SEEING CHEN-YEN BUDDHISMcana Siitra and the Sarvatathagatatattvasaf(lgraha.^32 These texts originally had
nothing to do with one another, other than the fact that both are major tantric
Buddhist ritual texts whose central divinity is Mahavairocana. In the Chen-yen
system developed in the eighth-century Chinese court, the central structures of
these two texts provided the blueprint for the ritual realization of siddhi and for
the elaboration of a variety of apotropeic rites.
Although the texts came to be viewed as a pair, each text was originally
meant to stand on its own, and each provides a comprehensive ritual vision, a
cosmos to be realized in the sadhana (ritual evocation). As is the case with
many Mahayana and Vajrayana texts, the Mahavairocana Siitra and the Sar-
vatathagatatattvasaf(lgraha were intended to substitute for the entire Tripitaka
and to be a summary and synthesis of Buddhist traditions.
Each of these texts contains two types of cosmology. One is a cosmology of
progress and process, exemplified by the bodhisattva path through the imagery
of seeds and fruit and of families (kula), and the language of substance and time.
The other is a cosmology of paradox, best known through the formulation of the
"Two Truths" or the identity and nonidentity of saf(lsara and nirvana. It is a cos-
mology of vision and light, a cosmology emphasizing structure and instanta-
neousness.33 These two cosmologies provide much of the dynamic tension and
creativity of Buddhism, as well as its adaptability. In the case of the Vajrayana,
the world of process stands in the same relationship to the world of paradox as
saf(lsara stands to nirvana in the Two Truths. The quick path uses the imagery
of the bodhisattva path, of seed and family, yet it collapses that imagery in the
immanent ritual instant. Not surprisingly, an examination of Vajrayana ritual
based on these texts usually reveals marked recursiveness-the adept is first
saved, then initiates others, who then save and ritually initiate yet others-in a
process that wraps around on itself in a "strange loop."^34 Thus, the savior
becomes the object of salvation in the process of ritual. The adept and those he
seeks to exorcise/initiate become ritual clones of one another. All are suffering,
all are saviors, in a ritual world where saf(lsara and nirvana collapse. This dual
structure marks the Vajrayana and most of its texts in China.
All Buddhist tantras are concerned with the construction of a ritual reality, a
universe which emerges in the sadhana experience.^35 This is the heart of tantric
practice. The purpose of the sadhana is the attainment of siddhi (ch 'eng-chiu,
transliterated as hsi-ti), the term literally meaning the attainment of a goal. The
basis of siddhi is usually defined as the realization of the practitioner's identity
with his "basic divinity."^36 When siddhi is considered from the perspective of
ultimate enlightenment, anuttarasamyaksambodhi, then one refers to it simply
as siddhi or more specifically as lokottara siddhi (ch 'u-shih ch 'eng-chiu, or
ch 'eng-chiu hsi-ti). When this attainment is considered from the perspective of
the ritual manipulation of the conditioned universe it may be referred to as
mundane siddhi (laukika siddhi, shih-chien ch 'eng-chiu). Although siddhi is
thus of "two types," an examination of ritual texts reveals that each attainment
implies and requires the other.