The Thirteenth of 108 Gates Of Dharma Illumination

[Shokai]

13) The Thirteenth Gate: Mindfulness of the heavens.

Mindfulness of the heavens is a gate of Dharma illumination; for it gives rise to a wide and big mind.(Nishijima/Cross)

Mindfulness of heaven is a gate of realizing Dharma; it arouses vest aspiration. (Tanahashi)

Gate Gatha:

May we, together with all buddhas;
Nurture our appreciation of the heavens
That we may actualize the spaciousness of Big Mind.

Reflection Prompts:

1. Does mindfulness of the heavens require visualization?

2. What is vast aspiration?

3. Are these two translation conveying the same thought?

Capping Verse:

Such room for all things
And then some
No walls in the sky

[aprapti]

aprapti


sat

[Tairin]

Thank you Shokai.

My response to your reflection prompts……I spend a lot of time in my own head. That tends to keep “reality” very near me like a bubble that surrounds me. It is when I look up and out into the distance that I seemingly break that closeness and experience the vastness around me. Similarly gazing up into the sky breaks that closeness particularly clear dark nights.


Tairin
Sat today and lah

[Tai Do]

Thank you, Shokai, for bringing us the Thirteenth Gate.

1. Does mindfulness of the heavens require visualization?

For those of us with good sight, it only requires to look up; for those with bad or no sight, it requires imagination and visualization. Either way, we see the clear blue sky with or without clouds at daytime or endless darkness punctuated by stars with or without clouds at nightime.

2. What is vest aspiration?

It is the aspiration to wear the Tatagatha's teachings, which are endless, beyond form and formless, and save all sentient beings.

3. Are these two translation conveying the same thought?

I think the heavens/sky metaphor is used for the Mind in Nishijima-Cross translation, and Tanahashi's introduce a new metaphor of the vest, which I interpret as the Kesa representing the boundless Dharma of all Buddhas and Ancestors and the Bodhisattva Vow to save all sentient beings from dhukkha.

Gassho,
Mateus
Satlah

P.S.: I answered to a version that had a typo in the Tanahashi version. The version I used reads:

Mindfulness of heaven is a gate of realizing Dharma; it arouses vest aspiration.

While the correct one reads:

Mindfulness of heaven is a gate of realizing Dharma; it arouses vast aspiration.

[Guest]

Does mindfulness of the heavens require visualization?

2. What is vast aspiration?

3. Are these two translation conveying the same thought?

1. Right now, I see the tree outside the window and the clouds appear to obscure the Sun. No visualization required.
2. Mindfulness requires returning to the life we somehow have refused over and over. The aspiration to return to this life means that our deluded thoughts of separation dissolve and we once again hold and are held by the vastness of the heavens.
3. I think Nishijima/Cross point to this wide and big mind that is our true nature. Whereas Tanahashi's is a bit more elusive although both point to the same place. Good to have both translations on hand as sometimes one hits the mark easier than the other. But, then maybe next week the other translation hits the mark better.

Gassho,

Bill (Daiman)
Stlah

[Shokai]