Have You Eaten Real Pork?

Question: When eating pork, how do the six consciousnesses eat it? Do they actually eat real pork? The four great elements of pork are constructed by the pig's tathāgatagarbha using the seeds of the four great elements, and have nothing to do with humans or their tathāgatagarbha. So how do the pig's four great elements enter the human body and then disappear?

The outer representation of the pig's body—the real meat, the essential object—can only be contacted by a person's tathāgatagarbha; the six consciousnesses can only contact the inner representation. So how do the six consciousnesses contact the pork and eat it? And the outer representation really does get eaten until it is gone—amazing!

When you put pork into your mouth, the body faculties such as the lips, teeth, and tongue cannot contact the real pork; chewing cannot chew the real pork; the tongue consciousness cannot taste the real flavor of the meat; and the outer representation of the pork, the essential object, cannot enter the stomach and intestines. In short, what the six consciousnesses contact are all false appearances; they cannot contact the true essential object. If that is the case, what is the point of eating meat? It is self-deception. The pig's tathāgatagarbha painstakingly transformed and produced that lump of meat—it has nothing to do with you, and you contributed no effort at all. By what right do you eat its meat? How is this any different from robbery and plunder? Having learned Buddhism, do you still continue to be a bandit and robber?