I guess it depends on the definition of thing and it. The usual use of both words is rather casual. People use the words it and thing in reference to abstract concepts and intangible qualities all the time, without committing the fallacy of reification. Nibbana is the thing / subject / topic / matter we have been discussing. Of course, it is not a concrete thing. I do think it has some reality independent of anyone knowing it (relax, the its are simply impersonal prepositions that I am using so I do not have to keep repeating Nibbana. Oh, and my use "I" should not be construed to mean I am proposing a real self.)tiltbillings wrote:male_robin wrote:tiltbillings wrote: . I would say you are pushing the definitions beyond what these definitions, as I have shown above, clearly say and into a realm of something.
You use the word Nibbana-ize. iirc, -Ize is a prefix that converts a noun or adjective into a verb, and carries the sense of to make into, become, or become like the noun or adjective to which it is affixed. However, the set of past particle adjectives or abstract nouns (the ones marked in the genitive case) we were just discussing seem to describe unbinding as unbecome (or freedom from becoming) and unmade. That's the problem with language. Saying that arhats are Nibbanized is no different than saying they have attained / acquired / or gotten Nibbana.