Having last month considered the attributes of the Buddha, we consider the Buddha’s manifestation in this saha world.
Your manifestation is nearly sixteen feet tall, aglow in purple-gold, Well proportioned, greatly radiant, and lustrous.
The tuft between your eyebrows curves like the crescent moon; the nape of your neck glows like the sun.
Your hair is dark blue and curly; there is a wen on the top of your head.
Pure eyes shine brightly as they blink up and down.
Eyebrows and eyelashes are deep blue and long; mouth and cheeks have fine definition:
Your lips and tongue are beautifully red, like vermilion fruits; White teeth, forty in number, are like snowy agates.
Your forehead is wide, your nose is full, and you have a welcoming face.
Your chest is like that of a lion, and it is marked with a svastika, the sign of virtue.
Hands and feet are flexible and have the mark of one thousand spokes.
Your armpits and palms are rounded; nothing escapes your grasp.
Your arms are long from shoulder to elbow to wrist; fingers are slender and straight.
Your skin is soft and delicate, and the hair on it curls to the right. Ankles and knees are not prominent; genitals, in equine manner,
are concealed.
You have slender muscles and ligaments, and your calves are
curved like a deer’s.10
Unblemished purity reflects on the outside and pervades within: You are pure water, never muddied or stained.
There are thirty-two aspects like these,
And eighty special features can similarly be seen.
But, in truth, you are without a form that has or does not have aspects.
All aspects of all things are beyond the scope of the eye.
The characteristic of your aspect-embodiment is that of having
no aspects;
The characteristic of the aspect-bodies of all living beings is the same.
You are able to inspire living beings to joyfully pay homage,
To deeply, sincerely, and devotedly show respect,
And, by such cause, to cast off arrogance and pride of self
And achieve a consummate embodiment such as this.
We, the assembled eighty thousand,
Collectively bow in homage to, and together take refuge in,
The Great Sage who is without attachment, the tamer of elephants and horses
Who has superseded emotion, conception, mind, volition, and discrimination;
We bow to and confide in the Dharma embodied—The synthesis of perfection in behavioral principles, concentration, discernment, emancipation, and perspective that pertains to emancipation;
And we bow to and take refuge in the wonderfully symbolic robe.
We bow to, and take refuge in, that which is hard to give form to in thought or in word!
This being the week of Hanamatsuri, see this post about the svastika, the sign of virtue, on the chest the Buddha.