Even if there are human beings or gods in heaven who have sur-
vived as rags, they are never sentient beings, they are just rags.
vived as rags, they are never sentient beings, they are just rags.
Shobogenzo
aya, they should receive the authentic transmission transmitted between
Buddhist patriarchs. In India and in China, in the ages of the right Dharma
and the imitative Dharma,15 even laypeople received and retained the ka? aya.
In this distant and remote land in the present degenerate age, those who shave
their beard and hair and call themselves the Buddha's disciples do not receive
and retain the ka? aya. They have never believed, known, or clarified that
they should receive and retain [the ka? aya]; it is lamentable. How much less
do they know of the [ka? aya's] material, color, and measurements. How
much less do they know how to wear it.
[54] The ka? aya has been called, since ancient time, �the clothing of
liberation. � It can liberate16 us from all hindrances such as karmic hindrances,
hindrances of af? iction, and hindrances of retribution. If a dragon gets a sin-
gle strand [of the ka? aya], it escapes the three kinds of heat. 17 If a bull touches
[a ka? aya] with one of its horns, its sins will naturally be extinguished. When
buddhas realize the truth they are always wearing the ka? aya. Remember,
[to wear the ka? aya] is the noblest and highest virtue. Truly, we have been
born in a remote land in [the age of] the latter Dharma, and we must regret
this. But at the same time, how should we measure the joy of meeting the
robe and the Dharma that have been transmitted from buddha to buddha,
from rightful successor to rightful successor? Which [other] lineage has
authentically transmitted both the robe and the Dharma of Sakyamuni in the
manner of our authentic transmission? Having met them, who could fail to
venerate them and to serve offerings to them? Even if, each day, we [have
to] discard bodies and lives as countless as the sands of the Ganges, we should
serve offerings to them. Indeed we should vow to meet them, humbly to
receive them upon the head,18 to serve offerings to them, and to venerate
them in every life in every age. Between us and the country of the Buddha's
birth, there are more than a hundred thousand miles of mountains and oceans,
and it is too far for us to travel; nevertheless, promoted by past good con-
duct, we have not been shut out by the mountains and oceans, and we have
not been spurned as the dullards of a remote [land]. Having met this right
Dharma, we should persistently practice it day and night. Having received
and retained this ka? aya, we should perpetually receive it upon the head in
humility and preserve it. How could this only be to have practiced merit
under one buddha or two buddhas? It may be to have practiced all kinds of
merit under buddhas equal to the sands of the Ganges. Even if [the people
who receive and retain the ka? aya] are ourselves, we should venerate them,
and we should rejoice. We should heartily repay the profound benevolence
of the ancestral master in transmitting the Dharma. Even animals repay kind-
ness; so how could human beings fail to recognize kindness? If we failed to
recognize kindness, we might be more stupid than animals. The merits of
this buddha robe and this Buddha-Dharma were never clarified or known by
anyone other than the ancestral master who transmitted the Buddha's right
Dharma. If we want to follow gladly the traces of the buddhas, we should
just be glad about this [transmission]. Even after hundred thousand myriads
of generations, we should esteem this authentic transmission as the authen-
tic transmission. This [transmission] may be the Buddha-Dharma itself; the
proof in due course will become evident. We should not liken [the trans-
mission] to the dilution of milk with water. It is like a crown prince suc-
ceeding to the throne. When we want to use milk, if there is no milk other
than this diluted milk [described above], although it is diluted milk we should
use it. Even when we do not dilute it with water, we must not use oil, we
must not use lacquer, and we must not use wine. This authentic transmis-
sion may also be like that. Even a mediocre follower of an ordinary master,
providing the authentic transmission is present, may be in a good situation
to use milk. [But] more to the point, the authentic transmission from buddha
to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch is like the succession of a crown
prince. Even secular [teaching] says, �One does not wear clothing different
from the official uniform of the previous reign. �19 How could disciples of
the Buddha wear [robes] different from the Buddha's robe?
[58] Since the tenth year of the Eihei era,20 during the reign of Emperor
Komei (Ch. Mingdi) of the Later Han dynasty,21 monks and laymen going
back and forth between the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands have
followed on each other's heels without cease, but none has claimed to have
met in the Western Heavens an ancestral master of the authentic transmis-
sion from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch; none has a record
of the lineage of the face-to-face transmission from the Tathagata. They have
only followed teachers of sutras and commentaries, and brought back San-
skrit books of sutras and philosophy. None speaks of having met an ances-
tral master who is a rightful successor to the Buddha's Dharma, and none
mentions that there are ancestral masters who have received the transmis-
sion of the Buddha's ka? aya. Clearly, they have not entered beyond the
threshold of the Buddha's Dharma. People like this have not clarified the
principle of the authentic transmission by Buddhist patriarchs. When Sakya-
muni Tathagata22 passed to Mahakasyapa the right Dharma-eye treasury and
the supreme state of bodhi, he transmitted them together with a ka? aya received
in the authentic transmission from Kasyapa Buddha. 23 Received by rightful
successor from rightful successor, [the ka? aya] reached Zen Master Daikan
of Sokeizan, the thirty-third generation. The material, color, and measure-
ments [of the ka? aya] had been transmitted intimately. Since then, the Dharma
descendants of Seigen and Nangaku24 have intimately transmitted the Dharma,
wearing the Dharma of the ancestral patriarchs and keeping the Dharma of
the ancestral patriarchs in order. The method of washing [the ka? aya] and
the method of receiving and retaining [the ka? aya] cannot be known with-
out learning in practice in the inner sanctum of the legitimate face-to-face
transmission of those methods.
[60] The ka? aya is said to include three robes. They are the five-stripe
robe, the seven-stripe robe, and the large robe of nine or more stripes.
Excellent practitioners receive only these three robes, and do not keep
other robes. To use just the three robes serves the body well enough.
When we are attending to business or doing chores, and when we are
going to and from the toilet, we wear the five-stripe robe. For doing
good practices among the sangha, we wear the seven-stripe robe. To
teach human beings and gods, and to make them devout, we should
wear the large robe of nine or more stripes. Or, when we are in a pri-
vate place we wear the five-stripe robe, when we go among the sangha
we wear the seven-stripe robe, and when we go into a royal palace or
into towns and villages we should wear the large robe. Or, when it is
nice and warm we wear the five-stripe robe, when it is cold we put on
the seven-stripe robe as well, and when the cold is severe we also put
on the large robe. Once, in ancient times, the weather on a midwinter
night was cold enough to split bamboo. As that night fell, the Tatha-
gata put on the five-stripe robe. As the night passed and it got colder,
he put on the seven-stripe robe as well. Later on in the night, when the
coldness reached a peak, he also put on the large robe. At this time,
the Buddha thought, �In future ages, when the cold is beyond endurance,
good sons should be able to clothe their bodies adequately with these
three robes. �25
[62] The method of wearing the ka? aya: �To bare only the right shoul-
der�26 is the usual method. There is a method of wearing [the ka? aya] so that
it goes over both shoulders, a form [followed by] the Tathagata and veter-
ans who are senior in years and experience: both shoulders are covered, while
the chest may be either exposed or covered. [The method of] covering both
shoulders is for a large ka? aya of sixty or more stripes. [Usually,] when we
wear the ka? aya, we wear both sides over the left arm and shoulder. The
front edge goes over the left side [of the ka? aya] and hangs over the [left
upper] arm. 27 In the case of the large ka? aya, [this] front edge passes over
the left shoulder and hangs down behind the back. There are various meth-
ods of wearing the ka? aya besides these; we should take time to study them
and should inquire into them.
