BUDDHISM IN CENTRAL ASIA AND CHINA 193him, there is no Unconditioned separate from the Conditioned. The universe
already is the body and mind of the Buddha Mahavairocana. Even if there
were an unconditioned realm to go to, no one would be able to go until the
entire universe went, grass and insects included. Because every part is inter-
penetrated by, identical with, and in union with every other part, all parts
would have to go together. Thus Fa-tsang replaces the two parts of the early
Buddhist view of Awakening-knowledge of the law of dependent co-arising
and knowledge of nirval)a (see Section 1.4.3)-with only the first of the two.
Additionally, according to him, that knowledge does not come from trying to
deconstruct the process of dependent co-arising, but simply from appreciating
its marvelous ramifications. In his vision, the cosmos is a dazzling place. One
does not try to gain release from it, but instead tries, as the Taoists and Confu-
cians, to live in harmony with it. One attains Buddhahood by appreciating its
wonder; and one continues to live in it for infinity, acting out of wisdom and
compassion, attuned to its infinitely repeating ramifications.
These, at least, were the intended implications of Fa-tsang's teachings.
Chan-jan (see Section 8.5.1), however, saw other implications. Placed against
Chih-i's doctrine of the six identities, Fa-tsang's assertion-that Buddhahood
was implicitly attained at the stage of accepting the right view of the uni-
verse-equated the second stage of identity with the sixth. This, Chan-jan
said, would lead to the danger of arrogance. One would feel that because one
was already Awakened, there was no need to practice morality or any other
stages of the Path. This point is borne out by Empress Wu's reported reaction
to Fa-tsang's lesson in dependent co-arising. After touring the mirrored room,
she had an identical room made for entertaining her paramours. According to
her reasoning, if the cosmos already was identical with the Buddha Mahavairo-
cana, there was no way to 'say that things should be any better than they al-
ready were, and one was justified in acting in whatever way one liked. For
her, the best thing to do in an infinitely repeating cosmos was to make love.
This issue-the place of Buddhist moral values on the Path-later formed
the basis for Tsung-mi's recasting of Hua-yen doctrine. Tsung-mi was a mas-
ter of the Ho-tse school of southern Ch' an, founded by Shen-hui (see Section
8.5.5). All southern Ch'an-schools taught a doctrine of sudden Awakening,
according to which gradual practice could not give rise to a true understand-
ing of the Buddha-nature. Because Awakening was an aU-or-nothing affair,
gradual approaches to the immediacy of full understanding only got in the
way. Thus some of the more radical Ch'an schools advocated the abandoning
of moral norms and formal meditation practice altogether. Recognizing the
danger in this approach, Tsung-mi sought a doctrinal justification for his con-
viction that sudden Awakening had to be followed by gradual cultivation-in-
cluding observance of moral principles and formal meditation-in order to
integrate that Awakening fully into one's life.
He found the justification he was looking for in the writings of Ch' eng-
kuan, the fourth Hua-yen patriarch, and so went to study with him. In the
course of his studies, he learned much that suited his purposes, but the doc-
trines that were the hallmarks of the Hua-yen school-the separateness of the