Tv Ab Kv 18.8 Abhidhamma claims you can not hear sounds in jhāna, but their logic is fallacious

[Ceisiwr]

I PM’d Charles Patton over at SuttaCentral to see what he knew regarding the Sarvāstivādin position. Here is his reply.

I’m not an expert on the Vibhāṣa, having only given it a cursory study now and again, but if one looks at Dhammajoti’s discussion of sensory perception in Sarvâstivāda Abhidharma’s psychological model, vitarka was considered a cause of sensory consciousness, and that saṃjñā was in turn the cause for vitarka. This is presumably because a sensory consciousness involves recognizing a thing by matching it to a concept in addition to the bare sensory input. That being the case, I would expect that they would consider dhyāna accompanied by vitarka to possibly involve sensory perception. But once vitarka has ceased, there’s no more sensory consciousness because the mind has turned inwards and become fixed to a single object, so it isn’t giving the five senses any attention.

Cf., the discussion on p.301 of Dhammajoti’s Sarvâstivāda Abhidharma. I’ve attached it in case you don’t have a copy.

[samseva]

Frank and BrokenBones think it is simply some weird meditative state, something which is Wrong Concentration. Is that shared by others here?

Even if they were to consider it as wrong concentration, what would it be based on—other than their own opinions?

Still, the Buddha, and other monks like Sāriputta, were advanced practitioners. It wouldn't be surprising that something like "jhāna-lite" would be considered elementary and a poor meditative state. Advanced meditators like the Buddha/Sāriputta likely much preferred something like the 4th jhāna, for example, which resembles actual jhāna (or "hard-jhāna" as "jhāna-lite" proponents like to call it).

[frank k]

...

You forgot the attestation from Abhidharmāmṛta. Which makes the matter:

Absorbed Jhāna
Theravāda, Sarvāstivāda and Pudgalavāda.

Jhāna-lite
Pubbaseliyā, Sautrāntikas, + unknown Central Asian Sarvāstivādin sect (Ven Ghoṣaka's)
...

Jhana lite is a bad term to use, for many reason.
https://lucid24.org/tped/j/jhana-lite/index.html
Same reason you don't refer to EBT or Theravada as Hinayana.
"absorbed jhana" is not great either. Thanissaro often translates jhana as absorption, and he certainly doesn't mean it in the LBT sense.

The other problem, as I already pointed out, is the label Theravada doesn't speak for all sutta followers who reject LBT scripture that contradicts the suttas.

VRJ is what I use (vism. redefinition of jhana) because it's short, clear, unambigious of what it's describing. If you want to use a longer descriptive label, something like disembodied frozen mind jhana to contrast with sutta jhana.

Or sutta jhana that uses standard dictionary
LBT jhana that uses a dictionary that redefines body as "body of mind" and "thinking" as "not thinking".

[Ceisiwr]

[VRJ is what I use (vism. redefinition of jhana) because it's short, clear, unambigious of what it's describing. If you want to use a longer descriptive label, something like disembodied frozen mind jhana to contrast with sutta jhana.

This debate predates the Visuddhimagga by some centuries. Both interpretations being argued for here are sutta based.

[frank k]

There are a quite a number of suttas that involve jhana in all 4 postures, but from the exchange here it's clear you're just going to disimiss them with your army of straw men.
Back to ignoring all your posts. My thread has become flooded with spammers from my ignore list.

If it were possible to eat food and walk at the same time there would be many suttas that say this.

If it were possible to close your eyes in sitting in meditation, there would be many suttas that say this. But there are no suttas that say one closes their eyes in meditation therefore this is not possible.

Why would there ever be such ridiculous things mentioned in the Suttas? You're just making a reductio ad absurdum (reduction to absurdity).

[samseva]

VRJ is what I use (vism. redefinition of jhana) because it's short, clear, unambigious of what it's describing. If you want to use a longer descriptive label, something like disembodied frozen mind jhana to contrast with sutta jhana.

Those are just frankisms. In other words, garbage.

[Coëmgenu]

...

You forgot the attestation from Abhidharmāmṛta. Which makes the matter:

Absorbed Jhāna
Theravāda, Sarvāstivāda and Pudgalavāda.

Jhāna-lite
Pubbaseliyā, Sautrāntikas, + unknown Central Asian Sarvāstivādin sect (Ven Ghoṣaka's)
...

Jhana lite is a bad term to use, for many reason.

I appreciate that you don't like the term because it makes your practice seem like Coke Zero, but I don't have any trouble using the language of others. I'll call it "diet jhāna" if my interlocutor is determined to call it that, doesn't change my opinions and stances concerning dhyāna in the least to call it embodied, light, soft dhyāna, or even waking/awake dhyāna.

[SilaSamadhi8]

Greetings Dhamma Friends,

Pardon me for barging into the discussion like this but I thought of something these past few days.
I don't know fully know Pali or have not read the entirety of Canon but from what I've read in the Suttas about the Cosmology of the universe as it was expounded by the Lord Buddha, I believe the Commentaries, Abhiddhama and Visudhimagga are correct about Jhanas, among other reasons, for the following:


One who attains the first Rupa-Jhana is reborn in the first level of the Brahma/Rupa worlds. The Brahmas do not enjoy the sense pleasures (not even fine ones like the devas) because they don't have senses, they are made of pure light/bliss (Rupa or fine material body) and enjoy themselves.
Therefore, it would be illogical to say that one perceive senses in the First Rupa-Jhana because that would be contradictory to the nature of the attainment and where one goes after death.


Hope this was insightful, if not then someone who is more knowledgeable can correct me if I'm wrong.


