The Governing Function of Manas Determines Its Wholesome and Unwholesome Nature

The phrase "the mind faculty silently encompasses all dharmas" means that the mind faculty corresponds with, harmonizes with, integrates with, and conditions all dharmas, including wholesome and unwholesome dharmas. This is quite straightforward to understand. If the mind faculty did not correspond with wholesome and unwholesome dharmas, how could the mental consciousness correspond with them? If there are dharmas that the mind faculty neither corresponds with nor conditions, how could the mental consciousness possibly correspond with or condition them?

Considering the actual functional role of the mind faculty, if it possessed only a non-defined nature, then mundane activities like washing clothes or cooking—which are karmically non-defined—would be governed by the choices of the mind faculty. However, performing good deeds and helping others for joy would not be governed by its choices, nor would acts like stealing, robbery, or false speech. This would imply that the mind faculty can only govern and make choices regarding some dharmas, while being unable to govern or choose regarding others. What, then, causes the mind faculty to govern only some dharmas but not others? Are the dharmas the mind faculty cannot govern instead governed by the mental consciousness? Does the mental consciousness then become the governing consciousness? Is it logical to split the mind faculty apart and fragment the dharmas like this?

If a person is virtuous, is it the mind faculty that is virtuous, or the mental consciousness, or both? If a person's virtue resides only in the mental consciousness, while the mind faculty is not virtuous, then after the mental consciousness ceases (e.g., at death), only the mind faculty remains. Would this person still be considered virtuous at that point? If the mind faculty is not virtuous, then they would no longer be virtuous. If a virtuous person ceases to be virtuous upon falling asleep (when mental consciousness ceases), how are their past virtuous deeds accounted for? Isn't this situation utterly bizarre? It defies reason and is completely illogical.

Following this logic, after a virtuous person dies and the mental consciousness of this life permanently ceases, they would be even less likely to be considered virtuous. A person who did good deeds their entire life would, upon death, have no one acknowledge them as virtuous—wouldn't that be unjust? If they died for their country or their people, their death wouldn't even be honorable, because the consciousness associated with that honor is gone. They couldn't be posthumously awarded honors, nor could their family receive spiritual or material compensation. If all the good deeds and contributions made by a virtuous person vanish with the cessation of their mental consciousness—because the remaining mind faculty is not virtuous—then virtuous people might become most afraid of death, unwilling to make sacrifices. They might even fear sleep or unconsciousness, because once mental consciousness ceases, their label and reputation as virtuous disappear, and they wouldn't go to a fortunate rebirth after death. Conversely, an evil person would cease to be evil upon death, avoiding the three lower realms. How advantageous would committing evil then be? Such reasoning is untenable. Therefore, the mind faculty of a virtuous person possesses a wholesome nature, the mind faculty of an evil person possesses an unwholesome nature, or perhaps the mind faculty of both virtuous and evil people possesses both wholesome and unwholesome natures, plus the non-defined nature, making three natures in total.

If only the mental consciousness possesses wholesome and unwholesome natures, and the mind faculty does not, then consider a virtuous person acting in a play, portraying an evil character committing evil deeds. At that moment, is this actor virtuous or evil? In work and daily life, some people are exceptionally adept at pretense—acting one way in public and another in private. Outwardly, they appear impeccable, like upright gentlemen, their behavior earning praise, yet secretly they scheme and plot to harm others. Is such a person virtuous or evil?

When sentient beings perform wholesome deeds or commit evil, it is a time of dual manifestation—the six consciousnesses operate openly, while the mind faculty operates covertly in the background. How do these two coordinate so seamlessly? Superficially, it appears the six consciousnesses are performing the wholesome or evil acts, but what is the mind faculty doing? What is its mental activity? How does it operate? Does it exercise mastery over these wholesome and evil matters? Does it merely allow the mental consciousness to govern the creation of wholesome and unwholesome karma? How does the mind faculty cause the six consciousnesses to arise and operate? How does it cause them to arise precisely upon the wholesome or unwholesome dharmas being engaged with? If these processes cannot be observed, how can one definitively assert that the mind faculty has no wholesome/unwholesome mental activity and no wholesome/unwholesome nature?