[64] For hundreds of years, through one dynasty after another�Liang,
Zhen, Sui, Tang, and Song28�many scholars of both the Great and the Small
Vehicles have abandoned the work of lecturing on sutras, recognizing that
it is not the ultimate, and progressed to learn the authentically transmitted
Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs; when they do so, they inevitably shed
their former shabby robes and receive and retain the authentically transmit-
ted ka? aya of the Buddhist patriarchs. This is indeed the abandonment of the
false and the return to the true. [In discussing] the right Dharma of the Tatha-
gata, [we see] the Western Heavens as the very root of the Dharma. Many
teachers of human beings, past and present, have established small views
based on the sentimental and parochial thinking of the common person.
Because the world of buddha and the world of living beings are beyond being
limited and being unlimited, the teachings, practice, and human truths of the
Mahayana and the Hinayana can never fit inside the narrow thoughts of com-
mon people today. Nevertheless, [common people] in China, acting at ran-
dom, have failed to see the Western Heavens as the root, and have consid-
ered their newly devised, limited, small views to be the Buddha-Dharma.
Such facts should never occur. Therefore if people today who have estab-
lished the mind want to receive and to retain the ka? aya, they must receive
and retain the ka? aya of the authentic transmission. They must not receive
and retain a ka? aya newly created according to the idea of the moment. The
ka? aya of the authentic transmission means the one that has been authenti-
cally transmitted from Shaolin [Temple] and Sokei [Mountain],29 the one
that has been received by the Tathagata's rightful successors without miss-
ing a single generation. The ka? aya worn by their Dharma children and
Dharma grandchildren is the traditional ka? aya. What has been newly cre-
ated in China is not traditional. Now, the ka? aya worn by the monks who
have come from the Western Heavens, in the past and present, are all worn
as the ka? aya authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs. Not one
of these monks [has worn a ka? aya] like the new ka? aya being produced in
China today by precepts scholars. Dull people believe in the ka? aya of pre-
cepts scholars; those who are clear throw [such robes] away. In general, the
merit of the ka? aya transmitted from buddha to buddha and from patriarch
to patriarch is evident and easy to believe in. Its authentic transmission has
been received exactly, its original form has been handed down personally,
and it exists really in the present. [The Buddhist patriarchs] have received
and retained it, and succeeded to each other's Dharma, until today. The ances-
tral masters who have received and retained [the ka? aya] are all masters and
disciples who experienced the state30 and received the transmission of Dharma.
This being so, we should make [the ka? aya] properly, according to the method
for making the ka? aya that has been authentically transmitted by the Buddhist
patriarchs. This alone is the authentic tradition, and so it has long been expe-
rienced and recognized by all common and sacred beings, human beings and
gods, and dragons and spirits. Having been born to meet the spread of this
Dharma, if we cover our body with the ka? aya only once, receiving it and
retaining it for just a k? a? a or a muhurta,31 that [experience] will surely serve
as a talisman to protect us32 in the realization of the supreme state of bodhi.
When we dye the body and mind with a single phrase or a single verse, it
becomes a seed of everlasting brightness which finally leads us to the supreme
state of bodhi. When we dye the body and mind with one real dharma or one
good deed, it may be also like this. Mental images arise and vanish instanta-
neously; they are without an abode. The physical body also arises and van-
ishes instantaneously; it too is without an abode. Nevertheless, the merit that
we practice always has its time of ripening and shedding. The ka? aya, simi-
larly, is beyond elaboration and beyond non-elaboration, it is beyond having
an abode and beyond having no abode: it is that which �buddhas alone, together
with buddhas, perfectly realize. �33 Nevertheless, practitioners who receive
and retain [the ka? aya] always accomplish the merit that is thus to be gained,
and they always arrive at the ultimate. Those without past good conduct�
even if they pass through one life, two lives, or countless lives�can never
meet the ka? aya, can never wear the ka? aya, can never believe in the ka? aya,
and can never clearly know the ka? aya. In China and Japan today, we see that
there are those who have had the opportunity to clothe their body once in the
ka? aya, and there are those who have not. [The difference] depends neither
upon high or low status nor upon stupidity or wisdom: clearly it was deter-
mined by past good conduct. This being so, if we have received and retained
the ka? aya, we should feel glad about our past good conduct, and should not
doubt the accumulation of merit and the piling up of virtue. If we have not
got [the ka? aya] yet, we should hope to get it. We should strive, without delay,
to sow the first seeds [of receiving and retaining the ka? aya] in this life. Those
who are prevented by some hindrance from receiving and retaining [the ka? aya]
should repent and confess before the buddha-tathagatas and the Three Treas-
ures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. How living beings in other countries
must wish, �If only the robe and the Dharma of the Tathagata had been authen-
tically transmitted and were intimately present in our country, as they are in
China! � Their shame must be deep, and their sadness tinged with resentment,
that the authentic tradition has not passed into their own country. Why are
we so fortunate as to have met the Dharma in which the robe and the Dharma
of the Tathagata, the World-honored One, have been authentically transmit-
ted? It is the in? uence of the great merit of praj �a nurtured in the past. In the
present corrupt age of the latter Dharma, [some] are not ashamed that they
themselves have no authentic transmission, and they envy others who pos-
sess the authentic transmission. I think they may be a band of demons. Their
present possessions and abodes which are in? uenced by their former conduct,
are not true and real. Just to devote themselves34 to and to venerate the authen-
tically transmitted Buddha-Dharma: this may be their real refuge in learning
[the state of] buddha. In sum, remember that the ka? aya is the object of the
buddhas' veneration and devotion. It is the body of the Buddha and the mind
of the Buddha. We call it �the clothing of liberation,�35 �the robe of a field of
happiness,�36 �the robe without form,�37 �the supreme robe,� �the robe of
endurance,�38 �the robe of the Tatha gata,� �the robe of great benevolence and
great compassion,� �the robe that is a banner of excellence,� and �the robe
of anuttara samyaksa? bodhi. � We should receive and retain it like this,
humbly receiving it upon the head. Because it is like this, we should never
change it according to [our own] mind.
[71] As material for the robe, we use silk or cotton, according to suit-
ability. It is not always the case that cotton is pure and silk is impure. There
is no viewpoint from which to hate cotton and to prefer silk; that would be
laughable. The usual method39 of the buddhas, in every case, is to see rags40
as the best material. There are ten sorts and four sorts of rags; namely, burned,
chewed by an ox, gnawed by rats, from clothes of dead people, and so forth. 41
�The people of the five areas of India42 discarded rags like these in streets
and fields, as if they were filth, and so they called them �filthy rags. '43 Prac-
titioners picked them up, washed them and sewed them, and used them to
cover the body. �44 Among those [rags] there are various kinds of silk and
various kinds of cotton. We should throw away the view [that discriminates
between] silk and cotton, and study rags in practice. When, in ancient times45
[the Buddha] was washing a robe of rags in Lake Anavatapta,46 the Dragon
King praised him with a rain of ? owers, and made prostrations of reverence.
