What exactly are conditioned phenomena?

The trichiliocosm (three-thousandfold great world system) manifested by all Buddhas and Bodhisattvas is conditioned dharma (saṃskṛta-dharma). What exactly is it? Or is it nothing at all? These conditioned dharmas are all generated from the formless and markless seeds within the tathāgatagarbha; they are empty and illusory, with no substantial dharma existing, and therefore one cannot say what these conditioned dharmas are. Yet one also cannot say that these conditioned dharmas are nothing at all, because these conditioned dharmas do exist in terms of their marks, and they have their corresponding functions in worldly dharma. Although these functions are also illusorily manifested, and in reality they are the functions of the tathāgatagarbha, these functions do indeed have their effects—that is why they are called conditioned dharmas; otherwise, they would be unconditioned dharmas (asaṃskṛta-dharma).

The reason conditioned dharmas are called conditioned dharmas is precisely that they possess worldly dharma-marks and functions; thus, people give names to these conditioned dharma-marks, calling them such-and-such, and then discriminate and grasp at them. A person of wisdom clearly understands the true face of these conditioned dharmas, yet still makes use of these conditioned dharmas without any obstruction or discord, with an inwardly calm mind, without greed or anger, and without clinging to one side. Everything such a person does violates neither the ultimate truth nor the conventional truth, and with great wisdom, such a person takes on the Bodhisattva's work of benefiting sentient beings.