唯識二十論 白話全本

§Prologue — plain reading (establishing the thesis)

Right at its opening, this treatise states a thesis head-on: the whole world we experience — the three realms of existence, the realm of desire, the realm of form, and the formless realm — is, in the last analysis, nothing but "what mind presents in the very moment." There is no real world standing on its own, out there, independent of mind.

This is not something Vasubandhu invented. He is citing what the scriptures themselves already say: "the three realms are nothing but mind" (三界唯心).

The four words "mind, thought, consciousness, cognition" (心、意、識、了) here all name one and the same thing; they only call it by different aspects. When this treatise uses the word "mind" (心), it folds in "thought" (意 — the part that deliberates and judges) and the "mental associates" (心所 — the various mental activities that arise together with mind: feeling, attention, the play of thoughts) as well.

And the word "only" (唯) — what does it rule out? It rules out just one thing: "that there is, outside the mind, some thing standing on its own, independent of mind." It does not deny that mind and its associates arise together, in mutual accord.

In the very moment a cognition arises within us, it itself takes on the look of "as though an external object were there" — just as a person afflicted with the eye-disease taimira (眩瞖) sees hairs floating and flies darting in the air. You take it that something is really out there; in fact it is mind presenting it to itself. In what is seen there is not the slightest bit of real external object.

It is against just this thesis that someone raises a forceful challenge. Vasubandhu answers with a verse:

§Verse — plain reading

If cognition does not in fact arise from a real external object, then why does it arise only at this particular place, why do so many beings see one and the same thing at once, and why can what is dreamt not function the way real things function?

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains what the verse is saying.

First he states the opponent's case for them, in full. The opponent says: suppose that, apart from cognition, there really are external objects out there such as colour-and-form; and suppose you (Vasubandhu) also hold that the cognition of colour-and-form does not arise from any such object — then there are four things you cannot account for:

First, why does this cognition arise only at one particular place, rather than anywhere at all?

Second, why, even at this place, does the cognition arise only at one particular time, rather than at any time at all?

Third, at one and the same place and time, where many beings are present, each with their own cognition at work — why is it not that just whichever one of them happens to see it first settles the matter, but rather that everyone sees one and the same thing together? Look: only a person with the eye-disease sees the hairs and flies in the air; one without the disease does not — which shows that cognition can perfectly well be confined to a single individual. So why, ordinarily, do everyone's cognitions converge on one and the same object? How can that be made sense of on the consciousness-only position?

Fourth, and further: why can the hairs a sufferer of the eye-disease sees not be used as real hairs? Why can the food and drink, the knives and staves, the poison, the clothes one obtains in a dream not fill the belly, wound a body, kill with poison, cover a frame? Why does the city of the gandharvas (尋香城 — that mirage-like phantom city), seen plain as day in the old stories, have none of the workings of a real city? Whereas the hairs, the food, the knives one sees in waking life — their workings are real, every one.

The opponent sums up: if it really were as you say — that there is no real external object out there, only cognition presenting itself as though an object were there — then those four things, "fixity of place, fixity of time, many beings seeing one and the same object together, and things having real efficacy," ought, every one of them, not to hold at all.

Having heard out these four objections, Vasubandhu yields not an inch. He answers with a single line: "It is not that these four all fail to hold." And he goes on to make it good with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

That "place is fixed and time is fixed" — this is like a dream; that "beings of differing bodies [see one and the same object together]" — this is like the hungry ghosts; they see together one and the same river of pus and the like; and that "there is no real object yet there is real working" — this, again, is like the way a dream can do a person harm.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

The phrase "like a dream" means: just as in what is seen in a dream. In a dream there is no real external object, and yet you see a village, a garden, men and women only at some particular place, not at every place; and at that very place, you see that village and garden only at some particular time, not at any time at all. This shows that even where there is no real external object apart from consciousness, the two matters — "place is fixed, time is fixed" — can still hold all the same.

Saying "like the ghosts" means: like the hungry ghosts (preta). A river filled with pus is called a "river of pus" — just as one says a "jar of clarified butter," meaning a jar filled with clarified butter. The hungry ghosts, being of one and the same karma ripening into one and the same fruit, gather together in many bodies and all see one and the same river of pus; it is not that within this only one of them sees it. The word "and the like" (等) in the verse further shows that the ghosts may also see filth and the like, and may also see beings holding knives and staves, barring and guarding the way so as not to let them get food. This shows that even where there is no real external object apart from consciousness, the matter of "many mind-streams seeing one and the same object together" still holds.

