Selected Lectures on the Sūtra of the Collection of the Father and Son (III)

Original text: 云何六触处。谓眼触处。而见于色。若耳触处。得闻其声。若鼻触处。能嗅于香。若舌触处。悉尝于味。若身触处。亲觉其触。若意触处。则知于法。

Explanation: The World-Honored One said: What are the six contact bases? They are the eye contact base whereby form is seen. Where the eye faculty contacts the form sense-object, eye consciousness arises, and form can be seen. At the place where the ear faculty contacts sound, ear consciousness arises and sounds are heard. At the place where the nose faculty contacts scent, nose consciousness arises, smelling fragrant odors, foul odors, and other mixed smells. At the place where the tongue faculty contacts taste, tongue consciousness arises, tasting the various flavors of sour, sweet, bitter, spicy, and salty. At the place where the body faculty contacts tactile objects, body consciousness arises, and the tactile object is felt. For example, when one contacts sunlight, one feels warmth; when wind blows on the body and the body contacts the wind, body consciousness can feel the coolness. This also includes the tranquility, comfort, hunger, thirst, fatigue, soreness, and weariness felt by the body—all of these are tactile sense-objects. At the manas, where the manas contacts the mental sense-object, mind consciousness arises and can discern all realms of mental sense-objects.

Original text: 云何十八意所伺察。谓眼见色已。若生适悦。若生忧恼。若住于舍。如是六根。各各缘彼。适悦等三。是名十八意所伺察。

Explanation: 伺察 (scrutiny) means observation, discernment, knowing, and felt experience. For example, after the eye faculty contacts the form sense-object, and eye consciousness and mind consciousness have discerned the form sense-object, if a state of mind of joy or of sorrow and vexation arises, or if it abides in a neutral felt state of neither joy nor sorrow, then three kinds of feeling appear—this is one faculty-object-consciousness triad among the three realms. The other five faculties—ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind—are the same as the eye faculty: faculty contacts object, consciousness arises, and the conscious mind will then experience feelings, producing one of three kinds of mental states: joy, sorrow and vexation, or neither joy nor aversion (equanimity). These respectively constitute five triads, fifteen realms; combined together they are six triads, eighteen realms. After each faculty contacts its object, there is the triad of faculty, object, and consciousness; the six faculties contacting the six objects combined together constitute the eighteen realms (dhātus), which respectively give rise to the three kinds of feeling—suffering, happiness, and neutrality. These are the eighteen scrutinies by the mind.