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1. Sometimes, analyzing things in too much detail can lead to more questions than answers.
- I prefer to resolve critical issues as much as with the Sutta Pitaka and the critical concepts of the Abhidhamma Pitaka.
- The Vinaya Pitaka is mainly on issues with Vinaya (disciplinary) rules and incidents that led to specific Vinaya rules. Many of those accounts can provide additional information, but they are not critical.
- I never look at Commentaries outside the Tipitaka. I resort to even the Tipitaka Commentaries only if necessary.
- However, I am not saying to avoid consulting Tipitaka Commentaries.
2. I think we can get a good understanding of various types of “vipallasa” mostly with the aid of the Sutta Pitaka.
- Understanding “sanna vipallasa” (arising due to “distorted sanna“) can resolve many issues. It helps with the other types of vipallasa too.
- I prefer to discuss the posts that have been published rather than trying to analyze passages from the Commentaries.
- If there are issues that are contradictory or unclear or need further clarification, please ask specific questions by pointing to a post and specific bullet numbers.
- However, if you feel strongly about a specific passage in a Commentary, I can take a look.
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Dosakkhayo wrote: “I may be wrong, but I think we should consider the possibility that sīlabbatupādāna is not the same as bhavupādāna.”
- Of course, those are two are different. “Silabbata upadana” means to “adhere to various anariya techniques to enjoy kama or jhanic pleasures (may be even believing they lead to Nibbana.) “Bhava upadana” means “craving a certain type of existence” hoping that would lead to permanent happiness.
- Did I say in a post they are the same? If they are the same, there is no need to list them as two categories.
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Yes. Our senses are amenable to only the human and animal realms.
- Many things about the other 29 realms are not amenable to our limited senses.
- While it is good to be aware of such phenomena, we should not spend too much time investigating them—still, these “nuggets” point out the complexity of the broader world of 31 realms.
Scientists are discovering many “strange phenomena” even within the animal realm. In many cases, animals have better or different sense capabilities.
- The sensory faculties of humans or animals (and in other realms) are devised by kammic energy to according the gati that gave rise to each birth.
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I am not sure discussing this issue helps cultivate the path.
- The Buddha repeatedly mentioned the following: “I only teach about suffering, how it arises, and how it can be overcome.”
- Unless someone can show how this discussion about time is related to the above statement, I don’t even want to think about this issue.
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Thank you, Dosakhayo, for the reference!
- It helps to quote the Tipitaka reference whenever we can (especially in a case like this, which can never be confirmed otherwise; some points can be confirmed by MUNDANE logic or reasoning, but this is an exception.)
P.S. We can learn a lot by contemplating what is embedded in this “information nugget.”
- This gives an idea of how “fine” or “subtle” the “body of a Deva” is.
- If 60 Devas can comfortably stay inside the space of a hole in a needle, we can imagine how small an entity it is (in mundane physical terms, we are used to).
- Listening does not REQUIRE dense physical ears. When outside a physical human body, a gandhabba hears similarly, just using the “sota pasada rupa.” Seeing is the same way.
- The dense physical body REQUIRED only for physical touching, tasting, and smelling. But then we have to endure the suffering that comes with it: injuries, sicknesses like cancer, body aches, etc.
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Thank you, Gad, for posting that sutta.
- The reason that many Devas visited the ‘human world” during the time of the Buddha was to learn Dhamma from the Buddha. There is no compelling reason for them to visit these days. (However, Waharaka Thero mentioned in a discourse that he occasionally had some evidence for such a visit.) Learning from a Buddha is a rare event.
- I read somewhere that an unimaginable number of Devas listened to the first sutta that the Buddha delivered. I remember the quotation (but not the source): “There were 60 Devas packed into a space comparable to the hole in a needle.” Since Devas have very fine bodies, that is not a crowded space for them!
- Of course, there were only five humans there, the five ascetics. While only Ven. Kondanna attained the Sotapanna stage that night, a vast number of Devas and Brahmas attained various magga phala.
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Excellent observation!
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Those are two different yet related phenomena.
1. The first one is more related to vaci sankhara (vitakka/vicara.)
- Before speaking or moving the body, we “talk to ourselves” about it, i.e., “the mind thinks about it” and even deliberate various aspects like “Should I say something?”, “Is it appropriate?” etc.
- But how much one deliberates is relative. Some people think incessantly about whether to do something or say something. But there are others who just “go with the flow.”
- That lady is in the second category. She does not even realize that she thinks before saying, writing, or doing things.
