宗鏡錄 36.46

36.46

The answer is: Indeed, the sage's merit is loftier than the two modes yet he is not humane; his radiance exceeds the sun and moon yet he is increasingly dark—how could it be said that trees and rocks blind his breast, that his state is merely [dull] nescience? Truly, it is because what differs from ordinary humans is divine brilliance; hence one cannot seek it through phenomenal marks. Your intention wishes to make the sage not possess knowledge for himself, while the sage has never been without knowledge. Is this not to go against the holy mind and miss the purport of the texts? Why? The sūtra says: 'True prajñā is pure like empty space: it is without knowledge and without perception, without activity and without conditions.' This means knowledge is intrinsically without knowledge; how could it depend on turning reflection around to be without knowledge only thereafter? If having knowledge whose nature is empty were called purity, then one would not distinguish delusion from wisdom: the three poisons and the four inversions would all be pure as well, so why singularly revere prajñā as pure? If one praises prajñā through what is known, what is known is not prajñā; what is known would itself be eternally pure while prajñā has never been pure, nor would there be any causal condition to bring about purity to praise prajñā. Thus, when the sūtra states that prajñā is pure, must it not be that because the substance and marks of prajñā are truly pure, it originally lacks the knowledge of deluded grasping? Lacking the knowledge of deluded grasping, it cannot be called knowledge. How is it merely that the absence of knowledge is called 'no knowledge'? Knowledge is itself devoid of knowledge! Therefore, the sage, with prajñā that is devoid of knowledge, illuminates that markless ultimate truth. The ultimate truth leaves out nothing, not even a hare or a horse; prajñā has no scrutiny that fails to be exhaustive. Hence it accords without deviation, hits the mark without positing correctness, and is tranquil without knowledge, yet there is nothing it does not know.