Is the result of Parinibbana Annihilation?

[nathan]

Dear Pt
You do understand that there are only citta cetasika and rupa, no self. Upon death of the arahat all that remains is the bone fragments, i.e. some rupa.

Thus in no way is there anilhilation as there never was a self, ever.

BTW there are some hilarious things on the internet about people talking with past Buddhas, or searching through relics of monks to find crystals which "show" they were arahats. I used to find these things a bit sad but it is better to enjoy a laugh (albeit rooted in lobha).
Edit to add this links. After writing this post I came across this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1096

robert

Oh I just remembered the best one yet. One article I read claims that an arhats citta or consciousness or whatver is some special type that is unbound and floats around somehow after death, presumably outside of samsara. Darn now I feel sad again.

As long as you recognize that nibbana exists, is not nothingness, and exists outside of space, time and consciousness I am fine with what you have to say here otherwise. As there never has been a self, eternities and annihilations could hardly be said to apply to such a thing. If the explanation was as cut and dried as you state here the Buddha could have presented the situation in exactly the same way, yet He did not.

[rowyourboat]

The range of jhana and the range of a Buddha is 'acinteyya' or 'unthinkinkable'. It is not possible to apply logical abhidhammic analysis to these phenomena beyond a certain level.

[sukhamanveti]

Dear Pt
You do understand that there are only citta cetasika and rupa, no self. Upon death of the arahat all that remains is the bone fragments, i.e. some rupa.

Thus in no way is there anilhilation as there never was a self, ever.

BTW there are some hilarious things on the internet about people talking with past Buddhas, or searching through relics of monks to find crystals which "show" they were arahats. I used to find these things a bit sad but it is better to enjoy a laugh (albeit rooted in lobha).
Edit to add this links. After writing this post I came across this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1096

robert

Oh I just remembered the best one yet. One article I read claims that an arhats citta or consciousness or whatver is some special type that is unbound and floats around somehow after death, presumably outside of samsara. Darn now I feel sad again:tantrum:

Hi robert,

Several of us already brought up Not-Self earlier in the thread and the false view of annihilationism as well, just so that we were all clear about what we were discussing. I think it is safe to say that everyone in this thread knows that a changing consciousness is not a Self. No one here is proposing belief in an ultimately existing Self.

The view of Thanissaro Bhikkhu & his teacher Phra Ajaan Fuang Jotiko is not that the arahat's consciousness "floats around," rather that it is so subtle and diffuse as to be in no specific location (perhaps everywhere would be accurate). This idea comes from looking at how the people of the Buddha's day would have understood the Buddha's extinguished fire metaphor. If the metaphor was aimed at an ancient people with a different view of the nature of fire, then it seems relevant to try to understand what that view was in order to see what the Buddha was getting at.

Now I know that Thanissaro Bhikkhu is sometimes unorthodox, so I can understand your reaction, but when a first-rate scholar who knows the Tipitaka in Pali like Bhikkhu Bodhi writes (in the introduction to his translation of the Majjhima Nikaya), "even the more sophisticated view that Nibbana is merely the destruction of defilements and the extinction of existence cannot stand up under scrutiny,"* it seems to me that it might be worthwhile to consider this viewpoint, rather than to reject it out of hand.

You may be right when you say "all that remains is the bone fragments," but there is much more to the opposing view than you might think.

Metta,

Ed

*The italics are mine.

[robertk]

[quote="sukhamanveti"][quote="robertk"]Dear Pt
Now I know that Thanissaro Bhikkhu is sometimes unorthodox, so I can understand your reaction, but when a first-rate scholar who knows the Tipitaka in Pali like Bhikkhu Bodhi writes (in the introduction to his translation of the Majjhima Nikaya), "even the more sophisticated view that Nibbana is merely the destruction of defilements and the extinction of existence cannot stand up under scrutiny,"* it seems to me that it might be worthwhile to consider this viewpoint, rather than to reject it out of hand.

You may be right when you say "all that remains is the bone fragments," but there is much more to the opposing view than you might think.

Metta,

Ed

Dear Ed
The view carries no more weight with me than if you told me that Martians were in Halley's Comet and will take me to eternal bliss in another galaxy. I understand the view thanissaro puts about well enough to know that it is eternalism and certainly opposed to Theravada teachings.
Of course if one dismisses the Abhidhamma, many suttas, all the ancient Commentaries then one might be able to digest it without choking. But then why do that?

[sukhamanveti]

Dear Ed
The view carries no more weight with me than if you told me that Martians were in Halley's Comet and will take me to eternal bliss in another galaxy. I understand the view thanissaro puts about well enough to know that it is eternalism and certainly opposed to Theravada teachings.
Of course if one dismisses the Abhidhamma, many suttas, all the ancient Commentaries then one might be able to digest it without choking. But then why do that?

