⏑⏑−−¦⏑⏑⏑−¦¦−−⏑⏑¦⏑−⏑− navipulā
yad-api
syād-asamaye yāto vanam-asāv-iti
|
⏑−−−¦⏑−−−¦¦−⏑−−¦⏑−⏑−
akālo
nāsti dharmasya jīvite cañcale sati
|| 6.21
6.21
Though he might be said
to have gone at a bad time
To the forest,
In dharma, in truth, no
bad time exists –
Life being as fickle as
it is.
COMMENT:
What the present Canto
is all about is what the Buddha's teaching is all about, which is
namely, turning back – knowing the path as a turning back. And the
fundamental means of knowing the path as a turning back is sitting in
lotus. Thus I assume, a priori, that today's verse also is about
sitting in lotus. And in this case (totally unlike my former assumption about the direction of the price of gold) my assumption will turn out to have been true.
In yesterday's verse,
where the contrast is between artha (riches, things of substance) and
dharma (religion, Buddhist law), I argued, Aśvaghoṣa's ironic
intention might be to express sitting in lotus as artha – a thing
of substance; in other words, the riches of paramārtha, ultimate
riches, the one great matter, sitting in lotus.
In today's verse, where
the contrast is between syāt... iti (what somebody might say) and
dharmasya (being of or in dharma), I think that the truth and the
reality of sitting in lotus is expressed as dharma – truth,
reality, the teaching of Buddha.
So there is as usual a
difference between the ostensible and hidden meanings of today's
verse, hinging on the ambguity of dharmasya, but the ostensible and
hidden meanings are not in this instance diametrically opposed to
each other in the ironic manner which Aśvaghoṣa loves. The difference is more subtle, the difference being that between "for dharma" and "in/of dharma."
In addition to the
multiplicity of meanings of the word dharma itself, dharmasya is in
the genitive, which has the broadest range of meanings of the
Sanskrit cases – so that dharmasya could mean of dharma, or in
dharma, or for dharma, or belonging to dharma.
The ostensible meaning
of dharmasya, then, as per EBC is “for religious duty (dharma).”
EHJ also translated dharmasya as “for dharma.” And PO was even
clearer in taking the genitive here to convey a dative sense; hence
“for pursuing dharma.”
The ostensible gist of
today's verse is that the prince is asking Chanda to relate to the king
the principle that any time, when old or when young, is a good time
for practising or pursuing dharma.
The hidden meaning,
again, is on this occasion not opposed to the ostensible meaning.
The relation between
the ostensible gist and the sub-text might be like the relation
between the questions “What is the time?” and “What is time?”
What is the time?
8.43 a.m.
What is time?
That is a question best
answered from the inside of sitting itself.
Hence, to paraphrase
Dogen, when all dharmas are seen as the Buddha-Dharma, then there are
good times and bad times, favourable moments and unfavourable
moments, auspicious days and inauspicious days.
When the myriad dharmas
are each not of the self, then there are movements, fast and slow,
like going into a forest.
Because the Buddha's
truth is originally transcendent over good and bad, in the sphere of
dharma, or in the sphere of practice of the truth, no bad time
exists.
And though it like this
weeds, though the gardener hates them, seem in no time to spring out
of nowhere, and lovely flowers, though the gardener has lavished love
and affection upon them, suddenly wilt, and drop down, dead.
The point, in
conclusion, is that akālo
nāsti dharmasya ostensibly expresses a principle (“there is no bad
time for pursuing dharma”) that any bystander can study, like a
human being by the side of a pond studying how energy spreads out by
observing ripples on the surface of water.
But
Aśvaghoṣa poetry, like Dogen's four-phased dialectic, is born from the inside of realization and it can only truly be understood on the basis of the
reader's own individual realization, in the way that a fish in a pond
knows water.
To
paraphrase Dogen again, if for a fish in the water there were a time
that was bad for knowing water, the fish would perish at once.
Therefore,
life being as fickle as it is – though when it comes to love and
money I have shown myself over the years to be terribly bad at
cutting my losses – I wrap myself every morning in a
traditionally-sewn kaṣāya, for an hour of no bad moments of
knowing the path as a turning back.
Today's
verse, notwithstading what it seems to say on the surface, is, in
truth, shining with realization. Hence the pleasure of translating
it, from the inside.
VOCABULARY
yad-api: even if, although
yad-api: even if, although
syāt (3rd
pers. sg. optative as): there might be
a-samaye (loc. sg.): m.
non-obligation , absence of contract or agreement ; unseasonableness
; unfit or unfavourable time
yātaḥ (nom. sg. m.):
mfn. gone , proceeded , marched ; gone away , fled , escaped
vanam (acc. sg.): n.
wood, forest
asau (nom. sg. m.):
that, that person
iti: “...,” thus
akālaḥ (nom. sg.) m.
a wrong or bad time
nāsti: there is not,
does not exist
dharmasya (gen. sg.):
of/for/in dharma
jīvite (loc. sg.): n.
life, duration of life
cañcale (loc. sg. n.):
mfn. (fr. Intens. √cal, to move) moving to and fro , movable ,
unsteady , shaking , quivering , flickering ; unsteady , inconstant ,
inconsiderate ; m. the wind ; m. a lover , libertine
sati = loc. abs. as: to
be
若言年少壯 非是遊學時
當知求正法 無時非爲時
若言年少壯 非是遊學時
當知求正法 無時非爲時
No comments:
Post a Comment