Realizing Tathāgatagarbha Is Enlightenment: Why Transform the Basis?

Seeing the path is divided into the seeing of the path of the Great Vehicle and that of the Small Vehicle; it is not only the Great Vehicle that is called seeing the path. Seeing the path of the Great Vehicle is the personal realization of the tathāgatagarbha; realizing the tathāgatagarbha means seeing the path-trace upon which the study and practice of the Great Vehicle depends. It is not that after realizing the tathāgatagarbha, one must additionally accomplish the successful transformation of the basis (āśraya-parāvṛtti) for it to count as enlightenment; the very moment one sees the tathāgatagarbha is itself realization. As for the transformation of the basis, after enlightenment one indeed needs to gradually carry out the transformation of the basis. When the transformation of the basis succeeds, one's mental disposition approaches the purity of the tathāgatagarbha, afflictions are eradicated, and in terms of wisdom one possesses the seed-wisdom (种智) of Consciousness-Only; thus one enters the family of the Tathāgata and becomes a true son of the Buddha. 

If the successful transformation of the basis were what constitutes seeing the mind and enlightenment, then realizing the tathāgatagarbha would not be enlightenment. Since it would not be enlightenment, then the tathāgatagarbha would not have been realized; rather, one would merely have intellectually deduced that there is a tathāgatagarbha. A tathāgatagarbha arrived at by intellectual deduction confers no experiential enjoyment of its merits, and so one would then need to compare one's bodily, verbal, and mental actions against the purity of the tathāgatagarbha, in order to restrain the bodily, verbal, and mental actions of the seven consciousnesses. When restrained to a certain degree, such that one no longer creates evil karma out of afflictions, that would count as enlightenment. But such restraint, without genuine enlightenment, can never succeed, and thus the so-called transformation of the basis would likewise never succeed. For without enlightenment, how could the transformation of the basis succeed? And after enlightenment, why would one need the transformation of the basis to succeed, and then have that established as enlightenment? Is this not a self-contradictory problem? 

Only after enlightenment can one gradually transform the basis toward the emptiness (śūnyatā) and purity of the tathāgatagarbha. Finally, when the first dhyāna arises and afflictions are eradicated, that is the most initial transformation of the basis. The second successful transformation of the basis occurs at the stage of an eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva, and the ultimate successful transformation of the basis occurs at the buddha stage. Ordinary beings who have not attained enlightenment do not even touch upon the question of the transformation of the basis, let alone its successful accomplishment—no such thing exists. To succeed in the transformation of the basis, one must at the very least eradicate afflictions, so that one's mental disposition and wisdom both draw near to and approximate those of the tathāgatagarbha. The tathāgatagarbha has not the slightest ignorance or affliction, nor even any habituated tendencies of affliction; the sixth and seventh consciousnesses must therefore rely on the tathāgatagarbha to purify their bodily, verbal, and mental actions and their wisdom, diligently cultivating precepts, meditative concentration (samādhi), and wisdom. 

For the initial successful transformation of the basis, one must at minimum eradicate afflictions and become a bodhisattva of the third or fourth fruit before it can barely be called a successful transformation of the basis. But at that time the habituated tendencies of affliction still remain, and one is still very far from the tathāgatagarbha; roughly two immeasurable kalpas of practice are still needed. Upon reaching beyond training (aśaikṣa) in the Great Vehicle, there is no longer any need to transform the basis toward the mental disposition and wisdom of the tathāgatagarbha. It is evident that the transformation of the basis is not something an unenlightened ordinary being who has not realized the truth can accomplish—it can only be a matter of wishful thinking.