Then, "like the way a dream can do harm": again, just as the objects in a dream are unreal and yet can cause a person the loss of vital essence and blood and the like — they have a real working. This shows that even where there is no real external object apart from consciousness, the matter of "an unreal object too can perform a working" still holds.

In this way, taking for now each separate illustration on its own, he displays that the four matters — "place is fixed" and the rest — can all hold. Vasubandhu then goes on, with the verse that follows, to carry the point further.

§Verse — plain reading

Those four things — take just the one illustration of "hell," and all of them hold: the suffering beings see, together, the wardens of hell and the rest arrive, and these wardens can really press in upon and harm them — and so the four senses — "fixity of place, fixity of time, common seeing, real efficacy" — all hold.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

You should know: here, using just the one illustration of "hell," he shows all four things — "fixity of place" and the rest — to hold. By "hell" is meant those beings who, in hell, are pressed in upon and suffer harm. Within hell there are in fact no wardens of hell or the like that count as real "sentient beings"; yet those suffering beings, by the force of the karmic retribution of shared karma, reinforced by [its] dominant force (同業異熟增上力 — the ripened fruit of like karma, plus its dominant reinforcing power), in one and the same place and at one and the same time, the mind-streams of many of them at once all see wardens of hell, vicious dogs, crows, iron mountains and the like arrive before them to press in upon and harm them. So you can see that even with no real external object apart from consciousness, the four things — "fixity of place, fixity of time, many beings seeing together, the capacity for efficacy" — all hold.

Then someone asks: why can one not say that the wardens of hell and the like are real sentient beings to begin with?

Vasubandhu says: this does not hold up to reason. First: the wardens should not be counted among the beings of hell, because they do not undergo the suffering those beings of hell undergo; and if the wardens too were to suffer and press in upon one another, then one could not even set up the distinction "hell" (那落迦 naraka) at all. Second: if the wardens and the sufferers were equal in body and in strength, the sufferers would not be so utterly terrified; and besides, the wardens themselves could not endure the heat of the iron ground — that fierce fire burning on and on — so how could they go and press in upon others? Third: nor can one say that the wardens are beings "not belonging to the hell-kind" to begin with who have been born into hell to serve there.

At this the opponent puts forward a fallback rescue: just as, even in the heavens, there are animals living mixed in, so too in hell there can be beings of the animal or hungry-ghost kind born to be the wardens of hell.

Vasubandhu says: this rescue does not hold. And he goes on to break it with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

Just as animals can be born up among the gods (and enjoy the bliss there), in the hells it is not so — the "animals and hungry ghosts serving as hell-wardens" the opponent posits do not undergo the suffering of the hells (and so the claim does not hold).

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Whenever an animal can be born up among the gods, it must first have the karma that "can call forth that blissful environment"; once born there, it must inevitably undergo the bliss that environment produces. But the hell-wardens and the like do not undergo the suffering that the hell environment produces. Therefore one cannot grant the claim that "animals and hungry ghosts are born into the hells to serve as wardens."

The opponent then steps back and concedes: very well, let it be granted this way — it is the powerful force of those hell-beings' karma (the force of karma's dominance, adhipati-bala) that produces a kind of "specially-conditioned material substance" (the special elements — a peculiar compounding of the four great elements: earth, water, fire, and wind), and these substances put forth strange differences of shape, colour, size, and strength, so that on them one fixes names such as "warden," which serve to make the hell-beings give rise to terror; and they can further conjure up all sorts of functions such as moving hand and foot and brandishing knives and staves — just as, in the hells, that "Ram Mountain" now parts and now closes, and the knife-thorns of the "iron-hard forest" now droop and now rise up.

Vasubandhu answers: these matters are not entirely absent (these phenomena and functions do indeed occur); but (the claim that "they are specially-conditioned material substances, born of the force of karma and really existing apart from consciousness") does not hold up to reason. Vasubandhu then goes on to make this clear with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

If you grant that, by the force of karma, a special kind of great matter (a special set of great elements, 異大種) can be produced, and that it gives rise to a transformation of just that kind — then what is there against letting this same transformation happen upon "consciousness" (識)?

