The Flower Ornament Scripture

by Thomas Cleary

  Sthavara touched the ground with her foot, whereupon countless deposits of jewels spontaneously gushed forth: this represents the way great compassion can clearly reveal the hidden resources of the mind-ground, having full use of the spirit without overt effort.

  Sthavara said she had attained liberation through an indestructible store of knowledge; since compassion arises from knowledge, nothing can destroy it, and since in action in the real universe no knowledge is not included and no compassion not fulfilled, it is called a store, or mine.

  The goddess also said she had attained this liberation eons before in the service of buddhas; because great compassion is limitless, even enlightenment and final extinction are all beginningless and endless household affairs.

  31. VASANTI

  Then Sudhana went to the city of Kapilavastu, saw the night goddess Vasanti, and realized the stage of joy.

  Kapilavastu is called the Yellow City, representing knowledge uniting with the middle way. Yellow is the color associated with the center and with felicity.

  Vasanti is said to be in charge of spring growth, symbolic of the production of myriad practices in the first stage. She is a night goddess to represent great knowledge in the night of birth and death.

  The next ten teachers beginning with this night goddess are female, emblematic of the great compassion of enlightening beings, like a mother begrudging no effort to raise her children. As they are in the spiritual ranks—in charge of protecting and helping the world—even though they do not physically leave the Buddha’s assembly, they still can project their appearances throughout the ten directions.

  The night goddess wore a red robe, a sacred crest, and pearl necklaces; all the stars and constellations shone on her body. This represents how the first stage includes the laws of all the stages, so the awareness of great compassionate differentiating knowledge is comprehensive.

  The goddess said she had attained the liberation of the light of truth that dispels the darkness of ignorance in all sentient beings and was able to be a guide or make shelter, passage, and light on dark, stormy, and dangerous nights to free beings from fear of the darkness. This shows how the practice of great compassion is detailed and comprehensive. She also said she had always been a woman for countless eons, practicing this teaching, showing how great compassion is so deep that it does not seek to leave the world, for in the original real universe there is no world to leave.

  32. SAMANTAGAMBHIRASHRIVIMALAPRABHA

  Then Sudhana saw the night goddess Samantagambhirashrivimalaprabha at the site of enlightenment and realized the stage of purity.

  Great compassion in the ordinary world is not separate from fundamental awareness, so this scene also takes place at the site of enlightenment.

  The night goddess said she had attained liberation through the bliss of tranquil meditation going everywhere. This is because the fundamental meditation underlying discipline, spontaneous meditation on the essence of all objects, is by nature inherently omnipresent.

  She said that while she focused her mind wholly on the salvation and protection of living beings, she practiced the various stages of meditation up to the extinction of irritation and affliction in sentient beings. This shows how the substance of discipline of the spiritual body is always spontaneously in a state of concentration yet always functions along with compassion, teaching in accord with the faculties of the learners; all is an aspect of meditation. Though this meditation is the same as what is practiced in the meditation heavens, there is not the same attitude of attraction to meditation and enjoyment of tranquillity.

  33. PRAMUDITANAYANAJAGADVIROCANA

  Then Sudhana saw the night goddess Pramuditanayanajagadvirocana on the right side of the enlightenment site and attained the stage of refulgence.

  The right is the position of compassion; this represents initiating action by enlightenment and developing tolerance and kindness. The goddess is called Joyful Eyes Illumining the World; joyful eyes represent tolerance and kindness, illumining the world means not abandoning sentient beings.

  From every pore of her body the night goddess emanated countless multitudes of projected bodies, filling the ten directions and expounding the practical aspects of the ten ways of transcendence; this illustrates how the work of the teaching reaches everywhere.

  She also emanated multitudes of bodies like various beings and multitudes of bodies like human and celestial rulers, pervading the ten directions, adapting and assimilating everywhere to liberate others.

