The Status and Relationship of Manas and Mind Consciousness in the World of the Five Aggregates

In the earliest period of life, there existed only the eighth consciousness and the manas—one true, one false—and thus the true self and the false self coexisted peacefully in this way, in a state of primal chaos. Because of the manas's ignorance and deluded thinking, being discontent with the status quo and wanting to seek outwardly, the eighth consciousness satisfied the manas, and the world of the three realms gradually took shape. Afterwards, the body of the five aggregates formed, and only then did the phenomenon of birth-and-death saṃsāra appear, and the six consciousnesses came into being to know and undergo the suffering and happiness of birth and death.

So the most fundamental self, the most primordial self, the self that can make decisions, is the manas, not the mind consciousness. The mind consciousness is merely a product of the manas's grasping and deluded thinking, a tool for the manas to explore the world and greedily cling to the world—the manas uses it when it wants to, and discards it when it does not.

From this, one can see what the status and relationship of the manas and the mind consciousness are within the world of the five aggregates: the manas's dominant position is far beyond the reach of the mind consciousness. Then it becomes perfectly clear who possesses the view of self, perfectly clear where the view of self comes from, perfectly clear whose view of self is to be eradicated, and perfectly clear how to eradicate the view of self.

Why do the vast majority of sentient beings constantly make a big fuss over the mind consciousness? Because the mind consciousness floats on the surface of the five aggregates; it is relatively shallow and easy to observe and perceive. The manas is buried deep and hidden; its dominant role is covert and extremely difficult to observe and perceive—because He is the master, the one in charge, He must be this deep and hidden, must rule from behind the curtain, so how could He easily let Himself be seen? This is the same principle as sentient beings seeing only the mundane world but not the true reality of the tathāgatagarbha.

For example, in the world, for a person as noble as an emperor, how could commoners without a certain amount of merit easily get to see the emperor and his ministers? They can only frequently see the soldiers and officials who do the work for the emperor and his ministers. Then to whose account should the good deeds and bad deeds done by these officials and soldiers be charged? They are all the directives of the emperor and his ministers! By the same token, whose fault is the view of self and the wrong view (mithyā-dṛṣṭi) of the body of the five aggregates? It is entirely the fault of the manas, and nothing else. Therefore, in cultivation one should teach the manas, transform the manas, and eradicate the manas's view of self—this is what is fundamental.