What Sense Objects Do the Manas and the Mind Consciousness Each Correspond To?

The manas is both an inner consciousness and an outer consciousness; it can discern all of the inner object-aspects within the supreme faculty (indriya) and the outer object-aspects outside the supreme faculty. Whatever dharmas the eighth consciousness manifests based on the essential realm, the manas can, relying on the eighth consciousness, contact and discern them all, including the realms of the five sense objects. The mind consciousness, however, is only an inner consciousness; it can only contact the mental sense-objects within the supreme faculty and cannot contact any other sense-object realms, except when it possesses supernatural powers.

When the eighth consciousness contacts the essential realm, it gathers in the four great element particles of the essential realm and immediately transforms them into a sense-object realm resembling the essential realm, which is then transmitted all the way into the supreme faculty to become the inner object-aspect. In between, it must pass through the transmission of many media, continuing until it reaches the five gross sense faculties. The portion before it reaches the five gross sense faculties all belongs to outer objects, outer realms, and outer object-aspects. So how many levels of object-aspects are there in total in the outer realm? Each medium it passes through forms one level of outer realm object-aspect, and then this sense-object aspect changes once; passing through another medium, the sense-object aspect changes once again—the more media it passes through, the more it changes. So how many layers of outer object-aspects are there? As many layers of media as there are, that many layers of outer object-aspects there are.

Then, when the object-aspect reaches the five gross sense faculties, it is transmitted through the transmitting nerves of the five gross sense faculties into the interior of the supreme faculty. The object-aspect before it reaches the supreme faculty still belongs to the outer object-aspect, or belongs to a state that is half outer object-aspect and half inner object-aspect; the transmitting medium has become the five gross sense faculties, and the outer objects have changed once again. Before this, the manas had been contacting and discerning all the object-aspects manifested by the eighth consciousness all along, which shows that the manas can discern this continuously transmitting and changing outer object-aspect sense-object realm, while the six consciousnesses have not yet arisen and certainly cannot discern it. So how far is the outer object-aspect discerned by the manas from the supreme faculty? As far as from the faculty to the essential realm—very close to the essential realm.

The inner object-aspect discerned by the mind consciousness, however, is relatively far from the essential realm and also at some distance from the five gross sense faculties; it can only discern the object-aspects within the supreme faculty. The object-aspect sense-object realms prior to the supreme faculty are unknown to the six consciousnesses. What the six consciousnesses know is extremely narrow, whereas what the manas knows is very abundant and very broad, and it knows it much earlier than the mind consciousness. Therefore, when encountering special situations, before we have time to think, we have sudden reactions and responses—this is the decision made first by the manas through its discernment. At this time, even though there is no mind consciousness, the manas, discerning on its own, knows the general situation and can also judge what effect the matter will have on oneself; if the effect would be relatively significant, the manas reacts first.

After the reaction is made, the object-aspect sense-object realm has already been transmitted to the supreme faculty, the six consciousnesses immediately appear, and they process the sense-object realm according to the manas's intent; only afterward does the mind consciousness realize what just happened. This is the result of the manas first discerning the outer six sense objects. Perhaps the manas discerns all object-aspects when discerning the outer object-aspects; the manas knows the entire process of the transmission of the outer sense-object realms, so its decision has long since been made, and only afterward do the six consciousnesses appear, making extremely rapid reactions and responses according to the manas's decision.