Does Ignorance Have an Origin?

The reason why ignorance is called "ignorance" is precisely because it is the state of not knowing. Not knowing has no origin; having no origin means it has no source. If ignorance had an origin and a source, where would it come from? Before ignorance emerged, there would have been clarity. Since there was clarity, that would be Buddha. Yet sentient beings have never been Buddhas. If one had become a Buddha, it would be impossible for ignorance to reappear and transform them back into a sentient being.

The mental faculty inherently possessed ignorance since beginningless eons; it was fundamentally unknowing and originally not Buddha. Ignorance did not later emerge from somewhere, transforming clarity into non-clarity. We observe that in the world, there is no method for producing ignorance. Ignorance has no origin and no source. If ignorance had a source, it would also have a destination. Where would its source be? Where would its destination lie? If ignorance had a destination and gathered in a certain place, then one day it would overflow and surge out, once again causing the mental faculty to possess ignorance, and the Buddha would once more become a sentient being. Such a thing will not happen, for otherwise, the practice of Buddhism and the attainment of Buddhahood would be meaningless. Despite exhaustive efforts, one would still fail to escape the great suffering of birth and death, and sentient beings would remain sentient beings forever.

If ignorance had a source, then before beginningless eons, there would have been no ignorance. Ignorance would be something that came later. When there was no ignorance, there was Buddha. How could a Buddha give rise to ignorance and become a sentient being? When ignorance is eliminated, where is it eliminated to? Ignorance has no root; it is not a substance. It has no source and no place of extinction. When clarity arises, ignorance naturally vanishes. The two do not coexist. When one arises, the other ceases; when one is present, the other is absent—like the two sides of a scale, one rising as the other falls, always in balance.