[T]he clarification of the threefold truth. Many Sūtras contain the meaning [of the threefold truth] in detail, but the terms come from the Ying lo ching and the Jên wang ching, i.e., the truth of existence, the truth of non-Being, and the supreme truth of the Middle Way. This [Lotus Sūtra] also contains this meaning. [The chapter on] the life-span [of the Tathāgata] says, “neither like nor different.”⁶⁰⁵ This refers to the Middle Way. “Alike” refers to the real [truth] and “different” to the mundane [truth].

605

See the Lotus Sūtra. The context reads (Hurvitz, Lotus Sūtra, 239): “The Thus Come One in full accord with Reality knows and sees the marks of the triple sphere. There is no birth-and-death, whether withdrawal from or emergence into the world, nor is there any being in the world nor anyone who passes into extinction. (The triple sphere) is neither Reality nor vanity, neither likeness nor difference.” return