A Buddhist discussion forum on the Dhamma of Theravāda Buddhism
https://www.dhammawheel.com/
I'm still not clear what you are looking for, are you looking for a description of the process of observing anicca, dukkha, anatta by observing processes at the 6 sense doors?rowyourboat wrote:Hi Tilt, Goofaholix
I'm just asking for an explanation of the vipassana nana from this sayadaw. Can you find me one? Everything else is just debate.
with metta
As the treatise deals chiefly with the advanced stages of the practice, it was originally not intended for publication. Handwritten or typed copies of the Burmese or Pali version were given only to those who, with some measure of success, had concluded a strict course of practice at the meditation centre.
If that's the case then he wants SUT to teach Mahasi technique. Mahasi technique isn't the only means of achieving Vipassana nana. In Burma it's taught very methodically but as I think you've pointed out the process between student and teacher is often much more practical and intuitive, particulaly in the West. I think SUT has taken it one step further into a more intuitive approach, and yes there is no need to write a book that is already written.mikenz66 wrote:I think that RYB means a description like Mahasi Sayadaw's Progress of Insight
http://aimwell.org/Books/Mahasi/Progress/progress.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
However, I'm not sure why it would be considered necessary for every teacher to write such a book, or spend a lot of time talking about such things. My experience with teachers is that they simply give me practical instructions and make comments on what I report back. It's clear from what they say about what I report that they are very familiar with the territory, but they don't tell me about things that I have not experienced. As I understand it, the original purpose of Mahasi Sayadaw's book was to aid his teachers in instruction, not to tell students what they should be experiencing.
It's more in line with Insight Meditation (aka Vipassana) of the West than with Insight Meditation (aka Vipassana) as taught by other Burmese teachers , yes.rowyourboat wrote:Thanks- I suspected that this method was more in line with 'Insight meditation' of the west rather than vipassana of the east.
I have no idea as to what you are talking about when it comes to "Western vipassana." At the retreats I have been to at IMS these things were quite seriously talked about.rowyourboat wrote:Well I think so- it is inherently unpalatable to a western audience. These nanas are tough. Why would anyone put themselves through revulsion, dispassion etc? It would be asking/risking too much IMO.
with metta
Fair comment. Though all I said was the technique SUT teaches is more intuitive and awareness more broad so similar to the way Mahasi style practice is taught in the West than how it is taught in Burma, I didn't say he was teaching that the purpose of the practice is just to be in the present moment.rowyourboat wrote:Thanks, yes, I respect IMS for forging ahead with this type of thing. I guess I was more referring to the 'Mindfulness' movement which Bikkhu Bodhi refers to here:
BB: I’m reluctant to make judgments about what other teachers are doing, but I will merely point to one important adaptation that has taken place in the contemporary teaching of vipassana meditation that can easily pass unnoticed. I get the impression that the purpose for which mindfulness meditation is being taught in the West has undergone a sea change from its traditional function, perhaps because many Western teachers are teaching outside the framework of classical Buddhist doctrine. Mindfulness meditation, it seems, is now taught mainly as a means to heighten our experience of the present moment. The aim of the practice is to enable us to accept everything that happens to us without discrimination. Through heightened mindfulness of the present moment, we learn to accept everything as intrinsically good, to see everything as instructive, to experience everything as inherently rewarding. We can thus simply abide in the present, heartily accepting whatever comes, open to the ever-fresh, ever-unpredictable flow of events.
Now at a certain level, such a style of teaching does impart valuable lessons to us. It is certainly much better to accept whatever comes than to live eagerly pursuing pleasure and anxiously fleeing pain. It is much wiser to see the positive lessons inherent in pain, loss and transience than to bemoan our miserable fate. However, to present this as the main point of the Buddha’s teaching would be, in my view, a misinterpretation of the Dhamma. The Buddha’s teaching, as given in the suttas, has quite a different logic behind it. The teaching isn’t designed to culminate in acceptance of the world, but to lead out beyond the confines of conditioned experience to that which transcends the world, to the ageless and deathless, which is also the cessation of suffering. Simply maintaining awareness of the present in order to arrive at a detached acceptance of the present could easily lead through the back door to a reconciliation with samsara, to a reaffirmation of samsara, not to release from samsara.
So we are back where we started, where can I find the explanation of the vipassana nana system so that I can check whether SUT teaching complies?rowyourboat wrote:I guess I'm just stressing the ease in which a mindfulness method could fall into the trap that Bikkhu Bodhi mentions above. Following the vipassana nana system is the only assurance that it is leading us to transcend samsara, rather than deeper into it.
How do you know that?rowyourboat wrote: I guess I'm just stressing the ease in which a mindfulness method could fall into the trap that Bikkhu Bodhi mentions above. Following the vipassana nana system is the only assurance that it is leading us to transcend samsara, rather than deeper into it.
Guess.Kenshou wrote:How do you know that?rowyourboat wrote: I guess I'm just stressing the ease in which a mindfulness method could fall into the trap that Bikkhu Bodhi mentions above. Following the vipassana nana system is the only assurance that it is leading us to transcend samsara, rather than deeper into it.
If that was true, I would think the Buddha would have taught the vipassana nana system to everyone he came across. I don't see any evidence for that.rowyourboat wrote:Following the vipassana nana system is the only assurance that it is leading us to transcend samsara, rather than deeper into it.