Gaṇḍavyūha, The Array of Heroes

Learning the Navagrantha Reading Guide

About the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra

Introduction

This is a website version of handout guides that were prepared for a sūtra reading group in 2019. It is part of a series on the Navagrantha, the nine most sacred texts of Mahāyāna Buddhism which can be found by clicking the prior hyperlink. Page numbers correspond to the 1993 translation by Thomas Cleary in The Flower Ornament Scripture.

Context

The Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra is a stand-alone sūtra which also serves as the final chapter of the Avataṃsaka Sūtra. The translation we will be reading by Thomas Cleary is the only English translation, but Sanskrit and Tibetan translations exist—a translation is ongoing from Tibetan as part of the 84,000 project. The original Avataṃsaka Sūtra in Sanskrit is no longer extant, only sections exist, such as the Daśabhūmikā (Ten Stage Sūtra) and the Gaṇḍavyūha—both of which form a part of the nine-text core Mahāyāna canon in Nepalese Buddhism, known as the Nāvagrantha, or Nine Sacred Texts.

According to Chinese sources, there were six variations of the Avataṃsaka Sūtra in Sanskrit. The longest one was 100,000 lines long, and the shortest one was 36,000 lines long. In Chinese, the first translation was from one of the shorter versions—this translation, by Buddhabhadra, was completed in 421 CE, and only contained a very short version of the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra at the end. The second translation, by Śikṣānanda, was completed in 704 CE, and included the full Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra. The third translation was specifically focused on the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra and was completed by the monk Prajñā in 798 CE. The most popular and definitive translation in Chinese was that of Śikṣānanda, and it is what Cleary’s translation is based off. In Śikṣānanda’s translation, which is probably from one of the middle-length Sanskrit versions, the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra is the 39th and final chapter. There is also a Newar translation of the sūtra.

While in Sanskrit it is divided into sections, in Chinese, it is not. This reading group, however, will read the sūtra according to those divisions, in order to break it up into readable chunks. In short, to explain why it is a part of the Avataṃsaka Sūtra, the Avataṃsaka Sūtra features the Buddha gradually teaching celestial beings and bodhisattvas starting from the site of awakening and up to the highest Brahmā heaven, and then back down to earth. He does this because humans were not yet able to hear the full significance of his entire realisation. Thus, he preached to those for whom it was easier first. Even in the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra, the final section, he is in Anāthapiṇḍada’s park, but the only humans he teaches are awakened bhikṣus and world rulers who had served past buddhas. This can signify the grandeur of this awakening, and need not be tied to a literal understanding of an historical event. In this way, also, we can see that the Avataṃsaka Sūtra is essentially an anthology of texts with similar themes.

Significance

The teachings of the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra emphasise bodhicitta, spiritual friends, and the quest for buddhahood, all of which feature heavily in all forms of Mahāyāna Buddhism. However it became an important part of the formation of the doctrines of the significant Chinese sect focused on the Avataṃsaka Sūtra, called the Huáyán sect. This also became one of the first sects in Japan, where it is known as the Kegon sect. To this sect belongs the famous 15-metre-tall Mahāvairocana Buddha at Tōdaiji temple in Nara, built by Emperor Shōmu in the 8th century.

D.T. Suzuki, who edited the first Sanskrit edition of the text, summarises the importance of this sūtra as follows, as found in the leaflet on the Shambala website for this sūtra:

“As to the Avataṃsaka Sūtra, it is really the consummation of Buddhist thought, Buddhist sentiment, and Buddhist experience. To my mind, no religious literature in the world can ever approach the grandeur of conception, the depth of feeling, and the gigantic scale of composition, as attained by the sutra. Here not only deeply speculative minds find satisfaction, but humble spirits and heavily oppressed hearts, too, will have their burdens lightened. Abstract truths are so concretely, so symbolically represented here that one will finally come to a realization of the truth that even in a particle of dust the whole universe is seen reflected-not this visible universe only, but a vast system of universes, conceivable by the highest minds only.”

Title

The term gaṇḍa can mean “hero,” or “massive.” (Osto, 2019) Vyūha means “array,” as in an array of soldiers or a flock of people in a crowd. Thus the title can mean either an “array of heroes” or a “grand array.” Douglas Osto suggests “Supreme Array.”