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Why not grant that "consciousness, by the force of karma, gives rise to a transformation of just this kind," and instead insist on holding that it is "the great elements (outside consciousness) that give rise to the transformation"? Vasubandhu then goes on to carry this further with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

The perfuming of karma (the karmic perfuming, vāsanā) perfumes in this place (within consciousness), yet you cling to the fruit being elsewhere (outside consciousness); that "the perfumed consciousness itself has the fruit" — this you do not allow: and on what ground?

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

The opponent clings to "the beings of hell, by their own force of karma, produce special great elements and give rise to a transformation of shapes and the rest." But that "perfuming of karma" ought, by rights, to be admitted to lie within "the continuum of consciousness" — it is not perfumed somewhere else. That being so, you yet do not allow "the transformation of the fruit to be within consciousness"; rather, in the very place where there is no perfuming (outside consciousness), you cling to there being a fruit — on what ground is this?

The opponent says: I have a teaching of the Buddha for my ground. That is: if it really were only consciousness manifesting as though there were colour-and-form, and there were no separate colour-and-form, then the Buddha ought not to have said "there are the bases of colour and the rest" (yet the Buddha did say so).

Vasubandhu answers: this teaching cannot be taken as a ground, because it has a separate intent (the Buddha, in saying it, had a hidden intent). Vasubandhu then uses the next verse to make that hidden intent clear.

§Verse — plain reading

In accordance with the beings he was to convert (seeing what teaching each was fit to receive), the World-Honoured One, carrying a hidden intent (密意), spoke of "there being objects such as colour-and-form" — just as the Buddha spoke of "there being spontaneously-born beings" (also a hidden intent, not a real existence).

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

It is just like when the Buddha says "there are spontaneously-born beings": the Buddha speaks this only on the strength of the sense that "the mind-stream of consciousness, unbroken and continuous, can travel on into a later life," speaking it with a hidden intent — he is not saying that there really exists some real "spontaneously-born self." The Buddha's purpose in speaking this way is to make clear that "there is no 'self of a being'; there is only the cause-and-effect of dharmas (the continuity)," and it is for this that he speaks of objects such as colour-and-form.

The scripture (speaking of objects such as colour-and-form) is likewise: the Buddha, in accordance with the beings he was to convert — seeing what teaching each was at that time fit to receive — speaks with a hidden intent; it is not that there separately, really exist objects such as colour-and-form (external dharmas).

Then, with what hidden intent exactly does the Buddha speak of "there being the twelve bases such as colour-and-form"? Vasubandhu answers with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

Consciousness arises from its own seed, and as it arises it takes on the look of an object-appearance turning into view; in order to establish the "inner sense-fields" and the "outer sense-fields," the Buddha spoke of them as the (colour-and-the-rest) twelve sense-fields.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

What is this verse saying? That "consciousness which presents colour-and-form" arises from its own seed, transforming under the convergence of the many conditions, severally; and the Buddha, on the basis of that seed and of the colour-and-form thus presented, speaks of them separately as the "eye sense-field" (眼處) and the "colour sense-field" (色處). And so on, up to "consciousness which presents touch," which likewise arises from its own seed, transforming under the convergence of the many conditions, severally; and the Buddha, on the basis of that seed and of the touch thus presented, speaks of them separately as the "body sense-field" (身處) and the "touch sense-field" (觸處).

It is precisely on the basis of this hidden intent (密意) that the Buddha speaks of there being the "colour-and-the-rest twelve sense-fields."

So then — what surpassing benefit is there in speaking thus, on the basis of a hidden intent? Vasubandhu answers with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

Relying on this teaching (of the twelve bases), one can enter into "the selflessness of the person" (the selflessness of the pudgala); as for "the selflessness of the dharmas that are clung to," one must rely further on another teaching (that of consciousness-only) to enter into it. The two selflessnesses are entered into separately, by relying on these two teachings.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains what this verse is saying.

