|
|
|
| |
MN # 99
To Subha
Subha Sutta
Dhamma Talk by Bhante Vimalaramsi
19-Feb-07 JT2
1. THUS HAVE I HEARD. On one occasion the Blessed One was living at
Sāvatthi in Jeta's Grove, Anāthapiṇḍika's Park.
2. Now on that occasion the brahmin student Subha, Todeyya's son, was
staying at the residence of a certain house holder in Sāvatthi for some
business or other. Then the brahmin student Subha, Todeyya's son, asked
the householder in whose residence he was staying: "Householder, I have
heard that Sāvatthi is not devoid of arahants. What recluse or brahmin
may we go to today to pay our respects?"
BV: Subha, Todeyya's son, had talked to the Buddha on a few different
occasions, and they were always real interesting discussions. Now he was
only fifteen or sixteen years old the first time he had the discussions.
And he was asking, questions like somebody that was quite old, and well
versed, so it was real interesting. That’s the kind of mind that he had.
MN: "Venerable sir, this Blessed One is living at Sāvatthi in Jeta's
Grove, Anāthapiṇḍika's Park. You may go to pay your respects to that
Blessed One, venerable sir."
3. Then, having assented to the householder, the brahmin student
Subha, Todeyya's son, went to the Blessed One and exchanged greetings
with him. When this courteous and amiable talk was finished, he sat down
at one side and asked the Blessed One:
4. "Master Gotama, the brahmins say this: The householder is
accomplishing the true way, the Dhamma that is wholesome. The one gone
forth [into homelessness] is not accomplishing the true way, the Dhamma
that is wholesome.' What does Master Gotama say about this?"
"Here, student, I am one who speaks after making an analysis; I do
not speak one-sidedly. I do not praise the wrong way of practice on the
part either of a householder or one gone forth; for whether it be a
householder or one gone forth, one who has entered on the wrong way of
practice, by reason of his wrong way of practice, is not accomplishing
the true way, the Dhamma that is wholesome. I praise the right way of
practice on the part either of a householder or one gone forth; for
whether be a householder or one gone forth, one who has entered on the
right way of practice, by reason of his right way of practice, is
accomplishing the true way, the Dhamma that is wholesome."
5. "Master Gotama, the brahmins say this: 'Since the work of the
household life involves a great deal of activity, great functions, great
engagements, and great undertakings, it is of great fruit. Since the
work of those gone forth involves a small amount of activity, small
functions, small engagements, and small undertakings, it is of small
fruit.' What does Master Gotama say about this?"
"Here too, student, I am one who speaks after making an analysis; I
do not speak one-sidedly. There is work involving a great deal of
activity, great functions, great engagements, and great undertakings,
which, when it fails, is of small fruit. There is work involving a great
deal of activity, great functions, great engagements, and great
undertakings, which, when it succeeds, is of great fruit. There is work
involving a small amount of activity, small functions, small
engagements, and small undertakings, which, when it fails, is of small
fruit. There is work involving a small amount of activity, small
functions, small engagements, and small undertakings, which, when it
succeeds, is of great fruit.
6. "What, student, is that work involving a great deal of
activity...which, when it fails, is of small fruit? Agriculture is that
work involving a great deal of activity...which, when it fails, is of
small fruit. And what, student, is that work involving a great deal of
activity...which, when it succeeds, is of great fruit? Agriculture again
is that work involving a great deal of activity...which, when it
succeeds, is of great fruit. And what, student, is that work involving a
small amount of activity...which, when it fails, is of small fruit?
Trade is that work involving a small amount of activity...which, when it
fails, is of small fruit. And what, student, is that work involving a
small amount of activity...which, when it succeeds, is of great fruit?
Trade again is that work involving a small amount of activity...which,
when it succeeds, is of great fruit.
7. "Just as agriculture, student, is work that involves a great deal
of activity...but is of small fruit when it fails, so the work of the
household life involves a great deal of activity, great functions, great
engagements, and great undertakings, but is of small fruit when it
fails. Just as agriculture is work that involves a great deal of
activity...and is of great fruit when it succeeds, so the work of the
household life involves a great deal of activity, great functions, great
engagements, and great undertakings, and is of great fruit when it
succeeds. Just as trade is work that involves a small amount of
activity...and is of small fruit when it fails, so the work of those
gone forth involves a small amount of activity, small functions, small
engagements, and small undertakings, and is of small fruit when it
fails. Just as trade is work that involves a small amount of
activity...but is of great fruit when it succeeds, so the work of those
gone forth involves a small amount of activity, small functions, small
engagements, and small undertakings, but is of great fruit when it
succeeds."
8. "Master Gotama, the brahmins prescribe five things for the
performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome."
"If it is not troublesome for you, student, please state to this
assembly the five things that the brahmins prescribe for the performance
of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome."
"It is not troublesome for me, Master Gotama, when such venerable
ones as yourself and others are sitting [in the assembly]."
"Then state them, student."
9. "Master Gotama, truth is the first thing that the brahmins
prescribe for the performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome.
Asceticism is the second thing...Celibacy is the third thing...Study is
the fourth thing...Generosity is the fifth thing that the brahmins
prescribe for the performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome.
These are the five things that the brahmins prescribe for the
performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome. What does Master
Gotama say about this?"
"How then, student, among the brahmins is there even a single brahmin
who says thus: 'I declare the result of these five things having
realised it myself with direct knowledge'?"—"No, Master Gotama."
"How then, student, among the brahmins is there even a single teacher
or teacher's teacher back to the seventh generation of teachers who says
thus: 'I declare the result of these five things having realised it
myself with direct knowledge'?"—"No, Master Gotama."
"How then, student, the ancient brahmin seers, the creators of the
hymns, the composers of the hymns, whose ancient hymns that were
formerly chanted, uttered, and compiled the brahmins nowadays still
chant and repeat, repeating what was spoken, reciting what was
recited—that is,
BV: And I’m not going to go into all of these names.
MN: {Atṭṭaka, Vāmaka, Vāmadeva, Vessāmitta, Yamataggi, Angirasa,
Bhāradvāja, Vāseṭṭha, Kassapa, and Bhagu}
—did even these ancient brahmin seers say thus: 'We declare the result
of these five things having realised it ourselves with direct
knowledge'?"—"No, Master Gotama."
BV: So, what are we talking about here? We’re talking about having the
direct experience, or, getting into philosophy. Philosophy is the talk,
without any action behind it. This is something that happens a lot, with
the different sects of Buddhism. They get into the philosophy, and they
start talking about the differences, and how you’re wrong and I’m right
because it says here… But they’re not talking directly about the
practice. They’re not talking directly, from their own experience, what
they see. They’re only saying ideas that other people have come up with,
and they don’t have the direct experience of the practice, behind it. So
philosophy is words and ideas with no action, and you have to be really
careful of this.
MN: "So, student, it seems that among the brahmins there is not even
a single brahmin who says thus: 'I declare the result of these five
things having realised it myself with direct knowledge.' And among the
brahmins there is not even a single teacher or a single teacher's
teacher back to the seventh generation of teachers, who says thus: 'I
declare the result of these five things having realised it myself with
direct knowledge.' And the ancient brahmin seers, the creators of the
hymns, the composers of the hymns even these ancient brahmin seers did
not say thus: 'We declare the result of these five things having
realised it ourselves with direct knowledge.' Suppose there were a file
of blind men each in touch with the next: the first one does not see,
the middle one does not see, and the last one does not see. So too,
student, in regard to their statement the brahmins seem to be like a
file of blind men: the first one does not see, the middle one does not
see, and the last one does not see."
10. When this was said, the brahmin student Subha, Todeyya's son, was
angry and displeased with the simile of the file of blind men, and he
reviled, disparaged, and censured the Blessed One, saying: "The recluse
Gotama will be worsted." Then he said to the Blessed One: "Master Gotama,
the brahmin Pokkharasāti of the Upamañña clan, lord of the Subhaga
Grove, says thus: 'Some recluses and brahmins here claim superhuman
states, distinctions in knowledge and vision worthy of the noble ones.
But what they say turns out to be ridiculous; it turns out to be mere
words, empty and hollow. For how could a human being know or see or
realise a superhuman state, a distinction in knowledge and vision worthy
of the noble ones? That is impossible.'"
11. "How then, student, does the brahmin Pokkharasāti understand the
minds of all recluses and brahmins, having encompassed them with his own
mind?"
"Master Gotama, the brahmin Pokkharasāti does not even understand the
mind of his slavewoman Puṇṇikā, having encompassed it with his own mind,
so how could he understand thus the minds of all recluses and brahmins?"
