Lecture Notes on the Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son (87)

The Conditions for Attaining Realization of the Fruits

The self-nature of the conscious mind is apart from all dharmas; it does not contain any dharmas—it is empty and lacks any self-existing nature. This is called "self-nature being apart." We should understand the body consciousness in this way, understanding the emptiness of the body consciousness; understand in this way our own karmic actions and the emptiness of those karmic actions; and understand the consciousness that first arises in the physical body as well as the emptiness of that consciousness. The six consciousnesses—eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind—have no place before they arise, and after they cease, they have nowhere to go; therefore they are empty. If one extinguishes the conscious mind, that dharma of cessation is also empty—who extinguished it? There is no agent of action that causes the conscious mind to cease. The conscious mind ceases by itself; no one extinguishes it.

Nothing in the world or beyond the world is not empty, except for the tathāgatagarbha. From beginning to end, from inside to outside, if one empties and purifies all the worldly dharmas of the three realms, one will realize the fourth fruit—not only will one never again go to the three evil destinies, one will also transcend the three realms. If one empties and purifies all of one's various mental activities and all kinds of minds—the greedy mind, the hateful mind, the ignorant mind, the arrogant mind, the mind that apprehends all dharmas—one can enter nirvāṇa without remainder. The emptiness of the physical body is relatively easy to realize, knowing it to be false, empty, and illusory; negating the various perceptions, feelings, thoughts, plans, and discernments of the conscious mind, and realizing that the conscious mind is empty and illusory, is somewhat more difficult. For those of sharp faculties, realizing the fruit is very easy; as long as these conditions are fulfilled and the conditions for realizing the fruit are complete, cultivation is not really all that difficult.