Chapter 21
Spoken Yet Not Spoken
“Subhåti,
do not say the Tathàgata has the thought, ‘I have spoken Dharma.’ Do not think that way. And why? If someone says the Tathàgata has spoken Dharma he slanders the Buddha due to his inability to understand what I say. Subhåti, in the Dharma spoken there is no Dharma which can be spoken, therefore it is called the Dharma spoken.Ÿ
Then the sagacious Subhåti said to the Buddha, “World Honored One, will there be living beings in the future who will believe this Såtra when they hear it spoken?Ÿ
The Buddha said, “Subhåti, they are neither living beings nor no living beings. And why? Subhåti, living beings, living beings, are spoken of by the Tathàgata as no living beings, therefore they are called living beings.Ÿ
Commentary :
The Buddha then addressed Subhåti. “Do not say that the Tathàgata thinks, ‘I have spoken Dharma.’ Do not say the Buddha has spoken Dharma. I do not think like that, and you should not think that way either.
Someone who says that the Tathàgata has spoken Dharma thereby slanders the Buddha.Such a person does not understand the Buddhadharma.Ÿ“The Buddha spoke dharma for forty-nine years,Ÿ
you say. “Many såtras remain. How can one say he did not speak Dharma?Ÿ
Once Ma¤ju÷rã Bodhisattva asked, “Will the Buddha please once again turn the Dharma wheel?Ÿ
The Buddha replied, “Ma¤ju÷rã, in forty-nine years I have not spoken one word. How can you ask me to turn the Dharma wheel again? Does that not imply that in the past I have already turned the Dharma wheel?Ÿ
That is what is meant by speaking yet not speaking.Once Subhåti was sitting in a cave cultivating and a god came scattering flowers. “Who has come to scatter flowers?Ÿ asked Subhåti.
“The god øakra,Ÿ came the reply. “øakra has come to scatter flowers.Ÿ
“Why have you come here to scatter flowers?Ÿ asked Subhåti.
øakra said, “Because the Venerable One speaks praj¤à well, I have come to make offerings.Ÿ
Subhåti said, “I have not said one word. How can you say I speak praj¤à?Ÿ
øakra replied, “The Venerable One has not spoken and I have not heard a thing. Nothing spoken and nothing heard: that is true praj¤à.Ÿ
You think it over. Nothing spoken and nothing heard is true praj¤à. Have you heard praj¤à? If not, that is true praj¤à.
In the same way, this section says, “If someone says the Tathàgata has spoken Dharma, he
slanders the Buddha.Ÿ
To deviate from the såtras by one word is to practice the speech of demons.
Yet to attach to the såtras when speaking is tantamount to slandering the Buddha. What should then be done?
Why is it said that the Buddha did not speak Dharma? It is because
the Buddha is without a mark of self, without a mark of others, without a mark of living beings. Being without all marks is being without a general physical appearance and without the perfection of marks. Since the Buddha is free of all marks, how can one say, “The Buddha speaks Dharma.Ÿ? How can that not be
slander of the Buddha?
The Buddha simultaneously
speaks Dharma and sweeps it away.He speaks it and sweeps it away, just as if he were sweeping the floor. Who speaks? Who sweeps? Who speaks and who cleans so that every last bit of filth is swept away?
Why is it slander to say that the Buddha spoke Dharma?
It is because someone who makes that statement
has not thoroughly understood that the
Dharma the Buddha spoke
is without any real substance.
Dharma is spoken because living beings make discriminations. If you made no discriminations, there would be no Dharma to speak.Then the sagacious Subhåti said to the Buddha, “World Honored One, will there be living beings in the future who will believe this Såtra when they hear it spoken?Ÿ Sagacious refers to the fact that Subhåti was an elder with wisdom and experience.
The Buddha said, “Subhåti, they are neither living beings…. They certainly are not living beings, because they have already resolved their hearts on the Bodhisattva Way. …nor no living beings.
Although they have produced the hearts of Bodhi-sattvas, their cultivation still is not perfected. Since it is not perfected, they are not not living beings. On the one hand they are definitely not living beings, but at the same time they still exist as living beings.
Why? Living beings, those who have the causal conditions to become living beings, are spoken of by the Buddha as no living beings. They are living beings who have resolved their hearts on the Bodhisattva Way, and so are not common, ordinary living beings.
The following words did not appear in early translations of the Såtra, but were added to later editions:
Then the Sagacious Subhåti said to the Buddha, “World Honored One, will there be living beings in the future who will believe this Såtra when they hear it spoken?Ÿ
The Buddha said, “Subhåti, they are neither living beings nor no living beings. And why? Subhåti, living beings, living beings, are spoken of by the Tathàgata as no living beings, therefore they are called living beings.Ÿ
In the past there was a Dharma Master who fell ill, died, and went before King Yama, who asked him, “After you were born what did you do?Ÿ
The Dharma Master reflected and said, “What I did most in my life was recite the Vajra Såtra.Ÿ
King Yama said, “That’s good. You recited the Vajra Såtra. Excellent. Sit down.Ÿ King Yama then asked the
Dharma Master to recite the Såtra for him.
When the Dharma Master finished the recitation King Yama said, “Your recitation of the Vajra Såtra was short by
one paragraph.Ÿ You will find the additional words carved on a stone tablet at Chung Li Temple in Hao Chou. Go there and find them, and then inform everyone in the world about them. You have worked hard in your recitation of the Såtra, so, although it is time for you to die, I will grant you ten more years of life so you can return to the world and encourage everyone to recite the Vajra Såtra.
The Dharma Master came to life again and requested the emperor to send a message to Chung Li Temple to find
the section of text. There, carved on a stone tablet, was the Vajra Såtra and it contained the additional paragraph. Early translations of the Såtra did not have those words, but all later editions contained them.
Chapter 22
There is No Dharma which can be Obtained
Obtained
Subhåti said to the Buddha, “World Honored One, is it that the Tathàgata in
attaining Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi
did not attain anything?Ÿ The Buddha said, “So it is, so it is, Subhåti. As to Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi,
there is not even the slight-est dharma which I could attain, therefore it is called Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi.Ÿ
Commentary :
After the Buddha had said that living beings were not living beings and not not living beings, Subhåti asked, “In
attaining the Unsurpassed, Proper and Equal, Right Enlight-enment, the one resultant dharma of Buddhahood, there is not even the slightest dharma to be attained. Therefore it is called Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi.
That is merely a false name, nothing more.’
There is no actual substance which one can point to and say, “That is Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi.Ÿ Why is there not even
the smallest dharma which can be
attained?
The principle was discussed before:
If you want to know if something is attainable, you first must know if it has been lost. If it was certain that Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi had been lost, then you could retrieve it.
But basically you
have not lost it. It is what
you have always had your basic nature. “In your clothing is a priceless gem, do not further seek outside.Ÿ
Do not go outside in search of anything. The priceless gem is within your clothing.
Cut open your clothing and you will see it.
Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi, the Unsurpassed, Proper and Equal, Right Enlightenment, is a special name for the
perfect, full Buddha-fruit.
Your Buddha-fruit is certainly not something that can be attained from outside. That which is called Anuttarasaüyaksaübodhi also
does not come from outside. It is what you have always had: your inherent family treasure. The riches are within your own household.
If you turn away and seek outside you will be abandoning what you have had all along. You will not find anything that way.
Seperti orang yang mengatakan I want emptyness, I want emptyness