Hi robert,

Thank you for your reply.

Please be patient with me. I will have to respond to you in stages and this will take some time.

First I would like to address the charge that Thanissaro Bhikkhu adheres to eternalism. (In subsequent responses I will address the rest.) Eternalism is, in essence, the view that a permanent, unchanging self exists or, as the Brahmajala Sutta (DN 1) defines it in verse 31, “The self and the world are eternal, barren, steadfast as a mountain peak, standing firm like a pillar. And though these beings roam and wander (through the round of existence), pass away and re-arise, yet the self and the world remain the same just like eternity itself.”(1) It is one of the wrong views given at MN 2.8: “It is this self of mine that speaks and feels and experiences here and there the result of good and bad actions; but this self of mine is permanent, everlasting, eternal, not subject to change, and it will endure as long as eternity.”(2)

Since an eternalist espouses a belief in an eternally immutable Self, Thanissaro Bhikkhu cannot be an eternalist, as near as I can tell, despite what some have concluded from his interpretation of Not-Self as a strategy. In the course of explaining his understanding of Not-Self (which he derives from MN 2) in the book Buddhist Religions, he actually agrees that a Buddhist should not believe in a permanent self for the following reason: “To believe in a permanent self, he [the Buddha] says, is to deny the possibility of spiritual self-change.”(3) He does not want to utterly deny the existence of a self in all possible senses, however, because he does not want to “deny the worth of a moral or religious life.”(4) Where he departs from the commentaries is in rejecting all views of a self, even as a conventional truth: “…a person seeking Awakening should entirely drop the question of the existence of the self and focus instead on the categories of the Four Noble Truths so as to avoid the pitfalls entailed in any view asserting the existence or nonexistence of the self. For a person well advanced on the Path… the question of whether or not there is a self simply would not occur.”(5) What he says about the strategy is this: “the not-self doctrine, like the teaching on suffering, is to be regarded as a strategy for undercutting craving and clinging in the formula of dependent co-arising. The meditator is taught simply to observe the five [aggregates] as they occur and to let go of them by noting that they are not self. This would open the way for the experience of the unfabricated [Nibbana], to which labels of ‘self’ or ‘not-self’…would not apply.”(6) (Let me be clear: I am not agreeing with this interpretation. I am merely attempting to explain it according to my understanding of it.)

I think that it is clear from the preceding that Thanissaro Bhikkhu, however unusual his interpretation may be, is not a proponent of a view of a permanent Self or of any self for that matter. Moreover, if he were, then surely he would have said so. For decades a number of diverse, heterodox Thai Buddhists have argued quite openly (and erroneously) that the Buddha taught the existence of a “true Self.”(7) If Thanissaro Bhikkhu really held this view, then I see no reason why he should not be communicative about it.

Now you might say, “A surviving super-consciousness (or whatever it is) that never completely ceases to exist once and for all must be permanent and therefore a Self,” but this would be to miss a crucial aspect of the radical view of impermanence taught by the Buddha. As the Paramatthajotika Commentary puts it: “When the Aggregates arise, decay, and die, O bhikkhu, every moment you are born, decay, and die.”(8) In other words, the Five Aggregates are constantly arising and ceasing. Anything that constantly arises and ceases must be “impermanent” or “subject to change.” Whatever is impermanent is not Self, according to the Buddha.(9) If Ven. Thanissaro’s “mind like fire unbound”(10) constantly arises and ceases, then it cannot be a Self, even if it continues to exist indefinitely.

1. Bhikkhu Bodhi, trans. The Discourse on the All-Embracing Net of Views: The Brahmajala Sutta and Its Commentaries (Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society, 1992) p. 62.
2. Ibid. The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha, 3rd edition (Somerville, Mass.: Wisdom Publications, 2005) p. 92.
3. Richard Robinson, Willard Johnson, and Thanissaro Bhikkhu, Buddhist Religions: A Historical Introduction, 5th edition (Belmont, CA: Holly J. Allen, 2005) p. 28.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid. pp. 28-29.
6. Ibid. p. 29.
7. Paul Williams, Mahayana Buddhism: The Doctrinal Foundations, 2nd edition (New York: Routledge, 2009) pp. 125-127.
8. quoted by Ven. Dr. Walpola Rahula in What the Buddha Taught, 2nd edition (New York: Grove Press, 1974) p. 33.
9. e.g., Majjhima Nikaya 22.26, 35.20, etc.
10. Ven. Thanissaro finds his definition of Nibbana as “unbinding” in Buddhaghosa’s Visuddhimagga and sees it as signifying “release from bondage”:“Thus the metaphor [for] nibbana in this case would have implications of calming together with release from dependencies, attachments, & bondage. This in turn suggests that of all the attempts to describe the etymology of the word nibbana, the closest is one Buddhaghosa proposed in The Path of Purification: Un- (nir) + binding (vana): Unbinding.” http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/auth ... ire/1.html

Best regards.

