Realization of Param Bhutakoti (ultimate reality-limit)

·期刊原文
Realization of Param Bhutakoti (ultimate reality-limit) in the Astasahasrika Prajnaparamita Sutra

By Frederick J. Streng
Philosophy East and West
Volume 32, Number 1
January 1982
pp. 91-98
(C) by University of Hawaii Press

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p. 91

Within the spectrum of religious attempts to express
ultimate reality, the Perfection of Wisdom Suutras
exhibit a deep sense of the arbitrary and imperfect
character of any terms or concepts. Nevertheless, in
a paper presented two years ago at the Regional
American Oriental Society meeting, I pointed out that
in these Indian Mahaayaana Buddhist texts there is
not a total rejection of all verbal form; rather,
sometimes words can help to purify the use of words
(Streng, 1977: 4).

In this article I want to examine a series of
shifts in the use of the term bhuutako.ti
(reality-limit) in The Perfection of Wisdom in
Eight-thousand Lines Suutra (A.s.tasaahasrikaa
Praj~naapaaramitaa Suutra, hereafter cited as PWEL).
This series of shifts indicates a progression of
spiritual understanding which culminates in the
deepest knowledge of ultimate reality. The range of
shifts includes the use of the term "reality-limit"
as a designation of [l] the boundary between
sa.msaara and nirvaa.na, (2) the inferior spiritual
achievement of a Disciple (`sravaka) and
pratyekabuddha, which Edward Conze calls the
"Hinayanist nirvana" (Perfection, 1973: 321), (3) the
true nature of existence as "emptiness" (`suunyataa),
and finally (4) the ultimate reality-limit (param
bhuutako.ti) that is informed by perfect wisdom and
skill-in-means. The most dramatic shift is seen by
comparing the use of the term "reality-limit" as the
boundary between sa.msaara and nirvaa.na, and its use
as the attainment of perfect wisdom through
skill-in-means; however, we should note the basic
shift from the second to the third usage, which is
elaborated more precisely in the fourth usage where
the term param (ultimate) is added to bhuutako.ti.

In chapter 1 of PWEL, the Lord Buddha is reported
as saying that foolish people are attached to ideas
about the existence or nonexistence of their
experience. Such people continually shape more chains
of sa.msaara. He concludes:

While they construct all dharmas which yet do not
exist, they neither know nor see the path which is
that which truly is. In consequence they do not go
forth from the triple world, and do not wake up to
the reality-limit. For that reason they come to be
styled "fools." They have no faith in the true dharma
(Perfection, 1973: 87).

Here we see that the Buddha uses the term
"reality-limit" to specify that boundary marking a
release from the samsaric cycle, that is, the triple
world of desire, form, and nonform.

This image reflects the understanding of the
Abhidhamma masters, who claimed that when an arahant
(a worthy person) was freed from all impurities
(kilesa) he attained nibbaana. The arahant did not
return to the illusory "reality created by desire--as
other beings did (Compendium, 1956: 69). This view

p. 92

recognizes how easy it is to construct by
mental-emotional attachments what appears as everyday
existence. Already in the Samyutta Nikaaya (II.l21ff.)
freedom from illusory reality is said to result from
knowing that the supports (sthiti) of phenomena
co-arise interdependently. These supports disappear
when the conditions requisite to their arising
disappear. Cessation of apparent existence is
achieved by methodical attention to the
arising-dissipating character of phenomena and to the
"occurences of factors" (dharmas) that constitute
phenomena.

This is a common use of the term"reality-limit"
in the PWEL; it is closely related to the second use
mentioned earlier. This use is emphasized by Edward
Conze in his translation of PWEL when he writes:

Reality-limit had for a while been one of the more
obscure synonyms of "Nirvana", but now by a shift in
meaning it becomes identified with the inferior
hinayanistic Nirvana of the Arhat as distinct from
the full and final Nirvana of a Buddha (Perfection,
1973: x).

