The Distance Between Knowing and Realizing Is Inconceivable

When eradicating the view of self (satkāya-dṛṣṭi-prahāṇa), the mind consciousness must contemplate and analyze thoroughly, leaving no loopholes at all, so that the manas completely and fully accepts it without any doubt; only then can the view of self be eradicated. In contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) to eradicate the view of self, the mind consciousness must find every means to contemplate and observe the illusory, unreal nature of the five aggregates (pañca-skandha) and the eighteen realms, successfully permeating and influencing the manas, so that the manas confirms from deep within that the five aggregates are truly not the self. Only then does the manas have sufficient conviction; no matter who says the five aggregates are real, the manas will not think that way or give its assent. To achieve this, the mind consciousness must first understand the principle itself and contemplate it clearly, and it must also give the manas a period of time to adapt and confirm, allowing the manas to become accustomed to the fact that the five aggregates are truly not the self and are not real.

When one has just encountered this teaching and just begun contemplating it, some people genuinely feel fear in their hearts, feel at a loss as if the six senses have lost their master, feel they have nothing to rely on, and feel inner emptiness and dread. This is because the manas has, since beginningless kalpas, firmly held that the five aggregates are the self and are real; now the mind consciousness tells Him that this is not so, and the manas can hardly bear it no matter what, so the mind feels fear and distress. Only through the mind consciousness's continuous permeation and influence, over a long period of time, after the manas has accepted it, will this feeling gradually fade away. For the manas to be fully psychologically prepared, the mind consciousness must repeatedly and continuously permeate and influence Him, constantly reinforcing the concept of no-self; eventually, one day, the view of self can be truly and thoroughly eradicated.

If only the mind consciousness knows that the five-aggregate body and all dharmas are illusory, but the manas does not yet know it or accept it, then it is of no real use; it is merely a superficial understanding, not the true eradication of the view of self. From the first fruit to the fourth fruit, the manas must continuously accept that the five aggregates are subject to arising and ceasing, impermanent, illusory, and not the self; when it fully accepts this, the manas completely eradicates its tendency to grasp at the world of the five aggregates, and gains the ability to transcend the cycle of birth and death. When the manas has completely eradicated all grasping and one attains the fourth fruit, it is like watching a movie on a dome screen: no matter what happens on the dome screen, whatever states appear, the mind remains as if nothing had happened, neither dodging nor welcoming. The manas no longer directs the body to dodge anything; the mind knows that all states are unreal, that they are all on the screen and not reality, and so one is no longer afraid.

From this we can see that the mind of sentient beings has both surface, superficial functions and hidden, concealed functions; yet what plays the decisive role is that hidden force—a force that is deeply rooted, hard to transform, and hard to persuade—which is the inertial force of the manas. Changing this inertial force is therefore extremely important, for it can resolve the great problem of birth and death spanning countless kalpas, including segmented birth-and-death (pariccheda-maraṇa) and transformational birth-and-death (parināma-maraṇa); it can also eradicate the ignorance, karma, and suffering accumulated since beginningless kalpas, and ascend to the other shore of nirvāṇa.

When the manas has completely eradicated its grasping at the five aggregates, in the Small Vehicle this is the arhat of the fourth fruit, and in the Great Vehicle it is the completion of the seventh bhūmi and entry into the eighth bhūmi. The liberation realization of an eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva is equivalent to that of a great arhat of the fourth fruit who is liberated in both ways (ubhayatobhāga-vimukta); the completion of the first bhūmi is equivalent to an arhat liberated by wisdom (prajñā-vimukta), but a first-bhūmi bodhisattva does not take the fruit of an arhat liberated by wisdom, and must not completely eradicate all the afflictions of delusive thinking. The state in which the manas has completely eradicated grasping at a self of persons is something we can know to some extent through inference and imaginative reasoning, even though we have not realized it. As for the manas completely eradicating grasping at a self of dharmas, we can contemplate it through inference and even non-valid cognition, and gain a rough idea, though we are even less able to realize it. Between this knowing and the actual realization may lie a gap of nearly two incalculable kalpas and three asaṃkhyeya kalpas. The distance between knowing and realizing is simply unimaginable.

Some people always become arrogant and self-satisfied merely because they know a bit of the Dharma's meaning; in fact, that amounts to nothing. Even if one has genuinely realized very profound Buddhadharma, it is still not worth being arrogant or self-satisfied about. Looking across the worlds of the ten directions and the three periods of past, future, and present, even if we cultivated to the level of an eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva, it would still count for nothing. Only people of shallow wisdom and limited experience easily develop arrogance and self-satisfaction, and only then is their pride deep and heavy. People with intelligence and wisdom, who are widely experienced and knowledgeable, do not easily develop pride, because they have seen or know of countless people who are superior to themselves by countless times; their horizons are extremely broad.