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MAHAMATI ASKED the Blessed One: Pray tell us, Blessed One, what is the fruitage that comes with self

-realisation of Noble Wisdom?

The Blessed One replied: First, there will come a clearing insight into the meaning and significance of

things and following that will come an unfolding insight into the significance of the spiritual ideals

(Paramitas) by reason of which the Bodhisattvas will be able to enter more deeply into the abode of

imagelessness and be able to experience the higher Samadhis and gradually to pass through the higher stages

of Bodhisattvahood.

After experiencing the "turning-about" in the deepest seat of consciousness, they will experience other

Samadhis even to the highest, the Vajravimbopama, which belongs to the Tathagatas and their transformations.

They will be able to enter into the realm of consciousness that lies beyond the consciousness of the

mind-system, even the consciousness of Tathagatahood. They will become endowed with all the powers, psychic

faculties, self-mastery, loving compassion, skillful means, and ability to enter into other Buddha-lands.

Before they had attained self-realisation of Noble Wisdom they had been influenced by the self-interests of

egoism, but after they attain self-realisation they will find themselves reacting spontaneously to the

impulses of a great and compassionate heart endowed

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with skillful and boundless means and sincerely and wholly devoted to the emancipation of all beings.

MAHAMATI SAID: Blessed One, tell us about the sustaining power of the Tathagatas by which the Bodhisattvas

are aided to attain self-realisation of Noble Wisdom?

The Blessed One replied: There are two kinds of sustaining power, which issue from the Tathagatas and are

at the service of the Bodhisattvas, sustained by which the Bodhisattvas should prostrate themselves before

them and show their appreciation by asking questions. The first kind of sustaining power is the Bodhisattva's

own adoration and faith in the Buddhas by reason of which the Buddhas are able to manifest themselves and

render their aid and to ordain them with their own hands. The second kind of sustaining power is the power

radiating from the Tathagatas that enables the Bodhisattvas to attain and to pass through the various

Samadhis and Samapattis without becoming intoxicated by their bliss.

Being sustained by the power of the Buddhas, the Bodhisattva even at the first stage will be able to

attain the Samadhi known as the Light of Mahayana. in that Samadhi Bodhisattvas will become conscious of the

presence of the Tathagatas coming from all their different abodes in the ten quarters to impart to the

Bodhisattvas their sustaining power in various ways. As the Bodhisattva Vajragarbha was sustained in his

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Samadhis and as many other Bodhisattvas of like degree and virtue have been sustained, so all earnest

disciples and masters and Bodhisattvas may experience this sustaining power of the Buddhas in their Samadhis

and Samapattis. The disciple's faith and the Tathagata's merit are two aspects of the same sustaining power

and by it alone are the Bodhisattvas enabled to become one with the company of the Buddhas.

Whatever Samadhis, psychic faculties and teachings are realised by the Bodhisattvas, they are made

possible only by the sustaining power of the Buddhas; if it were otherwise, the ignorant and the simpleminded

might attain the same fruitage. Wherever the Tathagatas enter with their sustaining power there will be

music, not only music made by human lips and played by human hands on various instruments, but there will be

music among the grass and shrubs and trees, and in mountains and towns and palaces and hovels; much more will

there be music in the hearts of those endowed with sentiency. The deaf, dumb and blind will be cured of their

deficiencies and will rejoice in their emancipation. Such is the extraordinary virtue of the sustaining power

imparted by the Tathagatas.

By the bestowal of this sustaining power, the Bodhisattvas are enabled to avoid the evils of passion,

hatred and enslaving karma; they are enabled to transcend the dhyana of the beginners and to advance beyond

the experience and truth already attained; they are enabled to demonstrate the Paramitas; and finally, to

attain the stage of Tathagatahood. Mahamati, if it were not for this sustaining power, they would relapse

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into the ways and thoughts of the philosophers, easygoing disciples and the evil-minded, and would thus

fall short of the highest attainment. For these reasons, earnest disciples and sincere Bodhisattvas are

sustained by the power of all the Tathagatas.

THEN SAID MAHAMATI: It has been said by the Blessed One that by fulfilling the six Paramitas, Buddhahood

is realised. Pray tell us what the Paramitas are, and how they are to be fulfilled?

The Blessed One replied: The Paramitas are ideals of spiritual perfection that are to be the guide of the

Bodhisattvas on the path to self-realisation. There are six of them but they are to be considered in three

different ways according to the progress of the Bodhisattva on the stages. At first they are to be considered

as ideals for the worldly life; next as ideals for the mental life; and, lastly, as ideals of the spiritual

and unitive life.

In the worldly life where one is still holding tenaciously to the notions of an ego-soul and what concerns

it and holding fast to discriminations of dualism, if only for worldly benefits, one should cherish ideals of

charity, good behavior, patience, zeal, thoughtfulness and wisdom. Even in the worldly life the practice of

these virtues will bring rewards of happiness and success.