The Chinese and Japanese title, from which Cleary gets the “Entry into the Realm of Reality” is 續入法界品 (Xu ru fajie pin; Zoku nyū hokkai bon), or “Chapter on the Entry into the Dharmadhātu,” or “Dharma Realm.” Thus, one feature of Cleary’s translations that may prove an obstacle of sorts at times may be his use of translations that give different terms for concepts that we are already familiar with by different names, such as “Dharma Realm,” which he calls the “Realm of Reality.”

Themes

1. Quest for Awakening

The most significant aspect of this sūtra is that it tells the story of the merchant’s son Sudhana, who searches for the Dharma, starting with the advice of the Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī. Mañjuśrī successfully guides Sudhana to seek out numerous “good friends” or kalyāṇamitras, who each point him closer to realising the Dharma Dhātu. The sūtra insists, in this way, that realising our Buddha Nature, or Tathāgatagarbha, we must rely upon many spiritual friends. Finally, after finding Maitreya Bodhisattva, Sudhana is guided back to Mañjuśrī, who finally introduces him to Samantabhadra Bodhisattva, who teaches him the Vow of Noble Conduct, or Bhadracarī Praṇidhāna, whereby he may realise the Dharma Body, or Dharmakāya.

2. Importance of Spiritual Friends

This importance of spiritual friends is also insisted upon by the Perfection of Wisdom in 8000 Lines, which states, revealing multiple layers to this teaching, that

“A Bodhisattva who has set out with earnest intention and wants to win full enlightenment should from the very beginning tend, love and honour the good friends.

Subhūti: ‘Who are those good friends of a Bodhisattva?”

The Lord: ‘The Buddhas and Lords, and also the irreversible Bodhisattvas who are skilful in the Bodhisattva-course, and who instruct and admonish him in the perfections, who demonstrate and expound the perfection of wisdom. The perfection of wisdom in particular should be regarded as a Bodhisattva’s good friend. All the six perfections, in fact, are the good friends of a Bodhisattva. They are his Teacher, his path, his light, his torch, his illumination, his shelter, his refuge, his place of rest, his final relief, his island, his mother, his father, and they lead him to cognition, to understanding, to full enlightenment. For it is in these perfections that the perfection of wisdom is accomplished.’ (396–7)”

Similarly, the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra states,

“Think of yourself as crossing over to the other shore, and think of spiritual benefactors as boatmen; think of their instructions as a ford, and think of the practices as a boat. ... Think of yourself as a prince, and think of spiritual benefactors as the chief ministers of a spiritual king; think of their instructions as the precepts of kingship, and think of the practices as putting on the turban of truth adorned with the crest of knowledge and overseeing the capital of the spiritual sovereign.” (1450–1)

Focusing on spiritual friends in this way, the Gaṇḍavyūha Sūtra narrates the journey of Sudhana in meeting fifty-three different spiritual friends, who have learned different aspects of the Bodhisattva path. They are young and old, male and female, Buddhist and non-Buddhist, monks and laymen, of various classes, castes, and professions. None of them claim to be fully awakened in any way, but they each have attainments in specific qualities of awakening, each one of which teaches Sudhana another piece of the puzzle.

In this way, the sūtra teaches how spiritual friends may come to any place and be in any guise. They are bodhisattvas with a purpose, and guide beings to awakening according to their environments and abilities as a skilful means (upāya).

3. On Bodhicitta

While Sudhana, as we shall see, receives many teachings from his spiritual friends, several noteworthy ones deal with the matter of bodhicitta, or the aspiration to attain buddhahood for the benefit of all sentient beings. Note that Cleary translates bodhicitta as “the determination for enlightenment.”

For instance, Maitreya states, “The determination for enlightenment is the seed of all elements of buddhahood; it is like a field, growing good qualities in all beings; it is like the earth, being a support for all beings; it is like water, washing away all afflictions; it is like wind, unattached to all worlds; it is like fire, burning up the deadwood of clinging to views.” (1476)

In this way, Maitreya gives one hundred and seventeen similes for bodhicitta, where by Sudhana was made to visualise all buddhas in the three realms working for sentient beings.

