The Essence of the Heart Sutra
Section 3 Bodhisattvas with Right Knowledge and Right Awareness Attain Nirvāṇa
Sutra text: 【无挂碍故。无有恐怖。远离颠倒梦想。究竟涅槃。】
I. Bodhisattvas Fear Neither Birth nor Death and Save Sentient Beings
After a bodhisattva realizes ultimate reality, he gradually gains the wisdom to transcend birth and death, gradually dissolves the terror of birth and death within the five aggregates, and no longer fears drifting alongside sentient beings through the six realms. The bodhisattva knows that in order to accomplish his own future Buddha pure land, he must extensively deliver sentient beings and benefit them; therefore the bodhisattva dares to make vows, using countless five-aggregate bodies in future lives to benefit himself and others. He will not, like arhats and pratyekabuddhas, take extinction early out of fear of the suffering of birth and death in the six realms' saṃsāra, entering nirvāṇa without remainder. The bodhisattva does not take nirvāṇa without remainder; in order to become a Buddha and to have sentient beings delivered, he relies on the nirvāṇa true mind, the tathāgatagarbha, without being encumbered by the afflictions of the five aggregates' birth and death, never extinguishing the five-aggregate body, and never leaving the three realms to escape suffering feelings.
The bodhisattva is also unafraid of descending into the three evil realms to deliver sentient beings, knowing that the three evil realms are an illusion, and may as well use this illusion to perform great dreamlike Buddha activities. When Śākyamuni, the World-Honored One, was a bodhisattva, out of great compassion for the suffering of sentient beings, he also often descended into the hells to deliver beings. The bodhisattva Śākyamuna went to the hells by the power of his vows to save sentient beings; he did not create hell karma, and thus had no karmic retribution of hell, so the painful retribution of hell could not be inflicted upon the bodhisattva's physical body. If the bodhisattva, out of compassion for sentient beings, resolved to undergo the painful retribution of hell on their behalf, the moment he made that resolve, a blow from the hell guardians would strike him dead, and the bodhisattva would then emerge from the hell.
If in the future we encounter the conditions and resolve to become a horse in order to deliver those fellow practitioners of the horse species—because they created evil karma in past lives and were reborn as horses in this life, yet the conditions for their deliverance have ripened—would we dare to go? Many people say they dare not; not daring is normal, because one does not yet have that ability and courage, and there are still many lingering worries in the mind. After attaining realization and cultivating to a certain degree to have that ability, one will have that courage. At that time, even if you took a horse womb and became an animal, you would not have the painful retribution that other horses have. Just like Śākyamuni Buddha, who, in order to deliver five hundred bodhisattvas who had fallen into the horse realm, accepted an invitation to a donor's home; the donor neglected the offering, and the Buddha ate horse fodder for three months. Yet the same horse fodder, when eaten by the Buddha, tasted better than celestial delicacies, because the Buddha's retribution is supremely excellent—whatever food or drink, once in his mouth, is the most delicious. As bodhisattvas cultivate diligently without cease, advancing from bhūmi to bhūmi, their retribution will also become ever more excellent, and in order to save and draw out sentient beings, they will no longer fear birth and death.
II. Sentient Beings Invertedly Grasp the False as True
When the bodhisattva relies on the tathāgatagarbha, which has no birth and death, there is no terror; gradually he will distance himself from all kinds of inverted dreams and thoughts, and the mind gains bright wisdom. Sentient beings' inversions total eight kinds: (1) taking suffering as bliss and bliss as suffering; (2) taking emptiness as existence and saying existence is empty; (3) saying the impermanent is permanent and the permanent is impermanent; (4) taking the non-self as self and the self as non-self. These four items expanded are the eight kinds of inverted wrong views.
