中觀論疏 9.3

9.3

Question: From the beginning up to now, cause and effect have been refuted in chapter after chapter; why are they explained again now? Answer: Cause and effect are the great lineage of all doctrines and the root for establishing faith. Confused people commit many errors regarding them; although briefly refuted above, they ought to be discussed again here in sequence below. For instance, the four tenets of the non-Buddhists asserting erroneous causes and erroneous effects differ, and there are the assertions of the ten schools among Mahāyāna and Hīnayāna teachers; hence we know that cause and effect are difficult to illuminate and must be analyzed once more. Second, although cause and effect were refuted previously, it was to establish other dharmas—as in the "Chapter on Causes and Conditions" refuting the cause and effect of the four conditions to establish the principle of non-arising, up through the "Chapter on the Five Aggregates" refuting cause and effect to establish the absence of the five aggregates—none of which directly examined cause and effect. Desiring now to examine cause and effect directly, this chapter is therefore introduced. If traced from what immediately precedes, it arises from the "Chapter on Time." The opponent says: If time in the three times does not exist, how could the dharmas of cause and effect exist? Yet the principle of cause and effect cannot be made non-existent; therefore, time must exist. Question: How many kinds of cause and effect are there? Answer: Briefly, there are three kinds: first, cause and effect of mutual production, like clay and a pot; second, cause and effect of mutual conditioning, like curled fingers; third, cause and effect of revealing causes, like a lamp revealing myriad things or the myriad practices revealing the Dharmakāya. Question: Does this chapter refute cause and effect, or does it elucidate cause and effect? Answer: Within every chapter there are both the refutation and the elucidation. To seek an intrinsically real cause and effect, whether internal or external, Mahāyāna or Hīnayāna, is entirely without foundation; hence it is called refuting cause and effect. Because those who assert an intrinsically real [cause and effect] destroy the meaning of cause and effect, the author of the treatise must refute them. Second, once intrinsically real cause and effect are eliminated, only then can cause and effect of dependent origination be distinguished. Being called dependent origination, cause and effect are vividly evident yet constantly tranquil and extinguished; therefore, generating contemplation within causes, prapañca is forgotten.