The Sound "Permanence"
Mahāmati asks what "permanence" actually refers to, and the Buddha answers with a teaching on confusion itself: confusion — the very appearance of a mirage, a fire-wheel, a dream — is, in one sense, permanent, since its constant recurrence never actually stops, even for the noble ones who see through it without being fooled by it. A river a hungry ghost sees as fire rather than water illustrates that confusion has its own kind of constancy apart from whether any particular being is deceived by it. The same confusion, met three different ways, gives rise to three spiritual lineages — the śrāvaka's, the pratyekabuddha's, and the buddha's own. The page closes with Mahāmati pressing a further, genuinely sharp question: is illusion itself existent, or not?
What Does "Permanent" Actually Mean?
爾時，大慧菩薩摩訶薩復白佛言：「世尊！常聲者，何事說？」
佛告大慧：「為惑亂。以彼惑亂，諸聖亦現，而非顛倒。大慧！如春時炎、火輪、垂髮、乾闥婆城、幻、夢、鏡像。世間顛倒，非明智也，然非不現。大慧！彼惑亂者，有種種現，非惑亂作無常。所以者何？謂離性非性故。大慧！云何離性非性惑亂？謂一切愚夫種種境界故。如彼恒河，餓鬼見不見故，無惑亂性；於餘現故，非無性。如是惑亂，諸聖離顛倒不顛倒。是故惑亂常，謂相相不壞故。大慧！非惑亂種種相妄想相壞，是故惑亂常。大慧！云何惑亂真實？若復因緣，諸聖於此惑亂，不起顛倒覺、非不顛倒覺。大慧！除諸聖，於此惑亂有少分想，非聖智事想。
「大慧！凡有者，愚夫妄說，非聖言說。彼惑亂者，倒不倒妄想，起二種種性，謂：聖種性，及愚夫種性。聖種性者，三種分別。謂：聲聞乘、緣覺乘、佛乘。云何愚夫妄想，起聲聞乘種性？謂：自共相計著，起聲聞乘種性，是名妄想起聲聞乘種性。大慧！即彼惑亂妄想，起緣覺乘種性。謂：即彼惑亂自共相，不觀計著，起緣覺乘種性。云何智者？即彼惑亂想，起佛乘種性。謂：覺自心現量，外性非性，不妄想相，起佛乘種性，是名即彼惑亂起佛乘種性。又種種事性，凡夫惑想，起愚夫種性。彼非有事，非無事，是名種性義。大慧！即彼惑亂不妄想，諸聖心、意、意識過習氣自性法轉變性，是名為如。是故說如離心。我說此句顯示離想，即說離一切想。」
Then Mahāmati Bodhisattva-Mahāsattva again said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, the sound 'permanence' — what matter does it actually refer to?"
The Buddha told Mahāmati: "It refers to confusion. Because of that confusion, even the noble ones themselves see it appear — yet, for them, it is not an inverted view. Mahāmati, it is like a spring mirage, a wheel of fire, floating strands of hair, a city of gandharvas, an illusion, a dream, or an image in a mirror — an inverted view to the world at large, not to one of clear wisdom, and yet it does still appear, all the same. Mahāmati, that same confusion appears in every kind of way, and yet this does not make confusion itself impermanent. Why is this? Because it is apart from [fixed] nature and the absence of one. Mahāmati, how is confusion apart from [fixed] nature and its absence? Because it is the very domain, in every kind of way, of every ordinary person. It is like that river the Ganges: because a hungry ghost sees it and does not see it [as water], this does not mean the river has a nature of mere confusion; because it appears to others [as water], it does not lack a nature either. Just so with confusion: the noble ones are apart from both an inverted view of it and the mere absence of that inversion. It is for this reason that confusion is permanent — because its very mark, as a mark, is never destroyed. Mahāmati, it is not that confusion's manifold marks are destroyed by false thought — it is for this very reason that confusion is permanent. Mahāmati, what does it mean for confusion to be genuinely real? It is that, whatever the cause and condition, the noble ones, with respect to this same confusion, give rise neither to an inverted awareness of it nor to the mere absence of an inverted awareness. Mahāmati, apart from the noble ones, anyone who still holds even the slightest notion regarding this confusion has not yet reached the matter of noble wisdom at all.
