World Honoured One, if both seeing and hearing are beyond birth
and death, why has the Buddha said that we have lost (sight of) our
True Nature and so acted in an inverted manner? Will you be
compassionate enough to enlighten us, and so wash off our defiling
dust? Thereupon the Buddha lowered His golden hued arm with
the fingers pointing downward and asked Ananda: As you now see my
hand, is it in a correct or inverted (position)?
Ananda replied: All worldly men regard this as inverted but I
myself do not know which position is correct or inverted. The
Buddha asked: If they hold that it is inverted, which position do
they consider to be upright?
Ananda replied: If the Buddha holds up His hand pointing to the
sky, it will be upright.
The Buddha then held up His hand and said:
If worldly men so discriminate between an upright and inverted
hand, they will in the same way differentiate between your body and
the Buddha's pure and clean Dharmakaya and will say that the
Tathagata's body is completely enlightened whereas yours is upside
down. If you look closely into your body and the Buddha, where is
this so called inversion?