Verse II.33 Variations
आर्यैश्च सूतिकामध्यस्थित बालार्कबिम्बवत्
āryaiśca sūtikāmadhyasthita bālārkabimbavat
།བྱིས་པས་དེ་སྔོན་མཐོང་མ་མྱོང་།
།བཙས་པའི་ཁྱིམ་ནས་བུ་ཆུང་གིས།
།ཉི་མའི་གཟུགས་བཞིན་འཕགས་པས་ཀྱང་།
Just as those born blind [have never seen] form.
Even noble ones [see it only] as an infant [would glimpse]
The orb of the sun while lying in the house of a new mother.
- De même que les aveugles de naissance ne voient pas les formes,
- Les êtres puérils ne l’ont jamais vue. Les êtres sublimes eux-mêmes
- Sont pareils à des nourrissons qui entrevoient la forme du soleil
- Depuis la chambre où ils viennent de naître.
RGVV Commentary on Verse II.33
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Obermiller (1931) [7]
- Indeed, as the visible forms for those that are born blind,
- It is not accessible to the perception of ordinary beings;
- And even to the Saints who, though they perceive it (a little),
- Are with respect to it like new-born infants
- Perceiving the sun from the house where they are kept.
Takasaki (1966) [8]
- Because it has never been seen before by ordinary persons,
- Like the visible forms for those who are born blind, nor even by the Saints,
- Like the disk of the sun for infants lying in their mother's bed.
Fuchs (2000) [9]
- Why [is it hard to realize]? Like the blind with regard
- to the visible, the children have never seen it before.
- Even noble ones [see it] as babies [would glimpse]
- the sun from within the house where they are born.
Textual sources
Commentaries on this verse
Academic notes
- Digital Sanskrit Buddhist Canon Unicode Input
- Digital Sanskrit Buddhist Canon Unicode Input
- 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.
- VT (fol. 14r6) glosses "the three wisdoms" as "those of study, reflection, and meditation" and "people with wisdom" as "śrāvakas, pratyekabuddhas, and bodhisattvas."
- VT (fol. 14r7) glosses °madhya° as °sthāna°, while Takasaki suggests the reading °sudma° instead of °madhya° (DP khyim).
- Skt. mṛdukarmaṇyabhāvāt. DP read "since it is nondual and workable" (gnyis med las su rung ba’i phyir).
- Obermiller, E. "The Sublime Science of the Great Vehicle to Salvation Being a Manual of Buddhist Monism." Acta Orientalia IX (1931), pp. 81-306.
- 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.
- 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.