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Christian may have attained the jhanas and may be at or close to the anagami stage. This may be because he practiced jhanas in his more recent lives.
For the vast majority of lay people, focusing on jhanas may be an unnecessary hinder. I’d like to very briefly share my experience with that vast majority here, and then speculate on the possible hindrances for us of focusing on the jhanas.
I have not attained any jhanas, and I hope that I am at or near the sotapanna anugami stage.
Finding this website was like winning the jackpot for me. Since coming here, I can summarize my “practice” as:
(1) Studying the Buddha’s big picture: the wider world of 31 realms.
(2) Studying and overcoming the 10 types of miccha ditthi.
(3) Cultivating anicca sanna.Personally, I am certain of one thing: I no longer have any of the 10 types of miccha ditthi. This does 2 wonderful things:
(1) It makes it easier to abstain from the BIG 8 consistently. The BIG 8 is discussed in the Meditation (bhavana) section.
When you learn of the apayā and the law of kamma, and are convinced of the rebirth process, you get quite motivated to abstain from the things that will land you there!
(2) It calms the mind and helps it absorb Dhamma concepts better.
There were times when I was just binge reading the posts and got absorbed in them because concepts were just clicking in the mind — naturally. It brings a natural joy — not piti sukkha since I was not in a jhana, but probably niramisa sukha.
Meanwhile, in observing the change in my personal life, I am almost certain that lobha has reduced to raga, and it is quite a relief. At the same time, I hope that dosa has reduced to patigha, and moha to avijja, but I am not sure of that.
My speculations of possible hindrances about focusing on the jhanas.
(1) It is hard!
Even to get to anariya jhanas one needs to live a secluded life. In daily life in an American metropolis, with a daily job and household responsibilities, social responsibilities, it’s next to impossible.(2) One may go astray, depending how or from whom one learns jhanas.
A few prominent jhanas teachers come to mind:- Leigh Brasington and Tina Rasmussen, who studied with Pa Auk Sayadaw
- Ayya Khema
I am quite reluctant to say what I am about to say about people who have attained jhanas, but I do not want to make vague claims. If you research these teachers, you will see in their teachings some contradictions with what we learn here:
(1)
Practice Samatha bhavana first to calm the mind (with breath or kasina) to bring about jhanas.(2)
Stopping thinking. We know that this is dangerous, as Lal pointed out in the Meditation section.(3)
They take anapanasati to be breath meditation.I hope this helps with those in a similar situation as mine.
Best,
LangTripleGemStudent,
by “transcendental” kusala-mula p.s., you may have meant puñña kriyā. Lal explained puñña kriyā in the post I referenced.
An arahant still does puñña kriyā, but not kusala kamma, since as Lal explained, there are no more defilements to be removed. puñña kriyā is possibly what you were trying to convey.
Lang
My understanding is that there is no kamma vinnana in an arahant. kamma vinnana is defiled consciousness; an arahant has only vipaka vinnana.
Like you said, an arahant still engages in kusala sankhara, which does not bring kamma vinnana.
Sankhara that bring kamma vinnana are apunnabhi sankhara, punnabhi sankhara, anenjabhi sankhara, ie all abhisankhara. An arahant engages in none of those.
In the following post, Lal explained why an arahant does not generate any kamma vinnana.
Mōha/Avijjā and Vipāka Viññāṇa/Kamma Viññāṇa
Best,
LangDipo,
“But, is arammana a condition, a state, a cause? … Is arammana a constituent element of one’s kammic profile?”
Is it necessary to dissect the concept to this level? It may not be helpful, and you may get lost in over intellectualizing things.
Numerous ārammaṇa come during waking hours. I was reading your post before writing this, so your post was an ārammaṇa for me at that time. Before that, I was reading a work email, so that work email was an ārammaṇa, etc., etc.
Do we need to get any deeper than this?
The crucial point is whether an ārammaṇa triggers defilements in the mind — such as lobha, dosa, moha. If it does then we strive to stop those defilements and cultivate the opposite qualities. That is meditation (bhavana), and is a different subject.
“Basically, let’s assume that a persons last thought is both the end and the starting point (citta vithi) and cuti patisandhi.
What comes next?”
Lal explained that, and it does sound like you got it, although it also seems like you are trying to dive a bit deeper than necessary.
Manomaya kaya (also called gandhabba for humans and animals) = hadaya vatthu + pasada rūpā.
citta vithis flow in the manomaya kaya.
