The causes for wisdom

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
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Alex123
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by Alex123 »

Retro, you are right:
"This is how he attends inappropriately: 'Was I in the past? Was I not in the past? What was I in the past? How was I in the past? Having been what, what was I in the past? Shall I be in the future? Shall I not be in the future? What shall I be in the future? How shall I be in the future? Having been what, what shall I be in the future?' Or else he is inwardly perplexed about the immediate present: 'Am I? Am I not? What am I? How am I? Where has this being come from? Where is it bound?'

"As he attends inappropriately in this way, one of six kinds of view arises in him: The view I have a self arises in him as true & established, or the view I have no self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive not-self... or the view It is precisely by means of not-self that I perceive self arises in him as true & established, or else he has a view like this: This very self of mine — the knower that is sensitive here & there to the ripening of good & bad actions — is the self of mine that is constant, everlasting, eternal, not subject to change, and will stay just as it is for eternity. This is called a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views. Bound by a fetter of views, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person is not freed from birth, aging, & death, from sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair. He is not freed, I tell you, from suffering & stress. mn2
Last edited by Alex123 on Wed May 01, 2013 11:33 am, edited 1 time in total.
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robertk
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by robertk »

DAN74
The danger of practice which is not rooted in deep mental cultivation that is usually had during long retreats, IMO, is that it is superficial and does not withstand strong blows. It is easy to feel that the practice is on track, easy to be a nice enough guy, untroubled and often moved to kindness, when life is relatively trouble-free and settled. But when you are suddenly afflicted by chronic pain, you loved ones seem to turn on you, your job is gone, your routine is upset, the clinging that hitherto was subtle and invisible becomes manifest.
Dear Dan
thanks for reading my long post. Just thought I would respond to this and also reply to some of the comments from some other members (not you)suggesting that Sujin and her students make no efforts.
Now I dont meditate at all-in the formal practice sense- nor does Nina van Gorkom or Sujin Boriharnwanket.

Sujin is now 86 years old: last year she went with many students on three overseas tripes to India , poland and Vietnam. On each of those trips everyday she was meeting for hours with Buddhists- those who accompanied her and from the 3 couuntries- to discuss details of Dhamma. I have known her well for 22 years now and honestly she seems to get stronger and stronger every year.
Nina van Gorkom, (now 85)flew out from holland last year to join the Vietnam trip and is now writing a new book on it. Last week while visiting her husbands grave (passed away last year) she slipped and broke her hip. She is in hospital but continuing to work on it and in great spirits looking forward to leaving hospital and flying out to Bangkok for a month or two in a few months.
If you wanted to refer to me though the casual obsever mights see some signs of laziness :popcorn: especially in comparison to those amazing women.

On the otherhand, to be honest I have been around Buddhist for 30 years now, I just haven't seen either in Bangkok or eleswhere much proof of your statement that it is the people who do the long retreats who have the real deal and that people like Nina or Sujin, or even me if I can be so conceited , who are superficial.
I know of serious meditators I have met who later come into strife in their lives and some even give up Buddhism altogether
But this is all hard to know. Just my superficial observations.
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Alex123
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by Alex123 »

robertk wrote:Just thought I would respond to this and also reply to some of the comments from some other members (not you)suggesting that Sujin and her students make no efforts.
There are two kinds of effort, and sometimes heavy labor is easier than deep meditation.
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Mr Man
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by Mr Man »

Hi robertk
I think in some ways the formal meditation thing is a bit of a red herring and the non meditation and a certain way of thinking can become the "technique". As you pointed out before we needed to be circumspect. Wisdom and ignorance are shared amongst us all.
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Dan74
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by Dan74 »

robertk wrote:DAN74
The danger of practice which is not rooted in deep mental cultivation that is usually had during long retreats, IMO, is that it is superficial and does not withstand strong blows. It is easy to feel that the practice is on track, easy to be a nice enough guy, untroubled and often moved to kindness, when life is relatively trouble-free and settled. But when you are suddenly afflicted by chronic pain, you loved ones seem to turn on you, your job is gone, your routine is upset, the clinging that hitherto was subtle and invisible becomes manifest.
Dear Dan
thanks for reading my long post. Just thought I would respond to this and also reply to some of the comments from some other members (not you)suggesting that Sujin and her students make no efforts.
Now I dont meditate at all-in the formal practice sense- nor does Nina van Gorkom or Sujin Boriharnwanket.