Understood in this way, the "reality-limit" is
something that, according to the PWEL, the
bodhisattva is warned against. It is the realization
of an inferior insight into the nature of things--that
is, as perceived by a Disciple or pratyekabuddha.
For example, the Lord Buddha explains in Chapter 20
that while both the bodhisattva and disciple enter
the concentrations on emptiness, signlessness and
wishlessness, that is, the three doors of
deliverance, the bodhisattva "does not realize the
reality-limit, that is, neither on the level of a
Disciple, nor on that of a pratyekabuddha. For he has
at his disposal very strong and powerful helpers, in
perfect wisdom and skill in means" (Perfection, 1973:
224). The warning against realizing this kind of
reality-limit is put in its strongest form when the
Lord says that the evil one, Mara, causes the
bodhisattva to confuse this inferior realization of
the reality-limit with Buddhahood. He says in
Chapter 11:

Mara may come along in the guise of a Buddha, with
magically created monks around him, and maintain that
a bodhisattva who courses in deep dharmas is one who
realises the reality-limit, who becomes a Disciple,
and not a bodhisattva ... (Perfection, 1973: 170).

Throughout the PWEL there is a distinction between
the bodhisattva path that includes the perfection of
wisdom and the path of the Disciple and
pratyeka-buddha whose chief characteristic is the
extinction of impurities (kle`sa).

The deeper awareness of the empty nature of the
dharmas in the perfection of wisdom is a major thrust
of the Perfection of Wisdom Suutras. By emphasizing
the empty (`suunya) nature of all existence,
including the experience of a reality-limit, there is
a dramatic shift from using the term "reality-limit"
to refer to the inferior realization by a Disciple to
its use to indicate the true (that is, "empty")
nature of things. In at least three places the term
"reality-limit" is used to indicate the true
understanding of reality-limit as empty. In Chapter 5

p. 93

of PWEL the Lord says that the training of a
bodhisattva leads to the manifestation of the
reality-limit, as follows:

Come here, son of a good family, do train yourself in
just this Path of the Bodhisattvas, for as a result
of this training, this coursing, this struggling you
will surely quickly awake to full enlightenment.
After that you will educate an infinite number of
beings in the complete extinction of the substratum
of rebirth, in other words, in the revelation of the
reality-limit (bhuutako.ti prabhaa-vanataa;
Perfection, 1973: 121).

In Chapter 10 `Sariputra, who here speaks because of
"the Buddha's might," discusses the power of the
mature wholesome roots (ku`salamuula) in the karman of
the bodhisattva. In contrast, he warns: "through the
abundance of that karman beings who have not
collected wholesome roots will find no satisfaction
nor faith in this reality-limit. But those who find
satisfaction and faith in it are people who have
collected wholesome roots, well collected them"
(Perfection, 1973: 155-156).

In these two passages the reality-limit depicted
is that known through perfection of wisdom. In
Chapter 9 it is specifically described in the
traditional formulation of emptiness as the
nonperception of any living being or of any dharma.
There the spokesman for the perfection of wisdom,
Subhuti, says:

The perfection of the bodhisattva has no mental
attitude, because it is imperturbable. This
perfection is unshakeable, in consequence of the
stability of the realm of dharma... This perfection
is quieted, because no sign is apprehended in all
dharmas. This perfection is faultless, as the
perfection of all virtues. This perfection is
undefiled, because imagination is not something that
is not. No living being is [ultimately] found in this
perfection, because of the reality-limit. This
perfection is unlimited because the manifestation of
all dharmas does not rise up(Pevfection, 1973:
151-152).

The profundity of the spiritual shift from the
practice and goals of the Disciple and pratyekabuddha
is seen in the description a few speeches earlier
when we are told that thousands of gods are overjoyed
because they will be able to see "the second turning
of the wheel of dharma taking place in Jambudvipa."
The Buddha then says: "This... is not the second
turning of the wheel of dharma. No dharma can be
turned forwards or backwards. Just this is the
Bodhisattva's perfection of wisdom" (Perfection,
1973: 150). Whereas before the term reality-limit
referred to the Disciples and pratyekabuddha's final
goal of nirvaa.na, it now serves to indicate a new
understanding of emptiness according to perfect
wisdom on the bodhisattva path.

