[This is from my Stages course for select
students]
The eighth consciousness, also known as the alaya consciousness
or storehouse consciousness, is a particularly complicated,
difficult subject to discuss. Shakyamuni Buddha taught for several
decades and had many highly advanced practitioners as his
disciples, yet despite disciples of high prajna wisdom and high
samadhi attainments, Shakyamuni rarely spoke of the alaya
consciousness in order to prevent any entries into error. That’s
how important this topic is, and how difficult it is to discuss. As
Shakyamuni said,
The storehouse consciousness [alaya] is very profound and
subtle;
All its seeds are like a torrential flow.
I do not explain it to the ignorant,
For fear they will cling to it and consider it a self.
Shakyamuni threfore gave very few teachings on the alaya
consciousness in order not to provide people with another false
source of fixation of something as the ultimate. He didn’t want to
talk extensively about something that sentient beings, lacking
wisdom, might take as a higher Self or final Reality.
In particular, he worried that beings might take the alaya as a big
Self, or true atman. In fact, the Hindu sages who were able to
reach to the alaya body of consciousness before him all made this
very mistake, taking the alaya as the Great Self (Brahman) when it
is only the essence of consciousness. They would reach this stage
of cultivation and claim, “I am He, I am He” or “I am Brahman, I am
Shiva.” Similarly, “All this is Brahman,” “I know the Supreme
Brahman; there is nothing higher than that (Prasna
UpanishadVI.7),” “All this Universe is Brahman. The Self is
Brahman. (Mandukya Upanishad, Verse 2).”
Contrast this with Buddha’s discourse in the Diamond Sutra where he
says that there is no such real thing as a world system or
agglomeration of world systems, for if such a thing existed in
reality it would be the oneness of all phenomena. Neither any
components nor the whole should be regarded as real. No stage of
attainment should be regarded as real either. If one even considers
themselves an ego, identity, being or real self, they are not
correct either. No stage of attainment is really existing or ever
really attained.
Many in history have reached the stage where they were able to
claim “I and the Father are one,” but this was also only reaching
the alaya -- if that far -- without fully transforming it or
overturning its basis. And many of those sages were killed by
people who did not understand what they were saying. To overturn
the alaya and produce a revolution in its basis, turning all its
seeds into wisdoms – that’s the stage of true enlightenment taught
by Shakyamuni Buddha. Many masters since then have been able to
reach to the alaya by cultivating the seventh consciousness to the
stage where they silenced the sixth and first five consciousnesses
by turning away from the senses and phenomena. Many yoga
concentration techniques will help you do this. But many of these
also made the mistake of holding on to the alaya as the object of
the seventh consciousness and clinging to it as a Self. In Zen a
master would have to break up someone’s stage of realization in
order to get them to perceive this (awaken) and go beyond.
Afterwards, as long as they had attained the right view and
understanding, a master would not worry about what particular
cultivation practices a student would thereafter choose to
follow.
This is so important to understand these various fine
distinctions that we should review this in more detail. If you do
not understand this, you cannot understand the real meaning of
enlightenment and how it puts an end to transmigration (as well as
sorrow, misery, etc.) or why it involves cultivating prajna
transcendental wisdom. Those things are just words until you
understand the whole picture and grand scheme of things.
In the Brahmanism and other religious streams that were created
by the Vedas and which predated Shakyamuni, Vedic philosophy
originally held that a great being named Brahman was the creator of
all beings, including man. Brahman was revered as the lord of all
creation, but was not apart from ourselves. In Vedic literature, it
was asserted that there was no difference, no duality between the
true self of human beings, called the “atman,” and the true self of
Brahman. Brahman is “One Without a Second” and fully present in
each and every individual being.
This is similar to a common religious theme that God and man
share the same essence, or the idea that “Heaven and man are one”
found in Confucianism. But Brahman, in this case, is considered
beyond form, and the universe and all the beings within it are
considered forms or phenomena that are transformations of Brahman
the great one Self. The Triple Realm is thus considered one
great unified whole that is Brahman’s very being. In Vedic
philosophy, the highest ideal is to return to the state where
Brahman and the individual soul, or atman, become one. Hence, the
cultivation methods espoused in Hinduism involve the purifying
effects of meditation and other elevating and refining cultivation
techniques that return the small self of the individual person to
the great self of Brahman. As “atman” is a word that originally
meant “breath” or “vital principle,” it is not surprising that the
majority of these methods involved breathing practices to cultivate
one’s chi, or prana. The anapana methods of Buddhism, for instance
(see the Anapanasati
Sutra) take hold of some of these breathing methods and
combine them with the practice of prajna wisdom to help speed the
process of attainment.
The name “Brahman” means absolutely pure and perfectly real. But
what is Brahman? Brahman gives birth to all things by
transformations that are akin to magical illusions that seem real,
but which lack any true substance. Brahman is therefore the
totality of the universe, just like the alaya. It is a unity of
mind and the material world, the fundamental nature. All apparent
phenomena are empty illusions that are the “play” or “sport” of
Brahman, who gives rise to all things without any particular aim or
purpose. Similarly, all things are born from consciousness, and
within this realm of interdependent origination no ultimate
purpose can be found. So all things are maya and have no ultimate
purpose, but everything is linked together through cause and effect
to comprise one great whole. As sentient beings and part of this
great body of transformations, we traverse from life to life in an
unending, ceaseless round of incarnations. None of it is real,
however, but just a gigantic set of illusory transformations that
we take to be real, which causes pain and suffering and sorrow.
