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

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Goofaholix
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Goofaholix »

cappuccino wrote:It's both.
Of course it's both, so why imply otherwise? if you get anywhere near a point please make it.
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“Peace is within oneself to be found in the same place as agitation and suffering. It is not found in a forest or on a hilltop, nor is it given by a teacher. Where you experience suffering, you can also find freedom from suffering. Trying to run away from suffering is actually to run toward it.”
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by theY »

Goofaholix wrote:
cappuccino wrote:He taught it was a reality after death.
What happens after the death of an Arahant is called Parinibbana.

Please provide a quote where the Buddha says Nibbana only happens after death.

What do you think Arahants experience in this lifetime if not Nibbana?
Almost whole of tipitaka. Because all khandhā, included khandhā of araha, is also aniccam & dukkham & anatta.

Arahā can hurt, can have ābādho (sick), and can pass away, so they still have a dukkakkhandha.

See this suttaṃ:

http://www.tipitaka.net/tipitaka/dhp/ve ... ?verse=277
"Verse 277: "All conditioned phenomena are impermanent"; when one sees this with Insight-wisdom, one becomes weary of dukkha (i.e., the khandhas). This is the Path to Purity.

Verse 278: "All conditioned phenomena are dukkha"; when one sees this with Insight-wisdom, one becomes weary of dukkha (i.e., the khandhas). This is the Path to Purity.

Verse 279: "All phenomena (dhammas) are without Self"; when one sees this with Insight-wisdom, one becomes weary of dukkha (i.e., the khandhas). This is the Path to Purity."
And khandhā of arahā called "saupādisesa(scrap khandhā)" in this suttaṃ:
http://www.wisdomlib.org/definition/upadi
Upādi°, (the compn. -from of upādāna, derived fr. upādā in analogy to nouns in °a & °ā which change their a to i in compn. with kṛ & bhū; otherwise a n. formation fr. dā analogous to °dhi fr. dhā in upadhi) = upādāna, but in more concrete meaning of “stuff of life”, substratum of being, khandha; only in combn. with °sesa (adj.) having some fuel of life (= khandhas or substratum) left, i.e. still dependent (on existence), not free, materially determined S. V, 129, 181; A. III, 143; It. 40; Vism. 509. More frequently neg. an-upādi-sesa (nibbāna, nibbānadhātu or parinibbāna, cp. similarly BSk. anupādi-vimukti M Vastu I. 69) completely emancipated, free, without any (material) substratum Vin. II, 239 (nibbāna-dhātu); D. III, 135; M. I, 148 (parinibbāna); A. II, 120; IV, 75 sq. , 202, 313; J. I, 28, 55; Sn. 876; It. 39, 121 (nibbāna-dhātu); Ps. I. 101; Vism. 509; DhA. IV, 108 (nibbāna); VvA. 164, 165. Opp. saupādisesa A. IV, 75 sq. , 378 sq.; Sn. 354 (opp. nibbāyi); Vism. 509; Nett 92. See further ref. under nibbāna & parinibbāna. (Page 149)
So, this life, arahā just see nibbāna but not nibbāna in this life.
Above message maybe out of date. Latest update will be in massage's link.
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Goofaholix
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Goofaholix »

theY wrote:
Goofaholix wrote:Please provide a quote where the Buddha says Nibbana only happens after death.

What do you think Arahants experience in this lifetime if not Nibbana?
Almost whole of tipitaka. Because all khandhā, included khandhā of araha, is also aniccam & dukkham & anatta.
Below is a series of quotes indicating Nibbana being realised in this life, I have yet to find one that indicates death is a pre-requisite;
“A bhikkhu has heard that nothing is worth adhering to. When a bhikkhu has heard that nothing is worth adhering to, he directly knows everything; having directly known everything, he fully understands everything; having fully understood everything, whatever feeling he feels, whether pleasant or painful or neither-painful-nor-pleasant, he abides contemplating impermanence in those feelings, contemplating fading away, contemplating cessation, contemplating relinquishment. Contemplating thus, he does not cling to anything in the world. When he does not cling, he is not agitated. When he is not agitated, he personally attains Nibbana. MN 37.3

“[After having the insight that the formless [meditation] states are conditioned, a bhikkhu] does not form any condition or generate any volition tending towards either being or non-being. Since he does not form any condition or generate any volition tending toward either being or non-being, he does not cling to anything in this world. When he does not cling, he is not agitated. When he is not agitated, he personally attains Nibbana.” MN 140.22