When the Buddha first began teaching the Dharma, he first taught the conventional truth, telling sentient beings that the five aggregates are suffering, empty, impermanent, and non-self. When the Buddha was on the verge of nirvāṇa, he taught the Great Nirvāṇa Sūtra, teaching the true ultimate truth—the permanence, bliss, self, and purity of the Buddha ground. On the surface, the earlier and later teachings appear inverted, but in reality both are truth, merely at different levels, both used to counteract sentient beings' inverted thoughts. Sentient beings take the suffering of the five aggregates as bliss, take the non-self five aggregates as self, take the impermanent conscious mind as permanent, and take the impure physical body as pure, clinging with craving to the five aggregates without letting go—these are the four inversions.
The other four inversions are taking the nirvāṇa mind of the Buddha ground—which is permanent, blissful, self, and pure—as impermanent, non-self, suffering, and impure.
(1) Sentient beings take the impermanent as permanent, grasping the mind consciousness—which cannot go to future lives—as an eternally existing true self. The perceiving, knowing mind consciousness is by nature intermittent and arising-ceasing, impossible to grasp, yet sentient beings take it as an immortal true self, believing the soul is imperishable and can go to future lives, grasping this as real, becoming eternalist non-Buddhists who do not escape the saṃsāra of birth and death. Non-Buddhists do not know there is the dharma of ultimate reality, the unborn and unceasing tathāgatagarbha, so they grasp the views of annihilationism and eternalism, believing that after death there is annihilation and nothing at all, or taking the perceiving mind consciousness as an eternal, permanent dharma; due to such wrong views they cannot attain liberation. They believe the subject of saṃsāra is the soul, and the soul is the arising-ceasing mind consciousness; the Buddha said the subject of sentient beings' saṃsāra is, however, the unborn and unceasing tathāgatagarbha. The soul-consciousness they speak of ceases under five conditions: when asleep without dreams, when unconscious, in the concentration of no perception, in the cessation attainment, and at death; when an arhat enters nirvāṇa, the mind consciousness also ceases. Since the soul is a mind that can cease, it is not the subject of saṃsāra; therefore believing the soul is imperishable is the non-Buddhist eternalist view; believing that after death sentient beings have nothing at all, with no unborn and unceasing mind continuing to future lives, is the non-Buddhist annihilationist view. These are all inverted wrong views.
(2) Sentient beings take the non-self as self, taking the five aggregates and eighteen realms, which are not self, as self and what belongs to self, not knowing they arise, cease, and change moment by moment and are not the real self; the real self never arises or ceases, never changes, exists forever, and has no suffering. Because sentient beings have ignorance within their minds, they take this false self of the five aggregates as the real, eternally unchanging self, and thus create immeasurable evil bodily, verbal, and mental actions for its sake; every arising thought is for the false self of the five aggregates, giving rise to all kinds of inverted thoughts, constantly protecting one's own interests—all taking the non-self as self, and therefore saṃsāra flows on without end.
(3) Sentient beings take suffering as bliss, transmigrating life after life through the six realms with immeasurable affliction. Because of ignorance, they do not know the six realms are suffering but instead take them as bliss, greedily clinging to and craving the ocean of suffering, unwilling to leave it, like maggots in a dung pit that do not know the stench and filth. Even if one obtains a human body, busily living out a lifetime, suffering still outweighs bliss. But strangely, the vast majority of people do not feel it as suffering; instead they cling to suffering feelings, unwilling to let go. Sentient beings are habituated to suffering, taking suffering as bliss, not knowing the truth of suffering, not knowing to escape—all because of the obscuration of ignorance from beginningless kalpas; this is the root of undergoing the suffering of saṃsāra through the six realms. To save and draw them out and sever this ignorance, only by proclaiming the liberation principles taught by the Buddha can sentient beings with the karmic connection give rise to the mind to cultivate the path, and only then can they distance themselves from inversion and attain liberation.
