Lecture Notes on the Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son (135)

In Practice, We Must Make the False Dharmas Better and Purer

Someone will ask: if nothing can be attained, then what are we practicing for? Practice means first understanding the principle that all dharmas are unattainable, then realizing that all dharmas are indeed unattainable, and finally, when the mind is utterly empty, one can attain great liberation, no longer bound by the notion of attainment, and thereby be liberated from all the suffering of birth and death. Even if there is truly nothing to be attained, we must still attain this dharma of non-attainment; otherwise, the cycle of birth and death will not cease.

All dharmas are illusory and unattainable. The suffering retribution we undergo is false, yet none of us wishes to undergo suffering retribution; committing evil deeds is false, yet we should not commit evil karmic actions; killing someone is false, yet we should not kill; hell is false, yet none of us is willing to go there; becoming a Buddha is false, yet we all wish to become Buddhas. Practice is just like this: false dharmas have the function of false dharmas, and the real has the function of the real. Since we cannot eliminate them all, we must make the false dharmas better and purer. Our seventh consciousness mind is false, yet it has a great function, so we must make it function in wholesome ways; we cannot abandon and discard the false altogether, for then we cannot become a Buddha. This dialectic may seem contradictory, but after attaining realization, one will know that it is not contradictory.