnosis of the truth
Could find no basis,
though the skandhas had not been undone.
Just so the Bodhisattva, when he
comprehends the dharmas as he should
Does not retire into blessed rest. In
wisdom then he dwells.
What is this wisdom, whose and whence, he queries,
And the he finds that
all these dharmas are entirely empty.
Uncowed and fearless in the face of
that discovery
Not far from Bodhi then is that Bodhi-being.
To course in the skandhas, in form, in feeling, in perception,
Will and so
on, and fail to consider them wisely;
Or to imagine these skandhas as being
empty;
Means to course in the sign, the track of non-production
ignored.
But when he does not course in form, in feeling, or perception,
In will or
consciousness, but wanders without home,
Remaining unaware of coursing in
firm wisdom,
His thoughts on non-production - then the best of all the
claming trances cleaves to him.
Through that the Bodhisattva now dwells tranquil in himself,
His future
Buddhahood assured by antecedent Buddhas.
Whether absorbed in trance, or
whether outside it, he minds not.
For of things as they are he knows the
essential original nature.
Coursing thus he courses in the wisdom of the Sugatas,
And yet he does not
apprehend the dharmas in which he courses.
This coursing he wisely knows as a
no-coursing,
That is his practice of wisdom, the highest perfection.
What exists not, that non-existent the foolish imagine;
Non-existence as
well as existence they fashion.
As dharmic facts existence and non-existence
are both not real.
A Bodhisattva goes forth when he wisely knows
this.
If he knows the five skandhas as like an illusion,
But makes not illusion
one thing, and the skandhas another;
If, freed from the notion of multiple
things, he courses in peace -
Then that is his practice of wisdom, the
highest perfection.
Those with good teachers as well as deep insight,
Cannot be frightened on
hearing the Mother’s deep tenets.
But those with bad teachers, who cab be
misled by others,
Are ruined thereby, as an unbaked pot when in contact with
moisture.
What is the reason why we speak of ‘Bodhisattvas’?
Desirous to extinguish
all attachment, and to cut it off,
True non-attachment, or the Bodhi of the
Jinas is their future lot.
‘Beings who strive for Bodhi’ are they therefore
called.
What is the reason why ‘Great Beings’ are so called?
They rise to the
highest place above a great number of people;
And of a great number of people
they cut off mistaken views.
That is why we come to speak of them as ‘Great
Beings’.
Great as a giver, as a thinker, as a power,
He mounts upon the vessel of
the Supreme Jinas.
Armed with the great armour he’ll subdue Mara the
artful.
These are the reasons why ‘Great Beings’ are so called.
This gnosis shows him all beings as like an illusion,
Resembling a great
crowd of people, conjured up at the crossroads,
By a magician, who then cuts
off many thousands of heads;
He knows this whole living world as a mock show,
and yet remains without fear.
Form, perception, feeling, will and consciousness
Are ununited, never
bound, cannot be freed.
Uncowed by his thought he marches onto his
Bodhi,
That for the highest of men is the best of all armours.
What then is ‘the vessel that leads to Bodhi’?
Mounted upon it ones guides
to Nirvana all beings.
Great is that vessel, immense, vast like the vastness
of space.
Those who travel upon it are carried to safety, delight and
ease.
Thus transcending the world, he eludes our apprehensions.
‘He goes to
Nirvana,’ but no one can say where he went to.
A fire’s extinguished, but
where, do we ask, has it gone to?
Likewise, how can we find him who has found
the Rest of the Blessed?
The Bodhisattva’s past, his future and his present must elude us,
Time’s
three dimensions nowhere touch him.
Quite pure is he, free form conditions,
unimpeded.
That is his practice of wisdom, highest perfection.
Wise Bodhisattvas, coursing thus, reflect on non-production,
And yet,
while doing so, engender in themselves the great compassion,
Which is,
however, free from any notion of a being.
Thereby they practice wisdom, the
highest perfection.