Sujin is now 86 years old: last year she went with many students on three overseas tripes to India , poland and Vietnam. On each of those trips everyday she was meeting for hours with Buddhists- those who accompanied her and from the 3 couuntries- to discuss details of Dhamma. I have known her well for 22 years now and honestly she seems to get stronger and stronger every year.
Nina van Gorkom, (now 85)flew out from holland last year to join the Vietnam trip and is now writing a new book on it. Last week while visiting her husbands grave (passed away last year) she slipped and broke her hip. She is in hospital but continuing to work on it and in great spirits looking forward to leaving hospital and flying out to Bangkok for a month or two in a few months.
If you wanted to refer to me though the casual obsever mights see some signs of laziness :popcorn: especially in comparison to those amazing women.

On the otherhand, to be honest I have been around Buddhist for 30 years now, I just haven't seen either in Bangkok or eleswhere much proof of your statement that it is the people who do the long retreats who have the real deal and that people like Nina or Sujin, or even me if I can be so conceited , who are superficial.
I know of serious meditators I have met who later come into strife in their lives and some even give up Buddhism altogether
But this is all hard to know. Just my superficial observations.
Hi Robert,

To be clear - I have my biases but as I said before I am in no position to judge yours, Sujin Boriharnwanket's or Nina van Gorkom's practice, nor do I have any basis to denigrate it. Like I said in my post:
I marvel that your group is able to find so much sustenance in the study and contemplation of the teachings without the need to meditate. I hope that your insights are genuine and deep and you will spread wisdom and compassion around you wherever you go.
What I tried to share throughout this thread (among other things) is what formal practice has meant to me. For my part if you don't see the value of meditation, that's fine. It's a funny thing that while your group feels that meditation is for the especially gifted, I feel that meditation is for the especially deluded, who need the space and silence in order to face the ignorance and see through it.

Well, each to their own.
_/|\_
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robertk
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by robertk »

Mr Man wrote:Hi robertk
I think in some ways the formal meditation thing is a bit of a red herring and the non meditation and a certain way of thinking can become the "technique". As you pointed out before we needed to be circumspect. Wisdom and ignorance are shared amongst us all.
so true :sage:
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robertk
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by robertk »

retrofuturist wrote:Greetings DF,

I
Let's be very clear... "No self" is an unverifiable ontological proposition and the Buddha did not teach it.

The views you express here in this topic seem single-mindedly fixated on maintaining consistency of speech with this unverifiable ontological proposition of "no self" which you appear to present as the centrepiece of the entire Dhamma, despite the fact the Buddha taught the experiential teaching that "all dhammas (experiences) are not self" rather than the ontological proposition that "there is no self". Ontological speculation seems like a thicket of views, rather than a cause that gives rise to liberative wisdom.



Metta,
Retro. :)
all the following is a great post by yuttadhammo, a mahasi practitioner
QUOTE
"This is how he attends inappropriately: ... Or else he is inwardly perplexed about the immediate present: 'Am I? Am I not? What am I? How am I? Where has this being come from? Where is it bound?'

"As he attends inappropriately in this way, one of six kinds of view arises in him: The view I have a self arises in him as true & established, or the view I have no self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive not-self ... This is called a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views."
The correct view is that there is no self. Whether one should teach this to others or not might be up for debate, but the truth of it is not. Right view is so important, the Lord Buddha placed it at the front of the eightfold noble path. As long as one holds to self in this or that, one still has wrong view. The very notion of I that exists in "I have no self", is already view of personality (sakkaayaditthi), and makes one stuck in a thicket, etc.

To say, on the other hand, that one could get stuck on such a view as "there is no self" doesn't make any sense, unless it is based on the idea that there once was a self in the past. The view of non-self frees the mind from any attachment internally or externally. It is, of course, possible that one might get caught up in pondering or fretting over the non-existence of self and miss the point, but that is not due to wrong view, it is due to wrong attention (ayoniso manasikara):

QUOTE
That opinion of theirs is based only on the personal sensations, on the worry and writhing consequent thereon, of those venerable recluses and Brahmans, who know not, neither perceive, and are subject to all kinds of craving:
45 foll. [41, 42] 'Those opinions of theirs are therefore based upon contact (through the senses).

58 foll. [43] 'That they should experience those sensations without such contact, such a condition of things could not be.

71. [44] 'They, all of them, receive those sensations through continual contact in the spheres of touch. To them on account of the sensations arises craving, on account of the craving arises the fuel (that is, the necessary condition, the food, the basis, of future lives). from the fuel results becoming, from the tendency to become arises rebirth, and from rebirth comes death, and grief, lamentation, pain, sorrow, and despair. It is, brethren, when a brother understands, as they really are, the origin and the end, the attraction, the danger, and the way of escape from the six realms of contact, that he gets to know what is above, beyond, them all.

