EBTs, such as the four principal Nikayas/Agamas, in history can be identified as either essential teachings (such as knowing-seeing the four noble truths, the notion of anicca, dukkha, anatta, and the middle way) or non-essential teachings (such as adaptations of Vedic religious myths) of Early Buddhism. But the texts are just texts, some edited or collected early, some later.
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Thank you very much for your help Venerable !
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If this state depends on past rupa, does it not depend on the presence of the element of earth?
If a rupa is temporary suspended how can there be vinnana if vinnana depends on a sense contact. I do not yet understand. Is this not one of the 6 sense vinnana’s?
Can there be a jhana while there are no elements? Can there be experienced change in jhana’s without elements?
Do you believe the Buddha and arahant have not left allready any Me and mine-making?
Oke, i can sympathize with the idea that there might be corruption going on, some showing off, some falsehood, hiding shallowness behind pseudo-profundity. But i also feel that this does not have to be the case.
I belief that there is no being, no human also, that has no hidden Truth inside.
That has no esoteric nature and understanding. In other words, everybody in a sense has a secret live and understanding too. Unfabricated, not part of conceiving.
To only see and talk about what is manifesting, arising and ceasing in the mind, and taking that to be Me and mine is a kind of shallowness, i feel. Also judging other people this way is a very narrow mindedness. It is like seeing someone become angry and immediately forget his/her empty and perfectly pure nature. Like judging the book at his cover.
I know, people like to judge this, want to disgrace it, maybe call this that ‘shallowness behind pseudo-profundity’, i regret that.
Vinnana has so many meanings. Cessation of sense vinnana does not happen for an arahant while alive but cessation of kamma-vinnana happens. The cessation of avijja does not lead to the cessation of sense vinnana too, ofcourse. In the context we must see what cessation of vinnna is refered to.
Vinnana is also not the same as mind. No one would agree that an ear-vinnana is the same as mind, or that one is mindless when one is unconscious. One also does not purify vinnana but mind, especially the latent tendencies in the subconscious. Mind has also a hidden aspect because we do not really see these tendencies lying, but while they arise we know and see them.
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some extra words on this:
I understand that there might be shallowness behind pseudo-profundity, but i also feel there is resistance towards letting go of intellectual understanding, descending into emptiness, making a home of ones heart instead of head. There is so much love for thinking, reasoning, conceiving, intellectual knowledge. I feel this is not really a quality.
In my opinion a great teacher is never really impressed with all that intellectual understanding. Not only that, a great practioner also not. Ofcourse there is use in conceiving, in reasoning, in ratio, in intellectual understanding but one must also not exegerate it, right? How do you see this?
Most of the time, i can see for myself, that it is exactly intellectual knowledge what is felt as deep by oneself. Like one now really knows something while one does only intoxicate oneself with the drug of thinking to know things.
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This also appears in Ud 1.10 in a context that I think sheds some light on it meaning.
This is said after Bahiya is given the following instruction:
This would seem to support your theory or another kind of consciousness. The verse that @josephzizys points to appears to be a translation of a later redaction or interpolation.
Samjna and Vijnana in Sanskrit refer to different kinds of consciousness, at least in the Salt Analogy. Samjna is dualistic (you in that) and Vijnana non dualistic(no you in that). Snp 4.11 appears to be pointing to the Vijnanna as non dualistic. The meaning and connotations of Vijnana appear to have changed over time. The Atthakavagga does not seem to be aware of the aggregates, so perhaps it was with the development of that concept that the original meaning was lost.
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Hi all, 
I don’t think there are. 
The brackets in “the cessation (the activity of) consciousness” in this translation already indicate that one has to be very liberal in one’s interpretation to read the discourse in this way. Because it doesn’t say “the activity of” consciousness ceases, it just says consciousness itself ceases. And that includes the infinite consciousness mentioned just before, which as others said is indeed a state of meditation that’s mentioned throughout the discourses to be impermanent and conditioned. (I prefer to call it ‘unbounded/boundless consciousness’, and also argued for this in the brief essay linked by Jasudho above, which notified me of this topic.)
The rendering ‘formless’ for 無形 I find interesting, because in the essay I concluded the Pāli equivalent anidassana to be a poetic metaphor for formless. The quite literal Chinese translations 無形 (formless/invisible) also agrees that renderings such as ‘without surface’ aren’t warranted.
