大波羅蜜

What This Concept Is Saying

"Mahāpāramitā" (大波羅蜜, "the great perfection") is not simply a matter of making pāramitā (波羅蜜, "perfection") bigger or stronger, nor is it a general reference to an especially generous or especially arduous good deed. In the classical sources, it has two related but distinct usages:

First, in the *Mahāprajñāpāramitā Sūtra* (《摩訶般若波羅蜜經》) and the *Da Zhidu Lun* (《大智度論》, Treatise on the Great Perfection of Wisdom, T1509), "mahāpāramitā" (摩訶波羅蜜) is an honorific for prajñāpāramitā (般若波羅蜜, "perfection of wisdom"). "Mahā" means "great," so the sūtra states directly: "是摩訶波羅蜜，是菩薩摩訶薩般若波羅蜜" (*"This is the mahāpāramitā; this is the prajñāpāramitā of the bodhisattva-mahāsattva"*). Here "great" primarily indicates that prajñā cannot be measured, delimited, or grasped, in parallel with such names as "immeasurable pāramitā" and "boundless pāramitā."

Second, in the *Sūtra of the Ultimate Meaning of Sequential Liberation, Grounds, and Pāramitās* (《相續解脫地波羅蜜了義經》, the chapter on grounds and pāramitās of the *Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra*), "mahāpāramitā" is a strict technical term of spiritual stages: from the eighth ground (bhūmi, 地) onward, when all kleśas (煩惱, "afflictions") are no longer present in activation (現行), the pāramitās cultivated by the bodhisattva are called "mahāpāramitā." This is not a state an ordinary practitioner can claim after a little effort, and even here one has not yet reached the ultimate fulfillment of buddhahood (佛地).

These two meanings do not compete with each other; rather, they speak of "great" from two angles: the prajñāpāramitā sūtras and treatises speak of "great" from the nature and characteristics of wisdom; the *Saṃdhinirmocana*-tradition sūtra speaks of "great" from the maturity of practice and whether afflictions are present in activation.

Let us first look at the first sense: why is prajñāpāramitā called "great"?

Pāramitā is usually explained as "reaching the other shore," which easily suggests: I stand on this shore of affliction, develop a certain ability, and then arrive at the far shore called nirvāṇa (涅槃). As an initial orientation this is not wrong, but prajñā continues to ask: do "I," "this shore," "the far shore," and "the one who crosses" really possess a fixed, unchanging, independently established self-nature (自性, svabhāva)? If nirvāṇa is treated as an ultimate prize to be possessed, then attachment to the far shore is still "dwelling" (住). The *Da Zhidu Lun* therefore also speaks of "no-far-shore pāramitā" (無彼岸波羅蜜): not a denial of liberation, but the statement that the true far shore is not an object that a self can appropriate.

The *Mahāprajñāpāramitā Sūtra* explains "great" through the "unattainability of the three times" (三際不可得): the past, future, and present of form (色) are all unattainable, and therefore form is called great; the same holds for feeling, perception, volitional formations, consciousness, and even all-knowledge (一切種智, sarvajñatā). "Unattainable" here does not mean that the empirical world is nothing at all; rather: if one seeks within the flow of causes and conditions (因緣, hetu-pratyaya) an independent, constant, self-subsistent entity, one cannot obtain it whether one searches from the past, present, or future.

Here the five aggregates (五蘊, pañcaskandha) in particular must be explained precisely:

- Form (色, rūpa) is not merely the "physical body" but the four great elements and the form derived from them, including both the body and external material phenomena such as the environment. - Feeling (受, vedanā) is the painful, pleasant, or neutral feeling that arises upon contact with an object; it is not the same as vague "emotion." - Perception (想, saṃjñā) is the grasping of marks, recognition, and labeling: recognizing this as a certain person, a certain tone, a certain kind of danger; it is not "having many thoughts" in the ordinary sense. - Volitional formations (行, saṃskāra) are the various volitional activities and corresponding mental processes that impel, organize, and enact bodily, verbal, and mental karma; they are not merely external actions. - Consciousness (識, vijñāna) is discernment that arises dependent on the sense faculties and their objects; it is not a permanent soul hiding behind body and mind.