Ed

[Jason]

Since an eternalist espouses a belief in an eternally immutable Self, Thanissaro Bhikkhu cannot be an eternalist, as near as I can tell, despite what some have concluded from his interpretation of Not-Self as a strategy.

Good luck trying to convince robertk of that, Ed. God knows I've been trying for years!

[clw_uk]

If Ven. Thanissaro’s “mind like fire unbound”(10) constantly arises and ceases, then it cannot be a Self, even if it continues to exist indefinitely.

only conditioned things are impermanent, that which is unconditioned is not subject to anicca, if "mind like a fire unbound" is meant to be nibbana or the mind of an arahant, then it is unconditioned and so not subject to anicca


Metta

[sukhamanveti]

If Ven. Thanissaro’s “mind like fire unbound”(10) constantly arises and ceases, then it cannot be a Self, even if it continues to exist indefinitely.

only conditioned things are impermanent, that which is unconditioned is not subject to anicca, if "mind like a fire unbound" is meant to be nibbana or the mind of an arahant, then it is unconditioned and so not subject to anicca


Metta

As see it, the mind is always conditioned in whichever form it takes according to the Buddha, but the Nibbana element which an enlightened consciousness perceives is unconditioned. I do not see how a mind could become unconditioned.

[sukhamanveti]

If Ven. Thanissaro’s “mind like fire unbound”(10) constantly arises and ceases, then it cannot be a Self, even if it continues to exist indefinitely.

only conditioned things are impermanent, that which is unconditioned is not subject to anicca, if "mind like a fire unbound" is meant to be nibbana or the mind of an arahant, then it is unconditioned and so not subject to anicca


Metta

As see it, the mind is always conditioned, in whichever form it takes, according to the Buddha, but the Nibbana element which an enlightened consciousness perceives is unconditioned. I do not see how a mind could become unconditioned.

P.S.: I should add that Ajahn Sumedho, as you know, seems to regard pure awareness as "unconditioned." This is an unorthodox perspective which I cannot make sense of and does not fit my understanding of the suttas or the Theravada tradition.

[sukhamanveti]

Since an eternalist espouses a belief in an eternally immutable Self, Thanissaro Bhikkhu cannot be an eternalist, as near as I can tell, despite what some have concluded from his interpretation of Not-Self as a strategy.

Good luck trying to convince robertk of that, Ed. God knows I've been trying for years!

Oh, no! I don't have the time or the energy for a debate that long.

[clw_uk]

P.S.: I should add that Ajahn Sumedho, as you know, seems to regard pure awareness as "unconditioned." This is an unorthodox perspective which I cannot make sense of and does not fit my understanding of the suttas or the Theravada tradition.

My understanding of his view (i must stress i might be wrong) is that pure awareness (which i take to be Voidness) is unconditioned since there is no ignorance in pure awareness, no liking or averting or constructing "I am". There is just knowing and watching of Dhammas rise and fall


I have found a similar teaching in the TFT from Ajahn Maha Boowa

The following comments about the nature of the citta have been excerpted from several discourses given by Ãcariya Mahã Boowa.

OF FOREMOST IMPORTANCE IS THE CITTA, the mind’s essential knowing nature. It consists of pure and simple awareness: the citta simply knows. Awareness of good and evil, and the critical judgements that result, are merely activities of the citta. At times, these activities may manifest as mindfulness; at other times, wisdom. But the true citta does not exhibit any activities or manifest any conditions at all. It only knows. Those activities that arise in the citta, such as awareness of good and evil, or happiness and suffering, or praise and blame, are all conditions of the consciousness that flows out from the citta. Since it represents activities and conditions of the citta that are, by their very nature, constantly arising and ceasing, this sort of consciousness is always unstable and unreliable.

The conscious acknowledgement of phenomena as they arise and cease is called viññãna. For instance, viññãna acknowledges and registers the sense impressions that are produced when sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations contact the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body respectively. Each such contact between an external sense sphere and its corresponding internal base gives rise to a specific consciousness that registers the moment at which each interaction takes place, and then promptly ceases at the same moment that the contact passes. Viññãna, therefore, is consciousness as a condition of the citta. Sankhãra, or thoughts and imagination, is also a condition of the citta. Once the citta has given expression to these conditions, they tend to proliferate without limit. On the other hand, when no conditions arise at all, only the citta’s inherent quality of knowing is apparent.