Concentration on emptiness through perfected
wisdom and skill in means permits one to avoid
"realizing the reality-limit" in the earlier sense.
Specifically, the Lord says that a bodhisattva should
contemplate the emptiness of the skandhas
(personality factors) with a certain attitude,
namely,

with an undisturbed series of thoughts in such a way
that, when he contemplates the fact that "form, etc.,
is empty", he does not regard that true nature of

p. 94

dharmas [i.e. emptiness] as something which, as a
result of its own true nature [i.e. emptiness], is a
real entity. But when he does not regard that true
nature of dharmas as a real thing, then he cannot
realize the reality-limit (Perfection, 1973: 222).

When Subhuti asks for a clarification of how a
bodhisattva stands firmly in the practice of
emptiness without "realizing emptiness," the Lord
distinguishes between "realizing" emptiness and
"completely conquering" emptiness. He says:

It is because a Bodhisattva contemplates that
emptiness which is possessed of the best of all modes
[that is, of the six perfections]. He does, however,
not contemplate that "I shall realize," or "I should
realize," but he contemplates that "this is the time
for complete conquest, and not for realization."
Without losing himself in the concentration, he ties
his thought to an objective support [for his
compassion] and he determines that he will take hold
of perfect wisdom [which is essentially skill in
means], and he will not realize its realization is not the final goal..gif border=0 align=middle> Meanwhile,
however, the Bodhisattva does not lose the dharmas
which act as the wings to enlightenment. He does not
effect the extinction of the outflows [which would
prevent renewed rebirths], but over that also he
achieves complete conquest (Perfection, 1973: 222).

The true reality-limit manifested in the
bodhisattva, then, includes the recognition that no
dharma, no practice, no experience is something
having a self-existing nature. But this is not all,
for one might become absorbed in the concentration on
emptiness and, so to speak, leave existence. The
shift to the forth usage of "reality-limit" is marked
by the addition of the term param, translated as
"ultimate" or "farthest," and set over against a
"midway reality-limit" (antaraa bhuutako.ti). The
ultimate reality-limit is attained only with skillful
means (upaayakau`sala), whereby a person achieves
complete conquest over even "the extinction of
outflows." This process is discussed in PWEL Chapter
20 where the special value of the bodhisattva path is
that it avoids realizing a midway reality-limit. The
Lord is reported to have said:

A Bodhisattva who courses in perfect wisdom and who
is upheld by skill in means, does not realise that
farthest reality-limit until his wholesome roots are
matured, well matured in full enlightenment. Only
when his wholesome roots are matured, well matured in
full enlightenment, only then does he realise that
farthest reality-limit. A Bodhisattva who courses in
perfect wisdom, who develops perfect wisdom, should
therefore contemplate and meditate on the deep true
nature of those dharmas, but he should not realise it
(Perfection, 1973: 224-25).

In response to this declaration Subhuti exclaims how
wonderful it is that the Buddha is explaining how one
can enter the concentration on emptiness and not
realize the reality-limit understood in the sense of
withdrawing from existence. Then the Lord gives a
summary statement of the bodhisattva path:

For the Bodhisattva has not abandoned all beings. He
has made the special vows to set free all those
beings. If the mind of a Bodhisattva forms the
aspiration not to abandon all beings but to set them
free (vimok.sa), and in addition he aspires for the
concentration (samaadhi) on emptiness, the Signless,
the

p. 95

Wishless, i.e. for the three doors to deliverance,
then that Bodhisattva should be known as one who is
endowed with skill in means, and he will not realise
the reality-limit midway, before his Buddha-dharmas
have become complete. For it is this skill in means
which protects him. His thought of enlightenment
consists in just that fact that he does not want to
leave all beings behind. When he is thus endowed with
the thought of enlightenment and with skill in means,
then he does not midway realise the reality-limit
(Perfection, 1973: 225).