Some people who study and practice Buddhism, although they understand the principle that the five aggregates are false, have not lessened their grasping at their own five aggregates in the slightest. At the time of death when they relinquish their lifespan, they absolutely refuse to let go of the physical body, unable to breathe their last breath for a week or even half a month; even though body and mind are in extreme agony, they would rather preserve the dying physical body than seek rebirth in the land of bliss. Some people, in order to obtain money and wealth, commit every evil, attracting so much painful retribution, yet still refuse to abandon their evil habits. All these people, because they do not know that the five aggregates are inherently suffering, empty, impermanent, and non-self, do not know that besides these six realms there are the more liberated four noble dharma realms, and do not know to pursue the supreme realms of Buddhas and bodhisattvas.
(4) Sentient beings take the impure as pure. The world of the five aggregates is everywhere filthy and dirty; the physical body's nine orifices constantly flow with impurities. From head to toe, from skin to internal organs, all are bacteria; tears and eye discharge, mucus and nasal filth, and saliva in the mouth are all bacteria; the skin and the flesh, sinews, bones, marrow, blood, and brains beneath the skin are all bacteria. The Buddha said the sentient being's body is a moving great dung bucket, extremely filthy, with the five organs and six viscera, the stench of feces and urine, rank and foul discharges. The physical body is so filthy, yet sentient beings are unaware, craving it incessantly, deludedly attached within it. The seventh consciousness mind is also filthy and impure; the defilements of immeasurable kalpas—greed, anger, delusion, arrogance, doubt, and countless wrong views and afflictions—defile the mind, long perfumed into seeds, yet sentient beings deludedly cling to this mind, not knowing to reflect back, all because of ignorance. Our ignorance is too deep; it requires immeasurable kalpas of perfuming and cultivating the Buddha's teachings to break through this ignorance bit by bit; when ignorance is completely broken, one is a Buddha originally pure and undefiled.
III. Why the World-Honored One First Taught Non-Self and Later Taught Self
Before Śākyamuni Buddha manifested nirvāṇa, he taught permanence, bliss, self, and purity in the Great Nirvāṇa Sūtra, yet when he first attained the Way he taught suffering, emptiness, impermanence, and non-self; this was not inconsistency in his earlier and later teachings. Because all sentient beings have the wrong view of taking the five aggregates as self, and due to this wrong view cannot attain liberation, the Buddha had to first teach the dharma of non-self, letting sentient beings sever the wrong view of self, first resolving the problem of birth and death. Non-Buddhists believed there is a self within the five aggregates, or believed the soul is imperishable and can continue to future lives, or took the various states of mind consciousness within meditative concentration as the real self. In order to break the non-Buddhists' wrong views, the Buddha had to proclaim the dharma of the Four Noble Truths, letting sentient beings realize that the five aggregates are non-self. The non-Buddhists said, "When the ascetic Gautama teaches non-self, we can still bear it." When the Buddha was on the verge of nirvāṇa, he taught permanence, bliss, self, and purity, saying that the dharma of non-self is the conventional truth, while the ultimate truth has a self; the tathāgatagarbha mind of the Buddha ground is the most real self, permanent and unchanging. Hearing this, the non-Buddhists were all bewildered, saying the ascetic Gautama taught in an inverted manner.
In fact, when the Buddha first taught non-self, it was to break the non-Buddhists' wrong view of the five aggregates as self; only then could the Buddha teach the true dharma—the great nirvāṇa of the Buddha ground, which is the self of permanence, bliss, self, and purity. Why did the Buddha teach that there is a self? Because the Buddha's tathāgatagarbha, the undefiled consciousness (amala-vijñāna), is the completely and utterly ultimate self, possessing a real, eternal self-nature. Within the undefiled consciousness there are no longer seeds of arising-ceasing, change, and defilement; segmented birth-and-death is gone, and transformational birth-and-death is also gone—this is the true, permanent self. The Buddha's undefiled consciousness has twenty-one mental factors and can independently accomplish all activities; that is the truly real self. Hearing that in the Buddha's dharma there is a true self to be sought, and that one does not end up as nothing at all in annihilation, the non-Buddhists flocked to the Buddha to leave home and followed him in studying the Mahāyāna dharma.