Prajñā does not merely declare the "body" empty while preserving a real feeler, thinker, or observer. Form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness—even the attainments of practice—are all established within dependent origination (緣起, pratītyasamutpāda), and none can be grasped as substantially real in self-nature. Thus "great" is not the expansion of some entity to infinite size, but the fact that no single dharma can draw an ontological boundary around prajñā.

The *Da Zhidu Lun* also explains mahā through "not making discriminations" (不作分別): with regard to form, one "makes it neither great nor small" (不作大、不作小), neither "united nor dispersed" (不作合、不作散), neither "vast nor narrow" (不作廣、不作狹); feeling, perception, volitional formations, consciousness, and even the Buddha-dharma and the Buddha likewise do not fall into this kind of reifying discrimination. This is not a call to lose ordinary discernment. One must still distinguish red from green lights when crossing the street, and distinguish medications and dosages when caring for the sick. What it dismantles is the freezing of conventional discrimination into absolute reality: because someone fails at this moment, concluding that he is essentially a failure; because a feeling is intense, concluding that it must last forever; because one has done a good deed, constructing a solid "I am a rescuer."

Thus, non-discrimination (無分別, nirvikalpa) is not indiscriminateness; it is the ability to discriminate, to take responsibility, and to act, without mistaking the names and boundaries produced by discrimination for the unchanging essence of dharmas.

The sūtra also unfolds "great" through seven aspects of dharma-nature (法性, dharmatā): emptiness (空), separation (離), non-existence (無有), inconceivability (不可思議), non-extinction (不滅), unknowability (不可知), and non-accomplishment of power (力不成就), spoken from sentient beings and form up to the Buddha, all corresponding to prajñāpāramitā. These are not seven mutually isolated levels but seven angles from which attachment is blocked: no single item among sentient beings, the five aggregates, practice, and the fruit of buddhahood may be grasped as a self-nature entity; nor, conversely, may one grasp an entity called "emptiness."

This is precisely the pivotal position of mahāpāramitā within the six pāramitās (六波羅蜜, ṣaḍ-pāramitā). The six perfections are usually given as giving (布施, dāna), moral discipline (持戒, śīla), patience (忍辱, kṣānti), vigor (精進, vīrya), meditative concentration (禪定, dhyāna), and wisdom (般若, prajñā). Prajñā does not abolish the first five; it makes them stop revolving around a solid self:

- Giving without clinging to the giver, the recipient, or the thing given; only then does giving fail to become superiority and control. - Moral discipline without using precepts to manufacture status-pride; only then does discipline truly protect sentient beings. - Patience without repeatedly solidifying "I have been humiliated"; only then is patience not suppression and accumulated resentment. - Vigor without grasping at merit and progress; only then does vigor fail to become anxious self-management. - Meditative concentration without craving tranquil states; only then does concentration fail to become a refuge from reality. - Prajñā sees that all of the above arise dependently and cannot be grasped, steering the remaining perfections toward liberation.

Hence the *Mahāprajñāpāramitā Sūtra* says: "欲得諸波羅蜜，當學般若波羅蜜" (*"If one wishes to obtain all the pāramitās, one should study prajñāpāramitā"*). The meaning is not that only intellectual analysis of emptiness counts as practice, but that any virtuous action, in order to truly become a "reaching the other shore" action, requires prajñā to dissolve within it the attachment to self (我執), the attachment to dharmas (法執), and the mind of attainment (所得心).

Yet non-attainment (無所得, anupalambha) is absolutely not "doing nothing." The sūtra says that the bodhisattva teaches sentient beings to practice prajñā, and that the teacher, the taught, and the teaching are all illusion-like (如幻, māyopama); it also uses the simile of a magician conjuring a crowd. "Illusion-like" does not mean that the suffering of sentient beings is fake suffering that can be ignored; it means that although these phenomena are causally effective, they lack an independent, unchanging self-nature. A fire in a dream cannot burn down a house upon waking, but the fear in a dream can indeed startle the body awake; likewise, dependently arisen dharmas are not substantially real in self-nature, yet they have causality, suffering and pleasure, and responsibilities to bear. Precisely because a person is not permanently nailed down by some fixed nature, change and liberation are possible.

