Are the aggregates dukkha?

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samseva
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

Post by samseva »

Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 9:11 am As for the tilakkhana, don't these just apply to conditioned existence, with the unconditioned (Nibbana) as the "escape"?
The only thing unconditioned—in the same way that it is described in the Suttas, as "the unconditioned"—is Nibbāna. For anicca and dukkha, the Buddha describes these characteristics only in relation to conditioned phenomena (sabbe saṅkhārā), because Nibbāna is permanent (cannot be reversed), and therefore anicca doesn't apply to it—and the characteristic of dukkha also doesn't apply, because Nibbāna can't give rise to suffering. The characteristic of anattā, however, applies to both conditioned phenomena and unconditioned phenomena (i.e., Nibbāna), because even Nibbāna itself is anattā/not-self. Therefore, for anattā, "sabbe dhammā" is said instead of "sabbe saṅkhāra."
Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 9:11 am Is there clear evidence in the suttas for your distinction between what is unsatisfactory and what is suffering? The idea of two types of dukkha?
When the Buddha describes the three characteristics of existence (tilakkhaṇa), that all "phenomena are impermanent, suffering and not-self," he doesn't mean that all things, including objects outside of our own mind—through their existence alone—"are" suffering. That doesn't make sense. It's that all things are unsatisfactory and are susceptible to the arising of suffering. In the teaching of the three characteristics of existence/tilakkhaṇa, dukkha is described as a characteristic.

In numerous other Suttas, however, the Buddha talks about dukkha, in the sense that it is usually understood, as mental pain.
Lakkhaṇa (nt.) [Vedic lakṣman nt. sign; adj. lakṣmaṇa; later Sk. lakṣmaṇa nt. In the defn of grammarians syn. with anka brand, e. g. Dhtp 536 "anka lakkhaṇe lakkha dassane," or Dhtm 748 "lakkha=dassanaanke"; cp. J i.451 lakkhaṇena anketi to brand. — The Sk. Np. Lakṣmaṇa appears also in Prk. as Lakkhaṇa: Pischel, Prk. Gr. § 312] 1. sign, characteristic, mark; esp. a sign as implying something extraordinary or pointing to the future, therefore a prognosticative mark (cp. talisman), a distinguishing mark or salient feature, property, quality
—PTS Dictionary
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mjaviem
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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asahi wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 4:36 am It is not a belief . The Buddha experiencing back pain and decided to lie down . Acknowledging the back pain but not identifying pain as Himself or belongs to Him . There is no denying of back pain for Buddha , however , knowing the body need resting , the thoughts of laying down arises to His mind .
By dictionary definition
Experience
...
3 something that happens [countable]
something that happens to you or something you do, especially when this has an effect on what you feel or think
...
https://www.ldoceonline.com/dictionary/experience

The Buddha and arahants awakened to the truth that there's no you so nothing happens to them and there's nothing they do and feelings and thougths are not theirs either. They don't have experiences. They see the painful feeling is there, there's no denying, but this is not an experience as Ceiswr wants us to believe.
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Ceisiwr
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

Post by Ceisiwr »

mjaviem wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 10:27 am
asahi wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 4:36 am It is not a belief . The Buddha experiencing back pain and decided to lie down . Acknowledging the back pain but not identifying pain as Himself or belongs to Him . There is no denying of back pain for Buddha , however , knowing the body need resting , the thoughts of laying down arises to His mind .
By dictionary definition
Experience
...
3 something that happens [countable]
something that happens to you or something you do, especially when this has an effect on what you feel or think
...
https://www.ldoceonline.com/dictionary/experience