By relying on the teaching of the "twelve bases" (六根、六境, the six sense-faculties and the six sense-objects) set out earlier, the one being taught can enter into "the selflessness of the person" (數取趣無我 — that is, there is no real "pudgala" 數取趣, no "self" that transmigrates and receives recompense). How so? One need only realize this: that from these two classes of six dharmas — the six sense-faculties and the six sense-objects — six consciousnesses arise and operate, and that within all this there is no "one who sees" and on down to no "one who knows" at all. Whoever is fit to receive this teaching of "the selflessness of sentient beings" (有情無我) can, right here, enter into "the selflessness of sentient beings."

Next, by relying on the further teaching of "consciousness-only" (唯識), the one being taught can enter into "the selflessness of the dharmas that are clung to" (所執法無我). How so? One need only realize this: that there is only consciousness arising and transforming so as to resemble (變似) dharmas such as colour-and-form, and that within all this there is no real dharma-mark of colour-and-form at all. Whoever is fit to receive this teaching of "the selflessness of dharmas" (諸法無我) can, right here, enter into "the selflessness of dharmas."

At this point someone asks: if "realizing that dharmas, in every kind whatsoever, do not exist" is what is called "entering into the selflessness of dharmas," then does not "consciousness-only" itself also end up coming to nothing? In that case, on what could consciousness-only be established at all?

Vasubandhu answers: it is not that "realizing that dharmas, in every kind, do not exist" is what is called "entering into the selflessness of dharmas." Rather, it is to penetrate that "the dharmas as differentiated by the wholly-imagined nature clung to by the childish" are selfless — this is what is called "entering into the selflessness of dharmas." It is not to say that even the "ineffable dharma-nature" (離言法性) within the realm of the Buddhas does not exist, and to call that the selflessness of dharmas (the ineffable dharma-nature is not among what is to be negated).

As for "the nature of consciousness-only" (唯識性) itself? This "nature of consciousness-only," when grasped as an object by some other consciousness — its substance too is without [reality]; this likewise is called the selflessness of dharmas. Were it otherwise — were one to grant that the objects clung to by the other consciousnesses are really existent — then the principle of "consciousness-only" could not stand at all, for that would amount to granting that the other consciousnesses have real objects.

Relying on this principle, "consciousness-only" is established as a teaching, to make everyone enter universally into "the selflessness of all dharmas"; yet this is not to sweep away, in every kind whatsoever, the "existent-nature" of dharmas (it is not a view of annihilation).

How, then, are we to know that the Buddha, relying on a hidden intent (密意) of just this kind, spoke of "there being bases such as colour-and-form," rather than there being some real external dharmas of colour-and-form, serving as the separate objective supports of the several colour-and-form consciousnesses? Vasubandhu answers with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

Because that (external) object is neither "one" (a single whole), nor "many" (a host of separate atoms), nor again something of the "aggregated, assembled" sort — because "the atom" (paramāṇu) itself simply cannot be established.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

What is this saying? Suppose there really were a colour-and-form sphere (and the rest) apart from cognition, serving as the separate object of the cognition of colour-and-form. Then this external object would have to be one of three things: either it should be "one" — like the "whole-possessing form" (有分色, a single integral form) that the Vaiśeṣikas cling to; or it should be "many" — as some cling to there really being many atoms, each separately serving as the object; or it should be "many atoms aggregated and assembled" — as some cling to there really being many atoms, all of them together aggregated and assembled and serving as the object.

But: that external object, by rights, cannot be "one," because the substance of a "whole-possessing form" is other than the form of each of the parts, and so cannot be grasped. By rights it cannot be "many" either, because the atoms taken one by one, each on its own, cannot be grasped. And by rights it cannot be "an aggregate or assemblage serving as the object," because "a single real atom" — that very thing — simply cannot be established.

Why is it that the atom cannot be established? Vasubandhu makes this clear with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

If one atom joins with six (the six in the six directions), then it ought to have six directional parts; if all six are crowded into one and the same place, then the whole heap (the aggregate) ought to be only as big as a single atom.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

If one atom (paramāṇu) joins, in each of the six directions — up, down, east, west, south, north — with one atom apiece, then it ought to have six parts: because one location cannot hold another location (the six directions each occupy a place, and that is six directional parts). Conversely, if the place of one atom can hold six atoms (all crowded into the same place), then every aggregate (the "aggregated form," 聚色) that is built up ought to be only as big as a single atom — because, even stacked one upon another, they would not exceed that measure; and in that case the aggregate too ought to be so small as to be invisible (yet the aggregate is plainly visible).

