Page Text
________________
THE PREACHER.
219
15. If such a one, by his paying that worship to the objects of veneration during eighteen thousand kotis of Æons, happens to hear this Satra, were it only once, he shall obtain an amazingly great advantage.
I announce to thee, Bhaishagyaraga, I declare to thee, that many are the Dharmaparyâyas which I have propounded, am propounding, and shall propound. And among all those Dharmaparyâyas, Bhaishagyarâga, it is this which is apt to meet with no acceptance with everybody, to find no belief with everybody. This, indeed, Bhaishagyarâga, is the transcendent spiritual esoteric lore of the law, preserved by the power of the Tathagatas, but never divulged; it is an article (of creed): not yet made known. By the majority of people, Bhaishagyaraga, this Dharmaparyâya is rejected during the lifetime of the Tathậgata ; in far higher degree such will be the case after his complete extinction.
Nevertheless, Bhaishagyaraga, one has to consider those young men or young ladies of good family to be invested with the robes of the Tathagata ; to be regarded and blessed by the Tathagatas living in other worlds, that they shall have the force of individual persuasion, the force that is rooted in virtue,
the exemplary preachers who are likened to the Tathagata, and sent by him (Tathagata-bhůta and Tathagata-dậta), spoken of in the preceding verses as well as in the prose passages above. Instead of models, I have used the phrase, objects of veneration, for clearness sake. Burnouf's original rendering 'images' is, so far as I can see, preferable to his correction of it into books.' There is no question of books, only of a single work, the Lotus ; and it is clear that we must try to make the contents of the last two stanzas agree with the final part of the preceding prose.
1 Or point of view, standpoint.
Digitized by Google
| SR No. | 007677 |
| Book Title | Saddharma Pundarika |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | H Kern |
| Publisher | Oxford |
| Publication Year | 1884 |
| Total Pages | 2546 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English |
| File Size | 46 MB |