"Mahāmati, to speak of [confusion] as simply 'existing' is the ignorant person's own false assertion, not the speech of the noble ones. That same confusion, [met with] an inverted view or the absence of one, gives rise to false thought, and thereby to two kinds of spiritual lineage: the noble lineage, and the ignorant lineage. The noble lineage is, in turn, distinguished into three: the lineage of the śrāvaka vehicle, of the pratyekabuddha vehicle, and of the buddha vehicle. How does an ignorant person's false thought give rise to the lineage of the śrāvaka vehicle? It is that attachment to own mark and shared mark gives rise to the lineage of the śrāvaka vehicle — this is called false thought giving rise to the lineage of the śrāvaka vehicle. Mahāmati, that same confused false thought gives rise to the lineage of the pratyekabuddha vehicle — namely, that same confusion's own mark and shared mark, observed yet not [as intimately] grasped at, gives rise to the lineage of the pratyekabuddha vehicle. How does the wise one give rise, from that same confusion, to the lineage of the buddha vehicle? It is that becoming aware that [the confusion] is one's own mind's manifestation, that what is external has no [fixed] nature, and being free of any mark of false thought concerning it, gives rise to the lineage of the buddha vehicle — this is called giving rise, from that same confusion, to the lineage of the buddha vehicle. Further, [attachment to] the manifold nature of actual matters, through the confused thought of ordinary people, gives rise to the ignorant lineage — [confusion itself] is neither a positive matter nor the absence of one; this is the very meaning of 'lineage.' Mahāmati, it is that same confusion, [approached] without false thought, [through which] the noble ones' own mind, will, and consciousness turn and transform beyond the habituated force and own-nature dharma [that bound them before] — this is what is called suchness. It is for this reason that suchness is said to be apart from mind. What I mean by this statement is to display being apart from every notion — that is, being apart from every notion whatsoever."
The commentators resolve the passage's apparent paradox — confusion is called both an "inverted view" and, in the very same breath, "permanent" — by locating the permanence not in the content of the confusion but in the bare fact of its recurring: "彼惑亂者有種種現，非惑亂作無常" — "that confusion appears in every kind of way, yet this does not make confusion itself impermanent." On the Ganges simile, they draw out precisely what is, and is not, being claimed: "餓鬼雖近恒河而不見水，以其見水是火，故云見不見也...無惑亂性者，謂不以見故為有，不以不見故為無" — "though a hungry ghost dwells right beside the Ganges, it does not see water there — it sees fire instead — hence the text speaks of 'seeing and not seeing.' 'It does not lack a nature of mere confusion' means that the river's reality is established neither because someone happens to see it, nor annulled because someone else fails to." The river itself — like confusion, like suchness — does not depend for its own constancy on whether any particular deluded being manages to perceive it correctly.
On why the identical confusion, met differently, produces three distinct spiritual lineages rather than one uniform reaction, the commentators trace the graduated difference precisely: the śrāvaka lineage arises when someone "於五陰自相、共相照了空寂而生厭離" — "illuminates the own mark and shared mark of the five aggregates as empty and still, and thereby gives rise to revulsion [from them]"; the pratyekabuddha lineage shares that same insight but adds only a preference for solitary withdrawal, glossed as "不親" — not intimately engaging further; and the buddha lineage alone adds the positive recognition that the very confusion being observed "是自心現量" — is one's own mind's own manifestation — rather than stopping at the negative move of merely disengaging from it. The same raw material, confusion itself, becomes three entirely different paths depending on how far the observer's own recognition is willing to go.
Is Illusion Itself Existent, or Not?
