Glib Chan Talk Is Not Equivalent to Practice and Realization

Practice before enlightenment is divided into many stages, and practice after enlightenment is likewise divided into many stages. If one practices before enlightenment using the methods meant for after enlightenment, one cannot succeed. If one has just attained enlightenment and practices according to the methods of bodhisattvas on the bhūmis, it will likewise prove ineffective. Holding lofty theories in one's hands and imagining that one has already realized them, that one can be like the sages and like the tathāgatagarbha—this is purely self-deception. Many people, upon seeing the statement that affliction is itself bodhi, think that regarding afflictions as transformations conjured by the tathāgatagarbha counts as practice, and make no effort to subdue their afflictions. As a result, affliction remains affliction, bodhi remains bodhi, and after death they still sink through birth and death—what benefit is there in that?

Some people understand that the tathāgatagarbha is beyond cultivation and beyond realization, and then assume that the seven consciousnesses and the five aggregates should also be beyond cultivation and realization, and that since the tathāgatagarbha is originally a Buddha, they might as well just be a Buddha at home. The tathāgatagarbha does not discriminate, so they too must not discriminate: since all dharmas arise from discrimination, if one simply stops discriminating, the mind will be empty and there will be no dharmas—so then, if you go hungry for seven days, you should have no objection to it.

Indeed, all dharmas are like illusions and transformations, but this is the realized attainment of bodhisattvas at the stage of the tenth residence and above. If you have not reached that level of practice and do not yet possess that actual realization, then do not hang the words "illusion and transformation" on your lips every day, turning them into mere Chan of the mouth. The tathāgatagarbha does not keep precepts, so some people think they too should be free of keeping precepts like the tathāgatagarbha, roaming free and unrestrained, casting off all decorum. They do not realize that their own mind is replete with all greed, hatred, and delusion—how could they cast off decorum and roam free and unrestrained? They cannot even give up the pleasure of a good meal, yet all day long they shout lofty, grandiose pronouncements. Empty talk often ruins a nation; those who can talk a foot high but walk not even an inch had best practice earnestly and concretely, and stop indulging in lofty rhetoric while their abilities fall far short of their ambitions.