Still, the essential knowing of the average person’s mind is very different from the essential knowing of an Arahant. The average person’s knowing nature is contaminated from within. Arahants, being khïõãsava, are free of all contamination. Their knowing is a pure and simple awareness without any adulteration. Pure awareness, devoid of all contaminants, is supreme awareness: a truly amazing quality of knowing that bestows perfect happiness, as befits the Arahant’s state of absolute purity. This Supreme Happiness always remains constant. It never changes or varies like conditioned phenomena of the world, which are always burdened with anicca, dukkha, and anattã. Such mundane characteristics cannot possibly enter into the citta of someone who has cleansed it until it is absolutely pure.

The citta forms the very foundation of samsãra; it is the essence of being that wanders from birth to birth. It is the instigator of the cycle of existence and the prime mover in the round of repeated birth and death. Samsãra is said to be a cycle because death and rebirth recur regularly according to the immutable law of kamma. The citta is governed by kamma, so it is obliged to revolve perpetually in this cycle following kamma’s dictates. As long as the citta remains under the jurisdiction of kamma, this will always be the case. The citta of the Arahant is the sole exception, for his citta has completely transcended kamma’s domain. Since he has also transcended all conventional connections, not a single aspect of relative, conventional reality can possibly become involved with the Arahant’s citta. At the level of Arahant, the citta has absolutely no involvement with anything.

Once the citta is totally pure, it simply knows according to its own inherent nature. It is here that the citta reaches it culmination; it attains perfection at the level of absolute purity. Here the continuous migration from one birth to the next finally comes to an end. Here the perpetual journey from the higher realms of existence to the lower ones and back again, through the repetitive cycle of birth, ageing, sickness, and death, totally ceases. Why does it cease here? Because those hidden, defiling elements that normally permeate the citta and cause it to spin around have been completely eliminated. All that remains is the pure citta, which will never again experience birth and death.

Rebirth is inevitable, however, for the citta that has yet to reach that level of purity. One may be tempted to deny that rebirth follows death, or one may doggedly hold to the nihilistic viewpoint that rejects all possibility of life after death, but such convictions cannot alter the truth. One’s essential knowing nature is not governed by speculation; nor is it influenced by people’s views and opinions. Its preeminence within one’s own being, coupled with the supreme authority of kamma, completely override all speculative considerations.

http://www.what-buddha-taught.net/Books ... m#APPENDIX


Metta

[sukhamanveti]

P.S.: I should add that Ajahn Sumedho, as you know, seems to regard pure awareness as "unconditioned." This is an unorthodox perspective which I cannot make sense of and does not fit my understanding of the suttas or the Theravada tradition.

My understanding of his view (i must stress i might be wrong) is that pure awareness (which i take to be Voidness) is unconditioned since there is no ignorance in pure awareness, no liking or averting or constructing "I am". There is just knowing and watching of Dhammas rise and fall


I have found a similar teaching in the TFT from Ajahn Maha Boowa

The following comments about the nature of the citta have been excerpted from several discourses given by Ãcariya Mahã Boowa.

OF FOREMOST IMPORTANCE IS THE CITTA, the mind’s essential knowing nature. It consists of pure and simple awareness: the citta simply knows. Awareness of good and evil, and the critical judgements that result, are merely activities of the citta. At times, these activities may manifest as mindfulness; at other times, wisdom. But the true citta does not exhibit any activities or manifest any conditions at all. It only knows. Those activities that arise in the citta, such as awareness of good and evil, or happiness and suffering, or praise and blame, are all conditions of the consciousness that flows out from the citta. Since it represents activities and conditions of the citta that are, by their very nature, constantly arising and ceasing, this sort of consciousness is always unstable and unreliable.

The conscious acknowledgement of phenomena as they arise and cease is called viññãna. For instance, viññãna acknowledges and registers the sense impressions that are produced when sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations contact the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body respectively. Each such contact between an external sense sphere and its corresponding internal base gives rise to a specific consciousness that registers the moment at which each interaction takes place, and then promptly ceases at the same moment that the contact passes. Viññãna, therefore, is consciousness as a condition of the citta. Sankhãra, or thoughts and imagination, is also a condition of the citta. Once the citta has given expression to these conditions, they tend to proliferate without limit. On the other hand, when no conditions arise at all, only the citta’s inherent quality of knowing is apparent.

