Tuesday, March 09, 2010

What is called the clear and clean Dharmakaya Buddha?

Here's a section from Chapter 6 Repentance of the Platform Sutra of Huineng that I just translated.

"What is called the clear and clean Dharmakaya Buddha? The nature of worldly people is at root clear and clean. The 10,000 things are secondary to one’s own nature. By consideration of every evil matter, then you give birth to evil practices. By consideration of every good matter, then you give birth to good practices. Thus, are all things located within one’s own nature, like the sky being always clear. Though the sun and moon are always bright, when they become covered by floating clouds, then above is bright and below is dark. If suddenly they encounter a puff of wind, the clouds disperse, above and below are bright together, and the 10,000 images all appear. The nature of worldly people is always floating and drifting like those clouds of the sky.

"Learned and virtuous ones, innate-intelligence (jnana) is like the sun, and intuitive-wisdom (prajna) is like the moon. This intelligence-wisdom (jnana-prajna) is always bright. By externally attaching to conditions, false thoughts are a cover of drifting clouds, and one’s own nature is not able to show one’s brightness. If one encounters a learned and virtuous one to hear the true and right Dharma and by oneself eliminates delusion and falsehood, then the internal and external are bright and unobstructed, and the 10,000 things all appear from within one’s own nature. A person’s seeing-nature (J. kensho) likewise is indeed returning to thusness. This is called the clear and clean Dharmakaya Buddha."

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