9. BUT WHERE WAS DANGMA WHEN THE ÂLAYA OF THE UNIVERSE(69) WAS IN PARAMÂRTHA (_a_),(70) AND THE GREAT WHEEL WAS ANUPÂDAKA (_b_)?
(a) Here we have before us the subject of centuries of scholastic disputations. The two terms “Âlaya,” and “Paramârtha,” have been the causes of dividing schools and splitting the truth into more different aspects than any other mystic words. Âlaya is the Soul of the World or Anima Mundi—the Over‐Soul of Emerson—which according to esoteric teaching changes its nature periodically. Âlaya, though eternal and changeless in its inner essence on the planes which are unreachable by either men or cosmic gods (Dhyâni‐Buddhas), changes during the active life‐period with respect to the lower planes, ours included. During that time not only the Dhyâni‐Buddhas are one with Âlaya in Soul and Essence, but even the man strong in Yoga (Mystic Meditation) “is able to merge his soul with it,” as Aryâsanga, of the Yogâchârya school, says. This is not Nirvâna, but a condition next to it. Hence the disagreement. Thus, while the Yogâchâryas of the Mahâyâna School say that Âlaya (Nyingpo and Tsang in Tibetan) is the personification of the Voidness, and yet Âlaya is the basis of every visible and invisible thing, and that, though it is eternal and immutable in its essence, it reflects itself in every object of the Universe “like the moon in clear tranquil water”; other schools dispute the statement. The same for Paramârtha. The Yogâchâryas interpret the term as that which is also dependent upon other things (_paratantra_); and the Madhyamikas say that Paramârtha is limited to Paranishpanna or Absolute Perfection; _i.e._, in the exposition of these “Two Truths” of the Four, the former believe and maintain that, on this plane, at any rate, there exists only Samvritisatya or relative truth; and the latter teach the existence of Paramârthasatya, Absolute Truth.(71) “No Arhat, O mendicants, can reach absolute knowledge before he becomes one with Paranirvâna. Parikalpita and Paratantra are his two great enemies.”(72) Parikalpita (in Tibetan Kun‐ tag) is error, made by those unable to realize the emptiness and illusionary nature of all; who believe something to exist which does not—_e.g._, the Non‐Ego. And Paratantra is that, whatever it is, which exists only through a dependent or causal connection, and which has to disappear as soon as the cause from which it proceeds is removed—_e.g._, the flame of a wick. Destroy or extinguish it, and light disappears.