  The night goddess said that in the distant past she was the wife of a king who was in fact Manjushri, the spirit of wisdom, and that she was awakened by a night spirit emanated by Samantabhadra, the spirit of Universal Good. This represents how activation of complex functions based on fundamental knowledge and practice of great compassion are not limited by time; this is because cultivation of world transcendence shows up in an instant, while practice of great compassion goes on forever.

  34. SAMANTASATTVATRANOJAHSHRI

  Then at the same assembly Sudhana saw the night goddess Samantasattvatranojahshri and realized the stage of blazing radiance.

  In this rank knowledge and compassion are completed and one is born in the house of the enlightened, never parting from enlightenment; hence the goddess was in this assembly at the Buddha’s site of enlightenment.

  Sudhana saw the goddess in all worlds, in all states of being, in all times, liberating sentient beings by techniques adapted to their languages, behaviors, and understandings. This was because she had attained the freedom to appear in all worlds to civilize beings.

  The goddess said that in a past eon called Sphere of Purity there appeared as many buddhas as particles in a polar mountain; in that time a king was born spontaneously from a lotus, and the king had a daughter, who was none other than the night goddess herself. The name of the age is based on the roundness and purity of the body of knowledge. The buddhas as numerous as particles represent different fruits of knowledge realized in the course of progressive practice. The king being born from a lotus represents knowledge being undefiled. The princess being the night goddess herself stands for the merging of knowledge and compassion.

  The goddess said she had attained her liberation from one hundred and ten buddhas in the past, and she also said she followed buddhas numerous as atoms in lands. The interpenetration of the causes and results of the ten and eleven stages make a hundred and ten buddhas. When knowledge is complete and praxis comprehensive, one’s own mind is like buddha, all acts are like buddha, all insights are like buddha, nothing in all worlds in the ten directions is not buddha—this is “buddhas numerous as atoms in lands.” To see any thing or any being as other than buddha is a false view.

  The goddess also said that in such and such ages, in the time of such and such buddhas, she had been a night spirit, an emperor, and other beings, including an entertainer. Entertainment represents delight in truth. These incarnations all represent practices according to rank within the realization of enlightenment.

  Therefore when practice and realization reach each other, the buddhas spontaneously respond. If you see anything apart from your own practice and own realization, this is not true seeing. Even if you get visions by forced seeking, these are only temporary hallucinations, not real buddhas.

  35. PRASHANTARUTASAGARAVATI

  Not far from here Sudhana saw the night goddess Prashantarutasagaravati and realized the stage difficult to conquer.

  In this stage one uses meditation concentration to cultivate worldly arts and crafts. As one has these skills without becoming alienated from the essence of enlightenment and the practice of diligence, the goddess’s place is said to be “not far from here.”

  The goddess is called Possessed of an Ocean of Tranquil Sound. Tranquillity is concentration, while the ocean of sound is function. This illustrates how the body of concentration is uncontrived yet its response is universal. This night goddess was the mother of the night goddess of universal salvation, representing t
he ability of the body of concentration to produce energetic action. Unless all practices are based on concentration, one will become fatigued at some time.

  The goddess said she had attained liberation of supernal manifestations producing floods of joy in each instant of thought. This illustrates the all-pervasiveness of the joy of meditation, the mutual adornment of principle and practice, the vastness of benefit to the living. She also said she would serve all the future buddhas of this eon, as well as the future buddhas of all worlds in all eons, illustrating how the essence of meditation is complete, in the sense that past, present, and future form one time, like a mirror containing multiple images.

  36. SARVANAGARARAKSHASAMBHAVATEJAHSHRI

  Then in the Buddha’s assembly Sudhana saw the night goddess Sarvanagararakshasambhavatejahshri and attained the stage of presence.

  This goddess represents protection of the minds of sentient beings and increasing the power of knowledge and insight in the mind. She said she had attained liberation of extremely profound, free, subtle sound, illustrating the single “sound” that is everywhere in the universe, without substance, without discrimination, able to express all truths, teach sentient beings, and manifest all knowledge freely.