As sentient beings, we have two choices: (1) to become free of
maya by achieving liberation where we return to the fundamental
state of Brahman, or (2) to continue the endless suffering rounds
of birth and death through ceaseless transmigration. To awaken to
Brahman and return to his nature requires that we throw off the
barrier of ignorance and cultivate illumination. The means to do
so, according to Brahmanism, the Vedas and Hinduism, was to
withdraw from the senses and to cultivate yoga, mantra and
meditative concentration. Most all cultivation methods in the world
can be traced back to the Indian discoveries in these areas.
Pure consciousness, in its purest base form as the alaya
consciousness, can indeed be reached this way, which is exactly
what many of the Vedic sages accomplished. Of course, many did not
even reach that high stage of attainment, but somee stage much
lower. In pure consciousness meditation, you can detach from the
senses and the sixth consciousness, which is akin to the yoga
injunctions to withdraw from the outward senses and turn
inwards. By grasping phenomena with the sixth consciousness you
discriminate an objective world, but when that discrimination
ceases, you can reach cessation as a state.
If you do that, what is then the object of the seventh
consciousness? The alaya consciousness. If one is ignorant about
the proper path, the seventh consciousness will take the alaya and
hold to it as a self. If one is not ignorant, they will refrain
from clinging to the alaya or taking it as something real, and by
continuing to shine the empty awareness of prajna without clinging,
let mind be born without abiding in any of its states. The highest
reality is approachable only by prajna transcendental wisdom, and
this is always and ever the correct path of cultivation. As the
sage Nisargadatta said of his own attainment,
I am conscious and unconscious, both conscious and unconscious,
neither conscious nor unconscious – to all this I am witness – but
really there is no witness, because there is no thing to be a
witness to. I am perfectly empty of all mental formations, void of
mind – yet fully aware. This I try to express by saying that I am
beyond the mind.[1]
If one is not careful and posits Brahman as the ultimate Source,
then when consciousness is the only object then the seventh
consciousness will take the “purity” of the alaya as an object; it
will take hold of the alaya as Brahman the Great Self. If one
correctly cultivates prajna, they can overturn the alaya and reach
true and perfect enlightenment that is beyond consciousness and the
Three Realms.
With thoughts ever arising, with all its seeds always in the
process of transformation, the alaya is the source of all creation
and transmigration. But one can mistake the alaya as the pure truth
or ultimate essence where there is neither subject nor object,
positive nor negative, good or bad - just as Vedic works cite –
because that is the nature of the alaya seen in its aspect of
purity. Like Brahman, the alaya is the master of transmigration and
transformation because of the constant stirring of its seeds
(elements) until and unless it has been overturned by voidness
meditation so that one detaches from it as an object and thus
transcends it.
One should not even consider the alaya as being Real, but let it
be without attachment or fixation. It can be transcended only by
emptiness meditation, which means the “cultivation of prajna
wisdom.” When you can let go of the alaya as an object, so that it
returns to its original inherent identity as the ground state of
Suchness, you can “experience a revolution in its basis” and the
seeds of the alaya (the components of consciousness) can all become
clear wisdoms. Then one can become the ultimate master of
consciousness as well as birth and death, because consciousness is
the source of transmigration. This is how one ultimately
becomes free of the stream of incarnations and one learns how to
master their mind. The mind can no longer cheat you because you
always see through it. When the alaya becomes transformed, it is
called “immaculate consciousness” that is pure without
clinging.
This is where the true enlightenment first introduced by
Buddhism surpassed the Hindu and Vedic sages who reached the realm
of Brahman, or the alaya, and took it as a fixed Supreme Self. It
is easy to mistake it as the highest Self just as Shakyamuni said,
so he rarely spoke of it. It’s hard enough just getting people to
attain a state of dhayan-samadhi, let alone reach this far. Few
people attain to this in their cultivation, and of those who can,
Shakyamuni didn’t want people to grasp onto the alaya as anything
real. If you do, you cannot go beyond it. In his many years of
teaching, Shakyamuni Buddha often refused to go into deep
explanations of the real nature of nirvana, called the
Tathagatagarbha doctrine, until he had been teaching for quite a
while and his disciples had “grown up” with spiritual attainments
and prajna wisdom. The nirvana of Buddhism is to overturn the alaya
whereas in the previous sects and schools, it was to reach to the
alaya, or simply to reach some stage of dhyana and the lower
heavens with their appropriate gods and goddesses. This is what you
find in most worldly religions.
Initially in his teaching career, Shakyamuni considered most of
his disciples as children of limited capacities who could only
"digest" the simple and basic spiritual fare of "suffering,
impermanence and non-Self." So he set up the path as
something that put an end to suffering, and stressed the analysis
of the mind and mental formations to discover that there is no such
thing as an ego. Once his students had progressed upon the
spiritual path with the cultivation attainments of samadhi, gong-fu
and prajna wisdom, only then were they ready to be introduced
to the culminational teachings of the Tathagatagarbha or
Buddhanature, as revealed in the Mahaparinirvana Sutra, which deal
with bliss, permanence and true Self. But this is a different,
higher set than the sat-chit-ananda (existence, consciousness,
bliss) of Hinduism because it goes BEYOND the alaya whereas the
Vedic sat-chit-ananda stops at the alaya and mistakes it as the
ultimate, calling it Brahman. As Buddha said, the true
sat-chit-ananda is the achievement of the nirvana without remainder
beyond the realm or function of the alaya. One achieves this by
cultivating prajna wisdom to let go of the alaya, and the even
bigger secret is that prajna wisdom is also considered a guest
rather than the ultimate host, which is how one continues to
cultivate to a higher and higher attainment without any effort at
all.