The "permanence" of permanence, bliss, self, and purity refers to the tathāgatagarbha undefiled consciousness of the Buddha ground: He has neither transformational birth-and-death nor segmented birth-and-death, has no seeds of impermanence of arising-ceasing and change, and will never again be perfumed or altered—therefore it is called permanent. The sentient being's tathāgatagarbha still contains seeds of arising-ceasing and change; segmented birth-and-death has not ended, transformational birth-and-death lies latent, and there are still extremely many seeds of ignorance—therefore it is not permanently unchanging. The sentient being's tathāgatagarbha is constantly being perfumed: learning deviant dharmas, it is perfumed into seeds; learning wholesome dharmas, it is also perfumed into seeds; wholesome and unwholesome seeds constantly change—it is fundamentally not permanent.
The "bliss" of permanence, bliss, self, and purity refers to the undefiled consciousness of the Buddha ground: He has no suffering feelings, does not confront any realm, has relinquished all feelings, tranquil without clamor—that is true bliss, the ultimate bliss of quiescent cessation. The bliss feelings of worldly dharmas are always accompanied by suffering feelings; as long as the tathāgatagarbha contains seeds of defilement and afflictions of the seventh consciousness mind, it is not undefiled, because the transformed and produced seventh consciousness mind is not pure, not tranquil, and thus not true bliss. The bliss of the undefiled consciousness, however, is apart from all marks, abiding in purity and quiescent cessation, without the suffering of suffering, the suffering of conditioning, and the suffering of decay.
The "purity" of permanence, bliss, self, and purity refers to the undefiled consciousness of the Buddha ground being ultimately pure, having severed all defiled seeds, transforming them all into pure karmic seeds, having severed afflictions and the habits of afflictions, having severed all ignorance—already ultimately pure. In the sentient being's tathāgatagarbha, however, the karmic seeds created by the seventh consciousness all exist and lie buried, making the tathāgatagarbha possess the arising-ceasing nature of the Ālayavijñāna; before the eighth bhūmi, the bodhisattva's tathāgatagarbha possesses the nature of the Ālayavijñāna, indicating that within it are stored seeds of afflictions and the habits of afflictions. Through cultivation, the bodhisattva clears away the defiled karmic seeds in the Ālayavijñāna and stores pure karmic seeds; only in the end can the Ālayavijñāna transform into the pure, undefiled undefiled consciousness.
After the Buddha taught the true dharma of permanence, bliss, self, and purity, the non-Buddhist leaders could not contain themselves, saying: "Gautama, when you taught suffering, emptiness, impermanence, and non-self, we could still bear it, because it is similar to our dharma; now you teach permanence, bliss, self, and purity—that there is a self—and as a result our disciples have all gone forth under you; this we cannot bear." Then they all went to debate the dharma with the Buddha, and within a few words the Buddha made them realize the fruits. Throughout his life of teaching the Dharma, the Buddha delivered countless non-Buddhists; when the six non-Buddhist teachers contended with the Buddha, they had several hundred million non-Buddhist disciples, all of whom were delivered over by the Buddha.
Even as the Buddha was on the verge of nirvāṇa, he was still delivering those non-Buddhists; many of those non-Buddhists were the Buddha's disciples from past lives, whom he had earlier gathered among the non-Buddhist assemblies, and in the end they all returned to the Buddha's dharma, realizing the arhat fruit and the bodhisattva fruit. Some of them realized the arhat fruit extremely quickly—the Buddha resolved it with a few words. But in this Dharma-ending age of today, how difficult it is for us to realize even the first fruit; many people practice a whole lifetime without a trace of it. Why is the gap so great? Because the non-Buddhists in the Buddha's time mostly loathed suffering and had the mind of renunciation, their meditative concentration attainments were very high, they had already completed cultivating the thirty-seven aids to the path, and their afflictions had already been subdued; as long as they believed and accepted the Buddha's words and contemplated the principle of the Four Noble Truths a little, they could realize the fruits.
