Lecture Notes on the Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son (181)

What are the ten unwholesome karmic deeds?

Ordinary beings of scant learning and no wisdom give rise to delight and craving upon contact with agreeable objects. Agreeable contact refers to bodily contact that greatly delights and pleases the mind consciousness; it is called wonderful touch (sukha-sparśa). For example, the body touching soft clothing, warm sunlight, a comfortable bed—and among these, the most significant is the touch between men and women; the desire realm (kāmadhātu) is a world established primarily on this kind of touch. What the body faculty and body consciousness come into contact with is called the touch sense-object (sparśa-viṣaya). For instance, when warm, comfortable sunlight touches the body, when cold or hot wind touches the body, when soft or hard clothing touches the body, and the body consciousness has a sensation, this is called touch; the dharma that is touched is called the touch sense-object. Also, when one is hungry or thirsty, the sensation in the stomach is also touch—all of these are touch sense-objects. Another example: after sitting for a long time, one feels fatigued; fatigue is also a touch sense-object. When meditating, if the body feels tranquil and at ease (praśrabdhi), if the body feels extremely comfortable—all of these are touch sense-objects.

Ordinary sentient beings crave agreeable touch sensations the most, primarily the touch between men and women. When a man and a woman touch each other, the mind gives rise to delight and craving, and thus the mind becomes defiled. This is craving and attachment centered on the mind consciousness, also including the eye consciousness and body consciousness, but mainly centered on the sensations of the sixth consciousness (manovijñāna). Once the mind consciousness gives rise to defiled attachment, it creates karma; the step after the mind gives rise to delight and craving is certainly the creation of karma, and karmic actions will appear. People without cultivation will produce foolish bodily, verbal, and mental karmic actions. Some cultivators, though their minds may sometimes have defilement, do not create bodily or verbal karmic actions; the most accomplished cultivators do not even allow their minds to be defiled. The karmic actions that can be created: three kinds of bodily karma—killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct; four kinds of verbal karma—lying, frivolous speech, divisive speech, and harsh speech; and three kinds of mental karma—greed, hatred, and delusion.

The three bodily deeds, four verbal deeds, and three mental deeds together constitute the ten karmic deeds, with body, speech, and mind mutually aligned and following one another. After the ten karmic deeds are committed, these karmic actions cease moment by moment; the seeds of karmic actions are outputted to take effect and then cease—that instant of karmic action is gone, and finally the entire action and creation disappears. Yet the karmic seeds remain and are recorded. Who records them? It is the Ālayavijñāna, which is closest to us, that records them, because He outputs seeds and then retrieves the seeds; the karmic actions created by the seeds are thereby simultaneously stored in the Ālayavijñāna.