Is there consciousness in Nirodha Samāpatti?

[rhinoceroshorn]

Hello my friends. Help me understand this part of MN43:

"When someone dies, their physical, verbal, and mental processes have ceased and stilled; their vitality is spent; their warmth is dissipated; and their faculties have disintegrated. When a mendicant has attained the cessation of perception and feeling, their physical, verbal, and mental processes have ceased and stilled. But their vitality is not spent; their warmth is not dissipated; and their faculties are very clear. That’s the difference between someone who has passed away and a mendicant who has attained the cessation of perception and feeling.”

https://suttacentral.net/mn43/en/sujato

What does it mean in practical terms? One in Nirodha Samapatti ceased feelings and perceptions, but is also conscious of this state, since the 5 senses are "clear"?

[rhinoceroshorn]

Another question: can one exit NS at will?
Some sources say you must predetermine the exit time during the 8th jhāna. How does this work?

[confusedlayman]

Hello my friends. Help me understand this part of MN43:

"When someone dies, their physical, verbal, and mental processes have ceased and stilled; their vitality is spent; their warmth is dissipated; and their faculties have disintegrated. When a mendicant has attained the cessation of perception and feeling, their physical, verbal, and mental processes have ceased and stilled. But their vitality is not spent; their warmth is not dissipated; and their faculties are very clear. That’s the difference between someone who has passed away and a mendicant who has attained the cessation of perception and feeling.”

https://suttacentral.net/mn43/en/sujato

What does it mean in practical terms? One in Nirodha Samapatti ceased feelings and perceptions, but is also conscious of this state, since the 5 senses are "clear"?

no concious if im nt wrong sir

[rhinoceroshorn]

Hello my friends. Help me understand this part of MN43:

"When someone dies, their physical, verbal, and mental processes have ceased and stilled; their vitality is spent; their warmth is dissipated; and their faculties have disintegrated. When a mendicant has attained the cessation of perception and feeling, their physical, verbal, and mental processes have ceased and stilled. But their vitality is not spent; their warmth is not dissipated; and their faculties are very clear. That’s the difference between someone who has passed away and a mendicant who has attained the cessation of perception and feeling.”

https://suttacentral.net/mn43/en/sujato

What does it mean in practical terms? One in Nirodha Samapatti ceased feelings and perceptions, but is also conscious of this state, since the 5 senses are "clear"?

no concious if im nt wrong sir

Please provide sutta, commentary, or direct experience account.
How can faculties be clear and you are unconscious at the same time?

[confusedlayman]

I dont know im not clear im actuaally not that stage..

Im not advance practitoner

[rhinoceroshorn]

I dont know im not clear im actuaally not that stage..

Im not advance practitoner

It's fine, my friend.
I have been reading some threads and this seems to be a confusing topic.

DooDoot made the same question some time ago:
https://dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=32111

Venerable Dhammanando corrected a translation about this some time ago...

The mental faculties are very clear.]

Bad translation. If it meant the mental faculty (manindriya) then it would be singular. As indriyāni paribhinnāni is plural, it is the five sense-faculties that are clear.

Bhikkhu Bodhi's endnote:

• MA says that the faculties during the ordinary course of life, being impinged upon by sense objects, are afflicted and soiled like a mirror set up at a crossroads; but the faculties of one in cessation become exceptionally clear like a mirror placed in a case and deposited in a box.

Nirodha seems to be a very obscure "jhāna". Since it can only be accessed by anāgāmis and arahatas, it's reasonable the uncertainty about it. There are not many of them, let alone many of them who discuss about this openly.

[Zom]

Nirodha seems to be a very obscure "jhāna".

Nirodha is actual real nibbana. Consciousness ends there, and because it ends, one becomes anagami or arahant after he achieved that.

[Lucas Oliveira]

I recently read a comment on a quote from Veros 45 from Tao Te Ching ..

I think it helps us understand a little bit about Nibbana ..