12. "Student, suppose there were a man born blind who could not see
dark and light forms, who could not see blue, yellow, red, or pink
forms, who could not see what was even and uneven, who could not see the
stars or the sun and moon. He might say thus: There are no dark and
light forms, and no one who sees dark and light forms; there are no
blue, yellow, red, or pink forms, and no one who sees blue, yellow, red,
or pink forms; there is nothing even and uneven, and no one who sees
anything even and uneven; there are no stars and no sun and moon, and no
one who sees stars and the sun and moon. I do not know these, I do not
see these, therefore these do not exist.' Speaking thus, student, would
he be speaking rightly?"
"No, Master Gotama. There are dark and light forms, and those who see
dark and light forms… there are the stars and the sun and moon, and
those who see the stars and the sun and moon. Saying, 'I do not know
these, I do not see these, therefore these do not exist,' he would not
be speaking rightly."
13. "So too, student, the brahmin Pokkharasāti is blind and
visionless. That he could know or see or realise a superhuman state, a
distinction in knowledge and vision worthy of the noble ones—this is
impossible. What do you think, student? What is better for those
well-to-do brahmins of Kosala such as the brahmin Cankī,
BV: And he goes through a bunch of other names, I’m not going to go
through.
MN: {the brahmin Tarukkha, the brahmin Pokkharasāti, the brahmin
Jāṇussoṇi,}
or your father, the brahmin Todeyya— that the statements they
make accord with worldly convention or flaunt worldly convention?"—"That
they accord with worldly convention, Master Gotama."
"What is better for them, that the statements they make be thoughtful
or thoughtless?"—"Thoughtful, Master Gotama."— "What is better for them,
that they make their statements after reflecting or without
reflecting?"—"After reflecting, Master Gotama."—"What is better for
them, that the statements they make be beneficial or
unbeneficial?"—"Beneficial, Master Gotama."
14. "What do you think, student? If that is so, did the statement
made by the brahmin Pokkharasāti accord with worldly convention or
flaunt worldly convention?"—"It flaunted worldly convention, Master
Gotama."—"Was the statement made thoughtful or
thoughtless?"—"Thoughtless, Master Gotama."—"Was the statement made
after reflecting or without reflecting?"—"Without reflecting, Master
Gotama."—"Was the statement made beneficial or
unbeneficial?"—"Unbeneficial, Master Gotama."
15. "Now there are these five hindrances, student. What are the five?
The hindrance of sensual desire, the hindrance of ill will, the
hindrance of sloth and torpor, the hindrance of restlessness and
remorse, and the hindrance of doubt. These are the five hindrances. The
brahmin Pokkharasāti is obstructed, hindered, blocked, and enveloped by
these five hindrances. That he could know or see or realise a superhuman
state, a distinction in knowledge and vision worthy of the noble
ones—this is impossible.
16. "Now there are these five cords of sensual pleasure, student.
What are the five? Forms cognizable by the eye that are wished for,
desired, agreeable, and likeable, connected with sensual desire and
provocative of lust. Sounds cognizable by the ear...Odours cognizable by
the nose...Flavours cognizable by the tongue...Tangibles cognizable by
the body that are wished for, desired, agreeable, and likeable,
connected with sensual desire and provocative of lust. These are the
five cords of sensual pleasure. The brahmin Pokkharasāti is tied to
these five cords of sensual pleasure, infatuated with them and utterly
committed to them; he enjoys them without seeing the danger in them or
understanding the escape from them. That he could know or see or realise
a superhuman state, a distinction in knowledge and vision worthy of the
noble ones—this is impossible.
17. "What do you think, student? Which of these two fires would have
a [better] flame, colour, and radiance—a fire that might burn in
dependence on fuel, such as grass and wood, or a fire that might burn
independent of fuel, such as grass and wood?"
"If it were possible, Master Gotama, for a fire to burn independent
of fuel such as grass and wood, that fire would have a [better] flame,
colour, and radiance."
"It is impossible, student, it cannot happen that a fire could burn
independent of fuel such as grass or wood except through [the exercise
of] supernormal power. Like the fire that burns dependent on fuel such
as grass and wood, I say, is the rapture that is dependent on the five
cords of sensual pleasure. Like the fire that burns independent of fuel
such as grass and wood, I say, is the rapture that is apart from sensual
pleasures, apart from unwholesome states. And what, student, is the
rapture that is apart from sensual pleasures, apart from unwholesome
states? Here, quite secluded from sensual pleasures,
BV: Now. I’m reading a long time. Now we get to some talk.
What does it mean to be secluded from sensual pleasures? How do you
become secluded from sensual pleasures? I just read to you what the
sensual pleasures are. How do you become secluded from them? Well. when
you close your eyes, you’re secluded from the sensual pleasure of
seeing. When a sound arises, you let the sound be, and relax, and don’t
get involved in listening to the sound; you are secluding yourself from
the sensual pleasure of hearing. And taste. And smell. And touch. That’s
what it means always, when it’s talking about… This is talking about
getting into the jhānas. But, the only way you can get into the jhāna,
is by being secluded form these sense pleasures.
Ok. Being
MN: secluded from unwholesome states,
BV: How do you become secluded from unwholesome states? It’s by
letting go of the hindrances. That’s how you become secluded from
unwholesome states, and you do that by the practice of six Rs. Allowing
it to be without getting involved with it. It all comes back to
Dependent Origination. Because right after that consciousness arises,
then, that’s called contact, then feeling arises, that is pleasant or
unpleasant, or neither pleasant-nor-unpleasant, and then the craving.
And the craving, there is a start, of the identification, the personal
identification, occurs. And when you see that starting to happen, and
you relax right then, with the six Rs, as I understand it, when the,
relax and let go of, the feeling, as soon as the craving starts to arise
we let it go right then. Then there’s no, clinging that happens and no
habitual tendency and that sort of thing. When you let go of the
clinging, what happens is you have the pure mind, that observes,
whatever is there without being involved in any way with it, without
taking it personally. Observing how the process, occurs is what
dependent Origination is all about. And the more quickly you can let go
of the craving, which is the cause of suffering, then, the, rest of the
identification, completely disappears at that time, for that, brief
period of time. Your mind is very clear. And when you bring your, that
clear attention back to your object of meditation. So, after the
relaxation… Yeah?
S: ~
BV: Well it’s the noticing that there is tightness. It does take
practice to be able to do that. It’s just like when you first start
meditating. Your mind flip flops all over the place, and you don’t
really see what is happening very clearly because your mind is moving so
much. As you begin to practice the six Rs and you begin to let go and
try to relax, and that doesn’t mean you’re going to every time - it’s a
trial, you start to become familiar with the process and being able to
recognize how the process works, and as you’re able to do that more and
more, your mind doesn’t flip flop so much, and you start staying on your
object of meditation for a longer period of time, without a distraction.
The way that I teach, so that you can be, more aware of the tightness,
because when you’re smiling, and you’re happy, and you laugh, you don’t
have any tension, and then when you’re not doing that you see that there
is tension. And one of the things that, seems to always happen when you
get on the spiritual path is you seem to get serious, and you don’t need
to be serious. So the more fun you have while you’re doing, the easier
everything becomes, because there’s not the hindrances, coming up and
stopping you. There’s not the: "I want this to be the way I want it to
be." There’s more fluid motion to everything, and everything becomes
easier, and you become, actually, much more efficient with what you are
doing, when you’re happy doing it.
When I was teaching in Malaysia, I had a lot of college students, and
they only took, one test a year. For the whole year, they either made it
or didn’t make it, with one test, and they put a terrible amount of
pressure on themselves about that. And they would come and a couple of
weeks or three weeks before their test, they would come and do a one
week retreat, where I was continually telling them that when anxiety
arises, all of a sudden, you’re not studding any more, you’re thinking
about something that’s going to happen in the future. And you’re
worrying about that, and you get so distracted by this kind of
hindrance. So I basically showed them how to let go of that hindrance,
and relax into it, and then have fun while they were studying. And when
I told them that I wanted them to laugh while they were studding, they
thought I was crazy, until they took their tests and everybody did quite
nicely, and they were real happy about that. So the more we can have fun
with what we’re doing in the present moment, the more alert and aware or
mind is.
