retrofuturist wrote:Greetings Mike,
Unless you are Tilt, I don't see what your acceptance has to do with whether or not Tilt accepts that all the nidanas are dependent on avijja.
It is curious how people wish to speak for the lokas of others.
Metta,
Retro.
Old kamma:
"The eye [ear, nose tongue, body (touch), mind], monks, is to be regarded as old kamma, brought into existence and created by volition, forming a basis for feeling." "the eye . . . feeling." In other words:
"Dependent on the eye and forms arise visual consciousness. The concurrence of the three is contact. Conditioned by contact is feeling." Looks like avijja had a role to play in the formation of old kamma, which is the basis for this process -- "the eye . . . feeling." Mike's speaking for "my loka" was appropriate.
retrofuturist wrote:Greetings Tilt,
tiltbillings wrote:You do not have to decribe the arahant's experience. The Buddha already has, as in the text I quoted
He is talking about
loka, not
lokuttara.
Lokuttara is of the arahant. The rest of your argument falls with that...
If you don't see or accept that all the nidanas are dependent on avijja, then you don't. I don't know what I can do about that.
Arahants have bodies, and having bodies we get:
Dependent on the eye and forms arise visual consciousness. The concurrence of the three is contact. Conditioned by contact is feeling for the arahant. It is with their bodies that arahants live in the world, but, of course, that does not deny the fact that being arahants they are no longer conditioned -- asankhata -- by greed, hatred, and delusion, the delusional connexion with the
all is broken, they are tathagata:
Since a tathagata, even when actually present, is incomprehensible, it is inept to say of him – of the Uttermost Person, the Supernal Person, the Attainer of the Supernal – that after death the tathagata is, or is not, or both is and is not, or neither is nor is not SN III 118. But their backs can hurt and even "
when I am traveling along a road and see no one in front or behind me, at that time I have my ease, even when urinating & defecating." My guesss, as the Buddha states, that arahants see, etc just like we do (but without the greed, hatred, and delusion), and my guess is that they pee and poop just like we do. No need to try to make them some sort of totally, completely unconditioned in every aspect whatever.
"Monks, I will teach you the All as a phenomenon to be abandoned. Listen & pay close attention. I will speak."
"As you say, lord," the monks responded.
The Blessed One said, "And which All is a phenomenon to be abandoned? The eye is to be abandoned. [1] Forms are to be abandoned. Consciousness at the eye is to be abandoned. Contact at the eye is to be abandoned. And whatever there is that arises in dependence on contact at the eye — experienced as pleasure, pain or neither-pleasure-nor-pain — that too is to be abandoned.
"The ear is to be abandoned. Sounds are to be abandoned...
"The nose is to be abandoned. Aromas are to be abandoned...
"The tongue is to be abandoned. Flavors are to be abandoned...
"The body is to be abandoned. Tactile sensations are to be abandoned...
"The intellect is to be abandoned. Ideas are to be abandoned. Consciousness at the intellect is to be abandoned. Contact at the intellect is to be abandoned. And whatever there is that arises in dependence on contact at the intellect — experienced as pleasure, pain or neither-pleasure-nor-pain — that too is to be abandoned.
"This is called the All as a phenomenon to be abandoned." Note
1.To abandon the eye, etc., here means to abandon passion and desire for these things.
SN iv 15 CDB ii 1140
It is worth noting what Ven Thanissaro is not saying here.