[TripleGemStudent]

Just would like to confirm that Arahants are still subjected to dukkha lakkhana; sankhara dukkha, viparinama dukkha, dukkha dukkha until their parinibbana? 

[Lal]

Living Arahants can experience only the “saririka vedana” in the physical body (like injuries, sicknesses, etc.) They do not experience “mental suffering.” 

• One could think of  Sankhara dukkha, viparinama dukkha, and dukkha dukkha as dukkha vedana.
• But they are also the CAUSES of future suffering. 
• Arahants do not engage in those and also are not affected by them.

There are many ways to think about Sankhara dukkha, viparinama dukkha, and dukkha dukkha.

• For example, when someone attaches to an arammana, they start doing sankhara with avijja. That leads to “heating the mind” while doing them and also leads to future suffering.
• Whenever one is engaged in “avijja paccaya sankhara,” that moves them away from the “pabhassara mind.” That is going backward or “viparinama.” 
• Whenever a mind attaches to a “disliked arammana,” that causes “heating or stress in mind.” But then they keep thinking about it and generate more “stressful thoughts,” and that leads to a second round of suffering based on the same arammana. P.S. The Buddha compared that to being pierced by a spear twice: “Salla Sutta (SN 36.6.)“
• I will write about those in upcoming posts. We can see various levels of suffering depending on how deep one goes!

2 users thanked author for this post.

TripleGemStudent, Jittananto

[TripleGemStudent]

Thank you very much Venerable sir for the pragmatic response. I require some additional time and further contemplation to write out a satisfactory response in this thread for feedback / evaluation. 

[Author]

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