Attachment to the Fruits of Attainment and to Realizing Those Fruits Is Also Self-View (ātma-dṛṣṭi)

Nowadays there are hundreds and thousands of people who appear to have attained enlightenment and realized the fruits, and the streets are almost crowded with "sages." Yet so many of these sages show no difference at all before and after their "awakening" with regard to afflictions of the mind and nature—no elevation of thought, no meditative absorption (samādhi), their bodily, verbal, and mental actions just as before, or even more defiled than before, with arrogance even heavier than before. How can it be proven whether such people have truly realized the fruits or seen the true mind? It simply cannot be proven. They have not cultivated the thirty-seven aids to enlightenment at all, and the precepts, meditation, and wisdom are completely lacking. Many are merely at the level of intellectual understanding by the consciousness—a grasp and comprehension at the level of knowledge. Many more do not even possess complete theoretical knowledge; they cannot even resonate with or reach the level of the consciousness, let alone the manas.

So nowadays there are simply far too many people committing gross false speech. Why do they commit gross false speech? Only those with a heavy view of self, who cling to "me" as being right, will commit gross false speech. Those with a slight view of self will be extremely cautious and careful, very much seeking truth from facts; they will seek verification everywhere—whether their state of cultivation is truly realization or not. They will not blindly exalt themselves, claiming how great they are. If a person with a heavy view of self believes he has realized the fruit, and you tell him that is not realization, he will immediately become agitated and angry. Why does he become angry? Because he is extremely attached to the matter of realizing the fruit, extremely attached to being a sage, extremely attached to being different from others, extremely attached to the fruit and the status, and deeply concerned about his own attainment and identity.

This kind of attachment shows that the "self" still exists in his mind, the same as before, or even heavier than before. If you tell him that realization by the consciousness is not true realization of the fruit—that emotional sentiment, intellectual understanding, reasoning, and guessing do not count as realization of the fruit, and that realization must occur in the manas—then in order to defend his attainment and reputation, he will oppose, refute, and attack in every way, without any thought or reflection whatsoever, completely disregarding the facts, and even less will he engage in self-examination. Because there is a "self" in his mind—that self which has realized the fruit, an extraordinary self, a self different from others, a self high above all others. Taking such a self as truly existent, he will especially defend it; and taking the fruit as truly his own, he will especially defend it as well. This shows that this person's view of self exists in full, and he has not realized the fruit at all. Once one has truly eliminated the view of self and one's wisdom gradually grows, one will have the ability to judge whether a person of various mental activities has a self in mind, whether he is someone who has eliminated the view of self, to what degree his view of self remains, and whether it is severe.