4. Samantabhadra’s Ten Vows

The final and perhaps most influential section of the sūtra is Samantabhadra’s prayer of ten vows of bodhisattva conduct, known as the Vow of Noble Conduct, or Bhadracarī Praṇidhāna which forms an important part of recitation liturgy in both Nepalese and Tibetan Buddhism, and is the structure of practice recommended by many Indian masters, such as Śantideva and Atiśa. These ten vows are to:

i. Pay homage to all buddhas

ii. Praise the buddhas

iii. Make offerings

iv. Repent evil deeds

v. Rejoice in the merits of others

vi. Request the buddhas to turn the Dharma Wheel

vii. Request the buddhas to not pass into nirvāṇa but remain to teach

viii. Follow the teachings of the buddhas at all times

ix. Accommodate and benefit all beings

x. Transfer merits to the attainment of buddhahood for the benefit of all beings

Review of the Entire Sūtra

Setting

1. Introduction: The Buddha transforms the world in a samādhi and bodhisattvas see the interpenetration of the worlds and buddhas, which is inconceivable for ordinary beings.

2. Samantabhadra: Samantabhadra Bodhisattva describes how all bodhisattvas are united by Vairocana Buddha, through whom they manifest throughout the world in infinite forms.

3. Mañjuśrī: Śāriputra follows Mañjuśrī to the south and he and monks are taught and attain realisations. Mañjuśrī proceeds to Dhanyakara where he meets Sudhana. Sudhana gives rise to Bodhicitta when Mañjuśrī explains the origin of Sudhana’s name. Mañjuśrī tells him to seek buddhahood through the aid of spiritual friends and guides him to Meghaśrī.

The Ten Abodes

States of mind in which a bodhisattva practices, understanding that buddhas and one’s own mind are not separate. Clarification of the implications of each abode, practice, and so forth are given in parentheses based upon the longer discussions in their relevant sections of the Avataṃsaka Sūtra.

1. Inspiration: Meghaśrī, the monk on the peak.

(Giving rise to bodhicitta and vowing to serve buddhas, and attain buddhahood for the benefit of all beings)

2. Preparing the Ground: Sāgaramegha, the monk who learned from a buddha in the ocean.
(Developing wholesome attitudes towards others and correcting one’s behaviour to be wholesome)

3. Practice: Supratiṣṭhita, who can pass through anything and go anywhere.

(Contemplating phenomena in regards to the three marks of existence and observation of phenomena in the three realms)

4. Noble Birth: Megha, who teaches about speech with the Wheel of Letters.

(Permanent access to the presence of awakening through deep faith, and deeper understanding about the teachings of buddhas, realising buddhas’ equality)

5. Full Equipment with Skill in Means: Muktaka, who shows all buddhas within his body as products of his own mind.

(Cultivating virtues that can be used to benefit others, while being aware of beings’ nonidentity)

6. Correct State of Mind: Saradhvaja, emanating bodhisattvas and buddhas while walking. (Having unwavering minds with regards to the buddhas, and in regards to their aspiration towards buddhahood for the benefit of beings, due to knowing the signlessness of dharmas) 7. Non-regression: Āśā, who brings beings to irreversibility after they look at her. (Having firmness in practice, and being undaunted about the path and in regards to how formlessness is form and vice versa)

8. Youthful Nature: Bhīṣmottaranirghoṣa, who shows countless buddhas upon touching one’s head.

(Having flawless thought, speech, and deeds and being able to take upon new deeds on the path at will)

9. Spiritual Prince: Jayoṣmāyatana, who endures fires and teaches Sudhana to jump from a razor precipice.

(Knowing what techniques are to be known in order to oppose beings’ afflictions, studying the skills and manners of a spiritual monarch)

10. Coronation: Maitrāyaṇī, teaches many arrays that are one in her palace which reflects all buddhas.

(As a spiritual monarch, analysing and purifying countless worlds and promoting the knowledge proper to buddhas of all worlds, things, and beings)

The Ten Practices

The practices which enable bodhisattvas to put into action, to help self and other, the knowledge of the ten abodes.

1. Joy: Sudarśana, who walks in the woods and teaches Sudhana that he has heard aeons of teachings.

(Based on the perfection of generosity, one develops giving without regard for beings or the given, seeing all as empty, but not taking pride in one’s accomplishments)

2. Beneficial Practice: Indriyeśvara, who plays by the river and has been taught all forms of practical knowledge.

(Based on the perfection of morality, being able to master life and correct behaviour in regards to oneself and others entirely on the basis of non-attachment and knowledge of emptiness)

3. Non-Opposition: Prabhūtā, who satisfies the needs of beings with her vessel without exhausting it.

(Based on the perfection of patience, developing humility and patience in regards to not seeking personal gain and resolving to transcendently aid beings without giving rise to evil states of mind)

4. Indomitability: Vidvān, who produces all needs of beings by looking at the sky.

(Based on the perfection of energy, becoming free from mental poisons and directing energy towards ending one’s delusions and eliminating other’s compulsions and harmful deeds too)

5. Non-Confusion: Ratnacūḍa, who created a house representing the ten pāramitās from the merit of offering a ball of incense to past buddhas.