The Vaibhāṣika masters of the country of Kaśmīra say: "It is not the case that atoms have any such thing as joining — because atoms have no directional parts, they thereby escape the earlier fault (of the six parts); only aggregated form has the principle of joining, because aggregated form has directional parts."

Vasubandhu says: this account too will not do. (As for why it will not do,) the next verse makes it clear.

§Verse — plain reading

Since the atoms (極微 paramāṇu) do not, after all, combine, who then is the "combiner" that makes the aggregate-form (聚色) combine? Or [if you say the aggregates too] fail to combine — then it is plain that [the atoms'] "not combining" is not because they have no spatial parts.

§Treatise — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Now one should press the opponent on what he has claimed. Since, apart from the atoms, there is no further thing called "aggregate-form" (the aggregate-form just is the atoms), then, the atoms having no combining, who is the "combiner" that makes the aggregate-form combine?

Suppose the opponent shifts his words again to save himself: "Among the aggregate-forms there is, in fact, no such thing as combining either." Then the opponent ought no longer to say: "The reason the atoms do not combine is that they have no spatial parts." For the aggregate-forms plainly do have spatial parts, and yet they too are not allowed to combine. So it is plain that "the atoms do not combine" is not because they have no spatial parts.

Therefore "a single real atom" simply cannot be established.

Further: granting that the atoms combine or do not combine, the fault is as stated above. (And going one step further,) granting that the atoms "have spatial parts" or "have no spatial parts" — both alike are a grave fault. Why so? Vasubandhu explains it with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

If an atom has directional parts (方分), then by rights it should not be "one" (it has become many parts); if it has no directional parts, then there should be no shadow and no obstruction (yet shadow and obstruction plainly exist); and since aggregate-form (聚色) is not other than the atom, there is no "second thing" either (nothing else to cast a shadow or obstruct).

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

If a single atom (極微 paramāṇu) has, as its very substance, "six directional parts, each distinct," then how can it still count as "one"? (It is already many parts.)

Conversely, if a single atom has no distinct directional parts: then when the sun has just risen and its light shines upon the atom, how could there come to be a shadow on its other side (the side away from the light)? For (having no directional parts) there is no "part the light does not reach" (and so no shaded face away from the light).

Further, take one who holds that the atom has no directional parts: then how could this atom and that atom ever obstruct one another? Only because there is "a part that the other cannot enter" (a facing side) can one speak of this and that obstructing each other. And since (having no directional parts) they do not obstruct one another, then the many atoms ought to be able to pile up in one and the same location, so that every aggregate of form would be no larger than a single atom — the very fault stated before (in Verse 11).

Why not allow that "shadow and obstruction belong to aggregate-form, not to the atom"? Is it that, apart from the atom, there is some further "aggregate-form" that can cast a shadow and serve as an obstruction? It is not so. If it were so (the aggregate being other than the atom), then aggregate-form ought not to have a "second thing" (something distinct from the atom) — that is to say, if aggregate-form is not other than the atom, then shadow and obstruction turn out not to belong to aggregate-form (and still fall back on the atom, so the objection remains unresolved).

Therefore, whether one arranges this as "atom" or arranges it as "aggregate," neither is a real single thing. So why bother to ponder and investigate "atom" and "aggregate" at all?

But this still does not rule out the "characteristic of external form and the rest." And what is this (external form)? It means: the object confronting eye and the rest — that is, the real substance of form and the rest, such as blue and so on. We should together examine carefully: this real nature of blue and so on, confronting eye and the rest — is it in the end "one" or "many"? Suppose (whichever you choose), what fault follows? Both have a fault: the fault of "many" is as stated before (in the refutation of atoms); and "one" too is unreasonable. Vasubandhu makes this clear with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

(If the colour-and-form before your eyes were "one," four things would not hold:) First, there could be no walking step by step; second, there could be no being "arrived here, not yet arrived there" at the same moment; third, there could be no many things (elephants, horses, and the like) with gaps between them in one place; fourth, there could be no tiny water-insects and other hard-to-see fine things (set apart from coarse things).