Many practitioners tend to mistakenly identify the stilling of
the sixth consciousness when all thoughts cease - a time when the
alaya is alone in the meditation - as pure consciousness and the
Higher Self or ultimate attainment. Properly speaking, we can call
this “cultivating the seventh consciousness” rather than the eighth
because you don’t go beyond the eighth but take it as your object
of meditation. This is the source of all the deep philosophical
mistakes in Hinduism, and the reason is from meditation
(cultivation) that did not go high enough or far enough. The great
Confucian Wang Yang Ming also made this mistake, as have many
others since Shakyamuni’s time. It is truly difficult to reach the
alaya, and even more difficult to find a great and skillful teacher
who can help you crush your experiential realm and toss all away so
that you abide nowhere at all.
If the alaya is the object of concentration without movement of
the sixth or seventh consciousness (the mind), we can describe it
as formless, pure, unchanging, formless, timeless,
undifferentiated, all-pervading, self-illuminating, absolute,
without attributes, beginning or end. It’s easy for you to find
such quotes in various religious texts, and to add to this list.
This is where most people, as high stage Arhats, stop in their
cultivation, and indeed in the Upanishads and other cultivation
texts we find reference to these descriptions.
Shakyamuni could find no teacher in his day who had reached the
stage of totally and completely overturning the alaya, nor could he
find this dharma taught anywhere. However, upon reaching perfect
and complete enlightenment he could see the other Buddhas who had
achieved this feat and who had surmounted the Three Realms. He
could also see and perfectly understand all the beings who had
attained a stage of incomplete enlightenment, a fractional nirvana
or Bodhisattva bhumi, because they had not yet freed themselves
totally from the alaya (base of consciousness) and purified it.
Surpassing it, he can easily see through them and understand all
their levels and stages of meditation, their karma,
transformations, mental faults and so forth. Now you can understand
why the various Buddhist scriptures say things like this, for now
it becomes a science you can understand rather than just flowery
religious overblown wording. A “Buddha” doesn’t mean Buddhism. It
means a completely enlightened being, from any place within the
Triple Realm, who has overturned the alaya and escaped the Three
Realms, and who can thus survey the Three Realms clearly from
without and know all such things within it like:
1. What is right or wrong in each and every
condition.
2. What the karma is of every sentient being - whether of the past,
present or future.
3. All the various stages and types of dhyana and
samadhi.
4. The powers and faculties of all sentient beings.
5. The desires or moral direction of every sentient
being.
6. The actual condition of every sentient being.
7. The direction and consequence of all dharmas, events, functions,
happenings or circumstances.
8. All causes of mortality and of good and evil in their
reality.
9. The end of all beings and Nirvana.
10. The destruction of all illusions of every kind.
When one holds the alaya (pure consciousness) as the object of
meditation and their stage of cultivation is not stable, it is easy
for the alaya to be moved by the sixth consciousness, after which
creation (and thus transmigration) seems to appear. Transcending
the alaya is true non-production, no-birth, no-origination. At the
stage of cultivating the alaya when the sixth consciousness is
still, it may appear to be a realm of non-production, no-birth,
no-origination, unborn non-moving non-duality where we say it is
changeless, formless and so forth, but this is because the mind is
momentarily still but the alaya has not been transcended and
overturned. Only the true overturning of complete and perfect
enlightenment produces a revolution in the seeds of consciousness.
Otherwise one is just holding the alaya as an object of
consciousness and enjoying its purity.
When the sixth consciousness once again stirs, worldly things
will once again appear which is the changeable maya of Brahman.
Creation is then a vibration in pure consciousness. Everything we
see thus depends on movements of the mind and when the movements
cease, the mind is thoughtless and returns to its source. As Ramana
Maharshi said, “There is no creation in the state of realization.
When one sees the Self, the world is not seen. So see the Self and
realize that there has been no creation.”[2] He also said, “The creation is said to have
an origin. How? Like a tree and the seed from which it has grown.
How was the seed produced? From a similar tree. Where is the end to
the series of questions? Therefore, one must know one’s Self before
the world is known.”[3] Thus we have the cultivation school of
Yogacara called Consciousness-Only, or Mind-Only, which leads one
back to the alaya and urges prajna wisdom cultivation for complete
and perfect enlightenment.
