Only by Personally Realizing All Dharmas Can One Confirm Them Beyond Doubt

That all dharmas can be personally realized and directly observed in valid direct cognition—this is more important than anything else. Even words spoken from the Buddha's own mouth should be personally examined and verified through direct realization before one can finally confirm them without doubt. A principle that one has personally verified is a fact, and fact is more reliable than the Buddha's words. And what the Buddha personally spoke is more reliable than the transmitted Buddhist sūtras, because sūtras have passed through the mouths and hands of others and are thus secondhand accounts. Sūtras are more reliable than the treatises of bodhisattvas of the stage of near-perfect enlightenment; the treatises of such bodhisattvas are more reliable than the treatises of other bodhisattvas; the treatises of other great bodhisattvas are more reliable than the words of ordinary beings. In the final analysis, no matter how reliable the sūtras and treatises may be, nothing is more reliable than personal realization.

Yet now, even if the Buddha came in person to transmit the Dharma, all sentient beings would only be able to accept the Buddhist sūtras in faith, and not accept what the Buddha personally spoke, because they would not know that it was the Buddha who had descended into the world, and they themselves lack the wisdom to discern whether the Dharma-meaning is true or not. Thus what they believe in would be blind faith and reverential faith—not faith based on realization, nor true faith, but merely faith in the Buddha's fame and prestige. If sentient beings believed that the Buddha had personally come to the Sahā world to transmit the Dharma, then they would believe what the Buddha, appearing in the form of a Buddha, says, and would not necessarily have to believe the sūtras, even if the sūtras were perfectly true. This also shows that sentient beings' faith in the Buddha and in the Dharma he teaches is blind faith and reverential faith, not faith based on realization. If one believes the Dharma taught by someone who appears in the form of a Buddha, then what should be done if Māra Pāpīyas manifests the form of a Buddha and comes to transmit the Dharma? One would have to believe him completely as well, and would then be led astray, sinking into birth-and-death, unable to attain liberation.

Therefore, of the thousands upon thousands of words that could be said, only personal realization is the most reliable. To believe only in facts, to believe only in truth—this is the principle that everyone should follow. But realizing the truth is an extremely, extremely difficult matter, requiring immense merit and wisdom, which is why sentient beings have no choice but to believe what comes from the mouths of others—an unavoidable expedient. This is also why, at the time of his departure, the Buddha exhorted and admonished his disciples again and again, insisting that they must follow the four reliances and the four non-reliances. This shows that the four reliances and four non-reliances must be extremely difficult to practice—almost ninety-nine percent of people cannot do it, because of their deficiency in merit, meditative concentration (samādhi), and wisdom.

On the other hand, as soon as one speaks of trusting personal realization, there will be some people deeply steeped in arrogance of self who believe only in their own inferences and interpretations, taking these to be what they themselves have realized, and no longer believing what those who have realized the truth say. Their arrogance grows ever greater, to the point of self-deception and deceiving others, and in the end they still gain no benefit from the Dharma. Such is the phenomenon of learning Buddhism in the Dharma-ending age: even if the Buddha came, it would be difficult to manage. Sentient beings veer either left or right—either blindly following others, or, out of arrogance and excessive self-confidence, trusting themselves too much. Those lacking wisdom find it very hard to grasp an appropriate measure, very hard to hold to a suitable degree; one might say that even the world's physicians would throw up their hands in helplessness.