Good luck trying to convince robertk of that, Ed. God knows I've been trying for years!sukhamanveti wrote:Since an eternalist espouses a belief in an eternally immutable Self, Thanissaro Bhikkhu cannot be an eternalist, as near as I can tell, despite what some have concluded from his interpretation of Not-Self as a strategy.
If Ven. Thanissaro’s “mind like fire unbound”(10) constantly arises and ceases, then it cannot be a Self, even if it continues to exist indefinitely.
As see it, the mind is always conditioned in whichever form it takes according to the Buddha, but the Nibbana element which an enlightened consciousness perceives is unconditioned. I do not see how a mind could become unconditioned.clw_uk wrote:If Ven. Thanissaro’s “mind like fire unbound”(10) constantly arises and ceases, then it cannot be a Self, even if it continues to exist indefinitely.
only conditioned things are impermanent, that which is unconditioned is not subject to anicca, if "mind like a fire unbound" is meant to be nibbana or the mind of an arahant, then it is unconditioned and so not subject to anicca
Metta
P.S.: I should add that Ajahn Sumedho, as you know, seems to regard pure awareness as "unconditioned." This is an unorthodox perspective which I cannot make sense of and does not fit my understanding of the suttas or the Theravada tradition.sukhamanveti wrote:As see it, the mind is always conditioned, in whichever form it takes, according to the Buddha, but the Nibbana element which an enlightened consciousness perceives is unconditioned. I do not see how a mind could become unconditioned.clw_uk wrote:If Ven. Thanissaro’s “mind like fire unbound”(10) constantly arises and ceases, then it cannot be a Self, even if it continues to exist indefinitely.
only conditioned things are impermanent, that which is unconditioned is not subject to anicca, if "mind like a fire unbound" is meant to be nibbana or the mind of an arahant, then it is unconditioned and so not subject to anicca
Metta
Oh, no! I don't have the time or the energy for a debate that long.Elohim wrote:Good luck trying to convince robertk of that, Ed. God knows I've been trying for years!sukhamanveti wrote:Since an eternalist espouses a belief in an eternally immutable Self, Thanissaro Bhikkhu cannot be an eternalist, as near as I can tell, despite what some have concluded from his interpretation of Not-Self as a strategy.
P.S.: I should add that Ajahn Sumedho, as you know, seems to regard pure awareness as "unconditioned." This is an unorthodox perspective which I cannot make sense of and does not fit my understanding of the suttas or the Theravada tradition.
http://www.what-buddha-taught.net/Books ... m#APPENDIX" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;The following comments about the nature of the citta have been excerpted from several discourses given by Ãcariya Mahã Boowa.
OF FOREMOST IMPORTANCE IS THE CITTA, the mind’s essential knowing nature. It consists of pure and simple awareness: the citta simply knows. Awareness of good and evil, and the critical judgements that result, are merely activities of the citta. At times, these activities may manifest as mindfulness; at other times, wisdom. But the true citta does not exhibit any activities or manifest any conditions at all. It only knows. Those activities that arise in the citta, such as awareness of good and evil, or happiness and suffering, or praise and blame, are all conditions of the consciousness that flows out from the citta. Since it represents activities and conditions of the citta that are, by their very nature, constantly arising and ceasing, this sort of consciousness is always unstable and unreliable.
The conscious acknowledgement of phenomena as they arise and cease is called viññãna. For instance, viññãna acknowledges and registers the sense impressions that are produced when sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations contact the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body respectively. Each such contact between an external sense sphere and its corresponding internal base gives rise to a specific consciousness that registers the moment at which each interaction takes place, and then promptly ceases at the same moment that the contact passes. Viññãna, therefore, is consciousness as a condition of the citta. Sankhãra, or thoughts and imagination, is also a condition of the citta. Once the citta has given expression to these conditions, they tend to proliferate without limit. On the other hand, when no conditions arise at all, only the citta’s inherent quality of knowing is apparent.
