The Continual Scrutiny and Deliberation of the Manas

The character "scrutiny" in the manas's continual scrutiny and deliberation reveals the mental activities of the manas, and also reveals the functions that the manas performs. This shows that the manas is not a useless object or mere decoration; it has a very important decisive role—it is a living, active conscious mind.

Whenever the manas contacts any dharma, it must scrutinize it. Whatever dharmas the six consciousnesses discern, the manas must scrutinize them. Once the scrutiny has passed, it will make a decision and proceed to handle the matter. So what role does the manas play in investigating Chan? What role does it play in the elimination of self-view? What role does it play in seeing one's true mind and seeing one's nature? What role does it play in realizing all dharmas? In all of these, it plays the decisive role.

All dharmas must pass through the manas's checkpoint. If the manas has not judged them as qualified, they cannot be processed. When the manas scrutinizes, it has its own mental activity of consciousness; it must make its own deliberation—it does not simply obey the six consciousnesses, immediately approving whatever they discern. Therefore, everything seen by the six consciousnesses must be clearly and distinctly understood by the manas. If the manas does not understand, the scrutiny fails to qualify, cannot pass the checkpoint, and the manas cannot make its decision. Both the elimination of self-view and seeing the true mind and seeing one's nature must pass through the manas's scrutiny and review. If the manas does not agree, one cannot eliminate self-view, cannot see the true mind and see one's nature. The elimination of self-view and awakening to the true mind done by the mind consciousness unilaterally are merely the mind consciousness's own understanding and belief; if the master, the leader, does not agree, it does not count. For the mind consciousness to presume, without the leader's consent, to declare that self-view has been eliminated and the true mind has been seen—how could that be reasonable?

How can one let the manas itself arrive at the result and the answer? The mind consciousness should analyze and reflect less, and instead let the manas deliberate and ponder on its own more—this is the most effective way. Once the mind consciousness knows the answer, it no longer wants to continue investigating, and the manas then has no opportunity to investigate, and thus can never attain realization. Therefore, if the answer to seeing the true mind is casually inquired about or casually told to someone, once the mind consciousness knows it, the manas can no longer apply effort, and realization becomes impossible. The same applies to the elimination of self-view: one cannot demand that the master explain it in too much detail. If the mind consciousness already knows everything, the manas can no longer ponder it, and the elimination of self-view becomes very difficult.