Still, the essential knowing of the average person’s mind is very different from the essential knowing of an Arahant. The average person’s knowing nature is contaminated from within. Arahants, being khïõãsava, are free of all contamination. Their knowing is a pure and simple awareness without any adulteration. Pure awareness, devoid of all contaminants, is supreme awareness: a truly amazing quality of knowing that bestows perfect happiness, as befits the Arahant’s state of absolute purity. This Supreme Happiness always remains constant. It never changes or varies like conditioned phenomena of the world, which are always burdened with anicca, dukkha, and anattã. Such mundane characteristics cannot possibly enter into the citta of someone who has cleansed it until it is absolutely pure.

The citta forms the very foundation of samsãra; it is the essence of being that wanders from birth to birth. It is the instigator of the cycle of existence and the prime mover in the round of repeated birth and death. Samsãra is said to be a cycle because death and rebirth recur regularly according to the immutable law of kamma. The citta is governed by kamma, so it is obliged to revolve perpetually in this cycle following kamma’s dictates. As long as the citta remains under the jurisdiction of kamma, this will always be the case. The citta of the Arahant is the sole exception, for his citta has completely transcended kamma’s domain. Since he has also transcended all conventional connections, not a single aspect of relative, conventional reality can possibly become involved with the Arahant’s citta. At the level of Arahant, the citta has absolutely no involvement with anything.

Once the citta is totally pure, it simply knows according to its own inherent nature. It is here that the citta reaches it culmination; it attains perfection at the level of absolute purity. Here the continuous migration from one birth to the next finally comes to an end. Here the perpetual journey from the higher realms of existence to the lower ones and back again, through the repetitive cycle of birth, ageing, sickness, and death, totally ceases. Why does it cease here? Because those hidden, defiling elements that normally permeate the citta and cause it to spin around have been completely eliminated. All that remains is the pure citta, which will never again experience birth and death.

Rebirth is inevitable, however, for the citta that has yet to reach that level of purity. One may be tempted to deny that rebirth follows death, or one may doggedly hold to the nihilistic viewpoint that rejects all possibility of life after death, but such convictions cannot alter the truth. One’s essential knowing nature is not governed by speculation; nor is it influenced by people’s views and opinions. Its preeminence within one’s own being, coupled with the supreme authority of kamma, completely override all speculative considerations.

http://www.what-buddha-taught.net/Books ... m#APPENDIX


Metta

Interesting. This reminds me of the concept of rigpa in the Nyingma lineage of Tibetan Buddhism.

[nathan]

Seems to me that no matter what is said about this in an attempt to clarify the nature of nibbana here and now and of parinibbana one is bound to be accused of saying something indicative of either an eternalistic or annihilationistic doctrine. Seems to me that the Buddha sidestepped this by saying that he was not saying either of these things and leaving it at a thorough negation of the typical accusations. That is probably as far as any teacher can safely go with this. I think if people keep up the flack we will eventually not have teachers who are willing to say anything more than what the Buddha said, which is fine by me but is going to be tough for those who are looking for anything more than that. More could probably be said about it but not without suffering these accusations in one form or another. After a few years of experience with all of these shenanigans in forum discussions, if I am ever asked to teach anything about anything all I am probably going to do is recite directly from the suttas and say "best of luck and git crackin' ".


metta & upekkha

[fig tree]

Seems to me that no matter what is said about this in an attempt to clarify the nature of nibbana here and now and of parinibbana one is bound to be accused of saying something indicative of either an eternalistic or annihilationistic doctrine. Seems to me that the Buddha sidestepped this by saying that he was not saying either of these things and leaving it at a thorough negation of the typical accusations.

Some of what we're saying really doesn't differentiate between the person who does not attain arahantship and the person who does, but it seems to me that part of our difficulty here is that there's some difference, but it's pretty easy to describe it misleadingly.

We have suttas on the one hand like SN 12.46 (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn12/sn12.046.than.html) where an individual is said to be not entirely other than the person who committed an action (nor simply the same), and SN15.3 (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn15/sn15.003.than.html) which refer to monks' long wanderings in samsara. Some of our actions are committed very late in life or for various other reasons don't ripen in this life, so I think we can infer that the person suffering is sometimes a later life. On the other hand we have suttas such as SN 44.11 (http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn44/sn44.011.than.html) where the Buddha refers to the absence of basis for making such future attributions in his case.

As a psychological observation, it seems to me that fairly often when we are veering toward the annihilationist doctrine, it comes accompanied by certain expectations concerning cause-and-effect. For example, a secular atheist who considers a person to be essentially the same as their body (with brain) might think of a dead mass-murderer like McVeigh that what he did has given rise to a bunch of suffering, but all of it by completely different people from him (since he's dead). Or one might find oneself speculating that the world might now be a better place now if Sariputta had stopped short of becoming noble, so that he would still be here, as presumably a relatively virtuous person continuing to help others. ("Uh oh... we lost bhante to nibbana!") Even if we are careful to think, "a permanent self is not to be found in him", I think we can still err by reasoning as though the presence of his self were a separate cause of the good results he produced, which is no longer available.