Some teachers of the Small Vehicle have a theory about transformed thread,47
which also may be without foundation. People of the Great Vehicle might
laugh at it. What kind [of thread] is not transformed thread? When those
teachers hear of �transformation� they believe their ears, but when they see
the transformation itself they doubt their eyes. Remember, in picking up
rags, there may be cotton that looks like silk and there may be silk that looks
like cotton. There being myriad differences in local customs it is hard to
fathom [nature's] creation�eyes of ? esh cannot know it. Having obtained
such material, we should not discuss whether it is silk or cotton but should
call it rags.
Even if there are human beings or gods in heaven who have sur-
vived as rags, they are never sentient beings, they are just rags. Even if there
are pine trees or chrysanthemums that have survived as rags, they are never
insentient beings, they are just rags. When we believe the principle that rags
are not silk or cotton, and not gold, silver, pearl, or jewel, rags are realized.
Before we have got rid of views and opinions about silk and cotton, we have
never seen rags even in a dream. On one occasion a monk asks the eternal
buddha,48 �Should we see the robe you received on Obai [Mountain] in the
middle of the night as cotton, or should we see it as silk? In short, as what
material should we see it? � The eternal buddha says, �It is not cotton and it
is not silk. � Remember, it is a profound teaching49 of the Buddha's truth that
the ka? aya is beyond silk and cotton.
[74] The Venerable Sa? avasa50 is third in the transmission of the Dharma
treasury. He has been endowed with a robe since birth. While he is a lay-
man this robe is a secular garment, but when he leaves home51 it turns into
a ka? aya. In another case, the bhik? u? i Sukra,52 after establishing the will
and being clothed in a cotton robe, has been born with a robe in every life
and middle existence. On the day that she meets Sakyamuni Buddha and
leaves home, the secular robe that she has had since birth changes instantly
into a ka? aya, as in the case of Venerable Sa? avasa. Clearly, the ka? aya is
beyond silk, cotton, and so forth. Moreover, the fact that the virtue of the
Buddha-Dharma can transform body and mind and all dharmas is as in those
examples. The truth is evident that when we leave home and receive the pre-
cepts, body and mind, object-and-subject, change at once; it is only because
we are stupid that we do not know. It is not true that the usual rule53 of the
buddhas applies only to Sa? avasa and to Sukra but not to us; we should not
doubt that benefit [accrues] in accordance with individual standing. We
should consider such truths in detail and learn them in practice. The ka? aya
that covers the body of [the monks whom the Buddha] welcomes54 to take
the precepts is not necessarily cotton or silk: the Buddha's in? uence is difficult
to consider. The precious pearl within the robe55 is beyond those who count
grains of sand. 56 We should clarify and should learn in practice that which
has quantity and that which is without quantity, that which has form and that
which is without form, in the material, color, and measurements of the ka? aya
of the buddhas. This is what all the ancestral masters of the Western Heav-
ens and the Eastern Lands, past and present, learned in practice and trans-
mitted as the authentic tradition. If someone is able to see and to hear [a mas-
ter] in whom there is nothing to doubt�the authentic transmission from
patriarch to patriarch being evident�but fails, without reason, to receive the
authentic transmission from this ancestral master, such smugness would be
hard to condone. The extent of [this] stupidity might be due to unbelief. It
would be to abandon the real and to pursue the false, to discard the root and
to seek after branches. It would be to slight the Tathagata. People who wish
to establish the bodhi-mind should always receive the authentic transmis-
sion of an ancestral master. Not only have we met the Buddha-Dharma
which is so difficult to meet: also, as Dharma descendants in the authentic
transmission of the Buddha's ka? aya, we have been able to see and to hear,
to learn and to practice, and to receive and to retain [the authentic trans-
mission of the Buddha's ka? aya]. This is just to see the Tathagata himself,
it is to hear the Buddha's preaching of Dharma, it is to be illuminated by
the Buddha's brightness, it is to receive and to use what the Buddha received
and used, it is to receive the one-to-one transmission of the Buddha's mind,
it is to have got the Buddha's marrow, it is to be covered directly by Sakya-
muni Buddha's ka? aya, and it is Sakyamuni Buddha himself directly bestow-
ing the ka? aya upon us. Because we follow the Buddha, we have devoutly57
received this ka? aya.
[78] The method of washing the ka? aya: Put the ka? aya, unfolded, into
a clean tub, then immerse the ka? aya in fragrant, fully boiled hot water, and
leave it to soak for about two hours. 58 Another method is to soak the ka? aya
in pure, fully boiled ash-water59 and to wait for the water to cool. Nowadays
we usually use [the] hot ash-water [method]. Hot ash-water is what we call
aku-no-yu here [in Japan]. 60 When the ash-water has cooled, rinse [the ka? aya]
again and again in clean and clear hot water. During the rinsing do not put in
both hands to scrub [the ka? aya] and do not tread on it. Continue until any
dirt or grease has been removed. After that, mix aloes, sandalwood,61 or other
incense into some cold water and rinse [the ka? aya]. Then hang it on a wash-
ing pole62 to dry. After it is thoroughly dry, fold it and put it in a high place,
burn incense and scatter petals, walk round it several times [with the ka? aya]
to the right,63 and perform prostrations. After making three prostrations, six
prostrations, or nine prostrations, kneel up and join the hands,64 then hold the
ka? aya up with both hands, and in the mouth recite the verse [in praise of the
ka? aya]. 65 After that stand up and put on [the ka? aya] according to the method.
[80] 66The World-honored One addresses the great assembly: �In the
ancient past when I was in the order of Buddha Jewel Treasury,67 I
was Bodhisattva Great Compassion. 68 At that time, the bodhisattva
mahasattva Great Compassion made the following vow before Buddha
Jewel Treasury:
�World-honored One! If, after I became a buddha, there were liv-
ing beings who had entered my Dharma and left home and who wore
the ka? aya�even if they were bhik? us , bhik? u? is , upasakas , and
upasikas69 who had accumulated heavy sins by violating the grave pro-
hibitions, by enacting false views, or by contemptuously disbelieving
the Three Treasures�and in a single moment of consciousness the
reverence arose in their mind to honor the sa? gha? i robe70 and the rev-
erence arose in their mind to honor the World-honored One (the
Buddha) or the Dharma and the Sangha but, World-honored One, even
one among those living beings could not, in [one of] the three vehi-
cles,71 receive affirmation,72 and as a result regressed or went astray,
it would mean that I had deceived the buddhas who are present now
in the worlds of the ten directions and in countless, infinite asa? kheya
kalpas, and I surely should not realize anuttara samyak sa? bodhi.
�World-honored One! After I have become a buddha, if gods, drag-
ons, and demons, and human and nonhuman beings are able to wear
this ka? aya, to venerate, to serve offerings to, to honor, and to praise
it, as long as those people are able to see a small part of this ka? aya,
they will be able not to regress while within the three vehicles.
�When living beings are af? icted by hunger or thirst�whether
they are wretched demons, miserable people, or living beings in the
state of hungry ghosts�if they are able to obtain a piece of the ka? aya
even as small as four inches,73 they will at once be able to eat and drink
their fill and to accomplish quickly whatever they wish.
�When living beings offend each other, causing ill will to arise
and a fight to develop�or when gods, dragons, demons, gandharvas,
asuras, garu? as, ki? naras, mahoragas, kum bha? ? as, pisacas, and
human and nonhuman beings are fighting each other�if they remem-
ber this ka? aya, in due course, by virtue of the power of the ka? aya,
they will beget the mind of compassion, soft and ? exible mind, mind
free of enmity, serene mind, the regulated mind of virtue, and they will
get back the state of purity.
