Selected Lectures from the Pitāputrasamāgama Sūtra

Original Text: Great King, the extinction of the final consciousness is called the death aggregate. The arising of the initial consciousness is called the birth aggregate.

Explanation: The Buddha said: Great King, at the end of life, when the consciousness and mind have all perished, the five aggregates are called the death aggregate. At the moment the consciousness and mind first arise, the five aggregates are called the birth aggregate.

The magnitude of karmic offenses also lies in mental conduct, the degree of malice, whether there is malice present, and whether there is intent to kill. For example, if there is a complete, living person inside a sack, and someone unintentionally kills them, unaware that there is a person inside the sack, mistaking it for an inanimate object, and stabs it with a knife, resulting in death, this does not constitute intentional killing. After death, they will not fall into hell to receive retribution. Nevertheless, in the future when encountering that person, they will be unintentionally killed by that person in return, but they will not suffer the evil retribution of hell. When killing, it must be discerned whether it is intentional or unintentional. Intentional killing constitutes the offense of killing, belonging to the karma of murder; unintentional killing is not a complete act of killing, but there is still karmic cause and effect. On the other hand, if the sack contains a wooden object, not a person, and someone, driven by malice, kills it while mistaking it for another person—though the object inherently lacks life, killing it would be equivalent to chopping firewood—but because the mind harbored hatred and intent to kill, treating it as a person to be killed, the offense is great. The magnitude of the offense lies in the state of mind.

If one crushes an ant to death with extreme malicious intent, this offense is also grave, because the malice is too severe, differing from ordinary killing. Ordinary killing may sometimes be unintentional or involve slight malice, and the karmic retribution differs entirely. Thus, sentencing in law follows the same principle: it distinguishes between intentional and unintentional killing, resulting in different sentencing outcomes.

In summary, cultivation involves refining the deluded consciousness of the seventh consciousness. When the deluded mind is well-cultivated, the mind becomes purified. When the ālaya consciousness contains no seeds of evil karma, one attains Buddhahood and recovers one's original true nature. Currently, the karmic seeds stored within our ālaya consciousness are defiled and obscured by ignorance. Our seventh consciousness is afflicted by greed, hatred, and delusion. The Buddha's seventh consciousness is entirely pure, having already transformed consciousness into wisdom, utterly devoid of selfhood.