What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

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Sam Vara
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What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

Post by Sam Vara »

Bhikkhu Cintita has written a very interesting essay on the eye and on sense-spheres in general:

https://bhikkhucintita.files.wordpress. ... pheres.pdf

It makes good sense out of potentially puzzling passages in the suttas, and offers some excellent advice on how to work with these ideas in practice.
We have two eyes. I don't mean the right eye and the left eye, but
the objective eye and the subjective eye, the one that exists in the
world, and the one that arises in experience. This is a simple
distinction, but very important to keep clear about in what
follows, so let me say a few words about it here. From the
beginning, it is important to recognize the strongly subjective
orientation of the early Dhamma, particularly with regard to
mind. The field of inquiry is almost completely restricted to elements
as they occur in experience, with almost no interest in
mechanisms that might exist outside of experience. In fact, “the
world” itself is understood as not something “out there,” but as
the world of experience.
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Re: What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

Post by auto »

https://suttacentral.net/sn35.235/en/bodhi
“And what, bhikkhus, is the Dhamma exposition on the theme of burning? It would be better, bhikkhus, for the eye faculty to be lacerated by a red-hot iron pin burning, blazing, and glowing, than for one to grasp the sign through the features in a form cognizable by the eye. For if consciousness should stand tied to gratification in the sign or in the features, and if one should die on that occasion, it is possible that one will go to one of two destinations: hell or the animal realm. Having seen this danger, I speak thus.
.....
“In regard to this, bhikkhus, the instructed noble disciple reflects thus: ‘Leave off lacerating the eye faculty with a red-hot iron pin burning, blazing, and glowing. Let me attend only to this: So the eye is impermanent, forms are impermanent, eye-consciousness is impermanent, eye-contact is impermanent, whatever feeling arises with eye-contact as condition—whether pleasant or painful or neither-painful-nor-pleasant—that too is impermanent.
https://suttacentral.net/sn35.236/en/bodhi
...
“So too, bhikkhus, when there is the eye, pleasure and pain arise internally with eye-contact as condition. When there is the ear, pleasure and pain arise internally with ear-contact as condition…. When there is the mind, pleasure and pain arise internally with mind-contact as condition.
...
“So too, bhikkhus, when there is no eye, no pleasure and pain arise internally with eye-contact as condition. When there is no ear, no pleasure and pain arise internally with ear-contact as condition…. When there is no mind, no pleasure and pain arise internally with mind-contact as condition.”
https://suttacentral.net/sn35.232/en/bodhi
....
“Suppose, friend, a black ox and a white ox were yoked together by a single harness or yoke. Would one be speaking rightly if one were to say: ‘The black ox is the fetter of the white ox; the white ox is the fetter of the black ox’?”

“No, friend. The black ox is not the fetter of the white ox nor is the white ox the fetter of the black ox, but rather the single harness or yoke by which the two are yoked together: that is the fetter there.”

“So too, friend, the eye is not the fetter of forms … nor are mental phenomena the fetter of the mind, but rather the desire and lust that arise there in dependence on both: that is the fetter there.
...
“If, friend, the eye were the fetter of forms or if forms were the fetter of the eye, this living of the holy life could not be discerned for the complete destruction of suffering. But since the eye is not the fetter of forms nor are forms the fetter of the eye —but rather the desire and lust that arise there in dependence on both is the fetter there—the living of the holy life is discerned for the complete destruction of suffering.
“In this way too, friend, it may be understood how that is so: There exists in the Blessed One the eye, the Blessed One sees a form with the eye, yet there is no desire and lust in the Blessed One
“In this way, friend, it can be understood how the eye is not the fetter of forms nor forms the fetter of the eye, but rather the desire and lust that arise there in dependence on both is the fetter there
so in order to see the holy life is to see the fetter to discern the holy life. Basically the coffee and eye are innocent, the desire what arises is the fetter. Desire arises in body.