I don't know whether Thervada teaches that each effect (of some cause) is in turn among the causes of further effects. (I've read that attributed to another school.) I've almost never heard or read a reason to think it's not true. (Black holes at one time were suspected by secular physicists of erasing information about things that fall into them, but no longer are. That's about all.) I wonder whether this is correct, and if so whether it would help to bar some of our misunderstandings of dependent origination. Certainly things that arise in arahants have effects, through their deeds and so on. That they do not give rise to anything that we can call a reappearance of them after death distinguishes them from ordinary people, but I wonder whether we aren't tending to infer mistakenly that paranibbana "stifles" the effects in ways that it doesn't, due to a lingering trace of the annihilationist error.

Fig Tree

[villkorkarma]

There is no I becourse I think maybe we and others beeing reborn with different situations good and bad so therefore and the influenting beginns there and the process has started already, there is no choice just things happens thats all.

[Alex123]

Having read Ajahn Brahm's book, Mindfulness, Bliss and Beyond, this question keeps haunting me. With parinibbana described as the remainder-less cessation of everything, what is the difference between that and annihilation? I understand that as long as you're subject to rebirth, annihilation is wrong view. What I don't understand is how the results are different when you're no longer subject to rebirth. Everything ceases, right? The flame is extinguished, out, gone. It didn't go anywhere, it's just gone. So, how is this different from annihilation?

Regards: AdvaitaJ

What is so bad about remainder-less cessation?


It is not annihilation because there is no one to be annihilated in the first place.




The suttas clearly state that :


1.Arahant/Tathagata is not found inside or outside of 5 aggregates. SN 22.85-86

2.Self or what belongs to self is not found in truth or reality. MN22

3.There is no permanent possession. MN22. 5 aggregates are impermanent SN22.97

4.Nibbāna is cessation of becoming. AN10.7. bhavanirodho nibbāna. IMHO cessation of becoming is not some new becoming, such as becoming an infinite consciousness.

5. Wouldn’t gaining a permanent, eternal, not subject to change consciousness be considered acquiring (ūpadhi) Something? But many suttas clearly say that Nibbana is calming of all fabrications and relinquishing of ALL acquisitions sabbasaṅkhārasamatho sabbūpadhipaṭinissaggo – PTS A 4.423 (AN 9.36)


6. Five Aggregates cease and never reoccur when Parinibbāna happens. Thus what can remain and be oneself or possession of oneself? Why is there no sutta that says that at parinibbana 5 aggregates cease but some Consciousness remains?

7.There is no eternal and unchanging consciousness that transmigrates from sense base to sense base, much less from life to life. MN38. All consciousness is conditioned and dependently arisen.

8.“The body disintegrated, perception ceased, pain & rapture were entirely consumed, fabrications were stilled: consciousness (Viññāṇaṃ) has come to its end.” – Ud 8.9 Such is the description of Nibbāna.

9.Consciousness cannot be without other aggregates (which cease in parinibbāna)

"Were someone to say, 'I will describe a coming, a going, a passing away, an arising, a growth, an increase, or a proliferation of consciousness apart from form, from feeling, from perception, from fabrications,' that would be impossible.”
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html



What would be condition for consciousness in Nibbāna? OF what would it be aware? Wouldn’t its object of awareness be one of the aggregates? But then it would mean that something conditioned (aggregates) remain in Nibbāna…



Re: Viññāṇaṃ anidassanaṃ in DN11
In DN11 quote if one looks carefully, there are two questions and two answers to the questions of:
Q #1 Where do water, earth, fire, & wind have no footing?
Q #2 Where are long & short, coarse & fine, fair & foul, name & form brought to an end?

Q1) Where do water, earth, fire, & wind have no footing?
A1) Consciousness without endless comparison, and radiant everywhere, Here water, earth, fire, & wind have no footing.

Q2) Where are long & short, coarse & fine, fair & foul, name & form brought to an end?
A2) Here long & short coarse & fine fair & foul, name & form are all brought to an end. With the cessation of consciousness each is here brought to an end.'"

There is absolutely no reason to believe that Viññāṇa remains in Nibbāna, and DN11 clearly states that consciousness ceases.


Remember that ALL things are dukkha. To posit something that remains eternally is only to posit an eternally existent dukkha and according to MN22 there isn’t anything that is permanent and everlasting not subject to change. The talk on ANY kind of existence in Nibbana betrays one's wish for eternal survival, even if it is in some unexplained form.

