SuttaCentral
This Sutta is for those who is still liable to DEATH. Arahant is Free of DEATH as your above Sutta said.
‘All those liable to death are frightened and terrified of death.’” …
…
These are the four people liable to death who are not frightened and terrified of death.”
I used 6 sense contacts because that cannot be denied to exist.
When we say things are empty of self, it means the self doesn’t exist and it’s a figure of imagination. We cannot find it if we searched.
When you say apply this to the 6 sense contacts, and say they are inherently empty, I don’t think you mean the same thing.
If eye contact doesn’t exist, then there’s no possiblity of sight. It can be directly verified that sight appears, and logically deduced that even to arahants, sight appears as they clearly see things. So it’s not the same emptiness as empty of existence. It’s the same emptiness as in empty of self.
Since eye contact comes to be, there must be conditions for it. And therefore it is impermanent, and thus suffering. Same for all sense contacts. And there’s a way to cease what is conditioned. That’s what you have been denying. That what is conditioned can cease, not just in the mind as a concept when emptiness is seen, but actually not present, not vividly appearing.
I dunno how you can get the stamina to debate with basically the whole site about this and still go on. I am getting tired again. I don’t think anything will change your mind anyway, unless you meet with a Buddha in the future and ask him these.
Can you define an arahant and death?
If we take arahant to be the conventional 5 aggregates, and death to be the breaking up of the aggregates, by the death of the Buddha and so many arahants recorded in the suttas, arahants do die.
So your definition must be something special and unusual.
What I see that the Buddha meant is that the 5 aggregates unclung to, will not be subjected to rebirth anymore, hence freed from future deaths, only that this final death is inevitable as it’s conditioned by being reborn in the first place.
If you posit an arahant as a soul or dhammakaya or some other eternal mind, separated from the 5 aggregates, anything which survives the physical body breaking up (for the arahant), then you might be in danger of introducing soul to the arahant, falling into eternalism.
I took this to refer to an arahant, but admit it may not and your point may be valid. Thanks.
Meanwhile, you chose not to respond about DN16.
When using abstract words and designations like “arahant” people apply different views and definitions, so it’s difficult to discuss.
Maybe it’s a bit more clear if we use the word “experiences.” Were the Buddha’s experiences of old kamma and life conditions the same as yours? If not, it’s those particular-to-each-life-experiences that will cease for an arahant – that is, death.
In this sense arahants die – of course without rebirth, so dukkha ceases without remainder at the final death of all experience.
Welcome to the world of paradoxes.
But your definition of terms in this context doesn’t apply.
Effort to end dukkha by practicing the N8FP is not craving and the cessation of dukkha via the cessation of experience at final nibbāna is not non-existence as it is used in the suttas, although some people accused the Buddha of teaching annihilation, which he denied – though he did say those who held to the wrong view of annihilation were closer than those who held to eternalistc views.
See SN 12.15, Iti49, and from MN60:
“If those ascetics and brahmins who say that there is no such thing as the total cessation of continued existence are correct, it is possible that I will be unfailingly reborn among the gods who are formless and made of perception. If those ascetics and brahmins who say that there is such a thing as the total cessation of continued existence are correct, it is possible that I will be fully extinguished in the present life. The view of those ascetics and brahmins who say that there is no such thing as the total cessation of continued existence is close to greed, yoking, relishing, attachment, and grasping. The view of those ascetics and brahmins who say that there is such a thing as the total cessation of continued existence is close to non-greed, non-yoking, non-relishing, non-attachment, and non-grasping.’ Reflecting like this, they simply practice for disillusionment, dispassion, and cessation regarding future lives.”
Everything that is felt would include the formless realms, and mind.
Hi Jasudho,
I believe we already had a long discussion about this on this very thread! So to reply to you now would just be to start a circle. I know that your most recent post is introducing a new sutta to consider, but notice how you state your view about the debated premise as if it were true at the beginning of your reply 
– I know what your position is!
For what it is worth, I don’t personally care if paranibbana is existence, non-existence, both, neither, beyond language, cessation, or whatever. I trust the Buddha that it is worth it to make the effort to sever the fetters, and so (for now) I just focus on that.
And yet the Buddha said Nibbāna is beyond language, reasoning and logic (Atakkāvacara)
Reading suttas and applying logic to what one is reading will lead one astray.
