Beyond the Noble Eightfold Path

The Noble Eightfold Way leads you to the eradication of attachment and aversion, but not of ignorance. Remembering him, you lose the suffering, but you do not achieve the final liberation.

The Noble Octuple Way takes you to be anagami … and then?

Stick around for more. Next time, on Discuss & Discover!

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Hah! Buddhist forums sometimes feel like that, don’t they.

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In Spanish we have very serious Buddhist forums where the people say is because they practice it. It is not a Buddhist literary hall of amateurs

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What exactly does ‘final liberation’ mean to you? Thank you :seedling:

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The eightfold path does not take anyone anywhere, it does allow - through the convergence of all path factors - for the further path factors of right knowledge and right liberation to eventuate.

This is what we find explicit in MN117 and implicit in AN10.2 / AN11.2, SN12.23.

The DN2 also presents a very detailed account of the expected fruitions of those who undertake the contemplative life under the Dhamma and Vinaya brought back to this world by the Buddha. At the very end of the process we find:

“In the same way, great king, when his mind is thus concentrated, pure and bright …. the bhikkhu directs and inclines it to the knowledge of the destruction of the cankers.
He understands as it really is: ‘This is suffering’ …
He understands: ‘Destroyed is birth, the holy life has been lived, what had to be done has been done, there is nothing further beyond this.’
This too, great king, is a visible fruit of recluseship more excellent and sublime than the previous ones.
And, great king, there is no other fruit of recluseship higher or more sublime than this one.”

The process is gradual and the labels the concept stages of awakening consist of are meaningful in one’s assessment of how much of the five lower and higher fetters have been abandoned by oneself.

This was a very smart doctrinal choice by the Buddha as it consists of a clear guidance for one’s own assessment of how much work is left undone towards the real ending of suffering.

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:clap:

May 's well include DN 15 yeah?

:hushed:

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O DN 2 é um exemplo perfeito do que o Buda queria que sua história bhikkhus: Santos queria, não esclarecida.

Grande parte da história nos leva a diversas actividades relacionadas com a perfeição da virtude, mas a virtude anexado ao Samsara exatamente como ignorância. Em vez de amarrar para o inferno, amarrado para o céu, que é o de ser exatamente o mesmo.

Este é o problema: se você optar por virtude, ética chegar à extinção do sofrimento. E depois? Para morrer e ir vagando pelo Samsara?

O Nobre Caminho Óctuplo é ético trouxe às suas consequências máximas e conduz inevitavelmente ao fim do sofrimento. Mas mesmo lá. Quem ele é sofre e aquele que erradicou apego e aversão, e é chamado de “anagami”.

Mas o Nobre Caminho Óctuplo não mantém a fórmula para erradicar a ignorância.

No final da história, como que por magia, o Buda introduz “Através deste conhecimento e visão, sua mente está livre das impurezas de sensualidade, das impurezas de existência e as impurezas da ignorância.”

Como vai erradicar as impurezas da existência se tudo o que foi feito está ligada à existência por virtude?

E como vai erradicar a ignorância ainda não sabe como?

O Buda falhou e seu fracasso tem um nome: Ananda.

No momento da sua morte, o Buda é destinado a Ananda, um ser cheio de inteligência, memória e virtude, um santo, e diz-lhe que se ele quer iluminar-me a fazer o que ele fez, ou nenhuma das opções acima.

Um ser iluminado há necessidade de restringir seus sentidos, não precisa de nenhuma virtude, nem precisa de conhecimento de nada. Um ser iluminado é sábio e está além do bem e do mal, porque nada se liga-lo a Samsara e, é claro, nada pode fazê-lo sofrer, é liberado de kamma.

There are some ideas here I find intriguing – whether , for instance, if the practice promises o eliminate all forms of ignorance, at least in a western conception of ignorance.

But I am asking myself if the question quoted above t is a “rhetorical question” – a statement written in the form of a question – or a inquiry – a request or invitation for others to answer the question.

I think we need to keep in mind that avijja in the context of the Buddhist path means ignorance of a very specific kind.

