Note: Edited the quotation you cited adding “and”:
cjmacie wrote:
btw: Appreciating the difference between
appana-samādhi (absorbed
jhāna)
and vipassana-khanika-samādhi (“momentary concentration") could help cut through the confusion as to whether insight happens afterwards (the former), or during (the latter) type of
samādhi.
mikenz66 wrote: ↑Sun Oct 22, 2017 9:37 pm
cjmacie wrote: ↑Sun Oct 22, 2017 3:42 pm
btw: Appreciating the difference between
appana-samādhi (absorbed
jhāna)
and vipassana-khanika-samādhi (“momentary concentration") could help cut through the confusion as to whether insight happens afterwards (the former), or during (the latter) type of
samādhi.
Yes, I guess we might as well use the well-established terms.
Trying to force Mahasi’s terminology on anyone probably wouldn’t get too far. Being aware of his distinctions, however, may provide a perspective that others may recognize from their own viewpoint.
The distinction – momentary vs absorbed concentration – as well as their interrelationship is further worked-out in some detail in the teachings of both the Mahasi Sayadaw and the Pa Auk Sayadaw.
Mahasi clearly recognized that the Buddha defined
sammā-samādhi in terms of
jhāna, and I suspect that he and many (probably most) other monastics in his following know that skill. The “revolutionary” aspect of his teaching, however, which created such a large and influential following, was devising a
dhamma exposition to demonstrate that the other shades of
samādhi could also function as
sammā-samādhi for those not inclined to achieving
jhāna. That is to say, those yogis for whom it doesn’t come easily by temperament, or, more significantly, the large number of people living in modern high-stress “civilization”, which is not conducive to cultivating deep absorptive concentration. His method for those was “noting”, moment to moment in a concentrated manner, phenomenal experience; which, when highly developed, gains intensity as, so to speak, very brief “absorption” in
gnosis (deeply knowing first hand – the deeper meaning of “noting”) the momentary phenomenon, and in turn triggers then “seeing” (insight) it’s true nature. At the end point (entering Path realizations) the intensity of such
vipassana-khanika-samādhi is functionally identical to that of
appana/jhāna-samādhi.
The Pa Auk teaching, on the other hand, begins with strict training in
appana/jhāna-samādhi, which is actually just a stepping stone into deeper practice of insight. At advanced stages of
jhāna mastery, he teaches yogis to enter and exit absorption very rapidly – up to many times per second – to alternate with insight moments then more sharply seen. The insight stage of practice here, in Pa Auk teaching, is actually examining the “elements” (
mahadhatu – earth, air, fire, water perceptual characteristics) that make up the experience of phenomena, which is the same as what the Mahasi method teaches, e.g. in noting with walking meditation.
Those are both Burmese lineages, highly formal and analytic, heavily using
Visuddhimagga and other commentarial sources to support interpreting the
sutta-s.
Thai (“Forest”) teachers have quite a different perspective, less formal and textually analytic. Living in the wilderness means not having access to or spending lots of time studying texts. (For other factors separating the Thai and Burmese traditions, see a discussion of the long history of Thai-Burmese enmity:
https://discourse.suttacentral.net/t/wh ... tions/6755)
The bulk of my practical training has been in this tradition, with reading and listening to Thanissaro Bhikkhu (Than-Geoff, or just TG). After later exposure to the Burmese teaching methods, I’ve come to see that TG’s methods, on the surface so different, basically arrive at the same level of practice as in the Burmese methods. TG shies away from teaching “
jhāna-by-the-numbers”, as he puts it, and his introductory instructions are more like access and momentary concentration, but he aims it at further states similar to “absorption”. (And it’s certain that he knows totally absorbed
jhāna practice.) More specifically, when he describes very advanced practice, e.g. approaching stream-entry, he characterizes it as alternating between episodes of deepening concentration (direct experience, knowing the stilled mind) and then noticing (seeing into) residual tinges of
dukkha; and repeating this sequence to an ultimate point of refinement where the mind is still enough (purified) that it can relinquish the trying and opens to the “Deathless” (
nibbana). At other times, he teaches investigating conditioned arising and passing, knowing in ever greater detail how every moment of phenomenal awareness is conditioned; when this is carried-out exhaustively, then the mind is in position to recognize the “Unconditioned” (again,
nibbana).
These findings have been described before – maybe becoming just as boring as the other issues repeatedly raised. (Someone just started a new thread asking the difference between
jhāna and
samādhi...)