This is a key, that, all Buddhists, it doesn’t matter whether you’re
Mahāyāna or Theravada or Vajrayāna, we all have this key, in the
teachings, but we forget to use them, quite often. So, one of the things
I started doing, is stressing more having joy arise, and that means
smiling, and having fun, and laughing, and that sort of thing, because
when you mind has this joy in it, your mind is uplifted, and you’re very
alert, and you awareness is very fast, and it’s real easy to see when
you start, getting heavy about something, and developing your sense of
humor, about how crazy your mind is, about your old, habitual
tendencies, and letting go of those and developing that smile, it
changes your perspective completely, so that now you become efficient
with what you’re doing in the present moment. You’re not doing this and
thinking that. You’re being right with what you’re doing. That’s the
importance of having the joy. So.
S: ~
BV: Laugh out loud? No, but he smiled a fair amount. If you read the
Theravada Abhidhamma they… of course he never smiled. He only… he would
sometimes show his teeth and most of the time, he didn’t. In the
Mahāyāna abhidhamma, they had him smiling all over the place. So, you
know, it’s kind of this. What do you do with that? But I know from my
own practice, that…
S: ~
BV: Yeah. Yes. That’s, actually, that was the Buddha’s cousin. That
wasn’t the Buddha.
S: ~
BV: Yeah. Some students gave me one of those, he said it was a Buddha
image, and I got excited, and then I saw this little fat guy there, and
I told him that it was his cousin, and his cousin looked very close, to
the Buddha, so he didn’t want people coming up and saying: "Reverend
sir." and calling him the Buddha, he, started eating, so he would look
different. That’s the story. I don’t know how true that is, but… My
student, when he found out it wasn’t the Buddha, started calling him
James. (Laughs)
S: ~
BV: The Buddha might not have laughed out loud, after he became the
Buddha, but in all of the lifetimes before that, he did. This is a step.
On of the things I’ve noticed, is, when, you start developing,
spiritually, you sense of humor changes. You stop laughing at things,
and you start laughing with things. And when somebody says something
that’s absolutely true, I mean there’s no doubt about it, the first
thing that happens to me is it makes me laugh. And that’s one of the
signs that you can look for of whether you’re progressing spiritually,
is the change, in your sense of humor, and when I hear someone that says
something that’s very true, I laugh, but it’s more like a chuckle. It’s
not a belly laugh, where I continue laughing, laughing, laughing. It’s
just a little laugh, and it comes from inside, and I’ve seen people,
that heard me laugh, and they tried to imitate it, and they couldn’t,
because it was pure joy that was coming out.
Ok.
MN: a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the first jhāna, which is
accompanied by applied and sustained thought, with rapture and pleasure
born of seclusion.
BV: Now the pleasure born of seclusion is, in Pāli, it’s sukha, and
that is happiness. Since we’re talking about pīti, why don’t we explain
a little bit about it. There’s five different kinds of pīti according to
Theravada, abhidhamma. The first kind, it’s just there for a moment, and
it’s like gooseflesh - those little goose bumps that happen. And then it
fades away. The next kind is like a flash of lightening. It’s very
intense joy for a short period of time, and then it fades away. Now, one
of the things that happens, always, when joy arises, it doesn’t matter
which kind of joy it is, always right after the joy, there’s a brief
period of calmness and tranquility, where your mind is very, very
peaceful for a period of time. It seems like that’s where you can get
very organized thinking, for a period of time. The next kind of joy is
like you are standing in the ocean and you have these waves of joy come
over you, keep coming. Now, these first three kinds of joy can happen
for anyone, depending on conditions. It doesn’t have to do with mental
development at all. They can just arise because the conditions are right
for them to arise. I’ve read some stories about some Christian ministers
that had this kind of joy arise, like the flash of lightening, and they
attributed that to God talking to them. So it’s very clear that they
made up their mind to let go of an attachment, and joy arose because of
that. And then they became very tranquil and peaceful, and they had
clear thinking right after that. The next two kinds of joy only arise
through mental development. The next kind of joy is called uplifting
joy. Now, this is the kind of joy that you experience in the first jhāna,
and the second jhāna. Their different degrees. But the uplifting joy,
your mind feels very light, and your body feels very light. Now this
kind of joy has excitement in it, and it really feels good, like that.
The last kind of joy is called all pervading joy. Now, this is the kind
of joy, that, when it arises, it is the enlightenment factor of joy. And
the all pervading joy, it doesn’t have the excitement in it anymore. It
doesn’t have the lightness of body, but it just kind of oozes out of
everywhere. It just feels great. When this kind of joy arises, you see
quite often Buddha images, they’re sitting and their eyes are half open?
The artist is trying to show that they are experiencing this kind of
joy. What happens is, you can be sitting, and all of a sudden, your eyes
open up. And you think: "Well, isn’t that interesting?" And then you
close your eyes, and your eyes open up. And you go: "Whoa, this is
weird!" And you close your eyes, and your eyes open up. After the third
time, then you say: "Well, if your eyes want to be open, ok, they can be
open!" And it doesn’t matter. You’re not focusing on anything. But
that’s one of the things that can happen when you have the enlightenment
factor of joy arise. And you know that little smile on the Buddha image?
That is another thing that the artist is trying to show, of joy. It’s
not a great big toothy grin, it’s just a little: "This is nice." Now,
when the uplifting joy fades away, and it will, right after that, you
have a very, very, strong feeling of comfort, in your mind and in your
body. Where the uplifting joy had this excitement in it, the happiness
when it arises, the comfortable feeling is like a placid lake that has
no ripples in it at all. You just feel very comfortable, very peaceful,
very calm, very tranquil.
Now, in Pāli, and especially in abhidhamma, they start talking about
five different factors being in the first jhāna. You have a thinking
mind. You have an examining mind. You have joy. You have happiness. The
last word, they call it ekaggatā, in Pāli. And they always like to break
this word up, because eka means one. So they say: "This is one-pointedness."
But actually, this particular word, you can’t break up like that. When
you look up in the dictionary, ekagga, means tranquil. Ekaggatā is the
act of tranquility. So, what we’re talking about here, is the last
factor; is having a mind that is still, and tranquil, and at ease. But
it’s not one pointed, on only one object. While you’re in the jhāna, you
can still, see movement of mind’s attention from one thing to another.
You can still see these sort of things. So you’re not practicing a
one-pointed kind of concentration. When you’re practicing the six Rs,
because of that relaxed step, it changes the jhāna, from one-pointed
concentration to, the tranquility insight, because you’re practicing the
tranquility and the insight, exactly that time. You can’t get into the
jhānas, unless you have insight. And the insights are how mind’s
attention moves. When the hindrance arises, how does it arise? What
happens first? What happens after that? What happens after that? And
when you start letting it go, you start letting it go backward. Your
mind is distracted, and then you recognize it. And let it be, and relax,
and come back to your object of meditation. Now, it gets distracted
again, and right before your mind really gets caught, you see what
happens right before that. So when you’re able to recognize that, before
you really get caught and pulled away for a long period of time, then,
you start letting go at that time. And then you start recognizing what
happens right before that. And that’s how you wind up, learning the
Dependent Origination.
Now, I just happened to bring another book in with me, and this is
the Saṃyutta Nikāya, and this is a very, very, interesting book in a lot
of different ways. And there’s eighty-four different discourses on
Dependent Origination, in this one section. And the last part is
incredibly interesting, because the last three suttas, they tell you
what to look for in a teacher, how to do the training, and how to exert
yourself. This is real interesting stuff. And it says:
SN II The Book of Causation (Nidābavagga)
IX. With Incorporated Repetition Series
82 (1) A Teacher
(page 620)
SN II, 82(1) At Sāvatthi. "Bhikkhus, one who does not know and see as
it really is aging-and-death, its origin, its cessation, and the
way leading to its cessation, should search for a teacher in order to
know this as it really is.
BV: That tells you the kind of teacher you want to be looking for. Now
this is real interesting in itself, because what I just read to you was,
the Four Noble Truths. Every link in Dependent Origination is seen
through the eyes of the Four Noble Truths. What is the link? That’s the
suffering. Its origin, that’s the second Noble Truth. Its cessation,
that’s the third Noble Truth. And the way leading to the cessation,
that’s the fourth Noble Truth. So, I think you found a great teacher,
and when you’re out and you don’t have this great teacher to come to,
you start looking for the teacher that can show you the Four Noble
Truths, and Dependent Origination. And if they don’t really understand
that, it’s best to let them go, and go search for another one.
SN: "Bhikkhus, one who does not know and see as it really is birth …
habitual tendency … clinging … craving … feeling … contact … the six
sense bases … name-and-form … consciousness … volitional formations,
their origin, their cessation, and the way leading to their cessation,
should search for a teacher in order to know this as it really is."
SN II 83 (2) Training
"Bhikkhus, one who does not know and see as it really is
aging-and-death … volitional formations, their origin, their cessation,
and the way leading to their cessation, should practice the training in
order to know this as it really is.