One will only imagine that they understand something prior to the actual experience, based only on applying a certain logic from reading the suttas.
This was quite evident regarding things stated in posts in other threads on this forum (and even liked by monastics) about the formless. From insects ending up there after the destruction of Kama Loka, to even suicide victims ending up in the formless.
These wrong statements comes solely from reading the suttas and getting an idea of what the formless
realms ”ought to be like”, based on a certain logic.
Actual meditation and insights has nothing to do with the logic.
Meditation and insight goes against the very things most say is impossible in the first place.
So why apply a rigid and narrow view of how things
”must” be regarding Nibbāna, based on logic?
(while also rejecting suttas that don’t fit the cessationist view)
As an example:
There is the law of gravity, but there is also levitation.
The fact that the Buddha had no praise for such supernatural abilities actually proves that one can develop these and they truly exist.
(Why would the Buddha dismiss something non-existent?)
But more importantly where is the logic in that a meditator all of a sudden can walk through walls, become invisible and on top of that defy the law of gravity by levitating?
There might be logical explanations on how matter, motion and conscioussness operate that most agree on - but all those logical (restricted) explanations turn out to be wrong in the light of meditation.
This view of Nibbāna is only a logical conclusion based on the Buddha saying that one can’t describe anything beyond ’The All’. Which goes hand in hand with the Buddha saying Nibbāna is beyond language:
And what is the all?
It’s just the eye and sights, the ear and sounds, the nose and smells, the tongue and tastes, the body and touches, and the mind and ideas.
This is called the all.
Mendicants, suppose someone was to say:
‘I’ll reject this all and describe another all.’ They’d have no grounds for that.
I’m glad that in the Bikkhu Bodhi interview, Nibbāna was mentioned as an element (Dhātu) just like how MN1 starts with the element Earth, goes through all the elements and all the planes of existence and ends with Nibbāna as an element that even putthujhanas can delight in…
But not Asaññasattāvāso… 
(I’ll reply to you in that thread some other day 
)
I mainly pointed out how how iti44 Nibbānadhātusutta is translated incorrectly by both John D Ireland and Bhikkhu Sujato. Since the term “pañcindriyāni” refers to the five faculties or spiritual faculties, which are faith, energy, mindfulness, concentration, and wisdom.
Not the 5 senses…
As to your view on ’when nothing is felt’ and what that ”must” imply, is once again an interpretation based on a certain form of logic.
Which leads me back to MN 49, where the Buddha mentions something that is truly Atakkāvacara - beyond logic, namely: Viññāṇaṁ anidassanaṁ
Once again:
Anidassanaṁ is a synonym for Nibbāna (obviously not the second formless realm) from SN 43.14
The invisible (Anidassanañca) …
that in which nothing appears …
Anidassanañca vo, bhikkhave, desessāmi anidassanagāmiñca maggaṁ.
Taṁ suṇātha. Katamañca, bhikkhave, anidassanaṁ …pe….
From MN 49:
Since directly knowing all as all, and since directly knowing that which does not fall within the scope of experience characterized by all, I have not become all, I have not become in all, I have not become as all, I have not become one who thinks ‘all is mine’, I have not affirmed all.
Consciousness where nothing appears, infinite, luminous all-round—that is what does not fall within the scope of experience characterized by earth, water, fire, air, creatures, gods, the Progenitor, Brahmā, the gods of streaming radiance, the gods replete with glory, the gods of abundant fruit, the Vanquisher, and the all.
‘Seeing the danger in continued existence—
that life in any existence will cease to be—
I didn’t affirm any kind of existence,
and didn’t grasp at relishing.’
The Buddha is saying all of the above because first Brahma says this:
So, mendicant, I tell you this:
you will never find another escape beyond this, and you will eventually get weary and frustrated.
If you attach to earth, you will lie close to me, in my domain, subject to my will, and expendable.
If you attach to water …
fire …
air …
creatures …
gods …
the Progenitor …
Brahmā, you will lie close to me, in my domain, subject to my will, and expendable.’
Then the Buddha explains that there are higher Rupa Loka realms that Brahma does not know and see:
But there are three other realms that you don’t know or see, but which I know and see. There is the realm named after the gods of streaming radiance, There is the realm named after the gods replete with glory … There is the realm named after the gods of abundant fruit, which you don’t know or see.
So Baka is obviously not saying anything at all about the formless realms later on, because he doesn’t even know and see the higher Rupa Loka realms(!)
