宗鏡錄 49.49

49.49

Answer: Because they are nominal, it does not take them as object, just as with non-concurrent dharmas. The Abhidharmasamuccaya says: 'Extremely reduced and extremely distant [forms] are merely that which the sixth, manovijñāna, can analyze into subtle atoms.' Hence, the eighth does not take them as object. Among forms induced by taking precepts: as for form concurrent with absorption or the path, this [eighth consciousness] does not take them as object, because their substance is solely active intention (cetanā). Form arising from conceptual construction is merely reflections in a mirror or the moon in water; this too it does not take as object, because it arises solely from the conceptual construction of the sixth consciousness. Furthermore, among forms produced by meditative absorption, such as in the contemplation of the ten totalities, it also does not take nominal imagined forms as object. Therefore, the text of this treatise states that it only takes real forms as object and does not take nominal ones, because what is taken as object by the eighth must possess efficacy. Those [nominal forms] lack real efficacy, so the eighth does not take them as object. Now, among the substances of all dharmas, the first are existent dharmas, and the second are non-existent dharmas. Why does the eighth not take non-existent dharmas as object? This [consciousness] takes objects spontaneously, not through conceptualization, because it lacks deliberation. Subsequent wisdom and the like possess deliberation, and the six consciousnesses possess conceptualization. From this, one knows that the substance of the eighth consciousness does not take a self as object. The transformation of the eighth consciousness must have efficacy when it transforms; therefore, it does not take what is without efficacy as object. Being without efficacy, it therefore does not take a self and so forth as object, because they lack substance and efficacy. Among existent dharmas, there are summarily two kinds: first, conditioned; second, unconditioned. Why does this consciousness not take the unconditioned as object? If it were the real unconditioned, it has not yet been realized at the stage of the cause; if it were nominal unconditioned, it lacks substance and efficacy. In neither case can it be taken as object.