A true cultivator can also become so steeped in meditation on
pure consciousness that no worldly things are seen, and this
nothingness can be mistaken for a destruction of the alaya. There
are all sorts of ways one can go astray in their cultivation at
this high stage of cultivating consciousness, with many of these
great errors being explained in the Surangama Sutra. You’ll find
such a high level discussion of these mistakes in no other
literature other than in this sutra, such as the following excerpt
regarding the mistakes one can make in cultivating through the
skandha of consciousness:
“Ananda, as the disciples practice samadhi and the skandha of
volition comes to an end, within the nature of all things in the
world the subtle disturbance in this clear state that is the common
life force shared by all living things suddenly breaks open. At
this point, the fine fabric of samsara, together with the deep
thread of the karma of transmigration and feeling and response are
radically suspended. Now they have reached the threshold of the
great enlightenment to nirvana, like the cock’s crow that causes us
to gaze to the east where brilliant rays already appear. The six
senses are empty and still and no longer galloping abroad. Within
and without are perfect clarity, and one enters a state where
nothing stains our consciousness. Profoundly penetrating the origin
of life of the twelve classes of living things in the ten
directions, they can contemplate the source of attachment without
feeling any attraction themselves. Now they have already achieved
an identity with all things in the universe; daylight dawns and all
secrets are revealed. This is called ‘the realm of the skandha of
consciousness.’ In the midst of the world’s attractions they are
now able to maintain their identity with the world, for they have
overcome the six senses, so that the senses are able to unite or
function separately, and hearing and seeing are interchangeable in
their purity. The world of the ten directions, together with his
own body and mind are like glass, which is perfectly transparent
within and without. This is called ‘the end of the skandha of
consciousness.’ In this way, the practitioner can transcend the
defilements of life and contemplate the source of its impurity,
which arises from insubstantial imaginings and foolish
thoughts.
1. “Ananda, you must know that as the disciples come to
thoroughly comprehend the voidness of the skandha of volition, they
will revert to the source of the skandha of consciousness. Although
they have wiped out the illusion of birth and death, they have not
yet reached the perfection of nirvana. Nevertheless, they are able
to unify the six senses or use them independently. The are also
able to unify their consciousness with the consciousness of all
living things and achieve a state of omniscience. However, if in
reverting to this state of perfection they take it as the cause of
true permanence and regard this as the superior interpretation,
they will fall into the error of holding onto the notion of
causality and become an adherent of the Kapila doctrine, that holds
primordial obscurity as the origin of reality, and thus, miss the
true bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge and
correct views.
This is called the first false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which holds that the consciousness attained produces
the effects experienced. In this way one strays far from perfect
enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds of
heresy.
2. “Ananda, progressing further, as the disciples come to
thoroughly comprehend the voidness of the skandha of volition, they
are able to wipe out the concept of birth and death. However,
before realizing the wonder of nirvana, in reverting to this state
of pure consciousness, they may survey the universe and regard it
as their own body, insisting that the twelve classes of living
things throughout boundless space all flow from it. In this way
they will fall into the error of holding that they create what they
do not in reality create, and thus, become adherents of the deva
Mahasvara, who appears in a limitless body. Thus, they miss the
true bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge and
correct views.
This is
called the second false condition of the skandha of consciousness,
which holds that the mind is the ultimate creator and that this is
the highest attainment. In this way, one strays far from
enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds of
arrogance for asserting the omnipresence of the self.
3. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, if before realizing the wonder
of nirvana, they cling to the skandha of consciousness, they may
take it that the body and mind both flow from this state and that
boundless space in the ten directions also arises from this. Then
they will insist that the realm from which all of this is expressed
is the true, permanent, indestructible body. As a result of
concluding that consciousness is permanent, they will be confused
regarding both noncreation and also creation and destruction. For
complacence in this deluded interpretation, they will fall into
regarding what is not permanent as permanent and become adherents
of Ishvaradeva, the divine creator of all things. Thus, they miss
the true bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge and
correct views.
This is called the third false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which holds the causality of mind, and therefore
produces an erroneous conclusion. In this way one strays far from
enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds of
false perfection.
4. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, before realizing the wonder of
nirvana, they may believe that their understanding is perfect
universal knowledge, and based on this knowledge, insist that even
the plant kingdom is sentient, no different from mankind. Likewise,
plants being the same as men, when men die they return as plants.
For this indiscriminate application of the concept of universal
knowledge, they fall into attributing knowledge where there is no
knowledge and become adherents of the doctrine of Vasistha and
Sani, who held that everything is sentient. Thus, they miss the
true bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge and
correct views.
This then is called the fourth false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which incorrectly concludes that the omniscient mind
is the ultimate attainment. In this way one strays far from
enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds of
false knowledge.
5. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, if before realizing the wonder
of nirvana, they succeed in harmonizing the functioning of the six
senses, they may find the source of creation in these harmonious
transformations. In the midst of this they may be tempted to
worship the brilliance of fire, the purity of water, the freedom of
wind, or the creativity of the earth. They may take these elements
as the fundamental causes of creation and insist that they are the
permanent reality. For attributing creativity to that which has no
power to create, they become followers of the doctrine of Kasyapa
and the Brahmins, who devote themselves to the worship of fire and
water and seek to escape the cycle of birth and death. Thus, they
miss the true bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge
and correct views.
This is called the fifth false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which engages in worship of the elements, losing
one’s mind in the pursuit of external objects, and thereby chasing
false causes and effects. In this way one strays far from
enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds of
distorting the laws of transformation.
6. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, before realizing the wonder of
nirvana, and in this state of perfect clarity, they may conclude
that this state of consciousness is itself void and that all
transformations end in annihilation. Taking refuge in eternal
annihilation, and believing this to be the superior interpretation,
these practitioners fall into relying on what is unreliable and
become adherents of the dhyana of thoughtlessness. Thus, they miss
the bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge and
correct views.
This is called the sixth false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which posits perfect annihilation and mindlessness
and leads to voidness and fruitlessness. In this way one strays far
from enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds
of annihilation.
7. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, before realizing the wonder of
nirvana, and in this state of perfect constancy, they may desire to
attain immortality of the body and share in the perfection and
everlasting deathlessness. For insisting on the superiority of this
interpretation, they will fall into coveting the unattainable and
become adherents of the immortality seekers. Thus, they miss the
bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge and correct
views.
This is called the seventh false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which consists of clinging to the source of life,
leading to foolish causes and bitter fruits. In this way one strays
far from enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the
seeds of foolishly clinging to longevity.
8. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, if before realizing the wonder
of nirvana, they may contemplate the fundamental unity of the
source of life and come to fear the total annihilation of this
material plane, and therefore use their mental powers to retire to
a lotus palace, display the seven treasures, and surround
themselves with beautiful women, then for insisting on indulging in
this fantasy, these practitioners will fall into regarding as real
what is not real and become adherents of the heavenly demons. Thus,
they miss the bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge
and correct views.
This is called the eighth false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which generates the effects of heterodox thinking
and reaps the bitter worldly fruit. In this way one strays far from
enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds of
Deva Mara.
9. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, if before realizing the wonder
of nirvana, practitioners in the midst of this clear understanding
of the source of life begin to make distinctions of fine and
coarse, true and false, and seek results from the law of cause and
effect, they will turn their backs on the path of purity. By
attempting to put an end to suffering, and taking pride in this
achievement, they will make no further progress. Insisting on the
superiority of this interpretation, they will fall into arrested
sravaka stage practice and become adherents of the ignorant monks
and uneducable devas of the four dhyana heavens. Thus, they miss
the bodhi of the Buddha-nature and lose correct knowledge and
correct views.
This is called the ninth false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which takes perfection of consciousness as
realization of the fruits of nirvana. In this way one strays far
from enlightenment, turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds
of fettered voidness.
10. “Continuing, as the disciples come to thoroughly comprehend the
voidness of the skandha of volition, they are able to wipe out the
concept of birth and death. However, before realizing the wonders
of nirvana and in the midst of this perfect and pure consciousness,
they may seek to probe more deeply into its marvels, take this as
nirvana, and no longer strive for further progress. Believing this
to be the superior interpretation, they will be arrested at the
pratyeka-buddha stage and become adherents of selfish
enlightenment. Thus, they miss the bodhi of the Buddha-nature and
lose correct knowledge and correct views.
This is called the tenth false condition of the skandha of
consciousness, which consists of believing that pure consciousness
bears clear fruit. In this way one strays far from enlightenment,
turns one’s back on nirvana, and sows the seeds of perfecting one’s
own consciousness without seeking to help other living things.
“Ananda, these are the ten states of dhyana in the midst of which
you may lose your head and become complacent before reaching the
ultimate goal. This is the result of the interaction of the skandha
of consciousness with the practice of meditation. Living things are
stubborn and deluded and unable to assess their own level of
accomplishment. Encountering these experiences, they delight in old
habits and delusions, and resting on their laurels, take these as
their final refuge. They claim to be satisfied with this so-called
supreme bodhi, and violating the Buddha’s prohibition against
lying, become contaminated with the evil karma of heretics and
maras and finally fall into eternal hell. As to those sravakas and
pratyeka-buddhas, whose minds become arrested at their respective
levels of attainment, they are not able to make further progress.
You disciples must uphold my teachings and proclaim them after my
nirvana during the dharma-ending age in order to awaken all living
things to this doctrine and not allow the maras of false perception
to bring calamities upon yourselves. Strive always to protect
yourselves and conquer heterodoxy. Teach them to enter body and
mind into the wisdom of the Buddha and throughout the course of
their practice never to stray onto deviant paths.
“Tathagatas as innumerable as particles of dust over kalpas as
numberless as the sands of the Ganges have passed through this
dharma-door to enlighten their minds and attain the highest Tao.
When the skandha of consciousness is overcome, then all of your
senses are coordinated, and you can enter the first stage of the
indestructible wisdom of the bodhisattva, whose perfect and clear
mind will be transformed into pure glass containing a precious moon
within. In this way you will transcend the ten stages of
bodhisattva faith, the ten stages of unfertilized wisdom, the ten
necessary actions, the ten commitments, the four good roots of
development, and all the ten stages of the bodhisattvas progress to
Buddhahood, omniscience, and perfect clarity to enter the
Tathagata’s magnificent sea of perfect and complete bodhi, and
revert to the state to which nothing can be added. These are the
subtle mara-states detected by past Buddhas, as they abided in
vipasyana and practiced passionless samatha. If you are familiar
with these mara-states, you will be able to keep your minds free of
defilement. In this way you will not fall into unorthodox views,
the maras of the five skandhas will be swept away, Deva Mara will
be smashed, the powerful ghosts and spirits will lose their nerve
and take flight, the spirits of the rivers and hills will no longer
appear to you, and you will achieve complete bodhi without the
slightest deficiency. Even beginning from the most unenlightened
state, one can progress to nirvana and no longer suffer delusion
and depression.”[4]
Many of the formless samadhi absorptions can now be better
understood from this discussion, and while they are talked of as
stages of liberation or enlightenment in some schools, you can also
understand that this is only partial enlightenment because one only
attains to the alaya but has not produced a revolution in its
basis. The alaya itself must return to its own source.
