Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in East Asia

310 richard d. mcbride ii

these two reward bodies in more detail. The self-saṃbhogakāya, in the
inner mind (neishen ), is what evinces the attainment of the four
wisdoms (sizhi ) and the other-sam ̣bhogakāya is what externally
causes (wailing ) the completion of the ten bodhisattva stages
(T. 870.18:288b9–23). This essay lists the same four wisdoms described
greater detail in the Vijñapatimātratāsiddhi-śāstra (Cheng weishi lun
): perfect achievement wisdom (chengsuozuo zhi ,
kṛtyānuṣthana-jñānạ ), sublime contemplation wisdom (miaoguancha
zhi , pratyavekṣana-jñāna), universal equality wisdom
(pingdengxing zhi , samatā-jñāna), and great perfect mirror
wisdom (dayuanjing zhi , mahādarśanā-jñāna) (T. 1585.31:
56a12–29; Ochi 1988; Hasegawa 1993, 1999a, 1999; Yoritomi 1999b).
Despite the religious rhetoric of transcending dualism, dualism has
long played an important role in Indian and Buddhist philosophy—
from the ancient Indian dualistic concepts of puruṣa and prakṛti to
the dualistic goals of the bodhisattva’s practice as described in the
Vimalakīrtinirdeśasūtra: wisdom (prajñā) and compassion (upāya).
The Sanzhong xidi po diyu zhuan yezhang chu sanjie bimi tuoluoni
fa (Ritual of the Secret
Dhāraṇīs of the Three Siddhis for the Destruction of Hell, the Trans-
formation of Karmic Hindrances, and the Liberation from the Three
Conditioned Worlds, T. 905), a text belonging to the Susiddhi family of
texts and attributed to Śubhakarasiṃha (Shanwuwei , 637–735),
but actually dating to the mid-ninth century,^1 introduces the dualistic
concepts of zhi (wisdom) and li (principle) by pronouncing that
the Buddha Mahāvairocana displays two kinds of dharmakāyas to lead
beings to enlightenment: a dharma body of wisdom (zhi fashen
) and a dharma body of principle (li fashen ).

The Tathāgata Mahāvairocana, in order to cause one to know this way,

displays two kinds of dharma bodies. In the dharma body of wisdom,

the Buddha dwells in the principle of reality and by means of his self-re-

ward body he manifests the thirty-seven worthies (viz., the deities of the

mandala) and causes all to enter the way of nonduality. In the dharma

body of principle, the Buddha dwells in thusness and quiescence. The

Dharma, nevertheless, constantly dwells in immovability and manifests

(^1) Chen 1998, 2009 argues that T. 905 was instead composed in Japan between 902
and 1047 in order to legitimate the esoteric lineage and practices of the Tendai tra-
dition because the text, along with T. 906 and T. 907, is not mentioned in Chinese
catalogs of the eighth and ninth century, it copies or emends lines from Yixing’s com-
mentary on the Mahāvairocana sūtra (T. 1796), and incorporates all of T. 907. See also
Orzech, “After Amoghavajra: Esoteric Buddhism in the late Tang,” in this volume.