四明尊者教行錄 4.64

4.64

Twenty-third Question: The intention of the Zhiguan and other works is: the beginningless storehouse consciousness inherently possesses the dharmas of the ten realms and the ten thusnesses, and this is also the case up to the Buddha fruit. The Hongjue says: 'The icchantika severs cultivated goodness completely, but inherent goodness remains. The Tathāgata severs cultivated evil completely, but inherent evil remains.' A recent doubter says: 'The Awakening of Faith, under the section on remedying erroneous attachments, says: "Hearing the sūtras explain that all defiled dharmas of worldly birth-and-death exist relying on the tathāgatagarbha, and that all dharmas are not separate from suchness, due to lack of understanding, they say that the self-nature of the tathāgatagarbha inherently possesses all worldly dharmas of birth-and-death and so forth. How is this remedied? (Question.) Because from the beginning, the tathāgatagarbha only possesses pure merits that surpass the sands of the Ganges, which are not separated, not severed, and not different from the meaning of suchness; and because the defiled dharmas of afflictions that surpass the sands of the Ganges are merely false existence, inherently non-existent by nature, and from beginningless realms have never corresponded with the tathāgatagarbha. If the nature of the tathāgatagarbha possessed false dharmas, and one were to cause realization to eternally cease falsity, that would be impossible (Answer)." The treatise states that by nature they are inherently non-existent; why does this completely contradict the inherent possession expounded by Tiantai?'