However the non-Buddhists cultivated, without the Buddha's pointing out, they could not eradicate the view of self (satkāya-dṛṣṭi) and would forever transmigrate through the six realms. As long as the Buddha expounded for them that what is within meditative concentration is the arising-ceasing mind consciousness, not the nirvāṇa mind, they would contemplate it, accept it, eradicate the view of self, and attain purity of the dharma eye; some immediately became great arhats with the three knowledges and six superknowledges. Without that crucial word of instruction from the Buddha, they would forever transmigrate through the six realms; even if born into the highest heaven of neither perception nor non-perception, enjoying the bliss of meditative concentration for eighty thousand great kalpas, once their merit was exhausted and evil karma manifested, they would fall into the three evil realms to transmigrate and suffer. Therefore, to escape the suffering of birth and death saṃsāra, one must study the Buddha's dharma: study the Four Noble Truths of the Āgama liberation path, study the principle of prajñā, and the dharma of seeing the mind and seeing the nature. The true Buddha dharma is the tathāgatagarbha dharma, the dharma of becoming a Buddha through ultimate liberation.
The above concerns inversion. Sentient beings also have dreams and thoughts, all within the great dream of birth and death; at enlightenment one awakens a little from the dream of birth and death, but not yet thoroughly; only the Buddha has thoroughly awakened from the great dream of birth and death, attaining ultimate liberation and realizing the supreme great nirvāṇa. Ordinary sentient beings, life after life, are all within the great dream of birth and death, deluded and inverted, with false thoughts and grasping; the great bodhisattvas, like the Buddha, also greatly perform Buddha activities within the dream.
IV. The Four Nirvāṇas of the Sages of the Three Vehicles
Sentient beings, for beginningless kalpas, have long dwelt within the great dream of birth and death, muddled and unaware, not knowing to awaken. Only after the bodhisattva sees the mind and attains realization does he have the wisdom of initial awakening, beginning to slowly awaken from the dream of birth and death, but not yet thoroughly; only upon becoming a Buddha is one thoroughly awakened from the great dream of birth and death—therefore the Buddha is called the ultimate awakening. The bodhisattva knows this world is like a dream, illusion, bubble, and shadow, and has already awakened to some degree; although the awakening is not yet complete or thorough, he is no longer like ordinary sentient beings, completely deluded and inverted, falsely grasping the world of the five aggregates as truly existent. Therefore, after the bodhisattva attains realization, he gradually has no encumbrance regarding the world of the five aggregates. Relying on this prajñā-pāramitā mind of attaining nothing, there is also no terror; he will distance himself from all kinds of inverted dreams and thoughts, and finally realize the ultimate nirvāṇa of the Buddha ground.
There are altogether four kinds of nirvāṇa:
(1) The nirvāṇa of the self-nature pure mind: this is the nirvāṇa nature inherently possessed by the tathāgatagarbha itself. Nirvāṇa: "nir" means unborn, "vāṇa" means unceasing; unborn and unceasing is nirvāṇa. The tathāgatagarbha is the unborn and unceasing nirvāṇa mind-substance; He is not born depending on other dharmas, originally exists, will never cease, and is Himself the nirvāṇa nature of the middle way. Therefore the first kind of nirvāṇa is called nirvāṇa of self-nature purity, realized by bodhisattvas at the seventh abode stage upon seeing the mind and becoming enlightened.
(2) Nirvāṇa with remainder is the nirvāṇa realized by those of the third fruit and fourth fruit. The fourth-fruit arhat has eradicated self-grasping, eradicated craving for the three realms, and the mind is liberated; yet having a physical body active in the world, he still cannot avoid slight suffering feelings, which exist dependent on the arhat's five-aggregate body—as long as there is a five-aggregate body, there are suffering feelings. For example, when the weather is hot, they still feel stuffy and hot and still avoid the sun's rays; when cold, they still feel cold; when a mosquito bites their body, they still feel pain and itch; when a stone strikes their body, they still feel pain. These sufferings experienced by the physical body are all minor sufferings, also called residual sufferings; therefore the state realized by the fourth-fruit person is called nirvāṇa with remainder. Even so, their minds have already attained liberation, without craving for the world of the three realms; at the end of life they have the ability to extinguish themselves and not be reborn. The mind attains liberation. Before entering nirvāṇa without remainder, while lifespan remains, this is nirvāṇa with remainder.
