The Warning Function of the Manas

Question: In the past, when I felt fear, dread, or anxiety in my mind, I always had the feeling that something was about to happen, but I didn't know what it would be, and my mind was not at peace—and then something really did happen. Is this the manas knowing in advance?

Answer: Fear, dread, anxiety, and other such mental phenomena are expressions of the manas's emotions, making the mind consciousness feel that something bad is about to happen, yet without knowing exactly what it is. The manas can foresee many things in advance—it knows almost everything—but it cannot personally deal with them; it can only alert the mind consciousness, and only after the mind consciousness understands can it set about doing something, planning and making arrangements. The manas is anxious about what is going to happen, but it does not know how to express it so that the mind consciousness will know. Only after the event occurs does the mind consciousness find out what it was, but by then it is often one step too late, and nothing can be done about it.

Sometimes the things dreamed in a dream are also the manas dwelling on something, then alerting the mind consciousness to be aware of it and letting the mind consciousness handle it; as a result, the things in the dream really do happen later. This is the manas's alerting function, also called a precognitive dream. Because the mind consciousness is intelligent and wise, with the capacity for analysis and thinking, it can come up with ways to solve problems and can take concrete measures and actions, whereas the manas is incapable of taking any action. Therefore, when it foresees that something is going to happen, it will alert the mind consciousness in various ways, reminding the mind consciousness to know. Once the mind consciousness receives the alert and the hint, it may realize that something is going to happen and prepare in advance. If the manas has the wisdom to alert the mind consciousness, it can make it easy for the mind consciousness to comprehend; if the mind consciousness has wisdom, it will also easily comprehend the manas's warnings and hints.

A precognitive dream is the manas letting the mind consciousness know in advance about things that will happen later. The manas can know events of the future that have not yet occurred and can reach into the future. Why is this so? Because the tathāgatagarbha, in accordance with karmic seeds, can know the affairs of the three realms' world in the past, present, and future. Relying on the dharmas seen by the tathāgatagarbha, the manas can give rise to its own views. Since the tathāgatagarbha can see all dharmas, the manas can also see all dharmas, but the dharmas seen by the two differ in essence.