The Discerning Wisdom of Manas

The superficial cleverness and quick-wittedness all belong to the wisdom of the mind consciousness; it is relatively shallow, giving people a feeling of restlessness and ostentation—lacking depth, lacking steadiness, unreliable—because wisdom that is not that of the manas is not true wisdom. The wisdom of the manas can manifest as profound, persistent, composed, reliable, and trustworthy, giving a sense of solidity. The manas is relatively inferior in wisdom regarding the fine discrimination of the six sense objects; its power of discrimination is weak and has a kind of foolishness—it does not know good from evil, does not know what is beneficial or harmful, does not know superior from inferior, does not know east, west, south, or north, does not know long or short, square or round, and cannot distinguish male from female. Without the guidance of the mind consciousness, its discrimination always goes awry, mistaking east for west and this for that. However, in the general, overall, holistic discrimination, the manas is beyond the reach of the mind consciousness, because the manas grasps the overall picture and full scope of all dharmas; it can make rapid judgments and decisions about major matters, directing the six consciousnesses to make swift emergency responses, and can avert the occurrence of many disasters.

The manas's discriminating wisdom regarding the six sense objects still exists; it is simply not as specific and minute as the discrimination of the mind consciousness. Because their scopes of responsibility differ, the manas handles overall planning and overall wisdom; it cannot attend to every detail and cover everything, for the minute, trivial matters are all completed by its subordinates, the six consciousnesses. The manas does not have the energy for this; otherwise, it would be unable to grasp the major matters.

The division of labor between the manas and the mind consciousness can be illustrated with a concrete example. For instance, while sleeping, the blanket gets kicked off, and the body, uncovered, feels somewhat cool. The manas discerns this situation but cannot handle it itself, so it keeps this matter in mind. Then the tathāgatagarbha discerns the manas's mental factor of volition and manifests a dream for the manas to resolve this matter. The mind consciousness dreams that it is in a cold environment and feels very cold. The manas knows the body feels cold and thus decides to cover the body with the blanket. At this point, the manas cannot distinguish between inside and outside the dream; it takes the dream state as being outside the dream and makes its decision. The mind consciousness also does not know whether it is inside or outside the dream; taking the dream state as real, it obeys the manas's decision and covers the body with the blanket. But the mind consciousness that can cover the body with the blanket is no longer the solitary mental consciousness; it is the mental consciousness accompanying the five sense consciousnesses (pañcavijñāna-sahagata-manovijñāna), so the body consciousness also arises and, together, covers the body with the blanket. The manas's inability to distinguish inside the dream from outside is a lack of wisdom, yet its ability to devise a way to handle the matter is wisdom; its ability to discern that an unusual condition has arisen in the body is also the manas's discriminating wisdom. The analysis and handling of specific situations belong to the responsibility of the mind consciousness. Such is the division of labor and cooperation between the two.