Saṃyukta Āgama (297), Part One

（一）Original text: 如是我闻。一时佛住拘留搜调牛聚落。尔时。世尊告诸比丘。我当为汝等说法。初中后善。善义善味。纯一清净。梵行清白。所谓大空法经。谛听。善思。当为汝说。云何为大空法经。所谓此有故彼有。此起故彼起。谓缘无明行。缘行识。乃至纯大苦聚集。

Explanation: The World-Honored One told the bhikṣus: I shall teach the Dharma for you—a Dharma that is good in the beginning, good in the middle, and good in the end, with wholesome meaning and wholesome flavor, purely pure, with a brahma-life that is pure and undefiled; it is called the Great Emptiness Sūtra (Mahāśūnyatā-dharma Sūtra). Listen carefully and contemplate well; I shall now teach it for you. What is the Great Emptiness Sūtra? It is this: because this dharma exists, that dharma exists; because this dharma arises, that dharma arises in turn. That is to say, ignorance conditions volitional formations (avidyā-pratyayāḥ saṃskārāḥ), volitional formations condition consciousness, and so on, up to the complete gathering of great suffering.

Original text: 缘生老死者。若有问言。彼谁老死。老死属谁。彼则答言。我即老死。今老死属我。老死是我。所言命即是身。或言命异身异。此则一义。而说有种种。若见言命即是身。彼梵行者所无有。若复见言。命异身异。梵行者所无有。于此二边。心所不随。正向中道。贤圣出世。如实不颠倒正见。谓缘生老死。如是生有取爱。受触六入处。名色识行。缘无明故有行。

Explanation: Regarding the question that aging-and-death arises conditioned on birth, if someone asks who has aging-and-death, and to whom aging-and-death belongs, you should answer: I myself am the aging-and-death; now aging-and-death belongs to me; aging-and-death is me. If someone says that life is identical with the physical body, or says that when life changes, the physical body changes with it, these statements all have the same meaning, though expressed in various ways. If someone holds the view that life is identical with the physical body, then for those practicing the brahma-life, in the end there would be no more life; if someone holds the view that when life changes, the physical body changes with it, then for those practicing the brahma-life, in the end there would be no change of life.

The bhikṣus should not let their minds follow either of the two extremes regarding life and the physical body—whether they exist or do not exist—but should single-mindedly turn directly toward the Middle Way of nirvāṇa. After the noble sages appear in the world, they hold the true and correct view regarding life, without inversion, teaching the twelve links of dependent origination: namely, only conditioned on birth is there aging-and-death; conditioned on existence (bhava) there is birth; conditioned on grasping there is existence; conditioned on craving there is grasping; conditioned on feeling there is craving; conditioned on contact there is feeling; conditioned on the six sense bases (ṣaḍāyatana) there is contact; due to name-and-form there are the six sense bases; conditioned on the six consciousnesses there is name-and-form; conditioned on volitional formations there are the six consciousnesses; conditioned on ignorance there are volitional formations.