Much more in the mind-world of earnest disciples and masters will their practice bring joys of

emancipation, enlightenment and peace of mind, because the

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[paragraph continues] Paramitas are grounded on right-knowledge and

lead to thoughts of Nirvana, even if the Nirvana of their thoughts is for themselves. In the mind-world the

Paramitas become more ideal and more sympathetic; charity can no longer be expressed in the giving of

impersonal gifts but will call for the more costly gifts of sympathy and understanding; good behavior will

call for something more than outward conformity to the five precepts because in the light of the Paramitas

they must practise humility, simplicity, restraint and self-giving. Patience will call for something more

than forbearance with external circumstances and the temperaments of other people: it will now call for

patience with one's self. Zeal will call for something more than industry and outward show of earnestness: it

will call for more self-control in the task of following the Noble Path and in manifestating the Dharma in

one's own life. Thoughtfulness will give way to mindfulness wherein discriminated meanings and logical

deductions and rationalisations will give way to intuitions of significance and spirit. The Paramita of

Wisdom (Prajna) will no longer be concerned with pragmatic wisdom and erudition, but will reveal itself in

its true perfectness of All-inclusive Truth which is Love.

The third aspect of the Paramitas as seen in the ideal perfections of the Tathagatas can only be fully

understood by the Bodhisattva-Mahasattvas who are devoted to the highest spiritual discipline and have fully

understood that there is nothing to be seen in the world but that which issues from the mind itself; in whose

minds the discriminations of dualities has ceased to function; and seizing and clinging has become

non-existent.

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[paragraph continues] Thus free from all attachments to individual

objects and ideas, their minds are free to consider ways of benefitting and giving happiness to others, even

to all sentient beings To the Bodhisattva-Mahasattvas the ideal of charity is shown in the self-yielding of

the Tathagata's hope of Nirvana that all may enjoy it together. While having relations with an objective

world there is no rising in the minds of the Tathagatas of discriminations between the interests of self and

the interests of others, between good and evil,--there is just the spontaneity and effortless actuality of

perfect behavior. To practise patience with full knowledge of this and that, of grasp and grasping, but with

no thought of discrimination nor of attachment,--that is the Tathagatas Paramita of Patience. To exert

oneself with energy from the first part of the night to its end in conformity with the disciplinary measures

with no rising of discrimination as to comfort or discomfort,--that is the Tathagata's Paramita of Zeal. Not

to discriminate between self and others in thoughts of Nirvana, but to keep the mind fixed on Nirvana,--that

is the Paramita of Mindfulness. As to the Prajna-Paramita, which is Noble Wisdom, who can predicate it? When

in Samadhi the mind ceases to discriminate and there is only perfect and love-filled imagelessness, then an

inscrutable "turning-about" will take place in the inmost consciousness and one will have attained

self-realisation of Noble Wisdom,--that is the highest Prajna-Paramita.

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THEN MAHAMATI SAID to the Blessed One: You have spoken of an astral-body, a "mind-vision-body"

(manomayakaya) which the Bodhisattvas are able to assume, as being one of the fruits of

self-realisation of Noble Wisdom: pray tell us, Blessed One, what is meant by such a transcendental body?

The Blessed One replied: There are three kinds of such transcendental bodies: First, there is the one in

which the Bodhisattva attains enjoyment of the Samadhis and Samapattis. Second, there is the one which is

assumed by the Tathagatas according to the class of beings to be sustained, and which achieves and perfects

spontaneously with no attachment and no effort. Third, there is the one in which the Tathagatas receive their

intuition of Dharmakaya.

The transcendental personality that enters into the enjoyment of the Samadhis comes with the third, fourth

and fifth stages as the mentations of the mindsystem become quieted and waves of consciousness are no more

stirred on the face of Universal Mind. In this state, the conscious-mind is still aware, in a measure, of the

bliss being experienced by this cessation of the mind's activities.

The second kind of transcendental personality is the kind assumed by the Bodhisattvas and Tathagatas as

bodies of transformation by which they demonstrate their original vows in the work of achieving and

perfecting; it comes with the eighth stage of Bodhisattvahood. When the Bodhisattva has a thorough-going

penetration into the maya-like nature of things and understands the dharma of imagelessness, he will

experience the "turning-about" in his deepest consciousness

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and will become able to experience the higher Samadhis even to the highest. By entering into these exalted

Samadhis he attains a personality that transcends the conscious-mind, by reason of which he obtains

supernatural powers of self-mastery and activities because of which he is able to move as he wishes, as

quickly as a dream changes, as quickly as an image changes in a mirror. This transcendental body is not a

product of the elements and yet there is something in it that is analogous to what is so produced; it is

furnished with all the differences appertaining to the world of form but without their limitations; possessed

of this "mind-vision-body" he is able to be present in all the assemblages in all the Buddha-lands. Just as

his thoughts move instantly and without hindrance over walls and rivers and trees and mountains, and just as

in memory he recalls and visits the scenes of his past experiences, so, while his mind keeps functioning in

the body, his thoughts May be a hundred thousand yojanas away. In the same fashion the transcendental

personality that experiences the Samadhi Vajravimbopama will be endowed with supernatural powers and psychic

faculties and self-mastery by reason of which he will be able to follow the noble paths that lead to the

assemblages of the Buddhas, moving about as freely as he may wish. But his wishes will no longer be

self-centered nor tainted by discrimination and attachment, for this transcendental personality is not his

old body, but is the transcendental embodiment of his original vows of self-yielding in order to bring all

beings to maturity.

The third kind of transcendental personality is so

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ineffable that it is able to attain intuitions of the Dharmakaya, that is, it attains intuitions of the

boundless and inscrutable cognition of Universal Mind. As Bodhisattva-Mahasattvas attain the highest of the

stages and become conversant with all the treasures to be realised in Noble Wisdom, they will attain this

inconceivable transformation-body which is the true nature of all the Tathagatas past, present and future,

and will participate in the blissful peace which pervades the Dharma of all the Buddhas.