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THE DIAMOND SUTRA

The Lord Buddha thereupon addressed Subhuti, saying: "If there were any real or permanent quality in merit, the Lord Buddha would not have spoken of such merit as 'considerable.' It is because there is neither a tangible nor material quality in merit, that the Lord Buddha referred to the merit of that disciple as 'considerable.'"

The Lord Buddha addressed Subhuti, saying: "What think you? Can the Lord Buddha be perceived by means of his perfect material body?"[1] Subhuti replied, saying:

merit indeed!"—The Vagrakkhedika.—Max Müller

Within the meaning of the Buddhic Law, charity is purely a spiritual concept; and merit consequent upon fulfilling the Law of charity, must have a purely spiritual realisation. This is the sense in which the Lord Buddha referred to merit as "considerable."—Chinese Annotation.

  1. ↑ "The first of the Buddha's bodies is the Dharma-Kaya (body of the Law), supposed to be a kind of ethereal essence of a highly sublimated nature and co-extensive with space.
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