The second sense is the three stages set forth in the *Sūtra of the Ultimate Meaning of Sequential Liberation, Grounds, and Pāramitās*:

1. "Pāramitā" (波羅蜜): on the ground of resolve and practice (解行地), one cultivates virtuous dharmas such as giving; afflictions still arise, but the practitioner can subdue them and not be overcome by them. 2. "Superior pāramitā" (上波羅蜜): from the first ground (初地) onward, afflictions may still arise, but one can abandon them and not be defeated by them. 3. "Mahāpāramitā" (大波羅蜜): from the eighth ground (第八地) onward, "all afflictions, all are no longer present in activation" (一切煩惱一切不行); the practice of the pāramitās reaches a stage of high spontaneity and purity.

The criterion for these three levels is not how spectacular the good deeds are, but how deep a transformation has occurred in the relationship between the afflictions and the practitioner. The first level is like steadying a ship after the waves rise; the second not only steadies the ship but gradually eliminates the conditions that produce the waves; the third is when all afflictions are no longer present in activation.

The sūtra also uses the terms "harmful companion" (害伴), "weak envoy" (羸使), and "subtle envoy" (細微使) to describe the characteristics of afflictions on the various grounds: the fifth ground is called "harmful companion," the sixth and seventh "weak envoy," and the eighth "subtle envoy," and it explicitly states that above the eighth ground all afflictions are no longer present in activation. This cannot be loosely rendered as "the eighth-ground bodhisattva has nothing left to abandon." The sūtra also uses "the fault of the skin is severed, the fault of the flesh is severed, the fault of the bone is severed" (皮過斷、膚過斷、骨過斷) to indicate that the abandoning of delusion gradually deepens, and states that only buddhahood is ultimately free from all affliction-envoys (煩惱使, anuśaya). In other words, "afflictions are not present in activation" and "all affliction-envoys are ultimately and completely abandoned" are not the same statement; mahāpāramitā is extremely deep and vast, yet it is still not the fulfillment of buddhahood.

More importantly, this system of stages does not turn practice into a personal purification contest. The sūtra summarizes all the pāramitās: "悲為因，受報攝眾生為果，滿足大菩提為大義" (*"Compassion is the cause; receiving the reward and gathering in sentient beings is the fruit; fulfilling great awakening is the ultimate meaning"*). The starting point is great compassion (大悲, mahākaruṇā); the result is gathering in sentient beings with the body and abilities one has attained; the ultimate meaning is the perfection of great awakening (大菩提, mahābodhi). If so-called "higher practice" makes one increasingly indifferent to sentient beings and preoccupied with announcing one's own stage, that has already departed from the cause, fruit, and ultimate meaning of mahāpāramitā.

A Walkthrough in Daily Life

Consider a very contemporary scenario: you work overtime to finish a proposal, and the next day in the meeting your supervisor publicly says it "completely misses the point." Your chest tightens; back at your desk you keep refreshing the work chat and see a colleague's proposal being praised. In the evening your partner messages asking why you have not replied, and you almost blurt out: "Everyone thinks I'm no good."

Let us first walk through the five aggregates, without crudely translating them as "body, feelings, thoughts, behavior, soul."

- Form (色): the light in the meeting room, the supervisor's voice, the document on the screen, the colleague's expression, as well as your own body—tight shoulders, racing heartbeat—are all experiences within the range of form-dharmas. The form aggregate absolutely does not refer only to your physical body; sounds, visible shapes, and other external objects cannot be excluded either. - Feeling (受): the supervisor's words come into contact with conditions such as the ear faculty and ear consciousness, giving rise to an unpleasant feeling; seeing a colleague praised may also give rise to a painful feeling; when your partner shows concern, a pleasant feeling may briefly arise before being covered over by irritation. Feeling is the painful, pleasant, or neutral quality of experience. "I am ashamed" or "he is humiliating me" is already more than feeling; it includes perception's recognition and volitional formations' activity. - Perception (想): the mind grasps marks, recognizes, and labels—"this is criticism," "that expression is mocking me," "the supervisor favors my colleague." The core of the perception aggregate is mark-grasping recognition, not a general reference to all thoughts in the head. In particular, note: the supervisor did say the proposal missed the point—this is a verifiable piece of information; "everyone has concluded I am incompetent" may be a holistic label that perception has quickly completed on the basis of scant clues. - Volitional formations (行): subsequently arise the impulse to defend yourself, retaliatory silence, repeatedly refreshing the group chat, preparing to stay up all night redoing the work, the urge to snap at your partner, or the decision to pause for ten minutes before replying. The volitional activities that impel these bodily, verbal, and mental reactions belong to the volitional-formation aggregate. This aggregate is not present only after you actually send a message or slam a door; intentions, instigations, and habitual constructions not yet enacted outwardly are already within it. - Consciousness (識): ear consciousness discerns sounds, eye consciousness discerns text and expressions, and mental consciousness continues to discern and connect these contents. Consciousness arises dependent on faculties and objects; it should not be understood as a constant "true self" sitting inside watching the whole process.

