the great Nibbana = annihilation, eternal, or something else thread

A discussion on all aspects of Theravāda Buddhism
rowyourboat
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by rowyourboat »

TMingyur wrote:
kirk5a wrote:
TMingyur wrote:It seems to be difficult to leave "cessation" just what the meaning of "cessation" is and not to fabricate it into something else.

Why is this?

Because there is no cessation yet.

Kind regards
Cessation of what?
Afflictive obscurations.

Kind regards

Cessation of the five aggregates.

It happens on a background of an extremely purified mind, hence all the light mentioned above. Some people have bliss lasting several hours, after a cessation experience, if apparently their faculties are strong.

with metta

Matheesha
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kirk5a
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by kirk5a »

From the same talk:

"As soon as we destroy avijja-paccaya sankhara, what happens? Avijjayatveva asesaviraga-nirodha sankhara nirodho -- 'All that is needed is for unawareness to be completely disbanded from the heart, then nirodho hoti -- everything else is disbanded.' What do you say to that? Evametassa kevalassa dukkhakkhandhassa nirodho hoti -- 'All that is needed is for unawareness to be utterly disbanded, and everything -- the entire mass of suffering and stress -- is disbanded.' And that which knows that unawareness is disbanded, that's the pure one. How can that pure one disband or be annihilated? It's an utter truth."
"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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ground
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by ground »

rowyourboat wrote:
TMingyur wrote:
kirk5a wrote: Cessation of what?
Afflictive obscurations.

Cessation of the five aggregates.
Different perspective but "Cessation of the five aggregates" cannot be really true. Perhaps better "Transforming the clinging into the non-clinging"
rowyourboat wrote: Some people have bliss lasting several hours, after a cessation experience, if apparently their faculties are strong.
see ... in this description ... aggregates ... still arising.


Therefore if a "living being" attains it the most appropriate description is "cessation of afflictive obscurations". This leaves "everything else" open and avoids speculative fantasies. Because it is just cessation of dukkha and the afflictive obscurations are the causes of dukkha (from the conventional subject's perspective).

Only cessation of dukkha and its causes but no confirmation of anything else "in their place". This is how to restrain one's fantasy.

No fairy tales please! No nibbana cult!

Kind regards
rowyourboat
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by rowyourboat »

Hi TMingyur,

No nibbana cult - keep it nice and clean. Not too much talk on suffering.

Ok then.

With metta

Matheesha
With Metta

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Assaji
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by Assaji »

Hi,

There's a good sutta on this subject:

'Now, at that time this evil supposition had arisen to Ven. Yamaka: "As I understand the Teaching explained by the Blessed One, a monk with no more (mental) effluents, on the break-up of the body, is annihilated, perishes, & does not exist after death."'

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

On the the other hand, the translation of 'vinnanam anidassanam' as a kind of consciousness is dubious:

http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=5618" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Metta, Dmytro
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kirk5a
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by kirk5a »

TMingyur wrote:Only cessation of dukkha and its causes but no confirmation of anything else "in their place". This is how to restrain one's fantasy.

No fairy tales please! No nibbana cult!
Fair enough, but there seems to be a need to restrain runaway cessationist dogma, on the other hand. Otherwise I think we just end up at Sauron's view, quite frankly.
"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
rowyourboat
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by rowyourboat »

kirk5a wrote:From the same talk:

"As soon as we destroy avijja-paccaya sankhara, what happens? Avijjayatveva asesaviraga-nirodha sankhara nirodho -- 'All that is needed is for unawareness to be completely disbanded from the heart, then nirodho hoti -- everything else is disbanded.' What do you say to that? Evametassa kevalassa dukkhakkhandhassa nirodho hoti -- 'All that is needed is for unawareness to be utterly disbanded, and everything -- the entire mass of suffering and stress -- is disbanded.' And that which knows that unawareness is disbanded, that's the pure one. How can that pure one disband or be annihilated? It's an utter truth."
'The Pure one'? Sound like something that is perfect and everlasting, hence sukha and nicca. Did the Buddha say that there was anything in the five aggregates (hence, can be experienced and known) which is sukha and nicca (satisfactory and permanent)? :smile:

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Matheesha
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mlswe
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by mlswe »

yeah that "one" in "pure one" seems so uneccesary from a dhamma perspective, nibbana is called the unconditioned, not the unconditioned one
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kirk5a
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by kirk5a »

rowyourboat wrote:
kirk5a wrote:From the same talk:

"As soon as we destroy avijja-paccaya sankhara, what happens? Avijjayatveva asesaviraga-nirodha sankhara nirodho -- 'All that is needed is for unawareness to be completely disbanded from the heart, then nirodho hoti -- everything else is disbanded.' What do you say to that? Evametassa kevalassa dukkhakkhandhassa nirodho hoti -- 'All that is needed is for unawareness to be utterly disbanded, and everything -- the entire mass of suffering and stress -- is disbanded.' And that which knows that unawareness is disbanded, that's the pure one. How can that pure one disband or be annihilated? It's an utter truth."
'The Pure one'? Sound like something that is perfect and everlasting, hence sukha and nicca. Did the Buddha say that there was anything in the five aggregates (hence, can be experienced and known which is sukha and nicca (satisfactory and permanent)? :smile:

With metta

Matheesha
He said "that which KNOWS THAT UNAWARENESS IS DISBANDED" - not that which is KNOWN (that which is subject to disbanding).