BV: That’s how you train yourself. That’s why you keep on hearing me
talk about the six Rs, because that is the way you can train yourself to
see, Dependent Origination.
SN II (3)-93 (12) Exertion, Etc.
"Bhikkhus, one who does not know and see as it really is
aging-and-death … volitional formations, their origin, their cessation,
and the way leading to their cessation, should make an exertion … arouse
a desire … arouse enthusiasm … be unremitting … arouse ardour … apply
energy … practice perseverance … practice mindfulness … practice clear
compression … practice diligence in order to know this as it really is."
BV: Now, there’s one other sutta that’s on the Dependent Origination
that I wanted to read to you, and, this is incredibly interesting also,
and it’s called the two ways.
SN: 3 (3) The Two Ways (page 536)
At Sāvatthi. "Bhikkhus, I will teach you the wrong way and the right
way. Listen to that and attend closely, I will speak."
"Yes venerable sir." Those monks replied. The Blessed One said this:
"And what monks, is the wrong way? With ignorance as condition,
volitional formations [come to be]; with volitional formations as
condition, consciousness comes to be …. Such is the origin of this whole
mass of suffering.
BV: It goes through the whole thing. I’m not going to do that right now.
SN: This, Bhikkhus, is called the wrong way. BV: Now, why do you suppose it’s the wrong way? Because
it’s talking about, suffering. And this is how the suffering arises.
It’s just talking about the first two Noble Truths. Now:
SN: "And what monks is the right way? With the remainderless fading away
and cessation of ignorance comes cessation of volitional formations,
cessation of consciousness….
BV: So what are we talking about here? We’re talking about, the third
Noble Truth, and the fourth Noble Truth. We’re talking about, how these
things cease. Not how they came up, or why they came up. We don’t care.
What we’re talking about, is how, they fade away.
SN: Such is the cessation of this whole mass of suffering. This
bhikkhus, is called the right way."
BV: So, when we’re talking about Dependent Origination, we’re talking
about, the ceasing of the Dependent Origination. Now, how is this
practically realized? I just got through telling you, when your mind
gets distracted, and you see what happens, right before it gets carried
away, and you let go of that, you’re starting to see the cessation of
the Dependent Origination. You will start to recognize it after a while.
You will start to see when a feeling arises, then the craving arises,
after the craving there’s the clinging and the habitual tendency, and
you’ll start to recognize that and be able to let it go more and more
quickly and more and more easily. So this is, the real strong
importance, of being able to recognize how, the process works, and when
you start recognizing this as the process, it’s not personal anymore.
It’s not me. It’s not mine. It’s only this craving. It’s only the
feeling. Did I ask the feeling to come up? No. It came up by itself.
It’s only this sense door. It doesn’t really matter, because you’re
seeing it through the eyes, of, the impersonal nature of everything that
arises. Now in Theravada Buddhism there is a big stress on seeing the
three characteristics of existence, seeing impermanence, suffering, and
not self nature. When you see Dependent Origination, you automatically
see these three characteristics in everything. Learning how to smile,
sharpens your awareness, so much, that you will be able to see and
recognize this process, in a short period of time. As we see this over
and over and over and over and over again, in everything, then, we
finally start to understand, little bits at a time, that everything that
arises is part of this impersonal process. It’s there for a moment and
disappears. Dependent Origination, all of the links of dependent
origination are continually arising and passing away, arising and
passing away, and you see this, and you see the suffering nature of
this. And as you start to practice your six Rs and let go and relax,
you’re letting go of the suffering, and you’re letting go of the,
personality belief that these things are yours, and you have control
over them. So this gets to be a real interesting process. And there’s
all kinds of different levels of the process. Any kind of practice that
doesn’t show, how the process works, will lead you away from the deep
understanding that the Buddha was trying to give to us, with, this kind
of understanding.
There’s a real interesting idea that’s been floating around, I know I
had it when I practicing vipassanā for so long, that, the Buddha on his
night of enlightenment, he sat underneath the bodhi tree and bang, he
saw Dependent Origination and he understood it completely. But that was
one of the things he was working on while he was still a bodhisatta. He
was figuring out Dependent Origination. And he saw all of these links
and how they are interconnected and he saw, how the four Noble Truths
actually work, with each one of the links of Dependent Origination, and
as he kept watching that, over and over again, finally he realized it,
then there was the big "Oh wow.", and the experience of nibbāna. But
that’s something that he’d been working on for a long time.
Ok, now what we’re talking about here, we were talking about the
rapture and the sensual pleasures and that’s the cause for rapture, but
the Buddha was talking about a different kind of rapture when he was
talking about the, getting into the jhāna, and he said:
MN: This is a rapture apart from sensual pleasures, apart from
unwholesome states. Again, with the stilling of applied and sustained
thought, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the second jhāna, which has
self-confidence and singleness of mind without applied and sustained
thought, with rapture and pleasure born of concentration. This too is a
rapture apart from sensual pleasures, apart from unwholesome states.
18. "Of those five things, student, that the brahmins prescribe for
the performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome, which of the
five do they prescribe as the most fruitful for the performance of
merit, for accomplishing the wholesome?"
"Of those five things, Master Gotama, that the brahmins prescribe for
the performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome, they
prescribe generosity as the most fruitful for the performance of merit,
for accomplishing the wholesome."
BV: Now, just to give you an idea, you’re practicing Loving-Kindness
meditation, and you’re sending this powerful loving feeling, and you’re
giving it away. Now, in the Aṅguttara Nikāya1, it talks about
how you make the most amount of merit. He says that, giving to monks,
you make a huge amount of merit. And you don’t give to monks
individually; you give to the entire sangha, when you give to the monks,
and he’s the representative. You make more merit, by taking the refuge
in the Buddha, Dhammma, and sangha. That’s how powerful that is. You
make more merit still by taking and keeping the precepts, without
breaking them. You make more merit, by one thought moment of
Loving-Kindness. How much is a thought moment? (Snap) That was a million
or so. And you make the most amount of merit by developing your wisdom
and seeing Dependent Origination, realizing Dependent Origination. So,
you’re practicing Loving-Kindness meditation every day, and you’re
sending these loving and kind thoughts, you are giving those kind
thoughts and kind feelings away, to your spiritual friend. You’re
practicing your generosity. Mahasi Sayadaw, in one of his talks, and I
have no idea how he figured this out, but he said that if you practice
Loving-Kindness, without having a lot of interfering thoughts, for
thirty minutes, that’s the equivalent in merit of feeding,
three-thousand people, three times a day. That’s just thirty minutes a
day of practicing Loving-Kindness. But again, I have no idea how he
figured that out, but it sounds great. (Laughter) But that really is a
philosophy; I don’t think we can really depend on that, too much. But
that gives you an idea of what you’re doing with this retreat, and why I
like to have people practice Loving-Kindness meditation. Because one,
you’re starting to see Dependent Origination, and two, you’re practicing
with metta, and both of those together is a huge block of merit, for,
all kinds of wholesome things to arise, not only for you but for people
around you.
So,
MN: 19. "What do you think, student? Here a brahmin might be holding
a great sacrifice, and two other brahmins would go there thinking to
take part in that great sacrifice. One brahmin among them would think:
'Oh, that only I might get the best seat, the best water, the best
almsfood in the refectory; that no other brahmin might get the best
seat, the best water, the best almsfood in the refectory!' And it is
possible that the other brahmin, not that brahmin, gets the best seat,
the best water, the best almsfood in the refectory. Thinking about this,
the first brahmin might become angry and displeased. What kind of result
do the brahmins describe for this?"
"Master Gotama, brahmins do not give gifts in such a way, thinking:
'Let the others become angry and displeased because of this.' Rather,
brahmins give gifts motivated by compassion."
"That being so, student, isn't this the brahmins' sixth basis for the
performance of merit, that is, the motive of compassion?"
"That being so, Master Gotama, this is the brahmins' sixth basis for
the performance of merit, that is, the motive of compassion."
20. "Those five things, student, that the brahmins prescribe for the
performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome— where do you
often see those five things, among householders or among those gone
forth?"
"Those five things, Master Gotama, that the brahmins prescribe for
the performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome, I often see
among those gone forth, seldom among householders. For the householder
has a great deal of activity, great functions, great engagements, and
great undertakings: he does not constantly and invariably speak the
truth, practise asceticism, observe celibacy, engage in study, or engage
in generosity. But one gone forth has a small amount of activity, small
functions, small engagements, and small undertakings: he constantly and
invariably speaks the truth, practises asceticism, observes celibacy,
engages in study, and engages in generosity. Thus those five things that
the brahmins prescribe for the performance of merit, for accomplishing
the wholesome, I often see among those gone forth, seldom among
householders."
