Saṃsāra Is Nirvāṇa

Question: What is the ultimate source of birth and death? Where does birth and death come from? Who produces birth and death? What does birth and death depend upon to exist?

Answer: It is because of the Ālayavijñāna that the body of the five aggregates (pañca-skandha) can manifest, and from this there is birth and death. Because the Ālayavijñāna can store the karmic seeds of birth and death and can also output the karmic seeds of birth and death, sentient beings have birth and death. The Ālayavijñāna is true emptiness (samyag-śūnyatā); birth and death are wondrous existence. Within that which is without birth and death, birth and death are provisionally manifested—birth and death are precisely nirvāṇa, and the Ālayavijñāna is the mind of nirvāṇa. Birth and death and the Ālayavijñāna are neither identical nor different. Birth and death are entirely the Ālayavijñāna, yet the Ālayavijñāna is not birth and death. The Ālayavijñāna is the great ocean; birth and death are the foam. Birth and death are precisely nirvāṇa—all phenomena of birth and death are manifested and conjured by the Ālayavijñāna; there is no real birth and death. Birth and death are an illusion; in essence, everything is the Ālayavijñāna.