Fazang on Awakening of Faith

[Nicholas Weeks]

This is mainly a request for a source that would have a price way under $240 for this translation. Found by ordering direct from Mellen Press it is a mere $160.

http://www.biblio.com/book/english-tran ... /344652348

Secondarily, has anyone read this?

[Nicholas Weeks]

An important translation of, perhaps, the most influential Dharma shastra in Eastern Asia.

Fa-tsang begins:

The True Mind that is serene and vast is separate from the words and forms found in the fish nets and hare snares (of deluded conceptualization). Abstrusely boundless, invisible and inaudible, it is neither the object of that which knows nor the subject of that which is known. It is neither produced nor destroyed and is not something affected by the four momentary states. Neither coming nor going, none of the three time periods can change it. But taking non-abiding as its nature, it flows and branches, rising and falling in accord with (the arising of) delusion and enlightenment. So, in dependence on causes and conditions it does arise and is destroyed.

[Ayu]

Wonderful.

[Nicholas Weeks]

Starting to study this overpriced text (Mellen is like that) and Fa-tsang is wonderful!

Save your dollars or find a used or library copy - it is a sublime teaching - highly recommended. Or pay the full price... http://mellenpress.com/mellenpress.cfm?bookid=5935&pc=9

[Nicholas Weeks]

Some more from the beginning:

Nevertheless, though multitudes of phenomena repeatedly arise, rousing and popping about, (such activity) has never yet moved the Mind’s Origin. Still and quiet, empty yet formed it does not stand in opposition to karmic results. So, utilizing an unchanging nature it nevertheless dependently arises so that the pure and the impure are constantly differentiated. Yet, in not abandoning conditions as Thusness, the sage and the common man become one.

It is just like waves which because they are not different than the water’s movement, are just the water differentiated into waves. Furthermore, because the water itself is not different than the stream of flowing waves, it is just the waves manifest on the water. Because of this, movement and quiescence interpenetrate, the ultimate and the conventional interfuse, and samsara and nirvana uniformly pervade one another.