Mahayana View of Perceiving the Buddha

By Wong Weng Hon (M.A)
wongwh49@streamyx.com

Introduction

Whoever knows his true self or original nature perceives the Buddha. Perceiving the Buddha is not perceiving a divine personality or figure of the Buddha nor his image. Perceiving the ultimate Truth or the Essence or Absolute is perceiving the Buddha. When one perceives one’s original nature, one’s illusory ego vanishes. In short, when you know that you are not yourself (Selfless or Non-self), you are a Buddha (Realizes Dharmabody of a Tathāgata). When the illusory self is dead, the Buddha is born. So, do not be yourself as yourself does not exist. When you do not be yourself, you become the Buddha. To know that you are not yourself, you have to transcend the duality between the perceiver and the perceived. To be more exact, perceiving the Buddha is perceiving the Dharmabody.

Dharmabody is not a substance but a Truth. The Truth is Emptiness. Emptiness refers to the emptiness of the conditioned phenomena or contingent beings of the multiplicity of the cosmos.

Interdependence

When it is discerned by the enlightened one that all phenomena are empty, it connotes that all phenomena are devoid of self-natures or intrinsic natures or souls. Therefore, all phenomena are sign-less, mark-less or characteristic-less in the ultimate sense. The signs, marks or characteristics of phenomena are superimposed and determined by the false imagination of the worldlings. In actuality, no single phenomenon, such as a tree, exists as an independent absolute existence. A tree can not survive independently or separately without soil, air, water, sunlight, suitable climax and temperature and so forth. Likewise, a human being cannot survive singly without other essential living conditions. There are numerous essential conditions which support the survival or normal functioning of a human being. Similarly, a human being also conditions the survival of other human beings. For instance, a man conditions the survival or interests of his wife, children, perhaps his parents, co-workers, relatives, friends, traders, businessmen, doctors, civil servants and many others related to him either directly or indirectly and knowingly or unknowingly . Succinctly put , no phenomenon is a separate or independent self-contained entity. All phenomena are interdependent and interrelated. In short, there is no independent self entity. No man is an island. The world is interdependent and borderless. No nation can survive or live independently without international mutual transactions in politics, economy, social exchanges, education, science and technology, engineering, management, trades and businesses and so forth. International mutual transactions preserve the well-being, welfare, prosperity, development progress of individual states nations, or countries. Briefly speaking, this is a borderless world and a global village in which all live as one. The win-win formula is declared as a solution to world peace and prosperity. Win-win relationship mirrors harmonious partner with partner relationship not autocratic superior–subordinate relationship. Such an intimate work relationship is expounded in the doctrine of identity and interdependence in Avataṃsaka Sūtra (Hua-Yen Buddhism).

Love

Loving-kindness or compassion or love ensues from the right vision of inter-dependence or interrelationship. The relationship between love and interdependence can be easily apprehended through a metaphor of the relationship between a good Boss and good Workers: The workers work diligently preserving the continuous goodwill and progress, prosperity of the Boss’s business firm. In return, the Boss offers lucrative salaries or wages, excellent fringe benefits and handsome annual bonuses to his workers. It is only logical that the workers love their benevolent, understanding and generous boss . Japanese superior economic power is constructed and established on the basis of this excellent work culture. It is also natural that the boss, in turn, loves his subordinates for their diligence, loyalty, truthworthiness, cooperation and commitment. Both the Boss and the workers are on the same boat. Their interests and survival are mutual inclusive. No one on the boat can rock the boat.

Totality or Unity

So we perceive that phenomena do not exist as separate self-contained entities. They dependently co-arise as a unity or totality constituting the infinite cosmos. Within the infinite totality or unity, there is neither increase nor decrease. For instance, if a million of Vietnamese refugees had migrated to the United States or Canada, the total population of the world remains constant. Mobility constantly occurs within the content of the totality because all phenomena are not static existents but are dynamic processes occurring within the totality. Whatever increase or decrease taking place within the structure of the totality will not affect the totality of the cosmos which is infinite. Likewise, many changes or variations may occur in the space, it will not affect the infinite totality of the space. The space encompasses all the myriad beings in it. Likewise, the infinite totality encompasses everything.

