The Cooperative Relationship Between the Mind Consciousness and the Manas

Ru Chun: The manas creates a dream, yet the mind consciousness cannot figure out its meaning for a long while. Is this mainly due to the mind consciousness's insufficient capacity to receive, or is the manas's feedback ability poor?

Reply: There are mainly two reasons for poor communication between the manas and the mind consciousness: First, the manas itself lacks sufficient wisdom, so in dreams, in meditation, and in other situations, the states it displays are not quite apt or appropriate, with vague and unclear meanings. Second, the mind consciousness lacks sufficient wisdom and cannot fully understand the meaning and direction of the states displayed by the manas, unable to see through the manas's intentions. In at least one of the two, wisdom is insufficient; sometimes, and for some people, the wisdom of both the manas and the mind consciousness is very weak, which is often caused by meager merit (alpa-puṇya).

Ru Chun: After reading the article "The Experience of Learning to Use the Manas" written by a fellow practitioner, I, your disciple, believe that the wisdom arising in many dharmas is the result of the joint cooperation of the mind consciousness and the manas. Reason one: when wisdom arises from the manas's deliberation (manana) alone, whatever the manas wants the mind consciousness to know, as soon as it makes a mental engagement, the mind consciousness immediately knows it, without words. For example, when the manas hands over its answer to a question to the mind consciousness, it does so without words or text—as if with a snap, the mind consciousness just knows. The feeling is like someone describing a picture to you: after imagining for a long while you can only get a rough idea, but if he directly unfolds the painting and shows it to you, you understand it all at once. How exactly it is transmitted, the mind consciousness does not know, and it assumes it is its own sudden flash of inspiration. But to receive the content, the mind consciousness needs wisdom and the power of determination (adhimokṣa) in order to fully accept and comprehend it.

Assessment: The manas transmits the dharma it has deliberated upon to the mind consciousness so that the mind consciousness understands it. This process is the manas contacting the mental sense-objects; through mental engagement, the mind consciousness arises upon the dharma, and in an instant the five universal mental factors begin to operate, and the mind consciousness understands the dharma pushed out by the manas. The five universal mental factors appear to be five stages of the mind's operation; in reality they are extremely fast—one cannot perceive that there is a process—but no matter how fast, it is still called a process. When the mind consciousness lacks wisdom and its comprehension is poor, there will be a momentary hesitation; with even less wisdom, the hesitation lengthens, and it will keep pondering and mulling; with still less wisdom, it may ponder for a very long time without understanding, wanting to speak yet stopping, stammering and unable to express clearly.

Ru Chun: The manas's deliberation and mode of expression are often simple, direct, true, commanding, rich, broad in scope, and unrestrained, free of limitations (and therefore capable of innovation); it can only be intuited, not conveyed in words, just as the Master previously said, "A thousand words are all contained in silence." The mind consciousness's thousand words cannot match the manas's wordless artistic conception, dreamscape, and situational context (such as: hair turning white overnight, embracing and weeping, etc.). But if the manas feels that a certain occasion and time call for expression in language and words, He lets the six consciousnesses speak a thousand words.

Assessment: The manas can only be intuited, not conveyed in words. Although the manas cannot speak, the dharmas contained in the manas's intent and mind are too many, the information too vast, the significance too profound; yet the manas can transmit dharmas with such an enormous amount of information to the mind consciousness clearly and plainly in an instant, and the result depends on the mind consciousness's receptivity and power of expression. Sometimes even if the mind consciousness's receptivity is very good, expressing it may take a thousand words, which is very troublesome, and it may still not be expressed clearly. Because this is not a dharma the mind consciousness deliberated upon itself; when one speaks of another's affairs, it is indeed a bit hard to explain clearly. And the thousand words the mind consciousness wants to say are all in the heart of the manas, which cannot speak; thus the manas's mind holds a highly condensed, extremely streamlined intent—simple, direct, and clean-cut.

Ru Chun's remark is well put: the mind consciousness's thousand words cannot match the manas's wordless artistic conception, situational context, and dreamscape. These states are designed so that the mind consciousness can understand them; a single state would require the mind consciousness a thousand words to describe and express, and perhaps even then it might not be expressed clearly and fully.

Ru Chun: Reason two: the manas's functions are powerful, but many of His thoughts and wisdom require the mind consciousness to have matching wisdom in order to correctly understand their meaning and intent, and then manifest them through concrete dharmas, so that principle and affairs can be perfectly integrated. This is what we often say: keep lofty aspirations in the heart while keeping feet on solid ground. If only the manas has high wisdom while the wisdom of the six consciousnesses is all very low, the manas may feel frustrated and suppressed. Therefore, both the manas and the mind consciousness must have wisdom, communicating and knowing each other with a high degree of matching, so that their minds can be linked by a single point of understanding. I wonder whether this understanding is correct.

Assessment: The wisdom displayed in this passage is quite good, but the language is not perfectly expressed and the wording is not precise enough. We sentient beings all take the mind consciousness's knowing as our knowing; only after the mind consciousness knows can it, together with the five sense consciousnesses, process and act. Therefore, when the manas has ideas and thoughts, it needs the mind consciousness to know and implement them. Naturally, the more wisdom the mind consciousness has, the better it can correctly understand and comprehend the manas's intentions and thoughts, and only then can it correctly and reasonably carry them out through bodily, verbal, and mental actions. So the wisdom of these two minds—the manas and the mind consciousness—must match each other; otherwise, if the two communicate poorly and affairs are handled badly, one or both sides will feel depressed and helpless.