Re: Arguments in favor of being able to hear in the first jhana
Posted: Fri May 25, 2018 2:16 am
From my perspective, you are creating a duality by contrasting jhana with your ordinary state. You list benefits, but the benefits are only in relation to their opposites. Anyone can tell you that jhanas are impermanent and whatever is there before jhana happens, happens again when jhana is left. It is an attempt to find some permanent state that you can identify with. This is a mistake that most meditators make and rarely pass through. The seeking for permanence is nothing more than clinging, having attachment to an experience. 'Seeing' this is 'Insight'. Insight has nothing to do with jhanas or any particular experience. It is a direct knowing that nothing is permanent and there is no person at the center of experience. It is a letting go of all images and states.budo wrote: ↑Thu May 24, 2018 3:47 pmThe same benefits the suttas claimSaengnapha wrote: ↑Wed May 23, 2018 7:58 amWhat benefit do you feel this brings you?budo wrote: ↑Tue May 22, 2018 9:16 pm From my personal experience, the best jhana's I've had were ones with absolutely zero external sounds and my field of vision was pure white, on the way to this my sound became "localized" as in I could no longer hear outside the windows but only what's in the room, especially things like the floor and walls creeking, and then it leads to zero sound. This had the highest amount of piti and sukha. Any other forms I had that had sound in them were very mild in comparison.
Leigh Brasington also has suttas he translated on his site with the Buddha saying that sound is a thorn to first jhana, which I agree with. The louder the sounds around me (music, motorcycles, people screaming, etc..) the less chance of me being able to enter the full white vision no-sound jhana.
I just don't think one can generate strong concentration without seclusion from the senses, just like it says in the suttas. In fact I have such strong aversion to sound now that I'm planning on moving to a small town in the middle of no where with no houses around me, I just can't bare to be around loud people, motorcycles, scooters, music, etc..
Whenever I have a full blown jhana experience I also lose all desire to eat anything as well, just all desire for sensuality is temporarily suspended.
- pleasure and bliss born of seclusion
- insights and clearer mind
- equanimity
- peace and quiet
- divine eye sometimes
- divine ear sometimes
- can sit in meditation for several hours
- no 5 hindrances (ill will, sensual desire, doubt, restlessness, sloth)