無論以其心性思想或其修證論來講，或者著眼於其文理脈絡，《大佛頂如來密因修證了義諸菩薩萬行首楞嚴經》（簡稱《楞嚴經》）可說以所謂〈觀音圓通章〉一段經文為一經的重心。此一段經文所講的乃是觀音菩薩自述其修證佛法的方法，即以聽覺為中心的一種修行手法。雖然做為一經的重心，此一章經文則用字艱澀難解，多容猜疑，歷來註家字義解釋以及全章詮釋各各不同。聖嚴法師所著《觀音妙智—觀音菩薩耳根圓通法門講要》，全書亦是專門講此一章，詳細的發揮法師自己的看法。本文乃探討此一章的各種解釋以及現代哲學涵義，特別著眼於此經如何用這種以聽覺為中心的模式，來規定宇宙的又超越主客對待、又包容主客兩面的究竟原理（佛性、心性），以及此種模式的究竟原理如何可用來解決西洋傳統宗教與思想中，以視覺為中心的模式來規定的宇宙究竟原理所帶來的某些問題。

The Lengyanjing (Śūraṃgama Sūtra) reaches what is arguably its philosophical and soteriological center in the description of a method of Buddhist practice declared by Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva (Ch: Guanyin Pusa). This method consist of a form of concentration and contemplation of the faculty of hearing. The actual description of the method, however, is terse and ambiguous in the original Chinese text, and has lent itself to radically divergent interpretations over the centuries, representing diverse readings both philologically and philosophically. The interpretation of this passage, reflected even in the very way in which the specific characters of the text and how they are parsed, depends heavily on the school of Buddhism to which the exegete belongs and the dominant concerns of Chinese Buddhist culture at the time of the work. Master Shengyen offers a detailed exegesis of this passage in his book Guanyin Miaozhi: Guanyin pusa ergen yuantong famen jiang yao (觀音妙智：觀音菩薩耳根圓通法門講 要) (Avalokiteśvara’s Wondrous Wisdom: Lectures on the Essence of Avalokiteśvara Bodhisattva’s Dharma-gate of Perfection of the Organ of the Ear). In this paper I examine this passage and its various interpretations, including that of Master Shengyen, together with the elaboration on the organ of hearing and its implications found in the gatha of Mañjuśrī which follows Avalokiteśvara’s soliloquy in the sutra, comparing these interpretative stances and attempting to elucidate what is at stake in the various approaches and hermeneutic decisions involved. This gives us a basis from which to consider the philosophical implications of this privileging of the sense of hearing over all other senses, as well as over all other specific practices and mental operations, for Buddhist practice and the attainment of the realization of the absolute or unconditioned state of liberation, the omnipresent and always-operating ground of all experience which on the one hand transcends subjectivity and objectivity, and on the other fully includes both subjectivity and objectivity, thereby integrating them into one another, such that all objectivity is subjective-objective, and all subjectivity is objective-subjective, in both cases properly speaking neither subjective nor objective. The exact implications of this idea are brought into dialogue with attempts to elucidate the nature of the unconditioned, and its unification and transcendence of objectivity and subjectivity, in certain Western philosophical figures (notably Spinoza and some of the post-Kantian German Idealist philosophers), as well as the trend in late 20th century phenomenology which has discerned a prejudice toward an “ocularcentric” paradigm in traditional Western philosophical conceptions of Being (e.g., Levinas’ critique of Heidegger) and the trend toward a reconsideration of the implications of a shift to an aural paradigm (e.g., in works such as David Michael Levin’s The Listening Self). We will conclude with some further reflections on the far-reaching implications of the difference between the conception and experience of the Absolute as derived from an ocular paradigm and that derived from an aural paradigm.