The Innate Enlightenment and Acquired Enlightenment of Sentient Beings

All sentient beings possess the fundamental awareness, which is the wisdom and virtuous attributes of the Tathagata. Due to ignorance, sentient beings have never discovered this fundamental awareness. When this fundamental awareness is discovered, beginningless ignorance is shattered, and awakening begins. This is called initial awakening, where the conscious mind starts to awaken, hence named initial awakening. Initial awakening depends on the fundamental awareness for its existence; the object of initial awakening is the fundamental awareness itself. Moreover, without the supportive condition of the fundamental awareness, the conscious mind cannot begin to awaken, and thus there would be no initial awakening. Prior to initial awakening, there is the non-awakening of the conscious mind; due to ignorance, the conscious mind cannot awaken to the fundamental awareness. This non-awakening of the conscious mind also depends on the fundamental awareness for its existence. The seeds of non-awakening ignorance reside within the fundamental awareness, and the non-awakening conscious mind arises dependent on the fundamental awareness.

The fundamental awareness is inherently awakened; since beginningless kalpas, it has never been deluded or inverted. This is the eighth consciousness, the Tathagatagarbha. As we often say: Suchness neither knows nor does not know, neither perceives nor does not perceive, neither thinks nor does not think. Suchness is the fundamental awareness. It is not unaware of any dharma, does not fail to perceive any dharma, and does not neglect any dharma. If there were any dharma that it did not know, perceive, or think of, it would be unable to manifest that dharma or deliver the corresponding seeds, and thus that dharma could not form or appear.

To lack knowledge of even one thing is ignorance. The fundamental awareness is free from ignorance; it knows everything. However, this knowing is not like the knowing of the seven consciousnesses; its nature is utterly distinct from that of the seven consciousnesses. The knowing of the seven consciousnesses is limited to the realms of the six dusts; at best, it may know the principle of Tathagatagarbha or the principles of worldly and transcendental matters, but these too are merely objects of the mental dust. Beyond this, the seven consciousnesses know nothing. The knowing of the fundamental awareness encompasses all dharmas within the three realms; there is not a single worldly or transcendental dharma that it does not know, perceive, or think of—it is utterly wondrous. The more we investigate its knowing, the more clearly and distinctly we comprehend the origins and interconnections of all phenomena throughout the threefold universe, and the higher our wisdom becomes, increasingly corresponding with the fundamental awareness.