Turning the Hearing Back Inward to Enter the Stream and Illuminate the Nature
To cultivate the practice of turning the hearing inward according to Guanyin, one must first arouse the great Bodhi mind. The Bodhi mind consists of three: the wholesome mind, the compassionate mind, and the direct mind. The wholesome mind means broadly doing all good deeds and stopping all evil deeds. The compassionate mind means broadly liberating sentient beings. The direct mind means right mindfulness of suchness. The Bodhisattva’s vows are:
- Sentient beings are boundless, I vow to liberate them. (wholesome mind)
- Afflictions are inexhaustible, I vow to sever them. (wholesome mind)
- Dharma gates are immeasurable, I vow to learn them. (compassionate mind)
- The Buddha Way is unsurpassed, I vow to realize it. (direct mind)
When one first arouses the Bodhi Mind, all Buddhas protect and remember one, and all sages bestow their blessings. The hundred examples in the Avatamsaka Sutra still do not exhaust the abundant virtue of the Bodhi mind. Whoever forgets the Bodhi mind while cultivating various practices will immediately be seized and held by demons. To cultivate various practices without arousing the Bodhi mind is like plowing and harrowing without sowing seeds, and one will never become a Buddha.
Turning the hearing inward, entering the stream, and illuminating the nature is the root of liberation. Tathagata Guanyin taught entering samadhi through hearing, contemplation, and cultivation wisdom. Bodhisattva Guanshiyin, following this instruction and applying effort, begins with hearing wisdom. From this point onward, contemplation wisdom and cultivation wisdom are included until entering right concentration.
Hearing wisdom: In the ordinary sense, it means learning extensively and hearing much. The substance of extensive learning is the ear consciousness together with the discriminating mind consciousness, understanding and discerning clearly. Here, the substance of hearing wisdom is the nature of hearing, wisdom and principle as such, without discrimination.
Contemplation wisdom: In the ordinary sense, it means repeatedly thinking over and examining an issue. Here, contemplation wisdom means consistently turning the hearing inward, outwardly escaping the sound objects, inwardly silently merging with principle and wisdom, without being drawn along by meanings of existence or nonexistence.
Cultivation wisdom: In the ordinary sense, it means practicing the teachings. Cultivation wisdom here means attaining that all practices and meditation contemplation do not contradict one another. Even spitting or waving one’s hands is never without concentration, much less while practicing wholesome deeds.
The ear faculty flowing along with the current and following sounds is the root of bondage. Turning the hearing inward, entering the stream, and illuminating the nature is the root of liberation. In the Surangama Sutra, all Buddhas told Ananda: “The root of cyclic birth and death and liberation and Nirvana all lies in the six faculties”. The Bodhisattva’s cultivation of this Dharma Door of Perfect Penetration through the Ear Faculty accords precisely with the intent of Shakyamuni Buddha and the Buddhas of the ten directions.
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Entering the Stream and Forgetting the Object
Entering the stream: The subject that enters is contemplative wisdom. The object entered is the ear door. Entering means turning the hearing back to illuminate the nature, not running after sounds. That is the reverse of the stream of karmic delusion woven together from beginningless time. Following the stream of the sages is the nature of hearing in the ear faculty. Entering the stream means contemplation wisdom together with cultivation wisdom, using contemplative wisdom to contemplate (not the discriminating thinking of consciousness). Who is it that hears sounds? As soon as there is the slightest sound, immediately investigate this question. Continuously, closely, without interruption. When the sound ends, again ask who hears stillness? The Chan school investigates the huatou using the mind faculty, while this uses the ear faculty. But they are the same in that the light of wisdom shines inward.
The Buddha taught simply not to follow the movement and stillness of the sense objects, to escape attachment and subdue inwardly, returning to the true source. Thus the light of wisdom does not shine outward. There is no need to forget the objects, yet the objects are still forgotten.
Entering the stream: Accord with awakening.
Forgetting the object: Turn away from the dust.
Accord with awakening & Turn away from the dust is the wondrous essential instruction for cultivation in the Surangama, extremely concise, extremely skillful. Forgetting means liberation. The object means the sound object. Forgetting the object means liberating oneself from the movement of the sound object, and is also the initial stage of practice. It is not that the sound is destroyed, but that the power of concentration has accomplished its work. Entering the stream is cultivating and realizing perfect penetration. Once the moving object is extinguished, the still object appears. From now on, throughout the day one hears the stillness. The still object is a knot that must be undone. One still uses the two wisdoms: contemplation wisdom and cultivation wisdom. Do not condition oneself upon the still object that is heard, but investigate who hears the still object? The still object is the scene, the nature of hearing is the mind. When the place of entry has become quiescent, the two aspects of movement and stillness clearly do not arise: Forgetting the object is liberation from the moving object. At this point, the still knot is liberated. The still object is still within the domain of the form aggregate, like a person with clear eyes inside a dark room. When the place of entry has become quiescent, both knots of movement and stillness are liberated. Clearly nothing arises: The characteristics of the two objects, movement and stillness, are clearly unobtainable. The characteristic of the object entered is also silent, and the two states of movement and stillness clearly no longer arise. The source of the six faculties and six objects also all comes to a complete halt, meaning that the first knot of the agitated sense objects has been opened. The sound object is completely silent, and the two characteristics of movement and stillness clearly no longer arise again. This means that the form aggregate has been broken through, and the two knots of movement and stillness have been completely liberated.