The Buddha and arahants awakened to the truth that there's no you so nothing happens to them and there's nothing they do and feelings and thougths are not theirs either. They don't have experiences. They see the painful feeling is there, there's no denying, but this is not an experience as Ceiswr wants us to believe.
Anatta doesn’t mean not experiencing anything. It means viewing experience correctly. If he is feeling pain then he is having an experience at that time, a painful one. Something is happening. If the Buddha didn’t experience anything he wouldn’t feel, hear, touch etc much less walk around talking to people, but he did. This may come of a shock to you, but I imagine he still had thoughts of “I am this” etc too.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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Ceisiwr wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 10:53 am Anatta doesn’t mean not experiencing anything. It means viewing experience correctly. If he is feeling pain then he is having an experience at that time, a painful one. Something is happening. If the Buddha didn’t experience anything he wouldn’t feel, hear, touch etc much less walk around talking to people, but he did. This may come of a shock to you, but I imagine he still had thoughts of “I am this” etc too.
Wrong. Or at least that's not Buddha-dhamma. There's nothing he possessed, nothing that he took as mine or I. A thought of "I am this" if present is not possessed by him. You can't stop believing in self, that's why you repeat "he is feeling" "he is having" "he feels, hears, touches, walks around". That's why you can't accept the idea of full-liberation in the present.
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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samseva wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 9:40 am
Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 9:11 am As for the tilakkhana, don't these just apply to conditioned existence, with the unconditioned (Nibbana) as the "escape"?
The only thing unconditioned—in the same way that it is described in the Suttas, as "the unconditioned"—is Nibbāna. For anicca and dukkha, the Buddha describes these characteristics only in relation to conditioned phenomena (sabbe saṅkhārā), because Nibbāna is permanent (cannot be reversed), and therefore anicca doesn't apply to it—and the characteristic of dukkha also doesn't apply, because Nibbāna can't give rise to suffering. The characteristic of anattā, however, applies to both conditioned phenomena and unconditioned phenomena (i.e., Nibbāna), because even Nibbāna itself is anattā/not-self. Therefore, for anattā, "sabbe dhammā" is said instead of "sabbe saṅkhāra."
Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 9:11 am Is there clear evidence in the suttas for your distinction between what is unsatisfactory and what is suffering? The idea of two types of dukkha?
When the Buddha describes the three characteristics of existence (tilakkhaṇa), that all "phenomena are impermanent, suffering and not-self," he doesn't mean that all things, including objects outside of our own mind—through their existence alone—"are" suffering. That doesn't make sense. It's that all things are unsatisfactory and are susceptible to the arising of suffering. In the teaching of the three characteristics of existence/tilakkhaṇa, dukkha is described as a characteristic.

In numerous other Suttas, however, the Buddha talks about dukkha, in the sense that it is usually understood, as mental pain.
The suttas straightforwardly say that sankharas are dukkha because they're anicca.
They don't say sankharas are "susceptible to dukkha", they say they are dukkha.

I'm still not seeing clear support for this idea that there are two types of dukkha, ie suffering and susceptible to suffering.
Last edited by Spiny Norman on Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:50 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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mjaviem wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:10 am
Ceisiwr wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 10:53 am Anatta doesn’t mean not experiencing anything. It means viewing experience correctly. If he is feeling pain then he is having an experience at that time, a painful one. Something is happening. If the Buddha didn’t experience anything he wouldn’t feel, hear, touch etc much less walk around talking to people, but he did. This may come of a shock to you, but I imagine he still had thoughts of “I am this” etc too.
Wrong. Or at least that's not Buddha-dhamma. There's nothing he possessed, nothing that he took as mine or I. A thought of "I am this" if present is not possessed by him. You can't stop believing in self, that's why you repeat "he is feeling" "he is having" "he feels, hears, touches, walks around". That's why you can't accept the idea of full-liberation in the present.
The Bahiya Sutta appears to support the idea that dukkha depends on the presence of self-view.
"When there is no you there... This is the end of suffering".
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:41 am The suttas straightforwardly say that sankharas are dukkha because they're anicca.
Yes, and?

Dukkha is mental pain. You asked me if there is a distinction in the Suttas between dukkha as mental pain, and dukkha as a characteristic, such as in the teaching of the three characteristics of existence (tilankhaṇa).