If you do that, we no longer speak of transmigration or even
consciousness but of transcendental wisdom, and thus the first
five, the sixth, seventh and eighth consciousnesses are all
transformed into their specific wisdoms of direct
seeing-knowing-realizing without clinging. Consciousness still
functions, but one is clear through and through because they have
penetrated through the alaya, past the realm of consciousness
entirely, and one does not cling with stickiness to any of its
operations. One still lets thoughts be born, but without resting
the mind anywhere. One functions in the world, the ordinary mind
still functions, but one is clear and void through and through. One
has become the master. You function in the world while transcending
it. This is true Buddhahood.
Thus we have the Great Mirror Wisdom, Action Performing Wisdom,
Wisdom of Equality and so forth that are the transformations of
consciousness when prajna wisdom causes a revolution in its basis.
The Mind clearly knows all the thoughts and functions within
consciousness, but is not deceived by them. Operating outside the
alaya and not subject to transmigration but seeing through it, this
is why Zen masters can freely exercise their “great functioning”
and the “sharp point of potential,” for they are not bound by
consciousness and can take advantage of any circumstances to help
people awaken.
One functions in the world while transcending it. In fact, one
transcends the entire Triple Realm for it is all entirely bound
with consciousness because it is created of consciousness. No
gong-fu is supreme other than the accomplishment of enlightenment
past the Triple Realm. It is as the Taoist-Zen immortal Chang
Tzu-yang said, “Even if you have a halo crowning your head, it is
still a mirage; even if clouds arise under your feet, you are not
immortal.”[5] What
achievement is worthy when bound within the Three Realms?
Of course the modern Advaita Vedanta teachers have also now been
able to achieve this enlightenment of Shakyamuni by transcending
Brahman, and have tried to lift Hinduism up with the appropriate
teachings and understanding of non-duality, non-clinging and thus
the over-turning of the alaya. But if one simply relies on the old
Veda, Upanishads and other scriptures, it is easy to remain caught
in the net. Of course, you're so talented if you even get that far
to realize the skandha of consciousness, the alaya, Brahman.
The key point is that to attain perfect and pure enlightenment
you must forget any notions of the Self and cultivate prajna to go
beyond the alaya and drop attachments to consciousness, for the
Higher Self, or the alaya, or universe as a whole (the entire
Triple Realm) are the obstacle of the voidness of Reality. The
basis of the yoga cultivation and meditation methods in Vedic
culture are not wrong. It’s just that practitioners do not go far
enough for there is farther to go. Shakyamuni simply took what was
the best of what was in use and added an understanding and practice
of prajna wisdom so that one could proceed faster and attain
farther than what was previously available. This is what
enlightened Buddhas teach – how to become ultimately free and
liberated, which why the beings of all directions and states in the
Triple Realm come to them for teachings. In this way by attaining
to the basis of (transcending) consciousness, one surmounts all of
creation (the Triple Realm) and attains the Tathagatagarbha or
Matrix of Reality.
If one does not transcend the alaya then one does not understand
the fundamental, one does not know the Source. As high as your
attainment is, this lack of comprehension is still called
“Ignorance,” and thus the sages before Shakyamuni were technically
still in the realm of ignorance. Colloquially we can say that “they
had the Tao,” but the measure of their Tao was not complete.
Knowing that, we can also say “they did not have the Tao.” To
overturn the alaya is to destroy the root of ignorance. To attain
the alaya or rest in the alaya or take it as the ultimate object of
one’s efforts is to remain in ignorance, bound in ignorance. The
difference is not insignificant, but the entire purpose of this
book.
When you don’t know something we call it “ignorance,” so not
knowing the source, we are all bound to Ignorance. One might
comprehend a portion of the alaya, but without perfect and clear
penetration one only can achieve “nirvana with a remainder.” The
dhyana, on the other hand, are a type of common phenomenon that can
be cultivated by anyone, and which can serve as a stepping stone or
practice station to help you lay a foundation for the ultimate
attainment. They are not the monopoly of Buddhism, Hinduism,
Taoism, Shintoism or any other school and are feely cultivated
throughout the universe including the various human religions. They
are the birth mother of sages and sages, initiates, adepts, gurus
and great ones. But the real “great ones” are those with perfect
and complete enlightenment wherein the entire alaya has been
transformed.
When we previously spoke of the five types of eyes or powers one
could attain through their cultivation efforts, we stated that a
perfectly awakened, completely awakened Buddha attains a “Buddha
eye” not attained by lower level sages because he has “gone beyond,
gone beyond” the limits of (the alaya) consciousness whereas the
other sages are still operating within the realm of consciousness.
Above, beyond, transcending the Triple Realm – however you wish to
word it – the “Buddha eye” is an omniscient eye without limitations
that can see, comprehend, penetrate everything within the universe
of the Triple Realm. Buddha often taught that Arhats could see an
incredible number of aeons into the past or future but their vision
was still limited because they were still bound by the
incompleteness of their cultivation. So now you can understand
this. This is all science.
Bodhisattvas can attain the “wisdom eye” that realizes or “sees”
emptiness because of cultivating partially through the alaya. Many
of the Hindu sages before Shakyamuni (and many sages afterwards)
only attained the ability to be able to see the Form Realms within
the Triple Realm, so they did not even cultivate to the alaya. They
created religions or teachings based on their limited attainments
that only reached so far up to certain Heavens. This explains the
various differing ranks of sages, and also why we have different
ranks of ultimate Gods such as Jehovah, Odin, God the Father,
Indra, Sakka, Brahman, Mahesvara and so forth, which brings up an
interesting story to help make clear the sort of ranks and
knowledge capabilities of the gods in the various heavens.
