Commentary on the Diamond Sutra: Cultivating Goodness with a Pure Mind, Twenty-three

Original text: 复次。须菩提。是法平等。无有高下。是名阿耨多罗三藐三菩提。

Explanation: Continuing on, Subhūti, all dharmas in the world are equal, without any difference of high or low. Realizing such a state is called anuttarā-samyak-saṃbodhi, that is, the accomplishment of the unsurpassed Buddha Way.

"All dharmas" refers to all dharmas of the threefold world. Whatever is called a dharma, whatever existing dharma-marks there are, without missing even a speck, are all equal and uniform, without high or low, without difference; the whole of them is precisely suchness (tathatā). Observed from the perspective of the principle-substance of suchness, all dharma-marks are the equal true mind-substance, without a second mark. Giving birth to such great wisdom is provisionally named the attainment of anuttarā-samyak-saṃbodhi.

Why does the World-Honored One speak thus? Because at the time of the Buddha's attainment of the Way, the Buddha's seventh consciousness had already been completely and thoroughly transformed into the wisdom of equality (samatā-jñāna). His cognition of all dharmas, whether worldly or transcendent, had reached ultimate and thorough equality, without the slightest trace of an unequal mind. First, taking the Buddha's most ultimate and unsurpassed wonderful discernment wisdom (pratyavekṣaṇā-jñāna) of the sixth consciousness: it observes that all the myriad dharmas of the threefold world are dharma-marks produced on the basis of the functioning of the true mind-substance of suchness, the mind of suchness; in their essence they are all the suchness of the original substance.

It is just like all the gold articles fashioned from gold, including all ornaments, all daily utensils, and various portraits of people and figures: whatever objects are made of gold, their essence is gold, nothing else. Whether it is a gold ornament or a gold-cast portrait of a person or figure, it is all gold and can all be used and circulated as gold. If someone does not see the gold but only sees the appearance of the objects, such a person is one who clings to false appearances and does not recognize true worth. Not knowing the preciousness of true gold, he abandons the gold and takes the false appearance; such a person is called one without wisdom. Worldly ordinary beings are likewise: they only see all the illusory appearances of the world and do not see the substance of those illusory appearances; they cling to names and marks and do not recognize the essence. Therefore, out of foolishness and attachment to marks, they transmigrate endlessly through birth and death in the six realms, suffering without end—truly worthy of compassion.

The Buddha's wonderful discernment wisdom not only sees that all dharmas are suchness, but can also directly contemplate how suchness transmits the seeds within the mind-substance, accomplishing the appearance of all the myriad dharmas of the threefold world. Therefore, the Buddha's seventh consciousness, the wisdom of equality, can treat all sentient beings of the threefold world equally, without discriminating the different marks of high or low, noble or base. The Buddha regards all sentient beings equally as all possessing the wisdom and virtues of the Tathāgata's marks, all being Buddhas at the causal stage, who in time to come will all perfectly accomplish the realization of the fruitional stage. Therefore the Buddha gives rise to unconditional great compassion toward sentient beings, broadly benefiting sentient beings: whenever beings' faculties ripen, regardless of whether they are wholesome or unwholesome, He will equally bestow the food of Dharma and deliver them to attain the Way and liberation.

Original text: 以无我无人无众生无寿者。修一切善法。即得阿耨多罗三藐三菩提。

Explanation: When sentient beings, within their minds, do not abide in the mark of self, the mark of person, the mark of sentient being, or the mark of life span, and cultivate all the wholesome dharmas of the world and beyond the world with a mind that practices with no mark of self, no mark of person, no mark of sentient being, and no mark of life span, they will attain anuttarā-samyak-saṃbodhi.

Not long after the opening of the Diamond Sutra, the World-Honored One already broke sentient beings of the four marks. Only a bodhisattva who has broken the four marks can accord with the principle-substance of the vajra prajñā, can accord with the true reality of all dharmas, can accord with suchness, and ultimately will accord with anuttarā-samyak-saṃbodhi. Because sentient beings, since beginningless kalpas, have constantly clung to the four marks and failed to accord with the principle-substance of emptiness (śūnyatā), for the sake of the four marks they have created vast, boundless evil karma, sinking for accumulated kalpas in the ocean of saṃsāra and karma, suffering immeasurably with no prospect of emergence—the root cause lies in the disease of clinging to the four marks. With great compassion, the World-Honored One, in order to dig out the root of the disease of beings' attachment to and clinging to marks, skillfully devised various expedients to break beings of the four marks, because once without the four marks, one can escape the great pit of fire of birth and death.