In an ultimate sense avijja means a practical lack of knowledge and vision in regards to the four noble truths, its respective ennobling task and its ultimate natural implications (i.e. cessation of suffering).

Nowhere in EBTs we will see the Buddha suggesting that “at the end of the path” one gains omniscience or becomes a genius.

In fact, the concept of omniscience (kevala-ñana) belongs to Jain doctrine. Their belief is that humans already had knowledge of everything knowable, it only had to be illuminated or uncovered.

The big picture suttas aforementioned indicate that to the right of the threshold of knowledge and vision of how things come to be one should only expect dispassion and disenchantment.

And from dispassion and disenchantment one’s mind and heart gains the momentum required for the breakthrough knowledge & vision of release.

The released mind, finally free of practical ignorance with regards to the four noble truths and its implications is left with no other choice than letting suffering reach its end:

‘Destroyed is birth, the holy life has been lived, what had to be done has been done, there is nothing further beyond this.’

:anjal:

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Well here are some things about which we are all ignorant:

  1. The number of planets in our galaxy inhabited by intelligent life.
  2. The names of the players on the Brazilian roster in the 2026 World Cup.
  3. How many concubines King Bimbisara slept with.
  4. The complete set of physical laws characterizing our physical universe.
  5. How the world looks from the perspective of a fruit fly.

I don’t think there is any rational basis for thinking that following the Buddha’s path all the way to nibbana would end our ignorance of those things.

But I do think we can say this: if we could ever manage to put down the burden of our attachments and cravings completely, and reach the complete end of suffering and the final extinguishing of dukkha in nibbana, the fact that we are ignorant of the five items above would no longer bother us! :slight_smile:

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:thinking:

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They don’t have to bother us well before Nibbana. :wink:

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True, but the anxious and dissatisfied craving for knowledge and intellectual power is one part of the human condition, and I suspect we will always have some trace of it at every stage short of full liberation.

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The anxious and unsatisfied desire for knowledge, the Buddha calls the “desire to learn” is an essential part of the right path to complete enlightenment. The same way that the blessed one used, besides taking the shelter in oneself, to look for a pleasant place and to practice the jhanas. That, and not another, is the formula for success. Which used Moggallana and Sariputta, and which the Buddha himself recommended to Ananda.
It is very curious that only applied for him and his closest friends. To the others, none of that: the triple refuge, a life of penury and study. And we know and result …

But I wonder if the question quoted above is a “rhetorical question” -a written statement in the form of a question or a question-a request or invitation for others to answer the question.

The question is a question.
And it is a question that asks for answers. Technically in my exploration I have found myself in this impasse: without attachment, without aversion, without suffering and without further road. That way you do not leave Samsara.

And the question I ask because I know that the Buddha did not give the answer. He did not have to give it either.

This question is an exercise that can serve to verify that it is necessary to make a bypass to the Dhamma of the Buddha to reach the complete illumination.

And the most intriguing … why did you stop saying it? Or even more mysterious why, since early Buddhism, this did not take the suttas or was removed from memory?

I agree. And our modern Western culture exalts intellectual power to unhealthy extremes, IMO.

Ignorance is something much more fundamental than “not knowing things”. Avijja is what conditions Samsara. Without avija the Samsara would collapse instantly. Avijja is what conditions the existence of the same conditionality and is what differentiates Samsara (conditioned by so much ignorant) of Nibbāna, (unconditioned, therefore without avijja).
It only considers that conditionality necessarily involves information. That is, the information conditions conditionality. Also, ignorance conditions information, without ignorance information is not possible. And if we now understand that the action of consciousness (Citta) is pure information, information is synonymous with cetanā (Keto = Citta). That is, the avijjā conditions cetanā and cetanā conditions the kamma (or conditionality).

This claim seems to be contradicted by the Sammādiṭṭhi Sutta, MN9 and by numerous suttas in the SN’s Nidānavagga and Mahāvagga, which state:

The way leading to the cessation of ignorance is just this Noble Eightfold Path; that is, right view…right concentration.

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