Hi Ven! This I agree forms part of understanding what the discourse is about, but the story doesn’t have to be literal, and I’m not convinced the formless meditations is the only thing the monk is inquiring about. It seems he also thinks these attainments are themselves nibbāna, in part because he asks for where the four elements cease without remnant, i.e., cease forever.
Discussions about this discourse always start with the verses, but I think it is helpful to consider the wider context as well. Noteworthy is the place of this discourse in the Dīgha Nikāya. It’s part of the Sīlakkhandha Vagga, each discourse of which addresses views of outsiders. The function of this discourse therefore isn’t to give some of the canon’s highest teachings on nibbāna. Its primary function is to refute the doctrines of others. That knowledge helps us interpret the sutta. 
An important idea of the discourse, one that it sort of revolves around, is:
And what is the miracle of instruction? Here, Kevaddha, a monk gives instruction as follows: "Consider in this way, don’t consider in that, direct your mind this way, not that way, give up that, gain this and persevere in it.”
So who are considering things the wrong way in this case? Whose view is to be given up? As in most cases, it’s the Brahmins. This is indicated indirectly by the story wherein Brahmā doesn’t know the answer to the question and refers to the Buddha, and more directly by the specific terms used in the verses.
However, since no Brahmin is explicitly addressed, and since the commentary is—as always—completely unaware of Upaniṣadic ideas and terminology, it misinterpreted the verse’s “invisible, unbounded consciousness” (viññāṇaṃ anidassanaṃ anantaṃ). It took this to refer to the ability to know (viññātabba) nibbāna, even though the word ananta should make it clear that this refers to the second formless state, the state of unbounded (or “infinite”) consciousness.
Note, though, that the commentary understood viññāṇa here to have the meaning of understanding rather than awareness. It did not think this was about a type of unconditioned consciousness, a consciousness outside of the aggregates or alike. Such ideas only came later, quite possibly indirectly influenced by the commentary’s initial misunderstanding and reference to nibbāna.
But as I said, it seems the verses are actually a response to the Brahmins. Richard Gombrich already observed that “the opening statement of the answer seems prima facie to reify consciousness and the language sounds as if it could come from an Upaniṣad” (How Buddhism Began). He did not provide further sources, but I have no doubt these verses indeed reference Brahmanic ideas. In the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad the Brahmin sage Yājñavalkya describes the highest form of existence as “an unbounded, limitless mass of consciousness” and also calls it “neither fine nor coarse, neither long nor short”, in both cases using the direct Sanskrit equivalents of the terms used in the Kevaddha Sutta. (2.4.12, 3.8.8) He also describes this form of existence as being different from and uninfluenced by the four elements. (3.7.3) Further, the Taittirīya Upaniṣad calls this highest essence “invisible” (nadṛśya). (2.8)
It is a bit more speculative, but the term ‘all-shining’ or ‘luminous all-round’ (sabbato pabhaṁ) might have a link with a statement from the Chāndogya Upaniṣad: “Far above here [is brahman] the light that shines from heaven on the backs of everything, on the backs of all (sabba) things, in the very highest of the high worlds—it is clearly this very same light here within a man. […] This self of mine that lies deep within my heart—it is made of mind, […] luminous is its appearance.” (3.13.7) One idea here seems to be that this consciousness makes awareness of things in the world possible. It “illuminates” them, making them in a sense visible. However, the term ‘all-shining’, which to Yājñavalkya would have implied a pure eternal entity, to the Buddha merely referred to the purity of a temporal and individual experience.
The term nāmarūpa is also found in the Upaniṣads, where a type of knowing or consciousness apart from “name and form” was the highest goal. (See e.g. Falk Nāma-rūpa and Dharma-rūpa.)
Yājñavalkya’s unbounded consciousness likely differed from the Buddha’s, not only philosophically but also in practice, because the Upaniṣads indicate Yājñavalkya arrived at it through reason rather than meditation. (See e.g. Jayatilleke, Early Buddhist Theory of Knowledge §42) But regardless, the Buddha did use the exact same terminology, which indicates he—or whoever composed the Kevaddha Sutta—was very familiar with these Brahmanic ideas and was addressing them directly.
