What Is It That We Cultivate in Spiritual Practice?

In the end, does cultivation mean killing off the mind consciousness, or killing off the manas? Killing off the mind consciousness is the cause; killing off the manas is the result. Although killing off the manas is the ultimate goal, the starting point must still be the mind consciousness. The mind consciousness dies every night, and the mind consciousness of a person in a vegetative state is more or less dead all the time, yet in later lives they still cannot avoid the three evil paths, let alone the cycle of rebirth in the six realms. What does this show? It shows that the great authority over birth and death is held in the hands of the manas. Therefore, cultivation must be carried out at the manas: we must understand the manas clearly, subdue the manas, and eradicate the ignorance of the manas. How exactly should one go about extinguishing the ignorance of the manas? Ignorance extends into all the afflictive mental factors (caittas). So whose mental factors are the afflictive mental factors, primarily? Ignorance of the manas leads to the suffering of birth, aging, sickness, and death—which afflictive mental factors does the manas not possess? If the manas did not possess all the afflictive mental factors, would cultivation not be easy and pleasant?

Some people insist that the manas is neither wholesome nor unwholesome. If that were so, would we still need to cultivate? The tathāgatagarbha is neither wholesome nor unwholesome, and that is precisely why the tathāgatagarbha never cultivates and does not need to cultivate at all. What would it cultivate? What would He correct? He has no ignorance, no unwholesomeness, and nothing deviant. If the tathāgatagarbha were to engage in cultivation, it would probably go astray and become crooked. Both wholesomeness and unwholesomeness stem from ignorance; where there is ignorance, there must be the wholesome and the unwholesome. The tathāgatagarbha has no ignorance, so He neither creates wholesome karma nor unwholesome karma—He responds according to conditions without any deliberate mental effort. Only where there is ignorance is there a mind of anger, and only then does one give rise to the intention to create the karma of killing; only where there is ignorance is there foolish delusion, and only then does one create the karma of killing.