(Based on the perfection of meditation, developing mindfulness so that one’s mind becomes imperturbable and so one can aid beings without confusion)

6. Good Manifestation: Samantanetra, who can cure beings and teach them the Dharma and makes magical perfumes.

(Based on the perfection of wisdom, developing non-acquisitiveness in body, speech, and mind based on knowledge of thusness and emptiness)

7. Non-Attachment: King Anala, who manifests illusory torturers and criminals in order to guide evil beings of his land away from evil.

(Based on the perfection of skilful means, developing non-attachment towards sacred and mundane one knows how to teach according to beings’ needs and without emotional attachment)

8. Difficult-to-Attain: King Mahāprabha, whose kingdom appears to be either clay or jewels depending upon beings’ faculties.

(Based on the perfection of vows, one develops non-weariness in regards to the vow of universally aiding beings, and will always travel back and forward to aid beings without grasping to mundane or supramundane)

9. Good Teaching: Acalā, whose house makes Sudhana enter many samādhis and who can allow one to see countless buddhas.

(Based on the perfection of power, one develops the intellectual and super-mundane powers to aid beings, aiding beings as refuges for them and revealing the power of awakening)

10. Truth: Sarvagāmin, who dwells on a mountain peak and teaches going everywhere. (Based on the perfection of knowledge, one develops knowledge of truth and falsehood on a transcendent level, knowing both how to benefit beings, the right times to do so, and what to teach them)

The Ten Dedications

These are the dedications of a bodhisattva’s virtues to the attainment of buddhahood in order to save all sentient beings out of compassion. In addition to awakened mind (abodes) and practices, one needs to have proper direction in order to aim them at the correct goal. Dedication is using the combination of wisdom and compassion.

1. Saving All Beings Without Clinging to any Image of Beings: Utpalabhūti, who liberates beings by compounding fragrances.

(Based upon the first six perfections and the four immeasurables, one dedicates these virtues to aiding beings to enable their purification and awakening)

2. Indestructible Dedication: Vaira, who knows treasures in the oceans and helps mariners obtain them while teaching them the Dharma.

(Developing indestructible faith in the buddhas, bodhisattvas and the path based on joy and the essential empty nature of things, but not clinging to any forms)

3. Equal to All Buddhas: Jayottama, who teaches businessmen and elders of the city. (Not perceiving any like or dislike for anything, one develops a free and joyous mind which is equal to the bliss of buddhas’ attainments, and one dedicates the virtues of this to beings’ attainments)

4. Reaching All Places: Siṃhavijṛmbhita, who teaches beings at the feet of jewelled trees to remove their vain imaginings and offer to all buddhas but does not perceive any beings. (Using the power of one’s virtues to reach all places and times to aid beings through teaching, and universally perceiving all places)

5. Infinite Stores of Virtue: Vasumitrā, who creates dispassion by the skilful means of sensedesires.

(Through repentance and removal of the defilements, one listens to the Dharma, puts it into practice, and thus dedicates virtue to awakening and all buddhas)

6. Actively Stabilizing All Roots of Goodness: Veṣṭhila, who realises buddhas don’t enter nirvāṇa and sees them all in successive moments.

(Exercising generosity to all beings in all ways based upon control of body and mind in order to foster development of beings’ good qualities)

7. According to all Sentient Beings: Avalokiteśvara, who allows beings to overcome their fears by manifesting and allowing them to use his name to help them when in peril. (Giving people what they need without any artifice, expectations, or pride and developing an unattached, and liberated mind)

8. Characteristic of True Thusness: Ananyagāmin, who passes countless lands in a single thought, paying homage to countless buddhas and heling countless beings therein. (Developing clear and perfect recollection, and vowing to attain freedom of body, speech, and mind without clinging to anything or anyone, or relying on anything such as discriminatory views)

9. Without Bondage or Attachment: Mahādeva, who manifests treasures for beings to give away to teach them relinquishment.

(Developing emancipation from compulsion, and dedicating virtues to non-attached actions and thoughts)

10. Infinite Dedication Equal to the Cosmos: Earth Goddess Sthāvarā, who witnesses the roots of goodness of all buddhas at the site of awakening.