Gombrich also commented on the Kevaddha Sutta (DN11) that “it is a bit risky to take a riddle or its solution as a philosophical tenet or argument”. I wholeheartedly embrace this sentiment, but in this particular case the overall meaning seems clear enough to me. In short, the Buddha acknowledged the existence of an unbounded consciousness but denied its unconditioned nature. To the Buddha all consciousness is dependently arisen, including unbounded consciousness. His essential response to the Brahmanic ideas is therefore two final lines of verse: “when consciousness ceases, then those come to cease”. While the Yājñavalkya’s goal was a type of consciousness free from name and form, his goal was the cessation of consciousness.
Some interpreters have failed to keep these two concepts apart. Oldenberg for example wrote in The Doctrine of the Upaniṣads and the Early Buddhism that the “Brahmanic thinking […] is also basically valid for the Buddhistic”, both resulting in “the blissful merging with infinity” when name and form are abandoned. 
This is exactly the kind of thinking the Buddha was trying to avoid when saying consciousness depends on nāmarūpa. The essential message in these verses is that nāmarūpa can only end when consciousness ends as well. So it’s somewhat ironic (and perhaps also a bit sad) that these statements are now often interpreted in the exact opposite way. 
Oldenberg isn’t alone in this. Some very well-known Buddhist monks have made similar statements, although less publicly.
That something is inauthentic in some versions of MN49 is not in question, because the Pāli versions differ. None of them actually correctly attributes the quote to the Buddha. The Burmese tries to do so, but does it in a broken way, lacking an end quote marker ti. Since the other versions aren’t broken in such a way and attribute the words to Brahmā, and since the Chinese parallel attributes a similar statement to him, this is more likely to be the more authentic reading. That of course also aligns with an unbounded/infinite consciousness being a Brahmanic idea of liberation.
That aside, if we have to take a playful statement on ‘the all’ from one sutta to interpret a unique and broken quotation in another sutta, to interpret a cryptic riddle-like verse in yet another, and then this we take as one the strongest indications that the Buddha’s goal was a type of consciousness… to me this isn’t really very solid reasoning.
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With respect,
is it fruitful for a discussion to imply one’s own understanding is deep and dealing with emptiness and that of others just rational and intellectual?
I know you repeatedly say things like “I feel”, and thanks for that. But I hope you’ll realize people on the other side will feel the exact same things. Notice how this topic started. If the ultimate goal was a type of consciousness or existence, then, as DeadBuddha said, “Are we to conclude that these currents/religions also really enable us to achieve nibbana?”, “do all religions point to the same wisdom?” That conclusion would actually make Buddhism less deep and less esoteric.
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Thanks. Parallels are always nice to have.
Thanks for getting back to me. Its taken me some pondering of this issue so I took some time out for said pondering. There are just some things about this interpretation that seemed kind of awkward. Anyway, I will post my thoughts …
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Part 1
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cloud
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cloud sdert
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cloud vndiie
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cloud zvwerdt
What kind of clouds are we talking about?
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cloud – simple enough
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cloud forest
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cloud storage
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cloud burst
All are types of clouds, right? Let’s just for now set aside the idea that vinanna anidassana is a kind of vinanna – maybe it is, but maybe it means ‘vinanna like but different’, or maybe it is something found in the presence of vinanna like ‘cloud forest’, or something entirely different.
Part 2
For a start, let’s assume that Ven. Sujato is right when he speculates that this sutta is about a monk that has mastered the form jhanas and wants to know about the formless jhanas. This monk uses his psychic powers to travel through the various realms asking this question: “Where do these four great elements—the earth property, the liquid property, the fire property, and the wind property—cease without remainder?”
Assuming the Buddha knows the nature of the question, why does he then rephrase the question into two separate ones:
Buddha:
Instead, the question should be asked like this:
“‘Where do water, earth, fire, & wind have no footing?
Where are long & short, coarse & fine, fair & foul,
name & form brought to an end?
If the monk is just wondering about how to develop the formless states then why introduce “where are long …” into the issue? Maybe the Buddha wants to give him some extra teaching. That certainly happens often in the suttas.
So Sujato tells us the Buddha rephrases this as two questions, 1) regarding where the four elements have no footing and 2) where are ….name and for brought to an end.
And the answers are then:
- the formless attainment of infinite consciousness
- nibanna
There are some problems that I see with this approach:
- if the monk wants to develop the formless jhanas then he should probably start with the first one not the second. The state of infinite space is where the perception of the form element ceases not the state of infinite consciousness. Remember, the monk is asking about where the form properties “cease without remainder” – he never asked anything about ‘infinite consciousness’ (remember: its just a label).
AN9.31
For someone who has attained the dimension of infinite space, the perception of form has ceased.