Baka also imagined his dwelling as: ‘This is permanent, this is everlasting, this is eternal, this is whole, this is imperishable yet that dwelling happens to be below the gods of streaming radiance, the gods replete with glory & the gods of abundant fruit…not the second formless realm.
Also let us not forget the fact one can’t teach dhamma to any of the beings in arupa loka:
Furthermore, a Realized One has arisen in the world.
But person has been reborn in one of the long-lived orders of gods.
This is the fourth lost opportunity for spiritual practice.
Which means that if one can’t teach dhamma while in the formless, how could the Buddha ”teach Baka a lesson” FROM the second formless realm(!?).
The mistake cessationists make is to instantly, thanks to their logic, equate ”Viññāṇaṁ anidassanaṁ anantaṁ sabbato pabhaṁ” with something other than Nibbāna so it ”must” refer to the second formless realm…
But I hope it is clear it has nothing to do with the second formless realm and that the essays with theories regarding Viññāṇaṁ anidassanaṁ have grave mistakes in them.
Anidassanaṁ is a reference to Nibbāna found in SN 43.14 and it also has nothing to do with doctrines of Eternalism since it has to do with Nibbāna:
Otherwise why are we asked to give up every notion of me and mine regarding Nibbāna in MN 1?
And Viññāṇaṁ anidassanaṁ anantaṁ sabbato pabhaṁ ”Consciousness where nothing appears, infinite, luminous all-round” - outside ’the all’, does not sound that different from this in the Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma:
The seventh liberation is transcending all aspects of neither perception nor non-perception and abiding in a state beyond thought and non-thought.
The eighth liberation is transcending all aspects of thought and non-thought, illuminating all worlds equally, and remaining motionless.
the undefiled …the truth …the far shore …the subtle …the very hard to see …the freedom from old age …the constant …the not falling apart …that in which nothing appears …the unproliferated …the peaceful …the freedom from death …the sublime …the state of grace …the sanctuary …the ending of craving …the incredible …the amazing …the untroubled …the not liable to trouble …extinguishment …the unafflicted …dispassion …purity …freedom …not clinging …the island …the protection …the shelter …the refuge …
Hi Soren,
Apologies. There was no intention to go in circles and we’ll respectfully disengage from this topic. 
BTW, my last post wasn’t about the cessation vs eternalism debate. Rather it was in response to the post you offered that equated those who incline to understand final nibbāna as cessation of craving for non-existence.
All best
Hi Bhante 
It was not my intention to accuse you of deliberately misrepresenting anyone’s views or arguments. I take this exchange as a good-faith discussion. The definition of the fallacy I posted, and had in mind, doesn’t include intentional misrepresentation. I’m sorry if my comment made the wrong impression!
I will mark that in my previous comment.
Such conversation helps me to see my and other assumptions and ways of thinking. So for that, thank you!
But what “does not fit the assumption that Nirvana is a mere nothingness”? It is not that The Teacher doesn’t mention there is no self, instead it is the limits of language.
But that (cesationism -added by @pyjter) is also not beyond the reach of language, as the teachings on the characteristic of not self, found among the early discourses, show. Thus, the reply to Upasīva does not fit the assumption that Nirvana is a mere nothingness but much rather conveys an utter transcendence that is completely beyond the reach of language and measurements.
Yes, “the same reasoning would also be relevant”, but I don’t see it as the same argument (see above). Again, his argumentation is cumulative.
In the case of the analysis of MN22, I agree with you. Ven Analāyo comes closer to an argument from “a lack of contrary evidence” (Wikipedia). But I would not agree with you that, in that case, it is a fallacy.
We are discussing what Buddha says, so it is important what he says. It’s also significant what he doesn’t say. Otherwise, anything can pass as his teaching.
If he doesn’t say something, what does it mean? Is it true, false „unknowable, only knowable in the future, or neither completely true nor completely false"? (Wikipedia)
I would say, that for a text interpretation, the argument “that something is false because it isn’t said to be true” is not always true, but has very heavy weight. What is explicit is more significant.
It looks like your definition of reification is too broad; in your case, it includes all that is “something more than just a nothing.” But usually reification means “The treatment of a relatively abstract signified (e.g. technology, mind, or self) as if it were a single, bounded, undifferentiated, fixed, and unchanging thing, the essential nature of which could be taken for granted”.
