As a practitioner, there are two primary principles to cultivate buddhahood. The first is to cultivate a non-arising and non-ceasing mind. The second is to generate bodhicitta. Sentient beings are important—without them it is impossible to attain bodhisattvahood and buddhahood.
Everything in life arises and eventually passes away. Know this, and free yourself from all afflictions.
The wondrous luminous true mind is non-arising and non-ceasing, while all worldly phenomena arise and cease—including seeing, hearing, feeling, and knowing. Therefore, buddhanature cannot be realized through worldly dharma. One must instead take the non-arising and non-ceasing mind as the causal ground in order to reach the fruition ground of buddhahood.
The third, fourth, and fifth layers of turbidity are afflictions, sentient beings, and life, which no one can escape from. These turbidities cloud the pure and wondrous luminous true mind.
There are five layers of turbidity: kalpa turbidity, view turbidity, affliction turbidity, sentient beings turbidity, and life turbidity. The first is kalpa turbidity, marked by calamities. View turbidity arises from seeing, hearing, feeling, and knowing, which enshroud the wondrous luminous true mind.
Without health, what good is sudden wealth? Health is the most important; everything else comes second. But if a person is both poor and sick, that is truly a bitter kind of suffering.
It is precisely because of the eyes that see, ears that hear, tongue that tastes, body that touches and feels, and the mind that perceives, that we are unable to awaken to the Path.
All phenomena arise and cease, except the sky, the cosmic space. One must use the non-arising and non-ceasing mind to seek the Buddha’s wisdom and to understand the Buddha’s mind, because the Buddha’s mind is non-arising and non-ceasing.
Do you have self-mastery through your spiritual cultivation? Have you reached the state of non-leakage?
No matter how many sutras or dharmas you hear, if you lack actual practice, in the face of adversity, you will crumble instantly.
Buddhadharma is not only to be heard and understood, but must also be practiced and realized. Only when one can let go of all desires and attachments can one reach attainment.
By cutting off the three conditions of killing, stealing, and lust, the bodhi-mind manifests. The bodhi-mind does not arise naturally nor due to causes and conditions; it is also not obtained through conceptual reasoning or arduous cultivation—it is inherently present.
To describe how each being has the tathagata-garbha or wondrous luminous true mind, the Buddha gives two analogies. Although every being has the tathagata-garbha within, they do not realize it and keep looking for it externally. Even when they have been told that they have it, they remain enshrouded by the external world that they cannot abandon their delusion.
Once confusion is recognized as confusion, it can no longer sustain itself and naturally dissolves, revealing the originally present wondrous luminous true mind.
The realm of the buddhas and the supreme perfect enlightenment cannot be fathomed by the followers of the Lesser Vehicle, let alone by ordinary beings in samsara.
The Buddha first teaches negation—explaining that nothing is the tathagata-garbha or the wondrous luminous true mind, because it is beyond description and conception. He then teaches affirmation—that everything is the manifestation and transformation of the tathagata-garbha and wondrous luminous true mind. Thus, everything both “is” and “is not,” which is why it is said that form is emptiness, and emptiness is form. The entire dharma realm is pervaded by it.
So why does the Buddha negate everything, only to later affirm everything? It is because through nullification, one ultimately attains realization—realizing one’s true nature.
When one realizes the wondrous luminous true mind and merges with the tathagata-garbha, one’s perception of the world is completely transformed. One is many, and many are one; the great can contain the small, and astonishingly, the small can also contain the great.
The tathagata-garbha encompasses both form and emptiness. Therefore, do not regard the self as real!
Ruminating on which shadow of the sun or which reflection of the moon is the real one is simply wasting time; it is merely circling in empty falsity and has no basis in reality. The sun and the moon themselves are not real; likewise, the human body and the entire saha world are not real.
The Tathagata explains that while the cosmic space is empty, boundless, and without form, it accommodates the interplay of five elements to manifest freely.
After the Buddha’s explanation, what do you think, do mountains, rivers, and the great earth truly exist?
