The Profound Meaning of the Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā Sutra from the Consciousness-Only Perspective (Second Edition)
Chapter 9 Generating the Dharma in Accordance with the Truth, Eight
Original text:须菩提。于意云何。若人满三千大千世界七宝。以用布施。是人所得福德。宁为多不。须菩提言。甚多。世尊。何以故。是福德即非福德性。是故如来说福德多。若复有人。于此经中受持乃至四句偈等。为他人说。其福胜彼。何以故。须菩提。一切诸佛及诸佛阿耨多罗三藐三菩提法。皆从此经出。须菩提。所谓佛法者。即非佛法。
Explanation: Subhūti, what do you think? If someone were to take the seven treasures of the trichiliocosm (three thousand great thousand worlds) and use them for generosity (dāna), would the merit this person obtains be abundant? Subhūti said: Very abundant, World-Honored One. Why is this said? Because such giving obtains merit, not the nature of merit; the nature of merit admits no distinction of more or less, and therefore the Tathāgata says the merit is abundant. The Buddha said that if someone, in this Diamond Sutra, receives and upholds even a four-line verse, and expounds it for others, the merit obtained would surpass that of giving the seven treasures. Why is this said? Subhūti, all buddhas and the dharma of the buddhas' anuttarā-samyak-saṃbodhi all arise from this sutra (the vajra mind, vajra-citta). Subhūti, the so-called buddhadharma is not an inherently existent dharma; it is provisionally named buddhadharma.
The seven treasures of the trichiliocosm include the seven human treasures of Jambudvīpa on planet Earth, the seven treasures of Uttarakuru, Aparagodānīya, and Pūrvavideha, the seven treasures of the dragon palaces of the four great oceans, the seven treasures of the seven golden mountains, the seven treasures of Mount Sumeru, the seven treasures of the Heaven of the Four Great Kings, the seven treasures of the Trāyastriṃśa Heaven, the seven treasures of the Yāma Heaven, the seven treasures of the Tuṣita Heaven, the seven treasures of the Nirmāṇarati Heaven, the seven treasures of the Paranirmita-vaśavartin Heaven, and the seven treasures of the eighteen heavens of the form realm. And one trichiliocosm contains one billion four great continents, one billion four great oceans, one billion seven golden mountains, one billion Mount Sumerus, one billion Heavens of the Four Great Kings, one billion Trāyastriṃśa Heavens, one billion Yāma Heavens, one billion Tuṣita Heavens, one billion Nirmāṇarati Heavens, one billion Paranirmita-vaśavartin Heavens, one billion first-dhyāna heavens, one million second-dhyāna heavens, one thousand third-dhyāna heavens, plus the fourth-dhyāna heavens, the five Pure Abode heavens (the five heavens of non-returners), the four formless heavens, and the four heavens of the formless realm.
The seven treasures of so many celestial bodies, mountains, and seas are beyond calculation; if all were given away, that merit would be even more incalculable. Yet such acts of giving away treasures are all conditioned dharmas, arising-and-ceasing dharmas, and are also dharmas with finite measure; thus they can be worn away, exhausted, and used up. If one becomes a heavenly lord in one of the heavens of the desire realm, dwelling in a heavenly palace, enjoying pleasures with celestial sons and celestial daughters for several or several dozen lifetimes, the merit will be used up, and afterward one becomes an impoverished person without merit, with a great likelihood of falling into the three evil destinies. But there is a kind of unconditioned merit that can never be exhausted and never be worn away, and that is the nature of merit inherent in the tathāgatagarbha.
The tathāgatagarbha contains the seeds of the four great elements—earth, water, fire, and wind. These four great-element seeds combine together, and according to various proportions constitute the seven treasures, the hundred treasures, and countless precious things. The seven treasures, seven golden mountains, Mount Sumeru, four great oceans, heavenly palaces of the trichiliocosm, the entire trichiliocosm, and the buddha-lands of the ten directions all come from the tathāgatagarbhas of sentient beings. The material bodies of all sentient beings, the material bodies of śrāvakas, pratyekabuddhas, and bodhisattvas, and the material bodies of buddhas all come from their respective tathāgatagarbhas. The merit of the tathāgatagarbha has no quantity and cannot be calculated, and the merit it brings to sentient beings is also boundless and immeasurable, beyond counting. Only conditioned merit can be calculated and can be said to be abundant or great; the unconditioned nature of merit of the tathāgatagarbha cannot be calculated and cannot be expressed or compared with "abundant" or "great." However abundant is still little; however great is still small—anything with quantity is small. Only that which is immeasurable and inexpressible is the greatest and most abundant; therefore unconditioned merit is far superior to conditioned merit.
Then how is this unconditioned merit to be cultivated? The Buddha said, if someone can study and practice the Diamond Sutra, receiving the true meaning within the sutra, and after realizing the vajra mind expounds it for others—even if they can only expound a single four-line verse from the sutra—the merit obtained far surpasses the merit of giving the seven treasures. The Diamond Sutra expounds precisely this tathāgatagarbha essence, solid as a vajra and never subject to decay or destruction. The tathāgatagarbha possesses the reality and purity of being unconditioned, non-abiding, without marks, unborn, and unceasing; realizing He grants the fundamental non-discriminative wisdom. Then, through contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) on the various merits of the tathāgatagarbha, one obtains differentiated wisdom, also called subsequently attained wisdom; wisdom gradually deepens and sharpens, merit gradually increases, and then, by studying the seeds contained within the tathāgatagarbha, when one possesses one portion of the wisdom of the varieties of paths, one enters the first bhūmi and becomes a noble one.
