"The Deathless" (amata)

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tiltbillings
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

kirk5a wrote:
tiltbillings wrote:So, explain to us what "nibbana does exist" means.
No.

I am going to return to the open air of heedfulness, the path to the deathless.

Have a good day.
This is not a surprise. You have dodged the hard questions in this discussion from the very beginning. Then just be careful with the locution "the Deathless" when using translations that use it, understanding it is not referring to some objective thing that exists.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by Spiny Norman »

Have we reached any concensus on what "the deathless" actually means? Just checking!
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tiltbillings
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

porpoise wrote:Have we reached any concensus on what "the deathless" actually means? Just checking!
If one follows the suttas, amata, which is defined as the destruction of greed, hatred and delusion refers to the fact that there is no longer any rebirth and with no rebirth, no death -- which is to say: freedom from death.
  • MN 26:

    "Then, monks, being subject myself to birth, seeing the drawbacks of birth, seeking freedom from birth, unexcelled rest from the yoke, Unbinding/nibbana, I reached freedom from birth, unexcelled rest from the yoke: Unbinding. Being subject myself to aging... illness... death... sorrow... defilement, seeing the drawbacks of aging... illness... death... sorrow... defilement, seeking freedom from aging, freedom from illness, freedom from death, freedom from sorrow, unexcelled rest from the yoke, Unbinding, I reached the freedom from aging, freedom from illness, freedom from death, freedom from sorrow, unexcelled rest from the yoke: Unbinding. Knowledge & vision arose in me: 'Unprovoked is my release. This is the last birth. There is now no further becoming.'
  • Furthermore, a sage at peace is not born, does not age, does not die, is unagitated, and is free from longing. He has nothing whereby he would be born. Not being born, will he age? Not aging, will he die? Not dying, will he be agitated? Not being agitated, for what will he long? It was in reference to this that it was said, 'He has been stilled where the currents of construing do not flow. And when the currents of construing do not flow, he is said to be a sage at peace.' MN (140) III 246
  • Gone to the beyond of becoming,
    you let go of in front,
    let go of behind,
    let go of between.
    With a heart everywhere let-go,
    you don't come again to birth
    & aging.
    (Ven Thanisssaro) Dhp 348

    Through not seeing the Four Noble Truths,
    Long was the weary path from birth to birth.
    When these are known, removed is rebirth's cause,
    The root of sorrow plucked; then ends rebirth.
    DN ii 91

    "Destroyed is birth; the higher life is fulfilled; nothing more is to
    be done, and beyond this life nothing more remains."
    DN ii 153

    Then Mara the Evil One, wanting to arouse fear, horripilation, & terror in her, wanting to make her fall away from concentration, approached her & said, "What is it that you don't approve of, nun?"

    [Sister Cala:]
    "I don't approve of birth, my friend."

    [Mara:]
    Why don't you approve of birth?
    One who is born
    enjoys sensual pleasures.
    Who on earth
    ever persuaded you:
    'Nun, don't approve of birth'?

    [Sister Cala:]
    For one who is born
    there's death.

    One who is born
    sees pain.
    It's a binding, a flogging, a torment.
    That's why one shouldn't approve
    of birth.

    The Awakened One taught me the Dhamma
    — the overcoming of birth —
    for the abandoning of all pain,
    he established me in
    the truth.
    But beings who have come to form
    & those with a share in the formless,
    if they don't discern cessation,
    return to becoming-again.
    S i 132
It is not some sort of "the unborn" or "the Deathless" we are striving for here. It is freedom from birth and death. There is no grammartical or phiological reason why the translations of the texts in question cannot accurately reflect that.
  • At Savatthi. "Monks, remain with your minds well-established in the four establishings of mindfulness. Don't let freedom from death be lost to you. -- SN 47.41
  • "Sariputta, do you take it on conviction that the faculty of conviction, when developed & pursued, gains a footing in freedom from death, has freedom from death as its goal & consummation? -- SN v 220
  • "Monks, these seven perceptions, when developed & pursued, are of great fruit, of great benefit. They gain a footing in freedom from death, have freedom from death as their final end. -- AN iv 46
  • For knowing, the Blessed One knows; seeing, he sees. He is the Eye, he is Knowledge, he is Dhamma, he is Brahma. He is the speaker, the proclaimer, the elucidator of meaning, the giver of feedom from death, the lord of the Dhamma, the Tathagata. -- MN i 108
  • "There is the case where a monk remains focused on the body in & of itself — ardent, alert, & mindful — subduing greed & distress with reference to the world. For him, remaining focused on the body in and of itself, any desire for the body is abandoned. From the abandoning of desire, freedom from death is realized. -- SN v 181
  • "There is the case where a monk remains focused on the body in & of itself — ardent, alert, & mindful — subduing greed & distress with reference to the world. For him, remaining focused on the body in and of itself, the body is comprehended. From the comprehension of the body, freedom from death is realized. -- SN v 182
  • Throw open the door to freedom from death!
    Let them hear the Dhamma
    realized by the Stainless One!
    -- SN i 136
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by kirk5a »