After this walkthrough, prajñā does not command you to say "everything is empty, so my supervisor did not criticize me." The criticism did occur as a dependently arisen event, and it may contain valid feedback or inappropriate expression. What prajñā sees is: the supervisor's evaluation, the quality of the proposal, your present pain, and the conclusion "I am a failure" are not the same thing; they are temporarily assembled from different conditions and cannot be compressed into one eternal self-verdict.

Next, walk through the six pāramitās:

- Giving (布施) need not be money; it can also be giving attention, information, and opportunities for cooperation. You can ask the supervisor to point out the two most critical problems, or continue sharing the materials you have organized with the team. But if you trade on "I am so magnanimous, you should acknowledge my nobility," the virtuous deed is still bound by the mind of attainment. - Moral discipline (持戒) is not creating harm because you have been frustrated: not spreading rumors about colleagues, not attacking your partner with insulting language, not falsifying data to save face. Moral discipline also does not mean silently tolerating workplace bullying; if there is persistent humiliation or improper management, you can preserve the facts, clarify boundaries, and seek proper channels for redress. - Patience (忍辱) is not swallowing your grievance and pretending nothing is wrong, but not letting a wave of painful feeling immediately take over body, speech, and mind. You can endure the present discomfort, first discern which parts of the criticism are matters of fact and which are matters of expression, and then decide how to respond. Patience protects the clarity of action; it is not a convenience for protecting those who harm. - Vigor (精進) is persistently revising the proposal and your habits, not proving your worth through all-nighters and self-recrimination. What vigor counteracts is laziness and withdrawal; it is not endless self-exploitation. - Meditative concentration (禪定) is keeping attention from being continually hijacked by shame, comparison, and phone notifications. Even dwelling with the breath for a moment, clearly knowing that the painful feeling is changing, is creating the condition for not being carried along by afflictions. But temporary calm does not prove that afflictions have been abandoned, let alone the eighth ground's "all afflictions, all are no longer present in activation." - Prajñā (般若) is seeing that the entire event has no fixed core: the proposal can be revised, the relationship can be communicated about, the painful feeling will change, the label "failure" arises in dependence on conditions, and even "I am a person who is very good at contemplating" cannot be held on to. Thus you still revise the proposal, clarify boundaries, and apologize to your partner, but you need not accomplish these things by guarding a rigid self-image.

Here the three most common mapping errors are: understanding form (色) only as heartbeat and body, missing external objects such as screens and sounds; understanding perception (想) as "wild thoughts," missing the most basic recognition and mark-grasping; and understanding volitional formations (行) only as the final aggressive message sent, missing the comparing, justifying, avoiding, and retaliatory intentions already set in motion beforehand.

From the perspective of stages, the fact that you did not lose your temper this time only shows a certain capacity for awareness and subduing when afflictions arise; it cannot be called "mahāpāramitā" on that basis. The important task for ordinary people is not to hastily claim the eighth ground, but to see, endure, and transform afflictions more and more clearly as they arise, no longer completely dominated by them. Steadying one real step is closer to the path of liberation than imagining oneself already "free of afflictions."

Why Contemporary People Need It

Contemporary life is especially skilled at turning convenient labels into ontological judgments. Algorithms predict "what you like" from fragmentary behavior; performance systems use a few metrics to indicate "how much you are worth"; social platforms compress complex persons into avatars, positions, and popularity; and we, in turn, define ourselves by a single mistake, a relationship, a diagnosis, or an identity.

Mahāpāramitā reminds us: labels can have instrumental value, but they have no right to monopolize the whole truth of a person. "This is a preference inferred by an algorithm" is not the same as "this is who I am"; "I am anxious right now" is not the same as "I am essentially an anxious person"; "this child lost control today" is not the same as "he is a bad child." This is not self-consolation; it is refusing to mistake a dependently arisen process for a fixed self-nature.