Multiplicity

The original nature of Man is the Buddha-nature. When worldings are ignorant of their original nature of Buddhahood, the grasping upon the Five Aggregates generate countless wholesome and unwholesome karmas. The results or fruits of the karmas are manifested in the three worlds of Sensual Desire, Form and Formless constituting the multiplicity or separation. This reality is asserted by 6th Chan Patriarch, Hui-neng that Self-nature can engender myriad beings. In other words, the myriad beings in the cosmos are produced from ignorance of the self-nature of Man. Briefly speaking, it is the notion of self or selfishness or egoism that myriad beings of the multiplicity are manifested in the cosmos in the mundane vision of the worldlings. But if the worldlings are awakened to the ultimate truth of totality or Emptiness and the illusiveness of multiplicity, the worldlings can make a return journey to their original nature and unite with the Essence of Buddhahood. The essence of Buddhahood is totality governed by the Law of Dependent co-arising. It is incorrigible to mistake or misinterpret the Buddha-nature as a permanent substance. The Buddha rejects the doctrine of a permanent substance but advocates doctrine of Insubstantiality, Non-self or Emptiness. All sentient beings are comparable to the metaphor of rivers following and converging at the ocean. Any river, which is unobstructed by obstacle, will eventually reach the ocean and will unite with it. It becomes one with the ocean. Likewise, an enlightened one eventually will be in communion with all the Buddhas in the past, present and future. An enlightened one does not extinguish upon death. An enlightened one is to be perceived as a dynamic phenomenon before entering parinibbāna.

Return Journey

Self-realization or self-awakening from the sleep of ignorance is crucial to make a return journey to the one’s original nature. In the first place, a phenomenon or being does not exist independently or separately. How could a non-existent phenomenon or being extinguish ? Similarly, in the first place you do not exist. How you expect a non-existent ‘You’ to extinguish upon death? If you realize this truth of Emptiness, you know your original self which is the Buddha. Whoever knows his original self becomes the Buddha. This statement should be interpreted thus: Whoever apprehends intuitively or discerns the truth of Emptiness, he becomes self-enlightened. Instantly, he transcends the cycle of birth and death. Before death, he becomes unconditioned or undefiled by both internal and external stimuli of the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, touches and thoughts which constitute the multiplicity viewed only by the worldlings. He is now unconditioned or undefiled because he now realizes the truth of totality or Emptiness governed by the law of Dependent Co-arising. To perceive the Buddha is to realize the Dharmabody oneself.

In order to realize the Dharmabody of a Buddha, the proposition uttered by the saints below is worth being contemplated:

If you know yourself to be non-existent or empty, and thereby
incapable extinguishing or ceasing to exist, only then you
see the Buddha.

I repeat the theme of the above proposition:

One cannot speak of extinction because in order to cease existing,
one has to have existed. In the first place, you have never existed,
how could you extinguish ?

If you can comprehend the above proposition, you understand the profound tenet of Non-self or Emptiness, the central theme of Buddhism. If you have not grasped the quintessence of the message, scrutinize further to know your true self.

The Buddha reiterated emphatically in his discourses thus:

The Form is not you;
The Feelings are not you;
The Perceptions are not you;
The Volitions are not you;
The consciousness is not you.

Nonself or Emptiness connotes that there is nothing in the human body which is you. A human being is akin to the metaphor of a human robot without a soul. Even there is Buddha-nature in the robot. Medical advancement has evidenced that a robotic surgeon can performs surgical operation more precisely and more effectively than a human surgeon. A robotic car assembler can function more efficiently and precisely 24 hours a day without sleep. And yet there is no soul in the robot. The Buddha preaches that all sentient beings including human beings, of course, are soulless. The Śākyamuni Buddha reiterated the key idea of his tenet which is Soulessness, Non-self, Insubstantiality or Emptiness throughout his preaching career of 45 years on Earth. ‘You’ or Self does not exist. If you knows that You or Self does not exist, you are instantaneously enlightened. You can then discard the scripture as you have reached the other shore!