Q:
From all you have just said, Mind is the Buddha; but it is not
clear as to what sort of mind is meant by this “Mind which is
the Buddha.”
A:
How many minds have you got?
Q:
But is the Buddha the ordinary mind or the Enlightened mind?
A:
Where on earth do you keep your “ordinary mind” and your
“Enlightened mind?”
Q:
In the teaching of the Three Vehicles it is stated that there
are both. Why does Your Reverence deny it?
A:
In the teaching of the Three Vehicles it is clearly explained
that the ordinary and Enlightened minds are illusions. You don’t
understand. All this clinging to the idea of things existing is
to mistake vacuity for the truth. How can such conceptions not
be illusory? Being illusory, they hide Mind from you. If you
would only rid yourselves of the concepts of ordinary and
Enlightened, you would find that there is no other Buddha than
the Buddha in your own Mind.
When
Bodhidharma came from the West, he just pointed out that the
substance of which all men are composed is the Buddha. You
people go on misunderstanding; you hold to concepts such as
“ordinary” and “Enlightened,” directing your thoughts outwards
where they gallop about like horses! All this amounts to
beclouding your own minds! So I tell you Mind is the Buddha. As
soon as thought or sensation arises, you fall into dualism.
Beginning-less time and the present moment are the same. There
is no this and no that. To understand this truth is called
complete and unexcelled Enlightenment.
Q:
Upon what Doctrine (Dharma-principles) does Your Reverence base
these words?
A:
Why seek a doctrine? As soon as you have a doctrine, you fall
into dualistic thought.
Q:
Just now you said that the beginning-less past and the present
are the same. What do you mean by that?
A:
It is just because of your SEEKING that you make a difference
between them. If you were to stop seeking, how could there be
any difference between them?
Q:
If they are not different, why do you employ separate terms for
them?
A:
If you hadn’t mentioned ordinary and Enlightened, who would have
bothered to say such things? Just as those categories have no
real existence, so Mind is not really “mind.” And, as both Mind
and those categories are really illusions, wherever can you hope
to find anything?
