All Dharmas Are the Nature of Tathāgatagarbha

The Buddha in the Śūraṅgama Sūtra refuted the naturalist heretics as well as the causation heretics. All dharmas return to the true Dharma—the tathāgatagarbha. The arising, abiding, changing, and ceasing of all dharmas seem to each have their own inherent patterns, but in reality they are all controlled by the tathāgatagarbha. Without the tathāgatagarbha's functions of generating and upholding, not even a single trace of the arising, abiding, changing, or ceasing of any dharma would exist. Never mind chemical reactions or physical processes—in essence, they are all the workings of the tathāgatagarbha. Without the material form generated and manifested by the tathāgatagarbha and the seven consciousnesses, and without the mental factors (caittas) of the seven consciousnesses, where would those unreal dharmas dissociated from mind—such as speed and flux—come from?

The phenomena of arising, abiding, changing, and ceasing of material form can only have their essence clarified through the consciousness-only seed-wisdom (āśraya-parāvṛtti-jñāna) of bodhisattvas who have attained the bhūmis; that is what is seen by the Dharma-eye, not something that ordinary beings or bodhisattvas of ordinary enlightenment—those who have merely seen the mind and their nature—can truly discern and observe. The consciousness-only seed-wisdom of bhūmi-attained bodhisattvas can observe that in every single dharma there is the tathāgatagarbha's concrete operation; the tathāgatagarbha is the puppeteer of all dharmas. Ordinary beings can only see the puppets performing the play, but cannot see the mechanism behind the puppets. Yet precisely because of this, ordinary beings remain self-assured, taking the puppets' movements as real and as having self-nature, even claiming that there is no string pulling the puppets from behind, and that the puppets operate all by themselves. This shows that sentient beings are obscured by ignorance and cannot see the substance and essence of things.

If one wishes to be a bodhisattva but does not make the great vow and does not cultivate merit, one simply cannot become a bodhisattva. One will never be able to sort out the true meaning of the Dharma, and will not arrive at correct understanding. Then one calls the heterodox teachings orthodox and the orthodox teachings heterodox, inverting right and wrong and throwing the Buddha's Dharma into confusion. How many people have actually given rise to the bodhisattva mind? Without the bodhisattva mind, one will not have correct understanding of the Buddha's Dharma, nor correct views and knowledge. Even a very simple question cannot be sorted out even after many years. If the wisdom of science, apart from the Buddha's Dharma, could be used, then scientists could become Buddhas. Then we could just study science and need not study Buddhism. Not carefully studying and investigating the Śūraṅgama Sūtra, which the Buddha taught so excellently and so definitively, but instead studying the scientists' atheism—is that the conduct of a bodhisattva?

"All dharmas are created by mind alone" and "all dharmas are the nature of the tathāgatagarbha"—these two statements were spoken by the Buddha. If you have faith in the Buddha's words, then come and explain them, and see whether the Buddha is right or the scientists are right. Some people also talk about the "first-cause heresy"—look and see whether the Buddha is a first-cause heretic. If the Buddha is a first-cause heretic, then since we are the Buddha's disciples, we should all become first-cause heretics too. Is the viewpoint that all dharmas are mind-only the viewpoint of the first-cause heresy?

Explain the statement "all dharmas are created by mind alone," and explain the statement in the Śūraṅgama Sūtra that "all dharmas are the nature of the tathāgatagarbha." The heretical teachings refuted in the Śūraṅgama Sūtra—why do Buddhist practitioners not carefully contemplate them? That material form exists naturally is what the Buddha calls the naturalist heresy; that all dharmas exist through causes and conditions rather than through the tathāgatagarbha is what the Buddha calls the causation heresy. In the end, the Buddha concluded: all dharmas are the nature of the tathāgatagarbha and are generated by the tathāgatagarbha.

If those who study the Buddha's Dharma do not accept the Śūraṅgama Sūtra and do not accept what the Buddha taught, what path is that? Contending with the Buddha and going against the Buddhist sutras—what path is that? Draw your own conclusion.