PACIFIC WORLD - The Institute of Buddhist Studies

52
Pacific World
mentioned. 69 Two points in this passage are especially noteworthy. First,
using the toes as an example, the passage emphasizes how each mark
should be visualized and brought to clarity before proceeding to the next
mark. Second, the passage points out a critical phase of the visualization
when it gets to the visualization of the face. Should the face not be clear
the text does not tell the practitioner to redouble his or her efforts at
accomplishing the visualization. Rather the text instructs the practitioner
to cease the visualization and undergo a period of repentance. This will
purify the practitioner’s karma sufficiently so that the visualization
will then become clear and stable. This function of ritual repentance is
a theme this text comes back to repeatedly. Although later practitioners
of meditative visualization are not explicit on this point, this may also
be one of the reasons why meditative visualization and repentance have
had such a close relationship in China. I have been unable to find any
comparably explicit linkage between repentance and meditative clarity in
Indian Buddhist discussions of meditation. 70
The text continues with a brief description of the visualization done in
the normal order and then begins to describe the process of multiplying
the Buddha image. 71
After you have done it this way, to and fro, fourteen times, truly
visualize a single image making it perfectly clear and distinct.
When this visualization is entirely accomplished, whether coming
out of meditation or entering into meditation, one will continually
see the image standing before the practitioner. When you have
seen one clearly and distinctly, then imagine two images. When
you have finished seeing two images, next imagine three images,
and so on until you get to imagining ten [images], making them
all clear and distinct. After you have finished seeing ten images,
imagine a whole room full of Buddha images so that no spaces or
cracks are between them.
The text then describes another round of purification, vows, and ritual
repentance, this time in much greater detail. 72
After you have made the room full [of Buddha images], return
again to zealously lighting incense and scattering flowers. Sweep
the stūpa, plaster the earth, bathe the assembly of monks, and
massage and provide physical relaxation 73 for your father, mother,