大般涅槃經集解 69.8

69.8

Sengliang comments: 'From what causes and conditions do the two things arise?': craving and feeling are the roots of birth-and-death; he further contemplates their proximate causes. 'Knowing that they arise due to perception': perception grasps conventional designations, and inversions have degrees of gravity: the heavy serves as the cause of craving, and the light serves as the cause of feeling. 'Seeing forms, one does not give rise to greed': this explains the cause of feeling. Clinging to the pleasant gives rise to greed; the pleasant characteristic is conventional. The eye consciousness sees forms without yet grasping them through conventional perception; through conventional perception one experiences good and bad, which, being light, serves as the cause of feeling. 'And when contemplating feeling, one also does not give rise to greed': this explains the cause of craving. Feeling arises from inversion; when feeling first obtains the good, it has not yet produced inverted perception; having grasped it as permanent and pleasurable, it culminates in greed and craving, which, being heavy, serves as the cause of craving. 'Perceptions are of three kinds': 'minor' has two aspects—first, its object-condition is minor; second, the time it abides in the condition is brief; this also applies up to 'immeasurable'. 'Not settled': an unfocused mind conditions objects without settling, and its abiding time is also brief; the coarse concentration of the desire realm is also like this. In the formless realm there is no form; it is not stirred by external conditions and abides in concentration for a long time—how then is it explained? 'The cessation of perception and feeling is called liberation': this explains why the Buddha taught perception and feeling as causes of defilements. Baoliang comments: The wise person should contemplate from where the two things, feeling and craving, arise. 'Knowing that they arise from perception': from here on is the second gateway, contemplating perception; that is, the characteristics of conventional dharmas, hence called perception. In general, inverted and false conditionings all fail to attain the true reality of dharmas. 'These perceptions are of three kinds': if one imagines a small condition, it is called a minor perception; if one imagines a large condition, it is called a great perception; if one imagines an immeasurable condition, it is called an immeasurable perception. Further, a minor perception refers to the lightning concentration of the desire realm for one who has not entered absorption. A great perception refers to the concentrations of the eight dhyāna stages for one who has entered absorption. An immeasurable perception refers to the ten universal bases (daśa-kṛtsnāyatanāni). If the three perceptions cease, feeling therefore ceases; perception and feeling having ceased, it is then called liberation.