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Suppose one takes all the blue-and-the-rest, the objects the eye sees, to be "one thing with no division within it." Then: there ought to be no such thing as "walking step by step across the ground" — because the moment you set one foot down, you should arrive at everything (the whole expanse). And at one and the same moment there ought to be no distinction of "arrived" and "not yet arrived" here and there — because, it being one thing at one moment, there ought by rights to be no "already reached" and "not yet reached." And in one place there ought to be no situation of many elephants, horses, and the like with gaps between them — for if having one in a place is the same as having the rest, then how could this-one and that-one be told apart? Or, with two things, how could there be "arrived, not arrived" in one place, with a gap visible in between? And there ought also to be no tiny water-insects and other hard-to-see fine things — because, being in the same location as the coarse, large thing, they should be equal in size to it (yet they are in fact small and hard to see).

If one says, "it is by the this-and-that difference in their appearance that they become different things, and not for any other reason" — then one must concede this: these things-with-differences can be analysed down layer by layer, divided into many atoms (paramāṇu). But it has already been made clear above that an atom is not a real thing. With that, the "eye and the rest" (the faculties) and "colour-and-form and the rest" (the objects) apart from consciousness — whether faculty or object — cannot be established at all. By this, the principle that "there is consciousness only" is well established.

Dharmas are settled as existing or not existing by means of "means of knowing" (pramāṇa, the methods of cognition); and among all means of knowing, "direct perception" (pratyakṣa, present and first-hand realization) carries the most weight. (The opponent will say:) if there were no external object, how could there arise this awareness — "I now plainly realize, by direct perception, an object like this"? (Vasubandhu says:) this "direct perception as proof" does not hold either. The next verse explains it.

§Verse — plain reading

The feeling of "seeing it right now, for myself" is there even in a dream; and at the very moment this feeling of "I am now seeing it for myself" arises, the seeing (the eye-consciousness) and the object seen are in fact both already gone — so how can one still grant that there is any "direct perception" (現量)?

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Just as in a dream — where, though there is no external object, there is all the same a feeling of "I am now seeing it for myself" — so too the "feeling of seeing for oneself" at all other (waking) times should be understood to be of the same kind (it is no guarantee that an external object is there). And so, when the opponent brings forward "I am now seeing it for myself" as proof that "there is an external object," it does not hold.

Further: suppose at that moment there is this feeling, "I am now seeing this colour for myself" — yet at that very moment the "seeing" is in fact already gone. For this "I am seeing for myself" relies on mind-consciousness (意識) to discern it, and by the time mind-consciousness arises and discerns, the eye-consciousness and the rest (the consciousness that was truly seeing a moment before) must already have passed away. For one who holds to "momentary arising-and-ceasing," by the time there is this feeling, the colour and the other objects that appeared have also already ceased. That being so, how at this moment can one still grant that there is any "direct perception"?

(The opponent retreats a step and says:) Surely one must first have personally undergone the experience for oneself, and only afterward can mind-consciousness recall it; so there must definitely have been an "object that was undergone," and that which was able to see this object counts as "direct perception" — and by this "the real existence of external objects" is established. (Vasubandhu says:) In this way too — proving that there are external objects by "first undergoing, then recalling" — the reasoning does not hold either. Why? Vasubandhu explains it in the next verse.

§Verse — plain reading (half-verse)

Just as with the "cognition that appears as though there were an external object," spoken of before, the later memory arises from this (object-seeming cognition).

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Just as was said before: although there is no external object, eye-consciousness and the rest do "appear as though an external object were there." Thereafter, at a later moment, (consciousness) is in concord with "recollection" (念), and the discriminating mind-consciousness too "appears as though it were that earlier object" — and this is called "remembering what was once experienced." Therefore, to try to use "later memory" to prove that "what was seen before was a real external object" — this does not hold (memory arises from the object-seeming cognition, not from an external object).

If, as in a dream, cognition arises all the same even though there is no real object, then it is the same in the waking state too. (The opponent challenges:) just as people themselves know that "the object in a dream does not exist," then since the waking state too is (on your account) like this (consciousness transforming, with nothing real), why does (the waking person) not know it for themselves (that what is before them is unreal)? Since they do not themselves know that "the object seen while awake does not exist," how can it be like "the cognition in a dream, where the object really does not exist at all" (and so say that the waking object too is wholly non-existent)?