One may also draw a limited analogy with AI: the output of a generative model depends on training materials, prompts, parameters, and the present context; it is not an independently self-producing sentence. Human experience likewise shows strong conditionality. But this is only an analogy to help understand "appearing in dependence on conditions"; one cannot thereby assert that AI mechanisms are identical to Buddhist dependent origination, nor that computational models have proven emptiness. Regarding the nature of consciousness and the relation between neural activity and subjective experience, science and philosophy still have many unresolved questions; what Buddhism is concerned with is not merely describing mechanisms but how to bring attachment and suffering to an end.

Mahāpāramitā also has a very practical value: it simultaneously guards against nihilism and moral narcissism.

If one hears only "emptiness," one might say: "Since it is all illusion-like, harming others is no big deal." But the emptiness of prajñā is precisely dependent-origination emptiness; actions produce consequences in dependence on conditions, so one must be all the more careful. If one hears only "do good," one might build an identity structure of "I am the rescuer, the other is the rescued," turning giving into control, moral discipline into judgment, and patience into oppression of the weak. Prajñā makes one take causality seriously without using merit to reinforce the self.

It also reinterprets freedom. People usually think freedom is "doing whatever I want," but if one must act the moment a desire arises, that is more like being automatically driven by affliction. The initial freedom of practice is that although afflictions arise, one is not conquered by them; a deeper freedom is that the power of afflictions is gradually abandoned; and the mahāpāramitā above the eighth ground described in the *Sūtra of the Ultimate Meaning of Sequential Liberation, Grounds, and Pāramitās* is the point at which all afflictions are no longer present in activation. Freedom, then, is not willful expansion but the layer-by-layer cessation of compulsive grasping.

However, the endpoint of mahāpāramitā is not a person finally obtaining permanent tranquility. That sūtra says "compassion is the cause," which already determines its direction: the deeper the wisdom, the more unobstructed the concern for sentient beings should be. What emptiness removes is not compassion but the possessiveness, bias, and self-performance within compassion; what non-attainment removes is not action but the demand "by this I become a great person."

Thus, the position of mahāpāramitā within the entire path of liberation can be summarized as: setting the perfections in motion with great compassion, using prajñā to keep the perfections from dwelling on persons, dharmas, and attainments, and through prolonged practice transforming layer by layer the modes in which afflictions arise, ultimately tending toward perfect awakening. It is at once a praise of the boundless depth and breadth of prajñā and a strict designation for bodhisattva practice matured to the eighth ground and above.

The widely known Heart Sūtra (《心經》) says "照見五蘊皆空" (*"clearly perceiving that the five aggregates are all empty"*), which helps one understand the direction of prajñā here: it is not merely negating the physical body but seeing that form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness all lack any graspable self-nature. The famous line of the Diamond Sūtra (《金剛般若波羅蜜經》), "應無所住而生其心" (*"one should give rise to the mind without dwelling anywhere"*), expresses a similar practical tension: it is not about not giving rise to mind or not performing good deeds, but about giving rise to giving, compassion, and the aspiration for awakening without dwelling on a fixed self, persons, merit, and attainment. Neither passage should be read as passive withdrawal; both teach one to take responsibility without dwelling.

Common Misreadings and Clarifications

First, the misreading that "mahāpāramitā is simply a pāramitā with more merit."

"More" is still a quantitative comparison. The *Da Zhidu Lun* explains "great" precisely through "neither great nor small, neither united nor dispersed, neither vast nor narrow." What it points to is not a larger asset of merit but prajñā's freedom from reifying discrimination. As for "great" in the sense of stage, the criterion is that all afflictions are no longer present in activation, which is also not a matter of the grand scale of good deeds.

Second, the misreading that "mahāpāramitā and prajñāpāramitā are two different teachings."

In the context of the *Mahāprajñāpāramitā Sūtra* and the *Da Zhidu Lun*, the two are related as praise and praised: "mahāpāramitā" is an honorific for the bodhisattva's prajñāpāramitā, listed alongside names such as "immeasurable" and "boundless." But in the *Sūtra of the Ultimate Meaning of Sequential Liberation, Grounds, and Pāramitās*, it is the name for the practice of the six perfections reaching a specific stage. One must first identify the source when reading; the definition of one system cannot be used to erase the other.