So I answererd you: There is dukkha as a characteristic—such as in the three characteristics of existence (tilakkhaṇa)—and there is dukkha as actual mental pain, like in probably hundreds of Suttas.
Lakkhaṇa (nt.) [Vedic lakṣman nt. sign; adj. lakṣmaṇa; later Sk. lakṣmaṇa nt. In the defn of grammarians syn. with anka brand, e. g. Dhtp 536 "anka lakkhaṇe lakkha dassane," or Dhtm 748 "lakkha=dassanaanke"; cp. J i.451 lakkhaṇena anketi to brand. — The Sk. Np. Lakṣmaṇa appears also in Prk. as Lakkhaṇa: Pischel, Prk. Gr. § 312] 1. sign, characteristic, mark; esp. a sign as implying something extraordinary or pointing to the future, therefore a prognosticative mark (cp. talisman), a distinguishing mark or salient feature, property, quality
—PTS Dictionary
Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:41 am They don't say sankharas are "susceptible to dukkha", they say they are dukkha.
So money "is" mental pain? The possessions one owns "is" actual mental pain? The usual translation of dukkha as a characteristic is that "all conditioned phenomena are unsatisfactory."
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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samseva wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:04 pm
The 1st dart is dukkha too, not just the 2nd. Pain itself is dukkha.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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Ceisiwr wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:10 pm The 1st dart is dukkha too, not just the 2nd. Pain itself is dukkha.
The first dart has the characteristic of dukkha. Dukkha that arrises is actual mental pain.
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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samseva wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:12 pm
Ceisiwr wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:10 pm The 1st dart is dukkha too, not just the 2nd. Pain itself is dukkha.
The first dart has the characteristic of dukkha. Dukkha that arrises is actual mental pain.
This is the crux of the issue, IMO. Is dukkha just mental pain?
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:19 pm This is the crux of the issue, IMO. Is dukkha just mental pain?
The teaching of the three characteristics of existence/tilakkhaṇa—of anicca, dukkha and anattā—is one of the most fundamental and important teachings after the Four Nobles Truths.
Lakkhaṇa (nt.) [Vedic lakṣman nt. sign; adj. lakṣmaṇa; later Sk. lakṣmaṇa nt. In the defn of grammarians syn. with anka brand, e. g. Dhtp 536 "anka lakkhaṇe lakkha dassane," or Dhtm 748 "lakkha=dassanaanke"; cp. J i.451 lakkhaṇena anketi to brand. — The Sk. Np. Lakṣmaṇa appears also in Prk. as Lakkhaṇa: Pischel, Prk. Gr. § 312] 1. sign, characteristic, mark; esp. a sign as implying something extraordinary or pointing to the future, therefore a prognosticative mark (cp. talisman), a distinguishing mark or salient feature, property, quality
—PTS Dictionary
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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samseva wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:04 pm Dukkha is mental pain.
I don't think that has been clearly established, and it certainly doesn't follow from "sabbe sankhara dukkha".
Nibbana is said to include the "stilling of all formations" (sankharas), which suggests that sankharas need to cease in order for dukkha to cease. It's reminiscent of DO in reverse or cessation mode.
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 11:48 am The Bahiya Sutta appears to support the idea that dukkha depends on the presence of self-view.
"When there is no you there... This is the end of suffering".
Could you please use english instead of pali so I can follow what you mean? I agree with "that suffering depends on the presence of self-view. When there is no you there... This is the end of suffering".
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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samseva wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:12 pm
Ceisiwr wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:10 pm The 1st dart is dukkha too, not just the 2nd. Pain itself is dukkha.
The first dart has the characteristic of dukkha. Dukkha that arrises is actual mental pain.
Pain itself is dukkha.
“Knowing that this body is just like foam,
understanding it has the nature of a mirage,
cutting off Māra’s flower-tipped arrows,
one should go beyond the King of Death’s sight.”
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Re: Are the aggregates dukkha?

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Spiny Norman wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:26 pm
samseva wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:04 pm Dukkha is mental pain.
I don't think that has been clearly established
If you want to think dukkha is not mental pain—even though there are hundreds of Suttas that describe dukkha as such—and also that there is no such thing as dukkha as a characteristic—even though the Buddha literally taught the teaching of the three characteristics of existence—fine. That's not my problem.
Last edited by samseva on Wed Oct 20, 2021 12:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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