The Six Faculties Are Fundamentally One Root

Reading the Śūraṅgama Sūtra and observing the results of the cultivation of the twenty-five sages, one knows that the manas can completely substitute for the first six consciousnesses. This is a fact of the sages' cultivation; they are not necessarily bodhisattvas—arhats can also achieve it. The prerequisite is to be endowed with meditative concentration (dhyāna) and to possess the power of meditative absorption (samādhi).

The World-Honored One repeatedly emphasizes in the Śūraṅgama Sūtra that the six faculties are fundamentally one faculty, divided into six due to ignorance and deluded thinking. After attaining the Way, the six dissolve and even the one vanishes—all are the functions of original enlightenment. Among the Buddhist sūtras, it is still the Śūraṅgama Sūtra that explains things most profoundly and thoroughly. The World-Honored One everywhere guides us to see the mind and realize its nature, to understand the essence of all dharmas, and to find the way home.

Memorizing the Buddhist sūtras is far, far better than memorizing the treatises of bodhisattvas. After all, the sūtras spoken by the Buddha are more reliable than the treatises and will not mislead people—except when limited by the translator's level of realization and ability, or when errors arise through repeated transmission and circulation. Moreover, the wisdom of bodhisattvas is far inferior to the wisdom of the Buddha; whatever they say has some discrepancies, and none is entirely correct. Even to be eighty percent correct is already rare and precious.