Still, the essential knowing of the average person’s mind is very different from the essential knowing of an Arahant. The average person’s knowing nature is contaminated from within. Arahants, being khïõãsava, are free of all contamination. Their knowing is a pure and simple awareness without any adulteration. Pure awareness, devoid of all contaminants, is supreme awareness: a truly amazing quality of knowing that bestows perfect happiness, as befits the Arahant’s state of absolute purity. This Supreme Happiness always remains constant. It never changes or varies like conditioned phenomena of the world, which are always burdened with anicca, dukkha, and anattã. Such mundane characteristics cannot possibly enter into the citta of someone who has cleansed it until it is absolutely pure.
The citta forms the very foundation of samsãra; it is the essence of being that wanders from birth to birth. It is the instigator of the cycle of existence and the prime mover in the round of repeated birth and death. Samsãra is said to be a cycle because death and rebirth recur regularly according to the immutable law of kamma. The citta is governed by kamma, so it is obliged to revolve perpetually in this cycle following kamma’s dictates. As long as the citta remains under the jurisdiction of kamma, this will always be the case. The citta of the Arahant is the sole exception, for his citta has completely transcended kamma’s domain. Since he has also transcended all conventional connections, not a single aspect of relative, conventional reality can possibly become involved with the Arahant’s citta. At the level of Arahant, the citta has absolutely no involvement with anything.
Once the citta is totally pure, it simply knows according to its own inherent nature. It is here that the citta reaches it culmination; it attains perfection at the level of absolute purity. Here the continuous migration from one birth to the next finally comes to an end. Here the perpetual journey from the higher realms of existence to the lower ones and back again, through the repetitive cycle of birth, ageing, sickness, and death, totally ceases. Why does it cease here? Because those hidden, defiling elements that normally permeate the citta and cause it to spin around have been completely eliminated. All that remains is the pure citta, which will never again experience birth and death.
Rebirth is inevitable, however, for the citta that has yet to reach that level of purity. One may be tempted to deny that rebirth follows death, or one may doggedly hold to the nihilistic viewpoint that rejects all possibility of life after death, but such convictions cannot alter the truth. One’s essential knowing nature is not governed by speculation; nor is it influenced by people’s views and opinions. Its preeminence within one’s own being, coupled with the supreme authority of kamma, completely override all speculative considerations.
Interesting. This reminds me of the concept of rigpa in the Nyingma lineage of Tibetan Buddhism.clw_uk wrote:P.S.: I should add that Ajahn Sumedho, as you know, seems to regard pure awareness as "unconditioned." This is an unorthodox perspective which I cannot make sense of and does not fit my understanding of the suttas or the Theravada tradition.
My understanding of his view (i must stress i might be wrong) is that pure awareness (which i take to be Voidness) is unconditioned since there is no ignorance in pure awareness, no liking or averting or constructing "I am". There is just knowing and watching of Dhammas rise and fall
I have found a similar teaching in the TFT from Ajahn Maha Boowa
http://www.what-buddha-taught.net/Books ... m#APPENDIX" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;The following comments about the nature of the citta have been excerpted from several discourses given by Ãcariya Mahã Boowa.
OF FOREMOST IMPORTANCE IS THE CITTA, the mind’s essential knowing nature. It consists of pure and simple awareness: the citta simply knows. Awareness of good and evil, and the critical judgements that result, are merely activities of the citta. At times, these activities may manifest as mindfulness; at other times, wisdom. But the true citta does not exhibit any activities or manifest any conditions at all. It only knows. Those activities that arise in the citta, such as awareness of good and evil, or happiness and suffering, or praise and blame, are all conditions of the consciousness that flows out from the citta. Since it represents activities and conditions of the citta that are, by their very nature, constantly arising and ceasing, this sort of consciousness is always unstable and unreliable.
The conscious acknowledgement of phenomena as they arise and cease is called viññãna. For instance, viññãna acknowledges and registers the sense impressions that are produced when sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations contact the eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and body respectively. Each such contact between an external sense sphere and its corresponding internal base gives rise to a specific consciousness that registers the moment at which each interaction takes place, and then promptly ceases at the same moment that the contact passes. Viññãna, therefore, is consciousness as a condition of the citta. Sankhãra, or thoughts and imagination, is also a condition of the citta. Once the citta has given expression to these conditions, they tend to proliferate without limit. On the other hand, when no conditions arise at all, only the citta’s inherent quality of knowing is apparent.
