Without Tathāgatagarbha, There Is No Dharma at All

Why can a willow tree sway? Can it sway by itself? Some say the swaying of the willow is a natural phenomenon, arising from causes and conditions; some say the willow's fluttering is due to the force of the wind. Yet the World-Honored One said in the Śūraṅgama Sūtra: 一切法非自然性，非因缘性，meaning that all of them are the nature of the tathāgatagarbha. Apart from the tathāgatagarbha there are no dharmas at all; the willow tree cannot, apart from the tathāgatagarbha, flutter up by itself, and if the wind were apart from the tathāgatagarbha, it would not exist at all, much less be able to perform the function of blowing. The patriarchs of the Chan school said: 心外无法，满目青山，all dharmas are dharmas within the mind of the tathāgatagarbha, and the green mountains filling one's eyes are all the nature of the tathāgatagarbha.

All conditioned dharmas of causes and conditions, if apart from the tathāgatagarbha, cannot exist at all. Therefore, to say that all dharmas exist naturally, or that they are produced by causes and conditions, is conceptual proliferation (prapañca); in essence they are all generated by the tathāgatagarbha. There is no sun, willow tree, wind, or myriad things existing independently outside the tathāgatagarbha; there is no sun or wind that, apart from the tathāgatagarbha, could have functions of its own, nor phenomena such as the swaying of the willow tree. These phenomena are all results generated by the tathāgatagarbha through its nature of the great elements, and at the same time are never apart from the karmic conditions of sentient beings.

Wind is generated by the combined seeds of the four great elements, with the wind element predominant. When a great wind rises, why does it carry a whooshing sound? Sometimes there is even a roaring sound? Why does the great ocean have the sound of startling waves and terrifying billows? These sounds are also material form (rūpa), generated by the tathāgatagarbha using the seeds of the four great elements. When material form arises and ceases continuously, so-called energy can be produced. When a great wind formed by earth, water, fire, and wind arises, because the arising and ceasing of its own seeds is excessively rapid, wind speed is formed. Wind speed is not a real material substance; it is a product of the phenomena of material arising and ceasing, also called energy. Energy is not a real material substance; it too is a product of the phenomena of material arising and ceasing.

When the great wind continuously arises and ceases, creating the false appearance of continuous movement, the so-called energy thus formed, upon encountering other objects, acts upon those other objects. Because the movement is too fast and the energy too great, when the two meet, it is in fact called a collision. After the collision, the state of the object—whether at rest or in motion—is changed, and at the same time a sound of collision is emitted. The larger the mass of wind, the greater its energy; when it encounters other objects, the sound of collision produced is louder, and the more it can alter the course of other objects. The sounds in the great ocean are produced in the same way.

In any tiny corner of the worlds of the ten directions, apart from the tathāgatagarbha, nothing can exist, and nothing can have its own function; all are the functions of the tathāgatagarbha. The tathāgatagarbhas of all sentient beings are operating every second and every instant, continuously outputting the seeds of the four great elements and the seeds of the seven great elements, constantly causing the myriad things to arise, abide, change, and perish; there is not a single tathāgatagarbha that is idle and useless. Each tathāgatagarbha has its own individual plot of land—one's own "acre and three-tenths"—that it must maintain by itself; there are also shared fields of cooperation that require joint maintenance and mutual coordination, yet they all coordinate seamlessly and perfectly.

Before sentient beings are born, the external living environment has already been constructed by the tathāgatagarbhas of all sentient beings with karmic connections, employing the nature of the great elements; only then can sentient beings be born into this world and live in it. Before a sentient being has been born into this world, his tathāgatagarbha has already been working for many kalpas, and only after the world has been constructed completely can the sentient being be born into this world. Before this celestial body is about to be destroyed, the tathāgatagarbhas of all sentient beings must go to other worlds to participate in construction; after the construction is complete, when their karmic connection with this world ends, the sentient beings will be reborn there. The work done by our tathāgatagarbhas is extremely numerous and massive in quantity, yet it has never proclaimed itself, enduring toil without complaint, seeking neither fame nor gain. One truly does not know what He is doing it all for.