Practice Should Be Divided into Levels and Stages

The practice of the Four Noble Truths by the arhats and the practice of the twelve links of dependent origination by the pratyekabuddhas are methods of subtraction and relinquishment, because in their minds there exist dharmas and things, and thus in their practice they continually reduce mental activities and relinquish greed and all afflictions. The arhats believe that the three realms truly exist, that the body of the five aggregates truly exists, that suffering feelings truly exist, and that cause and effect truly exist; therefore they resolve to relinquish all of this and leave the three realms. A mind of grasping and rejecting becomes clever artifice, and it is not the supreme and most genuine method of practice, although it is a path that every practitioner must pass through.

However, practice is divided into levels and stages: first one must abandon evil and take up the wholesome; after the mind is wholesome, one then neither takes up evil nor takes up the wholesome—neither grasping nor rejecting, the mind abides in the Middle Way. Bodhisattvas understand that all dharmas are illusory transformations of the tathāgatagarbha; there is nothing in their minds, and thus there is nothing to relinquish. Toward all dharmas they neither grasp nor reject, neither crave nor loathe; they face everything with equanimity and deliver sentient beings with composure. Therefore they absolutely have no wish to leave the three realms and take up nirvāṇa.