Still, the essential knowing of the average person’s mind is very different from the essential knowing of an Arahant. The average person’s knowing nature is contaminated from within. Arahants, being khïõãsava, are free of all contamination. Their knowing is a pure and simple awareness without any adulteration. Pure awareness, devoid of all contaminants, is supreme awareness: a truly amazing quality of knowing that bestows perfect happiness, as befits the Arahant’s state of absolute purity. This Supreme Happiness always remains constant. It never changes or varies like conditioned phenomena of the world, which are always burdened with anicca, dukkha, and anattã. Such mundane characteristics cannot possibly enter into the citta of someone who has cleansed it until it is absolutely pure.
The citta forms the very foundation of samsãra; it is the essence of being that wanders from birth to birth. It is the instigator of the cycle of existence and the prime mover in the round of repeated birth and death. Samsãra is said to be a cycle because death and rebirth recur regularly according to the immutable law of kamma. The citta is governed by kamma, so it is obliged to revolve perpetually in this cycle following kamma’s dictates. As long as the citta remains under the jurisdiction of kamma, this will always be the case. The citta of the Arahant is the sole exception, for his citta has completely transcended kamma’s domain. Since he has also transcended all conventional connections, not a single aspect of relative, conventional reality can possibly become involved with the Arahant’s citta. At the level of Arahant, the citta has absolutely no involvement with anything.
Once the citta is totally pure, it simply knows according to its own inherent nature. It is here that the citta reaches it culmination; it attains perfection at the level of absolute purity. Here the continuous migration from one birth to the next finally comes to an end. Here the perpetual journey from the higher realms of existence to the lower ones and back again, through the repetitive cycle of birth, ageing, sickness, and death, totally ceases. Why does it cease here? Because those hidden, defiling elements that normally permeate the citta and cause it to spin around have been completely eliminated. All that remains is the pure citta, which will never again experience birth and death.
Rebirth is inevitable, however, for the citta that has yet to reach that level of purity. One may be tempted to deny that rebirth follows death, or one may doggedly hold to the nihilistic viewpoint that rejects all possibility of life after death, but such convictions cannot alter the truth. One’s essential knowing nature is not governed by speculation; nor is it influenced by people’s views and opinions. Its preeminence within one’s own being, coupled with the supreme authority of kamma, completely override all speculative considerations.
Metta
Some of what we're saying really doesn't differentiate between the person who does not attain arahantship and the person who does, but it seems to me that part of our difficulty here is that there's some difference, but it's pretty easy to describe it misleadingly.nathan wrote:Seems to me that no matter what is said about this in an attempt to clarify the nature of nibbana here and now and of parinibbana one is bound to be accused of saying something indicative of either an eternalistic or annihilationistic doctrine. Seems to me that the Buddha sidestepped this by saying that he was not saying either of these things and leaving it at a thorough negation of the typical accusations.
Now this line of thinking raises a rather important question: what kind of state is Nibbana?Alex123 wrote:If all existence is suffering and the death would be the end of the suffering (and equivalent to parinibbana), why not hasten it? Isn't cessation of dukkha (mental and physical) is what Buddhism all about?
...Even 8th Jhana is still imperfect. No feelings & perceptions is much better. If there was one life, it would be easy to accomplish that.
And further:
When we first learn that the name for the goal of Buddhist practice, nibbana (nirvana), literally means the extinguishing of a fire, it's hard to imagine a deadlier image for a spiritual goal: utter annihilation. It turns out, though, that this reading of the concept is a mistake in translation, not so much of a word as of an image. What did an extinguished fire represent to the Indians of the Buddha's day? Anything but annihilation.
According to the ancient Brahmans, when a fire was extinguished it went into a state of latency. Rather than ceasing to exist, it became dormant and in that state — unbound from any particular fuel — it became diffused throughout the cosmos.
And finally:The image underlying nibbana is one of freedom. The Pali commentaries support this point by tracing the word nibbana to its verbal root, which means "unbinding." What kind of unbinding? The texts describe two levels. One is the unbinding in this lifetime, symbolized by a fire that has gone out but whose embers are still warm. This stands for the enlightened arahant, who is conscious of sights and sounds, sensitive to pleasure and pain, but freed from passion, aversion, and delusion. The second level of unbinding, symbolized by a fire so totally out that its embers have grown cold, is what the arahant experiences after this life. All input from the senses cools away and he/she is totally freed from even the subtlest stresses and limitations of existence in space and time.
