Selected Lectures on the Father and Son Collection Sūtra

Original text: 如是了知。初识初识空。自业自业空。身识身识空。若灭灭空。若生生空。轮回轮回空。涅槃涅槃。皆自性空。无有作者。亦无受者。但随世俗。之所显示。非第一义。作是说也。

Explanation: One should know in this way the initial consciousness and the emptiness of the initial consciousness, know the karmic actions one has created and the emptiness of those karmic actions, and know the body consciousness and the emptiness of the body consciousness; in this way one should know that if all dharmas arise, their arising is empty, and if all dharmas cease, their ceasing is also empty; at the same time, one should also know saṃsāra and the emptiness of saṃsāra, and know nirvāṇa and the emptiness of nirvāṇa. The creation and transmigration of karmic formations have neither a doer nor an experiencer; all dharmas are merely manifested in accordance with worldly conventions. At the ultimate truth (paramārtha-satya), such statements would not be made.

The initial consciousness that arises on the physical body of the next life is also empty, and the karmic actions that are created are also empty. The body consciousness is also empty. If I extinguish this dharma, this act of cessation is itself empty—is there a real dharma of cessation, a principle by which this dharma ceases? No, it is empty. The arising of consciousness in the next life—the dharma of arising in that birth is also empty; is there a fixed, unchanging law or principle of arising? No, it is empty, and yet all dharmas arise in just this way. As we transmigrate through the six realms—being humans, devas, animals, or hungry ghosts—that transmigration is also empty. If saṃsāra were not empty, we would transmigrate forever, unable to attain liberation, unable to become Buddhas, and cultivation would be useless. The fact that we can cut off saṃsāra and escape from it shows that saṃsāra is empty, that there is no real, indestructible dharma of saṃsāra. We ourselves are not real, so could there be a real dharma of saṃsāra? No—it is all empty, all illusory.

If we attain nirvāṇa, having extinguished the worldly dharmas of the three realms—the five aggregates extinguished, the eighteen realms extinguished, the body extinguished, the mind extinguished, feelings extinguished, perceptions extinguished, the bodily, verbal, and mental actions extinguished—all extinguished, leaving only an Ālayavijñāna that neither arises nor ceases, tranquil and quiescent—that state is called nirvāṇa. This state in which the five aggregates and the eighteen realms have all been extinguished is itself also empty, also subject to arising, ceasing, and change, and is not forever unchanging. The state of nirvāṇa likewise comes from nowhere and goes nowhere; there is no one who enters nirvāṇa and no one who exits nirvāṇa—no doer and no experiencer.

Therefore nirvāṇa is not a real existence; nirvāṇa is the manifestation of a state of tranquility, just as unreal as the clamorous phenomena of the world—it is illusory and conjured. This state is also empty; only the Ālayavijñāna is not empty, and everything else is empty. Nirvāṇa has no marks—even the state of emptiness is empty, and this emptiness does not exist apart from the Ālayavijñāna.

None of the dharmas has a doer, nor is there an experiencer. When one realizes the fourth fruit of arhatship and enters nirvāṇa, there is no person who realized the fourth fruit, no arhat who entered nirvāṇa, and no arhat who enjoys the bliss of quiescence—who experiences the bliss of quiescence in nirvāṇa? Can such a person be found? In nirvāṇa there is no person, no arhat; if there were, it would not be nirvāṇa. The arhat's physical body is extinguished, the conscious mind is extinguished, the functions of the five aggregates are extinguished, and the phenomena of the eighteen realms are extinguished; therefore in nirvāṇa there is no arhat and no person experiencing the bliss of quiescence.