21. "Those five things, student, that the brahmins prescribe for the
performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome, I call equipment
of the mind, that is, for developing a mind that is without hostility
and without ill will. Here, student, a bhikkhu is a speaker of truth.
Thinking, 'I am a speaker of truth,' he gains inspiration in the
meaning, gains inspiration in the Dhamma, gains gladness connected with
the Dhamma. It is that gladness connected with the wholesome that I call
an equipment of the mind. Here, student, a bhikkhu is an ascetic...one
who is celibate...one who engages in study...one who engages in
generosity. Thinking,
BV: One of the ways that monks can practice generosity, is kind of
neat, for the end result, that they get from that, but it takes twelve
years of practice, without a break. And that would be, I would go to a
monastery, and I would arrange with the head monk, the abbot, I would
tell him: "I want to practice this kind of generosity. I want to
practice going out on alms round, and then sharing the alms round with
everybody, in the monastery." And I would go out on alms round every
day, and I would offer it to the head monk, and then the next senior,
and the next senior, as much food as I have. When I ran out of food, I
would go out on alms round again, and do it again. And then offer it to
the head monk, and the next senior, and the next senior all the way
down, untill everybody in the monastery was fed. Only then would I take
food for myself. Now, I have to do this every day, for twelve years. So
it’s best if it’s a small monastery. (Laughter) But the trick is, I
cannot entertain one thought of remorse. Now, in monasteries, there’s
monks that are coming and going. And sometimes there’s monks that are, not so
nice, and not so pleasant to be around, but, because of this practice, I
practice giving them the food, and I cannot hold one thought of: "I wish
I didn’t have to give him food.", or "I wish he didn’t take this food."
I cannot hold any thought of remorse, for twelve years. After that,
there is the benefit that anywhere I would go, say I go into the middle
of the forest, and it’s time to eat a meal, there will be food in my
bowl, whether somebody put it there or not, there would be food in the
bowl. It can be offered by devas and that sort of thing. So, there’s
this story about this one monk that practiced this during the time of
the Buddha, and they went into a forest, right about, time to go on alms
round, and Sāriputta said to the Buddha: "Do we really want to go in
right now or do we want to go out on alms round?" And the Buddha said:
"Never mind, there’s this monk with us." And it got to be time to eat,
and the Buddha said to this monk: "Walk in front of me." And he walked
for a little ways, and then he stopped and he opened up his bowl, and
there’s all of this food, and he started giving, and of course there was
five hundred arahrts; there’s always five hundred arahats, no matter
what. And he fed every one of them, and still had a lot of food left
over in his bowl. So that’s one of the advantages, but that’s an
extremely difficult practice to do for twelve years. To not hold one
thought of remorse: "I wish I didn’t have to do this for this person, or
share with them because they said nasty things and whatever they did
things that weren’t very nice." Yes?
S: ~
BV: Yes. In a way, you control yourself. You practice your six Rs,
you see that dissatisfaction starting to come up, it’s a, painful
feeling, and there’s craving and then there’s the thoughts that come up
right after that. So you, don’t indulge in that kind of thinking. It
helps you to develop your mindfulness, in very particular way. So, who
wants to try this one? (Laughter) But when monks, we don’t have a whole
lot of stuff in the way of material things to share, but monks are
continually sharing things, all the time. A monk can come to my center
and one of his robes is missing or, not in good shape; I have lots of
robes, so I give him a robe. We share food continually. We share our
requisites, and the more you wind up sharing, the more happiness you
have. And I had a practice, when I was first at a, meditation center
when I first started, of, whenever I got a particularly good piece of
fruit, I’d take a bite and go: "Whoa, that’s really good!", I’d go
around and share it with other people. "Taste this. This is great
stuff." And some of the people that were there, they started to like the
idea of seeing me come around with a piece of fruit in my hand, because
they knew they were going to get a good taste for it. And that was just
one of the fun little things, that anybody can practice. I remember when
Munindra first came to this country, he was at the meditation center I
was at, and we would sit down for a meal, and he was constantly taking
food off of his plate and putting it on other people’s plates. He was
always sharing his food as much as he could. That was a great practice.
That was real fun. So, practicing your generosity is not only practicing
with material things. It’s not only practicing with physical things.
It’s also sharing your kind thoughts with other people, saying things
that you know will make them happy; avoid saying that’s that will make
them angry – that’s part of generosity, too. And the more you hold these
uplifting kind thoughts, in your mind, that’s part of generosity.
One of the things that I just got through reading, it was by
Buddhaghosa, and his observation was, when people start getting off of
the spiritual path, they start becoming more, selfish; they’re not so
willing to share so much. And during the time of the Buddha, there were
people that, they measured their wealth not by how much they had, but by
how much they gave, and there were some people that were incredibly
wealthy, and they would set up what they called alms houses, that you
would place for anybody could come and get food or any of the
requisites. And they had four gates to their towns and their cities, and
they would set one up at each gate, and then, if they were really
wealthy, they would set one up in the middle of the town, and set one up
right beside their house, the family would feed anybody that came, and,
if they needed to spend the night, they could spend the night after they
cleaned up, in the little house. If they needed any medicine, they would
make sure they got medicine. If they needed any clothing, there was
always clothing around. And they were continually sharing like that, and
that’s how people, measured their wealth. But what’s happening today?
You measure your wealth by how much, material things you have, how much
land you have, how much money you have in the bank. And that’s saying
right there that the spiritual qualities in this country, are not very
strong, because there isn’t that sharing. There’s more of a: "Me first"
attitude. And you’re starting to notice that more and more with the
people coming out of college, and that’s kind of sad. The more you can
practice your generosity, the happier your mind becomes. And the happier
your mind becomes, it makes you want to do more; it makes you want to
extend out to other people and help them. And extending out to other
people, with your voice is incredibly important – saying things that
make other people happy, even when you don’t feel like saying things
that would make them happy, doing that anyway – a very necessary part,
of your meditation. And this is a way that you develop a general kind of
mindfulness, of what you’re going to say, and what you’re going to do,
before you do it. So this helps your awareness, a lot, so that you can
have a more uplifted, tranquil, peaceful, mind. Practicing your
generosity, one of the reasons I like the smile so much is because you
can give it away real easily. All you have to do is smile to somebody
else, and then they start smiling. It’s shocking to see, sometimes. If
you’re in a place where there’s hustle and bustle, and you see somebody
and you start smiling, it’s like they don’t even know that you’re there,
and then all of a sudden, it’s like: "Oh!", and they look at you
smiling, and they smile back. It’s great stuff. The more you can
practice that, the more uplifted your mind becomes. The more uplifted
your mind becomes, the more alert your mind becomes. This is part of
right effort. So, we need to continually practice. Practice makes
perfect, eventually, if there’s such a thing as perfect, I’m not sure.
(Laughs) But, as we can develop this uplifted mind that’s giving, we
become much more alert, to what your mind is doing in the present
moment. We become much more alert to how mind’s attention moves from one
thing to another.
Ok- thinking
MN: 'I am one who engages in generosity,' he gains inspiration in the
meaning, gains inspiration in the Dhamma, gains gladness connected with
the Dhamma. It is that gladness connected with the wholesome that I call
an equipment of the mind. Thus those five things that the brahmins
prescribe for the performance of merit, for accomplishing the wholesome,
I call equipment of the mind, that is, for developing a mind that is
without hostility and without ill will."
22. When this was said, the brahmin student Subha, Todeyya's son,
said to the Blessed One: "Master Gotama, I have heard that the recluse
Gotama knows the path to the company of Brahmā."
"What do you think, student? Is the village of Nalakara near here,
not far from here?"
"Yes, sir, the village of Nalakara is near here, not far from here."
"What do you think, student? Suppose there was a man born and raised
in the village of Naḷakāra, and as soon as he had left Naḷakāra they
asked him about the path to the village. Would that man be slow or
hesitant in answering?"
"No, Master Gotama. Why is that? Because that man has been born and
raised in Naḷakāra, and is well acquainted with all the' paths to the
village."
"Still, a man born and raised in the village of Naḷakāra might be
slow or hesitant in answering when asked about the path to the village,
but a Tathāgata, when asked about the Brahmā-world or the way leading to
the Brahmā-world, would never be slow or hesitant in answering. I
understand Brahmā, student, and I understand the Brahmā-world, and I
understand the way leading to the Brahmā-world, and I understand how one
should practise to reappear in the Brahmā-world."