The more of the tathāgatagarbha's seed-functions one studies, the broader and deeper one's wisdom becomes. Upon entering the eighth bhūmi, without preparatory effort or attention, one can directly and swiftly manifest all needed material things—mountains, rivers, the great earth, gold, silver, jewels, and so on—and can also manifest a trichiliocosm buddha-land, and can generate immeasurable superknowledges and meditative absorptions (samādhi) to benefit sentient beings. The higher one cultivates, the deeper the wisdom, the greater the virtues and capacities, the more the emanated bodies, the more sentient beings delivered; after accomplishing the buddha-way, wisdom is boundless and merit immeasurable. All of this is initiated on the foundation of realizing the tathāgatagarbha; all virtues, capacities, functions, superknowledges, and samādhis come from the tathāgatagarbha. Without realization there is no merit and no benefit, nor can there be great wisdom and great merit.
The Buddha told Subhūti: why, after realization, does expounding it for others yield merit surpassing the giving of the seven treasures? Because all buddhas and all the buddhadharma spoken by the buddhas come from this vajra mind, the tathāgatagarbha. On the foundation of realizing the tathāgatagarbha, one studies the seed-functions of the tathāgatagarbha, and from then on can gradually accomplish the buddha-way and perfect bodhi. The seeds of wholesome dharmas cultivated by the buddhas over three great asaṃkhyeya kalpas are all stored in their own tathāgatagarbhas, with ignorance extinguished. The buddhas accomplished buddhahood precisely by realizing the tathāgatagarbha, and then expounded for sentient beings all the dharmas of accomplishing buddhahood; the dharmas they spoke also flowed out from the buddhas' own tathāgatagarbha, the self-nature of their own minds.
The Buddha said to Subhūti: "The so-called buddhadharma is not buddhadharma." This sentence directly seizes the theme and becomes the central sentence of this chapter. All the dharmas of accomplishing buddhahood that the Buddha taught are the so-called buddhadharma—conventionally, the dharma spoken by the Buddha is called buddhadharma. And the dharma the Buddha spoke consists of dharma-seeds the Buddha cultivated and retained in the Buddha's tathāgatagarbha, expounded through various conditions. These dharma-seeds were stored in later, were formed later, and are not originally existent dharmas. Once the Buddha expounded them, they are dharmas arisen from conditions, not fixed dharmas originally existent. Since they are not originally existent fixed dharmas, they are not buddhadharma in the true sense.
Buddhadharma in the true sense is originally existent, eternally unchanging, unborn and unceasing, not arisen from conditions, originally thus, the tathāgatagarbha that is dharmatā as it is—the undefiled consciousness (amala-vijñāna), suchness (tathatā), the ultimate truth (paramārtha), the eighth consciousness, the Ālayavijñāna (vipāka-consciousness), the great mirror-like wisdom (ādarśa-jñāna). All the rest are humanly assigned names and designations, provisionally spoken of as buddhadharma. In summary, among worldly and world-transcending dharmas, only suchness is the true dharma, the dharma in the true sense, the original dharma, the dharma of ultimate reality (dharmatā); all the rest arise later, are formed by conditions, and are dharmas subject to arising and ceasing—they are not dharmas of ultimate reality.
The Marks of Buddhadharma Must Also Be Broken Through
All buddhas and all dharmas of accomplishing buddhahood arise from the vajra mind; therefore the dharma that sentient beings call buddhadharma is also non-buddhadharma (it is named buddhadharma). First, to speak of it: the buddhas are buddhas who became buddhas later; the five-aggregate body with the thirty-two marks is produced and manifested by their own undefiled consciousness (amala-vijñāna); the wisdom of equality, the wisdom of wondrous observation, and the wisdom of accomplished deeds are manifested by their own undefiled consciousness. The undefiled consciousness, moment by moment, uses the seeds of the seven great elements to produce and sustain the buddhas' five aggregates and seven consciousnesses; only thus can the buddhas exist and appear. The dharmas by which the buddhas accomplished buddhahood are dharmas that did not exist before and came to exist afterward, experiential dharmas accumulated and summarized by the buddhas through their cultivation over three immeasurable kalpas; they are dharmas arisen from conditions, not fixed dharmas, and are also produced and sustained by the buddhas' undefiled consciousness.
Therefore the buddhadharma as called by sentient beings is not an originally existent dharma, not a true unborn-and-unceasing dharma; it was only later named buddhadharma, provisionally named buddhadharma. Although buddhadharma is empty and without self-nature, it is also not non-buddhadharma, because these dharmas after all have the function of accomplishing buddhahood and have existence in the phenomenal realm; they are not dharmas of utter emptiness with nothing to be seen.
After the dharma-marks of all buddhas and all their dharmas of accomplishing buddhahood have been broken through, apart from the vajra mind and the buddha-nature of suchness, what other dharma truly exists, a dharma that cannot be altered and cannot be broken through? There is none. When even the dharma-marks of the most supreme dharma can be broken through, then in the world there is no dharma-mark that cannot be broken through; the world is truly empty, silent, and desolate, not worth sentient beings' pursuit, seeking, and grasping. Let everyone's mind rest—cease and desist—no need to fabricate and contrive in vain, because no matter how one contrives, it is all empty illusion, of no use whatsoever.