2. The second category is a more established “field of investigation.” See “Aphantasia.”
- The opposite of aphantasia is phantasia or “to fantasize.” Again, some people spend hours fantasizing about various expectations or “reliving past events” by recalling those events. They have vivid images arising in their minds.
- You can test your ability to make “imageries” in your mind. Close your eyes and try to imagine a red apple in your mind. Some can, and some cannot. Some people can go through past experiences in vivid detail (even with color).
- We have discussed a similar and related phenomenon of HSAM: “Recent Evidence for Unbroken Memory Records (HSAM).”
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In the suttas, what is mentioned in most cases is that “a certain Deva came to see the Buddha, and the light of that Deva lighted up the vicinity of Jetavanaramaya.”
- See, for example, “Oghataraṇa Sutta (SN 1.1)“: “Then, late at night, a glorious deity, lighting up the entire Jeta’s Grove, went up to the Buddha, bowed, stood to one side, and said to him,…”
I have not seen a sutta specifically state that people saw a Deva‘s body.
- However, if they want to, they can “make up a dense body for the humans to see them.”
- There is a sutta that says the following. Once, a Deva came to see the Buddha and “could not balance his subtle, almost weightless body and was having a hard time standing up.” So, the Buddha asked the Deva to “make up a dense body so that he could stand firm.” I don’t recall the name of the sutta.
By the way, there are many suttas, roughly from SN 1.1 (above sutta) to SN 6.10, that describe the visits of various Devas and Brahmas to see and discuss dhamma concepts with the Buddha.
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It probably was not an anantariya kamma.
- It is likely that Matthakundali was at the end of his human bhava.
- Just because he died at an early age, that does not rule out kammic energy being exhausted. Even though human bhava usually lasts many thousands of years, it is not possible to know when it will end.
- I know of a young person who was in good health and fell dead while playing. He just fell dead instantly. I also had an aunt who also fell dead while opening a fridge! In both cases, they died before hitting the ground.
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These questions can be answered only by a Buddha.
- The bottom line is that the physical body of even an Arahant is subject to any kind of kamma vipaka. In the ulmate sense, there is no “permanent identity” attached to any physical body. A physical body (and the mental body) evolves according to Paticca Samuppada.
- As we know, Ven. Moggallana was beaten to death, and the Buddha suffered from backaches and had an injury, too.
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Yes. There are various types of kamma vipaka. Some are very rare:
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1. While it is good to have a general understanding of kamma vipāka, that is a subject fully amenable to the mind of a Buddha.
- The Buddha mentioned four things that are fully amenable only to the mind of a Buddha. They should not be thought about incessantly; anyone who tries to think about them in detail will only get frustrated.”
- See “Acinteyya Sutta (AN 4.77)“: “Kamma vipāko, bhikkhave, acinteyyo, na cintetabbo.”
2. Another point is the following. While the generic meaning of “kamma” is an “action/deed,” in Buddha Dhamma, it specifically means a “deed done with a defiled mind.”
- Walking to the kitchen to get a glass of water is a kamma in the generic sense, but that is not a kamma discussed by the Buddha.
- There is nothing to worry about the first, generic kind. We need to worry about the types of kamma done with lobha, dosa, and moha in mind.
- It is pretty apparent what types of kamma need to be avoided. We also have a good idea about which types of kamma are stronger than others. That is enough to avoid “getting into trouble.”
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1. Those steps describe the prevalent mindset. That is how most people think.
- However, there is a better approach described by the Buddha.
2. In Buddha’s perspective, the goal is to “cool the mind” (preventing it from getting “heated” via lobha, dosa, and moha.)
- The approach is not only to ignore insults but also to have genuine “mettā” for that person.
- Think about this: 99.9999% of people today do not understand how suffering arises. The only way they know of responding to insults is to “pay back the same way.”
- But we know such responses will only take our minds away from Nibbāna and toward more suffering.
- Many concepts that need to be contemplated are embedded in the third chart from the current post, “Purāna and Nava Kamma – Sequence of Kamma Generation.” (I could not get the chart to appear here. But you should carefully examine it. a mind tends to move away from Nibbāna (represented by the diamond in the chart.) It takes a real effort to resist “going with the flow,” but the benefits are enormous.)
3. If one lives that mindset, many of these issues will go away over time. It is not going to happen in a day or two. It may take a few months, at least.
- But I have personally verified/experienced it over the past ten years.
- “Dhamma will guide and protect one who lives by Dhamma” (”Dhammo ha ve rakkhati Dhammacāri.”)
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