The Six Identities of Buddha: Partial Realization Buddha and Ultimate Buddha

Alright, let's look at the next one. We're now entering the sage stage, moving from the inner ordinary stage to the sage stage's Partial Realization Buddha. Please join your palms.

Sage Stage

(5) Partial Realization Buddha

Suddenly the mind opens, luminous, all is understood; Yet tracing the source remains incomplete— Still the moon is seen through haze.

So the Partial Realization Buddha is one for whom, in a flash, the mind opens to awakening and everything becomes brilliantly clear. That word huo—"sudden"—means awakening happens all at once. In practice, we go through long stretches of contemplating principle and cultivating through specifics, long periods of accumulation. But awakening itself arrives in a single instant. And when does that instant come? It comes within samadhi.

That's why, at the first of the Ten Abodes in the Perfect Teaching—when you first break through ignorance and first realize the Dharmakaya—it doesn't happen in a scattered mind. You might be accumulating merit and virtue, doing repentance practices, cultivating the six paramitas—all of that might happen while the mind is scattered. But that very first moment when the Dharmakaya manifests must arise within a single moment of accord in samadhi. Supported by the power of meditative absorption, you suddenly break through one layer of ignorance and realize one degree of the Dharmakaya. Once the Dharmakaya is realized, all things become brilliantly clear.

In our earlier stages—the Name Stage, the Contemplation and Practice Stage, the Resemblance Stage—our relationship to suchness was one of contemplation, a kind of simulation and imagination. Now, true suchness is actually present before you. Once suchness manifests, you look again at the world and truly see it as like a dream, like an illusion. The myriad dharmas return to the One Mind, and each thing is simultaneously empty, provisionally existent, and the Middle Way.

But what's still the problem here? Tracing the source isn't yet complete; you still see the moon through haze. You may have realized one degree of the Dharmakaya, or two—the luminosity of suchness has appeared—but you haven't yet become a Buddha.

This stage of the Partial Realization Buddha spans forty-one ranks of the Dharmakaya: the Ten Abodes, the Ten Practices, the Ten Dedications, on through the Ten Grounds and Equal Enlightenment. The merit of the Dharmakaya gradually becomes complete, yet still the source isn't fully reached. This is the Partial Realization Buddha.

Now let's look at the final stage—the Buddha Stage, the Ultimate Buddha. Please join your palms.

Buddha Stage

(6) Ultimate Buddha

All along, the true was delusion; Today, all delusion is true. Only the original nature is restored— Not a single dharma is new.

After you become a Buddha—after you attain perfect Buddhahood—you can of course look back across countless kalpas spent in the ordinary world. And you'd come to one conclusion: all along, the true was delusion; today, all delusion is true.

Here's the thing. Your mind right now is spinning with delusive thoughts all day long, right? But suppose one day you become a Buddha. Is the mind that's spinning with delusive thoughts right now the same as the mind that has become a Buddha, or different? Have you swapped in a new mind? This single line gives you the answer.

When we're deluded, when we reach outward and grasp at conditions, the mind of suchness becomes entirely delusion. Suchness can't be divided up. You can't say, "Well, one-third of my suchness is busy spinning delusions, and the other two-thirds is still suchness." That's not how it works—not at all. It's only a matter of depth.

So in the past, the entirety of the true became delusion. Now, the entirety of delusion is the true. It's just that the depth of delusion and awakening differs, which is why we speak of the Six Identities of Buddha. But fundamentally, suchness cannot be sliced apart. The wholly true gives rise to delusion; the wholly deluded gives rise to the true.

There's a Chan master who said that before he awakened, when he looked at the grass on the hillside, he saw nothing but grass. Now when he looks again, he finds it's all medicine. What does this mean? If you don't understand the properties of herbs, grass is just useless grass. But if you do understand, every blade has its purpose—it's all medicine.

Another Chan master spoke along the same lines: Before, when I looked at the ocean, I saw nothing but waves. Now when I look again, I see nothing but seawater. This is exactly "all along, the true was delusion; today, all delusion is true." The key is simply whether one is awakened or deluded. One moment of delusion—the true was all delusion. One moment of awakening—all delusion is the true. The essence hasn't changed at all; only the function has shifted.

So becoming a Buddha is simply restoring the original nature—not a single dharma is new. Our practice only unveils the meritorious power already inherent in our self-nature. We haven't added a thing. As we've said before: it's the same stretch of empty sky, the same stretch of earth—and yet something has changed. A ray of light has appeared in the sky.

Our mind always possessed suchness, but it was suchness hidden in darkness. Now it has been drawn forth by light. The empty sky has gained a ray of light; the great earth has gained a measure of freedom.

We always inherently possessed the Ten Dharma Realms, but we had no say over which realm we'd manifest. Whatever the great earth of our past produced—all was driven by karma; not the least bit was up to us.

After you become a Buddha, you can manifest as a little white rabbit, or a human being, or a celestial being, or appear in the thirty-two marks and eighty excellent characteristics of a Nirmanakaya Buddha. The Ten Dharma Realms—this is what's called spontaneous mastery over rebirth. The great earth has gained a measure of freedom.

The sky has gained a ray of light; the earth has gained a measure of freedom. And the rest? The sky is still the sky; the earth is still the earth. The essence hasn't changed. That is what is meant by the Ultimate Buddha.

Master Jingjie, The Lotus Sutra