Lecture Notes on the Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son (23)

Why can the tathāgatagarbha never be destroyed?

What is the thing that never changes? It is the tathāgatagarbha. The three calamities can destroy the great trichiliocosm, so what is it that cannot be destroyed? It is the tathāgatagarbha. Why can it not be destroyed? Because His nature is empty, and His marks are also empty; therefore there is nothing that can be destroyed. We all have marks, and whatever has marks can be destroyed; moreover, we all have birth, and thus there is death, whereas the tathāgatagarbha neither arises nor ceases.

If a house is empty, and someone comes to steal things, or rob things, or to destroy things, he cannot succeed. When something is empty, there is nothing to be destroyed—who can destroy empty space? The tathāgatagarbha's nature is empty, and therefore it cannot be destroyed. But all the marks manifested and transformed by the tathāgatagarbha are marks with form, and only things with marks can be destroyed. When we have no money in our pockets, who can rob us of our money? As long as something exists, it can perish; as long as something is born, it can die—such is the principle both in the world and beyond the world.