成唯識論述記 8.340

8.340

Question: As the sūtras say that various karmas have greed, hatred, and delusion as their conditions, why is only delusion mentioned here? Answer: Here [saṃskāra] refers generally to meritorious, non-meritorious, and immovable, whereas the conditions of greed and hatred only generate non-meritorious [karma]. Question: Physical and vocal karma are initiated by volition (cetanā), so saṃskāra also conditions saṃskāra; why is only ignorance stated as the condition? Answer: It is stated based on being the condition that initiates all saṃskāra, and based on being the condition that generates wholesome and defiled volition. Having thus presented the questions and answers regarding this saṃskāra, the questions and answers all the way down to aging-and-death are similarly so, as explained extensively one by one in Fascicle 10 of the Great Treatise, and cannot be cited in full detail. Here, the immediate [link] of ignorance being the condition for saṃskāra is tentatively explained; if taken across intervening [links], it is also the condition all the way to aging-and-death. However, a subsequent link is not the condition for a preceding one: one does not cultivate a subsequent link to sever a preceding link, but rather [a preceding link] arises to cultivate [the path] to sever a subsequent one.