In these passages we see that the bodhisattva does
not realize the reality-limit as understood in terms
of the spiritual achievement of the Disciple or
pratye-kabuddha; the distinction between such an
inferior realization and that of a bodhisatlva is
emphasized by saying that a bodhisattva realizes the
ultimate reality-limit, which is a perfect conquest
of emptiness through skillful means. Likewise, to say
that a bodhisattva realizes the ultimate
reality-limit is the same thing as saying that the
bodhisattva does not realize a midway reality-limit.

At this point it is useful to ask how it is that
skillful means is the key to realizing the ultimate
reality-limit. In Chapter 20 the Lord explains:

Since [the bodhisattva] has not abandoned all beings,
he is thus able to win full enlightenment, safely and
securely. At the time when a Bodhisattva has made all
beings into an objective support for his thought of
friendliness, and with the highest friendliness ties
himself to them, at that time he rises above the
factiousness of the defilements and of Mara, he rises
above the level of Disciple and Pratyekabuddha, and
he abides in that concentration [on friendliness]
(Perfection, 1973: 224).

This assertion that a bodhisattva makes all beings
into an objective support for his thought of
friendliness is revolutionary, and appears to
contradict the recognition that all arising of
existence is to be seen as empty, in order to avoid
the incipient tendency of mental processes to
establish ("station, " prati.s.thiti) the mental
processes within illusory forms (See Streng, 1975:
77-80). The PWEL asserts that thought-constiuction
remains clear as long as it remains unobstructed. To
aid in keeping thoughts clear a person is asked to
regard the teaching of the perfection of wisdom, or
all-knowledge, as unproduced (Perfection, 1973:
90-91). In another Perfection of Wisdom Sutra, the
Diamond Sutra, the Buddha tells Subhuti that the
bodhisattva "should produce an unsupported thought,
i.e. a thought which is nowhere supported
(prati.s.thiti), a thought unsupported by sights,
sounds, smells, tastes, touchables or mind-objects"
(Conze, 1958: 47-48). The problem concerns how one is
to use "objective supports," such as images, ideas,
and perceptions, without letting them become
deceptions; or, to put it in the religious
phraseology of the PWEL, how can the "wholesome
roots," that is, the thought of enlightenment, the
purity of thought, and "freedom of egotism in all its
forms" (Dayal, 1932: 61) be transformed into perfect
enlightenment. This problem was considered directly
in Chapter 6 in a dialogue between Subhuti and the
celestial bodhisattva Maitreya: if everything is
empty, does that mean that there is no actual
spiritual transformation? If, on the other hand, a
person participates

p. 96

in the actual world, does one not by definition
willfully create thoughts which depend on signs and
objective supports? In the dialogue Subhuti says to
Maitreya:

If a bodhisattva treated as an objective support or
as a sign that foundation which does not exist, and
that objective support, which does not exist, would
he then not have a perverted perception, perverted
thought, perverted views? ... And as the foundation
entity, the objective support, the point of view [are
nonexistent], so is enlightenment, so is the thought
[of enlightenment] and so, all dharmas, all elements.
But then on which foundations, by which objective
supports, or points of view, does he turn over that
thought into full enlightenment, or what meritorious
work, founded on jubilation, does he turn over into
what utmost, right and perfect enlightenment?
(Perfection, 1973: 126)

The problem, then, is if the perfect
enlightenment is empty, the talk about turning over
itself is empty, as well as any actual
transformation. Maitreya responds:

This should not be taught or expounded in front of a
Bodhisattva who has newly set out on the vehicle. For
he would lose that little faith, which is his, that
little affection, serenity and respect which are his.
... [After some further discussion, Maitreya
explains:] The Bodhisattva must not, as a result of
the thought by which he turns that over, become one
who perceives a thought. It is thus that the
meritorious work founded on jubilation becomes
something which is turned over into full
enlightenment. If he does not perceive that thought,
[identifying it] as "this is that thought," then a
Bodhisattva has no perverted perception, thought, or
view. But if he perceives the thought by which he
turns that over, [identifying it] as "this is that
thought," then he becomes one who perceives thought.
As a result, he has a perverted perception, thought
and view. But a Bodhisattva turns over rightly, not
wrongly, when he perceives and brings to mind the
thought which turns over in such a way that he
regards it as "just extinct, extinct," as "stopped,
departed, reversed"; and when he reflects that what
is extinct that can not be turned over; and that this
[extinctness, etc.] is the very dharmic nature also
of that thought by which one turns over, and also of
the dharmas through which one turns over, as well as
the dharmas to which one turns over. It is thus that
the bodhisattva should turn over (Perfection, 1973:
126-128).

The depth of a bodhisattva's insight into the
empty nature of things allows him or her to
participate in the construction of thoughts, "
signs," and objective supports while not being caught
by them. The ability to attain "full knowledge"
without either destroying or being attached to forms
is exposed by the celestial bodhisattva Maitreya when
he says:

[A bodhisattva] does not bring to mind nor turn over
[that wholesome roots] to full enlightenment if he
brings about a sign by reflecting that what is past
is extinct, stopped, departed, reversed; that what is
future has not yet arrived; and that of the present
no stability is got at, and that which is not got at
has no sign, or range. On the other hand he also does
not turn over to full enlightenment if he fails to
bring about a sign or to bring to mind as a result of
sheer inattentiveness, if he fails to attend as a
result of lack of mindfulness or of lack of
understanding. But that wholesome root becomes
something which

p. 97

has been turned over [or transformed] into full
enlightenment on condition that he brings to mind
that signn, but does not treat it as a sign. It is
thus that the Bodhisattva should train himseIf
therein. This should be known as his skill-in-means.
When, through that skill-in-means, he turns over a
wholesome root, then he is near to the allknowledge
(Perfection, 1973: 128-129).

Again in Chapter 19 of PWEL this problem is
considered in a dialogue between `Saariputra and
Subhuuti. `Saariputra is perplexed about why the
Buddha's enlightened reaction to the experienced
world does not result in more karman. He asks:

If, as a result of such conscious reflection, the
deed of that man is added on to his collection of
karma, then the deed of the Buddha, the Lord, when
he, thinking to himself, consciously forms the notion
that he wants to enter extinction, [--that deed] will
also be added to the Buddha's heap and collection of
karma? (Perfection, 1973: 215).

Subhuuti responds:

No, indeed not, Sariputra, for the Tathagata is one
who has forsaken all reflections and discriminations.
Space on its own cannot raise a deed or thought
without objective support, not without one. A thought
can arise only with an objective support, not without
one. Intellectual acts must refer to dharmas which
are seen, heard, felt, or known. In respect to some
objects, intellectual acts take defilement upon
themselves, in respect of others purification. Acts
of will and deeds can therefore arise only with
objective support, not without (Perfection, 1973:
216).

In response, `Sariputra asks: "Since the Lord has
described all objective support as isolated (vivikta)
[without an inherent relation to a subject], how can
an act of will arise only with objective support, and
not without"? (Perfection, 1973: 216).

Subhuuti replies,

An act of will is raised only with an objective
support, and not without, in the sense that one
treats an actually non-existent objective support as
a sign, as an objective support, in fact also the act
of will is isolated, and also the sign. And so are
karma-formations which are conditioned on ignorance,
and so all the links of conditioned co-production up
to decay and death conditioned by birth. Even so,
objective supports are isolated. The act of will is
isolated from the sign [which seem to cause it] and
it arises only in reference to the conventional
expressions current in the world (Perfection, 1973:
216).

The realization of the ultimate reality-limit,
then, is an illumined awareness of the empty nature
of all existing things whereby a bodhisaltva, in an
empty mode of thought-construction, establishes an
isolated objective support for his or her
friendliness. This way of perceiving the world,
including oneself, can be described for communication
purposes as a spiritual process whereby the wholesome
roots are matured and thereby transformed into
perfect enlightenment.

p. 98

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