  The goddess said she had attained this liberation eons in the past. The first buddha in her recollection was called the Illuminating King Voicing the Ocean of All Truths; after that buddha’s demise, a certain king left home to preserve the buddha’s teachings. The countless eons refer to the ability to turn the countless expressions of the sentient beings of all worlds into a total ocean of expressions of insight. The first buddha stands for fundamental knowledge, and the buddha’s name represents freedom in expounding truth and breaking delusion.

  The demise of the buddha represents the attainment of knowledge free from bondage and the disappearance of trapped attention and reflection. The king leaving home stands for knowledge of emptiness. Since wisdom activates transcendent compassion, the king’s daughter also became a nun.

  By the time the buddha’s teaching was about to die out, there were a thousand sects that often engaged in disputation and quarrel and were on the verge of destroying Buddhism. This illustrates insight into emptiness that is not yet equipped with the great compassion to enter the ordinary world.

  The goddess also mentioned one hundred buddhas and said she had served them all: this represents cultivating the fruits of interdependent progress of all ten stages within the sixth stage. The reason she did not reach the manifestation of the fruits of the eleventh stage is that insight into emptiness is not yet the practice of Universal Good that enters into bondage. It is for this same reason that in the book on the ten concentrations the thirty enlightening beings with insight into emptiness all entered the stage of coronation yet did not see the body of Universal Good.

  37. SARVAVRIKSHAPRAPHULLANASUKHASAMVASA

  Then, in the Buddha’s assembly, Sudhana saw the night goddess Sarvavrikshapraphullanasukhasamvasa and realized the stage of far going.

  This goddess symbolizes using expedients in the midst of freedom from birth and death to enter into birth and death and carry out practices everywhere.

  The goddess said she had attained liberation producing the light of great joy, meaning that she had clearly penetrated the four integrative methods and the four infinite minds.

  She also said that in the remote past there had been a king named Encompassing Sound of the Proclamation of All Laws, who had five hundred ministers, six thousand concubines, and seven hundred sons. The king set up a great charitable event, which a young woman named Jewel Light, daughter of a grandee, attended with sixty maids.

  The king was Vairocana and the young woman Jewel Light was the night goddess; this represents the stage of practical compassion in a bad time when there is a lot of suffering. The king represents knowledge, the five hundred ministers represent the five ranks being practiced in concert, the six thousand concubines represent compassion pervading the six realms of being, the seven hundred princes represent the practices of the seven limbs of enlightenment, the woman Jewel Light represents compassion, the sixty maidens at the assembly represent the compassion of the six ranks combining with knowledge. That the king was Vairocana Buddha represents knowledge being the fruit of action in the ordinary world.

  38. SARVAJAGADRAKSHAPRANIDHANAVIRYAPRABHA

  Then at the site of enlightenment Sudhana saw the night goddess Sarvajagadrakshapranidhanaviryaprabha and realized the stage of immovability.

  The spirit, whose name means “Light of Energy of the Vow To Protect All Beings,” represents total absorption in helping living beings, using effortless knowledge to let the power of the fundamental vow do its work.

  Sudhana saw the spirit sitting on a seat of jewels reflecting the abodes of all beings; this represents how the pure function of knowledge in effortless knowledge appears in all places.

  The body of the night goddess showed reflections of the sun, moon, and stars; and she appeared to sentient beings everywhere in the forms of various bodies, according to the mentalities of those beings. This represents the body of knowledge appearing in context.

  The night spirit said she had attained liberty to teach beings in ways that promoted goodness. When knowledge of the essence of nonbeing is realized, all faculties of goodness develop.

  Certain metaphors are raised here, such as that of the orb of knowledge of enlightening beings being like the sun traversing the sky, having itself no day or night; or like a phantom in the world, having no joy or sorrow. The goddess uses them to answer the question of how long it has been since she has been inspired to seek enlightenment, making it clear that enlightening liberation cannot be measured in temporal terms.