The last citta vithi of one life is followed by the first citta vithi of the next life. If the next life is in a different realm then it is a new set of hadaya vatthu + pasada rūpā.
If it is still in the same human bhava, then the same set of hadaya vatthu + pasada rūpā exits the dead body, and will be pulled into a womb in the future. In the mean time, citta vithis are still flowing.
In the abhidhamma section, Lal described gandhabba and citta vithis in details, including the name of each citta in a citta vithi.
If that’s the level of details you are after then check that out.
Best,
LangI have been reading the current series of post, the latest of which being:
Pañcupādānakkhandha – Attachment to One’s Experiences
Thank you very much for these posts, especially when it so happened that I was reviewing the “old” section on pañcakkhandha:
The Five Aggregates (Pañcakkhandha)
In this forum, Lal said:
2. When I die, my gandhabba (with hadaya vatthu) will come out of my physical body. Then it will wait in that gandhabba state until pulled into a matching womb, and I will be reborn to have a different human body.This is from the view point of the “building blocks” level of abhidhamma. In the transition, what actually arises is still pañcakkhandha, or perhaps pañcupādānakkhandha, correct?
Also, from #4 of the latest post mentioned above:
4. To put it another way, the alcoholic will automatically generate pañcupādānakkhandha which will have “samphassa-jā-vedanā” in his vedanākkhandha.
Along with vedanākkhandha, other khandā may be “contaminated” as well?
There is abhisaṅkhāra in saṅkhārakkhandha, kamma viññāṇa in viññāṇakkhandha, and (I guess) avijja in saññākkhandha?
Dipobhasadhamma, you kept asking about a “starting point”. It’s hard to know what you meant exactly, but in the context of pañcakkhandha, especially with the latest post, that “starting point” may be taken to be an ārammaṇa. An ārammaṇa triggers pañcakkhandha, and most likely in an average being, pañcupādānakkhandha.
This triggering works both in a current life and from one life to the next. In the latter case the ārammaṇa is called a nimitta I believe.
And even from the “building blocks” abhidhamma point of view, we can still view an ārammaṇa as a “starting point” of some sort. My understanding of the “data flow” of mental processes is:
An ārammaṇa makes contact with a sense organ, say the physical eyes.
The sense organ sends signals to the brain, via the nervous system.
The brain sends signals to the manomaya kaya (gandhabba), via another system (the “ray” system I believe).
The ghandabba processes the signals from the brain and sends back instructions — vaci sankhara, kaya sankhara.Best,
Langniramisa sukha is a sense of well-being, and not a feeling (vedana) as Lal explained.
Yet it is possible to feel (not sure if this is the right word) that it is getting more stable. On the other hand, it’s also possible to see it getting weaker.
Yash said:
“And my one more question is that during any meditation session, say Ariya Metta Bhavana, do we have to contemplate on the same concept for hours? The mind becomes tired by contemplating on the same concept. Please help me solve this issue”.
The Meditation section, if you haven’t gone through them, should give you guidance on this. I revisit this section time and time again.
Near the end of that series, Lal shared his own experience of his practice of Bojjhaṅga Bhāvanā and metta Bhāvanā:
Bojjhaṅga Bhāvanā and metta Bhāvanā
I look forward to any new experiences Lal will be sharing in this forum thread.
Best,
Lang“Pubbe dhammaṭṭhitiñāṇaṁ, pacchā nibbāne ñāṇan”
Is this yet another way to formulate the conditions for the sotapanna stage?
We have learned about the four conditions to the sotapanna stage:
Sappurisasaṃsevo
saddhammassavanaṃ
yonisomanasikāro
dhammānudhammappaṭipattiIn yet another post, we also learned of two more terms: Anuloma Khanti and Sammattaniyāma.
It looks like these are 3 different ways to express the same thing, correct?
Thank you,
LangHi,
I recently had a discussion with someone, and was about to bring up a few things about the jhanas when I saw this thread, so I’ll post them here. It may or may not be relevant to the topic at hand, but we may inadvertably stumble onto it, i.e. the critical role of the jhanas.
According to this person, THE way to liberation is via the 4 jhanas, or at least the 4 jhanas have to be there. This is what his teacher teaches, and the argument goes something like this (there are 2 aspects to it):
(1)
The noble eightfold path is the way to liberation.
samma samadhi is part of the path.
samma samadhi is defined as the 4 jhanas.For the last point, he said that was found in many places, one of which was the Magga-vibhanga Sutta.
