Ah now I'm getting it. The example "hit by clods" was just an example. In fact I don't consider the locals who threw clods and sticks at Angulimala and that incident actually as vipaka. This is as you said a projection of the type the Buddha warned against, which I totally agree. If one examines the Angulimala Sutta closely, one can find out that the Buddha isn't actually saying that the incident with the locals is the fruit of Angulimalas action. The Buddha just says that what Angulimala experiences - whatever this may be in that particular moment - that this experience is the fruit of kamma. This is in my eyes very important. One can easily interpret the sutta in a way thinking an angry mob of locals is the fruit of action. That's why I was speaking about Anglumalas experience being vipaka, not that he has been hit by clods and stuff.retrofuturist wrote:Because any explanation for what happened to Angulimala ventures away from "loka" into the "outside world"..... and most disturbingly in my mind, the inference that Angulimala's kamma was the proximite cause for the kamma of his attackers, thereby absolving them of responsibility for their own actions, introducing a 'ground hog day' scenario where in the future someone will have to punish them for throwing clods, and someone will have to punish them and so on. Within the context of the Dhamma there is no need to speculatively believe such things, and it's actually detrimental to the notions of personal accountability and responsibility for one's own (spiritual) development.acinteyyo wrote:but I don't understand why the actual experience itself couldn't be seen as being vipaka.
There's no need to describe Angulimalas experience, which would again be a projection of the type the Buddha warned against as you already pointed out.retrofuturist wrote:Since such an explanation involves reaching outside of loka/sabba, it is venturing into the realm of the "conventional" loka.... thus his explanation is a conventional one, rather than a precise one, framed in terms of aggregates, senses etc.acinteyyo wrote:The example I would provide would of course be Angulimala again. Whatever he was experiencing, the Buddha told him it is the fruit of action he is experiencing in the here&now.
Okay, it doesn't matter very much anyway...retrofuturist wrote:Yeah, don't get too hung up on the mental bit though....acinteyyo wrote:According to my understanding an experience is nāmarūpa and viññāna or the pañcakhandhā (in case of the arahant), which then IMHO have to comprise some kind of non-mental vipaka to some extent. Rūpa obviously isn't mental.
I have problems with the meaning of "ontological", do you want to know if I acknowledge a physicality of the body beyond the experience of the body via the sabba of the six consciousnesses? All I know about the physicality of the body is what is experienced by means of the six senses.retrofuturist wrote:What ven. Nyantiloka and and the Kathavatthu are calling "mental", you might call "nama", and understand differently to them. Which raises an interesting question... if you acknowledge the ontological physicality of the body, how to do "experience" it other than via the sabba of the six consciousnesses?
Don't know, which one? You're very welcome, I too thank you for this beneficial conversation.retrofuturist wrote:Not sure if you saw the edit to the earlier post, but thank you for engaging in discussion!
best wishes, acinteyyo