尔时,如来威神力故,十方各有一大菩萨,一一各与十佛刹微尘数菩萨俱,从十方来,其名曰:功德林菩萨、慧林菩萨、胜林菩萨、无畏林菩萨、惭愧林菩萨、精进林菩萨、力林菩萨、行林菩萨、觉林菩萨、智林菩萨。尔时,世尊不离菩提树下,而升夜摩天宫。夜摩天王遥见佛来,即以神力庄严此宫,置普胜妙宝莲华藏师子之座,其座百万层级,种种庄严。
逐句解释
如来威神力故,十方各有一大菩萨……从十方来
每一次法会开始,《华严经》都以同一个模式展开:因佛陀威神力的感应,十方(东西南北、四隅、上下共十方)各来一位大菩萨,各携无数随行菩萨。「十林菩萨」(功德林、慧林、胜林……)的名字都含「林」字——树林是无数树木共生的生态,象征华严的「众缘共生、一多相摄」世界观。菩萨从十方而来,本身就是「十方世界皆一法界」的象征性显现。
By the awesome spiritual power of the Tathagata, from each of the ten directions came one great bodhisattva, each accompanied by bodhisattvas as numerous as motes of dust in ten Buddha-lands.
The ten "Forest Bodhisattvas" (林菩萨) — Merit Forest, Wisdom Forest, Victory Forest, and so on — carry names that deliberately echo the image of a forest: a community of countless individual trees that together form a single living whole. This is the Avatamsaka's ecology of awakening. No bodhisattva arrives alone; each brings a retinue as vast as the universe itself. The arrival from all ten directions also enacts the sutra's central philosophical claim: all directions, all realms, all beings are already encompassed within the one Dharma-realm. The assembly is not travelling to the Buddha; the Buddha's world is expanding to include everything.
世尊不离菩提树下,而升夜摩天宫
这是《华严经》最具标志性的悖论之一:佛陀「不离菩提树下」——从未离开菩提树下的座位——却同时「升夜摩天宫」——升往夜摩天宫。两者同时为真。这不是神话式的叙述技巧,而是华严哲学的核心:佛陀的法身遍满一切处,祂不需要移动就已经在一切地方。「不离而升」正是「理事无碍」(真理与现象无障碍互融)的直接表达。
The World-Honoured One, without leaving his seat beneath the Bodhi Tree, ascended to the Yama Heaven Palace.
This paradox — simultaneously present at the Bodhi Tree and ascending to a heavenly realm — is one of the Avatamsaka's most distinctive structural features. It recurs at each ascent to a new heaven. From a conventional standpoint it is logically impossible; from the Avatamsaka's standpoint it is simply a description of the nature of Buddha-reality. The Dharmakaya (法身), the true body of the Buddha, is not located anywhere in particular and therefore is located everywhere simultaneously. The sutra is not asking us to suspend disbelief; it is training us to see reality differently — to move from the mind that says "one thing can only be in one place" to the mind that can hold interpenetration (相即相入) as a lived understanding.
夜摩天王遥见佛来,即以神力庄严此宫
夜摩天(Yāma Heaven)是欲界第三天,也称「时分天」或「善时天」——居此天者,感知不到痛苦,唯有快乐。夜摩天王遥见佛陀(「遥见」——在远处就能感知佛的到来),立即运用神力庄严宫殿、准备莲花座。天王以宫殿庄严礼敬佛陀,是《华严经》反复出现的模式:每一层宇宙的主人都以其所拥有的最美好事物来供养佛陀,象征一切世间共同皈依、共同供奉法界。
The Yama Heaven King, seeing the Buddha coming from afar, immediately used his spiritual powers to adorn this palace.
The Yama Heaven (夜摩天) is the third of the six desire-realm heavens, a realm said to be free of suffering, where time passes only in joy. The king's immediate, spontaneous response to the Buddha's approach — adorning the palace before the Buddha even arrives — is a gesture of total receptivity. It mirrors the proper inner response to the approach of awakening: we do not wait to be forced into readiness, but prepare joyfully the moment we perceive it coming. The prepared lion throne of precious jewelled lotuses, with its hundred thousand tiers, is the Avatamsaka's characteristic way of showing that no existing magnificence is adequate to honour Buddha-reality, yet the effort to offer it is itself the teaching.
置普胜妙宝莲华藏师子之座,其座百万层级,种种庄严
「师子之座」(师子座,即法座)是佛陀说法之处的传统称谓,狮子象征无畏。「普胜妙宝莲华藏」意为「以殊胜妙宝的莲花为庄严藏」——这既是宝物,也是整部《华严经》核心象征的回响:「华藏世界」(莲花藏庄严世界)。「百万层级」并非字面数字,而是「无量无边、层层叠叠」的语言表达,象征佛陀之座所统摄的世界是无量层次的宇宙结构。这把椅子,是整个宇宙为佛陀准备的。
A lion throne of universally supreme jewelled lotus-treasury was set out, its seat of a million tiers, adorned with every kind of splendour.
The "lion throne" (师子座) is the traditional term for the Buddha's teaching seat — the lion symbolises fearlessness and the power of the Dharma-roar. The description of this particular throne deliberately echoes the name of the entire cosmos described in Chapter 5: the Lotus-Treasury World (华藏世界). The throne is a microcosm of the universe. Its million tiers mirror the countless levels of reality that the Avatamsaka maps: from the most ordinary visible phenomena to the most subtle interpenetrations of the Dharmadhatu. Preparing such a throne is an act of total offering — the entire resources of heaven placed at the service of wisdom.
总结 · Summary
第十九品以华严式的宇宙升腾开场:佛陀「不离菩提树而升夜摩天宫」,同时身处人间道场与天宫,具体呈现了「法身无所不在」的华严核心。十方十位林菩萨各携无数眷属云集,夜摩天王以庄严宫殿、宝莲法座相迎。这一品不说法,只是铺陈气场——为接下来的十行法门建立宇宙级的庄严场景。
Chapter 19 opens the Avatamsaka's third great assembly with its characteristic cosmological theatre. The Buddha is simultaneously at the Bodhi Tree and in the Yama Heaven — this paradox is not glossed over but stated plainly, because it is the teaching: the Dharmakaya is omnipresent, not located. Ten Forest Bodhisattvas arrive from ten directions, each bringing vast retinues, and the Yama Heaven king prepares an offering of total splendour. No doctrine is expounded here; this chapter's entire function is to establish the sacred space — the luminous, boundless context — within which the Ten Practices (十行) of Chapter 21 will be taught. In the Avatamsaka, the setting is always already part of the teaching.