The Relationship Between the Manas and the Five Aggregates

The manas is neither independent of the five aggregates nor not independent of them; it is neither in union with the five aggregates nor not in union with them; it can both depart from the five aggregates and not depart from them. Why is this so? The manas is not independent of the five aggregates because all of the manas's deliberation (manasikāra), all of its thoughts and volitions, must be realized and carried out through the five aggregates; therefore the manas takes the five aggregates as self. Meanwhile, the operation of the five aggregates in turn strengthens and inspires the deliberation of the manas, so that the five aggregates revolve around the manas, and the manas revolves around the five aggregates, entangled with one another and inseparable.

The manas is fully capable of being independent of the five aggregates because: (1) Before the world was first established, there were no five aggregates; only the eighth consciousness and the manas existed. (2) At the moment of death (the stage of correct dying), the five aggregates cease, and only the eighth consciousness and the manas exist. (3) At the stage of the fertilized egg, when the five aggregates have not yet arisen, only the eighth consciousness and the manas exist. (4) In the cessation attainment (nirodha-samāpatti), only a faint aggregate of form remains among the five aggregates; the aggregates of feeling, perception, volitional formations, and consciousness of the six consciousnesses do not exist, while the eighth consciousness and the manas exist. (5) During unconsciousness and in other such periods, only a faint aggregate of form and aggregate of consciousness remain among the five aggregates, while the eighth consciousness and the manas exist unaffected. (6) When an arhat has just emerged from Nirvāṇa without remainder (Anupadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa), only the eighth consciousness and the manas exist; the five aggregates have not yet appeared. Thus the manas can be fully independent of the five aggregates, but it cannot be independent of the eighth consciousness. (7) Even when the five aggregates exist, the manas can still perfectly well have its own separate mental activities, and these mental activities do not arise because of the five aggregates.

In the continuous operation of the five aggregates, there is also a dimension in which the manas is independent of them. When the manas takes the five aggregates as itself, or takes the five aggregates as its own possessions, as tools for realizing its own thoughts and volitions, this already implies independence from the five aggregates. The five aggregates possess the attributes of the eighth consciousness, because they are transformed and manifested by the eighth consciousness through the seeds of the seven great elements; everywhere they display the information of the eighth consciousness—in fact, the five aggregates in their entirety are the eighth consciousness. But if one says that the five aggregates possess the attributes of the manas, it is because the five aggregates accord with the habitual tendencies of the manas, being the result of the manas's ignorance.