Grandmaster, through his own direct experiences, shows us and asks us to reflect and correct ourselves. Even the slightest deviation can lead us astray and leave us disoriented. In confusion, one needs someone to prompt us and guide the way.
Sentient beings cycle endlessly due to the root of killing, stealing, and sexual desire.
The Buddha teaches that the world forms in successive stages, beginning with a deluded thought arising from a lack of illumination.
Movement becomes the world; stillness is empty space. Empty space is sameness; the world is difference. When there is movement, the wheel of wind starts.
Life is nothing more than birth and death; it is a dream, a role in a play. Everyone undergoes birth and death. Only the karma that you create follows you.
The key point of this passage is the two kinds of emptiness: the absence of self is self-emptiness, and seeing all phenomena as emptiness is dharma-emptiness. Since the body only lasts a short time, how much can one attain or realize? That is what matters most; everything else is unimportant.
In the beginning of volume four, Purna Maitrayaniputra speaks for the assembly, acknowledging that these awakened people are still entangled in their own ingrained habitual tendencies and have not liberated themselves from afflictions and attachments.
Having realized the wondrous luminous true mind and understood that the body is a mere speck of dust amid vast space, Ananda joyfully joined his palms with utmost gratitude and praised the Tathagata.
The consciousnesses arise due to the sense faculties and objects. Without the six roots and six dusts, they are non-existent. They are mere manifestation of the tathagatha-garbha, and empty in nature.
The Heart Sutra states: “No eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body or mind; no sight, sound, smell, taste, touch, or anything. No realm of the eyes, up to and including the realm of mind-consciousness.”
This excerpt covers the non-existence of the realm of the eyes. It has no form, no bases, no location, and it is not an aggregate. It is empty, neither dependent-arising nor self-arising.
The empty space is truly vast, without any fixed form or shape, and it is indescribable.
It is difficult to know where wind comes from or where it will go. It is ever-changing and has no fixed form or location. Wind may appear to come from cosmic space, but it is not space. Wind and space are not related.
The water element exists even within space. Just like the wondrous luminous true mind—the tathagatha-garbha that contains everything, pervading all phenomena.
In a single thing, all the elements of earth, water, fire, wind, and space are present. Tantric spiritual cultivation utilizes the body’s earth, water, fire, and wind to eventually transform the body into rainbow light. It is crucial to first practice and attain the Treasure Vase Qi, as it is the foundation of all attainments.
The wondrous luminous true mind manifests as both the true emptiness and marvelous existence, where they coexist. All the myriad forms and appearances came from these manifestations.
Physical bodies in the world of form are coarse and temporary and undergo birth and death. But in the realm of dharma bodies, there is no birth or death.
The wondrous luminous true mind, another term for true suchness and buddhanature, can manifest and transform in myriad ways.
The Buddhist understanding of the world is divided into two viewpoints: worldly dharma and the ultimate truth of the transcendental beyond-worldly dharma.
The Surangama Sutra reveals the ultimate truth; therefore, all worldly phenomena are regarded as nonexistent and illusory.
When the eyes see, the ears hear, or the nose smells, corresponding consciousness arises. Yet all these processes have no clear boundaries nor any inherent nature; they are neither spontaneous nor born through causes and conditions.
The human body, the object it touches, and the consciousness that arises are interconnected. At the same time these three are not due to causes and conditions, or naturally self-arising, and even the feeling is only a temporary phenomenon.
Ultimately, all existence is temporary.
The tongue, the object of taste, and tongue-consciousness are interdependent and empty of self-nature. When separate, none of them exist on their own; only through mutual contact do they give rise to the experience of taste.
In this passage, the Buddha reiterates that the sense faculty of the nose, the sense object of smell, and the nose-consciousness are likewise false and illusory, devoid of any self-nature.
The ear consciousness, the faculty of hearing, and sounds are all illusory. They are interconnected and always changing. None of them have any fixed or self-nature.