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Perfect Penetration through the Ear Faculty
Thus gradually increasing, the hearing and what is heard are exhausted: Once the two knots of the sense objects are liberated, the knot of the faculty appears. The faculty is where hearing gathers. As one increases the effort of practice, the power of concentration deepens, and the faculty that hears is accordingly liberated. When there is no experiencer, the feeling aggregate is also broken through. When faculty and object have disappeared, from where can consciousness arise? Therefore the perception aggregate is also broken through.
Above, the Buddha said: “When this faculty is liberated, first realize the emptiness of person”, which is precisely at this point. The object forgotten, the faculty exhausted, consciousness disappears into a place without support. These three knots, the Buddha pointed out when speaking of “the laboring seeing gives rise to objects”. Now the coarse aspects of the three knots have been liberated, meaning that objects no longer arise and seeing no longer labors.
Exhausting hearing, not abiding: This is the liberation of the knot of awakening. The hearer and what is heard are both exhausted, faculty and object are both extinguished, and the six functions no longer manifest. Only a vast, boundless awakening remains. If one abides in this state, one attains only emptiness of self, not emptiness of dharmas, and will inevitably fall forever into the deep pit of non-doing. If one does not abide, one applies further effort, still contemplating the nature of hearing. After completely escaping both object and faculty, the present object of awareness is clear, still, and boundless. The subject of awareness is the wisdom that illuminates that object. Object and wisdom face each other, and the existence of subject and object is an obstacle that must be liberated.
Awareness, the object of awareness, are empty: Question: Awareness is the wisdom aspect belonging to Prajna. How can wisdom that accords with principle also be empty?
Answer: One should know that this is breaking the attachment to dharmas. If one still cherishes this wisdom and refuses to relinquish it, this is attachment to Dharma (attachment to wisdom), becoming a knot that must be liberated. That awareness-wisdom is the sixth consciousness, the mind consciousness. Now that the knot of awareness has been liberated, only when views and knowledge no longer arise can delusion cease to continue.
No-awareness, utterly perfect: Although the knot of awareness has been liberated. When subject-empty and object-empty are presently clear, emptiness is not yet complete. If one cherishes the principle of emptiness, this is attachment to Dharma (attachment to principle). Because as long as there is still emptiness, one is still attached to the nature of emptiness. Now investigate “Where does it have no support?” and only then is the nature of emptiness perfected.
Emptiness, the object of emptiness, are extinguished: Just as rubbing wood produces fire, when the fire burns, both pieces of wood are consumed. When the knot of “emptiness” is undone, the action aggregate has been completely broken through. As the Buddha said above, “the nature of emptiness, perfectly luminous, becomes the Dharma of liberation”. This is reaching the state of both being empty.
Birth and death: The knot of extinction is liberated. The two words birth and death collectively indicate the knots:
– When movement is extinguished, stillness arises.
– When stillness is extinguished, the faculty arises.
– When the faculty is extinguished, awareness arises.
– When awareness is extinguished, emptiness arises.
– When emptiness is extinguished, extinction arises.
If the knot of extinction is not undone, one remains permanently in the state of both being empty, which is a subtle obstacle to perfect penetration. In Chan it is said to be at the top of a hundred-foot pole, taking one more step, called the final gate of toil. Because this knot is extremely difficult to liberate. Once it is liberated, the body sees its original face. Therefore, the person who enters the stream and illuminates the nature, escaping the knot of extinction, reaches the place of neither birth nor death, and only then has returned home.
Already extinguished: This means contemplative wisdom returns to the source. All birth and death have already been extinguished. This knot of extinction is what the Buddha said above: “Because your mind-nature has been wildly disordered from beginningless time”. Once liberated, all five aggregates are completely broken through. The mad mind ceases, and cessation is Bodhi.
Quiescent extinction manifests before one: The word quiescent does not mean in opposition to movement, but that from beginningless time until now there has been neither movement nor stillness. Extinction does not mean in opposition to birth, but that from beginningless time until now there has been neither birth nor extinction. Empty mind, free from opposition, the wondrous substance solitary and perfect, that is the wondrous true suchness nature of the Tathagata Store, and also the ground of the quiescent extinction of the One Vehicle, precisely our true mind. The Buddha said that when a Bodhisattva reaches this point, from samadhi they attain the patience with the non-arising of dharmas. The Dharma of the ancient Buddha Guanshiyin and the practice and realization of liberating the knots by Shakyamuni Buddha are neither two nor different. Entering the Surangama Samadhi is realizing the First Abode in the Perfect Teaching.