Ten Implications of the Eight Consciousnesses, Each In One-Hundred Words
"It feels like a lever has pried opened the shell, and there is something wonderful and precious waiting to be discovered."
This short post offers you ten implications from our Vine of Obstacles Zen summer study of The Sutra That Explains the Profound Meaning (Samdhinirmocana Sutra), Chapter 5: "The Questions of Extensive Intelligence." Therein, the Bodhisattva, Extensive Intelligence, asks the Buddha what qualifies a Bodhisattva as wise (i.e, skillful in carry beings across the flood of suffering). The Buddha then launches into a description of the eight consciousnesses.
We selected this topic because it was what our students needed to take the next step in giving themselves completely to the Buddha Way.
Before we get into the ten implications, this qualifier: among the essential Yogacara teachings that are not included in this piece are mere-perception; the nine stages for calming the mind; and the Bodhisattva Vow.
More about these will be coming in the fall, including this:
Coming in September
September 20-October 11, including a guest talk by Meido Moore Roshi.
For now, you might see our last essay:
Dosho Port
As we were saying, after the Bodhisattva, Extensive Intelligence, raised a question, the Buddha then launches into a description of the eight consciousnesses. We will summarize those for you here:
The first six consciousnesses appear often in the buddhadharma—sight; sound; smell; taste; touch; and mental consciousness (manovijñāna/conscious awareness). The seventh consciousness (manas/ego consciousness) and the eighth consciousness (alaya/the storehouse consciousness) are unconscious layers and do not appear in the earlier teachings. However, they are among the brilliant contributions to the actual practice of the Buddha Way by the Yogacara's third turning of the dharma wheel.
In this Yogacara teaching, the sixth consciousness arises dependent on the seventh consciousness (ego consciouseness). In fact, ego consciousness serves as the organ through which the sixth consciousness (again, conscious awareness) perceives the data arising from the eighth consciousness (that includes the data from anything that had arisen in the previous moment in the first six consciousnesses). You might sit quietly for a long while contemplating this.
That’s the teaching of the eight consciousnesses in about 100 words. And although there are many implications to be drawn from this teaching (e.g., they explain the continuity of memory and sense of self), we will limit ourselves to ten. Each of these ten implications will also be presented below in about 100 words.
We draw these ten from our study and contemplations during this rich summer of teaching and practice, as well as from the Vine students, and head seat, Shujō. As one Viner put it:
- The sutra tells us how to move from delusion to clarity so that we see what a Buddha sees, and with the same level of clarity. This means that we can cultivate the skills to work with and alleviate suffering. Dogen's teaching, “To study the Buddha way is to study the self,” shines clearly here. This is what we're doing—looking at the nature of consciousness so that we are able to progress from our present state of greed, anger, and ignorance to the state of a Buddha.
- The sutra and commentaries offer a system for working with the system of the eight consciousness—i.e., the three wisdoms: hearing, contemplating, and practicing. The first step, hearing, means carefully taking in the teaching and distinguishing it from what you think it means (aka, your conditioning). The second step is to reflect deeply on that teaching. The third is to actually practice it. We find that some students take in too little teaching. Others take in too much without contemplating it. For both types, what is most important is to know the teaching well enough to live it (aka, practice it).
- In order to really contribute to the liberation of living beings, a profound awakening is necessary. The Buddha points out that although mastering the three wisdoms is necessary, they give a practitioner only conventional wisdom. Thus, an experience of the ultimate is necessary. The sutra also defines awakening: “I call bodhisattvas ‘skilled in the ultimate’ as soon as they, by themselves and in their own experience, neither perceive thought, nor phenomena, nor mental cognition but instead perceive in accordance with the truth.” We encourage you to hear, contemplate, and practice that.
- Be forewarned that the first step, clearly receiving this teaching, is not easy. That is because most modern people are conditioned to see their sixth consciousness (i.e., conscious awareness) as the self (i.e., ego). In fact, the more training you have in Western psychology, the more difficult it might be to clearly hear this teaching. Western psychology encourages our hardwired proclivity to impute a self-existence into conscious awareness—to treat ourselves and others as enduring phenomena. This leads conscious awareness to take credit and blame for whatever is produced in the sixth consciousness. Fortunately, reality is not like this!
- The seventh consciousness, ego consciousness, serves as the organ for conscious awareness. That organ is composed of self-view, self-pride, self-cherishing, and ignorance (aka, the four afflictions). Conscious awareness, then, perceives the world through the affliction of selfing. As Shujō, the Vine head seat, recently emphasized, "Selfing is so pervasive that we need teachers, teachings, and methods. We need friction and discomfort for transformation.” Indeed, we can see ego consciousness indirectly through the discomfort of the afflictions as they arise. So although conscious awareness is not to blame (or credit) for its momentary contents, it does have the opportunity to take radical responsibility.
- All seven other consciousnesses live in and are contingent upon the eighth consciousness. The eighth consciousness contains all of our karma in the form of seeds that will sprout when the time and circumstances are right. So, the sixth consciousness perceives what the self-afflictions have planted from past experience. All of this stored karma (wholesome, unwholesome, and neutral) is what is thrown into your next life, like a flame moving from one tree to another. In addition, deeply understanding the eight consciousnesses makes one a better listener in this life.
- The practice of the six paramitas (giving; precepts; patience; diligence; samadhi; and wisdom) is essential for purifying the seventh and eighth consciousnesses. “Purifying” means suffering from less distortion, allowing us to be more skillful at liberating ourselves, and supporting the liberation of others. Shujō reiterated, “What matters is what seeds are you planting and watering for the future. And how are you relating to what is arising.” This points to the scope of practice—it takes life after life of diligent practice to completely clear the storehouse consciousness. Sudden awakening in this lifetime will grease the wheels of the process.
- The process unfolds through three turns or three natures. Dogen again: “To study the buddha way is to study the self (i.e., first nature); to study the self is to forget the self (i.e., second nature); to forget the self is to be actualized by the ten thousand things (i.e., third nature)." The second nature is the dependent arising of a phenomena. The third nature—aka, perfect nature—is suchness denoted by the dependent arising phenomena. Suchness is not merely impermanence (that’s within the first nature of studying the self) and it is not nothing. Its four characteristics are constancy, bliss, self, and purity.
- Zen and the old Yogacara masters hum the same tune. Hakuin: “If, upon reaching this point, superior seekers engaging in authentic practice of the Way do not become content with it and regard it as final satori, but keep boring on straight ahead without backsliding, they will, before long, experience a sudden, profound insight. This is the moment when the mattock strikes down into the field of the eighth consciousness (i.e., the storehouse consciousness), the moment the eighth consciousness without design or plan, suddenly inverts, transforming into the Great Perfect Mirror Wisdom."
- Simultaneously the other consciousnesses are transformed. Ego consciousness becomes the Wisdom of Essential Identity, conscious awareness becomes the Wondrous Observing Wisdom, and the five sense consciousnesses become the Wisdom of Doing the Work. And yet, as Fayan said, “Although principle is suddenly illuminated, phenomena must be gradually realized.” And Dogen completes the above by noting, “There remains no trace of awakening, and this traceless awakening comes forth timelessly.”
Now you have it, a brief summary of the implications of the eight consciousnesses from the Vine’s study, reflection, practice, and awakening in the summer of 2026 (in the year of Fire and ICE)—keep it well.
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