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Upajāti (Indravajrā)
prāg-uttare
cāvasatha-pradeśe kūpaḥ svayaṁ prādur-abhūt-sitāmbuḥ |
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antaḥ-purāṇy-āgata-vismayāni
yasmin kriyās-tīrtha iva pracakruḥ || 1.23
1.23
In the
north-eastern corner of the residence
A well
of pure water spontaneously appeared;
And
there the royal householders, filled with wonder,
Performed
bathing practices
as if on the bank of a sacred stream.
as if on the bank of a sacred stream.
COMMENT:
EH
Johnston wrote somewhere that Aśvaghoṣa does not anywhere waste any word, and
on the basis of my own investigations so far, I think EHJ was right
on this point.
Googling“significance of north-east direction,” led me to a blog post which
confirms that “Out of the eight directions the North-east
has a special importance. The sun rises from the East, moves towards
the North and sets in the West. The early morning rays are auspicious
and must fall on the land we live on. These rays, to a great extent
are absorbed by water; therefore it is beneficial to have wells and
underground water tanks in the North-East direction.”
“The northeast direction” the
blogpost continues, “is enriched with the confluence of this energy
pool with the magnetic and subtler energy currents of the earth and
the etheric hole. The rishis, the Indian sages of Vedic Age had
mastered this knowledge.”
Fair enough. Nice one, Indian sages of
the Vedic Age.
What interests me even more about
today's verse is the meaning of the word svayam
“spontaeously, by itself,” in the 2nd pāda, and the
way that this meaning was not missed, but rather given particular
emphasis, in the Chinese translation. Nice one, Chinese translator, whoever you were.
In the following series of four
5-character lines, the Chinese character 自corresponding
to the Sanskrit svayam
appears not once but twice, describing not only the spontaneous
appearance of the well in today's verse but also the spontaneous
burning of fire in yesterday's verse.
世界諸火光 無薪自炎熾
淨水清涼井 前後自然生
淨水清涼井 前後自然生
Svayam,
“by itself,” expresses the principle of spontaneity which the
Chinese, even before the eastern migration of the Buddha's teaching
from India to China, were already investigating in connection with
the Tao. Hence, when in the opening words of Shobogenzo Dogen
described the supreme and subtle method of the buddha-tathāgatas
as 無為
, “free of doing, spontaneous,”
(Chinese: WU-WEI; Japanese: MU-I), he was using a term
borrowed from Taoism to express a fundamental principle of the
Buddha's teaching.
Thus, when in yesterday's verse I
interpreted anīritaḥ,
“without
being stirred,” as an expression of non-doing, it turns out that I
wasn't thinking anything original: the Chinese translator had gone
even further in the direction of a “non-doing” interpretation
and written of the light of fires (諸火光)
spontaneously (自)
blazing (炎熾)
without any firewood (無薪).
The Chinese translator lent emphasis to this sense of spontaneous
arising by repeating the character which means “spontaneously, by
itself,” (自)
in connection with the arising of a well in today's verse. Thus:
世界諸火光 無薪自炎熾
淨水清涼井 前後自然生
淨水清涼井 前後自然生
S. Beal: whilst in the world the fire’s
gleam of itself prevailed without the use of fuel. Pure water, cool
and refreshing from the springs, flowed here-and there, self-caused;
C.
Willemen: Fires
flared up spontaneously, without any fuel, all over the world. Cool
wells with clean water sprang up here and there all by themselves.
In his
instructions for how to sit, Dogen describes the secret of
sitting-dhyāna as
自成
一片
“to spontaneously become all of a piece.”
“Be
totally oblivious to all involvements,” Dogen recommended, “and
spontaneously become all of a piece.”
The
words of the Chinese Zen Master Tozan were
打
成
一片
"become
all of a piece in action,” “become all of a piece by just doing
it!”
But
Dogen evidently felt that he could improve on that with
自成 一片
“spontaneously
become all of a piece.”
I
am tempted to go on and on at length about this point, because it is
so intimately related to my own struggles when I was in Japan and
somehow knew that something in my practice and in my life wasn't flowing as easily as it might flow, but I couldn't see or figure out how I was getting in the way – until, filled with wonder (āgata-vismayaḥ),
I began to experience for myself what FM Alexander was going on
about.
In
the Saundarananda, Aśvaghoṣa describes Nanda's successive entry
into four stages of sitting-meditation – though in practice itself there do not seem to be any clear boundaries between one stage and the next. Anyway
the first stage might be described as a condition of spontaneous flow in
which endorphins are flowing around freely and in profusion and one
is thinking whatever one likes. In the second stage thoughts are
recognized as akin to waves that make ripples on a steady spontaneous
flow of clear water, and on this basis thoughts are stopped.
The
practice of sitting-dhyāna, then, is akin to the witnessing of the
spontanous flow of a sacred stream, and the 4th pāda of
today's verse, as I read it, points to that.
VOCABULARY
prāg-uttare
(loc. sg. m.): mfn. north-eastern
ca:
and
āvasatha-pradeśe
(loc. sg. m.): in a corner of the dwelling-place
āvasatha:
m. dwelling-place , abode , habitation
pradeśa:
m. pointing out; a spot , region , place
kūpaḥ
(nom. sg.): m. a well
svayam:
(ind.) by itself, spontaneously
prādur
abhūt: it appeared
prādur:
(ind.) " out of doors " (with bhū , to become manifest ,
be visible or audible , appear , arise , exist)
sitāmbuḥ
(nom. sg. m.): with pure water
sita:
mfn. white , pale , bright , light ; candid, pure
ambu:
n. water
antaḥ-purāṇi
(acc. pl.): n. the king's palace , the female apartments , gynaeceum
; those who live in the female apartments
antar:
inside, internal
pura:
n. fortress; the female apartments , gynaeceum
āgata-vismayāni
(acc. pl. n.): mfn. filled with wonder
āgata:
mfn. entered (into any state or condition of mind)
vismaya:
wonder , surprise , amazement , bewilderment , perplexity
yasmin
(loc. sg. relative pronoun): wherein
kriyāḥ
(acc. pl.): f. doing , performing , performance , occupation with (in
comp.) , business , act , action , undertaking , activity , work ,
labour ; bodily action , exercise of the limbs ; a religious rite or
ceremony ; religious action , worship
tīrthe
(loc. sg.): n. a passage , way , road , ford , stairs for landing or
for descent into a river , bathing-place , place of pilgrimage on the
banks of sacred streams , piece of water
iva:
like, as if
pracakruḥ
= 3rd
pers. pl. pra- √ kṛ : to make , produce , accomplish , perform
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