The Right Understanding of Manas

Preface

Esteeming the Manas Is Esteeming Genuine Realization

Why, in the Dharma-ending age, must the intrinsic nature, functions, and roles of the manas be demonstrated repeatedly, and be distinguished from the mind consciousness as much as possible? Because sentient beings of the final age have restless minds, scant good roots, heavy greed, and meager merit (alpa-puṇya); the bustle and chaos of worldly affairs make it difficult to keep precepts and difficult to cultivate meditative concentration (samādhi), and the mind cannot be purified. Buddhist practitioners generally focus on acquiring knowledge, often taking the theories they have learned and the emotional musings and intellectual interpretations of the mind consciousness as genuine realization, and taking the results of speculation, inference, and research as genuine realization. They mislead themselves and then mislead others, collectively committing the karma of grave false speech and collectively falling into the fiery pit of the three lower realms. If one understands the intrinsic nature of the manas, one will know what genuine realization looks like and how it differs from emotional musings and intellectual interpretations; one will understand the pivotal mechanism and crucial points of genuine realization, and thus avoid falling into such errors, so as not to commit the offense of grave false speech.

In the Buddha's time, sentient beings had deep good roots and abundant merit, their afflictions were slight, their minds were pure, and their meditative power was strong; after learning the theory, they could spontaneously and conscientiously engage in deep and subtle contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā), so realization was relatively easy. Because they possessed profound dhyāna, whatever dharma they learned could penetrate deep into the manas; as long as they attained realization of the fruits, it was true realization, not the false realization of the mind consciousness. Moreover, the Buddha was there to verify and seal it; the Buddha's wisdom and supernatural powers are measureless, so the verification was accurate and without any error.

Even among the monastic and lay communities before the Ming and Qing dynasties, many possessed profound dhyāna, and the environmental conditions for cultivating meditative concentration were relatively good. Especially during the Tang and Song dynasties, Buddhist practitioners all emphasized dhyāna and samādhi; with meditative concentration, they had the ability to contemplate and deliberate, and as long as the theory they learned was correct, realization was relatively easier. The phenomenon of emotional musings and intellectual interpretations was very rare; if there was realization, it was genuine realization—the only difficulty was that sutra texts and theories were hard to obtain. Therefore, sentient beings of that time could remain unaware of the functions and roles of the manas and still attain genuine realization.

In today's environment of study and practice, many people cannot keep the precepts and cannot cultivate meditative concentration; they can only focus on learning theoretical knowledge, and thus cannot attain genuine realization. Without genuine realization, one cannot put the Dharma into practice; it is mostly "Chan of the mouth"—speaking the principles fluently and eloquently, yet the mind does not accord with the Path, and greed, hatred, and delusion still prevail. Without meditative concentration, afflictions cannot be subdued or suppressed—let alone severed. Hence Buddhist communities are even more chaotic than the secular world, with even fiercer strife; not only do they cling to worldly fame and gain, they also cling to personal interests within the Buddha-Dharma, so that their afflictions are even worse than those of the secular world.

In this era where "sages" fly everywhere and desires run rampant, it is necessary to emphasize keeping the precepts and dhyāna, and to emphasize genuine realization through the manas, so that sentient beings will not claim realization without having realized it, will not fall into the three lower realms at death, and will not harm other students of the Dharma by leading them together into the fiery pit.