The Buddha insists that this level is indescribable, even in terms of existence or nonexistence, because words work only for things that have limits. All he really says about it — apart from images and metaphors — is that one can have foretastes of the experience in this lifetime, and that it's the ultimate happiness, something truly worth knowing.
The suttas, likewise, speak of "consciousness without surface, without end, luminous all around". Is this equivalent to oblivion?The consciousness of nirvana is said to be "without surface" (anidassanam), for it doesn't land. Because the consciousness-aggregate covers only consciousness that is near or far, past, present, or future — i.e., in connection with space and time — consciousness without surface is not included in the aggregates. It's not eternal because eternity is a function of time. And because non-local also means undefined, the Buddha insisted that an awakened person — unlike ordinary people — can't be located or defined in any relation to the aggregates in this life; after death, he/she can't be described as existing, not existing, neither, or both, because descriptions can apply only to definable things.
The issue is the "if".Lazy_eye wrote:Specifically, it was proposed that if there is only one life, "instant nibbana" can be attained through suicide.
But you believe there are other lives right? So you can safely assume that if you kill yourself you will be born again somewhere.Lazy_eye wrote:Specifically, it was proposed that if there is only one life, "instant nibbana" can be attained through suicide.
Nibbana is the complete and remainderless cessation of suffering caused by mental clinging to the five aggregatesLazy_eye wrote:what kind of state is Nibbana?
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He feels whatever feelings pleasant, or unpleasant or neither unpleasant nor pleasant. He sees impermanence in these feelings. Detaching his mind from them and seeing their cessation, gives them up. Thus he abides seeing impermanence, detachment, cessation and giving up of those feelings, does not seize anything in the world. Not seizing does not worry. Not worried is internally extinguished....
What should be done is done... there is nothing more to wish.
MN 37Annihilation does not apply. Eternalism doesn't apply. Why? Because both concepts have self-identification. You can ask yourself, what am I annihilating?Lazy_eye wrote:Buddhist nibbana is identical to annihilation
Nibbana is not nothingness.Lazy_eye wrote:If we equate nibbana with nothingness
There is that dimension where there is neither earth, nor water, nor fire, nor wind; neither dimension of the infinitude of space, nor dimension of the infinitude of consciousness, nor dimension of nothingness, nor dimension of neither perception nor non-perception; neither this world, nor the next world, nor sun, nor moon. And there, I say, there is neither coming, nor going, nor staying; neither passing away nor arising: unestablished, unevolving, without support (mental object). This, just this, is the end of stress.
nibbana sutta
But you said the Buddha said "we cannot say" right?Lazy_eye wrote:concluding that an enlightened person does not exist after death
But according to the Buddha, there are four things we cannot say about an awakened person: that he exists after death, does not exist, both does and does not exist, neither exists or does not exist.
The goal is not annihilation. The goal is seeing through direct experience that there is nothing that is yours to annihilate. Once you see that, the five aggregates that make up an awakened person will dwell and unbind according to the cause of nature.Lazy_eye wrote:Moreover, if the goal is utter annihilation, why do arhats continue to live?
Other than conceptual overlay (there is no Self, or anything pleasant that ceases), there is no difference between Parinibbana and Atheistic one-life-only death.Lazy_eye wrote:Hi all,
Specifically, it was proposed that if there is only one life, "instant nibbana" can be attained through suicide. As Alex123 explained,
Now this line of thinking raises a rather important question: what kind of state is Nibbana?
The Parinibbana of an Arhat (not anyone below) is described as"And so, my friend Yamaka — when you can't pin down the Tathagata as a truth or reality even in the present life http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html
And If I can add my 2 cents, those bodily remains will crumble to dust soon enough. No consciousness remains. Total peace, total freedom!"He understands: ‘With the breakup of the body, following the exhaustion of life, all feelings, not being delighted in, will become cool right here; mere
bodily remains will be left." - SN12.51(1).