大慧白佛言：「世尊！惑亂為有為無？」
佛告大慧：「如幻，無計著相。若惑亂有計著相者，計著性不可滅，緣起應如外道，說因緣生法。」
大慧白佛言：「世尊！若惑亂如幻者，復當與餘惑作因。」
佛告大慧：「非幻惑因，不起過故。大慧！幻不起過，無有妄想。大慧！幻者從他明處生，非自妄想過習氣處生，是故不起過。大慧！此是愚夫心惑計著，非聖賢也。」
爾時，世尊欲重宣此義而說偈言：
「聖不見惑亂， 中間亦無實，
中間若真實， 惑亂即真實。
捨離一切惑， 若有相生者，
是亦為惑亂， 不淨猶如翳。
Mahāmati said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, does confusion itself exist, or not?"
The Buddha told Mahāmati: "It is like an illusion — free of any mark that could be grasped at. Were confusion to have a graspable mark of its own, the very nature of that grasping could never be extinguished, and dependent origination would then be no different from what the outsiders teach as things arising through cause and condition."
Mahāmati said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, if confusion is like an illusion, then it ought, in turn, to serve as the cause of further confusion."
The Buddha told Mahāmati: "It is not that illusion is confusion's cause, since illusion does not give rise to any fault of that kind. Mahāmati, illusion gives rise to no fault, since it carries no false thought within it. Mahāmati, an illusion arises out of another's own skillful craft, not out of the place of one's own false thought and its habituated fault — it is for this reason that it gives rise to no fault at all. Mahāmati, [confusion, by contrast,] is the ignorant mind's own confused attachment — it is not [a fault belonging to] the noble and wise."
Then the World-Honored One, wishing to restate this meaning, spoke in verse: "The noble do not see confusion, nor is there anything real standing in between;
were what stands in between genuinely real, confusion itself would then be genuinely real.
Should one leave every confusion behind, and yet a mark should still arise —
this, too, would be confusion, impure just like a diseased eye."
The commentators are precise about why Mahāmati's question — does confusion exist or not — cannot simply be answered "yes" or "no," tracing the danger on each side: "若言妄法定有定無，則生計著性不可滅，故以如幻言之。若不能了如幻，則緣起之法同於外道邪計因緣矣" — "were one to say that the false dharma [of confusion] definitely exists or definitely does not exist, this would give rise to a fixed graspable nature that could never be extinguished — hence the answer given is 'like an illusion.' Were one unable to understand it in just this way, then the teaching of dependent origination would collapse into the very same wrongly conceived causation the outsiders themselves teach." The answer "like an illusion" is not evasive; it is the only answer that avoids handing confusion a fixed nature to grasp at, on either the existence or the non-existence side.
On why illusion, unlike confusion, gives rise to no fault, the commentators name three distinct reasons together rather than treating the point as a single claim: "一幻不起過故、二無妄想故、三從明處生故" — "first, illusion simply does not give rise to fault; second, it carries no false thought within it; third, it arises from a place of skillful craft [rather than from delusion]." A conjurer's illusion and a deluded mind's confusion may look superficially similar — both present something that is not quite what it appears to be — but the commentators insist the sūtra is drawing a real distinction: an illusion is a deliberate, skillful construction with no false thought driving it, while confusion is precisely the ignorant mind's own habituated misperception, and it is only the latter that the sūtra treats as a fault requiring correction. The closing verse's warning against clinging to "what stands in between" (中間) as though it were real applies this same caution reflexively — even the very framework of "confusion versus what confusion obscures" is not itself to be grasped as a final, real distinction.
Is Everything Really Like an Illusion?