“When ignorance is abandoned and true knowledge has arisen in a bhikkhu, then with the fading away of ignorance and the arising of true knowledge, he no longer clings to sensual pleasures, no longer clings to views, no longer clings to rules and observances, no longer clings to a doctrine of self (attavāda). When he does not cling, he is not agitated. When he is not agitated, he personally attains Nibbana.(parinibbāyati).” (parinibbayati [from nibbuta]; completely unbound/calmed/pacified) MN 11.17

“A bhikkhu is practicing thus: ‘It might not be, and it might not be mine; it will not be, and it will not be mine. What exists, what has come to be, that I am abandoning.’ Thus he obtains equanimity. He does not delight in that equanimity, welcome it, or remain holding to it. Since he does not do so, his consciousness does not become dependent on it and does not cling to it. A bhikkhu without clinging attains Nibbana.” MN 106.12
Here's Wikipedia has to say;
After attainment of Nibbana, the five aggregates (physical forms, feelings/sensations, perception, mental formations and consciousness) will continue to function, sustained by physical bodily vitality. This attainment is termed the nibbana element with a residue remaining. But once the Arahant pass-away and with the disintegration of the physical body, the five aggregates will cease to function, hence ending all traces of existence in the phenomenal world and thus total release from the misery of samsara. It would then be termed the nibbana element without residue remaining.[24] Parinibbana occurs at the death of an Arahant.
Basically if I believed the Buddha were teaching theoretically about something he was yet to experience then I wouldn't be following him, and of course if Nibbana were only experienced after death we wouldn't need a word for "Nibbana after death" ie Parinibbana.
Pronouns (no self / not self)
“Peace is within oneself to be found in the same place as agitation and suffering. It is not found in a forest or on a hilltop, nor is it given by a teacher. Where you experience suffering, you can also find freedom from suffering. Trying to run away from suffering is actually to run toward it.”
― Ajahn Chah
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Spiny Norman »

tiltbillings wrote:
Spiny Norman wrote:Thanks everyone. I still find the OP passage rather ambiguous.
It is not at all ambiguous. It is just that most of the translations do it no justice. As for the following, they are, indeed, perplexing, but clearly what these passages are describing is meditative experience. But once the experience is over, "My back aches. I will rest it." One can either make this remarkably complicated, often tripping into turning nibbana into a ultimate reality thing, or keep it much simpler, grounded in the fundamental structure of how the Dhamma is expressed: paṭiccasamuppāda.
I find this passage similarly ambiguous:

"There is that dimension, monks, where there is neither earth, nor water, nor fire, nor wind; neither dimension of the infinitude of space, nor dimension of the infinitude of consciousness, nor dimension of nothingness, nor dimension of neither perception nor non-perception; neither this world, nor the next world, nor sun, nor moon. And there, I say, there is neither coming, nor going, nor staying; neither passing away nor arising: unestablished,[1] unevolving, without support [mental object].[2] This, just this, is the end of stress."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

And this passage:

"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."
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html
Why do you say that the these two passages are describing meditative states, rather than Nibbana? In the first ( Ud 8.01 ) it says "This, just this, is the end of stress" and in the second ( Ud 1.10 ) it says "from bliss and pain, he is freed".

Bearing in mind the Arrow Sutta and the distinction between bodily pain and mental anguish, I still don't see the significance here of your quote: "My back aches. I will rest it."
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Spiny Norman »

Goofaholix wrote:
Spiny Norman wrote: and the interpretation of metaphors is inherently subjective.
Poetry is inherently subjective, that's what makes it beautiful among other things. That's why I think looking to the poetical books of the canon for metaphysical definitions is a mistake. Look to the suttas and discourses to establish doctrines and definitions first, and then to poetry and metaphor to challenge our standard ways of thinking.
But the debate is often about whether certain passages are intended literally or metaphorically. I still think the Udana passages are ambiguous in this sense, it is a matter of interpretation.
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by tiltbillings »

Spiny Norman wrote: I still don't see the significance here of your quote: "My back aches. I will rest it."
Because in all the goes with the feeling of an aching back and responding to it and voicing an intended action and then acting is transient, but what is permanent and unchanging is that all that transient mental/physical stuff is no longer conditioned (asankhata) by and is unbound (nibbana) from greed, hatred, and delusion. One may have particular meditative experiences related to the experience of the destruction of greed, hatred, and delusion, but the nibbana-ized individual still lives the world and nibbana is very much in the fact that nibbana-ized per is not longer subject to the binding conditions of 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: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Spiny Norman »

cappuccino wrote:He taught it was a reality after death.
I infer this from refuge, everlasting, safety, etc.
Nibbana is clearly a living experience, the question here is whether it is a sphere that one touches, a state of mind free from the taints, or both.