The mind gives rise to “good,” “bad,” and “indeterminate (unrecorded)” phenomena within consciousness. Yet all are illusory and ever-changing.
Both the human body and the sense of touch do not come from themselves, nor do they arise from anything; thus they are false and illusory.
In this excerpt, the Buddha explains that taste does not arise in the tongue, not from the taste objects, and not from emptiness. Thus, both taste and the faculty of the tongue are without inherent nature.
The Buddha uses sandalwood incense to illustrate the nose faculty. Fragrance does not arise from the incense, the nose, or space. Both scent and smelling are illusory, without self-nature, neither dependent-arising nor self-arising.
Ears and sound are both illusory and lack inherent existence. Sound does not move toward the ears, nor do the ears move toward sound. Yet they also arise from the wondrous luminous true mind due to a single deluded thought.
Sakyamuni Buddha explained to Ananda that the twelve sense bases—six sense faculties and six sense objects—also arise from the wondrous luminous true mind. A single thought of ignorance generates the twelve sense bases.
Thoughts arise due to the causes and conditions of the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body combined, and go through arising, abiding, changing, and ceasing. All these are momentary, illusory, and empty.
The Buddha explains that the sensory awareness of the body through touch or contact is also illusory; it is fleeting and it is not buddhanature or the wondrous luminous true mind. The main point of the Surangama Sutra is to explain that the buddhanature/wondrous luminous true mind is non-arising and non-ceasing; it is unspeakable.
Everything in life is coincidental. Things just happen—like a cloud, appearing and drifting into one’s heart, and then drifting away again. Everything that happens is impermanent, illusory, and without inherent nature. The only thing that remains permanent is the wondrous luminous true mind (buddhanature).
Your nose and sense of smell can change, but buddhanature—the wondrous luminous true mind—always remains the same. It is unchanging, neither born nor destroyed, and cannot be blocked or congested. Sakyamuni Buddha uses buddhanature as an example, contrasting it with the five senses to show that they are all deluded views.
In this discourse, the Buddha covers the second sense faculty—the ears. They too are illusory and are neither dependent-arising nor self-arising. Grandmaster Lu gave examples of how the hearing of the wondrous luminous true mind differs from the ordinary hearing.
In Volume Three, Sakyamuni Buddha explains that the six sense entries—eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind—are illusory and unreal. In this discourse, Grandmaster Lu first covered the eye faculty and gave clear examples contrasting seeing with the eye faculty versus the seeing nature of the wondrous luminous true mind.
Consciousness is also ever-changing and illusory. Consciousness discriminates, whereas non-discrimination is wisdom. All five skandhas are empty in nature. Yet, although they are illusory and unfixed, they are manifestations of the wondrous luminous true mind, due to an instant of deluded thought.
This excerpt discusses that perception is illusory. Where does fear come from? From our own perception. Fear, too, is illusory.
Whether one has eye problems or not, because of karma, all that is seen is deluded vision. We all possess buddhanature, yet it is obscured by our own karma and delusions. When karma is cleared and one remains unaffected by causes and conditions, the wondrous luminous true mind emerges.
Buddhadharma must be cultivated and personally experienced; merely listening to it will not manifest the wondrous luminous true mind. One must realize single-pointedness in samadhi.
Why does the Buddha teach us that everything arises due to causes and conditions, yet also says that the wondrous luminous true mind is unrelated to causes and conditions?
The wondrous luminous true mind is independent of any phenomena, yet it encompasses everything. It is neither self-arising nor dependent-arising, neither a cause nor an effect—its manifestation is sudden and impromptu.
Everything manifests from the wondrous luminous true mind. Though illusory, they are neither true nor false, neither real nor unreal. There is no duality.
Spiritual cultivation is a path that each person must take on their own. We cannot depend on the Buddha or anyone else to do it for us. No matter how much one has learned, if it is not put into practice, then it is of no use.
Ananda, foremost in hearing the Buddha’s teaching but lacking real practice, beseeched the Buddha to teach the methods to enter true samadhi and be liberated from defilements.