What Use Is the Mind Consciousness to the Manas?

The mind consciousness, the five sense consciousnesses, and the five aggregates are all tools that the manas must use. Without these tools, the manas would be powerless on its own in the world; it needs the six consciousnesses and the five aggregates to serve it, making use of them to grasp all dharmas in the world. Without the six consciousnesses and the five aggregates, the manas would be helpless.

Therefore, the manas can know many dharmas, but these dharmas must be processed by the mind consciousness. For example, suppose ghosts or spirits appear nearby. The manas finds it quite frightening, fearing a threat to itself, but it cannot deal with ghosts and spirits itself, nor can it evade them on its own. So, while the hairs stand on end, it alerts the mind consciousness to this matter. The mind consciousness then wonders: What exactly is going on? Why do I feel afraid? Why does the surroundings feel eerie, as if something is about to happen? When the mind consciousness is sharp and thinks it over, it may come to know that there are ghosts or spirits nearby, and so it finds a way to avoid them. In this way, the manas achieves its purpose.

Thus, although the manas has the capacity of knowing, matters still need to be handled by the mind consciousness and the five aggregates. After the manas realizes the dharma, the pure bodily, verbal, and mental actions must be carried out by the mind consciousness and the five aggregates; thus the pure bodily, verbal, and mental actions of the six consciousnesses manifest the purity of the manas. However, after one cultivates to a rather high level—having developed the four dhyānas and eight samādhis, and being endowed with immeasurable supernormal powers and powers of the Way—the manas can substitute for the six consciousnesses. At that point, the six consciousnesses need not arise at all; all matters are handled by the manas itself, with great speed and convenience. Therefore, the function and status of the mind consciousness cannot compare with those of the manas; the two are forever in a master-servant relationship. The master employs the servant to take care of trivial affairs, but when the master's capabilities are great—when everything runs on fully modernized procedures—the servant is no longer needed, and the master can handle everything well and skillfully on its own.