�When people are in an armed con? ict, a civil lawsuit, or a crim-
inal action, if they retain a small piece of this ka? aya as they go among
these combatants, and if in order to protect themselves they serve offer-
ings to, venerate, and honor it, these [other] people will be unable to
injure, to disturb, or to make fools of them; they will always be able
to beat their opponents and to come through all such difficulties .
�World-honored One! If my ka? aya were unable to accomplish
these five sacred merits,75 it would mean that I had deceived the bud-
dhas who are present now in the worlds of the ten directions and in
countless, infinite asa? kheya kalpas, and in future I ought not to accom-
plish anuttara samyak sa? bodhi or to do Buddhist works. Having lost
the virtuous Dharma, I would surely be unable to destroy non-
Buddhism. '
Good sons! 76 At that time Tathagata Jewel Treasury extended his
golden right arm and patted the head of Bodhisattva Great Compas-
sion, praising him with these words:
�Very good! Very good! Stout fellow! What you have said is a
great and rare treasure, and is great wisdom and virtue. When you have
realized anuttara samyaksa? bodhi, this robe, the ka? aya, will be able
to accomplish these five sacred merits and to produce great benefit. �
Good sons! At that time, the bodhisattva mahasattva Great Com-
passion, after hearing the praise of that buddha, jumped endlessly for
joy. Then the Buddha [again] extended his golden arm, with its hand
of long, webbed fingers77 as soft as the robe of a goddess. When he
patted the [bodhisattva's] head, the [bodhisattva's] body changed at
once into the youthful figure of a man of twenty. Good sons! In that
order the great assembly of gods, dragons, deities, gandharvas, and
human and nonhuman beings, with folded hands78 venerated Bodhi-
sattva Great Compassion; they served him offerings of all kinds of
? owers; they even made music and offered that; and they also praised
him in all kinds of ways, after which they abode in silence. 79
[86] From the age when the Tathagata was in the world until today,
whenever the merits of the ka? aya are quoted from the Sutra and the Vinaya80
of bodhisattvas and sravakas, these five sacred merits are always considered
fundamental. Truly, ka? ayas are the buddha robes of the buddhas of the three
times. Their merits are measureless. At the same time, to get the ka? aya in
the Dharma of Sakyamuni Buddha may be even better than to get the ka? aya
in the Dharma of other buddhas. The reason, if asked, is that in the ancient
past, when Sakyamuni Buddha was in the causal state81 as the bodhisattva
mahasattva Great Compassion, when he offered his five hundred great vows
before Buddha Jewel Treasury, he pointedly made the above vows in terms
of the merits of this ka? aya. Its merits may be utterly measureless and unthink-
able. This being so, the authentic transmission to the present of the skin,
? esh, bones, and marrow of the World-honored One, is the ka? aya robe. The
ancestral masters who have authentically transmitted the right Dharma-eye
treasury have, without exception, authentically transmitted the ka? aya. The
living beings who have received and retained this robe and humbly received
it upon their heads have, without exception, attained the truth within two or
three lives. Even when people have put [the ka? aya] on their body for a joke
or for gain, it has inevitably become the causes and conditions for their attain-
ing the truth.
[87] The ancestral master Nagarjuna82 says, �Further, in the Buddha-
Dharma, people who have left family life,83 even if they break the pre-
cepts and fall into sin, after they have expiated their sins, they can
attain liberation, as the bhik? u? i Utpalavar? a explains in the Jataka-
sutra:84 When the Buddha is in the world, this bhik? u? i attains the six
mystical powers85 and the state of an arhat. 86 She goes into the houses
of nobles and constantly praises the method of leaving family life, say-
ing to all the aristocratic ladies, �Sisters! You should leave family life. '
The noblewomen say, �We are young and our figures are full of
life and beauty. It would be difficult for us to keep the precepts. Some-
times we might break the precepts. '
The bhik? u? i says, �If you break the precepts, you break them.
Just leave family life! '
They ask, �If we break the precepts we will fall into hell. Why
should we want to break them? '
She answers, �If you fall into hell, you fall. '
The noblewomen all laugh at this, saying, �In hell we would have
to receive retribution for our sins. Why should we want to fall [into
hell]? '
The bhik? u? i says, �I remember in my own past life, once I became
a prostitute, wore all sorts of clothes, and spoke in old-fashioned lan-
guage. 87 One day I put on a bhik? u? i robe as a joke, and due to this as
a direct and indirect cause, at the time of Kasyapa Buddha88 I became
a bhik? u? i. I was still proud then of my noble pedigree and fine fea-
tures: vanity and arrogance arose in my mind, and I broke the precepts.
Because of the wrongness of breaking the precepts I fell into hell and
suffered for my various sins, but after I had suffered retribution I finally
met Sakyamuni Buddha, transcended family life, and attained the six
mystical powers and the truth of an arhat. Thus, I know that when we
leave family life and receive the precepts, even if we break the pre-
cepts, due to the precepts as direct and indirect causes we can attain
the truth of an arhat. If I had only done bad, without the precepts as
direct and indirect causes, I could not have attained the truth. In the
past I fell into hell in age after age. When I got out of hell I became a
bad person, and when the bad person died, I went back into hell, and
there was no gain at all. Now therefore I know from experience that
when we leave family life and receive the precepts, even if we break
the precepts, with this as a direct and indirect cause we can attain the
bodhi-effect. '�89
[90] The primary cause of this bhik? u? i Utpalavar? a90 attaining the truth
as an arhat is just the merit of her putting the ka? aya on her body for a joke;
because of this merit, and no other merit, she has now attained the truth. In
her second life she meets the Dharma of Kasyapa Buddha and becomes a
bhik? u? i. In her third life she meets Sakyamuni Buddha and becomes a great
arhat, equipped with the three kinds of knowledge and the six powers. The
three kinds of knowledge are supernatural insight, [knowing] past lives, and
ending the super? uous. The six powers are the power of mystical transmu-
tation, the power to know others' minds, the power of supernatural sight, the
power of supernatural hearing, the power to know past lives, and the power
to end the super? uous. 91 Truly, when she was only a wrongdoer she died and
entered hell to no avail, coming out of hell and becoming a wrongdoer again.
[But] when she has the precepts as direct and indirect causes, although she
has broken the precepts and fallen into hell, they are the direct and indirect
causes of her attaining the truth at last. Now, even someone who has worn
the ka? aya for a joke can attain the truth in her third life. How, then, could
someone who has established pure belief, and who wears the ka? aya for the
sake of the supreme state of bodhi, fail to accomplish that merit? Still fur-
ther, if we receive and retain [the ka? aya] throughout our life, humbly receiv-
ing it upon the head, the merit might be universal and great beyond measure.
Any human being who would like to establish the bodhi-mind should receive
and retain the ka? aya, and humbly receive it upon the head, without delay.
To have met this favorable age but not to have sown a Buddhist seed would
be deplorable. Having received a human body on the southern continent,92
having met the Dharma of Sakyamuni Buddha, and having been born to meet
an ancestral master who is a perfectly legitimate successor to the Buddha-
Dharma, if we idly passed up the chance to receive the ka? aya which has
been transmitted one-to-one and which is directly accessible, that would be
deplorable. Now, in regard to the authentic transmission of the ka?