(Focusing on giving bodhicitta to others, being impartial and cultivating awakening action for the benefit of all)

The Ten Stages

The stages whereby, applying the abodes, practices, and dedications, bodhisattvas gradually develop the qualities needed for buddhahood.

1. Joy: Night Goddess Vāsantī, who dispels the darkness of ignorance and guides beings from fear.

(Developing joy from thinking of buddhas, bodhisattvas and their practice, and the Dharma so as to give what beings need)

2. Purity: Night Goddess Samantagambhīraśrīvimalaprabhā, who goes everywhere through the bliss of tranquil meditation, knowing the omnipresent essence of all objects.

(Primarily develop purity of mind based upon morality)

3. Refulgence: Night Goddess Pramuditanayanajagadvirocanā, whose emanations show the ten perfections to all beings and was inspired to awakening by Mañjuśrī and Samantabhadra. (Developing nine levels of meditation by focusing on the marks of existence and the purity and development of the mind)

4. Blazing Radiance: Night Goddess Samantasattvatrāṇojaḥśrī, who never parts from Samantabhadra and appears in all worlds and adapts to all conditions.

(Contemplating realms and worlds and thus entering the radiance of the Dharma)

5. Difficult to Conquer: Night Goddess Praśāntarutasāgaravatī, who experiences great joy from Vairocana Buddha and his manifestations, vowing to put an end to all beings’ sufferings. (Developing impartial attention to the purity of teachings and conduct so that one has unwavering attention and meditation being able to thus develop skills according to beings’ needs)

6. Presence: Night Goddess Sarvanagararakṣāsaṃbhavatejaḥśrī, who has a liberation of entry into sound which teaches the Dharma to all beings according to their minds.

(Seeing all things as having no ultimate definition or distinction, and as ultimately pure, one sees the arising and falling of worlds as being like dreams, and engages in absorption in emptiness, signlessness, and wishlessness)

7. Far Going: Night Goddess Sarvavṛkṣapraphullanasukhasaṃvāsā, who attained liberation under a past king who gave away all beings needed, who became Vairocana.

(Going beyond ideas of personality, one detaches from the world but is able to continue to act in the world without being stained by it)

8. Immovability: Night Goddess Saravajagadrakṣāpraṇidhānavīryaprabhā, who attained a liberation by freeing tortured prisoners, but teaches that bodhisattva liberations are beyond ordinary understanding.

(Fully realising things are nonconceptual becoming detached from mental states with no actions based upon mental states arising and by means of knowledge distinguish the path and practices, carrying out awakening activities with non-retrogression)

9. Good Mind: Night Goddess Sutejomaṇḍalaratiśrī, who attained her liberation by being a buddha’s wet nurse in the past.

(Accurately knowing all kinds of actions, all that is beneficial and not beneficial, they become expert teachers at this stage, learning to teach in accord with beings’ needs)

10. Clouds of Teaching: Gopā, who has a liberation observing oceans of bodhisattva samādhis as a result of joining a prince bodhisattva Vairocana in a past life under a past buddha, and thence never being separated from him on the path.

(Gaining incalculable samādhis and liberation, one can rain down teachings from perfect awakening, which is nearby them)

The Practice of Universal Good (Samantabhadra)

These ten teachers represent the eleventh stage, which is the practice of Universal Good, which has ten aspects, and which culminates in full Buddhahood.

1. Producing Knowledge from Compassion: Māyā

2. Consistently Remembering All Truths through Mastery of Knowledge and Compassion: Surendrābhā

3. Teaching Worldly Principles Everywhere: Viśvāmitra

4. Penetrating the Mysteries of Writing and Higher Knowledge of Arts: Śilpābhijña 5. Helping People by both Conventional and Mystical Arts and Sciences:

Bhadrottamā

6. Pure Liberation by Being in the World Without Clinging Thoughts: Muktāsāra

7. Illumination by Pure Knowledge working in the World: Sucandra

8. Finding Infinite Forms in Formlessness: Ajitasena

9. Speaking so as to Reveal Truth: Śivarāgra

10. Living in the World with Complete Knowledge and Compassion: Śrīsaṃbhava & Śrīmati

Conclusion

Maitreya: Who reveals the tower of Vairocana and informs Sudhana that he will attain Buddhahood in one lifetime.
Mañjuśrī: Who shows Sudhana how effort and roots are required for knowledge.
The Vow of Practice of Samantabhadra: Who completes Sudhana’s practice and makes the vow of good bodhisattva conduct, or King of Prayers.

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