(3) Nirvāṇa without remainder: the fourth-fruit arhat has eradicated self-grasping and completely severed the four abodes of ignorance and delusion; the wisdom-liberated arhat must wait until his lifespan ends before he can extinguish his own five aggregates and eighteen realms, leaving only the tathāgatagarbha alone—this is remaining without intending to remain; the doubly liberated arhat can extinguish the five aggregates and eighteen realms at any time, leaving only the tathāgatagarbha alone. When the arhat extinguishes the five aggregates, suffering feelings cease, because without the five aggregates there is no feeling of suffering. The remaining tathāgatagarbha has no feeling and no suffering; this state where only the tathāgatagarbha exists alone is nirvāṇa without remainder.
Although the pratyekabuddha is a sage of the middle vehicle with wisdom surpassing the arhat, after relinquishing his lifespan he must still enter nirvāṇa without remainder; while his five aggregates exist, he abides in the state of nirvāṇa with remainder.
(4) Nirvāṇa without abode. Nirvāṇa without abode is the ultimate, perfectly complete liberation state realized by all Buddhas—liberated everywhere, unbound everywhere. The Buddha is the ultimately greatly liberated one; He neither abides in birth and death nor abides in nirvāṇa, not abiding in the quiescent realm of nothing at all. Although the Buddha has realized nirvāṇa without abode and attained ultimate liberation, the Buddha will not, like the arhat, extinguish body and obliterate wisdom, accomplishing nothing. The Buddha will not extinguish his own five aggregates to dwell alone in the quiescent realm, useless; the Buddha still uses the physical body and five aggregates to deliver immeasurable sentient beings, and moreover uses immeasurable five-aggregate bodies as emanations to deliver them.
The Buddha has no birth and death and does not abide in birth and death, yet can expediently manifest immeasurable arising-ceasing transformation bodies according to conditions, solely to benefit sentient beings and liberate them from suffering. The physical body manifested by the Buddha is called liberated form (mokṣa-rūpa); He is not bound by any ignorance or afflictions. Within the liberation realized by the arhat there is no form, no five-aggregate physical body; if a physical body were manifested again, there would still be transformational birth-and-death—therefore the arhat's liberation is not ultimate. Within nirvāṇa without abode, the Buddha can universally appear before all sentient beings, responding to conditions to deliver the deluded multitudes; when the conditions for propagating the Dharma in one world are exhausted, he appears in other worlds; although manifesting physical bodies in immeasurable Buddha lands, he does not abide in a single dharma—therefore what the Buddha realized is nirvāṇa without abode.
The Buddha has realized all four kinds of nirvāṇa; having realized these four nirvāṇas, he has thoroughly distanced himself from inverted dreams and thoughts, becoming an ultimately perfectly complete Buddha, the World-Honored One. The arhat's nirvāṇa is not yet ultimate; there are still inverted dreams and thoughts, he has not yet thoroughly awakened from the great dream of birth and death, still believes birth and death truly exist, and therefore fears birth and death, single-mindedly wanting to enter nirvāṇa. Although the arhat has extinguished the five-aggregate body, he has not truly liberated himself from birth and death; he has only eliminated the karmic seeds of segmented birth-and-death within the tathāgatagarbha, while transformational birth-and-death has not been extinguished, and the seeds of arising-ceasing still exist within the tathāgatagarbha. Therefore their liberation is not ultimate, their nirvāṇa is not ultimate; only the Buddha's great nirvāṇa is the ultimate permanence, bliss, self, and purity.