MN72 clearly states parinibbāna of Arahant is like flame going out. In fact the words extinguished is the same as word for Nibbāna. Just like extinguished flame doesn't become the whole world, same is with Arahant.


The metaphors for nibbāna is a flame going out that is simply reckoned as 'out' (nibbuto)

"If the fire burning in front of you were to go out (nibbāyeyya), would you know that, 'This fire burning in front of me has gone out (nibbuto)'?"
"...yes..."

"And suppose someone were to ask you, 'This fire that has gone out in front of you, in which direction from here has it gone? East? West? North? Or south?'
Thus asked, how would you reply?"

"That doesn't apply, Master Gotama. Any fire burning dependent on a sustenance of grass and timber, being unnourished — from having consumed that sustenance and not being offered any other — is classified simply as 'out' (unbound)."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html



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“What do you think: Do you regard the Tathagata as form-feeling-perception-fabrications-consciousness?"
"No, my friend."
"Do you regard the Tathagata as that which is without form, without feeling, without perception, without fabrications, without consciousness?"
"No, my friend."
"And so, my friend Yamaka — when you can't pin down the Tathagata as a truth or reality even in the present life
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html
=
"there is no form... no feeling... no perception... there are no fabrications... there is no consciousness that is constant, lasting, eternal, not subject to change, that will stay just as it is as long as eternity."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html
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"Monks, you would do well to possess that possession, the possession of which would be constant, permanent, eternal, not subject to change, that would stay just like that for an eternity. But do you see that possession, the possession of which would be constant, permanent, eternal, not subject to change, that would stay just like that for an eternity?"
"No, lord."
"Very good, monks. I, too, do not envision a possession, the possession of which would be constant, permanent, eternal, not subject to change, that would stay just like that for an eternity.
"Monks, you would do well to cling to that clinging to a doctrine of self, clinging to which there would not arise sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, & despair. But do you see a clinging to a doctrine of self, clinging to which there would not arise sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, & despair?"


"Monks, where there is a self, would there be [the thought,] 'belonging to my self'?"
"Yes, lord."
"Or, monks, where there is what belongs to self, would there be [the thought,] 'my self'?"
"Yes, lord."
"Monks, where a self or what belongs to self are not pinned down as a truth or reality, then the view-position — 'This cosmos is the self. After death this I will be constant, permanent, eternal, not subject to change. I will stay just like that for an eternity' — Isn't it utterly & completely a fool's teaching?"
"What else could it be, lord? It's utterly & completely a fool's teaching."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

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[Sariputta] how would you answer if you are thus asked: A monk, a worthy one, with no more mental effluents: what is he on the break-up of the body, after death?"
[Yamaka] "Thus asked, I would answer, 'Form is inconstant... Feeling... Perception... Fabrications... Consciousness is inconstant. That which is inconstant is stressful. That which is stressful has ceased and gone to its end."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

Yes, venerable sir, as I know the Teaching of the Blessed One, this consciousness transmigrates through existences, not anything else. [Buddha] Sàti, how is that consciousness? [Sati] Venerable sir, this uttering and feeling one, that reaps the results of actions good and evil done here and there. [Buddha:] Foolish man, to whom do you know me having preached this Teaching. Haven't I told, in various ways that consciousness is dependently arisen. Without a cause, there is no arising of consciousness. Yet, you foolish man, because of your wrong grasp, blame me, destroy yourself, and accumulate much demerit and that will be for your undoing and unpleasantness for a long time.
http://metta.lk/tipitaka/2Sutta-Pitaka/ ... ta-e1.html


http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

'This is peace, this is exquisite — the resolution of all fabrications; the relinquishment of all acquisitions; the ending of craving; dispassion; cessation; Unbinding.' ‘etaṃ santaṃ etaṃ paṇītaṃ yadidaṃ sabbasaṅkhārasamatho sabbūpadhipaṭinissaggo taṇhākkhayo virāgo nirodho nibbāna’nti.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... 9.than.htm



