How the Five Aggregates (pañca-skandha) Operate

Take drinking tea as an example to illustrate. Drinking tea is a process of the integrated, harmonious functioning of the five aggregates; the five aggregates of form, feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness, as well as the eighteen elements of the six faculties, six sense-objects, and six consciousnesses, all participate in it, with faculty, object, and consciousness touching and operating together in harmony. The one in charge is the manas, which is responsible for coordinating and regulating the activities of contact, feeling, perception, and volition of the six consciousnesses and the five faculties and six sense-objects. The most agile and swift is the manas; very often the mind consciousness does not even notice anything before the matter is already done. The five sense consciousnesses cooperate as if they had no thought of their own, completely faithful to the manas's intent, and at times the mind consciousness simply cannot figure it out.

The entire process of drinking tea is like this: if the tea is too hot and spills on the hand, one will startle and fling it off instantly, with no time for the mind consciousness to discern and analyze it through deliberation. When the manas wants to pick up the teacup and drink the tea, faculty and object will come into contact, generating the six consciousnesses to cooperate and operate, carrying out the manas's instruction, and only then can the tea be drunk. As for the specific operations of the six faculties and the operations of the six consciousnesses, you must observe and match them up yourself; especially the details require you to settle your mind and observe them yourself. You need to make the concepts of the five aggregates clear, and make clear the functions and roles of the eighteen elements.