23. "Master Gotama, I have heard that the recluse Gotama teaches the
path to the company of Brahmā. It would be good if Master Gotama would
teach me the path to the company of Brahmā."
"Then, student, listen and attend closely to what I shall say." "Yes,
sir," he replied. The Blessed One said this:
24. "What, student, is the path to the company of Brahmā? Here a
bhikkhu abides pervading one quarter with a mind imbued with
loving-kindness, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the
fourth; so above, below, around, and everywhere, and to all as to
himself, he abides pervading the all-encompassing world with a mind
imbued with loving-kindness,
{ abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without
hostility, and without ill will.}
BV: Now, this kind of meditation is what I teach after you break down the
barriers. What you’re doing right now is called breaking down the barriers.
You send Loving-Kindness to your spiritual friend, and you stay with that
same spiritual friend until you get to a certain jhāna. And then I will tell
you: "Ok, now go to another spiritual friend, and as soon as you see then
smiling and happy in you mind, then go to another spiritual friend." Now
this can happen all in one sitting, because when you get to this certain
level of the jhāna, you understand very well what you are doing, so it makes
it real easy to do this. After you do three or four spiritual friends, then
I tell you to go and bring up family members, people that you dearly love,
close friends. And radiate Loving-Kindness to them, and every time you see
one of them smiling and happy, go to another, and then another. After you do
that, then I tell you: "Ok, now what I want you to do is go to a neutral
person. A neutral person is where you ride the bus every day, you get on the
bus every day, and there’s the same people on the bus every day. You know
them; you see them; you might talk to them occasionally, but you don’t
really know them very well. That would be a neutral person. Or you go to a
store, and you go to the same checker every time. You know that person, but
you don’t really know them very well. That would be a neutral person. So you
pick out three or four neutral persons to radiate Loving-Kindness to, and
when you see them smiling and happy, you go to the next. Then the tough one
comes. Any enemies that you have, you radiate Loving-Kindness to them, and
that can be somewhat difficult because of your attachments. And you can
start thinking about: "Yeah, I wish them well, kind of, not really, they’re
kind of a turkey because they did me wrong one way or another.", and you
start thinking about them. Then you stop the meditation; go back to the
neutral person. Get the feeling of Loving-Kindness going, and then go back
to your enemy. And you do that until you see that enemy smiling and happy,
and you don’t feel any, ill will towards them. And you do that with as many,
enemies as you have, that you can think of. When you get done with that,
then I’ll come along and say: "Ok, now you start sending Loving-Kindness in
the directions." There’s six directions: in front of you; behind you; to the
right; to the left; above; below. And then all around, at the same time.
This is a very interesting practice, because this is where you start really
realizing the boundary-less nature of Loving-Kindness. There are no
boundaries. You can start radiating Loving-Kindness, and you radiate to this
room and you feel yourself fill this room with love, and then you extend it
a little bit further, and then extend it a little bit further, and extend it
through the state, and extend it through the country, and extend it through
the world, and you can keep going, as far as you want. But there’s no
boundaries on the limits of the Loving-Kindness, and it’s really quite
amazing. That’s what we’re talking about here.
MN: When the deliverance of mind by loving-kindness is developed in this
way, no limiting action remains there, none persists there. Just as a
vigorous trumpeter could make himself heard without difficulty in the four
quarters, so too, when the deliverance of mind by loving-kindness is
developed in this way, no limiting action remains there, none persists
there. This is the path to the company of Brahmā.
BV: When you get into the jhānas, when you’re practicing the
Loving-Kindness meditation, if you never get any higher, if you don’t attain
nibbāna, you will be reborn in a brahma loca. A brahama loca lasts for a
long time. Three’s two kinds of heavenly realms, basically speaking. There’s
the deva loca, and that’s people that practice their generosity and they’re
very good people during their life, but they really didn’t develop their
mind like they could have, and they will be reborn in a deva loca, and every
day they need to eat food, to keep their body alive. Any time they get
involved with something and they forget to eat, then their body will die and
they’ll be reborn in another realm, depending on their karma. Generally,
what they eat is grapes, which is kind of odd; I’d think you’d get tired of
eating the same thing. The heaven of the thirty-three, and this is
philosophy, I don’t know whether it’s really true or not. But they say the
heaven of the thirty-three, one day there is equivalent to one hundred years
here, in time, and you live to be, up to a hundred or so. That’s a long
period of time. Now, when you start practicing and getting into the jhānas,
then you’d be reborn in the brahma loca. The brahma loca, you don’t need
food for your sustenance, the thing that keeps your body alive is joy.
Brahma locas last for an incredibly long period of time. There’s a thing
called an asaṅkheyya. An asaṅkheyya is supposed to be, and this is from
commentaries, so I don’t know whether it’s true or not, but they say one asaṅkheyya is ten with one hundred and sixty zeros behind it. That’s a long
time. Ok, there’s four asaṅkheyya, to a mahākappa. There’s a time when
there’s the expansion of the universe. That’s the time we’re living in right
now. Then it will stop for a asaṅkheyya. And then it will start contracting,
and it will contract for an asaṅkheyya, and then it will stop for an
asaṅkheyya, and then the whole thing starts out again. That’s the expansion
and contraction of the universe, it’s called a mahākappa. Now that would
mean that for one whole cycle to happen, it would be roughly four hundred
and fifty zeros behind a ten, to the power of four hundred and fifty zeros.
Who knows whether those numbers are real or not? It just, let’s say it’s
just a real long time for the expansion and contraction of the universe. Now
when you get up into the third jhāna, and you have reasonable control over
getting into the third jhāna, if you never got any higher, you would die,
you would be reborn in that realm, it would last somewhere around, I think
it’s fifteen or sixteen mahākappas, that’s how long your life would last, in
that realm, and it’s a very pleasant, pleasurable realm. But eventually you
would die from that realm and depending on your karma, you would be reborn
somewhere else. Could be a hell realm, it could a human realm, could be an
animal realm, depending on your karma. When you go up into the fourth jhāna
… Now, when you’re practicing Loving-Kindness, the Loving-Kindness will take
you to the fourth jhāna. It’s just a little bit different than what the
commentaries say, but in the suttas, and I can show you exactly the sutta,
it says that the Loving-Kindness takes you to the fourth jhāna. When you are
practicing the Brahma Vihāras, as you go deeper into your practice,
naturally, your practice will start to change after a while, as you go in
the depths of the Loving-Kindness. The feeling will change, and then you’ll
start feeling an expansion, and you have reached, the realm of infinite
space. And this is real interesting because the Mahāyāna people, they talk a
lot about the Buddha having infinite compassion, and actually, I think what
it is, is, because, the Loving-Kindness in the Bhrama Vihāras it changes.
The feeling of Loving-Kindness actually changes, and you have to tell me
what the change is, I won’t tell you, then there’s this expansion of
infinite space, and you have this feeling, that’s going out with this
expansion, and that would be, infinite compassion, so that’s what they’re
actually talking about. The Buddha, every day he sat, in, meditation
practicing the compassion, and he was sitting in the realm of infinite space
when he did that. As your meditation goes deeper, the feeling of compassion
will change, to a feeling of joy; I won’t tell you what that feels like
either; you have to tell me. And what you will start to notice is, there are
a lot of different consciousnesses arising and passing away, arising and
passing away, at the eye, at the ear, at the nose, wherever. The
consciousnesses are continually arising and passing away, and, this is
called the realm of infinite consciousness. It’s the sixth jhāna. As your
meditation deepens, you’ll start to notice that there’s a little break in
between the arising of one consciousness and another, and that break will
start to get a little bit longer and a little bit longer as your mind
settles down more. And eventually you’ll get to a place, where the feeling
of joy disappears and the feeling of equanimity becomes very strong, and
this equanimity is the realm of nothingness, and this is where mind does not
look outside of itself anymore. Now you just looking in the mind. Very
interesting state. Very, very fun to learn how to adjust your energy, when
you’re watching, because if you put too much energy in, you get restless, if
not enough, you get dull. So there’s this balance that’s happening all of
the time in this jhāna, and it gets to be real fun to watch. As you go
deeper into the practice, now this is far as the Brahma Vihāras will take
you, to the realm of nothingness. What happens after that, is you’ll get to
a space where it’s called neither-perception-nor-non-perception, and it’s
like you’re, meditating along really nicely, and it’s like you go asleep,
but you know you’re not asleep. But it seems like that. Then, after, you
come out of that jhāna, and you start reflecting, and you start seeing
things that happened in the jhāna. And this is very interesting things that
will happen, and you’ll have to describe that to me too. I won’t give away a
lot of stuff. Now, what happens by the time you’ve gotten to this realm is
you started relaxing, and it’s becoming, completely automatic. Anything that
arises, there’s a release, relax, release, relax. Eventually, your mind has
been vibrating and becoming finer and finer until it’s hard to tell if
whether there’s any vibration at all. That’s the realm of
neither-perception-nor-non-perception. Eventually, you’ll get to a place and
you’ll relax so completely and totally, that, that is the cessation of
perception and feeling. Somebody took the switch, turned it off. There’s
nothing there. When the perception and feeling arise again, your mindfulness
is so sharp, that you will see all of the links of Dependent Origination.
