What is the relationship among bodily karma, verbal karma, and mental karma?

Which kind of karma is easy to guard against, and which kind is the hardest to guard against? Which kind of karma is coarse and easy to sever, and which kind is subtle and hard to sever? Which kind of karma should be severed first?

Of the three kinds of karma—bodily, verbal, and mental—all are directed and mobilized by the manas. Bodily karma is the actions and deeds of the six consciousnesses; verbal karma is the actions and deeds of the six consciousnesses; mental karma is divided into the mental actions and mental factors of the mind consciousness and the mental actions and mental factors of the manas.

Bodily and verbal actions are governed by the mind; without the mind, bodily and verbal karma cannot be created. Bodily and verbal karma are created by the six consciousnesses, and the six consciousnesses are directed by the manas. However, when the mind consciousness understands the principles, it can suppress the manas and forcibly prevent the creation of bodily and verbal karma. Therefore, bodily karma is the easiest to sever, verbal karma comes next, and what is hard to sever is the mental actions of the mind consciousness, while the hardest to sever are the mental actions of the manas.

The manas is extremely difficult to suppress and subdue, so the mental karma of the manas certainly involves greed, hatred, and delusion that are unceasing. It is only that when the mind consciousness understands the principles and knows cause and effect, it will suppress and subdue the body and speech so as not to create evil karma. If the manas has heavy afflictions, even the body and speech cannot be suppressed, and evil karma will certainly be created.

Therefore, for the body not to create killing, stealing, or sexual misconduct is relatively easy; for the mouth not to create divisive speech, false speech, frivolous speech, or harsh speech is also somewhat easier; the hardest is the manas—thoughts of greed, hatred, and delusion cannot be subdued and suppressed, and are even harder to eliminate.

Some people, seeing that keeping precepts with the body is rather difficult and keeping precepts with the mouth is also rather difficult, then find an excuse, saying that they only need to guard the karma of the mind—that as long as the mind is pure and the mental karma is not violated, then no matter what the body and mouth do, it does not count as breaking the precepts. This is an inverted way of thinking and acting. If one cannot even control the actions of the body, one certainly cannot control the afflictive thoughts of the manas; if one cannot even stop the creation of verbal karma, one certainly cannot stop the afflictive thoughts of the manas.

If the afflictive thoughts of the manas can be stopped, that is something only noble ones of the third fruit and above can accomplish. How could an ordinary being directly guard the mental karma of the manas, making the manas pure and free from breaking the precepts?

The five precepts of the Small Vehicle, the eight precepts of the fasting day (aṣṭāṇa-śīla), and the monastic precepts of bhikṣus and bhikṣuṇīs generally take as their main focus the restraint of evil bodily and verbal karma. As long as the body and mouth do not violate them, even deviant thoughts and deviant imaginings in the mind do not count as breaking the precepts. The precepts of the Great Vehicle, such as the Bodhisattva Precepts of the Brahmajāla Sūtra, mainly restrain and cultivate the mind-ground, and also restrain the body and speech along the way. As for the Bodhisattva Precepts in the Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra, these are the mind-ground precepts that should be observed by bhūmi bodhisattvas who have already eliminated their afflictions. Everything takes the benefit of sentient beings as foremost and most important. As long as sentient beings can be benefited, the body and speech may be inconsistent with Small Vehicle precept conduct, as long as they are consistent with the pure mind-ground of the manas, and as long as the manas does not violate the Small Vehicle precepts. In this way, mental actions devoted entirely to sentient beings are the mental actions of a Great Vehicle bodhisattva, conforming to the norms of the Great Vehicle Bodhisattva Precepts. If ordinary beings and stage-of-virtue bodhisattvas whose greed, hatred, and delusion afflictions have not been eliminated were to receive and keep the Bodhisattva Precepts in the Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra, they would be unable to do so, because they have selfish motives and afflictions.