(Vasubandhu says:) this too cannot serve as proof. (Why — that) is made clear by the next verse.

§Verse — plain reading (half-verse)

While one has not yet awakened, one cannot know that "what is seen in a dream is in fact not there."

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Just as, while one has not yet woken from sleep, one does not know that the objects in the dream are not externally real — it is only on waking that one knows. By the same reasoning, the beings of the world, through perfuming the habit of "false discrimination" (虛妄分別) until it is ripe and heavy, are as though still within a dream: everything they see is in fact not real, but until they have "attained true awakening" they cannot know this of themselves.

It is only when one attains that "non-discriminating cognition that is supramundane and counteracts (false discrimination)" (無分別智) that it is called "true awakening." After this, when the "mundane purified cognition" (世間淨智) obtained thereafter comes to be present, one is able to know as it truly is that "those objects are not real" — and this principle is equal and the same as (knowing, after waking from a dream, that the dream was unreal).

(The opponent then objects:) If beings each, through the transformation of their own mind-stream, give rise to "a cognition resembling an object," and not through an external object serving as the perceptual support — then how can it hold that these beings "draw near to a good teacher or a bad friend, and hear true teaching or false teaching," that these "two (cognitions) mutually determine (and so receive perfuming)," when there is no external teacher, friend, or teaching?

(Vasubandhu says:) It is not that this cannot hold. The next verse will make it clear.

§Verse — plain reading (half-verse)

Through the force of [the various consciousnesses of self and others] being reciprocally predominant over one another, the two consciousnesses — the perfuming and the perfumed — mutually determine each other (and so karmic perfuming comes about).

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Because a being's own continuum of consciousnesses and those of others serve, by turns, as "predominant conditions" (增上緣 adhipati-pratyaya) for one another, then, in accordance with the fitting case, "the two consciousnesses" mutually determine each other — that is to say: through a difference in the [consciousness] within another's continuum, a differentiated consciousness arises within (one's own) continuum; each in this way comes to be settled as determined, and not through any external object. (And so the perfuming that comes of keeping company with good or bad friends, and of hearing right or wrong teaching, comes about through consciousness and consciousness being predominant over one another; it does not need outward teachers, friends, or teaching to serve as its objective support.)

(The opponent objects again:) If, just as in a dream, the object is unreal and yet a consciousness arises all the same, and the waking consciousness is likewise (arising without an external object) — then why is it that the "desirable and undesirable" fruits to be received later for the good and bad deeds done in a dream and in waking are not the same? Vasubandhu answers with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading (half-verse)

The mind (in a dream) is impaired by sleep (its force grows weak), and so the fruit of deeds done dreaming and done awake is not the same.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

The mind during a dream, being impaired by sleep, has weakened force. The waking mind is not like this (its force is intact). And so for the deeds done (in dream and awake), the ripening (異熟, vipāka) — the fruit that is to be received later — comes out superior or inferior, differing accordingly — and this is not on account of any external object.

(The opponent objects again:) if there is only consciousness and no body, speech, and the like (no real things), then how can a sheep and the like be killed by someone else? And if the death of a sheep and the like is not on account of being harmed by another, then how does the butcher come to incur the offence of "taking life"? Vasubandhu answers with the following verse.

§Verse — plain reading

Because there arises a transformation in "another being's consciousness," the deed of "killing" comes to be [established]; just as the force of the will of ghosts and the like can make others lose right mindfulness (fall into dreams, be possessed), and so on.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Just as, through the force of the will of ghosts and the like, other sentient beings can be made to lose right mindfulness, to fall into dreaming, or to be possessed — such alterations come about in just this way. A person possessed of supernormal power can, through the force of the will, make others see all sorts of things in a dream — just as Mahākātyāyana, through the force of his wish, made King Sāraṇa and others dream strange things; and just as the ascetic seer of the wilderness (the araṇya hermitage), through the force of his angered intent, made King Vemacitrin dream strange things.

