The Reason Why the Present Age Must Speak More on the Manas

Regarding the manas, śrāvakas only need a simple understanding: the manas is one of the six faculties, the basis upon which the mind consciousness arises and depends—that is enough. Knowing that the manas is also subject to arising, ceasing, and change is sufficient; there is no need to understand too much. Mahāyāna bodhisattvas, before seeing the mind, likewise do not need to understand the manas in great depth, and in the initial stage right after seeing the mind—before passing through the contemplation of mirage-like phenomena—they also do not need to know much about the manas.

It is only in the Dharma-ending age, especially at the present stage, that because sentient beings study and practice with minds eager for quick success and instant benefit, their dispositions are restless and scattered, they lack meditative concentration (samādhi) and cannot cultivate it, and they often take intellectual understanding by the mind consciousness as enlightenment, or take the mind consciousness's understanding-through-study as enlightenment. The future retribution for this is fearsome. Therefore, in today's era, the manas must be discussed at length, to prevent the embarrassing phenomenon of mistaking understanding for realization from growing ever more common, to prevent the phenomenon of "empty in speech but not empty in mind" from becoming ever more severe, and to prevent the superficiality within Buddhism from worsening. Once the Buddha-dharma degenerates, later generations will have nothing to rely upon. Teaching the manas so that everyone can clearly distinguish between understanding-through-study and realization is to relieve an urgent need, to prevent the disorder within Buddhism from growing heavier, and to prevent Buddhism from perishing prematurely—it is done out of necessity.

Quite a few people neither want to properly keep the precepts, fearing restraint, nor want to laboriously cultivate meditative concentration, being fond of ease and averse to effort. They do not want to change their dispositions or eradicate ignorance and afflictions; they only want to quickly obtain the final fruit and become noble ones, enjoying boundless glory—unaware that pies never fall from the sky. If such a good thing existed, why would Śākyamuni Buddha and the Buddhas of the ten directions not let sentient beings know of it, and instead teach precepts, concentration, and wisdom, and the bodhisattva's six perfections, making sentient beings cultivate so laboriously? What could be the meaning of that?