ākāsānañcāyatanaṁ samāpannassa rūpasaññā niruddhā hoti;For someone who has attained the dimension of infinite consciousness, the perception of the dimension of infinite space has ceased.
viññāṇañcāyatanaṁ samāpannassa ākāsānañcāyatanasaññā niruddhā hoti;
- nor did he ask ‘Where does the perception of form cease temporarily?’ And if he has already mastered the four jhanas wouldn’t he at least be aware that the formless attainments are not permanent?
There is no basis that I can see to assume that the monk is asking about the dimension of infinite consciousness. The answer should be the dimesnion of infinite space – the first of the four formless attainments. So why would Ven Sujato expect the Buddha to jump over the first formless attainment and refer to the second?
Ven. Sujato wrote:
“The Buddha was so very very emphatic that the end of dependent origination was the end of all forms of consciousness. Making distinctions between “consciousness” and “awareness” and the like is no use, since these do not apply in the suttas.”.
- source (found in comments)
Nibbana is not viññāṇa. Really, it just isn’t. | Sujato’s Blog
I think this is the reason. His view is that with the end of dependent origination this is also the end of all forms of consciousness. And I agree – consciousness as it is defined in the context of dependent origination without a doubt ceases upon awakening. So the problem is that the Buddha (not the monk) throws the reference to ‘infinite consciousness’ into the mix – and this doesn’t seem to fit – this is why he needs to bring in the dimension of infinite consciousness instead of the dimension of infinite space. Keep in mind the cloud problem.
What I would like to do instead is just work with this sutta exactly as it is and set the troublesome term aside for later as I am not sure of what it means. Let’s instead focus on: What is it a label for? W hat does it point to?
(to be continued)
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Part 3
I learned that the Suttas are by and large accurate. I think I learned that from Ven. Sujato. Of course, there are variations introduced due to an ancient language as well as the difficult task of translation.
What might be an alternative way of looking at this sutta?
Lets proceed as it is written and see how far we can go.
First off, what is the motive of this monk in asking this question? We can’t say for sure but he is asking where these four properties cease without remainder – and we can be pretty sure this is accurate because it is repeated so many times.
As a monk who is already capable of psychic powers he probably knows that suffering and stress arise with the body. Maybe he has a thorn in his foot – making it difficult to walk – and that is why he uses psychic powers instead of just walking. Who knows.
Now the Buddha rephrases the question as:
“‘Where do water, earth, fire, & wind have no footing?
Where are … name & form brought to an end?”
We know that it is with the cessation of ignorance that name and form come to an end. But what about the four properties – do they lose their footing there?
Thanks to Sylvester who left a comment on Ven. Sujato’s article on this topic (linked to above) we don’t have to do much hunting. I will just copy his comment below [my emphasis]:
Sylvester says:
May 15, 2011 at 2:50 pm
Oops, my erstwhile speculation did not show up. Here it goes –
SN 1.27:
“Q1 From where do the streams turn back?
Q2 Where does the round no longer revolve?
Q3 Where do name-and-form Cease utterly without remainder?”
“A: Where water, earth, fire and air,
Do not gain a footing:
It is from here that the streams turn back (Q1),
Here that the round no longer revolves (Q2);
Here name-and-form
Cease utterly without remainder (Q3).”
“Kuto sarā nivattanti,
kattha vaṭṭaṃ na vattati;
Kattha nāmañca rūpañca,
asesaṃ uparujjhatī”ti.
“Yattha āpo ca pathavī,
tejo vāyo na gādhati;
Ato sarā nivattanti,
ettha vaṭṭaṃ na vattati;
Ettha nāmañca rūpañca,
asesaṃ uparujjhatī”ti.
In SN 1.27, the triad of questions is answered with just one reply, ie “Yattha āpo ca pathavī, tejo vāyo na gādhati”, (where water, earth, fire and air do not gain a footing). It should be obvious that the corresponding question “where do water, earth, fire and air not gain a footing” is answered by DN 11’s “viññāṇaṃ anidassanaṃ, anantaṃ sabbatopabhaṃ”. In other words, the answer to the 3 questions in SN 1.27 is also nothing more than “Viññāṇaṃ anidassanaṃ, anantaṃ sabbatopabhaṃ”.
Remember the cloud problem.
