The Difference Between Bacteria and Cells

Some say that bacteria can split their consciousness—of course, "consciousness" refers to the consciousness mind, the seven consciousnesses. If bacteria could split their consciousness, dividing into multiple consciousnesses and multiple five consciousnesses, then they would possess the abilities of doppelgangers, mind-born bodies, and transformation bodies, which would be great supernatural powers surpassing those of humans. Since they would be more powerful than humans, why would they still exist as bacteria? Bacteria are the most inferior and ignorant sentient beings, possessing a form body composed of the four great elements, along with weak and inferior functions of the consciousness mind. A single bacterium possesses one tathagatagarbha to sustain its body.

Cells are insentient matter; they lack the functions of the seven consciousnesses and have no tathagatagarbha to sustain them, because cells are not form bodies. They are the basic components of a sentient being's form body—minute particles on the sentient form body, constituted by the seeds of the four great elements. Cell division is one of the most fundamental functions of a sentient being's tathagatagarbha, a characteristic of the birth, cessation, alteration, and destruction of a sentient being's form body. Any change, arising, abiding, alteration, or cessation of the form body is a function of the sentient being's tathagatagarbha. Bacteria can invade cells, destroying them and thereby causing sentient beings to fall ill or die.