There’s a story in the Buddhist scriptures of a talented monk
who wanted to find out the answer to the question, “Where do the
four elements cease without remainder?” Through meditation he
reached the Heaven of the Four Great Kings, who did not know the
answer. Next he went to the thirty three gods in a higher Desire
Realm heaven, but none of these rulers knew either. He then asked
King Sakka (Indra), the king of these gods, but Sakka did not know
the answer. Up and up he went asking all sorts of gods at each and
every higher level. Finally he came to Great Brahma, the Creator,
Uncreated, Knower of All.
When the monk finally achieved an audience with Great Brahma,
Brahma appeared in all his majesty and glory announcing, "I am
Great Brahma, the Conqueror, the Unconquered, the All-Seeing,
All-Powerful, the Lord, the Maker and Creator, the Ruler, Appointer
and Orderer, Father of All That Have Been and Shall Be." The monk
then humbly and respectfully asked his question, but all Great
Brahma did was repeat, "I am Great Brahma, the Conqueror, the
Unconquered, the All-Seeing, All-Powerful, the Lord, the Maker and
Creator, the Ruler, Appointer and Orderer, Father of All That Have
Been and Shall Be."
The monk eventually got frustrated and said, “I know you are
"Great Brahma, the Conqueror, the Unconquered, the All-Seeing,
All-Powerful, the Lord, the Maker and Creator, the Ruler, Appointer
and Orderer, Father of All That Have Been and Shall Be," but I
asked you a question about where the four elements cease without
remainder. The Great Brahma replied, “Listen little monk, don’t
embarrass me. All these other gods are listening and think I know
everything. If you want to know the answer to a question like that,
don’t ask me. I don’t know the answer. For a question like that,
you have to go ask the Buddha.”
The monk then returned to the world and told Shakyamuni Buddha
the story. Shakyamuni and the monk both laughed and then the Buddha
told him, “When sailors are searching for land they let go of
pigeons from their ship. If the pigeons don’t return it means
they’ve found land nearby. If they do return, it’s because there is
no land in sight. You’re just like a pigeon who has returned back
to me because none of the gods could not give you the answer.” Then
he told the monk that nirvana is where the four
elements cease without remainder. But now you know that this
nirvana is a purification, revolution, seeing through or
overturning of the alaya consciousness, and not a resting or
cultivation of the alaya which would be a fractional enlightenment,
or nirvana with remainder. The higher gods did not know this
because they had not achieved it. And so it is with Jehovah (an
angry god or asura belonging to the Desire Realm), Christianity’s
Father “God” (a Form Realm deity), Indra, Odin, Allah, Ahura Mazda,
and so forth.
This is not a propaganda piece to trumpet any supposed
“superiority of Buddhism.” Remember we are speaking of
enlightenment dharma, not a religion called “Buddhism,” for
enlightenment dharma appears in countless realms. Since
Shakyamuni’s time, only a handful of individuals have completed the
course of full and complete enlightenment in this world, but the
last time any completely enlightened ones appeared in this world
to fully reveal and teach the full dharma was
Shakyamuni, so this is what we go by. In a different world it’s a
different name but it’s all about enlightenment. A similarly
interesting story from the Good and Evil Sutra that
further sheds light on our topic is as follows:
The following story relates what happened on one occasion when
the supernatural powers of Gautama Buddha and those of the six
non-Buddhist gurus were compared.
The six gurus and their disciples had gathered to receive alms.
The Buddha with his disciples purposely arrived late and the only
seats left were those that were in the low section. Because of the
Buddha's noble virtue and Supernatural power, all six gurus and
disciples unwillfully moved to the lower part, and although they
tried to return to the high section, the seats remained those of
the low section. The patron began to give water for washing from
the higher section to the lower but Buddha humbly said, "Please
give it to your guru first." Those six gurus became dumb. They
could only raise their arms to point to Gautama who sat in the seat
of the higher section, far in the distance from them. The Buddha's
prayer was as music. When the food was finally served, Buddha
repeated that the patron's guru should be served first, but the
food flew to the top of the gurus heads where they could not reach
it. Upon Buddha's receiving the food, each of the others also
received their food.
After the meal, the patron asked Buddha to preach but he
declined suggesting that the six gurus be asked first. They became
dumb and could not preach. Then Buddha preached and the patron, his
officials and family were all converted. With a grieved countenance
and an envious mind each guru went back to his own church and
learned some methods of magic. A demon transformed himself into a
human body and taught them how to obtain more powers than they had
before. Then these gurus asked the king whether they might have
another opportunity to compare their powers with those of the
Buddha. After receiving the Buddha's permission, the king made all
preparations, but Buddha wanted all the people of five Indian lands
to witness his victory, so when all the peoples of one province had
gathered, he moved on to Vaisali, then to Kausambi or Vatsa-pattna
in central India, and finally to a place called Sravasti which was
controlled by the well-known king Prasenajit. Gautama manifested
many kinds of supernatural powers in the Dharma assembly where
India's peoples gathered. The six gurus, however, were unable to do
anything. It is a rule that outsiders can do no magic in the
presence of a Buddha.
For many, many days the Buddha preached to his audience. While
Indra stood on the left side and Brahma himself stood on the right.
