The Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna

A short Mahāyāna treatise traditionally attributed to the Indian poet Aśvaghoṣa and said to have been translated into Chinese by Paramārtha in the 6th century. No Sanskrit original is known, and most scholars now think it was composed in China. Its central teaching is the 'one mind', which has two aspects: the mind as suchness, unchanging and beyond words, and the mind as arising and ceasing. These meet in the storehouse consciousness, where original enlightenment and ignorance exist together. The text explains how deluded thoughts arise when ignorance stirs the mind as wind stirs water into waves; how 'perfuming' works in both directions, so that ignorance clouds suchness and suchness can transform ignorance; and how practice moves from initial to full awakening. Later sections describe the practices of giving, moral discipline, patience, effort, and calming and insight, and recommend rebirth in Amitābha's Pure Land for those who fear their faith may falter.

It is one of the most influential texts in East Asian Buddhism, behind Huayan, Chan and much later thought, and gives a compact account of how a deluded mind can also be the ground of awakening.