眾生無邊誓願度
煩惱無盡誓願斷
法門無量誓願學
佛道無上誓願成

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Dharma Teachings

22 Jun 2020    Monday     2nd Teach Total 2418

How to eliminate the self-view (ātma-dṛṣṭi) of the mind consciousness?

Observing the non-self of the five aggregates and the eighteen realms mainly involves observing the non-self of the mind consciousness. The realms of the mind consciousness are quite numerous—some coarse, some subtle, some tranquil (praśama), some non-tranquil, some empty, some not empty. To observe the mind consciousness, one must experience the arising, ceasing, impermanence, suffering, emptiness, and non-self of its various states of consciousness. The mind consciousness has various state-marks, such as various marks of affliction, various marks of purity, various marks of emptiness, various marks of knowing, various marks of discernment, marks with language and words, marks without language and words, marks with sound, no sound, the mark of silence, the mark of clamor, and so on. All these marks and states are conditioned phenomena of arising, ceasing, and impermanence; none of them is the self; all of them are empty.

This includes when the mind settles down and not a single thought arises—that is the mark of tranquility of the mind consciousness. Seeing through His illusory nature and not taking Him as real, as self, as the Dharmakāya Buddha (dharma-kāya-buddha), or as the Tathāgata, one eliminates the self-view of the mind consciousness at that moment. But there are still self-views of the mind consciousness at other times: in the gap between the previous thought having ceased and the next thought not yet arrived, it seems tranquil (praśama), yet in substance it is still a state of the mind consciousness. Only by seeing through Him can one eliminate the self-view of the mind consciousness.

——Master Sheng-Ru's Teachings
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