A Detailed Exposition of the Vimalakirti Sutra 

by Grandmaster Lu, Living Buddha Lian Sheng of the True Buddha School 

Translated into English by the True Buddha School Vimalakirti Translation Team 

Discourse 19, 23 July 2022 - Chapter One—Buddhaverse (Continued)    

Chapter One—Buddhaverse 

They understood [the true reality beyond] all phenomena including the [spiritual] roots of sentient beings. They gained fearlessness and shielded beings from their fears. They trained their minds through the spiritual cultivation of merit, virtue, and wisdom. [1]

Now, we will talk about the Vimalakirti Sutra: They trained their minds through the spiritual cultivation of merit, virtue, and wisdom. Reading this, you might think there’s nothing more to say about it, right? It seems simple; it only talks about using merit, virtue, and wisdom to cultivate. But there is much more than meets the eye. Within this sentence, there is a great lesson to be learned. 

Vimalakirti is incredible, and he told me how to explain this passage. Let me explain merit (gong), virtue (de), jnana (zhi), and prajna (hui) one by one and dissect their meanings. Merit refers to external cultivation: generosity, acts of giving, and all good deeds. Virtue refers to the internal cultivation of our heart-mind. Jnana is tangible and refers to outer wisdom or the wisdom of existence, while prajna is intangible and refers to inner wisdom or the wisdom of emptiness. In buddhadharma, prajna signifies emptiness, while jnana denotes existence.

In terms of the wisdom of existence and emptiness, merit, such as giving and good deeds, are external, and they are considered existence. While virtue, which is internal, belongs to emptiness. Likewise, jnana is the wisdom of existence and prajna is the wisdom of emptiness.

According to Vimalakirti, you cultivate your mind by cultivating merit, virtue, jnana, and prajna. Let me relate it to the Vajra Sutra. Merit is considered the conditioned dharma, and virtue is the unconditioned dharma. How should we practice our minds? It is neither acting with conditions nor non-acting. Instead, we act without any conditions.

The three key points are acting, non-acting, and acting without conditions.[2] The first one is acting or doing with a purpose or condition. The second is not acting, not doing, or not exerting. And the last one is acting and doing but without any conditions. 

The Vajra Sutra states: Everything conditional is a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow. It is like a dewdrop or a flash of lightning. Always keep this in mind!

All conditioned actions are empty. All your good deeds, however much, are [intrinsically] empty. It’s just that mundane beings do not know that they are empty. They think doing something [good or important] is a good thing, but not necessarily. It is inherently the same as non-action.

According to Sakyamuni Buddha, “acting” refers to all actions with a purpose, such as gaining fame, benefits, or any material possessions such as houses, cars, and more. This is also called the conditioned dharma. As we know, everything conditional is ultimately empty.

Now, what is the unconditioned dharma? It is when you act or do without any conditions at all. The conditioned dharma belongs to the worldly path, whereas the unconditioned dharma belongs to the enlightenment path beyond the saha world (out-of-worldly path). 

The most important assertion in the Vimalakirti Sutra is neither worldly nor beyond-worldly; it is neither being of the world nor leaving it. Instead, Vimalakirti incorporates both worldly and out-of-worldly paths. When you do this, it is called unconditioned action. It means one acts or does anything without reasons, motives, or expectations. Doing without condition is when you have no specific intent, but you still do it anyway.

Many people don’t really understand acting with conditions, non-acting, and acting without conditions. In explaining this phrase, I need to clarify these three kinds of actions for you to understand. And it is very difficult to explain. 

Acting with conditions is when you do things with intention. For example, you act to lure a beauty or to do something to gain money, houses, or cars. These are all considered conditional or conditioned actions. [Conditioned dharma refers to this. Whereas unconditioned dharma refers to acting without conditions.]

What is non-action? Non-action is when you don’t want and don’t do anything. Say, you want to leave the world, so you go up the mountains and live in caves. You are not in contact with anyone until old age and eventually die. You eat vegetables that you plant yourself. You practice all by yourself and isolate yourself from the world. Not striving is considered non-action.

Vimalakirti states that both acting with conditions and non-acting are not good. Living and practicing in isolation brings no benefit to sentient beings. That’s no good! By the same token, working so hard to earn money to buy a house and car or marry a beautiful girl is not good either. Both of them are not right. What should you do then?

Vimalakirti says it is best to act without conditions. You don’t do things for the sake of houses, cars, a beautiful lady, fame, name, benefits, looks, and the like. Vimalakirti says, only this would be right! This is the third kind of conduct—unconditioned action—doing without any condition. I carry out my actions not for the sake of a house, car, beautiful lady, reputation, or anything else. Do you understand? 

If you truly want to cultivate your heart-mind, you need to act without condition. On the other hand, acting with condition is too mundane. And non-action is too sagely. Instead, you combine the mundane and the sagely together and act without condition. This is called unconditioned actions.

Spiritual cultivation is unlike what the ancient hermits believed. They thought that spiritual cultivation needed to be done all alone deep in the mountains, without any contact or care for the world and its sentient beings. They left everything behind and stayed there until their death. Vimalakirti disapproves of this kind of non-action.

On the other hand, Vimalakirti also disapproves of acting with conditions, like if you intend to get rich or become a politician, etc. It is not good to do such things in this world with a certain intent. However, if without any intent or expectation, you just do your best and earn a lot of money, and you give it away to help other beings without any motives or conditions, then Vimalakirti says this is right! This is acting without conditions! 

According to Vimalakirti, this is how we should cultivate spiritually through practicing merit, virtue, jnana, and prajna. While merit is external, virtue is internally embedded in it. Jnana pertains to the external wisdom, and prajna pertains to emptiness. The correct way is to cultivate all these accordingly. That’s my explanation of this phrase. 

Om mani padme hum. 

Next discourse on the Vimalakirti Sutra: Discourse 20, 24 July 2022 - Chapter One—Buddhaverse (Continued)

Previous discourse on the Vimalakirti Sutra: Discourse 18, 17 July 2022 - Chapter One—Buddhaverse (Continued)

Index of links to all discourse on the Vimalakirti Sutra: https://en.tbsn.org/guidem/detail/2975/ 

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Full webcast of 2022.07.23 Ksitigarbha Bodhisattva Group Practice (Ling Shen Ching Tze Temple, Redmond, USA) and dharma discourse with English interpretation: https://youtu.be/EUjZbLm_lF4