quote from essay
…, with regard to the sixfold-sphere of contact (SN 35.13, SN 35.103). If one does not understand these, one is “far from the dhamma and vinaya” (SN 35.71).
Before his awakening, the Buddha asked himself,
“What is the allure, what is the danger, what is the escape in the case of the eye?” … Then, bhikkhus, it occurred to me: “The pleasure and joy that arise in dependence on the eye; this is the allure in the eye. That the eye is impermanent, suffering, and subject to change: this is the danger in the eye.
The removal and abandonment of desire and lust for the eye: this is the escape from the eye.” … [and so on for ear, nose, etc.] So long, bhikkhus, as I did not directly know as they really are the allure, the danger and the escape in the case of these six interior spheres, I did not claim to have awakened … (SN 35.13)
just ending the quote

https://suttacentral.net/sn35.13/en/bodhi
...
“So long, bhikkhus, as I did not directly know as they really are the gratification, the danger, and the escape in the case of these six internal sense bases, I did not claim to have awakened to the unsurpassed perfect enlightenment in this world with its devas, Mara, and Brahma, in this generation with its ascetics and brahmins, its devas and humans. But when I directly knew all this as it really is, then I claimed to have awakened to the unsurpassed perfect enlightenment in this world with … its devas and humans.

“The knowledge and vision arose in me: ‘Unshakable is my liberation of mind; this is my last birth; now there is no more renewed existence.’”
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mikenz66
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Re: What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

Post by mikenz66 »

Thanks, Bhikkhu Cintita always has useful things to say...

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Re: What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

Post by auto »

i agree this essay has good points.

i like the TV example
The Buddha compares consciousness to “a magic-show, a juggler's trick entire” (SN 22.95).20 Likewise, the many manifestations of consciousness – for consciousness is never a single thing – provides the factory workers who fabricate wondrous products in the factory of name-and-form, including subjects and objects and the appearance of an entire independent objective reality.
To see how this works, imagine you enter a room in which a television is turned on. At first you may be conscious of pixels or shapes and colors on the screen and sounds. However, the next moment you are conscious of an ongoing situation located in the nineteenth century American West, in which people are acting out their intentions both virtuous and evil. It's magic! To a degree you are convinced that this situation is real, for you find yourself empathizing with the main characters, enraptured as their circumstances unfold. Such is the power of consciousness to evoke, and such is its power to conjure up the external world “out there,” and convince us that it is real. Notice that when we conceive dualistically, consciousness arises when form passes before the eye. When we see things as they really are, consciousness does not arise from eye and form; quite the opposite: consciousness fabricates eye and form and is therefore prior to it, for consciousness is that very discrimination that produces the dualism.
The essay seem to top on the Bahya Sutta, from essay
Our mission, if we decide to accept it, is to see for ourselves into the fabricated nature of the subject-object dualism expressed in the sense spheres. This is how we ultimately bring the world to an end. In a number of passages the Buddha describes how to approach this task:

Then, Bāhiya, you should train yourself thus: In reference to the seen, there will be only the seen. In reference to the heard, only the heard. In reference to the sensed, only the sensed.24 In reference to the cognized, only the cognized. That is how you should train yourself. When for you there will be only the seen in reference to the seen, only the heard in reference to the heard, only the sensed in reference to the sensed, only the cognized in reference to the cognized, then, Bāhiya, there is no you in connection with that. When there is no you in connection with that, there is no you there. When there is no you there, you are neither here nor yonder nor between the two. This, just this, is the end of stress. (Ud 1.10, Bāhiya Sutta)
end of bahira Sutta is

https://accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn ... .than.html
Through hearing this brief explanation of the Dhamma from the Blessed One, the mind of Bāhiya of the Bark-cloth right then and there was released from effluents through lack of clinging/sustenance. Having exhorted Bāhiya of the Bark-cloth with this brief explanation of the Dhamma, the Blessed One left.
Now, not long after the Blessed One's departure, Bāhiya was attacked & killed by a cow with a young calf. Then the Blessed One, having gone for alms in Sāvatthī, after the meal, returning from his alms round with a large number of monks, saw that Bāhiya had died. On seeing him, he said to the monks, "Take Bāhiya's body, monks, and, placing it on a litter and carrying it away, cremate it and build him a memorial. Your companion in the holy life has died."
Responding, "As you say, lord," to the Blessed One, the monks — placing Bāhiya's body on a litter, carrying it away, cremating it, and building him a memorial — went to the Blessed One. On arrival, having bowed down to him, sat to one side. As they were sitting there, they said to him, "Bāhiya's body has been cremated, lord, and his memorial has been built. What is his destination? What is his future state?"
"Monks, Bāhiya of the Bark-cloth was wise. He practiced the Dhamma in accordance with the Dhamma and did not pester me with issues related to the Dhamma. Bāhiya of the Bark-cloth, monks, is totally unbound."
Then, on realizing the significance of that, the Blessed One on that occasion exclaimed:

