their thoughts: ‘I do not say that all sentient beings lack a Self. I always say that sentient beings have the Buddha-nature (svabhāva). Is not that very Buddha-nature a Self? So I do not teach a nihilistic doctrine.’ The Buddha adds that it is because all sentient beings do not see the Buddha-nature that he teaches the four signs of impermanence, not-Self, suffering, and impurity. It is this that is thought to be a nihilistic doctrine. He has taught Self where there is really not-Self, and not-Self where there is really Self. This is not false but the Buddha’s skill-in-means, his cleverness in applying helpful stratagems. Here the Buddha-nature is really not-Self, but it is said to be a Self in a manner of speaking. Eternal Buddha Mark Blum stresses the fact that the Buddha in this sutra is presented, on the eve of his Great Nirvana, as one who is not subject to the processes of birth and death, but abides undying forever: The Buddha is presented as (an) eternal Being, transcending normal human limitations: Kosho Yamamoto gives a series of equations: Tathagatagarbha The Buddha-nature is equated with the Tathagatagarbha. According to Sally King, the term tathāgatagarbha may be understood in two ways: "embryonic tathāgata", the incipient Buddha, the cause of the Tathāgata, "womb of the tathāgata", the fruit of Tathāgata. The Chinese translated the term tathāgata in its meaning as "womb", c.q. "fruit". It was translated as , "tathāgata storehouse" "Buddha-matrix", or "Buddha embryo", the innate possibility of every sentient being to attain awakening in every sentient being. According to Mark Blum, Dharmaksema translates tathāgatagārbha as or simply mìzàng, "tathagata's hidden treasury". He notes that the two major Chinese versions of the sutra don't use the literal Chinese term for embryo or womb, but speak of the "wondrous interior treasure-house of the Buddha" found in all beings. "We never see a word that specifically means embryo or womb used for garbha in either Chinese translation of this sutra." This "hidden treasury" is present in all sentient beings: "[the Buddha] expounds the doctrine that this quality [of the hidden interior, wondrous treasury] is not only common to buddhas but to all living beings as well." The Buddha-nature is always present, in all times and in all beings. According to Liu, this does not mean that sentient beings are at present endowed with the qualities of a Buddha, but that