Verse 45

Transparency and Quietude act Governing under Heaven

Under heaven it means a manifested world; and Transparency and Quietude correspond, respectively, to Wú Jí and Tài Jí. In the manifested world, the yin yáng polarities act separately, but complementary and not excluding, generating life; in Tài Jí or Unidade, the two polarities are solidly united; and in Wú Jí, where there are no manifestations, the polarities also cease to exist: after uniting in Tái Jí, they change levels and recover characteristics of non-existence, prior to the creation of all manifestations.

Tao Te Ching
Translation and Commentary - Wu Jyh Cherng

[cappuccino]

Nirodha seems to be a very obscure "jhāna".

Nirodha is actual real nibbana. Consciousness ends there,

Nirvana means coolness


like rice that has cooled


(not annihilation)

[cappuccino]

from Tao Te Ching

not necessarily from Laozi

[rhinoceroshorn]

Nirodha seems to be a very obscure "jhāna".

Nirodha is actual real nibbana. Consciousness ends there, and because it ends, one becomes anagami or arahant after he achieved that.

Please explain how faculties are clear in Nirodha without consciousness.

[rhinoceroshorn]

When a mendicant has attained the cessation of perception and feeling, their physical, verbal, and mental processes have ceased and stilled. But their vitality is not spent; their warmth is not dissipated; and their faculties are very clear.
Yo cāyaṃ bhikkhu saññāvedayitanirodhaṃ samāpanno tassapi kāyasaṅkhārā niruddhā paṭippassaddhā, vacīsaṅkhārā niruddhā paṭippassaddhā, cittasaṅkhārā niruddhā paṭippassaddhā, āyu na parikkhīṇo, usmā
avūpasantā, indriyāni vippasannāni.

vippasanna

pp. of vippasīdati very clear; pure; bright.

I believe ani is the plural suffix of neutral words.

https://suttacentral.net/define/vippasanna

[Pondera]

Nirodha Samapatti is the cessation of perception and feeling. Not the cessation of experience.

By definition, sense consciousness (as a technical term) has ceased.

This means contact with sense objects is not the case. However the faculties remain (they simply don’t register feeling or perception).

Can one come out at will? In my experience, yes.

[rhinoceroshorn]

Nirodha Samapatti is the cessation of perception and feeling. Not the cessation of experience.

By definition, sense consciousness (as a technical term) has ceased.

This means contact with sense objects is not the case. However the faculties remain (they simply don’t register feeling or perception).

Can one come out at will? In my experience, yes.

Thank you, Pondera! This was what I needed to know!

Have you tried to inflict any pain in yourself in NS (not in, but something planned)? You can't feel it, right? You can't move or think, right? It's like turning into a tree, right?

[Pondera]

Nirodha Samapatti is the cessation of perception and feeling. Not the cessation of experience.

By definition, sense consciousness (as a technical term) has ceased.

This means contact with sense objects is not the case. However the faculties remain (they simply don’t register feeling or perception).

Can one come out at will? In my experience, yes.

Thank you, Pondera! This was what I needed to know!

Have you tried to inflict any pain in yourself in NS (not in, but something planned)? You can't feel it, right? You can't move or think, right? It's like turning into a tree, right?

Well. Let me explain. I suffered intense psychosomatic pain for four years before being released from that and starting a journey into concentration which lasted four months and culminated in my experience of Unbinding.

I spent about half an hour in Unbinding before returning to the world of sense.

If you imagine that your body is really just old karma, the Unbinding of that karma is how we refer to “the cessation of feeling”. In fact you witness your whole body’s karmic fabrication unwind and loosen and eventually unbind. Feeling stops. All perception of “body” is released.

So, although I didn’t inflict any pain on my “body” - there was no “body” to really speak of.

Like a “tree”? Not really. More like a single point in space. You are aware of a few things in Nirodha Samapatti. You are aware that the experience is boundless; you are aware that it is pure and unsullied by perception and feeling; and you are aware that there is no time.

You can stay there as long as you want. After half an hour (conventionally speaking) I decided to draw the infinite potential surrounding me into my mind made body. That was, essentially, the act of will power which ultimately led me back into the sphere of perception and feeling.

I’ve experienced this ONCE. And although I’m aware of the path to follow in order to arrive at that destination again; It is a gradual path which I am currently developing.

Haven’t got back to that place quite yet.