Differences Among Various Asamskrita Dharmas

Question: The Diamond Sutra states that all sages and saints differ due to the unconditioned dharmas. Does this mean they differ based on the degree of realization of the Tathagatagarbha Dharma, that is, the degree of realization of emptiness?

Answer: Sages and saints include śrāvaka arhats, pratyekabuddhas, bodhisattvas, and Buddhas, collectively known as the Four Holy Beings. Among them, the first two fruitions of the Śrāvaka Vehicle are considered virtuous persons, and those who have realized the mind up to before the First Ground of the bodhisattva path are also virtuous persons. The first two types, śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas, are of the Small Vehicle (Hinayana) capacity; they do not follow the Mahayana path to Buddhahood, do not investigate the Mahayana Tathagatagarbha Dharma, and have not realized the Tathagatagarbha. Only Mahayana bodhisattvas can investigate and realize the Tathagatagarbha. This is the difference between Mahayana bodhisattvas and Hinayana śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas.

The unconditioned dharmas realized by the Buddha are the most ultimate and thorough. Not only is the self empty, but dharmas are also empty; both self-attachment and dharma-attachment are completely severed, leaving the mind utterly empty, without even clinging to the Tathagatagarbha Dharma itself. Bodhisattvas who realize the Mahayana Tathagatagarbha have realized this supramundane unconditioned dharma. Subsequently, their seven consciousnesses will increasingly become unconditioned, like the Tathagatagarbha, whose mental activities remain unconditioned amidst the functions of conditioned dharmas—thus being both conditioned and unconditioned. Hinayana śrāvakas realize the emptiness of self through the non-self of the five aggregates; this is the Hinayana unconditioned dharma. Pratyekabuddhas realize the dependent arising of the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination, understanding that all dharmas are born from causes and conditions and are therefore empty; this is also a type of unconditioned dharma. After this realization, the minds of śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas must become non-active; their seven consciousnesses must also be unconditioned. This unconditioned nature differs from that of the Tathagatagarbha. The Tathagatagarbha’s mental activities are unconditioned within all functioning of conditioned dharmas—it is an unconditioned state that does not abandon the conditioned. In contrast, the unconditioned state sought by śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas is one that abandons the conditioned, even refraining from the most meaningful great deeds like attaining Buddhahood and liberating sentient beings. The Buddha described this as the unconditioned state of "withered sprouts and rotten seeds."

The unconditioned dharmas realized by śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas are a semblance, existing only by relying on the truly unconditioned Tathagatagarbha. They are neither ultimate nor real, and they still regard dharma appearances as truly existent, view the Three Realms and Six Paths as truly existent dharmas, and perceive suffering as truly existent. They do not know that all these are illusory manifestations of the Tathagatagarbha, essentially non-existent, all being the nature of Tathagatagarbha. Therefore, the level of unconditioned dharma they realize is very low. Although bodhisattvas have realized the unconditioned dharma of Tathagatagarbha, a level higher than that of śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas, due to insufficient cultivation, they have not fully relied upon the Tathagatagarbha. Their mental activities are not yet completely empty and unconditioned; thus, it is also not ultimate. Only the Buddha is the ultimate and thorough unconditioned.

Some say that śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas have also realized the Tathagatagarbha. If this were so, then śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas would also be bodhisattvas, no different from them. Their motivation should be the same, their vows should be the same, and they should all continue to deeply cultivate the Tathagatagarbha Dharma, walking the bodhisattva path, benefiting themselves and others. However, their conduct contradicts the bodhisattva path: they have not generated great compassion, fear the suffering of the Three Realms, fear their own rebirth in samsara, refuse to continue cultivating, refuse to save sentient beings, and choose to enter nirvāṇa. This is entirely not the mental conduct of a bodhisattva.

If śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas had realized the Tathagatagarbha, they should know how the Tathagatagarbha operates within the five aggregates, how it gives rise to and sustains the five-aggregate body. Then they should not fear conditioned dharmas and the suffering of the Three Realms and choose to enter nirvāṇa. Yet they are completely ignorant of the Tathagatagarbha Dharma and do not know that the suffering of the five aggregates is also illusory, something not to be feared or avoided. Realizing the Tathagatagarbha should enable one to observe it directly. If one merely hears the name of Tathagatagarbha and believes in its existence, that is still leagues away from realization. Therefore, śrāvakas and pratyekabuddhas absolutely have not realized the unconditioned dharma of Tathagatagarbha; rather, they have realized the Hinayana unconditioned dharmas of the non-self of the five aggregates and the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination. Due to the differences in the unconditioned dharmas they realize, sages and saints have distinctions in greatness and level. Bodhisattvas also differ in wisdom and fruition based on the degree of their realization of the Tathagatagarbha.

Non-Buddhists also have unconditioned dharmas. When cultivating to the Fourth Dhyāna, they attain the immovable unconditioned state, where body and mind are motionless, without breathing, without pulse, without heartbeat, without discrimination, without mental activity. Cultivating to the state of No-Thought Concentration (Asaṃjñā-samāpatti), consciousness ceases, and the mind becomes more unconditioned. Cultivating to the Concentration of Neither Perception Nor Non-Perception (Naivasaṃjñānāsaṃjñāyatana), consciousness ceases along with the two mental factors of feeling and perception; this is called the unconditioned state of the cessation of perception and feeling. Non-action, non-functioning, non-movement—this is the unconditioned state of conditioned dharmas subject to arising and ceasing.