With Metta.

[Coëmgenu]

Are you quite sure that rūpadhātu devas don't have six senses? Is this from a sutta, Visuddhimagga, etc.? Personal instruction? Visions of the deities? What is the source?

I know rūpadhātu devas to have physical bodies replete with 5 rūpa-derived sense organs. They experience the subtle "luminous rūpa" of the rūpadhātu instead of the coarse filthy rūpa of the kāmadhātu. Is this disputed in the Pāli Canon?

Arūpadhātu devas don't have the five rūpa-derived consciousnesses, AFAIK, but these are not devas of the rūpadhātu.

Is the matter otherwise in Theravāda?

[Ceisiwr]

Are you quite sure that rūpadhātu devas don't have six senses? Is this from a sutta, Visuddhimagga, etc.? Personal instruction? Visions of the deities? What is the source?

I know rūpadhātu devas to have physical bodies replete with 5 rūpa-derived sense organs. They experience the subtle "luminous rūpa" of the rūpadhātu instead of the coarse filthy rūpa of the kāmadhātu. Is this disputed in the Pāli Canon?

Arūpadhātu devas don't have the five rūpa-derived consciousnesses, AFAIK, but these are not devas of the rūpadhātu.

Is the matter otherwise in Theravāda?

Possibly based on suttas like DN15, although they still have the mind and the subtle form (which I would take as mental image).

“There are, Ānanda, beings who are diverse in body and diverse in perception, such as human beings, some gods, and some beings in the lower realms. This is the first station for consciousness.

“There are beings who are diverse in body but identical in perception, such as the gods of the Brahma-order who are generated through the first (jhāna). This is the second station for consciousness.

“There are beings who are identical in body but diverse in perception, such as the gods of streaming radiance. This is the third station for consciousness.

“There are beings who are identical in body and identical in perception, such as the gods of refulgent beauty. This is the fourth station for consciousness.

“There are beings who, through the complete surmounting of perceptions of material form, the passing away of perceptions of impingement, and non-attention to perceptions of diversity, (contemplating) ‘Space is infinite,’ arrive at the base of the infinity of space. This is the fifth station for consciousness.

“There are beings who, having completely surmounted the base of the infinity of space, (contemplating) ‘Consciousness is infinite,’ arrive at the base of the infinity of consciousness. This is the sixth station for consciousness.

“There are beings who, having completely surmounted the base of the infinity of consciousness, (contemplating) ‘There is nothing,’ arrive at the base of nothingness. This is the seventh station for consciousness.

“The base of non-percipient beings and, second, the base of neither perception nor non-perception—(these are the two bases).

“Therein, Ānanda, if one understands the first station for consciousness, that of beings who are diverse in body and diverse in perception, and if one understands its origin, its passing away, its satisfaction, its unsatisfactoriness, and the escape from it, is it proper for one to seek enjoyment in it?”

[Coëmgenu]

So, in Theravāda, the deities of the form heavens are constantly single-pointedly focused on nimittas?

[frank k]

...

Jhana lite is a bad term to use, for many reason.

I appreciate that you don't like the term because it makes your practice seem like Coke Zero, but I don't have any trouble using the language of others. I'll call it "diet jhāna" if my interlocutor is determined to call it that, doesn't change my opinions and stances concerning dhyāna in the least to call it embodied, light, soft dhyāna, or even waking/awake dhyāna.

You know what pejorative means?
By your same reasoning, I could call you a hinayanist or any number of bigoted terms to describe you and your dhyana in the spirit of adopting the language of whatever bigot I'm conversing with.
And that doesn't change my opinions and stances and so forth.

Reminder: this is a thread I started, but I can't prevent bigots from invading a public forum and spamming my thread. If you want to private message them or go start another thread to talk to them in their bigot speak, be my guest. But as the host of this thread, I would ask that people not use pejorative terms to differentiate the various understandings of 'jhana'.

What exactly do you know about my practice?
For the record, I've spent over 10 years practicing VRJ (vism. "jhana"), I can do jhana according to how the Buddha taught in the suttas (that is my preference), and I have had plenty of experience with formless samadhi (percipient, able to discern and think, not in frozen stupor), a little bit of experience with predetermined emergence from a frozen stupor, as well as a little bit of exploration with kasina.

It's not a matter of which definition of jhana is more difficult, it's a question of coherence and correct interpretation of what the Buddha described in the EBT. If you have to use a crooked dictionary to make some of the cherry picked EBT suttas comprehensible, while leaving most of the sutta passages on jhana incoherent (as a result of the crooked dictionary), it probably isn't model the Buddha was describing.

[Ceisiwr]

For the record, I've spent over 10 years practicing VRJ (vism. "jhana"), I can do jhana according to how the Buddha taught in the suttas (that is my preference), and I have had plenty of experience with formless samadhi (percipient, able to discern and think, not in frozen stupor), a little bit of experience with predetermined emergence from a frozen stupor, as well as a little bit of exploration with kasina.

Those are some lofty and difficult to achieve attainments you are claiming for yourself there.

[Coëmgenu]

Well, I'm fine with being flexible with language. I'll stop referring to it as "lite" if you consider it intolerably bigoted. I tolerate it being called lite, fake, various other things, because those words don't change what I consider to be the truth of the matter. I am used to people constantly incompetently dumping on Mahāyāna. Perhaps I'm just desensitized.

[Ceisiwr]

So, in Theravāda, the deities of the form heavens are constantly single-pointedly focused on nimittas?

Not just Theravāda, since this passage has parallels. There might be disagreement if it is nimittas that they are focused upon though.