In just this way, because there arises a transformation in "another being's consciousness," the matter of "violating [another's] life-faculty" can come about (and killing is thus established). One should understand: what is called "death" means that the "shared lot of beings" (nikāya-sabhāga), through an alteration of consciousness, undergoes the cutting-off of [a single lifespan's] continuum. Vasubandhu then goes on to make this clear with the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

The Daṇḍaka forest and the rest (three great forests) became empty and still — how could that have come about through a seer's wrath (his mind)? The [Buddha's established] teaching that "the penalty of mind is the gravest crime" — [if mind is not granted the power to cause death,] how then could this hold?

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

If one does not grant that "through the transformation of another's consciousness, by the force of its dominance, another sentient being can be made to die," then why, in order to establish that "the penalty of mind is the gravest crime," did the World-Honoured One put this question back to the householder Upāli (鄔波離): "Have you ever heard for what cause the Daṇḍaka forest, the Mātaṅga forest, and the Kaliṅga forest all became empty, open, and still (without a soul)?" The householder answered the Buddha: "Gautama! I have heard that it was on account of the seers' wrath."

Suppose someone insists: in truth it was that spirits and demons, revering the seers, knew that the seers' minds had given rise to revulsion, and so killed those sentient beings on the seers' behalf — it was not by the seers' mental wrath alone. Then how could [the World-Honoured One] cite this case to establish that "the penalty of mind is the gravest crime, its nature exceeding the penalty of body and the penalty of speech"? From this one should know: it was precisely on account of the seers' wrath (their mind) that those sentient beings died — this principle is skillfully established.

(Vasubandhu then puts a question back:) If there is only consciousness, then does the knowledge of others' minds (他心智, the knowing that knows another's mind) actually know another's mind or not? Suppose [either answer you give], what fault follows? If you say "it cannot know," then what sort of "knowledge of others' minds" is that? If you say "it can know," then "consciousness-only" ought not to hold (since there is another's mind as the object known). (Vasubandhu answers himself:) the "knowledge of others' minds," though it knows another's mind, does not know it as it really is. This is made clear by the verse that follows.

§Verse — plain reading

Why is it said of "the knowledge of others' minds" (para-citta-jñāna) that "it knows its object, but not as the object really is"? It is just like the knowledge by which one knows one's own mind (which is likewise not as it really is); these two kinds of knowledge can neither of them know in the way the Buddha's domain (knows things as they really are).

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

Why is it that the various kinds of "knowledge of others' minds" cannot know their object as it really is? It is just like "the knowledge of one's own mind" (the knowledge by which one knows one's own mind, which is likewise not as it really is). And why, then, can this "knowledge of one's own mind" not know its object as it really is? It is by reason of "not-knowing" (ajñāna — root ignorance). Both these kinds of knowledge, with respect to the object known, are each covered over and obscured by not-knowing; and so neither can know in the way the "Buddha's pure knowledge" illumines that "ineffable object."

The reason these two kinds of knowledge cannot know their object as it really is, is by reason of "(the object) appearing falsely as though it were external," and by reason of "the discrimination into grasped and grasper not yet being cut off."

The doctrinal import of "consciousness-only" is to be discerned and adjudicated without bound; the distinctions of its kinds are so hard to fathom, so profound — apart from the Buddha, who could discern it fully and at large? Vasubandhu now (concludes) with the last verse.

§Verse — plain reading

I have, within the measure of my own power, established the principle of "consciousness-only" in outline; but as for what lies herein — the perfect discernment of every kind in its entirety — that is hard to conceive, a domain only a Buddha can range.

§Auto-commentary — plain reading

Vasubandhu explains this verse.

The import of the principle of "consciousness-only" is boundless, of kinds without end; I have, within the measure of my own power, established it only in outline. The rest — "every kind in its entirety" (the perfect discernment thereof) — is not something that deliberation and disputation (of ordinary beings) can reach, for it lies beyond the domain that any "discursive thought (conceptual discrimination)" can range.

A principle and import such as this — only a Buddha is able to range it; for the Buddhas, the World-Honoured Ones, are without obstruction with respect to "every object" and to "the knowledge of every kind" (sarvâkāra-jñāna) alike.

〔End of scroll〕 Viṃśatikā (the Treatise on Consciousness-Only in Twenty [Verses]), one scroll.