華嚴經探玄記 13.35

13.35

First, regarding the sūtra as the uninterrupted continuity of the three paths: afflictions (kleśa) are twofold, namely those able to initiate and those able to moisten. Although all afflictions can both initiate and moisten, at the stage of initiating karma the power of ignorance is predominant, and in moistening karma to receive rebirth the power of craving and grasping is superior; therefore they are stated separately. Because there is no repeated initiation, a single ignorance is posited; because of repeatedly watering and moistening, craving and grasping are divided. Karma is also twofold, namely unmoistened and already moistened. When karma is in the projected cause (ākṣepa-hetu), not yet moistened by craving and grasping, its initial arising and activity has conspicuous characteristics and is called volitional formations. When karma is in the producing cause (janaka-hetu), already moistened by craving and grasping, closely giving rise to the future fruit, it is established with the name of existence. This is spoken with respect to existence being exclusively karma. Suffering is also twofold, namely in the cause and in the fruit. The five kinds, consciousness and the rest, are exclusively retribution causes; the two stages, birth and the rest, are merely retribution fruits. Because at the stage of the projected cause their differentiated characteristics are difficult to discern, five links are separately revealed in accordance with the future fruit stage: namely, at the time of continuing rebirth, the characteristic of consciousness is conspicuous through the cause; next, when the faculties are not yet complete, the characteristics of name-and-form increase; next, when the faculties are complete, the six sense bases are fully developed; depending on these, contact is initiated, and due to contact, sensation arises; at that time it is named the culmination of the fruit of sensation. Established according to these stages, the causes become five links. Because the differentiated characteristics of the fruit stage are easy to understand, two links are collectively posited to reveal the three sufferings. However, if the fruits to be produced are in the future, birth and aging-and-death are spoken of to give rise to revulsion; if they have arrived at the present, the five links, consciousness and the rest, are spoken of to make known their mutual arising across stages. This is fully differentiated as in the eighth fascicle of the Cheng weishi lun. Furthermore, these three—affliction, karma, and suffering—constitute the characteristics of saṃsāric transmigration, as a verse in the Dvādaśāṅga-pratītyasamutpāda Śāstra composed by Bodhisattva Śuddhamati says: / 'Afflictions are the first, eighth, and ninth; / karma is the second and the tenth; / the remaining seven are said to be suffering; / the three subsume the twelve factors. / From the three, two are born; / from the two, seven are born; / from the seven, three are born again; / therefore it turns like a wheel. / All worldly dharmas / are merely cause and fruit, without a person; / only from empty dharmas / are empty dharmas born in return.' / Explanation: this differentiates the mutual arising of the three paths to reveal the two kinds of selflessness, as explained at length therein.