And when you see the cessation of ignorance, there is the experience of
nibbāna. That’s exactly how it happens. When you’ve had that experience, and
you come out, you will feel a lot of joy, a lot of joy. It’s such a strong
experience, the impersonal nature of the Dependent Origination, it’s seeing
and realizing it, it’s such a strong experience, that it will change your
perspective, completely. Now, there is another part of this, and that is
called the fruition. According to Theravada abhidhamma, fruition happens in
… There’s seventeen parts to a thought moment. Ok. And there’s seven, parts
of a thought moment, that are called the javana moments, and nibbāna happens
in either the third, fourth, or fifth javana moment, and the next javana
moment is where fruition occurs. That’s what they say. It doesn’t happen
that way. That does not agree with the suttas. The fruition will occur for
you at any time, and it is the experience of the cessation of perception and
feeling and seeing Dependent Origination, again. Now the fruition, is where
the complete personality development happens. You will never again,
experience, lust, or hatred, or a belief in a personal self. You’ll never
have any doubt as to whether the practice is correct or not. You will never
have the belief that rites and rituals lead to nibbāna. Now what I just
described to you was the third stage of enlightenment. It can happen that,
depending on your karma, you can either reach the third stage or the fourth
stage of enlightenment, by doing this practice that we’re doing right now.
If you’re very attentive and you truly do understand, listening to a Dhamma
talk, you can become a sotāpanna; you can become enlightened in the first
stage of enlightenment. That happened to venerable Sāriputta, when he went
up to the venerable Assaji, who’d just become an arahat, and asked him who
his teacher was and what the teaching was. Assaji says: "I don’t know very
much, but I can tell you this: the Tathāgata told us that everything that
arises, passes away." Soon as he heard that, (Snap) he’s a sotāpanna. And
that happens with the second stage of enlightenment, too, depending on one’s
development. So the thing with listening to the Dhamma talk, it’s incredibly
important to be as attentive as you possibly can be. Because at any time,
all of a sudden your understanding, it can just click, and this is a funny
thing too, because a lot of these suttas that I read to you, many people
have heard them many times, and they’ll come to me after hearing it and
they’ll say: "You know, I’ve heard you give this three, four, five times,
and (Click) now I understand it. And then they’ll hear me give it another
time, and they’ll come back and go: "Wow, that was really something. I heard
it, but I didn’t really get it before. Now I got it!" And it helps your
level of understanding improve, as you hear these things, over and over.
Now, one of the bad raps for Buddhism is that the Buddha always repeated
everything three times, and I started taking the Middle Length Sayings, and
putting that back in, and taking the dot, dot, dot, out, and I’ll show you
what it’s like to hear that, in a couple of days. And what happens is, when
you hear, all of that repetition, it really starts to sink in, and you
really start to get it. And then when you go away and you start doing your
practice, it comes back very easily, and it’s one of the best ways I know
of, so you don’t have doubt, of what you’re doing, because you’ve heard it.
You hear everything three times, and quite often, more than that. It sinks
in very, very nicely, and your practice improves a lot because of that. So
how many times have you heard me mention the six Rs tonight? (Laughs) Three,
at least? It may be three dozen, one of the two. (Laughs) Ok, does anybody
have any questions? Comments? The last part was a preview of coming events.
When you keep this practice going, these are the things that you can expect
to see happen. and they do. I promise.
One of the things that happened when meditation first started happening
in this country, was it happened through Zen, and the only time you
meditated was when you were sitting, and that idea kind of carried on: "The
only time I meditate is while I’m sitting. While I’m doing my daily
activities, it doesn’t matter what I’m doing; I can do anything I want. But
I sit every day!" And if you can’t take your meditation with you into your
daily activities, then you haven’t got much of a meditation, to my way of
thinking. Now this is one of the true differences between the practice of
one-pointed concentration and the tranquility vipassanā, that I’m teaching.
The one-pointed concentration, will suppress a hindrance, when your
concentration is deep enough. It will stop the hindrance from arising,
temporarily, but when you lose that concentration, guess what comes back?
And you haven’t been aware of how the process works, of the hindrance, so,
it’s real easy to get overwhelmed. But when you’re practicing the way that
I’m showing you right now, the hindrance turns into your teacher, and you
start seeing it as a process, and then when you get out into your daily
life, you’re continuing on, and when a hindrance arises, you can start
recognizing it more quickly. That leads to more happiness in your life all
the time, or true contentment. And that’s a very necessary part of the
practice. To realize that: "Well I can do or say anything while I’m not
sitting.", is only indulging in your own pain and suffering, then if you’re
a true seeker, you’ll want to let that go. You’ll want to stop causing
yourself the pain. Develop that sense of humor about everything. Ok? Yes?
S: ~
BV: It’s a different kind of jhāna. The vipassanā jhāna that they’re
talking about, has access concentration, upacāra samādhi in it, and upacāra
samādhi is a kind of one-pointedness, that suppresses the hindrances; it
pushes them down. If you try to have a hindrance arise, and you’re just
checking. You know, you say: " Well, let’s see if I can make my mind hold a
thought of lust, for a minute." As soon as you bring that lust up, when you
have upacāra samādhi, your mind says: "No.", and just, will not allow it.
But, you really don’t get a chance to learn how the hindrance can arise that
way, because the force of the concentration stops these things. So, it’s a
different kind of jhāna from the vipassanā jhāna. And I started coining it
the tranquility jhāna. The samatha vipassanā jhāna. Because you’re getting
your insights, and your insights are of how that process works, and those
insights are big sometimes; they’re really: "Oh wow." s.
One of the things it says in the suttas, in the Saṃyutta Nikāya, it says
that anyone that sees the five aggregates, they are practicing the four
foundations of mindfulness. The five aggregates, body, feeling. Four
foundations of mindfulness, body, feeling. Then the foundations, you have
consciousness. The aggregates, you have perception, and the consciousness.
So those two go together with that. And then you have the dhammas, which is
the sankhāras, in Pāli, for, this, aggregates. Now, in this particular
sutta, this is a description of Sāriputta’ experience while he was in the
jhāna, and I’m just going to take the first jhāna here, and it says:
MN # 111: 4. "And the states in the first jhāna—the applied thought, the sustained
thought, the rapture, the pleasure, and the unification of mind; the
contact, feeling, perception, volition, and mind;
BV: That’s the five aggregates. Now, it says:
MN # 111: the zeal, decision, energy, mindfulness, equanimity, and
attention— these states were defined by him one by one as they occurred;
BV: They’re saying that all of these different things that I just
mentioned, you see while you are in the jhāna. When you’re in the
one-pointed jhāna, you can’t see these things.
S: ~
BV: Yes, it’s Middle Length Sayings, it’s page eight nine nine. And this
is one of my favorite suttas, because it is so incredibly precise about what
you see while you’re in the jhāna.
Ahhhhh-
MN # 111: known to him those states arose, known they were present, known
they disappeared.
BV: He’s seeing impermanence.
MN # 111: He understood thus: 'So indeed, these states, not having been,
come into being; having been, they vanish.' Regarding those states, he
abided unattracted; unrepelled,
BV: He wasn’t holding on, he wasn’t pushing away.
BV: He wasn’t identifying with these things.
MN # 111: detached, free, dissociated, with a mind rid of barriers. He
understood: 'There is an escape beyond,' and with the cultivation of that
[attainment], he confirmed that there is.
BV: So, when we’re, doing our practice, if we’re doing the samatha
vipassanā, we will see all of those things, in each one of the jhānas. If
you’re doing one-pointed concentration, you will not, and the access
concentration, is, the first part of one-pointed concentration. The
concentration is just a little bit too deep and it pushes down the
hindrance. And the hindrance is where our teachers are. And the hindrances
need to come up by themselves, and they will always come up, when your
mindfulness, gets a little weak, then the hindrance comes up. And you need
to develop the mind that welcomes the hindrance, and everybody thinks I’m a
little bit crazy for saying that. But this is your friend. This is showing
you: "Hey, this is how it works." If you are practicing the six Rs, you have
that relaxed, step, in it. If you don’t have the relaxed step in it, then
the kind of jhāna you will experience, is the kind of one-pointed jhāna.
