Inisght in the Visuddhimagga

Exploring the Dhamma, as understood from the perspective of the ancient Pali commentaries.
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zan
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Joined: Sun Aug 28, 2016 1:57 pm

Inisght in the Visuddhimagga

Post by zan »

According to the Visuddhimagga is it possible to go through the stages of insight without relying on the ability to see matter rise and fall?

As far as I can tell, in reading the sections about this, seeing matter rise and fall seems to be the goal of specific mediations and one could do other meditations and progress through the knowledges without relying on a direct visual experience of matter at all.

Is this correct?

If this thread is too similar to my other I apologize and will delete it if need be. This one is specifically about the Visuddhimagga whereas the other is about all and any interpretation.
Assume all of my words on dhamma could be incorrect. Seek an arahant for truth.


"If we base ourselves on the Pali Nikayas, then we should be compelled to conclude that Buddhism is realistic. There is no explicit denial anywhere of the external world. Nor is there any positive evidence to show that the world is mind-made or simply a projection of subjective thoughts. That Buddhism recognizes the extra-mental existence of matter and the external world is clearly suggested by the texts. Throughout the discourses it is the language of realism that one encounters.
-Y. Karunadasa
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_anicca_
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Re: Inisght in the Visuddhimagga

Post by _anicca_ »

You cannot go through the vipassana nanas without seeing the rise and fall of things.

Anicca usually precedes dukkha and anatta as the first characteristic to be seen.
"A virtuous monk, Kotthita my friend, should attend in an appropriate way to the five clinging-aggregates as inconstant, stressful, a disease, a cancer, an arrow, painful, an affliction, alien, a dissolution, an emptiness, not-self."

:buddha1:

http://vipassanameditation.asia
paul
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Re: Inisght in the Visuddhimagga

Post by paul »

According to the Visuddhimagga is it possible to go through the stages of insight without relying on the ability to see matter rise and fall?

No that's an absolutely wrong interpretation, as the previous post said, understanding rise and fall/impermanence is the beginning stage of insight and it's deemed essential in the Visuddhimagga, for example Knowledge of Rise and Fall 1 and 11, chapters XX and XXI. However insight into impermanence does not necessitate knowledge at the subtle level, it can be achieved through knowledge of gross impermanence of the body and natural materiality (XX, The Material Septad). Impermanence in materiality is much easier to discern than that in mentality. People wonder why attention must be given to the decay (dissolution) of materiality, but there is an unseen unwholesome current which engenders a continuing preference for newness creating a hallucination. The characteristic of impermanence does not become apparent because when rise and fall are not given attention, it is concealed by continuity.
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