The Difference Between Sentient and Insentient Beings

The fundamental difference between sentient beings and insentient things lies in this: the physical body of a sentient being is singly born and sustained by that being's own tathāgatagarbha, and on that physical body there is the discerning function of the seven consciousnesses, and thus there is the activity of the five aggregates. The material form of insentient things, however, is produced and sustained jointly by the tathāgatagarbhas of beings with collective karma, and has no seven consciousnesses or five aggregates, because the seven consciousnesses are produced from the consciousness-seeds output by a single tathāgatagarbha, and cannot be formed by the consciousness-seeds output jointly by many tathāgatagarbhas. Therefore insentient objects have no activity of the seven consciousnesses and five aggregates, and are not sentient beings. The fundamental difference between the five-aggregate activity of sentient beings and the material activity of insentient things is that the five-aggregate body of sentient beings has the functions of feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness.

If a being's manas feels that a certain material form is useful to it and can serve as its physical body, its tathāgatagarbha and manas will enter into or attach to that material form and give rise to five-aggregate activity—this is the phenomenon of possession in sentient beings. The reason beings want to enter the womb is that they want to have five-aggregate activity; without a material form there is no way to carry out five-aggregate activity, so all beings will find ways to enter the womb. If they truly lack the merit and opportunity to enter the womb, they will use a material form as their physical body and then carry out five-aggregate activity upon that material form. Therefore, on the physical body of a sentient being there must be the aggregate of feeling, or the functions of the aggregate of perception, the aggregate of volitional formations, and the aggregate of consciousness; only when these functions combine can a five-aggregate sentient being be formed. If a material form cannot be used by a being and cannot give rise to five-aggregate activity, the being will not attach to that material form.

After an earthworm is cut into two, three, or several segments, each segment may survive; at that point each segment of the body becomes a separate earthworm, and a separate earthworm is a single sentient being, with its own tathāgatagarbha facilitating its own separate five-aggregate activity, and the other surviving segments are the same. Because the earthworm's body has a special regenerative function, its bodily function can be utilized; when a being's tathāgatagarbha and manas enter into it, they can have their own physical body and five-aggregate activity. The bodies of other animals, once cut open, cannot regenerate and cannot be used again as a physical body, so beings will not enter into them, and the severed limbs will decay and perish.

Those beings without the merit or karmic connection to enter the womb will use any usable material as their physical body. The number of beings in a great trichiliocosm is enormous, and there are very many beings without physical bodies in a wandering, unattached state—lonely souls and wild ghosts of various kinds. They will not let pass any opportunity to enter the womb, doing everything they can to take birth or possess a body, so as to have their own five-aggregate activity. Without a physical body they feel they have nothing to rely on and feel intense suffering; being able to use a physical body to live in the world gives them something to rely on, and no one wishes to be without a body. If environmental conditions such as temperature and humidity are suitable, the beings entering wombs or possessing bodies will be especially numerous; they may become beings of various bacterial kinds, or enter into extremely tiny wriggling and fluttering beings. No matter which kind of being they enter into, as long as they can have a physical body to rely on, they are willing. Even though the life of bacteria arises, abides, changes, and perishes extremely quickly—entering a body and dying, entering a body and dying again—they still keep entering, because the feeling of having no body is truly painful.