Source: Dialogues of the Buddha (Rhys-Davids, Trans.)
The view "there is no self" does not fall into this category as it is free from the problems that a view of self holds.

Purification of view is most important for anyone starting out on the path to enlightenment. If one has wrong view from the start, one should be expected to undertake wrong practice. If one undertakes wrong practice, wrong knowledge and wrong release will follow. It is most important that one set on freedom from the rounds of rebirth should be clear from the start that all of the things inside of oneself and everything else in the world is void of a self.

Best wishes,

Yuttadhammo
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kirk5a
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by kirk5a »

If "there is no self" is the true and correct view, right view, at the front of the eightfold noble path, then show us where the Buddha said that. It ought to be all over the suttas.
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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kirk5a
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by kirk5a »

Yuttadhammo wrote:The view "there is no self" does not fall into this category as it is free from the problems that a view of self holds.
If the view "there is no self" was free from problems, then the Buddha would not have said the following:
If I — being asked by Vacchagotta the wanderer if there is no self — were to answer that there is no self, that would be conforming with those brahmans & contemplatives who are exponents of annihilationism
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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Alex123
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by Alex123 »

robertk wrote:The correct view is that there is no self.
Where is this stated? Why MN#2 calls "there is no self" inappropriate attention and contemplation of 4NT (not "there is no self") to be appropriate attention? In SN44.10 Buddha denied that he taught "no self" (natthattā) because that is annihilationism. Buddha refused to declare "there is no self" for Vacchagota. And if you are going to say that Vacchagotta was spiritually immature and couldn't yet handle the truth, neither did the Buddha teach "no self" to Ananda who was a sotapanna if I am not mistaken.

"And what is right view? Knowledge with reference to stress, knowledge with reference to the origination of stress, knowledge with reference to the cessation of stress, knowledge with reference to the way of practice leading to the cessation of stress: This is called right view. MN141
Please note: No talk about existence or non-existence of self.

"'Everything exists' is the senior form of cosmology, brahman."
"'Everything does not exist' is the second form of cosmology, brahman."
"'Everything is a Oneness' is the third form of cosmology, brahman."
"'Everything is a Manyness' is the fourth form of cosmology, brahman. Avoiding these two extremes, the Tathagata teaches the Dhamma via the middle: From ignorance as a requisite condition come fabrications. ... From birth as a requisite condition, then aging & death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair come into play. Such is the origination of this entire mass of stress & suffering. SN12.48
"By & large, Kaccayana, this world is supported by (takes as its object) a polarity, that of existence & non-existence. SN12.15
Talk about existence/non-existence is not part of Dhamma.
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retrofuturist
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by retrofuturist »

Greetings,

Well said Alex.

The Dhamma is about liberation from dukkha, not ontological speculation... not about the existence or non-existence of things, nor any such cosmology nor views. The Buddha made this point very often, and very clearly.
AN 10.69: Kathavatthu Sutta wrote:"It isn't right, monks, that sons of good families, on having gone forth out of faith from home to the homeless life, should get engaged in such topics of conversation, i.e., conversation about kings, robbers, & ministers of state... talk of whether things exist or not.

"There are these ten topics of [proper] conversation. Which ten? Talk on modesty, on contentment, on seclusion, on non-entanglement, on arousing persistence, on virtue, on concentration, on discernment, on release, and on the knowledge & vision of release. These are the ten topics of conversation. If you were to engage repeatedly in these ten topics of conversation, you would outshine even the sun & moon, so mighty, so powerful — to say nothing of the wanderers of other sects."
Despite what some people think, Nanavira Thera was not being malicious when he said the following in the preface to Notes On Dhamma... he was being incisively accurate on the state of play.
Nanavira Thera wrote:These books of the Pali Canon correctly represent the Buddha's Teaching, and can be regarded as trustworthy throughout. (Vinayapitaka:) Suttavibhanga, Mahāvagga, Cūlavagga; (Suttapitaka:) Dīghanikāya, Majjhimanikāya, Samyuttanikāya, Anguttaranikāya, Suttanipāta, Dhammapada, Udāna, Itivuttaka, Theratherīgāthā. (The Jātaka verses may be authentic, but they do not come within the scope of these Notes.) No other Pali books whatsoever should be taken as authoritative; and ignorance of them (and particularly of the traditional Commentaries) may be counted a positive advantage, as leaving less to be unlearned.
I am thankful to have given primacy to the suttas from the outset of my interest in the Dhamma. It has left me with less to unlearn. These suttas do not teach "there is no self" so it is not a view I will encumber nor entangle myself with.... it is a thicket best side-stepped. It seems all schools, even those that are comparatively more aligned to the suttas, have planted their own thickets of views along the way rather than just clearing the path.
AN 7.12 wrote:"Monks, with the abandoning & destruction of the seven obsessions, the holy life is fulfilled. Which seven? The obsession of sensual passion, the obsession of resistance, the obsession of views, the obsession of uncertainty, the obsession of conceit, the obsession of passion for becoming, the obsession of ignorance. With the abandoning & destruction of these seven obsessions, the holy life is fulfilled.

