The Profound Yogācāra Meaning of the Diamond Sutra (143)

Original text: 何以故。若世界实有者。即是一合相。如来说一合相。即非一合相。是名一合相。须菩提。一合相者。即是不可说。但凡夫之人贪著其事。

Explanation: The World-Honored One said: Why is this said? Because if the world truly existed as real, then this world would be a composite whole (a "combined appearance"). The combined appearance spoken of by the Tathāgata is not a real mark; there is no truly existent combined appearance—it is merely called a combined appearance in name. If this world truly existed, it would ultimately be a combined appearance composed of countless and countless particles of fine dust. The Tathāgata says this combined appearance is not a truly existent combined appearance, and there is no real thing called a combined appearance; all is illusory, and its essence is all the nature of the tathāgatagarbha. Therefore, a false name is also given to the combined appearance, and it too is called a combined appearance. Subhūti, a combined appearance is something that cannot be spoken of and cannot be expressed; yet ordinary beings all greedily cling to these marks.

The Buddha said that the combined appearance formed by material particles, fine particles, and fine dust—this combined appearance has nothing worth speaking about. Because all are bodies of false combination of the four great elements, without any mark of real existence, they are not real; they are all conjured forth by the tathāgatagarbha. They are all marks of the tathāgatagarbha, and their essence is all the tathāgatagarbha. Since this is so, there is no combined appearance that can be spoken of; thus the combined appearance is unspeakable, and one need not cling to it. Because it is not real—all marks are arising-and-ceasing and illusory. But regarding these arising-and-ceasing, illusory false marks, ordinary beings, for beginningless kalpas, have constantly greedily clung to these illusory false marks, believing them to be really existent and not empty. Ordinary beings invariably cling to the six sense objects, yet the six sense objects are also false marks composed of matter and the particles of the four great elements; they are not really existent and have no true mark. They are merely a name. Ordinary beings do not know this, and so they invariably cling to these named false marks.

Ordinary beings, for beginningless kalpas, have constantly clung to the lands and worlds in which they live and their living environments; in fact, these are all formed from material particles. These are all just combined appearances, all illusory, arising and ceasing, mutable—all formed by the tathāgatagarbha transmitting the seeds of the four great elements, outputting them instant after instant to form, sustain, and uphold them. Without the tathāgatagarbha, there would be none of these combined appearances. In fact, they are all marks of the tathāgatagarbha; these marks are not really existent—they are all false, conjured marks of combination, like things appearing in dreams and illusions in space, like marks in a dream, like flowers in the sky, not real. But ordinary beings do not know this point, do not know this fact, and so they take all the marks they contact as entirely real. Then they cling, grasp, and calculate; and because of this clinging, grasping, and calculating, they are bound by these false marks, bound within the birth-and-death cycle of the six realms of saṃsāra, unable to attain liberation.

Therefore the Buddha said that ordinary beings (that is, ignorant and foolish people) do not know the true reality of all dharmas, but only single-mindedly cling to illusory false marks. Only when sentient beings learn the true Mahāyāna dharma of real suchness—knowing that the entire world, the environment we depend on for survival, and the people, affairs, things, and principles we contact are all illusory marks formed by the tathāgatagarbha transmitting seeds, with an essence that is all the mark of the tathāgatagarbha and not really existent—only when they realize this true fact can sentient beings' tendency to cling be lightened and eliminated; then the cause of birth and death is also eliminated, and sentient beings can emerge from the cycle of birth and death.