Translated into English by Rev. Jikai 慈海 Tyler Dehn
©Translation by Jikai Tyler Dehn @ The Saichō Repository 最澄典藏 Project, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Available at: [https://tendaiaustralia.com/text-75/].
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阿字無點字名阿字。阿字者以無義曰阿。無者以無點曰無也。故大師所立阿者無也（云云）。
The [Sanskrit] letter “A” that is without a diacritical mark, [is what we mean when we] speak of the letter “A”. [That is,] the letter “A”, by means of the without-ness/absence (negation) of a thing, expresses “A”. And without-ness/absence (negation), by means of the absence of [diacritical] marks expresses “without-ness/absence”! This is why the Great Masters established that “A”, is ‘without-ness’…so it is said…
今謹案。曰阿者以實相一心名阿字。實相無其形。故以空相。阿字實相。以眞心爲體故名阿。雖諸法多無過今阿字者。大小諸乘在阿字一心。
Carefully consider that:
It is said that it is because [it embodies] the True Characteristic of the One Mind that “A” , is called the letter “A”. The True Characteristic is without such form, and therefore it is by emptiness (śūnyatā-lakṣaṇa) that it is characterised (i.e. ‘without-ness”). Because it takes the True Mind as its essence, the True Characteristic [that is the] letter “A”, is called the letter “A”. Although the various dharmas are many, they do not go beyond the present letter “A”, and the Mahāyāna, Hīnayāna, and the sundry vehicles abide in the One Mind that is [this very] letter “A”.
尋諸法者。一如無二如。阿者名毘盧遮那遍一切處。故以阿字。名大毘盧遮那。十方遍法界諸尊。從阿字一心流出。遍十
方法界。説法利生。譬如草木從一地生成菓。草木從一地出生。始
從阿字一心。萬品出生後成菓。從一心流出後遍法界。説法利生。阿字與草木。於一無在二而已。
Upon examining the myriad dharmas, [one discerns] that they are the One Suchness, for there is no ‘second suchness’. “A”, is [therefore] named Vairocana, who pervades all places. And this is why “A” is [further] named “Mahā” Vairocana. All of the World-Honoured Ones who pervade the Dharmadhātu in the ten directions, flow out from this letter “A”, and pervading the ten directions of the Dharmadhātu, they expound the Dharma and benefit beings.
It is akin to the grasses and trees which emerge from the one earth to bear fruit. [For just] as the grasses and trees emerge from the one earth, so too do the ten thousand things arise from the One Mind of the Letter “A”, and later bear fruit. From the One Mind they flow out, and later pervade the Dharmadhātu, expounding the Dharma and benefiting beings. The Letter “A”, and the grasses and trees, are nothing more than the one, for there is no two!
Saddharmatā 