Why can one escape the great pit of fire of birth and death by being without the four marks? From the perspective of the Hīnayāna teachings, as long as sentient beings can break the mark of self, they will escape the three evil paths. When they cultivate to the point of being able to eliminate attachment to their own five-aggregate body and to the dharmas of the threefold world, they will have the ability to escape the birth-and-death transmigration of the six realms, thereby escaping the pit of fire of segmented birth-and-death and gaining temporary rest. When sentient beings continue advancing along the bodhisattva path and the Buddha path, they will gradually break the various attachments to dharmas, sever the various forms of transformational birth-and-death, and realize the true purity of nirvāṇa; from then on there is no more birth and death, and only then is the great pit of fire of birth and death truly and thoroughly escaped.

And the starting point for entering the bodhisattva path and the Buddha path is to realize the vajra prajñā true mind-substance of suchness, which originally has no four marks. Cultivating in accordance with this principle-substance without the four marks, the mind becomes increasingly pure, and one will break all the conditioned dharma-marks of the world, not even clinging to the mark of suchness; the mind becomes empty and pure to the utmost degree of emptiness and purity, without the slightest remaining existence of or clinging to any dharma-mark. Only thus can one thoroughly and completely accord with the true mind-substance of suchness, and ultimately perfectly accomplish the Buddha Way and attain anuttarā-samyak-saṃbodhi. Therefore the World-Honored One said: with no self, no person, no sentient being, no life span, cultivating all wholesome dharmas and according with the nature-substance of suchness, one can accomplish anuttarā-samyak-saṃbodhi.

Original text: 须菩提。所言善法者。如来说即非善法。是名善法。

Explanation: Subhūti, the wholesome dharmas I speak of—the Tathāgata says they are not wholesome dharmas, in contrast to the wholesome dharmas that sentient beings acknowledge; there is no wholesome dharma in any actual sense; they are all merely a superficial appearance. Therefore they are provisionally named wholesome dharmas.

Wholesome dharmas are divided into many levels and contents: there are worldly wholesome dharmas and also transcendent wholesome dharmas; there are small wholesome dharmas and also great wholesome dharmas, and moreover wholesome dharmas in the ultimate sense. Worldly wholesome dharmas are the five precepts and the ten good deeds. When the World-Honored One first came to the Sahā world, He first taught the wholesome dharmas of humans and gods, letting sentient beings cultivate in accordance with them and gain worldly merit—this is small goodness. After sentient beings gain worldly merit, they can then follow the World-Honored One to study the Āgama path of liberation and escape the suffering of the threefold world—this is middling goodness. Then the World-Honored One spent more than twenty years proclaiming the principle of prajñā to sentient beings, letting them cultivate in accordance with it and all realize the true reality of prajñā, becoming bodhisattvas of the true meaning, and then give rise to various profound prajñā wisdoms—this is superior goodness. Afterward, the World-Honored One further proclaimed the profound principles of the vast and extensive Consciousness-Only teachings, delivering the Mahāyāna bodhisattvas so they gradually possessed the profound wisdom of the varieties of paths—this is great goodness. Finally, the World-Honored One proclaimed the ultimate meaning of the One Buddha Vehicle such as the Lotus Sutra and the Nirvāṇa Sutra, delivering all sentient beings to enter the path to Buddhahood and cultivate the dharma of becoming a Buddha, so as to reach the ultimate and perfect fruition of Buddhahood—this is ultimate goodness.

These wholesome dharmas all have corresponding dharma-marks, and these dharma-marks are all manifested and conjured forth on the basis of the markless mind-substance, the tathāgatagarbha, which originally has no four marks. These dharma-marks are all accomplished by the tathāgatagarbha transmitting seeds in accordance with various conditions. Superficially they exist and sentient beings can see them, but the existence is not real existence, and the marks are not true marks; their essence is the suchness of the tathāgatagarbha, all being things within the one true dharma-realm of suchness, not outside of suchness. All the marks of wholesome dharmas are like vessels of gold: they all come from gold, and their essence is all the gold of the tathāgatagarbha. Therefore they are all one true dharma-realm—the substance of suchness. Thus all these false appearances of wholesome dharmas, which are not really existent dharmas, are given the name "wholesome dharmas." Though the name is "wholesome dharmas," their substance is the principle-substance of suchness.