Where water, earth,
fire, & wind
have no footing:
There the stars don't shine,
the sun isn't visible.
There the moon doesn't appear.
There darkness is not found.
And when a sage,
a brahman through sagacity,
has realized [this] for himself,
then from form & formless,
from bliss & pain,
he is freed.
the beginning is
I have heard that on one occasion the Blessed One was staying near Sāvatthī at Jeta's Grove, Anāthapiṇḍika's monastery. And on that occasion Bāhiya of the Bark-cloth was living in Suppāraka by the seashore. He was worshipped, revered, honored, venerated, and given homage — a recipient of robes, alms food, lodgings, & medicinal requisites for the sick. Then, when he was alone in seclusion, this line of thinking appeared to his awareness: "Now, of those who in this world are arahants or have entered the path of arahantship, am I one?"
he weren't arahant but became arahant after hearing Blessed one teaching. Interesting is that he died after that. It seem once you come arhant you will also meet not so good stuff after Blessed One departure.
Through hearing this brief explanation of the Dhamma from the Blessed One, the mind of Bāhiya of the Bark-cloth right then and there was released from effluents through lack of clinging/sustenance. Having exhorted Bāhiya of the Bark-cloth with this brief explanation of the Dhamma, the Blessed One left.
Now, not long after the Blessed One's departure, Bāhiya was attacked & killed by a cow with a young calf. Then the Blessed One, having gone for alms in Sāvatthī, after the meal, returning from his alms round with a large number of monks, saw that Bāhiya had died. On seeing him, he said to the monks, "Take Bāhiya's body, monks, and, placing it on a litter and carrying it away, cremate it and build him a memorial. Your companion in the holy life has died."
Teach me the Dhamma, O Blessed One! Teach me the Dhamma, O One-Well-Gone, that will be for my long-term welfare & bliss."
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Re: What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

Post by mikenz66 »

auto wrote: Wed Apr 18, 2018 12:05 pm i like the TV example
Yes, and note that this is almost directly from Ven Nanananda's Nibbana Sermon 5:
http://seeingthroughthenet.net/books/
Nanananda wrote: At first sight the sutta, when it refers to a picture, seems to be
speaking about the man who drew it. But there is something deeper
than that. When the Buddha says that the picture called caraa is
also something thought out by the mind, he is not simply stating the
fact that the artist drew it after thinking it out with his mind. The ref-
erence is rather to the mind of the one who sees it. He, who sees it,
regards it as something marvellous. He creates a picture out of it. He
imagines something picturesque in it.
Nanananda wrote: What really has happened? How did they see a film show? Just as
much as one creates a name-and-form on one’s screen of consciousness
with the help of preparations, the film-goer has created a story
by putting together the series of scenes falling on the screen.
The viewer "creates" the picture, or the movie...

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Re: What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

Post by auto »

yep noticed, i haven't read nanananda book, so i decided to read couple pages out of 700, 0.o
Nibbana - The Mind Stilled.

name is bending towards form

iddappaccayata,

firewood - it is nama rupa. Because fire catches hold of the wood and wood catches hold of the fire.

Dve nāma kim?
Nāmañca rūpañca

"What is the ‘two’?"
"Name and form."

Upādānapaccayā bhavo
, "dependent
on grasping is existence"

fire simile solves tertralemma, solves the issue of sat and asat.


"He pointed out that
existence is a fire kept up by the fuel of grasping, so much so that,
when grasping ceases, existence ceases as well."

'fire gone' out is the extinction, word what people afraid because its points to annihilation.
Brahmin's point of view is that we can see nibbana and reach it and then the craving stops.

interesting point that dhamma has deeper meaning often mislead by set of arguments, he refers to buddhagosa and visuddhimagga.

that is the deeper dimension:
if nibbana is extuingishing of lust then its common to even for animals, that extinguishing is to assuage the pains with the fire,
but nibbana of arhants is cooling down, extinction what leaves permanent effect on arhant he sees influxes are extinct.

nibbana is not out there as an achievement after answering questions right but it is part of the holy life, if you pass the requierments you passed immediately for nibbana. (in book its better said)
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Re: What is the eye? - Essay on sense-spheres

Post by Mkoll »

Thank you for sharing this.

:anjali:
Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa
Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa
Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa
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