Saṃyukta Āgama, Volume 12 (285): Part 4

(IV) Original Text: Again, I contemplated: What is it that, when absent, causes existence to cease? What is it that, when extinguished, causes existence to be extinguished? With this contemplation, I entered into right contemplation, giving rise to the uninterrupted contemplation of reality as it is. I realized that when grasping ceases, existence ceases; when grasping is extinguished, existence is extinguished.

Again, I contemplated: What is it that, when absent, causes grasping to cease? What is it that, when extinguished, causes grasping to be extinguished? With this contemplation, I entered into right contemplation, giving rise to the uninterrupted contemplation of reality as it is. I realized that all grasped phenomena are impermanent, arising and ceasing. When desire for them is abandoned, extinguished, and relinquished—when the mind no longer dwells on them, is no longer bound or attached to them—then craving ceases. When craving ceases, grasping ceases. When grasping ceases, existence ceases. When existence ceases, birth ceases. When birth ceases, aging, illness, death, sorrow, lamentation, and suffering cease. Thus, the entire great mass of suffering ceases.

Explanation: The Buddha said: I again contemplated: What dharma, when absent, causes existence in the three realms to cease? What dharma, when extinguished, causes existence in the three realms to be extinguished? After giving rise to this doubt, I immediately entered right contemplation. Following right contemplation, I gave rise to the uninterrupted contemplation of reality as it is, realizing that when grasping ceases, existence in the three realms ceases; when grasping is extinguished, existence in the three realms is extinguished.

I then gave rise to this doubt: What dharma, when absent, causes grasping to cease? What dharma, when extinguished, causes grasping to be extinguished? Immediately entering right contemplation, I gave rise to the uninterrupted contemplation of reality as it is, realizing that all grasped dharmas are impermanent, arising and ceasing. When desire for these impermanent, arising-and-ceasing dharmas is absent, extinguished, and relinquished—when the mind no longer dwells on the dharmas of the five aggregates, is no longer bound by them—then craving ceases. When craving ceases, grasping of worldly dharmas ceases. When grasping ceases, existence in the three realms ceases. When existence in the three realms ceases, birth ceases. When birth ceases, aging, illness, death, sorrow, lamentation, and suffering cease. Thus, the great mass of suffering—the blazing fire of birth and death—is extinguished, and thereafter no suffering remains.

Why does existence in the three realms vanish when one no longer grasps the five aggregates? Because the nature of grasping is the ignorance of the mental faculty (manas), its tendency toward conceptual proliferation. The three realms are established precisely through the ignorant grasping of the mental faculty. When the mental faculty exhausts all grasping and no longer clings to the five aggregates, the mind becomes empty and pure, ceasing to create karmic actions within the three realms or creating them only minimally. The karmic seeds of the three realms then gradually dissipate. During the remainder of one’s lifespan, one abides in nirvana with residue. At the time of death, when the mental faculty neither grasps nor clings to any dharma, the ālaya-vijñāna can no longer give rise to any dharma or produce the seeds of the mental consciousness. The mental faculty then ceases, the five-aggregate body vanishes, and henceforth no five-aggregate body arises again. The existence pertaining to one’s own three realms is likewise extinguished and no longer arises. Without existence in the three realms, future lives have no basis for manifestation. Moreover, without the karmic seeds of the three realms, the conditions and causes for the arising of life are incomplete, and thus no living being will appear again.

Why does grasping cease when craving ceases? Because craving causes the mind to sink deeply into the five aggregates, unable to free itself, inevitably clinging to worldly dharmas. Without craving, one remains unattached to dharmas, accepting them freely according to conditions, and thus lacks the impetus to grasp. Therefore, the cycle of birth and death arises from craving. When one no longer craves the three realms, one necessarily attains nirvana, ending the ceaseless cycle of birth and death.