Both were the protectors of Buddha. Indra offered Buddha a lion
seat. At the moment he sat there was a sacred sound which emitted
from the five vajras and struck down all six gurus. They threw
themselves into the water. Although in different tongues the
peoples of India gave praise to Buddha Gautama as the victor and
final Lord. This story can be found in the "Good and Evil
Sutra". …
Now you will say that the above story was with regard to Buddha
and the six gurus but I have said nothing about Buddha and Brahma,
the highest of all higher selves. I will quote from the
Madhyamagama Sutra.
Once Buddha knew by his parocitta-jnana (ability to know the
thoughts of all other minds) that the perverse view (Mithya) had
arisen in Brahma's mind that all is permanent. Buddha flew to
Brahma's heaven and after explaining that everything is
impermanent, converted Brahma. Brahma then requested competition of
their powers which Buddha agreed to. First Brahma magically hid his
body but wherever he went Buddha could see him and said, "You are
here, you are there." Brahma could not elude such magic. Then
Buddha said, "I will try to hide myself, please try to point out
where I am." Buddha then hid his body in voidness meditation. On
purpose he let Brahma hear his voice, but Brahma could not point
him out. Thereby Brahma's faith was increased.[6]
This is similar to Sun Wu Kung, the Monkey King’s experience, in
the Journey to the
West where Wu Kong (representing the mind) used his
superpowers to travel for days in the universe to try to
escape Buddha. When he felt he had gone far enough, he stopped to
take a piss against a wall and marked it with a piece of chalk.
When it came for the Buddha to find him, it was revealed that the
wall was one of the Buddha’s fingers, and that the Monkey had been
flying in his universal hand the entire while. Outside of the Three
Realms, a Buddha surpasses it and transcends it while everything we
do is within it.
These are all quite entertaining stories and their major point
is to teach us that true enlightenment is to pierce through the
final barrier of the alaya, or skandha of consciousness in total.
Once you do that, which is by cultivating the prajna transcendental
wisdom of non-clinging, you can finally achieve the True Tao that
is neither empty nor not empty, neither real nor not-real, neither
existent nor non-existent.
The teachings of the alaya consciousness are therefore such a
great boon, such a great gift for humanity because they lead us to
liberation that ultimately frees us from birth and death, sorrow
and suffering, and also forever free humanity from the
superstitions of ultimate gods and religion as well as small
thinking. But if that’s the case, how are we to describe the
ultimate basis of the alaya?
So the highest (or ultimate, or primal) function of the life of
the cosmos is that in which mind and matter are the same substance.
If you look at it from the point of view of religious concepts, or
from the angle of the sacred, it could be called Buddha, or God, or
Lord, or Spirit, or some other transpersonal spiritual sacred
epithet. If you look at it from the angle of reason, it could also
be called essence, or mind, or principle, or natural law, or the
realm of reality, and so on. If you look at it from the angle of
conceptions customary among humankind, you could also call it
something like a spiritual body, in the sense of an inexhaustible
spiritual body at the root source of life. In sum, speaking in
terms of substance, it has emptiness as its substance; speaking in
terms of characteristics, the forms of all that exists in the
cosmos are its characteristics; speaking in terms of function, all
actions of all things and all beings in the cosmos are its
function.
Metaphorically speaking, it is like an ocean; the waves arising
in the ocean water are like the worlds of the cosmos produced by
causes and conditions; while the bubbles of foam on the waves are
like the individual bodies of living beings, each with its own
particular form produced by causes and conditions. Although the
phenomena of the waves and the bubbles have their individual
dissimilarities, they are never apart from the single inherent
nature of water. But a metaphor is just a similitude, not the
essence of the thing itself.
Living beings, because they cannot experientially arrive at the
ultimate end of the fundamental substance of their own nature, thus
abandon the root and pursue the branches, each clinging to their
own views, their own knowledge, considering it to be the ultimate.
Thus it is that sentient beings rest on their subjectivity to
formulate different knowledge and opinions of the world.
But in reality, subjectivity and objectivity both belong to the
discriminating function of thinking consciousness; and the
knowledge and perception of thinking consciousness itself functions
in dependence on the causes and conditions of the body and the
material world, so they themselves are unreal and cannot
sufficiently determine the existence or nonexistence of truth. If
only people could practice meditation with the thinking
consciousness in their own minds quieted, gradually they could
realize that the functions of body and mind are changing and
inconstant, like the world of phenomena, deceptive and unreal.
Seeking progress step by step from this point, analyzing layer by
layer, finding out all about human nature and the nature of all
things, arriving at the unique body of suchness in which body,
mind, and the cosmos are calm and unperturbed, not dwelling in
existence, not falling into voidness, one can then realize the
primal and ultimate truth of the cosmos and human life.
Shakyamuni called that “true suchness,” or the “nirvanic
essence,” or the “essence of the matrix of the realization of
suchness,” or “come from suchness.” In a broad sense, these are
different names for the basic substance of cosmic life. Therefore
he recognized that it is not ultimately true to call it either void
or existent. There is only one way, which is to arrive at physical
and mental stillness and silence, and then seek realization within
this stillness and silence. However, that basic substance of cosmic
life is inconceivable. “Inconceivable” is a technical term used in
the context of methods for cultivating realization; it means that
the object cannot be arrived at by ordinary conscious thought or
deliberation. So this term “inconceivable” is not to be
misunderstood as meaning “unthinkable.”[7]