Buddhist patriarchs. In India and in China, in the ages of the right Dharma
and the imitative Dharma,15 even laypeople received and retained the ka? aya.
In this distant and remote land in the present degenerate age, those who shave
their beard and hair and call themselves the Buddha's disciples do not receive
and retain the ka? aya. They have never believed, known, or clarified that
they should receive and retain [the ka? aya]; it is lamentable. How much less
do they know of the [ka? aya's] material, color, and measurements. How
much less do they know how to wear it.
[54] The ka? aya has been called, since ancient time, �the clothing of
liberation. � It can liberate16 us from all hindrances such as karmic hindrances,
hindrances of af? iction, and hindrances of retribution. If a dragon gets a sin-
gle strand [of the ka? aya], it escapes the three kinds of heat. 17 If a bull touches
[a ka? aya] with one of its horns, its sins will naturally be extinguished. When
buddhas realize the truth they are always wearing the ka? aya. Remember,
[to wear the ka? aya] is the noblest and highest virtue. Truly, we have been
born in a remote land in [the age of] the latter Dharma, and we must regret
this. But at the same time, how should we measure the joy of meeting the
robe and the Dharma that have been transmitted from buddha to buddha,
from rightful successor to rightful successor? Which [other] lineage has
authentically transmitted both the robe and the Dharma of Sakyamuni in the
manner of our authentic transmission? Having met them, who could fail to
venerate them and to serve offerings to them? Even if, each day, we [have
to] discard bodies and lives as countless as the sands of the Ganges, we should
serve offerings to them. Indeed we should vow to meet them, humbly to
receive them upon the head,18 to serve offerings to them, and to venerate
them in every life in every age. Between us and the country of the Buddha's
birth, there are more than a hundred thousand miles of mountains and oceans,
and it is too far for us to travel; nevertheless, promoted by past good con-
duct, we have not been shut out by the mountains and oceans, and we have
not been spurned as the dullards of a remote [land]. Having met this right
Dharma, we should persistently practice it day and night. Having received
and retained this ka? aya, we should perpetually receive it upon the head in
humility and preserve it. How could this only be to have practiced merit
under one buddha or two buddhas? It may be to have practiced all kinds of
merit under buddhas equal to the sands of the Ganges. Even if [the people
who receive and retain the ka? aya] are ourselves, we should venerate them,
and we should rejoice. We should heartily repay the profound benevolence
of the ancestral master in transmitting the Dharma. Even animals repay kind-
ness; so how could human beings fail to recognize kindness? If we failed to
recognize kindness, we might be more stupid than animals. The merits of
this buddha robe and this Buddha-Dharma were never clarified or known by
anyone other than the ancestral master who transmitted the Buddha's right
Dharma. If we want to follow gladly the traces of the buddhas, we should
just be glad about this [transmission]. Even after hundred thousand myriads
of generations, we should esteem this authentic transmission as the authen-
tic transmission. This [transmission] may be the Buddha-Dharma itself; the
proof in due course will become evident. We should not liken [the trans-
mission] to the dilution of milk with water. It is like a crown prince suc-
ceeding to the throne. When we want to use milk, if there is no milk other
than this diluted milk [described above], although it is diluted milk we should
use it. Even when we do not dilute it with water, we must not use oil, we
must not use lacquer, and we must not use wine. This authentic transmis-
sion may also be like that. Even a mediocre follower of an ordinary master,
providing the authentic transmission is present, may be in a good situation
to use milk. [But] more to the point, the authentic transmission from buddha
to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch is like the succession of a crown
prince. Even secular [teaching] says, �One does not wear clothing different
from the official uniform of the previous reign. �19 How could disciples of
the Buddha wear [robes] different from the Buddha's robe?
[58] Since the tenth year of the Eihei era,20 during the reign of Emperor
Komei (Ch. Mingdi) of the Later Han dynasty,21 monks and laymen going
back and forth between the Western Heavens and the Eastern Lands have
followed on each other's heels without cease, but none has claimed to have
met in the Western Heavens an ancestral master of the authentic transmis-
sion from buddha to buddha and from patriarch to patriarch; none has a record
of the lineage of the face-to-face transmission from the Tathagata. They have
only followed teachers of sutras and commentaries, and brought back San-
skrit books of sutras and philosophy. None speaks of having met an ances-
tral master who is a rightful successor to the Buddha's Dharma, and none
mentions that there are ancestral masters who have received the transmis-
sion of the Buddha's ka? aya. Clearly, they have not entered beyond the
threshold of the Buddha's Dharma. People like this have not clarified the
principle of the authentic transmission by Buddhist patriarchs. When Sakya-
muni Tathagata22 passed to Mahakasyapa the right Dharma-eye treasury and
the supreme state of bodhi, he transmitted them together with a ka? aya received
in the authentic transmission from Kasyapa Buddha. 23 Received by rightful
successor from rightful successor, [the ka? aya] reached Zen Master Daikan
of Sokeizan, the thirty-third generation. The material, color, and measure-
ments [of the ka? aya] had been transmitted intimately. Since then, the Dharma
descendants of Seigen and Nangaku24 have intimately transmitted the Dharma,
wearing the Dharma of the ancestral patriarchs and keeping the Dharma of
the ancestral patriarchs in order. The method of washing [the ka? aya] and
the method of receiving and retaining [the ka? aya] cannot be known with-
out learning in practice in the inner sanctum of the legitimate face-to-face
transmission of those methods.
[60] The ka? aya is said to include three robes. They are the five-stripe
robe, the seven-stripe robe, and the large robe of nine or more stripes.
Excellent practitioners receive only these three robes, and do not keep
other robes. To use just the three robes serves the body well enough.
When we are attending to business or doing chores, and when we are
going to and from the toilet, we wear the five-stripe robe. For doing
good practices among the sangha, we wear the seven-stripe robe. To
teach human beings and gods, and to make them devout, we should
wear the large robe of nine or more stripes. Or, when we are in a pri-
vate place we wear the five-stripe robe, when we go among the sangha
we wear the seven-stripe robe, and when we go into a royal palace or
into towns and villages we should wear the large robe. Or, when it is
nice and warm we wear the five-stripe robe, when it is cold we put on
the seven-stripe robe as well, and when the cold is severe we also put
on the large robe. Once, in ancient times, the weather on a midwinter
night was cold enough to split bamboo. As that night fell, the Tatha-
gata put on the five-stripe robe. As the night passed and it got colder,
he put on the seven-stripe robe as well. Later on in the night, when the
coldness reached a peak, he also put on the large robe. At this time,
the Buddha thought, �In future ages, when the cold is beyond endurance,
good sons should be able to clothe their bodies adequately with these
three robes. �25
[62] The method of wearing the ka? aya: �To bare only the right shoul-
der�26 is the usual method. There is a method of wearing [the ka? aya] so that
it goes over both shoulders, a form [followed by] the Tathagata and veter-
ans who are senior in years and experience: both shoulders are covered, while
the chest may be either exposed or covered. [The method of] covering both
shoulders is for a large ka? aya of sixty or more stripes. [Usually,] when we
wear the ka? aya, we wear both sides over the left arm and shoulder. The
front edge goes over the left side [of the ka? aya] and hangs over the [left
upper] arm. 27 In the case of the large ka? aya, [this] front edge passes over
the left shoulder and hangs down behind the back. There are various meth-
ods of wearing the ka? aya besides these; we should take time to study them
and should inquire into them.
