Verse I.70 Variations
यदार्यगोचरप्राप्तो दृश्यते बालगोचरे
yadāryagocaraprāpto dṛśyate bālagocare
།བྱིས་པའི་སྤྱོད་ཡུལ་དུ་སྟོན་ཏེ།
།དེ་ཉིད་ཕྱིར་ན་འགྲོ་བ་ཡི།
།གཉེན་གྱི་ཐབས་དང་སྙིང་རྗེ་མཆོག
Of the friends of beings are supreme—
They have attained the sphere of the noble ones
And yet show themselves in the sphere of naive beings.
Mais se montrent dans la sphère des êtres puérils. C’est bien pourquoi les méthodes et la compassion De ces amis des êtres sont suprêmes.
RGVV Commentary on Verse I.70
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Other English translations
Obermiller (1931) [13]
- He has attained the position of a Saint,
- And nevertheless appears in the state of a worldly being.
- Manifesting thus; for all that lives
- The help of a friend and Highest Commiseration.
Takasaki (1966) [14]
- Having attained the position of the Saints,
- He is nevertheless seen among ordinary beings;
- Therefore, he is, for the friends of all the world,
- The Highest Means and Compassion.
Fuchs (2000) [15]
- When they have attained the field of experience of the noble,
- they show themselves as the field of experience of the children.
- Hence means and compassion of the friends of beings are supreme.
Textual sources
Commentaries on this verse
Academic notes
- Digital Sanskrit Buddhist Canon Unicode Input
- Brunnhölzl, Karl. When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sūtra and Tantra. Boston: Snow Lion Publications, an imprint of Shambhala Publications, 2014.
- Verses 69 to 78 and their commentary are not in the Chinese. Takasaki (253, note 412) surmises that they were later editions, not present in the version that was translated into Chinese.
- I follow Takasaki’s suggestion of pratividhya for MB and J prativicya.
- I follow MA samāpattisamāpannaś and DP synods ’jug la . . . snyoms par zhugs pa yin against samāpattipratipannaś in J and MB.
- I follow Takasaki’s emendation deśanārūpakāyābhyāṃ of J deśanyārūpakāyābhyāṃ.
- "Daily behaviors" (īryāpatha) refers to standing, walking, sitting, and lying down, but the Sanskrit term can also refer to the observances of a religious mendicant.
- RYC (95) says that these four are listed in the Dhāraṇīśvararājasūtra.
- DP mistakenly "The Immovable One" (mi g.yo ba).
- I follow Schmithausen’s emendation °samādhisuvyavasthitatvāt (confirmed by DP ting nge ’dzin la legs par gnas pa’i phyir) of °samādhiṣu vyavasthitatvāt in J and MA/MB.
- With Schmithausen, I follow MB °niryātasya (DP mother phyin pa) against J niṣṭhāgatasya.
- YDC (300–301) explains that bodhisattvas from the second through the seventh bhūmis are beyond all saṃsāric worlds through their prajñā but still engage in these worlds through their compassion without being tainted by them, just like a lotus growing in a pond is not tainted by its muddy ground or water. The minds of bodhisattvas on the eighth bhūmi effortlessly engage in accomplishing the welfare of beings, just like a fire naturally burns up dry firewood. They also rest continuously in a meditative equipoise in which all characteristics have subsided because they have gained mastery over nonconceptual wisdom by virtue of the fundamental change of the afflicted mind. Bodhisattvas on the tenth bhūmi effortlessly and spontaneously accomplish the maturation of sentient beings. The distant cause of this is the power of their previous aspiration prayers up through the ninth bhūmi that they may be able to effortlessly accomplish the welfare of others. The close condition is that they are free from all conceptions of characteristics. From the perspective of the world, the manner in which bodhisattvas during the subsequent attainment of the tenth bhūmi mature sentient beings is equal to that of buddhas in terms of liberating beings from saṃsāra. However, in terms of their own welfare, they are not equal to buddhas—their realization and relinquishment compared to those of buddhas is like the amount of water in a hoofprint versus the amount in the ocean because they still have certain obscurations and seeds of latent tendencies. Also, in their accomplishing the welfare of others, they are equal to buddhas in terms of their enlightened activity’s being effortless, being uninterrupted, and manifesting in all kinds of ways. However, they are not equal to buddhas in accomplishing the welfare of others in all respects because they are not able to confer the empowerment of great light rays that only buddhas can bestow.
- Obermiller, E. "The Sublime Science of the Great Vehicle to Salvation Being a Manual of Buddhist Monism." Acta Orientalia IX (1931), pp. 81-306.
- Takasaki, Jikido. A Study on the Ratnagotravibhāga (Uttaratantra): Being a Treatise on the Tathāgatagarbha Theory of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Serie Orientale Roma 33. Roma: Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente (ISMEO), 1966.
- Fuchs, Rosemarie, trans. Buddha Nature: The Mahayana Uttaratantra Shastra. Commentary by Jamgon Kongtrul and explanations by Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso. Ithaca, N. Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 2000.