We also have SN7.6:
Where name and form
Yattha nāmañca rūpañca,
cease with nothing left over;
asesaṁ uparujjhati;
as well as impingement and perception of form:
Paṭighaṁ rūpasaññā ca,
it’s there that the tangle is cut.”
etthesā chijjate jaṭā”ti.
The term ‘gains no footing’ might also refer to the imperturbability of the Arahat.
SN22.76
How happy are the arahants!
Craving isn’t found in them.
Cut off is the conceit, ‘I am’;
burst, the net of delusion.
Having reached imperturbability,
their minds are clear & disturbance-free.
At this point we haven’t had to touch the text at all. I added a possible motive but it was not necessary – just wanted to show that there are other possibilities. We have an additional sutta that backs up the two question, one answer format of the original and others that support the general theme. And do remember that originally the monk only asked one question – it was the Buddha that rephrased it and also brought in the umm… ‘cloud reference’ thing.
Part 4
So what about that infinite consciousness thing?
First of all, let’s remember that this term is only used in a couple of places and not defined anywhere in the suttas so translation is not so easy. Here are some translations:
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Ven. Sujato: infinite consciousness
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Ven. Nananda: non-manifestative consciousness (he discusses this topic at length starting near the end of mind stilled number six and into seven and beyond – interesting stuff)
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Thanissaro Bhikkhu: consciousness without surface
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RhyDavids/Brasington: consciousness that is signless
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Bikkhu Bodhi: Don’t know, maybe someone can let me know?
My feeling regarding this term is that the Buddha uses it (vinanna) not because it is a type of vinanna but because vinanna is how a worldly person experiences ‘the world’ and he wants to contrast that with how an Arahant experiences the flow of phenomena while at the same time disjoined from it. Recall that when the Buddha awakens he says ‘the world’ came to an end (anyone got a citation for me?)
Having reached imperturbability, their minds are clear & disturbance-free.
The Arahat knows this – and according to the suttas it is you could say ‘a world of difference’ from that of the worldy person.
I am still looking for other terms the the suttas use do describe the knowing aspect of the mind of the Arahat. There are a number. If you have some you like feel free to post them.
Thanks for reading.
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Hi Charlie,
As I said in an earlier response, I do agree with you the monk in question is not just asking about the formless attainments. I think he also looks for liberation in them, and that helps us understand why the Buddha also explains what liberation really is; namely, the cessation of name-and-form and consciouness.
However,
This isn’t true. The thing is all over the place. It’s the anidassana that’s rare, not the infinite thing. If it refers to the state of infinite consciousness, like some suggest here, then in a sense it is explained very often.
As to your question why the Buddha’s response is the second formless attainment and not the first, and the reference to SN1.27, have you read the link in the second post of this thread? I suggested some answers there. In short:
- Form can still “find a footing” in the first formless attainment. This happens when one goes back to the fourth jhana. In the second formless this can’t happen. Form can’t disturb it anymore, but the perception of unbounded/infinite space (the first formless) can. See AN9.34:
Take a mendicant who […] enters and remains in the dimension of infinite space. While a mendicant is in such a meditation, should perceptions accompanied by form beset them due to loss of focus, that’s an affliction for them.
Furthermore, take a mendicant who […] enters and remains in the dimension of infinite consciousness. While a mendicant is in such a meditation, should perceptions accompanied by the dimension of infinite space beset them due to loss of focus, that’s an affliction for them.
This can explain why form only really finds no footing in the state of infinite consciousness.
- Form also doesn’t find a footing when name-and-form cease completely, i.e at parinibbana, but that doesn’t mean that every mention of this not-finding-a-footing is a reference to parinibbana. It’s like, suppose I once said “a tree isn’t an animal” and then concluding that every time I say “it isn’t an animal” I’m talking about a tree. There’s also other things that aren’t animals. Likewise, both the state of infinite/unbounded consciousness and nibbana are “things” where the four elements “find no footing”.
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If you look at my introduction:
What kind of clouds are we talking about?
- cloud – simple enough
- cloud forest
- cloud storage
- cloud burst
All are types of clouds, right? Let’s just for now set aside the idea that vinanna anidassana is a kind of vinanna – maybe it is, but maybe it means ‘vinanna like but different’, or maybe it is something found in the presence of vinanna like ‘cloud forest’, or something entirely different.
