Hello Stuart,Stuart wrote: 2. it is like memory, which again is sustained for a period of time, but which I can again personally verify does regress at a point in the future.
Yes, it is like your second option, as far as i understand.
One may develop some degree of panna at some point (it takes it a long time for it to be very well developed and pass through the stages of insight), but then if one were to be in the lower realms for an extremely long time, for example, , panna would probably not develop significantly at that time, I don't think. However, the accumulation would still remain. The difference is that over time, ones accumulations of self-view, lobha, and dosa, and so on, can also grow and increase. This doesn't mean the wisdom developed is gone, from what I understand, but that there are other accumulations at play.Stuart wrote: This is like any other skill or attainment. In this life, I can certainly learn to play the guitar and maintain that skill for the duration of my life - maybe there will even be an inclination in my next life to play guitar (if I make it into the human realm) - but 100,000,000 life times in the hell realms? Maybe, I would have lost the skill. Likewise with panna ..... until stream entry of course.
Stuart
xxx
Devedatta, for example, the Buddha's cousin who created a schism in the Sangha and tried to turn some of the Buddha's followers away from him, is now suffering in hell for a period of 100,000 great aeons, but will become a PaccekaBuddha during his first birth in the human realm after hell. This shows that he had accumulated a great, great deal of panna, even though he still had defilments, and that wisdom accumulation will not be lost in the citta even over 100,000 aeons in the Avicci hell realm.
Kevin