Upasika Kee Nanayon wrote: The Lord Buddha resolved Mogharaja's Problem,[8] by advising him to see the world as empty, as not-self, as being composed of elements and aggregates. The aggregates (and so on) must be stripped away, and concepts and assumptions such as 'person' or 'animal' (and so on) must be disestablished. The elements, aggregates, sense bases and concepts, need to be all exposed so that there's no more grasping at them. What remains is the Deathless Dhamma. This is without birth or death, and is also called the World-Transcending Dhamma or Nibbaana.

There are many names, but they all essentially refer to the same thing. When mundane things are spurned, the result is the Transcendent Dhamma, the Non-Determined Dhamma, Pure Dhamma. Just consider the running-on, the coursing-on from birth to death, from death to birth in the different realms of existence. Then decide if Nibbana is really worth attaining. On that farther shore, there's no suffering, no birth or death, because the 'King of Death' can't reach there. Yet because we can't fathom this out, we persist in repeatedly choosing to be born on this nether shore, amidst its endless suffering.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/thai ... .html#chb5" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

Thank you for quoting this.
kirk5a wrote:
Upasika Kee Nanayon wrote: The Lord Buddha resolved Mogharaja's Problem,[8] by advising him to see the world as empty, as not-self, as being composed of elements and aggregates. The aggregates (and so on) must be stripped away, and concepts and assumptions such as 'person' or 'animal' (and so on) must be disestablished. The elements, aggregates, sense bases and concepts, need to be all exposed so that there's no more grasping at them. What remains is the Deathless Dhamma. This is without birth or death, and is also called the World-Transcending Dhamma or Nibbaana.
And that is the problem: "The Deathless Dhamma." What does it actually mean? Is it referring to some sort objective thing outside the the experiences/dhammas of the individual within whom greed, hatred, and delusion has been destroyed? If so, that would certainly imply that nibbana would exist even if there were no ariyas.
There are many names, but they all essentially refer to the same thing. When mundane things are spurned, the result is the Transcendent Dhamma, the Non-Determined Dhamma, Pure Dhamma. Just consider the running-on, the coursing-on from birth to death, from death to birth in the different realms of existence. Then decide if Nibbana is really worth attaining. On that farther shore, there's no suffering, no birth or death, because the 'King of Death' can't reach there. Yet because we can't fathom this out, we persist in repeatedly choosing to be born on this nether shore, amidst its endless suffering.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/thai ... .html#chb5" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Interestingly, the "transcendent dhamma" would be any dhamma that is completely free of the conditioning of greed, hatred, and delusion. Truth/Dhamma are cognitions/dhammas free of greed, hatred, and delusion; it is not an objective, independently existing thing. We must be careful not to objectify Dhamma/nibbana, lest we turn it into some sort of existent thing that exists independently of any ariya.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by kirk5a »

tiltbillings wrote:Truth/Dhamma are cognitions/dhammas free of greed, hatred, and delusion
Are these cognitions constant or inconstant?
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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tiltbillings
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

kirk5a wrote:
tiltbillings wrote:Truth/Dhamma are cognitions/dhammas free of greed, hatred, and delusion
Are these cognitions constant or inconstant?
Cognitions rise and fall. What is constant is that the cognitions are free of the conditions of -- they are asankhata, no longer conditioned by -- greed, hatred, and delusion.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by kirk5a »

tiltbillings wrote:Cognitions rise and fall. What is constant is that the cognitions are free of the conditions of -- they are asankhata, no longer conditioned by -- greed, hatred, and delusion.
We know the Buddha taught that what is inconstant is dukkha. So even these cognitions are dukkha.
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

