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Sunday, January 11, 2015

Considerations of reputation or profit

"Moreover, among the translators of the sacred texts there have been those who were not thoroughly versed in Sanskrit or in Chinese, or those who, accustomed to the provisional teachings from their previous lives, distorted the meaning of the sutras and treatises pertaining to the true teaching so that it would accord with that of the provisional sutras and treatises. Similarly, among the Buddhist teachers in China there were those who, because they were accustomed to the provisional teachings they had known in their past lives, found the provisional sutras and treatises most congenial to their ways of thinking and declined to accept the principles of the true sutras. If they came on passages that differed even slightly from their own views in the matter, they twisted the logic of the passage and distorted it in interpretation so that it would accord with their own principles. Even if they later came to realize the truth of the matter, because they had considerations of reputation or profit in mind or did not wish to go against the inclinations of their lay supporters, they did not abandon the schools that adhered to the provisional teachings and join those that advocated the true teaching."

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