AVATAMSAKA SUTRA
Pages 300-302
Translated by Thomas Cleary
 
This is the realm of the learned
Who delight in ultimate peace.
I will explain for you;
Now please listen clearly.
 
Analyze the body within:
Who herein is the “self’?
Who can understand this way
Will comprehend the existence or not of the self.
 
This body is a temporary set-up
And has no place of abode;
Who understands this body
Will have no attachment to it.
 
Considering the body carefully,
Everything will be clearly seen:
Knowing all the elements are unreal.
One will not create mental fabrications.
 
Based on whom does life arise,
And based on whom does it disappear?
Like a turning wheel of fire,
Its beginning and end can’t be known.
 
The wise can observe with insight
The impermanence of all existents;
All things are empty and selfless.
Forever apart from all signs.
 
All consequences are born from actions;
Like dreams, they’re not truly real.
From moment to moment they continually die away.
The same as before and after.
 
Of all things seen in the world
Only mind is the host;
By grasping forms according to interpretation
It becomes deluded, not true to reality.
 
All philosophies in the world
Are mental fabrications;
There has never been a single doctrine
By which one could enter the true essence of things.
 
By the power of perceiver and perceived
All kinds of things are born;
They soon pass away, not staying.
Dying out instant to instant.
 
Then Manjushri asked Chief of the Precious, “All sentient beings equally have four gross physical elements, with no self and nothing pertaining to self — how come there is the experience of pain and pleasure, beauty and ugliness, internal and external goodness, little sensation and much sensation? Why do some experience consequences in the present, and some in the future? And all this while there is no good or bad in the realm of reality.” Chief of the Precious answered in verse:
 
According to what deeds are done
Do their resulting consequences come to be;
Yet the doer has no existence:
This is the Buddha’s teaching.
 
Like a clear mirror.
According to what comes before it,
Reflecting forms, each different.
So is the nature of actions.
 
And like a skillful magician
Standing at a crossroads
Causing many forms to appear.
So is the nature of actions.
 
Like a mechanical robot
Able to utter various sounds,
Neither self nor not self:
So is the nature of actions.
 
And like different species of birds
All emerging from eggs.
Yet their voices not the same:
So is the nature of actions.
 
Just as in the womb
All organs are developed,
Their substance and features coming from nowhere:
So is the nature of actions.
 
Also like being in hell —
The various painful things
All come from nowhere:
So is the nature of actions.
 
Also like the sovereign king
With seven supreme treasures—
Their provenance cannot be found:
So is the nature of actions.
 
And as when the various worlds
Are burnt by a great conflagration.
This fire comes from nowhere:
So does the nature of actions.