The Perfection Of Wisdom In Eight Thousand Lines
13,106 words
'The Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines' is the earliest text of the Prajnaparamita (Perfection of Wisdom texts) The following is a less strict interpretation of the 'Eight Thousand Lines' in its original verse form only. ** Many thanks to Reverend Neil Christopher for his hard work on this translation and granting permissing for this c...
Chapter 2
Where the Bodhisattva Stands
18. Where does a bodhisattva stand? Nowhere, they have no footings. Not in will or in consciousness, or in any skandha whatsoever. Not in change or no-change, not in suffering or ease, not in self or no-self; the lovely and the repulsive are all suchness and emptiness to them, and they don’t take stand upon any of the fruits of which they have won—no Arhat, no Buddhahood, no enlightenment.
19. The Buddha himself did not take station in the realm which is freed of conditions, nor in the state of the conditionless, but freely wandered, like one without a home. Likewise, the bodhisattva positions themselves on a position devoid of any basis to be considered a position.
Where the Bodhisattva Trains
20. Those who wish to become a disciple of the Buddha, cannot reach the goal without a desire to do so, and great effort. However, they move across the shore, but without eyes on the other shore. (Literally: They move across, but their eyes are not on the other shore)
21. Those who teach the dharma, and those who listen; those who win the fruit of the Arhat, Buddhahood, or world-savior, or obtain Nirvana itself have learned that they are mere illusions, mere dreams—as the Buddha has told us.
22. Knowing this, a wise and learned bodhisattva, works not towards Arhatship, nor enlightenment, nor Nirvana. In the practice alone one trains for the sake of the practice.
23. Increase or decrease of forms is not the basis or aim of their training, nor does one set out to obtain merit or obtain a dharma. The “All-knowledge” alone does the bodhisattva hope to obtain through this training; to that goal alone they train, and delight in its virtues.
The Facts of Existence
24. Forms are not wisdom, nor is any wisdom ever found in form; in consciousness, perceptions, feelings, or will they are not wisdom, and no wisdom is ever found in them. Existence is like space, without a break or a crack.
25. “Perceptions”—are mere words, to the Buddha has told us. Those who succeed in ridding themselves of perceptions, they having reached the Beyond, have fulfilled their Teacher’s commandments.
26. If the Buddha himself could go back to the very beginning of time and say the word “be” over and over again, for all eternity, not even he could cause anything into being by his speaking (words). Knowing this is in the practice of the highest perfection of wisdom.