Surangama Sutra Exposition
by Living Buddha Lian Sheng, Grandmaster Sheng-Yen Lu
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.
“Ananda, you know that the body and touch are conditions for the arising of body-consciousness. Does this consciousness arise from the body, taking the body as its sense-field? Or does it arise from touch, taking contact as its sense-field?
“Ananda, if it arises from the body itself, then without the conditions of contact and separation, what would your body be conscious of? If it arises from touch alone, then without your body, what could possibly be aware of that contact or separation?
“Ananda, objects do not feel touch; it is the body that knows contact. But if the knower is the body, then that is touch itself; if the knower is touch, then that is the body itself. Yet touch is not the body, and the body is not touch. The two characteristics of body and touch fundamentally have no bases.
“If you unite them with the body, that becomes the body’s own nature. If you separate them from the body, that becomes the characteristic of emptiness. Since neither ‘inner’ nor ‘outer’ can be established, how can a ‘middle’ be set up?
“If the middle cannot be established, and the natures of inner and outer are empty, from what would your consciousness arise, and how could a sense-field be defined?
“Therefore, you should understand that while body-consciousness seems to arise dependent on the body and touch, all three—the body, touch, and the body-consciousness realm—are ultimately false and illusory. They are fundamentally neither products of causes and conditions, nor do they possess any self-existing nature.
The human body, the object it touches, and the body-consciousness that arises from contact are interconnected. The human body must come into contact with someone or something for the body-consciousness to arise. If there is no object to touch, the body-consciousness will not arise. These three—the body, the object it touches, and the body-consciousness—lack a fixed, unchanging nature. They neither arise on their own nor dependent on each other; they are only temporary phenomena. The generation of body-consciousness has no clear boundary. Since they have no self-nature, they are essentially empty.
One time, Grandmaster was moving a chair in the garage when a girl also reached for the same chair. Their hands accidentally touched, and both felt a sudden tingling sensation. When they looked at each other and smiled, feelings arose. Similarly, in his youth, when his knees brushed against the knees of his childhood crush on a minivan, or when he shared an umbrella with a female coach attendant, body-consciousness arose in those moments.
Feelings, strangely, often arise when there is contact—physically or otherwise. They are hard to describe and beyond words and language; they can only be experienced. These are the so-called consciousnesses.
That is why Sakyamuni Buddha’s precepts are so strict. To attain arhatship one must close off the six sense organs (i.e. six thieves)—eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body and mind. In Taiwan, Master Chan Yun was known for upholding these precepts.
For example, monks following these strict rules could not look at women and had to keep their eyes lowered. They were not allowed to listen to women speak for more than four sentences, nor to hear beautiful music. Their food had to be bland, and before eating, they had to visualize it as filth. They could not perfume themselves, nor could people offer them flowers with fragrance. They were also forbidden from sleeping on large comfortable beds, instead they live in caves or burial grounds, sleeping under trees or beside graves. They could only sleep sitting up, not lying down, to train their bodies not to get used to comfort. Arhats would retreat deep into the mountains and find a cave to practice diligently, cutting off all pleasures of the six senses—these were the strictest precepts taught by Sakyamuni Buddha.
However, Vimalakirti had a different view! The teachings in the Vimalakirti Sutra belong to Mahayana, or Great Vehicle. In Mahayana, a bodhisattva lives among ordinary people to help them. One must first cultivate in seclusion to reach arhatship and attain meditative stability before immersing themselves in the saha world as a bodhisattva to deliver sentient beings.
According to Sakyamuni Buddha, beings in the heavenly realms can have children just by exchanging a glance or a smile—no physical contact is needed, not even a touch or embrace. Holding hands and hugging each other can also produce babies.
The six roots, the six dusts, and the six consciousnesses have no self-nature; they are empty and fundamentally nonexistent. If they appear to exist, it is only a temporary phenomenon.