Buddhāvataṃsaka Sūtra I: 10 Names of Dukkha in Sahāloka According to Ch. 8 of Fóhuāyán Jīng

This is a bit of an esoteric post. It is meant to supplement my studies in Buddhism, particularly of the Fóhuāyán Jīng (Chinese) or Buddhāvataṃsaka Sūtra (Sanskrit). The work only survives fully in Chinese, so I will be using the Chinese translation extensively.

In chapter 8 of the work, the Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī recites 400 different names, 40 for each of the Four Noble Truths in 10 "worlds."

The first world on our list is Sahāloka (Ch. 娑婆 suōpó), or the mundane world. The first of the Four Noble Truths is dukkha (苦 kǔ), or suffering.

I will first refer to the English and Chinese name according to this translation by the City of 10,000 Buddhas which is freely available online. I will also be providing the meaning of the name according to the commentary by Master Hsuan Hua.

The ten names are:

1. Offense, or 罪 zuì. Hsuan Hua says:

"Because you have offenses, you have suffering. If you don’t have any offenses, you won’t suffer. And if you don’t suffer, you don’t have offenses. So another name for suffering is 'offenses.'"

2. Opression, or 逼迫 bīpò. Hsuan Hua says:

It oppresses your body and mind.

3. Flux and change, or 變異 (biànyì). Hsuan Hua says:

This flux and change refers to the process of decay.

4. Grabbing onto conditions, or 攀緣 (pānyuán). Hsuan Hua says:

The motto of Gold Mountain Monastery and The City of Ten Thousand Buddhas is, “Freezing to death, we don’t climb on conditions,” which is to say, even if we were freezing to death, we wouldn’t create offenses by seeking advantage from people. The suffering of freezing to death is not as severe as creating offenses. Being opportunistic is also a form of suffering.

5. Conglomeration, or 聚 jù. Hsuan Hua says:

This means the aggregation of your offense karma. Here it doesn’t mean piling up your virtuous practices; it means piling up all of our offense karma.

6. Thorns, or 刺 cì. Hsuan Hua says:

Sometimes, suffering is called thorns. When you’re pierced by it, it hurts.

7. Relying on the root, or 依根 yī gēn. Hsuan Hua says:

... relying on the root of offenses.

8. Vain and deceptive, or 虛誑 xūkuáng. Hsuan Hua says:

You do a lot of empty and false things to cheat people.

9. Carbuncles and sores, or 癰瘡處 yōng chuāng chù. Hsuan Hua says:

This is like when your body breaks out in sores and starts to ooze blood and pus. Your precious energy leaks out through the sores and your body loses its health and vitality. Likewise, when you experience suffering, it takes away all your energy. The more suffering and abuse you go through, the more your self-nature loses its light and suffers a beating.

10. Conducts of stupid people, or 愚夫行 yúfū xíng. Hsuan Hua says:

Stupid people are those without wisdom. Because of a lack of wisdom, everything they do is offense karma. With offense karma, there is suffering.

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