What Is Meant by Non-Naturalness and Non-Causality?

In the Śūraṅgama Sūtra, the Buddha said that all dharmas do not exist naturally on their own, nor do they appear through the combination of causes and conditions; rather, they are manifested by the nature of the tathāgatagarbha. For example, take the trees on a mountain: if they existed naturally, they would also perish naturally, and after perishing, would they grow back again? No, they would not. Moreover, many trees are planted by human hands, and even those that are not planted by humans did not come into existence naturally; they appeared gradually along with the emergence of the Earth.

Then, do trees exist through the combination of causes and conditions? No, they do not. On the surface, the appearance of trees seems to result from the combination of causes and conditions such as human planting, watering and irrigation, fertilizing, and sunlight, which allow them to grow. In reality, this is not so. These conditioned dharmas are all illusory, subject to arising, ceasing, and change, and have no real function. The real function belongs to the tathāgatagarbha: it is the tathāgatagarbha that aggregates the seeds of the five great elements to form them. Without the seeds of the five great elements, there would be no trees, and not even the cellular particles of trees would appear. Even these external conditioned dharmas are themselves aggregated from the seeds of the seven great elements of the tathāgatagarbha; there are no real conditioned dharmas. Therefore, trees possess the nature of the tathāgatagarbha. When sentient beings see trees, it is the wondrous function of the tathāgatagarbha's seeing nature, the Buddha-nature—it is the wondrous nature of true suchness.

The material universe (the inanimate world) is one part of all dharmas. When the material universe first arose, what causes and conditions or supporting conditions prompted its appearance? There were none; no dharma can be found that could assist the arising of the material world. Take, for example, the gradual formation of the Earth: before its formation, no dharma existed that could serve as a supporting condition for the Earth's formation, and during the process of the Earth's formation, likewise no dharma could serve as a supporting condition for its formation. Therefore, the appearance of the Earth is not a matter of causes and conditions, and the formation of the material universe is likewise not a matter of causes and conditions.

Then, is the formation of the material universe a matter of naturalness? We must consider what the conceptual definition of naturalness is. What is called naturalness should mean existing spontaneously and naturally, unaffected by external factors, constantly existing and ever-present, neither arising nor ceasing. For example, the existence of the Earth should be spontaneous and natural; it should not be something that did not exist before and then gradually formed during a certain period of time—what is formed afterward is not natural. And after existing for a period of time, if it then gradually degenerates, disappears, and vanishes, that is equally unnatural. Likewise, the material universe has a beginning and an end, arising and ceasing, coming and going; thus it is not a matter of naturalness.

In summary, the material universe is neither a matter of causes and conditions nor a matter of naturalness. Then what nature is it? It is all the nature of the tathāgatagarbha. The arising and ceasing of the material world, as well as its arising, abiding, changing, and ceasing, are all brought about by the tathāgatagarbha; all are formed by the seeds of the seven great elements of the tathāgatagarbha operating within it. Arising is the tathāgatagarbha's arising; abiding is the tathāgatagarbha's sustaining; change is the tathāgatagarbha's transforming; ceasing is the retraction of the tathāgatagarbha's seeds. Therefore, the material universe, and indeed all dharmas, possess the characteristics of the tathāgatagarbha.

Some may say that the dharma of causes and conditions and the dharma of dependent origination are also dharmas taught by the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, and are therefore correct. But correct as they are, that correctness holds within a certain scope; it is the correctness of the initial stage of practice. Beyond that scope, past the initial stage of practice, it is no longer appropriate to cling to them as true and ultimate. This is because the dharma of causes and conditions and the dharma of dependent origination belong to the conventional truth (saṃvṛti-satya) and are not yet ultimate; upon investigation, they still belong to the provisional dharmas, the empty dharmas, and the expedient dharmas. The ultimate dharma is the Mahāyāna definitive dharma (Mahāyāna-nītārtha-dharma), which is the dharma of prajñā and of consciousness-only (Yogācāra). The most definitive and most ultimate is the dharma of consciousness-only; consciousness-only is the dharma that reaches the destination. The positioning of the dharma of causes and conditions should follow the Mahāyāna Śūraṅgama Sūtra as the standard, not the dharmas of the Small Vehicle or the Middle Vehicle. If the Small Vehicle disputes with the Mahāyāna, one should take complete refuge in the Mahāyāna, taking refuge in the ultimate gate of dharma and its principles. The Small Vehicle and the Middle Vehicle are stage-specific dharmas, transitional dharmas, not dharmas that reach the destination; they should be used, realized, and then discarded—one must not cling to them as ultimate. Even the most ultimate destination-reaching dharma, consciousness-only, should also be discarded once it has been realized; one must not carry it on one's back while climbing ashore. As long as even a single dharma remains in the mind, emptiness is not complete; if the mind is not completely emptied, one cannot reach the shore and attain true liberation.