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Hi Lal,
When underlying tendencies activate, do you reckon this to be vaci and kaya sankhara or mano sankhara? I personally think it are not really verbal thoughts.
Oke, thanks.
My feeling says it is especially the delight seeking/seeing activity- an orientation on something which lies in the future, a focus on the future-, from which a future (renewed existence) is created. Delight seeking feeds the process of becoming. Seeking delight in sense pleasures, in existence and in not to exist anymore and be freed of suffering.
The second noble truth, is, i think especially about this seeking delight as the most fundamental cause for renewed existence. Hate is secundary and arises when ones delight seeking activity is blocked/frustrated.
In that sense i think craving is not bad as cause. Craving as in delight seeking.
I wanted to share some thoughts with you:
What i understand from MN44 which deals with sakkaya ditthi and from SN22.89, sakkaya ditthi’s are self views related to a certain khandha. For example, the view can arise ‘i am this body’ while one stands for the mirror. Or the view might arise, ‘this pain is mine’ while pain arises or…’the pain is in me’. I think one might say that sakkaya ditthi’s arises in relation to a certain experience at a certain moment.
Asmi mana is not related to a specific experience or khandha, but the perception of Me relates to all khandha’s. In SN22.89 Khemaka explains this by illustrating that the scent of a flower does not relate to a particular part of the flower. In the same way the scent of subject in the mind, the perception of Me, the colour of personal existence, does not relate specifically to one khandha but to all.
Do you agree?
Lal said: “But unless one really understands that there is no “experiencer” involved, it is not possible to stop births even in the apayas”.
I think the sutta’s teach that understanding there is no experiencer involved is only the understanding of the arahant. Even sotapanna’s have the sanna of an experiencer who is involved in seeing, hearing, thinking, feeling, etc.
When i read those comments by Nina van Gorkom my impression from that is that one never comes to a point of really uprooting defilements unless Nibbana is experienced with magga citta. Only magga citta can do the uprooting. So, my impression is: one can weaken defilements and anusaya but not really uproot them when one has no direct experience of Nibbana. Experiencing Nibbana is a necessary condition to uproot then, and they will never arise again.
That is what i understand from those comments of Nina van Gorkom.Just to show to what i am refering too:
Nina van Gorkom says: “Only lokuttara kusala cittas, magga-cittas, eradicate the
latent tendencies of defilements”. In Abhidhamma in Daily Life, page 157“Only the magga-citta eradicates defilements; the phala-citta, which also
experiences nibbana, is vipaka, result of the magga-citta. (page 161)“Not all defilements can be eradicated by the magga-citta of the first stage of enlightenment. As we have seen, there are four stages of enlightenment (the stages of the sotapanna, the sakadagami, the anagam1 and the arahat), and for each of these stages there is a magga-citta which experiences nibbana and eradicates defilements”. Page 161
I do not argue the use of weakening defilements, and letting them go while they arise, but it seems that this cannot lead to their uprooting. On that point 1 would like some clarificaton. It seems that only te magga citta that experiences Nibbana can uproot defilements.
I wanted to aks for clarification:
It is said by some that defilements and also anusaya can only be eradicated by the magga-citta, for example this is said by Nina van Gorkom who writes a lot about Abhidhamma.
Does this also mean that one can not get rid of defilements and anusaya by not feeding them anymore? Maybe they will weaken by not feeding it anymore but they cannot be uprooted this way? So we can be mindfull of the arising of lust for sense pleausures, for example, let them go while they arise, not feed them, know the danger in it, but this cannot uproot them? Lust for sense pleasure will not really disappear this way? (lust for sense-pleaure as example).
Thanks for the post Lal.
I think it is mentioned before but i find SN22.89 very illustrative in regard to this topic.
I think it illustrates the difference between loosing sakkaya ditthi and still have some subtle attachment to what one experiences due to a residual longing and conceit “I am” in regard to those experiences.
In the sutta Khemaka seems to express that, although, he has lost the belief or view “I am those painful feelings” and “those painful feeling are mine“, he still seems to have some kind of sense of Me in regard to those painful feeling. This seems to suggest that there still is some kind of subtle non-intellectual, very deep-rooted proces of attachement in the mind after loosing sakkaya ditthi.
And this seems to imply that the painful feelings are for Khemaka an affliction, a burden, because there is still subtle attachment via asmi mana.So there remains for a very long time a scent of subject/me in the mind which operates like a subtle attachement mechanism to what is being experienced.
At least, that’s how i understand it. Please correct me if i a wrong.
Hi Lal,
From reading the posts it seems dhamma can also come from the mind while produced in javana citta? Can those dhamma that are created in javana citta’s contact mana indriya?
I think it needs some attention to explain how it is possible that the experiencing or sensing happens around the heart-region, while we clearly experience all kind of things like emotions, memories, thought in our head? It is like the head/brain does not only detect but also experiences/senses things. Of maybe the mind is overlapping the brain region?
Thanks Lal,
Please correct me i am wrong:
The ‘input’ of the 5 pasada rupa are signals from the brain. Those signals from the brain are results of processed sensory data from the outside world coming trough the physical eye, ear, tongue, nose and body. When texts mention the senses of eye, ear, etc not the physical senses are meant but the five pasada rupa’s.
The mana indriya can ‘communicate’ immediately with hadaya vatthu, that does not go via a pasada rupa. The input of mana indriya are called dhamma or mana rupa.
-Where do those dhamma come from that are detected by the mana indriya? Do they come from the brain or do they come from the mind?
-Do i understand it correctly, that when there is no mana indriya in a gandhabba that has left the body, there are also no memories in this gandhabba? Or are only certain memories not present?
(I notice i find it hard to see that mana indriya does not experience, right? It only detects. This is not easy to see because so much of our life is experienced of happening in our head).
Hi All,
It seems the mana indriya is located in the brain.
My question is, when it is part of the brain, does it not cease to exist when the brain ceases to exist? This does not seem logic to me. So, the question is, in what way is mana indriya relaled to the brain?
kind regards,
SiebeHi All,
Samyutta Nikāya 31 is called gandhabba-samyutta.
It deals with ‘deva’s of the gandhabba order‘. About them it is said in the first sutta of this part of the Nikāya:
“And what, bhikkhus, are the devas of the gandhabba order?
There are, bhikkhus, devas dwelling in fragrant roots, devas dwelling in fragrant heartwood, devas dwelling in fragrant softwood, devas dwelling in fragrant bark, devas dwelling in fragrant shoots, devas dwelling in fragrant leaves, devas dweliing in fragrant flowers, devas dwelling in fragrant fruits, devas dwelling in fragrant sap, and devas dwelling in fragrant scents. “These, bhikkhus, are called the devas of the gandhabba order.”They seem to be connected to plants/trees, and seem to be connected to scent.
kind regards,
SiebeHi Lal,
I have always understood Nibbana is asankhata. Does this not also mean that it has no beginning? It does not arise at any moment?
AN3.47 explains that the charateristic of the unconditioned are opposite to the conditioned, i.e. ..”no arising is evident, no vanishing is evident, and no change while persisting is evident”. (translation bhikkhu Sujato)
I have asked another question but maybe this is lost in the thread and unseen. Can you please answer this? The question: does the concept of lifestream in essence not refer to PS?