When the notion of suffering and beings leads him to think:
‘Suffering I
shall remove, the weal of the world I shall work!’
Beings are then imagined,
a self is imagined, -
The practice of wisdom, the highest perfection, is
lacking.
He wisely knows that all that lives is unproduced as he himself is;
He
knows that all that is no more exists than he or any beings.
The unproduced
and the produced are not distinquished,
That is the practice of wisdom, the
highest perfection.
All words for things in use in this world must be left behind,
All things
produced and made must be transcended -
The deathless, the supreme,
incomparable gnosis is then won.
That is the sense in which we speak of
perfect wisdom.
When free from doubts the Bodhisattva carries on his practice,
As skilled
in wisdom he is known to dwell.
All dharmas are not really there, their
essential original nature is empty,
To comprehend that is the practice of
wisdom, perfection supreme.
He does not stand in form, perception or in feeling,
In will or
consciousness, an any skandha whatsoever.
In Dharma’s true nature alone is he
standing.
Then that is his practice of wisdom, the highest
perfection.
Change or no change, suffering or ease, the self and the non-self,
The
lovely and repulsive - just one Suchness in this emptiness they are.
And so
he takes not his stand on the fruit which he won, which is threefold -
That
of an Arhat, a Single Buddha, a Buddha fully enlightened.
The Leader himself was not stationed in the realm which is free from
conditions,
Nor in the things which are under conditions, but freely he
wandered without a home.
Just so, without support or a basis a Bodhisattva is
standing.
A position devoid of a basis has that position been called by the
Jina.
Those who wish to become the Sugata’s Disciples,
Or Pratyekabuddhas, or
likewise, Kings of the Dharma -
Without resort to this Patience they cannot
reach their respective goals.
They move across, but their eyes are not on the
other shore.
Those who teach dharma, and those who listen when it is being
taught;
Those who have won the fruit of an Arhat, a Single Buddha, or a
world-saviour;
And the Nirvana obtained by the wise and the learned -
Mere
illusions, mere dreams - so has the Tathagata taught us.
Four kinds of person are not alarmed by this teaching:
Sons of the Jina
skilled in the truths; saints unable to turn back,
Arhats free from
defilements and taints, and rid of doubts;
Those whom good teachers mature
are reckoned the fourth kind.
Coursing thus, the wise and learned Bodhisattva,
Trains not for the
Arhatship, nor on the level of the Pratyekabuddhas.
In the Buddha-dharma
alone he trains for the sake of all-knowledge.
No training is his training,
and no-one is trained in this training.
Increase or decrease of forms is not the aim of this training,
nor does it
set out to acquire various dharmas.
All-knowledge alone he can hope to
acquire by this training.
To that he goes forth when he trains in this
training, and delights in it’s virtues.
Forms are not wisdom, nor is wisdom found in form,
In consciousness,
perceptions feeling or in will.
They are not wisdom, and no wisdom is in
them.
Like space it is, without break or crack.
Of all objective supports the essential original nature is boundless;
Of
beings likewise the essential original nature is boundless.
As the essential
original nature of space has no limits’
Just so the wisdom of the
World-knowers is boundless.
‘Perceptions’ - mere words, so Leaders have told us;
Perceptions forsaken
and gone, and the door is open to the beyond.
Those who succeed in ridding
themselves of perceptions,
They, having reached the Beyond, fulfil the
Teacher’s commandments.
If for aeons countless as the sands of the Ganges
The Leader would himself
continue to pronounce the word ‘being’:
Still, pure from the very start, no
being could ever result from his speaking.
That is the practice of wisdom,
the highest perfection.
And so the Jina concludes his preaching, and finally tells us:
‘When all I
said and did at last agreed with perfect wisdom,
Then this prediction I
received from Him who went before me:
"Fully enlightened, at a future time
thou shalt a Buddha be!"
From The Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines and its Verse Summary, trans. Edward Conze, Four Seasons Foundation, San Francisco 1983, pp.9-14