“Bhante mentioned that when a person becomes an arahant, even their traumas disappear. For instance, someone who is claustrophobic , fears animals, or has experienced personal traumas such as rape and intimidation—along with paranoia and various fears—will no longer experience these issues at the arahant stage. Do you agree with this perspective?”
- It is hard to say. We can only guess. It is possible that memories of trauma may not bother them.
______
” I ask because there are cases where some attitudes seem to persist even among arahants. For example, there was an arahant who spoke inappropriately to others; I can’t recall his name or story. “
- It was Ven. Pilindavaccha: “Pilindavaccha Sutta (Ud 3.6).”
_____
“If I am not mistaken only the Lord Buddha is completely devoid of all idiosyncrasies. “
- Yes. That is correct.
_______
“Bhante also said that taste is a useless sense. Is that true for science?”
- I don’t think that is entirely correct. Our bodies are made to provide that “saññā.” As we have discussed, taste is a “saññā.” However, it is not discussed that way in the suttas because Abhidhamma was not developed during the Buddha’s time. Per Abhidhamma, only “bodily vedanā” are real vedanā. But in the suttas, saññā and vedanā are clumped together as “vedanā.”
- Even Arahants experience “manāpa/amanāpa” or a sense of “like/dislike” generated by that “distorted saññā.” See “Nibbānadhātu Sutta (Iti 44)“: “Tassa tiṭṭhanteva pañcindriyāni yesaṁ avighātattā manāpāmanāpaṁ (“manāpa/amanāpa“) paccanubhoti, sukhadukkhaṁ paṭisaṁvedeti.” The English translation there is correct: “Their five sense faculties still remain. So long as their senses have not gone they continue to experience the agreeable and disagreeable, to feel pleasure and pain.” Also, note that “sukhadukkha” (sukha and dukkha) means “pleasure and pain,” and those are the genuine vedanā per Abhidhamma. Agreeable and disagreeable (“like/dislike”) arise due to saññā. In this sutta, at least those are separated, as in Abhidhamma.
