Lecture Notes on the Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son (60)

The Reason the Eye Faculty Is Illusory

Before the four great elements—earth, water, fire, and wind—are conveyed, do we have an eye faculty? No, originally there was nothing at all. When the tathāgatagarbha conveys out the four great element seeds of earth, water, fire, and wind, the eye faculty begins to form: the eye socket, the vitreous body of the eye, the retina, the visual transmission nerves—from nothing at all, material form (rūpa) gradually took shape, and finally it scatters and decays, and in the eye base there is not the slightest dharma to be found.

The four great element seeds of earth, water, fire, and wind are also formless and without marks; they are not material form. The tathāgatagarbha is formless and without marks; when it conveys out the formless, markless seeds, material form with shape and marks is formed—from nothing at all, a material object with shape and marks came into being. Within it there is not the slightest dharma to be found; nothing can be obtained: the earth nature cannot be obtained, the water nature cannot be obtained, the wind nature cannot be obtained, the fire nature cannot be obtained. Then the eye faculty, the eyeball, the vitreous body, the retina, and so on are all unobtainable, illusory, subject to destruction the moment destruction is spoken of; they cannot be relied upon and cannot be grasped.

The four great element seeds of earth, water, fire, and wind are all unobtainable, and the material world they form is also unobtainable; within it there is not the slightest dharma to be found. Why? Because material form has no autonomy, no sovereignty, no self-mastery (avaśatā); it is conjured up and unreal. Within this there is no one who acts as the master, no one who creates it. Who creates it? If we say that we create it, who calls upon us? Before the eye faculty was born, there were no five aggregates (pañca-skandha), no so-called "we"; the tathāgatagarbha does not act as a master and does not create; therefore there is neither a person nor a dharma that creates the eye faculty.