[64] For hundreds of years, through one dynasty after another�Liang,
Zhen, Sui, Tang, and Song28�many scholars of both the Great and the Small
Vehicles have abandoned the work of lecturing on sutras, recognizing that
it is not the ultimate, and progressed to learn the authentically transmitted
Dharma of the Buddhist patriarchs; when they do so, they inevitably shed
their former shabby robes and receive and retain the authentically transmit-
ted ka? aya of the Buddhist patriarchs. This is indeed the abandonment of the
false and the return to the true. [In discussing] the right Dharma of the Tatha-
gata, [we see] the Western Heavens as the very root of the Dharma. Many
teachers of human beings, past and present, have established small views
based on the sentimental and parochial thinking of the common person.
Because the world of buddha and the world of living beings are beyond being
limited and being unlimited, the teachings, practice, and human truths of the
Mahayana and the Hinayana can never fit inside the narrow thoughts of com-
mon people today. Nevertheless, [common people] in China, acting at ran-
dom, have failed to see the Western Heavens as the root, and have consid-
ered their newly devised, limited, small views to be the Buddha-Dharma.
Such facts should never occur. Therefore if people today who have estab-
lished the mind want to receive and to retain the ka? aya, they must receive
and retain the ka? aya of the authentic transmission. They must not receive
and retain a ka? aya newly created according to the idea of the moment. The
ka? aya of the authentic transmission means the one that has been authenti-
cally transmitted from Shaolin [Temple] and Sokei [Mountain],29 the one
that has been received by the Tathagata's rightful successors without miss-
ing a single generation. The ka? aya worn by their Dharma children and
Dharma grandchildren is the traditional ka? aya. What has been newly cre-
ated in China is not traditional. Now, the ka? aya worn by the monks who
have come from the Western Heavens, in the past and present, are all worn
as the ka? aya authentically transmitted by the Buddhist patriarchs. Not one
of these monks [has worn a ka? aya] like the new ka? aya being produced in
China today by precepts scholars. Dull people believe in the ka? aya of pre-
cepts scholars; those who are clear throw [such robes] away. In general, the
merit of the ka? aya transmitted from buddha to buddha and from patriarch
to patriarch is evident and easy to believe in. Its authentic transmission has
been received exactly, its original form has been handed down personally,
and it exists really in the present. [The Buddhist patriarchs] have received
and retained it, and succeeded to each other's Dharma, until today. The ances-
tral masters who have received and retained [the ka? aya] are all masters and
disciples who experienced the state30 and received the transmission of Dharma.
This being so, we should make [the ka? aya] properly, according to the method
for making the ka? aya that has been authentically transmitted by the Buddhist
patriarchs. This alone is the authentic tradition, and so it has long been expe-
rienced and recognized by all common and sacred beings, human beings and
gods, and dragons and spirits. Having been born to meet the spread of this
Dharma, if we cover our body with the ka? aya only once, receiving it and
retaining it for just a k? a? a or a muhurta,31 that [experience] will surely serve
as a talisman to protect us32 in the realization of the supreme state of bodhi.
When we dye the body and mind with a single phrase or a single verse, it
becomes a seed of everlasting brightness which finally leads us to the supreme
state of bodhi. When we dye the body and mind with one real dharma or one
good deed, it may be also like this. Mental images arise and vanish instanta-
neously; they are without an abode. The physical body also arises and van-
ishes instantaneously; it too is without an abode. Nevertheless, the merit that
we practice always has its time of ripening and shedding. The ka? aya, simi-
larly, is beyond elaboration and beyond non-elaboration, it is beyond having
an abode and beyond having no abode: it is that which �buddhas alone, together
with buddhas, perfectly realize. �33 Nevertheless, practitioners who receive
and retain [the ka? aya] always accomplish the merit that is thus to be gained,
and they always arrive at the ultimate. Those without past good conduct�
even if they pass through one life, two lives, or countless lives�can never
meet the ka? aya, can never wear the ka? aya, can never believe in the ka? aya,
and can never clearly know the ka? aya. In China and Japan today, we see that
there are those who have had the opportunity to clothe their body once in the
ka? aya, and there are those who have not. [The difference] depends neither
upon high or low status nor upon stupidity or wisdom: clearly it was deter-
mined by past good conduct. This being so, if we have received and retained
the ka? aya, we should feel glad about our past good conduct, and should not
doubt the accumulation of merit and the piling up of virtue. If we have not
got [the ka? aya] yet, we should hope to get it. We should strive, without delay,
to sow the first seeds [of receiving and retaining the ka? aya] in this life. Those
who are prevented by some hindrance from receiving and retaining [the ka? aya]
should repent and confess before the buddha-tathagatas and the Three Treas-
ures of Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. How living beings in other countries
must wish, �If only the robe and the Dharma of the Tathagata had been authen-
tically transmitted and were intimately present in our country, as they are in
China! � Their shame must be deep, and their sadness tinged with resentment,
that the authentic tradition has not passed into their own country. Why are
we so fortunate as to have met the Dharma in which the robe and the Dharma
of the Tathagata, the World-honored One, have been authentically transmit-
ted? It is the in? uence of the great merit of praj �a nurtured in the past. In the
present corrupt age of the latter Dharma, [some] are not ashamed that they
themselves have no authentic transmission, and they envy others who pos-
sess the authentic transmission. I think they may be a band of demons. Their
present possessions and abodes which are in? uenced by their former conduct,
are not true and real. Just to devote themselves34 to and to venerate the authen-
tically transmitted Buddha-Dharma: this may be their real refuge in learning
[the state of] buddha. In sum, remember that the ka? aya is the object of the
buddhas' veneration and devotion. It is the body of the Buddha and the mind
of the Buddha. We call it �the clothing of liberation,�35 �the robe of a field of
happiness,�36 �the robe without form,�37 �the supreme robe,� �the robe of
endurance,�38 �the robe of the Tatha gata,� �the robe of great benevolence and
great compassion,� �the robe that is a banner of excellence,� and �the robe
of anuttara samyaksa? bodhi. � We should receive and retain it like this,
humbly receiving it upon the head. Because it is like this, we should never
change it according to [our own] mind.
[71] As material for the robe, we use silk or cotton, according to suit-
ability. It is not always the case that cotton is pure and silk is impure. There
is no viewpoint from which to hate cotton and to prefer silk; that would be
laughable. The usual method39 of the buddhas, in every case, is to see rags40
as the best material. There are ten sorts and four sorts of rags; namely, burned,
chewed by an ox, gnawed by rats, from clothes of dead people, and so forth. 41
�The people of the five areas of India42 discarded rags like these in streets
and fields, as if they were filth, and so they called them �filthy rags. '43 Prac-
titioners picked them up, washed them and sewed them, and used them to
cover the body. �44 Among those [rags] there are various kinds of silk and
various kinds of cotton. We should throw away the view [that discriminates
between] silk and cotton, and study rags in practice. When, in ancient times45
[the Buddha] was washing a robe of rags in Lake Anavatapta,46 the Dragon
King praised him with a rain of ? owers, and made prostrations of reverence.
