70. The Essential Nature

The essential nature inherent in human beings is perfect and clairvoyant, but because of their ambition, human beings are running after their hope and their thirst from one limit to another. For that reason, the essential nature becomes a particular seed nature divided into four different degrees called: living creatures’ seed nature, bodhisattva’s seed nature, Buddha’s seed nature and Tathagata’s seed nature.

“The Buddha’s seed nature in its hidden state is often confused and called Buddha nature, in the enlightenment it is the nature of the Buddha.

The Tathagata is immobile and hidden and the bodhisattva has to use the immense immobile nature to observe the Tathagata and once detected, it is called Tathagata nature or Tathagata eye-store.

Everything is possible and accessible to the essential nature, it needs no help. If we know how to exploit it, the essential nature will be useful in all things. Human beings who therefore, practicing the Buddhism, rely on the essential nature to dissolve stupidity will be enlightened. Human beings practicing the sitting meditation rely on the theoretical study of nature to understand the meditation nature. Thanks to the meditation nature; they can communicate with the three worlds, fully know the three thousand and avoid stupidity. They should not falsely hope to see the three thousand, not expect in vain to attain the three worlds by disembodying their soul and entering into the scene. Though the practitioner attained the three worlds thoroughly knew the three thousand by wrong expectation and illusion leading to getting rid of the essential nature, which results in false expectation. They are but a mist.” –T.V.

The wise man practicing the Buddhist meditation has firstly to review himself from his spirit of practice to his bad karma, consciousness karma, faculty karma, and defilement karma, fetter karma. They have barred the practice in the way we ought to dissolve them. We try our best to look for the master to help us dissolve if we are unable to do it. We have to dissolve all bad natures, which can do harm to practice and make us not believe in it. If we do not practice vowing, we will dissolve and readjust in order that the essential nature might work well. This leads to boundless achievements.

We can thus recognize our essential nature to make it to be in conformity with the universal truth.

There are four features in the living creatures’seed nature: Increase- Decrease- Imperfection- Purity (as previously explained)

For living creatures, they often take shelter in the calmness to be content with their old age that is just like a patient taking a sedative to relieve the pain. The disciples have to digest an insult, to be patient, to make concession to avoid hard competition; that is the pure land action. In the first stage, the sitting meditator is often chaotically shaken by false thought so he has to make use of the purity to clear away error and fallacy. Eliminating fallacy and error and lighting the wrong way, that is the pure enlightenment. The disciple has to practice the enlightened purity in order to understand the Buddhist nature or dharma nature, which is only one. Otherwise, if the disciple does not practice the enlightened purity and he uses purity to practice purity as the other disciples of the final law period can do, he gradually enters into the isolated calmness.

The enlightened purity is alive, active and perfect.

Because it is based on all the dharma while the isolated calmness is caught in the living creature’s world and becomes thus imperfectly pure. Those falling into the calm and isolated meditation door will be obscurely dreamy and generate in their head an emptiness that makes them very uneasy and even foolish. When the disciple practices wrongly the meditation it is more and more distant from the true essence, while good regulation and control of the increase - decrease - imperfection - purity are the four precious pearls. If the disciple practices by his own will and generated wrong thoughts, unable to regulate and control the meditation it will lead him to the toxicity and the more he practices, the more he is empoisoned.

If the disciple gradually understands his essential nature, he performs his meditation perfectly and his practice will be lively all-round. In Buddhism, the truth is there is no dharma of the good and the evil, the good and the bad, the honesty and the dishonesty. Only the disciples who do not know the active and lively dharma and only read the sutra without dissolving through practice would not fully understand the meanings of the sutra.

The existence nature is continually active. How the false hope of the sitting meditation practitioner is, how his wishes, his virtue and wisdom are the meditation will express them accordingly to his nature. Believing them to be a meditative power, the practitioner becomes attached and sunk in them. The Blessed One Maittreya has reminded:

“The meditative nature depends on what he wants, follows what he wisheses and appears as true as it is. He believes it to be truly powerful and becomes attached to the meditation nature.” –T.V.

The Buddha’s Mind and the living creatures’ mind are not different, but they are not the same; because living creatures do not coincide with the Buddha mind they have not yet become Buddhas. Therefore, the disciple has to lean on the meditative nature without being in error. That is why the bodhisattvas then know the manifestation of the meditative nature according to their wishes. Therefore, the bodhisattvas have then realized with great compassion, with will and courage, realizing the mediatative nature and transformed into Tathagata Buddha.

For the immense universe, human beings all over are called the Tathagata’s constitution. For the disciple, his private nature results from the essence and is thus called essential nature. When practicing the sitting meditation, he has the meditative nature, which sometimes produces the bad and is called bad nature; when its action is good it is called good nature. It is merely the essential nature. Those who lean on the essential nature to practice adequately their abilities and merits will be naturally able to perceive. Therefore, they are assimilated to the universe called the Tathagata constitution. The devotee practiced the meditation, so he follows the footprint of the bodhisattvas who have practiced the dharma in the past. Formerly the Buddhas have the compassion and wished for saving living creatures, and the bodhisattva of today also follows the same wishes in order to be thoroughly enlightened and able to save living creatures.

“Why is the meditation sect passed down from mind to mind, from ultimate awareness to true enlightenment?” –T.V.

Because the meditation sect only specializes in essential nature with perception, it does not make use of writing. Even though using writing, it is only a pointing finger aiming at acquiring the insight. Therefore, the disciple is based on the meditation nature to understand his nature. He is not receiving the meditation to be enlightened. That is why it is called the essential mind. Those who acquire perfectly the understanding transmitted from mind to mind can attain enlightenment.

The meditator leaving his essential nature will certainly not know the meditative nature; furthermore, by creating fixed thoughts, ordinary thoughts or by studying, thinking, and predicting, he is distorting the Tathagata Meditation.

LORD SUPREME MAITREYA WITH LONG HOA