Verse I.31

From Buddha-Nature
Ratnagotravibhāga Root Verse I.31

Verse I.31 Variations

प्रभावानन्यथाभावस्निग्धभावस्वभावतः
चिन्तामणिनभोवारिगुणसाधर्म्यमेषु हि
prabhāvānanyathābhāvasnigdhabhāvasvabhāvataḥ
cintāmaṇinabhovāriguṇasādharmyameṣu hi
E. H. Johnston as input by the University of the West.[1]
།མཐུ་དང་གཞན་དུ་མི་འགྱུར་དང་།
།བརླན་པའི་ངོ་བོའི་རང་བཞིན་ཕྱིར།
།འདི་དག་ནོར་བུ་རིན་ཆེན་མཁའ།
།ཆུ་ཡི་ཡོན་ཏན་ཆོས་མཐུན་ཉིད།
By virtue of its nature of power,
Being unchanging, and being moist,
It resembles the qualities
Of a wish-fulfilling jewel, space, and water.
自在力不變

思實體柔軟
寶空水功德
相似相對法

Comme elle est puissante, immuable,
Et de nature humide,
Elle est analogue
Au précieux joyau, à l’espace et à l’eau.

RGVV Commentary on Verse I.31

Other English translations

Obermiller (1931) [4]
Being essentially powerful,
Unalterable and moist by nature,
It has a resemblance, in its distinctive features,
With the wish-fulfilling gem, with space, and water.
Takasaki (1966) [5]
Because of its own nature of power,
Identity, and being moist; in these [three points]
[The Essence of the Tathāgata has] a resemblance
To the quality of the wish-fulfilling jewel, the sky and water.
Fuchs (2000) [6]
[Wielding] power, not changing into something else,
and being a nature that has a moistening [quality]:
these [three] have properties corresponding
to those of a precious gem, the sky, and water.

Textual sources

Commentaries on this verse

Academic notes

  1. Digital Sanskrit Buddhist Canon Unicode Input
  2. Brunnhölzl, Karl. When the Clouds Part: The Uttaratantra and its Meditative Tradition as a Bridge between Sūtra and Tantra. Boston: Snow Lion Publications, an imprint of Shambhala Publications, 2014.
  3. Respectively, the three points of power, being unchanging, and being moist in I.31 refer back to the three aspects of the tathāgata heart that were taught in I.27–28—the dharmakāya’s radiating, the suchness of sentient beings and buddhas being undifferentiated, and the disposition existing in all beings.
  4. Obermiller, E. "The Sublime Science of the Great Vehicle to Salvation Being a Manual of Buddhist Monism." Acta Orientalia IX (1931), pp. 81-306.
  5. Takasaki, Jikido. A Study on the Ratnagotravibhāga (Uttaratantra): Being a Treatise on the Tathāgatagarbha Theory of Mahāyāna Buddhism. Serie Orientale Roma 33. Roma: Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente (ISMEO), 1966.
  6. Fuchs, Rosemarie, trans. Buddha Nature: The Mahayana Uttaratantra Shastra. Commentary by Jamgon Kongtrul and explanations by Khenpo Tsultrim Gyamtso. Ithaca, N. Y.: Snow Lion Publications, 2000.