Some teachers of the Small Vehicle have a theory about transformed thread,47
which also may be without foundation. People of the Great Vehicle might
laugh at it. What kind [of thread] is not transformed thread? When those
teachers hear of �transformation� they believe their ears, but when they see
the transformation itself they doubt their eyes. Remember, in picking up
rags, there may be cotton that looks like silk and there may be silk that looks
like cotton. There being myriad differences in local customs it is hard to
fathom [nature's] creation�eyes of ? esh cannot know it. Having obtained
such material, we should not discuss whether it is silk or cotton but should
call it rags.
Even if there are human beings or gods in heaven who have sur-
vived as rags, they are never sentient beings, they are just rags. Even if there
are pine trees or chrysanthemums that have survived as rags, they are never
insentient beings, they are just rags. When we believe the principle that rags
are not silk or cotton, and not gold, silver, pearl, or jewel, rags are realized.
Before we have got rid of views and opinions about silk and cotton, we have
never seen rags even in a dream. On one occasion a monk asks the eternal
buddha,48 �Should we see the robe you received on Obai [Mountain] in the
middle of the night as cotton, or should we see it as silk? In short, as what
material should we see it? � The eternal buddha says, �It is not cotton and it
is not silk. � Remember, it is a profound teaching49 of the Buddha's truth that
the ka? aya is beyond silk and cotton.
[74] The Venerable Sa? avasa50 is third in the transmission of the Dharma
treasury. He has been endowed with a robe since birth. While he is a lay-
man this robe is a secular garment, but when he leaves home51 it turns into
a ka? aya. In another case, the bhik? u? i Sukra,52 after establishing the will
and being clothed in a cotton robe, has been born with a robe in every life
and middle existence. On the day that she meets Sakyamuni Buddha and
leaves home, the secular robe that she has had since birth changes instantly
into a ka? aya, as in the case of Venerable Sa? avasa. Clearly, the ka? aya is
beyond silk, cotton, and so forth. Moreover, the fact that the virtue of the
Buddha-Dharma can transform body and mind and all dharmas is as in those
examples. The truth is evident that when we leave home and receive the pre-
cepts, body and mind, object-and-subject, change at once; it is only because
we are stupid that we do not know. It is not true that the usual rule53 of the
buddhas applies only to Sa? avasa and to Sukra but not to us; we should not
doubt that benefit [accrues] in accordance with individual standing. We
should consider such truths in detail and learn them in practice. The ka? aya
that covers the body of [the monks whom the Buddha] welcomes54 to take
the precepts is not necessarily cotton or silk: the Buddha's in? uence is difficult
to consider. The precious pearl within the robe55 is beyond those who count
grains of sand. 56 We should clarify and should learn in practice that which
has quantity and that which is without quantity, that which has form and that
which is without form, in the material, color, and measurements of the ka? aya
of the buddhas. This is what all the ancestral masters of the Western Heav-
ens and the Eastern Lands, past and present, learned in practice and trans-
mitted as the authentic tradition. If someone is able to see and to hear [a mas-
ter] in whom there is nothing to doubt�the authentic transmission from
patriarch to patriarch being evident�but fails, without reason, to receive the
authentic transmission from this ancestral master, such smugness would be
hard to condone. The extent of [this] stupidity might be due to unbelief. It
would be to abandon the real and to pursue the false, to discard the root and
to seek after branches. It would be to slight the Tathagata. People who wish
to establish the bodhi-mind should always receive the authentic transmis-
sion of an ancestral master. Not only have we met the Buddha-Dharma
which is so difficult to meet: also, as Dharma descendants in the authentic
transmission of the Buddha's ka? aya, we have been able to see and to hear,
to learn and to practice, and to receive and to retain [the authentic trans-
mission of the Buddha's ka? aya]. This is just to see the Tathagata himself,
it is to hear the Buddha's preaching of Dharma, it is to be illuminated by
the Buddha's brightness, it is to receive and to use what the Buddha received
and used, it is to receive the one-to-one transmission of the Buddha's mind,
it is to have got the Buddha's marrow, it is to be covered directly by Sakya-
muni Buddha's ka? aya, and it is Sakyamuni Buddha himself directly bestow-
ing the ka? aya upon us. Because we follow the Buddha, we have devoutly57
received this ka? aya.
[78] The method of washing the ka? aya: Put the ka? aya, unfolded, into
a clean tub, then immerse the ka? aya in fragrant, fully boiled hot water, and
leave it to soak for about two hours. 58 Another method is to soak the ka? aya
in pure, fully boiled ash-water59 and to wait for the water to cool. Nowadays
we usually use [the] hot ash-water [method]. Hot ash-water is what we call
aku-no-yu here [in Japan]. 60 When the ash-water has cooled, rinse [the ka? aya]
again and again in clean and clear hot water. During the rinsing do not put in
both hands to scrub [the ka? aya] and do not tread on it. Continue until any
dirt or grease has been removed. After that, mix aloes, sandalwood,61 or other
incense into some cold water and rinse [the ka? aya]. Then hang it on a wash-
ing pole62 to dry. After it is thoroughly dry, fold it and put it in a high place,
burn incense and scatter petals, walk round it several times [with the ka? aya]
to the right,63 and perform prostrations. After making three prostrations, six
prostrations, or nine prostrations, kneel up and join the hands,64 then hold the
ka? aya up with both hands, and in the mouth recite the verse [in praise of the
ka? aya]. 65 After that stand up and put on [the ka? aya] according to the method.
[80] 66The World-honored One addresses the great assembly: �In the
ancient past when I was in the order of Buddha Jewel Treasury,67 I
was Bodhisattva Great Compassion. 68 At that time, the bodhisattva
mahasattva Great Compassion made the following vow before Buddha
Jewel Treasury:
�World-honored One! If, after I became a buddha, there were liv-
ing beings who had entered my Dharma and left home and who wore
the ka? aya�even if they were bhik? us , bhik? u? is , upasakas , and
upasikas69 who had accumulated heavy sins by violating the grave pro-
hibitions, by enacting false views, or by contemptuously disbelieving
the Three Treasures�and in a single moment of consciousness the
reverence arose in their mind to honor the sa? gha? i robe70 and the rev-
erence arose in their mind to honor the World-honored One (the
Buddha) or the Dharma and the Sangha but, World-honored One, even
one among those living beings could not, in [one of] the three vehi-
cles,71 receive affirmation,72 and as a result regressed or went astray,
it would mean that I had deceived the buddhas who are present now
in the worlds of the ten directions and in countless, infinite asa? kheya
kalpas, and I surely should not realize anuttara samyak sa? bodhi.
�World-honored One! After I have become a buddha, if gods, drag-
ons, and demons, and human and nonhuman beings are able to wear
this ka? aya, to venerate, to serve offerings to, to honor, and to praise
it, as long as those people are able to see a small part of this ka? aya,
they will be able not to regress while within the three vehicles.
�When living beings are af? icted by hunger or thirst�whether
they are wretched demons, miserable people, or living beings in the
state of hungry ghosts�if they are able to obtain a piece of the ka? aya
even as small as four inches,73 they will at once be able to eat and drink
their fill and to accomplish quickly whatever they wish.
�When living beings offend each other, causing ill will to arise
and a fight to develop�or when gods, dragons, demons, gandharvas,
asuras, garu? as, ki? naras, mahoragas, kum bha? ? as, pisacas, and
human and nonhuman beings are fighting each other�if they remem-
ber this ka? aya, in due course, by virtue of the power of the ka? aya,
they will beget the mind of compassion, soft and ? exible mind, mind
free of enmity, serene mind, the regulated mind of virtue, and they will
get back the state of purity.
