How Did Mountains, Rivers, and the Great Earth Come to Be?

Question: Are mountains, rivers, and the great earth also produced by the eight consciousnesses operating together in harmony?

Answer: Before sentient beings were born, mountains, rivers, and the great earth already existed; they were jointly and harmoniously manifested by the tathāgatagarbhas of sentient beings sharing common karma, and have nothing to do with the six consciousnesses. They were manifested by the tathāgatagarbha in accordance with the common karma of sentient beings, materialized in accordance with sentient beings' karmic seeds within the three realms, and were also conjured up by the tathāgatagarbha through the ignorance and deluded thoughts of the manas. However, these manifestations are not entirely unrelated to the six consciousnesses either, because the karmic actions created by the six consciousnesses are stored as seeds, and in later lifetimes the circumstantial retribution of mountains, rivers, and the great earth will come into being. When the wholesome or unwholesome karma created by the six consciousnesses is great, then after mountains, rivers, and the great earth come into existence, they will also undergo changes.