kirk5a wrote:
tiltbillings wrote:Cognitions rise and fall. What is constant is that the cognitions are free of the conditions of -- they are asankhata, no longer conditioned by -- greed, hatred, and delusion.
We know the Buddha taught that what is inconstant is dukkha. So even these cognitions are dukkha.
So, arahants either do not have cognitions -- that is, they do not see, hear, taste, touch, smell, or have thoughts --, or they they are just big piles of dukkha like the rest of us.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by kirk5a »

tiltbillings wrote:So, arahants either do not have cognitions -- that is, they do not see, hear, taste, touch, smell, or have thoughts --,
Not true, obviously.
or they they are just big piles of dukkha like the rest of us.
What are you identifying the arahant as? The body? Cognitions?

And what do arahants say? Is there any arahant who has said that what rises and falls is not dukkha?
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

kirk5a wrote:
tiltbillings wrote:So, arahants either do not have cognitions -- that is, they do not see, hear, taste, touch, smell, or have thoughts --,
Not true, obviously.
or they they are just big piles of dukkha like the rest of us.
What are you identifying the arahant as? The body? Cognitions?
I am not identifying the arahant with anything; however, it is only through cognitions that there is going to be awareness of awakening, unless you are advocating some sort of mysterious awareness that is not a cognition.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

  • SN 2.26: It is in this very fathom-long physical frame with its perceptions and mind, that, I declare, lies the world, and the arising of the world, and the cessation of the world, and the path leading to the cessation of the world. [26]
    • 26.The import of this significant declaration can be understood in the context of those suttas in which the Buddha defines the concept of the world. The 'world,' for the Buddha, arises in the six sense-spheres (See above Note 21). Hence its cessation too, is to be experienced there, in the cessation of the six sense-spheres (salaayatananirodha). "I will teach you, monks, how the world comes to be and passes away... What monks, is the arising of the world? Dependent on eye and forms, arises visual consciousness. The concurrence of the three is contact. Conditioned by contact is feeling. Conditioned by feeling, craving. Conditioned by craving, grasping. Conditioned by grasping, becoming. Conditioned by becoming, birth. And conditioned by birth, arise decay, death, grief lamentation, suffering, despair. This is the arising of the world.
      And what, monks, is the passing away of the world? Dependent on the eye and forms arise visual consciousness. The concurrence of the three is contact. Conditioned by contact is feeling. Conditioned by feeling is craving. By the utter fading away and cessation of that craving, grasping ceases, by the ceasing of grasping, becoming ceases, by the ceasing of becoming birth ceases, by the ceasing of birth, decay-and-death, grief, lamentation, suffering, despair, cease. Such is the ceasing of this entire man
      [sic; should be 'mass'] of Ill." -- SN ii 73 CDB i 581

    http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/auth ... passage-10" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
    http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/auth ... tml#fnt-26" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

Seems I missed this.
kirk5a wrote:
And what do arahants say? Is there any arahant who has said that what rises and falls is not dukkha?
A cognition is dukkha because it is not satifactory to grasp, but there is freedom from grasping, obviously there is no dukkha in what rises and falls. If that were not the case, the arahant would be subject to dukkha with the rise and fall of cognitions, and that obviously is not the case.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by kirk5a »

tiltbillings wrote:Seems I missed this.
kirk5a wrote:
And what do arahants say? Is there any arahant who has said that what rises and falls is not dukkha?
A cognition is dukkha because it is not satifactory to grasp, but there is freedom from grasping, obviously there is no dukkha in what rises and falls. If that were not the case, the arahant would be subject to dukkha with the rise and fall of cognitions, and that obviously is not the case.
This is explained in the Arrow Sutta. The first arrow one is shot with is still dukkha. Otherwise, if it really was the case that "there is no dukkha in what rises and falls" for an arahant, they might as well be reborn then! Keep being reborn and help others, enjoy life, whatever. But arahants don't say " I'll be back." :lol: They say "Birth is destroyed... there is no more coming to any state of being."

But the idea that an arahant is "subject to" dukkha is not quite right. Again, what the arrow sutta says "He is disjoined, I tell you, from suffering & stress."