You will see that I am referring to both parts - vinanna and anidassana. I am trying to show how when we combine one word like vinanna with another word - the meaning can change entirely. And as we both say, the anidassana is the part that we don’t have a clear definition for. That’s why in the example I started with I left the spelling of the second word as random characters - to show that this is the part that we don’t understand so we can’t say how the first term is being modified by it. It’s why I wrote:
"Let’s just for now set aside the idea that vinanna anidassana is a kind of vinanna "
Does that clear things up?
Yes, I have read it many times along with the comments.
Well, that can happen but the same thing can happen in the attainment of infinite consciousness and then - using the same reasoning - if such disturbances continued you could drop back into the fourth and have the same problem. - this is why I quoted the definition from AN 9.31:
If you want to argue with the Buddha be my guest.
[edit to clear up a confusing statement:]
I wasn’t referring to parinibbana - I am of the opinion that no one should really be speculating on that unless they are a dead Arahat.
I was referring to nibbana. We may differ on which suttas are describing parinibbana - I basically stick with ones that state so very clearly something like ‘with the death of this body …’
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Hi Sunyo, just wanted to correct my earlier response to you. I did read your essay some time ago but this time did not pay close attention and thought you were referring to the first article written by Ven. Sujatto on his site. My apologies. I just took a second look at yours and I think I have talked about all the points that you bulleted there. Obviously, we have some different views but if there is anything there that you want to discuss - go for it.
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Thank you. I cannot ignore that buddha’s teachings do not resonate in me as leading to a mere cessation. For me they resonate as finding Truth, finding home, protection, a refuge. And i feel that a mere cessation is an aburd idea of finding a Home and Protection and the end of suffering or bliss .
I cannot really ignore this. Ofcourse i see what choices others make, i investigate them, but i feel this is all also personal, subjective. In the end, i try to see in a mirror and ask myself…what do i really know? With this question i never mean, ‘what do i intellectually know’. Do you?
@Jasudho has more or less concluded and said to me that it is not oke to trust intuition and gut-feeling, but i see this differenty. This has been a long proces for me. I have always been someone who was more inclined to ignore the knowledge of gut-feeling, intuition, and relied on thinking, reasoning, conceiving. This was a mistake i have seen. There is nothing wrong with relying on a kind of knowledge that is not like a position or conclusion after a long intensive process of studying and reasoning.
The ulitmate goal is, i feel, to find home. That is what the Buddha searched for himself (Snp) when he felt very insecure, unprotected, unsafe. Seeing suffering in the world, conflict, violence and also realising that suffering was also his nature. He felt very much unsafe and unprotected. That is where i can relate to.
In short, he realised that the only Real Home is the mind that not makes anything her home (me, mine, my self). The mind without bhava. The mind without grasping. The pure mind. The Buddha discovered that this is Real Home.
All this grasping, here and now, lead to bhava, and also after death. It leads to new homes because grasping is like building up, constructing a personal existence. That constructed will always desintegrate. So, any home, any bhava, is unsafe, unreliable because it is a construction. I see this.
He saw the builder of the home and ended it. This is how he realised Real Home. Homelessess is the characteristic of the totally detached mind. This mind cannot be identitified as this or that. You cannot even say that this mind is human, or man or woman, buddhist or jewish, here or there. I have feeling for this. This is, i believe, the cessation of bhava. The pure mind has no bhava or rather is beyond it. It is more like the base for every bhava.
Buddha found this Real Home and that is why he felt he had done his task. This homeless home is, in my opinion, no mere cessation, but is more like the intelligent and unsupported ground of any bhava or any home. I do not exclude that all religion teach this, or in some way express knowledge of it. The Home of the Tathagata’s.
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I wonder, why do you not distinguish consciousness and mind? Do you believe that someone is mindless when he is unconscious?
If the cessation of consciousness is really the goal, then you achieve the goal temporary while deep asleep, under narcosis? Is this what you believe?
If vinnana in fact ceases all the time, like Abhidhamma teaches, and may not be seen as something that is continues present, then we also realise to goal all the time in between those states that there is no vinnana?
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Hello Venerable, and thank you for your messages!
perhaps the text uses the term “consciousness” with two different meanings (once to speak of nibbana, a second time to speak of a samsaric consciousness)
There is a real problem with the use of the word “consciousness” when trying to understand the meaning of the text being referred to herein. If we revert to using Vinnana, then the Thai forest teachers say that there are seven types, the Vinnana that arises from the six senses and the rebirth Vinnana. The Thai forest teachers would also say that NONE of the these are the “consciousness” that is without surface as Vinnana arises and passes away.
