Overall Teaching

Utpalabhūti helps to liberate beings by compounding fragrances. He represents dedication, which is seen as an effect of the compounding of wisdom and compassion.

Summary

1.     Without concern for body or life, material things, or any kind of self-benefit, but only dedication to the buddhas and bodhisattva practice, constantly entering countless samādhis, Sudhana continued to Pṛthurāṣṭra[1] where he found the eminent perfumer[2] Utpalabhūti.[3]

2.     Sudhana requested Utpalabhūti teach him bodhisattva practice in order to gain access to omniscience.

3.     Utpalabhūti explained that it is good for Sudhana to seek buddhahood. He explained that he knows about all perfumes, fragrances, incenses, aromatic powders, human and nonhuman, all of which can do both human and super-mundane things, such as producing thoughts of the buddhas, the Dharmas, and the stages of bodhisattvas.

a.     He knows about nine kinds of special fragrance:[4]

i.        In the human world, a fragrance comes from the agitation of water spirits and can make anything it comes upon become as fragrant as golden flowers and ease the minds of any beings who smell it, becoming kind and joyful to all beings. When they thus become kind and joyful, their minds are pliant, and Utpalabhūti teaches them so that they become certain of attaining buddhahood.[5]

ii.       There is a kind of sandalwood that will protect anyone from harm[6] and drive away armies when a drum smeared with it is sounded.[7]

iii.     There is kind of aloe from the banks of Lake Heatless which will fill the whole continent and cause those who smell it to reject all evil. 

iv.     There is a fragrance from the Himalayas that causes dispassion, after which Utpalabhūti will teach them on dispassion.

v.       There is a fragrance from the world of spirits which causes sovereign rulers’ armies to stand in the sky. vi. There is an incense from the hall of the true Dharma which causes devas to gain awareness of awakening.

vii.       There is an incense from the pure treasuries in the heaven of timely portion which causes all inhabitants there to go to their ruler who will teach them the Dharma.

viii.     There is an incense in the heaven of satisfaction which will cause bodhisattvas destined to become a buddha in one lifetime to shower the Dharma in many arrays upon audiences of all buddhas.

ix.        There is an incense in the palace of the king of the heaven of beautiful emanations which causes rain to shower from the cloud of the Dharma for seven days.[8]

b.     Despite knowing these kinds of perfumings, he asks how he can tell the virtues of bodhisattvas who have proceeded beyond the delusion of the world, and who do not rely upon anything. Thus, Sudhana must proceed to Kutagara, where he may enquire of the mariner Vaira.

4.     Respecting him, Sudhana left.

[1] “The land is called Vast Territory to represent far-ranging vows.”

[2] “Utpalabhūti “being a perfumer symbolizes the combining of knowledge and compassion, noumenon and phenomena, nirvāṇa and saṃsāra, and ideas of defilement and purity all into one ball while still freely totalizing or distinguishing them. He is a layman on account of his great compassion, entering birth and death without being affected.”

[3] He represents the first dedication “Saving all beings without clinging to any image of beings.”

[4] “The nature of fragrance rests of nothing, yet it radiates good and extinguishes bad; this symbolizes great vows that rely on nothing yet radiate deeds that benefit beings.

 “The regal fragrance of fundamental knowledge emerges within ignorance, the fragrance of differentiating knowledge merges within myriad objects; so the eminent said he knew where the king of fragrances come from and knew how to compound fragrances.” (1594)

[5] This fragrance “represents the first abode, in which tranquillity and insight struggle with conditioning, producing the fragrance of knowledge; those who enter thereupon attain true awakening.”

[6] This fragrance “represents the abode of preparing the ground, in which the body of discipline is anointed with the principle of essencelessness so that it can enter the fire of the three poisons without being burned.”

[7] Li considers this a separate fragrance, perhaps based upon an alternate version of the text, “In the ocean there is a fragrance called invincible, which, when painted on drums, causes even brave opponents to retreat on hearing the sound of the drums; this represents the development of acceptance of reality in the abode of practical cultivation, causing evils to withdraw spontaneously.”

[8] Ten (see previous note, Li counts differently) “kinds of fragrance are mentioned, representing the ten abodes; by combining the two aspects of the ten abodes and ten practices—the absolute and the mundane, knowledge and compassion— causing them to be free, the method of dedication is created.

 “Because this dedication first enters the ocean of great compassion, one might leave out the awareness of knowledge; so ten fragrances are used to symbolize the principle of the ten abodes. Because one principle contains all the principles, this is represented by compounding fragrance.” (1595)