Additionally, the word “something” can indicate not only reified things but abstract numbers, not existing unicorns, and logically impossible things like a round square.
In Analāyo case, nibbana as “something more than just a nothing” doesn’t reify it.
Yes! To avoid reification.
I agree with that, but is it only possible interpretation?
If you allow, I will not respond to argument from “emotional response” because I’m not going to engage in psychoanalysis of anyone. It is an uncertain thing if they don’t disclose their emotions.
To the language!
He also argues that for Buddha to express the cessationist position is not beyond language or logic “… as the teachings on the characteristic of not self, found among the early discourses, show”.
There is nothing beyond language and logic in cessation. Ask any materialist or physicalist, they are also cessationists. Why? Because language is made for that, it is in the realm of common experience. This is why I wouldn’t call language subjective because if it is private, it can’t serve as a means of communication. It’s intersubjective. As I wrote before, it is a social construct and the usefulness of it outside the social dimension is limited.
There is no problem as long as we know that language is not a prefect tool and never mistake the proverbial finger for the moon.
That’s a good argument! I imagine that Ven Analāyo would argue that the imagery of Nibbana found in suttas implies that. Like this:
Nirvana is an island, yet that island is having nothing and taking up nothing. There is that where there is no birth, although to reify it as an unborn would be going too far. Light and darkness are both absent, all five aggregates cease, including consciousness, yet the destiny of those who have attained that much is beyond being designated.
I doubt that this is the Ven Analāyo position. He doesn’t argue that anything individual exists. “all five aggregates cease, including consciousness, yet the destiny of those who have attained that much is beyond being designated.”
He simply disagrees that nibbana is “a kind of death followed by mere nothingness”.
For those with a substantial view of the aggregates as dukkha incarnate that only ends with death I wonder what you make of this sutta:
“In that case, Bāhiya, you should train like this: ‘In the seen will be merely the seen; in the heard will be merely the heard; in the thought will be merely the thought; in the known will be merely the known.’ That’s how you should train. When you have trained in this way, you won’t be ‘by that’. When you’re not ‘by that’, you won’t be ‘in that’. When you’re not ‘in that’, you won’t be in this world or the world beyond or between the two. Just this is the end of suffering.”
Ud 1.10
Here the Teacher is referencing the end of suffering while the six sense contacts remain intact. How? By not taking up and identifying a self “in that” or “by that.” Not being “in that” or “by that” the Teacher says, “you won’t be.” How is it possible for suffering to have ended with the six sense contacts intact if dukkha incarnate only ends with death of a physical body?
Let me ask you questions.
Does an arahant have a full knowledge of freedom, totally detached from 5 kandhas (rupa, vedana, sanna, sankhara, vinnana) now or do they need to wait for the body to die to know? Also, will they ever say, “MY” body is dying if the conceit has totally eradicated with wisdom?
If one has totally detached from bhava and vibhava now (all fetters), do you still say they are dying in human body (aka in suffering) or Do you just say the body is death, but the arahant/Buddha (an awakened one) never die due to the wisdom of freedom?
If an arahant is free from all fetters, do you put the fetters back to say an arahant is still attach or take interest to the human body including all the khandhas?
Anyway, this is difficult to know for one, unless one has totally cooled the body and mind by fully developed n8fp and mind totally anchor on 4SP, that is Fully free from all sufferings (birth, sick, old age and death) as an arahant. That is No more ignorance, ill will, greed.
Quote from MN 140, but there are many. Like above.
…
They neither make a formation nor form an intention to continue existence or to end existence.Because of this, they don’t hold at anything in the world.
Not holding on, they’re not anxious. Not being anxious, they personally become extinguished.
They understand: ‘Birth has ended, the spiritual journey has been completed, what had to be done has been done, there is no return to any state of existence.’
…
That is how i have understood.
This is referring to attainment of arahanthood. Which is the end of mental suffering and already guarenteed end of physical suffering at death.
Even for stream winners, since they are already guarenteed to become arahants can be said to attained the deathless, even if they have 7 more lives and death to go. Reference: when Sariputta first became a stream enterer and was asked if he attained the deathless, he said yes.
When they die, there’s no more mind to know things. Ending of suffering is known while alive.
They can refer to their body with conventional usage of self without misunderstanding it.
