妙法蓮華經玄義 2.121

2.121

Third, opening the crude and revealing the subtle: as the sūtra states, "My Dharma is subtle and difficult to conceive." The previous three are all the Buddha's Dharma; how could the crudeness of the conceivable be different from the subtlety of the inconceivable? There is no liberation expounded apart from words; merely identifying the conceivable is the inconceivable. For example, an elder takes basins, vessels, rice, and flour to bestow upon the destitute son, making them the destitute son's property. If his original nature is settled, the destitute son is no longer a hired hand, and the basins and vessels return to the family home; how could they be another's property? The Tathāgata expounded the crude as an expedient means within the inconceivable; how can one cling to the crude as different from the subtle? Now determining the śrāvaka dharma [as such], it is the king of all sūtras. This opens the [first] two kinds of conditioned arising to discuss subtlety. Furthermore, the Great Sūtra states: "For the sake of all śrāvakas, he opens and reveals the wisdom eye." Formerly, the wisdom eye saw only emptiness and did not see non-emptiness. Now, opening the wisdom eye, it perceives non-emptiness, and non-emptiness is seeing the buddha-nature. Hence it is said: "Because the wisdom eye sees, it is not clearly distinct; the Buddha, seeing with the buddha eye, sees clearly and distinctly." This determines the bodhisattva's wisdom eye and opens the third conditioned arising, discussing subtlety in an absolute sense.