Is the Dharma Affirmed in the Minds of Sentient Beings Necessarily Correct?

Is the Dharma confirmed in the minds of sentient beings necessarily correct? No. If it were, the Buddha would not have told sentient beings: "Your mind is not to be trusted; only when you attain the fruition of Arhatship can your mind be trusted." Here, the fruition of Arhatship refers to the ultimate fruition of the Four Fruitions in the Hinayana path, whereas the Third Fruition still falls short. Confirmation means the affirmation and acceptance by the mental faculty (manas), forming an unremitting mental engagement that penetrates to the marrow, becoming unshakable and profoundly unfathomable. For example, the view of self (satkāya-dṛṣṭi) is what the mental faculty of sentient beings confirms—deeply rooted, unshakable, and called self-attachment (ātma-grāha).

Sentient beings harbor unwavering faith in their own minds, feeling absolutely certain of themselves—this is the confirmation of the mental faculty. However, the confirmations held by ordinary sentient beings involve grave faults and carry immense peril of life and death. For instance, ordinary beings all confirm the five aggregates (skandhas) as the self—such confirmation is a wrong view (mithyā-dṛṣṭi), not a right view (samyag-dṛṣṭi). Since beginningless kalpas, ordinary sentient beings have always confirmed their own views as correct and flawless, yet throughout these beginningless kalpas, they have remained trapped in the cycle of birth and death due to erroneous and inverted views, suffering various evil retributions and painful consequences.

"Your mind is not to be trusted"—the Buddha used this not only to admonish ordinary sentient beings but also to caution those from the First Fruition (Sotāpanna) up to the Third Fruition (Anāgāmin). This is because, prior to the Fourth Fruition, their realization of the emptiness (śūnyatā) of the world of the five aggregates is still incomplete and not ultimate. The view of self remains unextinguished within their thoughts and concepts; self-attachment still persists. Only the Fourth Fruition Arhat extinguishes the view of self entirely, realizes emptiness thoroughly, and eradicates self-attachment. Only then are their thoughts and concepts of emptiness pure, and only then can their mind be trusted. This understanding of emptiness, while thorough and ultimate within the scope of the Hinayana Dharma, remains vastly incomplete and non-ultimate compared to the Mahayana Dharma.

Therefore, whether ordinary beings attain fruition or not, generally speaking, their wisdom is insufficient for self-verification. Firstly, their cultivation period is short, lacking experience. Secondly, their exposure and learning are limited, leaving them without points of comparison, making them highly prone to misjudgment and erroneous assessment. Moreover, harboring self within their minds, unable to detach from affection, they become biased and overestimate themselves. This easily leads to false awakenings and false speech (mṛṣāvāda), and karmic retribution is inexorable.