法苑珠林 99.8

99.8

First: 'Rely on the Dharma and not on the person.' Persons exist only through emotional defilement, whereas the Dharma is the model. The correct principle of empty nature in its substance is free from falsehood. One takes this Dharma as the reliance of the saddharma. The Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra, as the ultimate teaching, fully clarifies this path. Those who engage in practice nowadays falsely set forth things according to their emotions, mostly abandoning the Dharma to follow persons. Setting up rules based on persons leads to betraying the testament [of the Buddha] and drowning body and mind. If one can turn away from such worldly minds and rely upon the authority of the sage, concealing the mind in conduct of duties and knowing that wrongs are empty of nature, taking this mind as the path: one part of knowing wrongs clearly accords with the principle of emptiness; one part of distasteful contemplation clearly opposes substantial phenomena. Calming the mind in this way is called cultivating the true path leading to the Dharma-nature.