"When, for a monk, the obsession of sensual passion has been abandoned, its root destroyed, made like a palmyra stump, deprived of the conditions of development, not destined for future arising; when, for him, the obsession of resistance... the obsession of views... the obsession of uncertainty... the obsession of conceit... the obsession of passion for becoming... the obsession of ignorance has been abandoned, its root destroyed, made like a palmyra stump, deprived of the conditions of development, not destined for future arising: this is called a monk who has cut through craving, has turned away from the fetter, and — by rightly breaking through conceit — has put an end to suffering & stress."
It's somewhat ironic that those making a big deal about "conditions" are, through adherence to a unique Dhamma designed to accommodate "the obsession of views", actually generating the "conditions of development" for the sustenance of that very "obsession". On the contrary, the "obsessions of views" pertaining to self should be abandoned, its root destroyed, made like a palmyra stump, deprived of the conditions of development, not destined for future arising... turn away from the fetter.

Maybe that would be a more profitable path than creating strawmen arguments that infer that other people who do not share the "no self" obsession hold the diametrically opposite ontological view of self.
SN 12.15 wrote:But when one sees the origination of the world as it actually is with right discernment, 'non-existence' with reference to the world does not occur to one. When one sees the cessation of the world as it actually is with right discernment, 'existence' with reference to the world does not occur to one.
Does 'existence' and 'non-existence' occur to you? Do you consider your path to be a path of right discernment?

:?:

Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa

:buddha1:

:anjali:

Metta,
Retro. :)
"Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."
SamKR
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by SamKR »

Hi Retro,

When someone says "there is no self", he could be saying in the sense of ontological annihilationism that was refuted by the Buddha.
Or, he could be saying in the sense of "there is no self to be found in all Dhammas" while directly seeing the phenomena. I think, the latter sense is equivalent to saying "all Dhammas are not self".

:anjali:
Last edited by SamKR on Thu May 02, 2013 1:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
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retrofuturist
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by retrofuturist »

Greetings Sam,
SamKR wrote:When someone says "there is no self", he could be saying in the sense of ontological annihilationism.
OR, he could be saying in the sense of "there is no self to be found in the Dhammas" while directly seeing the phenomena.
Very true... and if there is doubt, that question is worth asking.

However, this matter is not new, and such questions have now and previously been asked and answered.

(I see your edit and agree... the Buddha taught that all dhammas are not-self and "there is no self to be found in all dhammas" is a truthful portrayal of the teaching)

Metta,
Retro. :)
"Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by tiltbillings »

robertk wrote:DAN74
The danger of practice which is not rooted in deep mental cultivation that is usually had during long retreats, IMO, is that it is superficial and does not withstand strong blows. It is easy to feel that the practice is on track, easy to be a nice enough guy, untroubled and often moved to kindness, when life is relatively trouble-free and settled. But when you are suddenly afflicted by chronic pain, you loved ones seem to turn on you, your job is gone, your routine is upset, the clinging that hitherto was subtle and invisible becomes manifest.
Dear Dan
thanks for reading my long post. Just thought I would respond to this and also reply to some of the comments from some other members (not you)suggesting that Sujin and her students make no efforts.
That is the point. The Sujin method is very much a way of doing, a way of choices and effort, as has been repeatedly demonstrated here. But Sujin and her followers also choose to criticize other teachers for their advocating a way of doing and a way of choices and effort by stating that these other teachers' ways are inferior, caught up in lobha and self view, which is nothing more than a strawman argument on the part of Sujin and her followers.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Alex123
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Re: The causes for wisdom

Post by Alex123 »

SamKR wrote:Hi Retro,
When someone says "there is no self", he could be saying in the sense of ontological annihilationism that was refuted by the Buddha.
Or, he could be saying in the sense of "there is no self to be found in all Dhammas" while directly seeing the phenomena. I think, the latter sense is equivalent to saying "all Dhammas are not self".

:anjali:

Maybe anatta means that one should not consider anything that arises as self. This is active practice, while static "There is/isn't self" is a view.
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