The term “two truths” appears in many Sūtras, but it’s reality is difficult to comprehend. The world is in an uproar and has debated this issue for a long time. In the Miao-shêng-ting ching it says that the Buddha and Mañjuśrī had a dispute over the two truths in the past and they both fell into hell.⁵¹⁷ It was not until the time of the Buddha Kassapa⁵¹⁸ that their doubts were resolved satisfactorily.⁵¹⁹ If these two sages in their causal stages⁵²⁰ were not able to resolve the issue, how can contemporary people with their strong emotional passions attain a resolution?

517

This text, probably an apocryphal Chinese Sūtra, was lost and the Shakusen kōgi says that “this text is missing from the canon.” It was rediscovered, however, among the manuscripts at Tun-huang and published by Sekiguchi Shindai in his Tendai shikan no kenkyū, Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1969, 379-402. return

518

Kassapa was the sixth of the so-called “seven past Buddhas” preceding and including Śākyamuni. return

519

The text published by Sekiguchi 1969, 398, says, “The Buddha said to Ānanda, ‘I, in the distant past, studied widely and had a dispute with Mañjuśrī over [the meaning of] the two truths as being yu) or non being (wu). Mañjuśrī supported [the understanding of the two truths as] being; I supported non-being. On account of this dispute we were not able to determine whether the two truths mean being or non-being, and dying we fell into the three evil destinies where we wore hot steel globes for immeasurable kalpas. When I emerged from hell I met Kassapa, who then explained the two truths of being and non-being. The Buddha Kassapa said, ‘All dharmas are without a nature. [The meaning of] being and non-being which you speak of is not consistent with this meaning. Why? Because all myriad dharmas are all empty and quiescent. These two truths are both being and non-being. Your present understanding is merely an understanding of the literal meaning, not an understanding of the profound meaning. Your understanding of this is like the deaf and the dumb; how can you understand the profound meaning?’ I heard this and immediately went into the forest and contemplated it, entered a state of meditation, and for seven days within the four dhyāna states contemplated samādhi, the three contemplations, the three wisdoms, the three emptinesses, great emptiness, and the emptiness of supreme meaning, and finally understood this emptiness, that all the myriad dharmas are empty, are all empty and quiescent. Why? Because all the myriad dharmas are inherently empty by nature’. . .” return

520

The stages of practice wherein a potential Buddha, or bodhisattva, cultivates the practices which will lead to, or cause one to attain, the fruit of Buddhahood. return