It is similar to the debate around whether "unconditioned" is a noun or an adjective, or both.
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Polar Bear »

Spiny Norman wrote:
cappuccino wrote:He taught it was a reality after death.
I infer this from refuge, everlasting, safety, etc.
Nibbana is clearly a living experience, the question here is whether it is a sphere that one touches, a state of mind free from the taints, or both.

It is similar to the debate around whether "unconditioned" is a noun or an adjective, or both.
Sphere: a solid geometric figure generated by the revolution of a semicircle about its diameter; a round body whose surface is at all points equidistant from the center. Equation: x 2+ y 2+ z 2= r 2.

I think you do not literally mean sphere, so what is it that is being touched? From whence does said non-literal sphere come? Obviously, not being touched physically, it must be touched mentally. And from what you've said in this thread, it appears to me you must be conceiving of something that has always existed, that has no relation to space-time, is unchanging, is "outside" the mind, that the mind can cognize and thereby gain release from the defilements. But then, who cares about its status as object? For its only value would be its utility in destroying the defilements. For consciousness is impermanent and so would not "go to" nibbana at death but would cease like all other events of cognition do, albeit this time without a sequel.

Imagine there is a rock (a spherical one if you like :tongue: ), and if you touch this rock, you instantly become happy for the rest of your life. That does not somehow identify you with the rock, nor your happiness, you are not now the rock and your happiness is also not a rock. Or perhaps you don't just have to touch the rock, but must be in constant contact with it to remain happy. So you affix the rock to your skin permanently or sew it into your flesh. The rock does not in this case become your body or even properly a part, and your happiness is still not the rock. Rather, a rock is attached to your body, is the cause of your happiness, and at death consciousness will end and thereby the rock will no longer have any utility.

It seems to me that one only has two choices, either accept that nibbana is "merely" the destruction of passion, aversion, and delusion, the ending of craving, the remainderless cessation of dukkha, or nibbana is a form of consciousness. For if it were just an object of consciousness then it would have no utility and so the whole reason for you positing the notion would be nullified. Actually, there is a third option I suppose. (3) Nibbana is an object of consciousness, but not consciousness itself, and it has the attribute of making consciousness eternal/immortal so that consciousness may forever cognize nibbana.

Basically, it seems to me that the view that nibbana is a type of consciousness or an object that makes consciousness immortal stems from clinging to existence and therefore self-view. Any notion of nibbana being a reality after death is (1) you suggesting it is a reality for an eternal "you" in the form of a transcendent consciousness, or (2) it is a reality in itself, but that is of no consequence anyway since after death the individuated sequence of cognitive events having nibbana as object would have ended and thereby no longer have any relation to this reality.

And suggesting that the view "nibbana is an eternal consciousness (or related to one)" is not a self-view merely because in that consciousness no notion of self arises or is thought of seems unconvincing to my mind.

This is my rough intellectual understanding of the matter and please forgive my redundancy. To whatever extent this post produces pessimistic proliferative pondering pertaining to posthumous prospects, in anybody on a quest to become truly peaceful through this noble eightfold path, my apologies.

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"I don't envision a single thing that, when undeveloped & uncultivated, brings about such suffering & stress as the mind. The mind, when undeveloped & uncultivated, brings about suffering & stress."
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by tiltbillings »

polarbear101 wrote:
It seems to me that one only has two choices, either accept that nibbana is "merely" the destruction of passion, aversion, and delusion, the ending of craving, the remainderless cessation of dukkha, or nibbana is a form of consciousness.
It is both.
>> 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: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Spiny Norman »

polarbear101 wrote:It seems to me that one only has two choices, either accept that nibbana is "merely" the destruction of passion, aversion, and delusion, the ending of craving, the remainderless cessation of dukkha, or nibbana is a form of consciousness. For if it were just an object of consciousness then it would have no utility and so the whole reason for you positing the notion would be nullified. Actually, there is a third option I suppose. (3) Nibbana is an object of consciousness, but not consciousness itself, and it has the attribute of making consciousness eternal/immortal so that consciousness may forever cognize nibbana.
I am really trying to explore the meaning of the Udana passages referring to in the thread, and what they imply about the nature of Nibbana. Is Nibbana a sphere that one touches, a state of mind free from the taints, or both?

