起信論疏筆削記 16.58

16.58

Second, indicating and inquiring. The commentary: "Facing the principle, etc.": The wondrous principle of tathatā is in its essence free from all extreme and perverse marks, such as nonexistence, existence, oneness, difference, ordinary beings, sages, defilement, and purity. If one wishes to attain it, one must have right mindfulness. Right mindfulness is right wisdom, and right wisdom is the straightforward mind. Because the principle has no differentiations, the mind that faces it must be straightforward. Therefore, the Zhancha jing states: "Because tathatā can bring about the practitioner's upright and straightforward mind—just as a snake's nature is to crawl crookedly, but entering a tube it becomes straight—samādhi regulating the mind is also like this." Right mindfulness here is none other than the tathatā samādhi. "The root of the two practices": this straightforward mind serves commonly as the root for both practices, whereas the following two minds serve as the roots for each practice separately. The reason this [mind] serves commonly as the root for the two practices is that contemplating tathatā as possessing anāsrava virtues, all sentient beings equally possess this nature and will all become buddhas. Knowing that it possesses these virtues, one is able to generate the practice of self-benefit; knowing that the nature is identical, one is able to generate the practice of benefiting others (the root on which practice relies). Furthermore, because one contemplates that tathatā is not born at the prior limit nor ceases at the posterior limit, one can bring the two practices to ultimate fulfillment without weariness or aversion (the root of uninterrupted practice). Moreover, knowing that this nature is free from verbal conceptual differentiation and is utterly equal, one can cause the two practices to be free from marks, completing the anāsrava cause (the root of practice being in accord). Therefore, this One Mind commonly serves as the root for both.