Selected Lectures on the Sutra of the Meeting of Father and Son

Volume Eighteen  Chapter on the Distinctions of the Six Elements, Part Three of Twenty-Six

In this volume, the World-Honored One again uses several similes to illustrate that the states encountered in real life and the scenes manifested in dreams are identical in nature—all of them are false and illusory. The World-Honored One repeatedly speaks of dreams, using dreams to awaken His father, King Śuddhodana, to realization sooner, because King Śuddhodana had been a king for a long time, constantly indulging in the pleasures of the five desires and finding it hard to extricate himself. The Buddha used dreams to advise His father to quickly cultivate the Path and seek liberation, and not to remain immersed in the pleasures of the five desires. At the same time, He used this to awaken all disciples to fully recognize the illusory nature of all dharmas. When the manas truly acknowledges the illusory nature of these dharmas, one can realize the Path and attain the liberation fruit of the Small Vehicle, or even the liberation fruit of the Great Vehicle, thereby embarking on the path of liberation and buddhahood.

When Small Vehicle practice reaches a certain level, one can realize that the world of the five aggregates is empty, and that all dharmas of the eighteen elements are empty. In this way, one can sever the three inner fetters: the view of self (satkāya-dṛṣṭi), the view of attachment to views, and the view of doubt. Thereafter, one can tend toward liberation and be liberated from the suffering of birth-and-death and saṃsāra. Cultivation means recognizing that the so-called self is empty: the physical body is empty, the mind is empty, feelings are empty, thoughts are empty, deliberation and initial application and sustained examination (vitarka-vicāra) are empty, and actions and volitional activities are empty—the five aggregates of form, feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness are all empty. The eighteen elements are all empty: the six faculties of eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind are empty; the six sense objects that the six faculties confront are empty—form objects are empty, sound objects are empty, scent objects are empty, taste objects are empty, touch objects are empty, and mental objects are empty; the six consciousness-minds are all empty—eye consciousness is empty, ear consciousness is empty, nose consciousness is empty, tongue consciousness is empty, body consciousness is empty, mind consciousness is empty, and finally the manas is also empty. When all the five aggregates are realized as empty, the view of self is severed, and one attains the purity of the Dharma eye.