It seems that some people want to rewrite the Udana passages to fit their preconceptions. Others want to dismiss them as poetry. Others say they are just describing meditative states, though that is far from clear. None of these look like satisfactory responses to me. In some cases I am also puzzled by a stubborn refusal to acknowledge ambiguity where it exists.

PS Sphere = ayatana.
Last edited by Spiny Norman on Wed Sep 28, 2016 9:01 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by mikenz66 »

Spiny Norman wrote: ...
Why do you say that the these two passages are describing meditative states, rather than Nibbana? In the first ( Ud 8.01 ) it says "This, just this, is the end of stress" and in the second ( Ud 1.10 ) it says "from bliss and pain, he is freed".

Bearing in mind the Arrow Sutta and the distinction between bodily pain and mental anguish, I still don't see the significance here of your quote: "My back aches. I will rest it."
It seems to be referring to Nibbana, but the straightforard interpretation (see Nananada's nibbana sermons, or the standard Theravada commentarial interpretations) is that with that experience it is clear that that suffering was absent during that experience, and eventually will end completely (give or take some back ache on the way...) - nibanna without remainder.

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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by tiltbillings »

Spiny Norman wrote:
PS Sphere = ayatana.
You might want to ask Sylvester about that. The problem with this word and dhatu istheir English translations, which manifest in your struggling.
>> 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: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by davidbrainerd »

Goofaholix wrote:
cappuccino wrote:It is the Other Shore, the Everlasting, Safety,
the Island, the Refuge, the Beyond.

~ S 43.1-44
The trouble with taking poetical metaphor literally is that one only does it to the extent that it supports ones view.

I don't think one can have it both ways, if we are to properly take the above literally then Nibbana is an island that is reachable by boat and provides long term residency to refugees.
The other shore is an obvious metaphor so obviously it makes sense to interpret it as such.

But this:
Spiny Norman wrote:"There is, monks, an unborn[1] — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated. If there were not that unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, there would not be the case that escape from the born — become — made — fabricated would be discerned. But precisely because there is an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, escape from the born — become — made — fabricated is discerned.[2]"
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html

What do you think?
This is obviously NOT a metaphor so obviously it makes NO sense to interpret it as such.

The trouble with taking literal statements metaphorically is that one only does it to the extent that it supports ones view.

(Edit: By the way, Goofaholix, even in your quote, only other shore and island there can be metaphors; everlasting, refuge, and beyond must be literal.)
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by cappuccino »

Buddha rejected annihilation.

Why (therefore) are atheists arguing for annihilation?
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Re: Is Nibbana a transcendent reality, or just a state of mind?

Post by Goofaholix »

davidbrainerd wrote: This is obviously NOT a metaphor so obviously it makes NO sense to interpret it as such.

The trouble with taking literal statements metaphorically is that one only does it to the extent that it supports ones view..
I never said that one was metaphor, I said it was poetry. Poetry tends to play fast and loose with terminology substituting beauty for accuracy. Bearing that in mind if the use of the word "an" adds meaning that doesn't appear in more serious prose then the answer here is to not infer meaning from it.
davidbrainerd wrote: (Edit: By the way, Goofaholix, even in your quote, only other shore and island there can be metaphors; everlasting, refuge, and beyond must be literal.)
Seems reasonable. Thought everlasting what? refuge from what? beyond what? Poetry leaves it up to the reader to fill in the blanks, again I think it's reasonable that the blanks should be filled in from more serious prose rather than ones wishful thinking.
Pronouns (no self / not self)
“Peace is within oneself to be found in the same place as agitation and suffering. It is not found in a forest or on a hilltop, nor is it given by a teacher. Where you experience suffering, you can also find freedom from suffering. Trying to run away from suffering is actually to run toward it.”
― Ajahn Chah
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