The Understanding of Mind Consciousness and the Understanding of Manas

The wisdom of a single thought of correspondence refers to the manas, not to the mind consciousness. Therefore, when the Chan school speaks of sudden enlightenment, it means that the manas suddenly understands and realizes awakening. The mind consciousness gradually comes to understand through deliberation, analysis, and inference; the two are different. When the mind consciousness understands, it is quite plain and unremarkable, but when the manas understands, it is like a sudden breakthrough—the manas suddenly discovers a new continent, feeling novelty and astonishment, as if it penetrated to the marrow, and that is why reactions of body and mind appear. Of course, the manas's understanding and realization also have levels: some are substantive, and some are non-substantive. When the manas suddenly awakens to or understands a certain principle, it feels deeply moved, but this is not necessarily the ultimate realization.

Everyone knows the principle that the body is impermanent, arising and ceasing, illusory, and not the self; yet eradicating the view of the body and witnessing the fruit is extremely difficult. This is because of the manas's habitual cognition since beginningless kalpas, which regards the body as the self—a notion that is deeply entrenched. Without contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) of direct perception, one cannot overturn this fixed notion, cannot accept that the body is not the self, and cannot accept it. This requires the manas, based on the mind consciousness's deliberation, to engage in its own deliberation (manasikāra) and personally verify it; only when the evidence is sufficient will He have no choice but to confirm this principle.