Conventionally, arahants die. Ultimately, there’s no self, so we cannot point to an arahant or buddha even when they are conventionally still alive. Therefore the Buddha couldn’t answer the 4 questions of whether he would be exist or not or both or neither because the concept is wrong.
After death, we cannot even conventionally point to any 5 aggregates to refer to arahant. Not counting corpse.
There’s never a self, even the delusion of self is not a self, but the delusion of self is the one which keeps the 5 aggregates going on rebirth. Once the delusion of self is gone, aggregates becomes unclung to, the experience of physical pain is still possible for a conventional arahant.
In 3 suttas, I think one arahant in each sutta used the knife due to severe chronic bodily sickness. Arahants are also shown to take an interest to heal their body when sick as the 7 factors of enlightenment are chanted for the 3 monks, including Buddha, and healing happens. Buddha avoided the touch of the needle skin yakkha.
Having a body is still dukkha, physical dukkha, even when there’s no mental dukkha.
Hello Venerable!
I understand this is your interpretation, but I think it is important to note that this is not what the sutta literally says. Rather, it says “just this is the end of suffering”; not the further elaboration, “just this is the end of suffering except for physical suffering which you’ve now guaranteed will end later with your death.”
Hello Venerable!
Even if all planes of existence are, according to the Buddha, impermanent there is still an actual duration to all conditional beings which can vary from 80 years to millions of years.
This duration is something one can’t ignore:
When impermanence is known via suffering and one finally is forced to take rebirth one can say not-self of that whole entire conditional experience that has ended.
That is one of the reasons why the no self view is considered wrong in MN 2:
When they apply the mind irrationally in this way, one of the following six views arises in them and is taken as a genuine fact:
‘Atthi me attā’ti vā assa saccato thetato diṭṭhi uppajjati;
"When the conviction 'I lack a self' emerges from the clarity of truth and understanding..."
"From the bedrock of truth and genuine insight springs the perspective: 'There is no self for me.'"
"In the light of truth and clear discernment, the belief 'There is no self for me' takes root."
"Truth and deep understanding give rise to the perspective: 'There exists no self for me.'"
"With the foundation of truth and genuine perception, the notion 'I have no self' comes into being."
“With truth and settled conviction, the belief ‘there is no self for me’ arises.”
I have no clue how Ven. Sujato managed to translate it as:
”The view: ‘My self does not survive.’”
My point is:
”There is mother, there is father” is right view and the Buddha said we can never pay back what our parents have done for us.
So even if we say all is impermanent, unsatisfactory and not-self - while conditions remain there is still a being, who is the offspring of two beings.
Attakārīsutta - The Self-Doer AN 6.38
Brahmin? Is there a principle of departure?.. of arrival?.. of staying?.. of establishment?.. of progress?’
‘Yes, sir.’
'When there is a principle of progress, progressing beings are discerned. Brahmin, the beings discerned through the principle of progress are those that progress through self-effort and the effort of others. I have never encountered or heard of such a belief or view. How could someone, while entering and leaving through self-initiation and initiation by others, claim: “There is no self-effort, there is no effort for others?”’
When you’re not ‘in that’, you won’t be in this world or the world beyond or between the two. Just this is the end of suffering.”
Here the Teacher is referencing the end of suffering while the six sense contacts remain intact.
This is not the only way to read this sutta as not being in this world, or beyond or between can also refer to the cessation of existence - one life ceasing, the next not beginning nor there being any existence in between the two. Anyway, this is a poetic enigmatic text. This reading also makes more sense since it aligns in meaning with more clearer straightforward texts where the “end of this mass of suffering” comes when things like old age, death, sickness etc cease, which I have quoted to you before as well. In these texts like for example SN 12.1, death literally means physical death i.e the aggregates breaking up.
When rebirth ceases, old age and death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress cease. That is how this entire mass of suffering ceases.
Yes we can…One cannot say they do not exist.
The not identifying with the six senses refers to enlightenment. But the sutta continues to say: “When you’re not ‘in that’, you won’t be in this world or the world beyond or between the two. Just this is the end of suffering.””
This means, when you don’t identify, you won’t be reborn in any world whatsoever (with “in between” meaning a state between one life and the next). If you’re not reborn anywhere, in any realm, then just that is the end of suffering. So it does refer to the after death situation.
Living arahants are still in this world.
Yes, until they pass away, final, parinibbana without residue.