What Is Seeing One's Nature?

Seeing-nature is the wondrous meritorious quality of the tathāgatagarbha's seeing of dharmas, formed from the seed of the great element of seeing within the tathāgatagarbha. Only after the tathāgatagarbha sees dharmas can the seven consciousnesses have seeing, and can they see the dharmas corresponding to each of them. Seeing-nature is also called buddha-nature, and is also called the tathāgatagarbha-nature; it is the wondrous function of the tathāgatagarbha. Without buddha-nature, no dharma could be put to use, and none could arise. Therefore the Buddha said that all dharmas are the tathāgatagarbha-nature, all are the functions and operations of the tathāgatagarbha.

Buddha-nature, or seeing-nature, is also called the nature of awareness; it is the tathāgatagarbha's nature of being aware of all dharmas. The awareness-nature of the tathāgatagarbha has no arising or ceasing, but the manifestation of this awareness-nature is conditional; the conditions are the existence of conditioned and perishable dharmas such as brightness and darkness, form and emptiness, penetration and obstruction, as explained in the Śūraṅgama Sūtra. If these conditioned and perishable dharmas, these dharmas of dependent origination, did not exist, the awareness-nature could not manifest and operate. Only after the tathāgatagarbha is aware of and cognizes all dharmas can the seven consciousnesses have awareness and cognition, can they cognize and discern dharmas, know and see dharmas, and experience and feel dharmas. That is why the Buddha said that the awareness-nature of the tathāgatagarbha is the wondrous true suchness-nature, and that all dharmas are the wondrous true suchness-nature; without this wondrous true suchness-nature, no dharma could manifest or be born. This buddha-nature, this wondrous true suchness-nature, is of such importance that, combined with the tathāgatagarbha's five universally associated mental factors, it perfectly presents all dharmas; only thus is the world of the five aggregates so resplendent, colorful, and manifold.

The tathāgatagarbha is like an electric lamp, and buddha-nature is like the lamplight. The electric lamp emits light and illuminates all dharmas; only then can the tathāgatagarbha operate the dharmas, and while operating them, the mental factors arise and function in accompaniment. After buddha-nature manifests its wondrous function, the dharmas appear, the seven consciousnesses see the dharmas, and the eight consciousnesses operate in concord. Seeing-nature and buddha-nature can only be put to use depending on the tathāgatagarbha as the underlying essence, but they are not identical to the tathāgatagarbha essence, nor can they function unconditionally forever; here a phenomenon of arising and ceasing is hidden. However, one must not confuse the arising and ceasing of buddha-nature with the arising and perishing of the worldly dharmas of the five aggregates; the two are essentially different. Worldly dharmas go from nonexistence to existence, arising out of nothing, whereas buddha-nature exists from the beginning and need not be born.