That extra step where you relax, is, when the tension and tightness arises
that is, the second Noble Truth, that’s craving. And when you relax, you’re
letting go of the craving. Now, what happens with a lot of people, is they
don’t put that relax step in, and they bring their attention, back to your
object of meditation, and you still have the craving. And that’s the part
that helps mind go deeper. And I’m not saying that one-pointed
concentration, there is no benefits from it. There are benefits from it, but
they’re not the same benefits as the Buddha was teaching. He was not
teaching one-pointed, and I’ll tell you the hint, of why I say that. Because
while he was a bodhisatta, he went to the best teachers he could find, and
he did practice one-pointed concentration and was not satisfied with them.
Every time Buddhism would go into another area, you had people that they
already had their traditions. They had their ways of doing things, and they
wanted to put the Buddha’s in it. And at first, they might have been
teaching it the correct way, but over a period of time, that got lost. And
also the Burmese are very, very big on their commentaries, rather than, the
suttas themselves. And that’s a problem. that really is a problem, and I had
twenty years of that problem. Honest, I know. They changed the definition of
samatha to one-pointedness, and actually, when you look it up in the
Pāli-English dictionary, it will say that it’s the super tranquil state that
leads to jhāna. And the samatha has been changed to one-pointedness, which
is a little bit different than the tranquil state. As I understand it, and
I’ve never been able to read the Tibetan text without just going: "I have no
idea of what you’re saying.", so I put it down. But supposedly the Mahāmudrā
is very close to the
Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta. But I’ve never been able
to get through the stuff to be able to see that.
S: ~
BV: If you go to the Visudhimagga, it doesn’t have sixteen insights, like
the Burmese have, it has nine, and …
S: ~
BV: I know,
S: ~
BV: Yes, and that’s what happens when you go away from the original text,
because every commentary is somebody else’s idea about what they think the
Buddha was talking about. And they practiced, this way or that way, and they
say: ‘Well, this is what he was talking about, and this really works this
way, and this is how it is.", but then, when you go back to the original
suttas, and you go: "How in the world can they get that out of this?" It
gets real confusing. See, right after the time that the Buddha died, the
word, samādhi, it was a word that the Buddha made up. He made this word up,
to describe this particular kind of samatha vipassanā practice, and the
Brahmins, they started taking the word and using it in with their teaching,
but they changed the definition of it, and that definition stuck for a
really long period of time, and it gets incredibly confusing. So, with this,
it’s real tricky, studying the suttas if you don’t have a practice that goes
along with what the suttas are saying.
S: ~
BV: Well, I don’t know. Some of the experiences before the attainment of
nibbāna are described. But when you get to the experience of nibbāna, it’s
unconditioned; all we know is conditioned. How can you even talk about it?
It gets so confusing that I kind of throw up my hands and say: "I’m just
going to go back to the original stuff, and not worry about what everybody
else says."
There’s a story about the Zen teacher, what was his name, he was a big
Korean Zen teacher, and a Tibetan teacher came to visit. Now, they’re going
to have this big discussion, right? So all the students are: "Yeah, let’s
go. Let’s see what this is like!", and the Zen teacher holds up an orange,
and he says: "What is this?", and he kept saying it. And the Tibetan says:
"Don’t you have oranges in your country?" He turned around and walked away.
That was the big discussion.
And this is one of the things that’s different about the way I run a
retreat, and the way an awful lot of other people run a retreat, because I
don’t go around telling you: "Shh, don’t talk. Don’t talk." So that
everybody whispers, but they’re still, communicating with each other, and I
don’t see the need for that. Because the noble silence is when you get into
the second jhāna, because you’re not having that active mind, and you’re
starting to observe without having a lot of thoughts, and that’s what the
noble silence is about, to me. And I find it, when I was in Burma, I would
talk with the other monks about their experience, even though we were
supposed to be keeping noble silence, we taught each other a lot, with our
own observations and that sort of thing, and I found it very useful; I am
not going to stop you from talking with each other; I want you to talk about
Dhamma. I don’t want you to chit chatting about this and that, because
that’s nonsense stuff, and that’s a distraction. But talk on the Dhamma is a
good thing, to me.
So why don’t we share some merit now?
May suffering ones, be suffering free
And the fear struck, fearless be
May the grieving shed all grief
And may all beings find relief.
May all beings share this merit that we have thus acquired
For the acquisition of all kinds of happiness.
May beings inhabiting space and earth
Devas and nagas of mighty power
Share this merit of ours.
May they long protect the Buddha's dispensation.
Sadhu . . . Sadhu . . . Sadhu . . .
Sutta translations (C) Bhikkhu Bodhi 1995, 2001. All
sections of the suttas are Reprinted from The Middle Length Discourses of
the Buddha: A Translation of the Majjhima Nikaya and © Bhikkhu Bodhi 2000,
The Connected Discourses of the Buddha: A translation of the Samyutta Nikaya
with permission of Wisdom Publications, 199 Elm Street, Somerville, MA 02144
U.S.A,
www.wisdompubs.org
Footnote
1. AN 9-20
Unread remainder of MN # 99:
25-27, "Again, a bhikkhu abides pervading one quarter with a mind imbued
with compassion...with a mind imbued with altruistic joy...with a mind
imbued with equanimity, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise
the fourth; so above, below, around, and everywhere, and to all as to
himself, he abides pervading the all-encompassing world with a mind imbued
with equanimity, abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility, and
without ill will. When the deliverance of mind by equanimity is developed in
this way, no limiting action remains there, none persists there. Just as a
vigorous trumpeter could make himself heard without difficulty in the four
quarters, so too, when the deliverance of mind by equanimity is developed in
this way, no limiting action remains there, none persists there. This too is
the path to the company of Brahmā."
28. When this was said, the brahmin student Subha, Todeyya's son, said to
the Blessed One: "Magnificent, Master Gotama! Magnificent, Master Gotama!
Master Gotama has made the Dhamma clear in many ways, as though he were
turning upright what had been overturned, revealing what was hidden, showing
the way to one who was lost, or holding up a lamp in the dark for those with
eyesight to see forms. I go to Master Gotama for refuge and to the Dhamma
and to the Sangha of bhikkhus. Let Master Gotama remember me as a lay
follower who has gone to him for refuge for life.
29. "And now, Master Gotama, we depart. We are busy and have much to do."
"You may go, student, at your own convenience."
Then the brahmin student Subha, Todeyya's son, having delighted and
rejoiced in the Blessed One's words, rose from his seat, and after paying
homage to the Blessed One, keeping him on his right, he departed.
30. Now on that occasion the brahmin Janussoni was driving out of
Sāvatthi in the middle of the day in an all-white chariot drawn by white
mares. He saw the brahmin student Subha, Todeyya's son, coming in the
distance and asked him: "Now where is Master Bharadvaja coming from in the
middle of the day?"
"Sir, I am coming from the presence of the recluse Gotama." "What does
Master Bharadvaja think of the recluse Gotama's lucidity of wisdom? He is
wise, is he not?"
"Sir, who am I to know the recluse Gotama's lucidity of wisdom? One would
surely have to be his equal to know the reclusr Gotama's lucidity of
wisdom."
"Master Bharadvaja praises the recluse Gotama with high praise indeed."
"Sir, who am I to praise the recluse Gotama? The recluse Gotama is
praised by the praised as best among gods and humans. Sir, those five things
that the brahmins prescribe for the performance of merit, for accomplishing
the wholesome, the recluse Gotama calls equipment of the mind, that is, for
developing a mind that is without hostility and without ill will."
31. When this was said, the brahmin Jāṇussoṇi got down from his all-white
chariot drawn by white mares, and after arranging his upper robe on one
shoulder, he extended his hands in reverential salutation towards the
Blessed One and uttered this exclamation: "It is a gain for King Pasenadi of
Kosala, it is a great gain for King Pasenadi of Kosala that the Tathāgata,
accomplished and fully enlightened, lives in his realm."
Text last edited: 22-Jul-07
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| |
Anathapindika's Park, Dhamma Sukha Meditation Center,
8218 County Road 204, Annapolis, MO 63620
Contact PH: 573-546-1214
Email: sisterkhema@yahoo.com |
|
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Berlin-1 Apr 09
Bogor Dec 10
Vietnamese