Overall Teaching

The night goddess Vāsantī dispels the darkness of ignorance in all sentient beings and guides them from fear in the darkness and other situations. She practiced as a woman for countless lives and explains her journey.

Summary

1. Going to Kapilavastu,^[1] Sudhana recalled Sthāvarā’s liberation.

2. He went around the city from left to right and went in from the east and stood in the crossroads. After the sun set he longed to see the night goddess Vāsantī^[2] and thought of her with great respect, looking over all things. Then he saw Vāsantī in a bright jeweled tower in the sky sitting on a lotus throne. She was very beautiful in appearance and was adorned with jewels, including a crest of the moon on her crown and clothing which reflected the stars and constellations on her body. He saw all the beings who she saved, and all her manifestations and powers, in all her pores.^[3]

3. Having seen her, Sudhana paid respects to her and requested she teach him bodhisattva practice. She replied:

a. It is good for Sudhana to be devoted to spiritual benefactors.

b. She attained a liberation which dispels darkness for all beings with the light of truth and sets all beings towards the path to buddhahood.

c. Anyone who travels on a dark night when it is hard to see, no matter how they travel, if they encounter troubles, she rescues them by various means, wishing to be a refuge for all beings.

d. For those on land on a dark night, she saves them by means of the sun, moon, stars, and other bright display, thereby wishing to be a savior for all beings.

e. For those on mountain paths, or those who have vain worldly gains, or have misery and fears, she produces refuges by various means such as providing shelter, or by showing the right path with things like bird songs. She wishes to rescue them also from saṃsāra.

f. For those stuck in a jungle on a dark night, afraid of perils like tigers, she shows the right way to go, and similarly wishes to free beings from craving and the thicket of views.

g. For those in the desert, she shows them the way, and similarly wishes to liberate beings from the desert of saṃsāra and set them on the road to buddhahood.

h. For those in the trouble of owning a home in an inhabited area, she removes their attachment and establishes them in non-reliant omniscience.

i. For those attached to their house and relatives in villages, she gives them gifts wish transfers to them freedom from clinging to the senses and releases them from the sphere of mundane objects.

j. For those who lose their directions and want to travel, in various situations, she shows them the right direction. For those who are suffering, she shows them how to get relief, such as ponds for the thirsty. She also uses the light of ignorance to help those who are on the wrong path of views and actions, and cling to the idea of a self and attach to the sense-faculties and break the precepts, who injure bodhisattvas, are hostile to the buddha-vehicle, who are on the brink of disaster. She shows them all the path to the stage of buddhahood with its ten powers, and establishes them in knowledge of the equality of all buddhas.

k. For those who are sick, old, poor, tortured, imprisoned, she employs all means to take care of them by constant attendance and regards their welfare as her own. She releases those in danger from their dangers, and wishes to also liberate them from their mental afflictions, liberating them from their greed, anger, and ignorance, giving them jewels of true teachings, establishing them in the realm free from old age and death.

l. For those on wrong paths, in the tangles of wrong views, doing wrong deeds, doing ascetic practices, regarding the awakened as unawakened and vice versa, she first becomes their refuge and then establishes them on the right path. Just as she establishes them on the right path, she wishes to liberate and help all beings transcend on the path towards omniscience and never turn away from the realm of all sentient beings at the same time.^[4]

4. Then, revealing the realm of liberation further, the goddess said in verse:

a. Her liberation of mind produces happiness and ends the darkness of delusion.

b. Her kindness is vast and pure and developed over many aeons.

c. Her compassion is boundless and sooths all pains.

d. She produces both worldly happiness and that of the sages.

e. Her liberation turns away from the ills of the conditioned.

f. Her eye is vast and sees all buddhas under the bodhi tree.

g. She sees countless buddhas, beings and their suffering.

h. She hears all beings’ words and keeps them in mind, as well as the buddhas’ teachings.

i. Her smell is far reaching and pure and is an entry into all states of liberation.

j. Her tongue is long and jewel-like, by which she communicates the Dharma.

k. Her Dharmakāya is pure and omnipresent, seen according to beings’ mentalities.

l. Her mind is free from attachment and sees all buddhas but with no discrimination.

m. She knows the minds of all beings and their faculties but with no discrimination.

n. Her secret power is vast and by that she tames the untamable.

o. Her virtue is endless.

p. She sees all buddhas, and sees Vairocana pervading all lands in the ten directions, expounding the Dharma at the foot of the bodhi tree.