I did a search and found one version of Pali and English (it has the verse Lal mentioned):
He said I should be able to find the definition of samma samadhi as the 4 jhanas in many other places, including the Mahasatipatthana Sutta.
(2) The story of the enlightenment of the Buddha
The argument here is something like this:
As a boy, the Bodhisatta attended a groundbreaking festival, and he inadvertently got into the 1st jhana under a rose apple tree.
Later on, in the quest for enlightenment he almost died from extreme asceticism.
When he regained his strength he remembered the experience under the rose apple tree and thought that that may be the way to liberation and used that as the starting point all over again.
Conclusion: whatever he experienced as a boy, when fully cultivated led to enlightenment.
Side note: this person did not make a distinction between anariya and ariya jhana, and also, the stages of absorptions the Bodhisatta learned from the 2 teachers were not the jhanas. Otherwise, the Bodhisatta would have remembered that experience, which was more recent, rather than the experience as a boy.
What are your thoughts on these?
I need a refresher course on the life of the Buddha, but the arguments are well structured. For point (2) above, I can only think of this: The Bodhisatta experienced an ariya jhana as a boy and learned anariya jhanas from the 2 teachers. But this also has a problem: it means that he was an anagami as a boy, which was not possible.
Finally, Christian, when you said you were studying “Early Buddhism”, what do you mean by that? Are you saying that in the Tipitaka some suttas are older than others, and that you are studying those suttas?
Best,
LangLal’s Note: I have given the name of the sutta for Lang’s link. Please also don’t forget to check the “Open link in a new tab” box when inserting the link. That will open the link in a new tab so that the reader can go back and forth between the post and the link.
I happen to have 3:
(1)
The Dhammapadaby Narada
This one has brief stories and notes to accompany the verses.
(2)
The Dhammapada
Verses and StoriesTranslated by Daw Mya Tin
This one is bigger because the stories are more extensive. The stories are in a different section of the book, so you’ll have to flip back and forth. There are also notes that accompany the verses.
(3)
The Dhammapada
The Buddha’s Path of WisdomTranslated by Buddharakkhita
The thinnest book of the 3: just the verses and translation.
Hope you’ll find one you like; there are so many out there, with some free pdf books online.
For me, I need as much background and context as possible, so I like (2) the most among the above 3.
Best,
LangOne follow up question:
#3
They were convinced that Dhamma required new re-formulations to meet the needs of new ages, new populations, and new social circumstances. So they set out to produce new literature, which ultimately came to be known as Mahāyāna Buddhism.#4
Within those heydays of Mahāyāna Buddhism, it corrupted Theravāda Buddhism in Sri Lanka and other Asian countries.These actions by early Mahayanists would be anantariya kamma, wouldn’t they? Creating schism in the Sangha.
“without applied and sustained thought” means without vitakka/vicāra.
… and per #3 of the post vitakka/vicāra are kāma and akusala thoughts
Hi all,
Hope everyone has had a good 2022.
I was reading the following post which mentions a nimitta, so I thought this is a good forum to ask a couple of questions about it.
Ye Dhammā Hetuppabhavā.. and Yam Kiñci Samudaya Dhammam..
#10 discusses the nimitta.
(1) Let’s say a person is dying, and a nimitta comes in. That is an arammana that comes into contact with the mano indriya, correct? The other 5 indriya must be in the process of shutting down at that time.
(2) Besides the dying moment, are images in dreams also considered a nimitta?
Now some questions beyond PD, since this reminds me of a conversation I had with someone some time ago.
I explained to this person the Buddha Dhamma I learned here. He then made the following point, something like this:
If what you are saying is correct, then for a puthujjana, his rebirth is random. For a puthujjana, at the dying moment, any kamma bija from an infinite past can come at random, and he does not have the ability to reject it.
A sotapanna can reject apayagami kamma bijā, and beings with higher magga phala can reject more and more kamma bijā, and the arahant can reject all.
To rephrase it using this post, a puthujjana cannot reject the first nimitta that comes in at the dying moment.
What are your thoughts on this argument? I know that it goes against the hetu pala principle, yet there seems to be a validity to it.
Best,
LangI went back to edit the post and removed the link. I had never edited a post before, and forgot that I could do it.