How do we come to know what this "disjoined" actually is? See here, in the description of stream entry which I have been quoting:
the Visuddhimagga wrote: his consciousness
no longer enters into or settles down on or resolves upon any field of formations
at all, or clings, cleaves or clutches on to it, but retreats, retracts and recoils as
water does from a lotus leaf
Or even better, to return again to the sutta quotation:
"'I tell you, the ending of the mental fermentations depends on the first jhana.' Thus it has been said. In reference to what was it said? There is the case where a monk, secluded from sensuality, secluded from unskillful qualities, enters & remains in the first jhana: rapture & pleasure born of seclusion, accompanied by directed thought & evaluation. He regards whatever phenomena there that are connected with form, feeling, perception, fabrications, & consciousness, as inconstant, stressful, a disease, a cancer, an arrow, painful, an affliction, alien, a disintegration, an emptiness, not-self. He turns his mind away from those phenomena, and having done so, inclines his mind to the property of deathlessness: 'This is peace, this is exquisite — the resolution of all fabrications; the relinquishment of all acquisitions; the ending of craving; dispassion; cessation; Unbinding.'
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
"When one thing is practiced & pursued, ignorance is abandoned, clear knowing arises, the conceit 'I am' is abandoned, latent tendencies are uprooted, fetters are abandoned. Which one thing? Mindfulness immersed in the body." -AN 1.230
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Re: "The Deathless" (amata)

Post by tiltbillings »

kirk5a wrote: . . .
The texts you quote do not contradict anything I have said. If anything, they support my position, but the texts you quote certainly do not support your seeming contention that there is a "the Deathless" that exists even if there were no arahants or other ariya. Since you refuse, despite my repeatedly asking you, to explain your actual position, it is unclear what you are contending. You might want to clarify your position here.

Now we come to this:
kirk5a wrote: Otherwise, if it really was the case that "there is no dukkha in what rises and falls " for an arahant, they might as well be reborn then! Keep being reborn and help others, enjoy life, whatever.
Like much of what you have done with what I have said, the problem is, you take it out of context and twist it, which has been pointed out to you. And this particular taking my words out of context is no different. The full sentence, not just the bit you plucked out to twist: A cognition is dukkha because it is not satisfactory to grasp, but there is freedom from grasping, obviously there is no dukkha in what rises and falls.

And, of course, what I said was posted in a msg that immediately followed the msg where I quoted this:
  • And what, monks, is the passing away of the world? Dependent on the eye and forms arise visual consciousness. The concurrence of the three is contact. Conditioned by contact is feeling. Conditioned by feeling is craving. By the utter fading away and cessation of that craving, grasping ceases, by the ceasing of grasping, becoming ceases, by the ceasing of becoming birth ceases, by the ceasing of birth, decay-and-death, grief, lamentation, suffering, despair, cease. Such is the ceasing of this entire man[sic; should be 'mass'] of Ill." -- SN ii 73 CDB i 581
If there is no grasping, I am obviously talking about an arahant, and certainly in this is so in the context of this passage.

Now, this is a very interesting passage. The passage as a whole tells us where and how the drama of awakening happens. It also tells that for an arahant that -- Dependent on the eye and forms arise visual consciousness. The concurrence of the three is contact. Conditioned by contact is feeling -- continues to function, but the relationship to that which rises and falls has been radically altered. The craving for it has ceased, and with no craving, there is no grasping after it. And because of that there is no becoming -- no compulsion forward because of it -- leading to rebirth. And no rebirth gives us amata, freedom from death.

In other words, this statement of yours -- Otherwise, if it really was the case that "there is no dukkha in what rises and falls " for an arahant, they might as well be reborn then! Keep being reborn and help others, enjoy life, whatever -- is not something I said or even remotely implied. For the arahant is freed of craving for what rises and falls, no longer grasping after the khandhas, with no further compulsion to rebirth, the congitions that rise and fall are no longer conditioned – asankhata – for the arahant by greed, hatred, and delusion:

"And what have I [the Buddha] taught? 'This is dukkha... This is the origination of dukkha... This is the cessation of dukkha... This is the path of practice leading to the cessation of dukkha': This is what I have taught. And why have I taught these things? Because they are connected with the goal, relate to the rudiments of the holy life, and lead to disenchantment, to dispassion, to cessation, to calm, to direct knowledge, to self-awakening [sambodhi], to nibbana. This is why I have taught them. SN v 437 cf DN i 189. The arahant, in experiencing the rising and falling of seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching and cognizing, is free of dukkha.
>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
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