5. Sudhana asked how long she set out for awakening. She explained:

a. In the past, there was an aeon in which five billion buddhas were born. In a certain land there was a city called Lotus Light whose king was Bridge of Good Law, he was a cakravartin.

b. Bridge of Good Law’s wife was Moon of Understanding of Right. In the east of that city, a Buddha called Supreme Thunder of all Truths attained awakening and lit up the entire world-system.

c. In that city, the night goddess, Pure Moonlight, told the queen that the Buddha attained awakening to the east, and praised that Buddha. Thus the queen went to that Buddha and offered to him and his sangha.

d. That queen was Vāsantī in her past life, and as a result of the roots of good planted by that offering, she has always attained celestial greatness and never came upon bad times. But didn’t fully develop her faculties after many aeons.

e. After many aeons, ten thousand aeons before now, a buddha called Light of Tranquil Eyes with Senses Like the Polar Mountain arose, and she, who was an outstanding girl, called Light of Wisdom, born to an eminent man, was informed of that buddha by the night goddess at that time, and she went to see that buddha.

f. Having visited that buddha with her family, having seen him, she attained samādhis and having heard his teaching she attained the liberation called “the means of guiding sentient beings by the light of truth which dispels the darkness for all sentient beings.” By virtue of this, she pervades ten billion lands and is at the feet of the buddhas in those lands, and she manifests an appearance to beings in all those lands according to what pleases their inclinations.

g. This liberation grows in each moment, and pervades even more buddha-lands with each moment, taking in each of their teachings. She also undertakes to purify all those lands and to transform her body to accommodate all beings in those lands.

6. She claimed that she only knows this liberation, but cannot teach the liberation of bodhisattvas who are completely versed in the infinite vow of Samāntabhadra. Thus, in this awakening site in Magadha, there is another night goddess called Samantagambhīraśrīvimalaprabhā. Sudhana should go to her and ask her to teach him.

7. Sudhana then praised the night goddess in verse, emphasizing:

a. How bright her appearance is and how her true body is without distinction and gathers all worlds.

b. How her mind pervades all space and buddhas, and is without taint.

c. Clouds raining ornaments issue from her pores, as well as bodies, and lands.

d. Those who hear her name have great gain.

e. One should endure aeons of misfortune to hear of her.

f. Her qualities cannot be exhausted if described for aeons.

8. Having thus praised her, Sudhana paid respects to her, and left.

[1] “Kapilavastu is called the Yellow City, representing knowledge uniting with the middle way. Yellow is the colour associated with the centre and with felicity.”

[2] Bodhisattvas from sections 34–43 represent the Ten Stages or Bhūmis. Vāsantī represents the first stage: Joy. “Vāsantī is said to be in charge of spring growth, symbolic of the production of myriad practices in the first stage. She is a night goddess to represent great knowledge in the night of birth and death.

“The next ten teachers beginning with this night goddess are female, emblematic of the great compassion of bodhisattvas, like a mother begrudging no effort to raise her children. As they are in the spiritual ranks—in charge of protecting and helping the world—even though they do not physically leave the Buddha’s assembly, they still can project their appearances throughout the ten directions.” (1605)

[3] Her clothing “represents how the first stage includes the laws of all the stages, so the awareness of great compassionate differentiating knowledge is comprehensive.”

[4] “The goddess said she had attained the liberation of the light of truth that dispels the darkness of ignorance in all sentient beings and was able to be a guide or make shelter, passage, and light on dark, stormy, and dangerous nights to free beings from fear of the darkness. This shows how the practice of great compassion is detailed and comprehensive. She also said she had always been a woman for countless aeons, practicing this teaching, showing how great compassion is so deep that it does not seek to leave the world, for in the original real universe there is no world to leave.” (1606)