Black Box World (28)

The manas and the tathāgatagarbha can encompass all dharmas. Whatever dharma the tathāgatagarbha manifests, the manas can condition it, can receive it, and can discern it. All the six sense objects—the realms of form, sound, smell, taste, touch, and dharma—the realm of the body faculty, and the eleven forms comprising the five faculties, the five sense objects, and the form included among dharmas (dharmāyatana): all of them have a knowing that comes to discern them. What is this knowing? In the end, you will realize it. When you cultivate to a certain degree, you will realize that all dharmas are entirely the functions and operations of the tathāgatagarbha—the tathāgatagarbha is the true self! At the time of buddhahood, the tathāgatagarbha is truly, genuinely the self that is permanent, blissful, self, and pure! These illusory functions and operations are not the functions and operations of the self of the five aggregates; they are all manifested by the tathāgatagarbha, all functions and operations of the tathāgatagarbha.

Take another example: a blind person. When a blind person walks, he cannot see the road, so he holds a cane. When the cane probes forward and strikes a stone, the mind consciousness feels that it is very hard, even though he may not know it is a stone. When his cane touches the stone, he has not seen the stone, and his body has not come into contact with the stone, yet he knows that the thing ahead has an obstructing effect, and he will try his best to avoid it while walking. He has no eyes, yet he can know that it is a stone, or know that it is something hard that can trip him up.

Therefore, knowing hardness, or knowing that it is a stone, knowing form objects and touch objects—this does not necessarily require seeing with the eyes, nor does it necessarily require touching with the body; there are other methods of discernment, and of course a great secret is involved in all of this. For example, take a guide dog. A blind person uses a guide dog; when the guide dog sees an obstruction ahead, it turns direction, and the blind person is led to turn as well. Thus, without his eyes looking at the road, the blind person can know to walk forward, walk backward, walk left, or walk right. This knowing is very strange—this knowing can know without the eyes, can know without the five consciousnesses. If we develop all these functions, the six faculties will interfunction and be used interchangeably.

Take another example: when we close our eyes, although we do not see external forms, we can still see darkness, and darkness is also a kind of form. After the eyes have been closed for a long time, one no longer feels it is too dark, and some light-colors will appear before the eyes. A person without meditative concentration (samādhi) will see all sorts of colors; a person with meditative concentration will at first see red, then golden-red, and finally pale yellow. In the end, the light-colors seen become even fainter and brighter. Although our eye consciousness does not manifest, with eyes closed we can still see the forms before us. The seeing-nature here—whose seeing-nature does it belong to?

What do these functions and operations demonstrate? They demonstrate that behind our surface-level illusory functions, there is still a true, never-perishing virtue, capacity, nature, and function. He can encompass all dharmas. We can, without using the five faculties, possess the nature of seeing, hearing, awareness, and knowing—in the end, whose operations are the operations of the six faculties? They are all the functions and operations of the tathāgatagarbha. When we no longer take the functions and operations of the six faculties as the self or as real, and become less and less attached to the functions and operations of the six faculties, our inherently possessed wisdom and virtuous capacities will manifest, radiating great light. All these functions and operations will be fully developed and revealed, and no dharma will ever again be an obstruction—nothing will any longer be a secret.