「復次，大慧！非幻無有相似，見一切法如幻。」
大慧白佛言：「世尊！為種種幻相計著，言一切法如幻？為異相計著？若種種幻相計著，言一切性如幻者，世尊！有性不如幻者。所以者何？謂色種種相非因。世尊！無有因色種種相現如幻。世尊！是故無種種幻相計著相似性如幻。」
佛告大慧：「非種種幻相計著相似，一切法如幻。大慧！然不實一切法，速滅如電，是則如幻。大慧！譬如電光，剎那頃現，現已即滅，非愚夫現。如是一切性，自妄想自共相，觀察無性，非現色相計著。」
爾時，世尊欲重宣此義而說偈言：
「非幻無有譬， 說法性如幻；
不實速如電， 是故說如幻。」
"Furthermore, Mahāmati, it is not that there is nothing at all resembling illusion — it is precisely because there is that every dharma is seen to be like an illusion."
Mahāmati said to the Buddha: "World-Honored One, is it by attachment to the manifold marks of illusion itself that you say every dharma is like an illusion? Or is it by attachment to some different mark? If it is by attachment to the manifold marks of illusion that you say every nature is like an illusion, then, World-Honored One, there must be some other nature that is not like an illusion. Why is this? Because the manifold marks of form do not share illusion's own cause. World-Honored One, there is no cause by which the manifold marks of form could appear the way an illusion does. World-Honored One, it is for this reason that no nature resembling the manifold marks of illusion can be found, [and so no ground for] saying that everything is like an illusion."
The Buddha told Mahāmati: "It is not by attachment to the manifold marks of illusion that every dharma is said to be like an illusion. Mahāmati, rather, it is because every unreal dharma vanishes as swiftly as a flash of lightning that it is said to be like an illusion. Mahāmati, it is like a flash of lightning: appearing for the briefest instant, and, once appeared, vanishing at once — this is not something the ignorant themselves perceive. Just so, when the own mark and shared mark of every [fixed] nature is observed through one's own false thought, it is found to have no [fixed] nature at all — it is not a matter of attachment to some manifold mark that merely appears as form."
Then the World-Honored One, wishing to restate this meaning, spoke in verse: "It is not that illusion itself has nothing to be compared with — I teach that the nature of dharmas is like an illusion
because they are unreal and vanish as swiftly as lightning; it is for this reason that they are said to be like an illusion."
The commentators note that Mahāmati's challenge here targets a specific, narrow misreading of the "like an illusion" teaching, and that the Buddha's answer corrects that misreading rather than defending the teaching from scratch: "答中言諸法如幻者，正非計著幻相，直以一切法不實速滅如電乃如幻耳" — "the answer's point is precisely that dharmas are not called 'like an illusion' through attachment to illusion's own particular marks at all — it is simply that every dharma, being unreal and vanishing as swiftly as lightning, is, on that basis alone, like an illusion." Mahāmati's worry — that comparing everything to illusion smuggles in illusion's own specific properties as a universal standard — dissolves once the actual point of comparison is seen to be something narrower: not resemblance to illusion's particular mechanics, but shared instantaneous vanishing, the one feature illusion and every other dharma equally have in common.
Does "Unborn" Contradict "Like an Illusion"?
大慧復白佛言：「如世尊所說，一切性無生，及如幻，將無世尊前後所說自相違耶？說無生性如幻。」
佛告大慧：「非我說無生性如幻前後相違過。所以者何？謂生無生，覺自心現量。有非有，外性非性，無生現。大慧！非我前後說相違過，然壞外道因生，故我說一切性無生。大慧！外道癡聚，欲令有無有生，非自妄想種種計著緣。大慧！我非有無有生，是故我以無生說而說。大慧！說性者，為攝受生死故，壞無見斷見故，為我弟子攝受種種業受生處故，以性聲說，攝受生死。大慧！說幻性自性相，為離性自性相故，墮愚夫惡見相悕望，不知自心現量。壞因所作生，緣自性相計著。說幻夢自性相一切法，不令愚夫惡見悕望，計著自及他一切法，如實處見，作不正論。大慧！如實處見一切法者，謂起自心現量。」
爾時，世尊欲重宣此義而說偈言：
「無生作非性， 有性攝生死，
觀察如幻等， 於相不妄想。
Mahāmati again said to the Buddha: "As the World-Honored One has taught, every [fixed] nature is unborn, and yet is also like an illusion — does the World-Honored One not thereby contradict himself, teaching in one place that its nature is unborn, and in another that it is like an illusion?"