Is consciousness that good? Lets see SN12.63 Ven. TB trans. Consciousness is like being speared 300 times per day and yet magically being alive to feel the agony. So it is a calamity, a disaster to have consciousness and such a relief when it ceases!
““And how is the nutriment of consciousness to be regarded? Suppose that, having arrested a thief, a criminal, they were to show him to the
king: ‘This is a thief, a criminal for you, your majesty. Impose on him whatever punishment you like.’ So the king would say, ‘Go, men, and
stab him in the morning with a hundred spears.’ So they would stab him in the morning with a hundred spears. Then the king would say at noon, ‘Men, how is that man?’ ‘Still alive, your majesty.’ So the king would say, ‘Go, men, and stab him at noon with a hundred spears.’ So they would stab him at noon with a hundred spears. Then the king would say in the evening, ‘Men, how is that man?’ ‘Still alive, your majesty.’ So the king would say, ‘Go, men, and stab him in the evening with a hundred spears.’ So they would stab him in the evening with a hundred spears. Now what do you think, monks: Would that man, being stabbed with three hundred spears a day, experience pain & distress from that cause?” “Even if he were to be stabbed with only one spear, lord, he would experience pain & distress from that cause, to say nothing of three hundred spears.” “In the same way, I tell you, monks, is the nutriment of consciousness to be regarded. When the nutriment of consciousness is comprehended, name & form are comprehended. When name & form are comprehended, I tell you, there is nothing further for a disciple of the noble ones to do.” — SN 12:63
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

[nathan]

Having read Ajahn Brahm's book, Mindfulness, Bliss and Beyond, this question keeps haunting me. With parinibbana described as the remainder-less cessation of everything, what is the difference between that and annihilation? I understand that as long as you're subject to rebirth, annihilation is wrong view. What I don't understand is how the results are different when you're no longer subject to rebirth. Everything ceases, right? The flame is extinguished, out, gone. It didn't go anywhere, it's just gone. So, how is this different from annihilation?

Regards: AdvaitaJ

There is a difference but it is impossible to describe. It is impossible to describe because nibbana has no conditions which can be described and all language is based on conditions and describes conditions and conditional relations. It is impossible to describe because nibbana contains no consciousness condition or time condition or space condition and so it is only described in terms of the absence of all dependently originating conditions. It is not annihilation of conditions as dependently originated conditions continue for the apparent universe at large and for all apparent beings sustained by varying degrees of delusion and fundamental ignorance and it is not eternal as it neither arises nor passes. Reasoning is inadequate for comprehending nibbana as the conditions which sustain reason cannot contact or comprehend nibbana. It can be said that nibbana "is" and that it "is" what "is" when dependently arising and passing conditions are consciously, with insight and understanding, willfully and entirely abandoned, be this for a moment or for a period of time or with the lasting cessation of the dependent conditions that bound up together make up the appearances of being and becoming.

What conditions need to be developed and what conditions need to be abandoned in order to stop or to make an end to dependently originating conditions is what can be described and what can be done in order to realize nibbana but nibbana can not be said to be understandable. So what we can do is undertake the path that leads to the realization but no one can or ever will be able to communicate the nature of this realization because it is forever beyond range of understanding or description.

[rowyourboat]

Nibbana paccaya consciousness (vinnana)?

Vinnana paccaya nibbana?

There is no such causal connection, to reflect (mirror like) off each other. There can be no conscious awareness of the nibbana-dhathu.

Consciousness only reflects Nama-rupa.

With metta

Matheesha

[kirk5a]

There can be no conscious awareness of the nibbana-dhathu.

Could you provide a sutta passage which states that? Thanks.

[Alex123]

There can be no conscious awareness of the nibbana-dhathu.

Could you provide a sutta passage which states that? Thanks.

If there is no objects, no mind-base (or mind-element), then no consciousness is possible

In various ways we are told, that consciousness arises dependently. Without a cause there is no arising of consciousness. ...
Bhikkhus, founded on whatever, consciousness arises, it is reckoned on that.
On account of eye and forms arises consciousness, it's reckoned eye consciousness.
On account of ear and sounds arises consciousness, it's reckoned ear consciousness.
On account of nose and smells arises consciousness, it's reckoned nose consciousness.
On account of tongue and tastes arises consciousness, it's reckoned tongue consciousness.
On account of body and touches arises consciousness, it's reckoned body consciousness.
On account of mind and ideas arises consciousness, it's reckoned mind consciousness. Bhikkhus, just as based on whatever fire burns, it is reckoned by that. Fire ablaze with sticks is stick fire. Ablaze with twigs is twig fire. Ablaze with grass is grass fire. Ablaze with cow dung is cow dung fire. Ablaze with grain thrash is grain thrash fire. Ablaze with dirt is dirt fire.
http://metta.lk/tipitaka/2Sutta-Pitaka/ ... ta-e1.html

"Thus this is a cause, this is a reason, this is an origination, this is a requisite condition for consciousness, i.e., name-and-form. ...This is the extent to which there are means of designation, expression, and delineation. This is the extent to which the sphere of discernment extends, the extent to which the cycle revolves for the manifesting (discernibility) of this world — i.e., name-and-form together with consciousness.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

When nibbana-without-remainder occurs, is there mind-base or mind-element, + something left?


No.