Third, the misreading that "emptiness means nothing exists, and since nothing exists there is no need to take responsibility."

What prajñā calls unattainable is the independent, unchanging self-nature of dharmas, not experience and causality altogether. Suffering arises in dependence on conditions, so it can be intensified and it can be alleviated; actions produce consequences in dependence on conditions, so compassion, moral discipline, and wisdom have real meaning. Reading emptiness as the cancellation of responsibility is annihilationism (斷滅見), not mahāpāramitā.

Fourth, the misreading that "non-discrimination means not judging."

What the texts dismantle is clinging discrimination, not the discernment necessary for worldly life. A doctor must distinguish conditions; parents must judge dangers; managers must evaluate proposals. But one need not turn a diagnosis, a performance, or a single mistake into a person's eternal essence. Prajñā keeps discrimination instrumental and prevents it from escalating into ontological verdict.

Fifth, the misreading that "since there is non-attainment, there is no need to cultivate the six perfections."

On the contrary, non-attainment is precisely the wisdom condition under which the six perfections become pāramitās. Giving must still be given, precepts must still be kept, harm must still be stopped, and sentient beings must still be gathered in; the practitioner simply does not grasp the giver, the recipient, merit, or the fruit as fixed entities. When the *Mahāprajñāpāramitā Sūtra* says "if one wishes to obtain all the pāramitās, one should study prajñāpāramitā," it does not replace the other perfections with prajñā but unifies and purifies them through prajñā.

Sixth, the misreading that "if afflictions are not expressed outwardly, they have already been abandoned."

A person may not have gotten angry because of fear of consequences, social etiquette, sheer exhaustion, or temporary meditative stillness; this only shows that outward behavior was inhibited, not that afflictions were not arising, and certainly not that the affliction-envoys have been ultimately and completely abandoned. The *Sūtra of the Ultimate Meaning of Sequential Liberation, Grounds, and Pāramitās* strictly distinguishes subduing, abandoning, and non-arising, and further explains that only buddhahood is ultimately free from all affliction-envoys.

Seventh, the misreading that "the mahāpāramitā of the eighth ground is already equivalent to becoming a Buddha."

The sūtra explicitly says that mahāpāramitā begins at the eighth ground, but it also uses "the fault of the skin is severed, the fault of the flesh is severed, the fault of the bone is severed" to show that the abandoning of delusion still has gradations, with only buddhahood being ultimate. Thus the eighth ground and above is extremely deep and vast, but it cannot be equated with buddhahood. "All afflictions, all are no longer present in activation" also cannot be freely rewritten as "all cognitive obstructions have been ultimately and completely abandoned."

Eighth, the misreading that "illusion-like means pretending that sentient beings are not suffering."

What "illusion-like" dismantles is substantial self-existence, not causal efficacy. Precisely because suffering is not a fixed essence, it can be understood, intervened in, and brought to an end; precisely because "evil person," "failure," and "hopeless case" are not unchangeable self-natures, compassion is not futile. The bodhisattva knows that the one who crosses, the one crossed, and the crossing itself are all unattainable, yet still gathers in sentient beings; this is wisdom and great compassion maturing together, not using emptiness to bypass suffering.

Ninth, the misreading that "the higher one cultivates, the less feeling one has and the more one withdraws from people."

Mahāpāramitā has compassion as its cause, gathering in sentient beings as its fruit, and perfect awakening as its ultimate meaning. What it reduces is defilement, possessiveness, and compulsive reactivity, not the shaving of care into coldness. True "non-dwelling" enables one to approach suffering more closely without being swallowed by one's own self-drama; true "no-self" is not that no one takes responsibility, but that responsibility is no longer turned into self-glorification.

In the final analysis, the "great" of mahāpāramitā is not that the self becomes incomparably great, but that the measure of egocentrism can no longer enclose wisdom and compassion. Prajñā enables the practitioner to see: this shore cannot be grasped, the far shore cannot be grasped; sentient beings cannot be grasped, the fruit of buddhahood cannot be grasped. Yet within all this non-graspability, giving still occurs, moral discipline remains firm, patience, vigor, and concentration are still cultivated, and the suffering of sentient beings is still seriously attended to.

This is its deepest power: acting without grasping anything, yet not ceasing to act because there is nothing to grasp.