�When people are in an armed con? ict, a civil lawsuit, or a crim-
inal action, if they retain a small piece of this ka? aya as they go among
these combatants, and if in order to protect themselves they serve offer-
ings to, venerate, and honor it, these [other] people will be unable to
injure, to disturb, or to make fools of them; they will always be able
to beat their opponents and to come through all such difficulties .
�World-honored One! If my ka? aya were unable to accomplish
these five sacred merits,75 it would mean that I had deceived the bud-
dhas who are present now in the worlds of the ten directions and in
countless, infinite asa? kheya kalpas, and in future I ought not to accom-
plish anuttara samyak sa? bodhi or to do Buddhist works. Having lost
the virtuous Dharma, I would surely be unable to destroy non-
Buddhism. '
Good sons! 76 At that time Tathagata Jewel Treasury extended his
golden right arm and patted the head of Bodhisattva Great Compas-
sion, praising him with these words:
�Very good! Very good! Stout fellow! What you have said is a
great and rare treasure, and is great wisdom and virtue. When you have
realized anuttara samyaksa? bodhi, this robe, the ka? aya, will be able
to accomplish these five sacred merits and to produce great benefit. �
Good sons! At that time, the bodhisattva mahasattva Great Com-
passion, after hearing the praise of that buddha, jumped endlessly for
joy. Then the Buddha [again] extended his golden arm, with its hand
of long, webbed fingers77 as soft as the robe of a goddess. When he
patted the [bodhisattva's] head, the [bodhisattva's] body changed at
once into the youthful figure of a man of twenty. Good sons! In that
order the great assembly of gods, dragons, deities, gandharvas, and
human and nonhuman beings, with folded hands78 venerated Bodhi-
sattva Great Compassion; they served him offerings of all kinds of
? owers; they even made music and offered that; and they also praised
him in all kinds of ways, after which they abode in silence. 79
[86] From the age when the Tathagata was in the world until today,
whenever the merits of the ka? aya are quoted from the Sutra and the Vinaya80
of bodhisattvas and sravakas, these five sacred merits are always considered
fundamental. Truly, ka? ayas are the buddha robes of the buddhas of the three
times. Their merits are measureless. At the same time, to get the ka? aya in
the Dharma of Sakyamuni Buddha may be even better than to get the ka? aya
in the Dharma of other buddhas. The reason, if asked, is that in the ancient
past, when Sakyamuni Buddha was in the causal state81 as the bodhisattva
mahasattva Great Compassion, when he offered his five hundred great vows
before Buddha Jewel Treasury, he pointedly made the above vows in terms
of the merits of this ka? aya. Its merits may be utterly measureless and unthink-
able. This being so, the authentic transmission to the present of the skin,
? esh, bones, and marrow of the World-honored One, is the ka? aya robe. The
ancestral masters who have authentically transmitted the right Dharma-eye
treasury have, without exception, authentically transmitted the ka? aya. The
living beings who have received and retained this robe and humbly received
it upon their heads have, without exception, attained the truth within two or
three lives. Even when people have put [the ka? aya] on their body for a joke
or for gain, it has inevitably become the causes and conditions for their attain-
ing the truth.
[87] The ancestral master Nagarjuna82 says, �Further, in the Buddha-
Dharma, people who have left family life,83 even if they break the pre-
cepts and fall into sin, after they have expiated their sins, they can
attain liberation, as the bhik? u? i Utpalavar? a explains in the Jataka-
sutra:84 When the Buddha is in the world, this bhik? u? i attains the six
mystical powers85 and the state of an arhat. 86 She goes into the houses
of nobles and constantly praises the method of leaving family life, say-
ing to all the aristocratic ladies, �Sisters! You should leave family life. '
The noblewomen say, �We are young and our figures are full of
life and beauty. It would be difficult for us to keep the precepts. Some-
times we might break the precepts. '
The bhik? u? i says, �If you break the precepts, you break them.
Just leave family life! '
They ask, �If we break the precepts we will fall into hell. Why
should we want to break them? '
She answers, �If you fall into hell, you fall. '
The noblewomen all laugh at this, saying, �In hell we would have
to receive retribution for our sins. Why should we want to fall [into
hell]? '
The bhik? u? i says, �I remember in my own past life, once I became
a prostitute, wore all sorts of clothes, and spoke in old-fashioned lan-
guage. 87 One day I put on a bhik? u? i robe as a joke, and due to this as
a direct and indirect cause, at the time of Kasyapa Buddha88 I became
a bhik? u? i. I was still proud then of my noble pedigree and fine fea-
tures: vanity and arrogance arose in my mind, and I broke the precepts.
Because of the wrongness of breaking the precepts I fell into hell and
suffered for my various sins, but after I had suffered retribution I finally
met Sakyamuni Buddha, transcended family life, and attained the six
mystical powers and the truth of an arhat. Thus, I know that when we
leave family life and receive the precepts, even if we break the pre-
cepts, due to the precepts as direct and indirect causes we can attain
the truth of an arhat. If I had only done bad, without the precepts as
direct and indirect causes, I could not have attained the truth. In the
past I fell into hell in age after age. When I got out of hell I became a
bad person, and when the bad person died, I went back into hell, and
there was no gain at all. Now therefore I know from experience that
when we leave family life and receive the precepts, even if we break
the precepts, with this as a direct and indirect cause we can attain the
bodhi-effect. '�89
[90] The primary cause of this bhik? u? i Utpalavar? a90 attaining the truth
as an arhat is just the merit of her putting the ka? aya on her body for a joke;
because of this merit, and no other merit, she has now attained the truth. In
her second life she meets the Dharma of Kasyapa Buddha and becomes a
bhik? u? i. In her third life she meets Sakyamuni Buddha and becomes a great
arhat, equipped with the three kinds of knowledge and the six powers. The
three kinds of knowledge are supernatural insight, [knowing] past lives, and
ending the super? uous. The six powers are the power of mystical transmu-
tation, the power to know others' minds, the power of supernatural sight, the
power of supernatural hearing, the power to know past lives, and the power
to end the super? uous. 91 Truly, when she was only a wrongdoer she died and
entered hell to no avail, coming out of hell and becoming a wrongdoer again.
[But] when she has the precepts as direct and indirect causes, although she
has broken the precepts and fallen into hell, they are the direct and indirect
causes of her attaining the truth at last. Now, even someone who has worn
the ka? aya for a joke can attain the truth in her third life. How, then, could
someone who has established pure belief, and who wears the ka? aya for the
sake of the supreme state of bodhi, fail to accomplish that merit? Still fur-
ther, if we receive and retain [the ka? aya] throughout our life, humbly receiv-
ing it upon the head, the merit might be universal and great beyond measure.
Any human being who would like to establish the bodhi-mind should receive
and retain the ka? aya, and humbly receive it upon the head, without delay.
To have met this favorable age but not to have sown a Buddhist seed would
be deplorable. Having received a human body on the southern continent,92
having met the Dharma of Sakyamuni Buddha, and having been born to meet
an ancestral master who is a perfectly legitimate successor to the Buddha-
Dharma, if we idly passed up the chance to receive the ka? aya which has
been transmitted one-to-one and which is directly accessible, that would be
deplorable. Now, in regard to the authentic transmission of the ka?
