The Relationship Between the Manas and the Five Aggregates

The manas is neither independent of the five aggregates nor not independent of them; it is neither in union with the five aggregates nor not in union with them; it can both depart from the five aggregates and not depart from them. Why is this so? The manas is not independent of the five aggregates because all of the manas's deliberation, all of its thoughts and intentions, must be realized and carried out through the five aggregates, while the operation of the five aggregates in turn strengthens and inspires the manas's deliberation, so that the five aggregates revolve around the manas, and the manas revolves around the five aggregates, entangled with one another and inseparable.  

The manas is fully capable of being independent of the five aggregates because: first, before the world was initially established, there were no five aggregates—only the eighth consciousness and the manas existed; second, in the stage of actual death, the five aggregates are gone, and only the eighth consciousness and the manas exist; third, at the stage of the fertilized egg, when the five aggregates have not yet arisen, only the eighth consciousness and the manas exist; fourth, in the cessation attainment (nirodha-samāpatti), among the five aggregates only a faint aggregate of form remains, and the eighth consciousness and the manas also exist; fifth, during unconsciousness and in other such periods, among the five aggregates only faint aggregates of form and consciousness remain, while the eighth consciousness and the manas exist unaffected; sixth, when an arhat has just emerged from nirvāṇa without remainder, only the eighth consciousness and the manas exist, and the five aggregates have not yet appeared. Therefore, the manas can be fully independent of the five aggregates, but it cannot be independent of the eighth consciousness.

In the continuous operation of the five aggregates, there is also a level on which the manas is independent of them. When the manas takes the five aggregates as itself, or takes the five aggregates as its possessions, as instruments for realizing its own thoughts and intentions, this already implies independence from the five aggregates.  

The five aggregates possess the attributes of the eighth consciousness, because they are manifested by the eighth consciousness through the seven intrinsically existing great seeds, and everywhere they display the information of the eighth consciousness; in fact, the five aggregates in their entirety are the eighth consciousness. But if one says that the five aggregates possess the attributes of the manas, it is because the five aggregates accord with the manas's habitual tendencies, being the result of the manas's ignorance.