Day 26

Day 26 concludes Chapter 21, The Supernatural Powers of the Tathagatas, includes all of Chapter 22, Transmission, and opens Chapter 23, The Previous Life of Medicine Kind Bodhisattva.

Supernatural powers and innumerable merits:

The supernatural powers of the Buddhas are as immeasurable, limitless, and inconceivable as previously stated. But I shall not be able to tell all the merits of this sūtra to those to whom this sūtra is to be transmitted even if I continue telling them by my supernatural powers for many hundreds of thousands of billions of asaṃkhyas of kalpas. To sum up, all the teachings of the Tathāgata, all the unhindered, supernatural powers of the Tathāgata, all the treasury of the hidden core of the Tathāgata, and all the profound achievements of the Tathāgata are revealed and expounded explicitly in this sūtra. Therefore, keep, read, recite, expound and copy this sūtra, and act according to the teachings of it with all your hearts after my extinction!

And in gāthās:

The Buddhas joyfully display
Their immeasurable, supernatural powers
Because [the Bodhisattvas from underground]
[Vow to] keep this sūtra after my extinction.

Even if I praise for innumerable kalpas
The keeper of this sūtra,
To whom it is to be transmitted,
I cannot praise him highly enough.

His merits are as limitless,
As infinite, as boundless
As the skies of the worlds
Of the ten quarters.

Anyone who keeps this sūtra
Will be able to see me.
He also will be able to see
Many-Treasures Buddha,
[The Buddhas of] my replicas,
And the Bodhisattvas whom I have taught today.

Anyone who keeps this sūtra will be able to cause me to rejoice.
He also will be able to bring joy
To [the Buddhas of] my replicas
And also to Many-Treasures Buddha who once passed away.

A lamp unto the world:

Anyone who understands why the Buddhas expound [many] sūtras,
Who knows the position [of this sūtra in the series of sūtras],
And who expounds it after my extinction
According to its true meaning,
Will be able to eliminate the darkness
Of the living beings of the world where he walks about,
Just as the light of the sun and the moon
Eliminates all darkness.
He will be able to cause innumerable Bodhisattvas
To dwell finally in the One Vehicle.

Therefore, the man of wisdom
Who hears the benefits of these merits
And who keeps this sūtra after my extinction,
Will be able to attain
The enlightenment of the Buddha
Definitely and doubtlessly.

In Chapter 22, Transmission, the Buddha places his right hand on the head of each of the Bodisattvas and transmitts the Dharma to them, saying:

Keep, read, recite and expound [this sūtra in which the Dharma is given], and cause all living beings to hear it and know it! Why is that? It is because I have great compassion. I do not begrudge anything. I am fearless. I wish to give the wisdom of the Buddha, the wisdom of the Tathāgata, the wisdom of the Self-Existing One, to all living beings. I am the great almsgiver to all living beings. Follow me, and study my teachings without begrudging efforts!

And for those who can’t understand:

When you see anyone who does not receive [this sūtra] by faith, you should show him some other profound teachings of mine, teach him, benefit him, and cause him to rejoice. When you do all this, you will be able to repay the favors given to you by the Buddhas.

In Chapter 23, The Previous Life of Medicine-King Bodhisattva, we learn why it is that Medicine-King Bodhisattva can walk about this Sahā-World. Going beyond offerings by his supernatural powers, he offered his own body, setting it afire and in the process “illumined the worlds numbering eight thousands of millions of times the number of the sands of the River Ganges.”

The Buddhas of those worlds praised him, saying simultaneously, ‘Excellent, excellent, good man! All you did was a true endeavor. You made an offering to us according to the true Dharma. This offering excels the offerings of flowers, incense, necklaces, incense to burn, powdered incense, incense applicable to the skin, streamers and canopies of heavenly cloth, and the incense of the candana grown on this shore of the sea. It also excels the offerings of countries, cities, wives and children. Good man! This is the most excellent and honorable offering because you made it to us according to the Dharma.’