  The goddess related that in the remote past there had been a buddha named King Illumining Space with the Voice of Truth, who sat on the enlightenment site for a full hundred years. The king of that time and place, called Victorious Light, had a son, the crown prince Conquerer, who had twenty-eight of the thirty-two marks of a world ruler. After releasing people from prison, the prince led a holy life for five hundred years.

  The buddha represents effortless knowledge, like an echo, everywhere aware yet not based anywhere. The hundred years represent the hundred transcendent ways of the full ten stages practiced in one stage. The king represents knowledge, the prince represents practical kindness, the prison represents the sphere of operation of kindness. Leading a holy life for five hundred years after renunciation stands for leaving the home of effort and penetrating the five ranks in effortlessness. The prince only had twenty-eight of the marks of greatness, lacking four, because in the eighth stage one lacks the causes and effects of the ninth and tenth stages.

  39. SUTEJOMANDALARATISHRI

  Then Sudhana saw the night goddess Sutejomandalaratishri in the Lumbini grove and realized the stage of good mind.

  Lumbini is the garden where Buddha was born, called Supreme in Pleasure because of the bliss produced in people by the Teaching.

  In the stage of good mind, subtle insight and intellect are completed, and one is good at explaining teachings; hence the spirit is called Glory of the Sphere of Good Power.

  The goddess explained ten kinds of birth by which enlightening beings are born in the family of buddhas and said she had countless eons since attained liberty to be freely reborn. This means that having attained effortless knowledge and being on the verge of rising to receive a buddha’s work, in this stage one studies buddhas’ powers of elucidation—this is called being reborn.

  The goddess said she had purposely been reborn in the Lumbini grove, where she realized the Buddha would be born in a hundred years. The Buddha also appeared to be born in each Lumbini grove in the billion-world universe and in each atom of all worlds in the ten directions. The ascent from this stage to the tenth stage is referred to as a hundred years; being born in all places means that since unfabricated knowledge is like space, like magic, even a single moment of the descent of the spirit pervades the r
eal universe, without any here or there, coming or going, or interruption in time. Goddesses bearing gifts awaited the birth of the Buddha, illustrating the ancient saying, “Sages act, and all beings observe.”

  The night goddess recounted the story of a past age in which eighty decillion buddhas were born. A royal queen, accompanied by twenty decillion ladies-in-waiting, went to a park of golden flowers, and there, as she held onto a tree, she gave birth to an enlightening being. The wet nurse at that time was none other than the night goddess herself.

  The number of buddhas in the eon, eighty decillion, represents the issue of the effortless knowledge of the eighth stage. The number of ladies with the queen, twenty decillion, represents the fulfillment of joy in truth produced by the buddhas’ twin practice of compassion and knowledge. That the queen gave birth while holding onto a tree represents the development of great knowledge through focus on great compassion. The role of the wet nurse also symbolizes compassion.

  40. GOPA

  Then Sudhana saw the girl Gopa in Kapilavastu and realized the stage of clouds of teaching.

  The setting symbolizes the essence and function of knowledge and compassion reaching everywhere, immaterial yet nurturing and supporting all beings. The setting is the same as that of the first stage (represented by the night goddess Vasanti, the thirty-first benefactor) because knowledge and compassion are simultaneous.

  Gopa’s name has the sense of watching over, or protecting, representing the preservation of the ground of great compassion.

  According to the story, Gopa was the wife of Buddha in a past life, representing kindness, compassion, and delight in truth. She also is said to have been wife to Buddha for eons, symbolizing the inseparability of knowledge and compassion.

  Knowledge attuned to reality is omnipresent; it cannot be discussed in terms of matter, cannot be understood in terms of form or appearance. It manifests similarity to humans and demonstrates humanlike laws, it manifests similarity to celestials and demonstrates celestial ways; it is variegated according to the species to which it appears; it cannot be known by one practice, cannot be understood by one body. This is because that is the nature of the body of practices of Universal Good.