Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra, Volume 10: Explanation of the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination (11)

Original text:问。何故诸支相望。无因缘耶。答。因缘者。自体种子缘所显故。问。若诸支相望。无因缘者。何故说言。依因果体性。建立缘起耶。答。依增上缘所摄。引发因。牵引因。生起因故。说名为因。

Explanation: Question: Why is there no causative condition (hetu-pratyaya) among the links in their mutual relations? Answer: The causative condition is that which is manifested through the condition of the seeds of the self-entities of the links. Question: If there is no causative condition among the links in their mutual relations, why is it said that dependent origination is established based on the nature of cause and effect? (The nature of cause and effect means that a preceding cause can give rise to a subsequent effect, and the subsequent effect is the dharma of dependent origination.) Answer: These links rely on what is subsumed under the predominant condition (adhipati-pratyaya); the antecedent link (pūrvāṅga) is the initiating cause (pravartaka-hetu), attracting cause (ākṣepaka-hetu), and generative cause (janaka-hetu) of the consequent link (paścādṅga), and it is provisionally called the cause, while the consequent link is the effect. Therefore it is said that the dharma of dependent origination is established based on the nature of cause and effect.

The causative condition is the most important of the four conditions; it is the direct cause that gives birth to all dharmas. Seeds belong to causative-condition dharmas. The seeds are in the position of cause, while the eleven links (other than ignorance) are in the position of effect. Where there is a cause there must be an effect; "condition" also means "cause." It is the seeds that give rise to the appearance of the eleven links. The seeds refer to the karmic seeds left behind by the bodily, verbal, and mental actions of the six consciousnesses. This meaning is extremely profound: the seeds of the self-entities that can produce all the links all come from the Ālayavijñāna and are all stored in the Ālayavijñāna. In other words, all these links are born from the Ālayavijñāna, and the Ālayavijñāna together with the seeds of the self-entities are the causative conditions of these links.

Among the twelve links of dependent origination, only in the link "consciousness conditions name-and-form" is the birth of name-and-form accompanied by seeds; the seeds of the bodily, verbal, and mental actions of the six consciousnesses in the previous life are the causative condition for the birth of name-and-form in this life. But the birth of the subsequent links after name-and-form has no seeds; each link is induced by the preceding link. That is to say, the preceding link is the predominant condition, or the sequential condition/immediate condition (samanantara-pratyaya), or the object condition (ālambana-pratyaya) of the subsequent link, but none of them has seed as a causative condition. The same applies to "ignorance conditions volitional formations (avidyā-pratyayāḥ saṃskārāḥ)" and "volitional formations condition consciousness": there is no seed as a causative condition, only the sequential condition, the object condition, and the predominant condition.