The discernment of the tathāgatagarbha differs from the discernment of the manas

Question: When the manas cognizes an object with essence (daizhi jing), is this object-with-essence a mental sense-object (dharma dust), or the perceiving-aspect of the tathāgatagarbha? How can one reconcile the manas cognizing mental sense-objects with its cognizing the perceiving-aspect of the tathāgatagarbha?

Answer: The operation of the tathāgatagarbha relies upon the five universal mental factors of its own substance: attention (manaskāra), contact (sparśa), feeling (vedanā), perception (saṃjñā), and volition (cetanā). When these five mental factors operate upon the essential object (benzhi jing), they can discern the karmic seeds as well as sentient beings' faculties, physical body, and material environment; having the function of the perceiving-aspect, they can see all dharmas and illuminate all dharmas—and all these dharmas are the object-aspects perceived by the tathāgatagarbha. After the tathāgatagarbha's volition mental factor operates, it can manifest the object-with-essence, which is created and transformed by the tathāgatagarbha's volition mental factor. The object-with-essence is the object-aspect of the tathāgatagarbha, the result of the operation of its perceiving-aspect, and the mental sense-object manifested by the perceiving-aspect.

The seventh consciousness, relying on the perceiving-aspect of the tathāgatagarbha, can thereby cognize the object-aspect arising through the perceiving-aspect of the tathāgatagarbha—the object-with-essence. Therefore, although the seventh consciousness can cognize the perceiving-aspect of the tathāgatagarbha, this differs from the object-aspect perceived by the tathāgatagarbha: one is the essential object, while the other is a similar object transformed and arisen in dependence upon the essential object—like fire in a mirror, an illusory transformation. Although the essential object perceived by the perceiving-aspect of the tathāgatagarbha is also conjured forth by the tathāgatagarbha, the object-with-essence perceived by the seventh consciousness is an illusion within an illusion, a second transformation.

The object-aspects at the supreme faculty (rūpa-prasāda) are the object-with-essence and the Image-Only Object. The object-with-essence includes the true object-with-essence and the false object-with-essence, divided into transformational carrying (biandai) and narrow carrying (xiadai); it comprises material form, also mental dharmas, and also dharmas that are neither material nor mental. The essential object cognized by the tathāgatagarbha consists of minute particles composed of the four great elements—relatively coarse and relatively solid material form; whereas the material form of the object-with-essence, although also composed of particles of the four great elements, is subtle material form, not very solid, rather illusory—somewhat like the difference between the physical body of humans and the physical body of ghosts and spirits. The essential object, for example, is fire and water composed of the four great elements, the great earth, mountains and rivers, and so on; the object-with-essence is like the fire and water, the great earth, mountains and rivers, and so on in a mirror. One is real, the other unreal. The seven consciousnesses can only discern unreal dharmas, not real dharmas; real dharmas can only be discerned by the tathāgatagarbha.