As for what the Buddha said: "This is deathless: the liberation of the mind through lack of clinging/sustenance.'" MN 106.

edit: I took out the bit about "chutzpah" :smile: sorry
Last edited by kirk5a on Mon Feb 14, 2011 9:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"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
mlswe
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by mlswe »

maybe i was too rash posting while not delving deeply enough in the contents of discussion. However that "one" stood out.

observation: your tone seems to imply that certain persons, teachings, and the multitudes of copys of them are beyond inquery. Reveration has its place but sometimes it can fool us.
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kirk5a
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by kirk5a »

mlswe wrote:maybe i was too rash posting while not delving deeply enough in the contents of discussion. However that "one" stood out.

observation: your tone seems to imply that certain persons, teachings, and the multitudes of copys of them are beyond inquery. Reveration has its place but sometimes it can fool us.
My "tone" implies that something is beyond inquiry? How does a "tone" do that?

Well let me say explicitly that I regard nothing as beyond inquiry.
"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
mlswe
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by mlswe »

because this is text and not speech i am obviously missing many subtleties but the way you phrased it, words and order etc gave me that feeling. But it seems i was wrong, thats good too :)

wishing you well and thanks for replying
rowyourboat
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by rowyourboat »

Vinnana causes mental-material phenomena
Mental-material phenomena causes vinnana (consciouness)

Do you posit self-existent phenomena?

If that which is aware is disbanded, aggregates cease.

The bigger question is- why is there so much resistance to a moment of cessation in multiple moments of arising bliss? Sounds like attachment to aggregates to me. :stirthepot:

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Matheesha
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pegembara
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by pegembara »

Having nothing,
clinging to nothing:
that is the Island,
there is no other;
that is Nibbæna, I tell you,
the total ending of ageing and death.
~ SN 1094


This is why the metaphor of ‘The Island that you cannot go beyond’ is so
very powerful, because it points to the principle of an awareness that you can’t get
beyond. It’s very simple, very direct, and you can’t conceive it. You have to trust
it. You have to trust this simple ability that we all have to be fully present and fully
awake, and begin to recognize the grasping and the ideas we have taken on about
ourselves, about the world around us, about our thoughts and perceptions and
feelings.
The way of mindfulness is the way of recognizing conditions just as they
are. We simply recognize and acknowledge their presence, without blaming them
or judging them or criticizing them or praising them. We allow them to be, the
positive and the negative both. And, as we trust in this way of mindfulness more
and more, we begin to realize the reality of ‘The Island that you cannot go
beyond.’

It is a place, as Ajahn Chah said, where you experience “the reality of non-grasping.”



The Island

AN ANTHOLOGY OF THE
BUDDHA’S TEACHINGS
ON NIBBANA

http://www.forestsangha.org/index.php?o ... &Itemid=25" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
And what is right speech? Abstaining from lying, from divisive speech, from abusive speech, & from idle chatter: This is called right speech.
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kirk5a
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Re: Nibbana is Freedom Not Extinction

Post by kirk5a »

rowyourboat wrote:Vinnana causes mental-material phenomena
Mental-material phenomena causes vinnana (consciouness)

Do you posit self-existent phenomena?

If that which is aware is disbanded, aggregates cease.

The bigger question is- why is there so much resistance to a moment of cessation in multiple moments of arising bliss? Sounds like attachment to aggregates to me. :stirthepot:
I'm not positing anything actually.

My point in participating in this thread was just to share some words that go against the "extinction" idea, so here are some more:

"The Dhamma that can't be described: That's the genuine Dhamma. It doesn't have the word 'vanishes' or 'disappears' -- simply that the world can't reach in to know it and touch it. As for annihilating this Dhamma, it can't be annihilated. When we practice in line with the tactics given by each of the Buddhas, we can touch it and become aware of it. The heart becomes an awareness of the Dhamma, a right and fitting vessel for the Dhamma -- and there is no vessel more appropriate for receiving each level of the Dhamma than the heart. When it enters into the Dhamma in full measure, the heart becomes one with the Dhamma. The heart is the Dhamma. The Dhamma is the heart. Oneness. There is nothing but oneness, not becoming two with anything else."
- Ajahn Maha Boowa
http://www.what-buddha-taught.net/Books ... ey_Are.htm" 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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