I'll try and trim this as much as possible
Ceisiwr wrote: ↑Sat Mar 13, 2021 12:11 am
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1. Jhana is not necessary for Nibbana, only discernment.
Disagree.
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Good. me too
2. Jhana is necessary but not formless attainments.
Agree.
Kindof. I'll explain after I quote you addressing view number 4.
3. Specifically, the fourth jhana is necessary, but not the formless attainments.
Disagree. Awakening can occur with just the 1st Jhāna.
This requires some more explanation. Are we talking about the attainment of arahantship or the attainment of nibbana in general? If we are talking about the former, I'm going to hold the view that mastery of all four jhanas is a requisite of attaining arahantship, but not to attaining nibbana.
4. Jhana AND the formless attainments are necessary and the formless attainments are to be grouped with the process of destroying the asavas (specifically the asava of becoming) often paired with the stock description of three or six higher knowledges at the completion of training
Disagree.
This is the major issue of contention, and it seems that Pulsar wishes us to continue this discussion elsewhere, which I'm OK with, but it's happening here right now. Pulsar, if you are reading this and wish for this discussion to go elsewhere, please point me in the right direction.
Now I commented on your post about the formless attainments (sorry I don't know how to link properly) stating that the way the Buddha taught may have been influenced by the specific tendencies of his students.
That being said, I have to pose a few hypothetical questions: (keep in mind I'm referring to arahantship unless otherwise noted)
If someone already has no desire for non-being, would it be necessary to attain the formless attainments, being that they are annihilationist in nature? I don't know, but I'm starting to think not. It seems reasonable to me to be able to destroy the asava of sensuality through jhana and the asava of becoming (not swaying to the side of non-becoming) through attainment of the fourth jhana and subsequent direction of the mind.
What use do they have then? Again, I'm going back to my point that the Buddha enumerated three types of becoming: becoming in the sense realm, the form realm, and the formless realm. By directly experiencing all of them, one again runs the entire gamut of existence and sees firsthand their conditioned and impermanent nature.
5. Formless attainment can be had without jhana.
On the fence on this one. Check out AN 8.63, which links the 4 brahmavihārās and the Jhānā into one overall mode of practice. In another sutta the brahmavihārās are said to culminate in the formless:
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AN 8.63 reminds me very much of a certain Bhante Vimalaramsi who specializes in brahmaviharas.
This is a good segue into the debate about whether metta bhavana can be considered jhana. I think so, you might disagree with me, but I don't really want to get into that too much, because I don't think it matters. From what I've read and practiced over the years, the way the Dhamma was orriginally taught was not meant to be so rigid and standardized but rather more tailored to individuals. The type of discussion we're engaged in here probably has more value in the realm of teaching others than it does in our own practice of meditation.
AN 8.63 to me is a good example of this. I have no idea why it was taught this way. I think from this alone you could soundly argue that brahmaviharas are indeed jhana, and that they can lead directly to the formless and then nibbana. That sounds fine, but it's rather different than how it's taught elsewhere. Does that mean it's wrong? Does not mean the canon is not internally consistent? No, I think it just means the Buddha gave someone a way of understanding the practice that he thought was best for them in their particular circumstance.
In this modern day as we've seen clearly, it really helps us to study the context of the suttas, what came before and after and what spurred on an utterance of the Buddha, especially when many of us don't have teachers to show us a way that works for us. We have to comb through this vast Pali Canon, talk to others, study Pali even and that's still often not enough.
This brings me back to the question of whether or not the formless attainments are necessary, and I think maybe you're right, maybe they aren't. I still choose to include them in my practice for the sake of thoroughness and for all the other reasons I've outlined above. I'm a meditator and I think including the formless attainments is the most surefire way that would probably work for someone like me, while also admitting that I don't possess the confidence that they aren't necessary (for me anyways) required to actually omit them.
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Needless to say, it is an interesting topic. I'm still currently pretty wedded to the idea however that Āḷāra Kālāma & Uddaka Rāmaputta were annihilationists, that the Buddha began his career as one and that the formless are a valid option for liberation.
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I agree, the evidence definitely points to the Buddha being an annihilationist prior to his Enlightenment.