Proving that the Manas Has Wholesome and Unwholesome Nature through the Medicine Buddha Sutra

Original text of the Medicine Buddha Sūtra: 像法转时。有诸众生。为种种患之所困。长病羸(léi)瘦。不能饮食。喉唇干燥。见诸方暗。死相现前。父母亲属。朋友知识。涕泣围绕。然彼自身。卧于本处。见阎魔使。引其神识。至于阎魔法王之前。然诸有情。有俱生神。随其所作。若罪若福。皆具书之。尽持授与。阎魔法王。尔时彼王。推问其人。计算所作。随其罪福。而处断之。

Explanation: During the semblance Dharma age, sentient beings have meager merit (alpa-puṇya). When the karmic seeds of the evil deeds they committed in past lives and in this present life ripen, they become trapped by the retribution of their evil karma—bedridden for a long time, emaciated and weak, unable to eat or drink, with parched throat and lips, seeing everything dim and lusterless, with the signs of death manifesting before them. Their parents and family members weep around them. Yet while the sick person's body lies in bed, his consciousness is escorted by the black-and-white impermanence demons to the presence of King Yama. The patient's innate deity (sahaja-deva) then manifests all the sinful and meritorious karma he created throughout his life and presents it to King Yama. At this point King Yama interrogates the patient, evaluates the deeds he has committed, determines the abundance or scarcity of his sinful and meritorious karma, fixes his karmic retribution, and decides his destination.

All sentient beings possess an innate deity. This refers to the sovereign consciousness that has always existed and never ceased—the seventh consciousness, the manas. When the little impermanence ghosts seize someone, they are in fact escorting the sovereign consciousness, the manas, to King Yama. Before King Yama, everyone's manas automatically manifests the meritorious and sinful deeds performed throughout his life. Because King Yama possesses superknowledge, with a single thought of his mind he knows the various deeds the person has committed, rapidly reviewing them all like scanning images on a screen, and then King Yama begins his judgment.

This shows that it is the manas that creates sinful and meritorious karma, wholesome and unwholesome karma, and that the judgment is a judgment of the manas. The mind consciousness of the person while alive has long since ceased and cannot follow along to King Yama; what accompanies the manas is the mind consciousness temporarily born within the neutrino-body (antarā-bhava). This shows that the manas possesses the nature of good and evil—otherwise, how would wholesome and unwholesome karma arise? At this point the mind consciousness has all ceased and is not functioning; even if it does function, it is merely the runner and helper of the manas, assisting the manas in its tasks. King Yama pays no attention to the mind consciousness and seeks only the manas to determine the sinful and meritorious karma and its retribution.

When a person dies or is half-dead in apparent death, the mind consciousness almost entirely ceases to function. No matter the circumstances, the manas is forever the master of sentient beings, the sovereign consciousness. After death or apparent death, the manas is drawn by karmic force to the presence of King Yama. After King Yama has finished reviewing the manas's sinful and meritorious karma, he sees that there is still a bit of merit not yet exhausted, and that the person should not yet die. He therefore sends the person's manas back into the material body in the world of the living, and the person revives. Revival means the manas has returned within the material body and then summons the mind consciousness forth to function again.

When King Yama judges the dead, he knows to seek the dead person's master, not the dead person's assistants and foot soldiers. Every debt has its owner, and karma all the more has its owner. Only a fool would go looking for subordinates and helpers, errand boys, servants, maids, and the like. Therefore the manas can create all karma—wholesome, unwholesome, and neutral (avyākṛta)—possessing the nature of good and evil, and it has the mental factors of good and evil.