The Buddha told Mahāmati: "In teaching that its nature is unborn and yet like an illusion, I do not fall into the fault of self-contradiction. Why is this? Because that very arising is itself non-arising, once one becomes aware that it is the very measure of one's own mind's manifestation. Whether existent or not, what is external has no fixed nature at all — and it is precisely this that 'unborn' displays. Mahāmati, I do not fall into the fault of self-contradiction; rather, it is in order to demolish the outsiders' own teaching of arising from a cause that I teach every [fixed] nature to be unborn. Mahāmati, the outsiders, massed together in their ignorance, wish existence and non-existence themselves to give rise to something, [failing to see this] as nothing but their own condition of false thought and manifold attachment. Mahāmati, I do not teach that existence or non-existence gives rise to anything at all — it is for this reason that I speak by way of the teaching of the unborn. Mahāmati, when I do speak of a [fixed] nature, it is only so as to help beings properly grasp their own condition of birth-and-death, so as to demolish the view of non-existence and the view of annihilation, and so that my own disciples may properly grasp the place their own manifold karma leads them to be born into — it is by the sound of 'nature' that I speak, so as to help them properly grasp birth-and-death. Mahāmati, when I speak of illusion's own own-nature and mark, it is so as to leave behind attachment to the mark of fixed own-nature itself, for the sake of those who have fallen into the ignorant person's own evil views and vain hopes, not knowing that this is the very measure of their own mind's manifestation, and who [thereby] demolish the correct arising from cause I actually teach, becoming attached instead to a mark of own-nature bound up with mere conditions. It is by speaking of the own-nature and mark of illusion and of dreams, with respect to every dharma, that I keep the ignorant person's own evil views and vain hopes from becoming attached to every dharma, their own or another's, as though it were seen in the very place reality actually is, and thereby constructing a wrong theory about it. Mahāmati, to see every dharma in the very place reality actually is means precisely to give rise to the measure of one's own mind's manifestation."
Then the World-Honored One, wishing to restate this meaning, spoke in verse: "The unborn is what has no fixed nature of activity at all; speaking of a nature nonetheless helps one properly grasp birth-and-death —
observing all such things to be like an illusion, one gives rise to no false thought at all concerning any mark."
The commentators resolve Mahāmati's charge of self-contradiction by distinguishing what each teaching is doing rather than what each teaching flatly asserts: "為壞外道因生，故我說一切性無生... 說性者，為攝受生死故" — "it is in order to demolish the outsiders' teaching of arising from a cause that I teach every nature to be unborn... and when I speak of a [fixed] nature at all, it is [only] so as to help beings properly grasp their own condition of birth-and-death." "Unborn" and "like an illusion, and so in some sense provisionally describable" are not two competing claims about what ultimately exists; one is aimed outward, at demolishing a rival philosophical error, and the other is aimed pastorally, at helping ordinary disciples navigate karma and rebirth without falling into nihilism. The commentators' summary line makes the stakes explicit: teaching "nature" without immediately correcting it risks eternalism, while teaching "unborn" without any positive vocabulary at all risks annihilationism — and it is to avoid both, not to contradict himself, that the Buddha uses both kinds of language depending on which error a given hearer is closer to falling into.
Part 17 Complete
This closes Part 17: "permanence" identified with the constant recurrence of confusion itself, illustrated by a river a hungry ghost cannot see as water; the same confusion giving rise to three different spiritual lineages depending on how far a being's own recognition extends; and illusion cleared of blame for confusion's fault, since illusion carries no false thought within it at all. Part 18 turns to two further teachings: the name-body, phrase-body, and letter-body through which any teaching is actually conveyed, and the Buddha's own use of silence — the questions he deliberately declines to answer, not because he cannot, but because answering them would only deepen the very confusion this page has just described.
Continue to Part 18 — Names, Phrases, and Questions Left Unanswered →