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Embracing the Great Vehicle: Seeds and Cultivation
Seeds are divided into two types: secular and ultimate, possessing six characteristics:
- instantaneous cessation
- simultaneous result
- constant transformation
- determinative nature
- collective conditions
-
self-leading result
External seeds are physical or physiological and may not always be imprinted, while internal seeds are psychological and must always be imprinted, because without imprinting, how could there be fruit born? Recognizing this helps us deeply understand cause and effect and the operation of consciousness.
The essence of Manifestation-only Buddhist psychology lies in the inseparability of seeds and manifestations: within manifestation there is seed, within seed there is manifestation. A seed does not only exist in the form of a grain, but can also be present in the branch, leaf, flower, or root (for example, a chrysanthemum branch, a tobacco leaf, or a lotus root segment are all seeds). Each moment of transformation is a moment of cessation; manifestation and seed exist simultaneously.
Consciousness-only psychology distinguishes the Alaya consciousness as the foundational consciousness, and the evolving consciousnesses (such as eye consciousness, ear consciousness, mental consciousness, etc.) as the consciousnesses of reception, discrimination, and seeking. Mental factors (such as feeling, perception, volition, etc.) create the content of the consciousnesses. The practice of listening to the Dharma (object of imprinting) nourishes the seeds in the mind with the energy of imprinting, which is the Dharma and the Teacher, from which flowers and fruits of joy, happiness, love, and the fruit of enlightenment are born. Our practice must transcend the “provisional vehicle” of Manifestation-only, and move toward the “ultimate vehicle” of the absolute Mahayana in the spirit of the Avatamsaka: one is all, all is one.