To try and get around the problem of language and interpretation, Luang Poo Tate refers to Vinnana as an expression of “Mano” (as in Manopubbaṅgamā dhammā). Vinnana is therefore not Mano but a Mano creation. When Vinnana ceases, through purifying the Citta, Mano is all that is left. Mano (the Origination Mind) is not born, will not die, has no signs. Mano is void, a singularity. Mano is beyond the control of anyone or any condition and so, it too, is Anatta. Sabbe Dhamma Anatta.
Other teachers in the Thai tradition use different words but, if one sees beyond the language, then one can see that there are no inconsistencies and no inconsistencies with the Suttas.
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Thanks for your post. Of course, we’re all free to practice and choose to believe as we wish.
I’d like to clarify what appears to be a misunderstanding here.
I never wrote, and do not believe, that intuition plays no part in the Dhamma.
It’s very clear that thinking and conceiving can only go so far on the Path. No one in the suttas became fully Awakened by sitting on a rock and thinking about it. So, yes there is something beyond logic and mere thinking that’s necessary – insight that transcends thoughts, beliefs, and opinions. Of course, this is not mere intuition.
However, intuition imo is an integral part of the Path. Here I align it (though it’s not exactly the same thing), with saddha, faith/confidence in the Teachings.
When I first encountered the Teachings, before I had any experience with them, I intuitively felt in my heart that they were true, beneficial, and incredible. It was a form of saddha.
Also, even as we cultivate and practice the Path, we still have an intuition about the validity of the teachings we haven’t yet directly seen into and experienced. Other aspects of the Teachings have been validated through our experience, so it’s more than just intuition. But imo some degree of this remains prior to our direct experience and knowledge of being free of all greed, anger, and ignorance. Again, what I’m calling intuition here is an aspect of saddha.
My point in the prior post was that over-reliance on intuition, belief, and gut-feelings without checking them against the teachings in the suttas can potentially lead to (fill in the blank).
I mean, people have an intuition and belief in a self. It comes as the default programming of being born as a human.
So do we say that our deep intuition and the ever-present gut-feeling of being a self, a something, is true according to the Dhamma? True because it feels true?
Why would we even question it if we weren’t familiar with the Buddha’s teachings in the suttas?
So, yes, there is knowing beyond thinking.
And yes, there are disagreements about some of the subtler aspects of the teachings amongst experienced and well-meaning practitioners.
But those disagreements, AFAIK, are based on different understandings and interpretations of the Buddha’s teachings in the suttas – and not only on gut-feelings.
With respect and best wishes 
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May I ask how this differs from the Absolute as described in the Brihadaranyaka and Chandogya Upanishads?
Yājñavalkya taught “the unseen seer, the unheard hearer…the unknown knower.”
He also taught about an undying blissful formless radiance, etc.
Is this what the Buddha’s decades of teachings were about – expressing anicca and anatta as different than the Brahmanical teachings – but fundamentally pointing to an undying timeless mind and essentially the same outcome as the practices in the Upanishads?
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Ven. Ñāṇavīra:
Sometimes translated as ‘unattainable by reasoning’ or ‘not accessible to doubt’. But the Cartesian cogito ergo sum is also, in a sense, inaccessible to doubt; for I cannot doubt my existence without tacitly assuming it. This merely shows, however, that one cannot get beyond the cogito by doubting it. And the Dhamma is beyond the cogito. The cogito, then, can be reached by doubt—one doubts and doubts until one finds what one cannot doubt, what is inaccessible to doubt, namely the cogito. But the Dhamma cannot be reached in this way. Thus the Dhamma, though certainly inaccessible to doubt, is more than that; it is altogether beyond the sphere of doubt. The rationalist, however, does not even reach the inadequate cogito, or if he does reach it[a] he overshoots the mark (atidhāvati—Itivuttaka II,ii,12 <Iti. 43>); for he starts from the axiom that everything can be doubted (including, of course, the cogito). Cf. also Majjhima xi,2 <M.ii,232-3> & i,2 <M.i,8>. See NIBBĀNA.
Footnotes:
[a] When he is being professional, the rationalist will not allow that what is inaccessible to doubt is even intelligible, and he does not permit himself to consider the cogito; but in his unprofessional moments, when the personal problem becomes insistent, he exorcizes the cogito by supposing that it is a rational proposition, which enables him to doubt it, and then to deny it. ‘Les positivistes ne font qu’exorciser le spectre de l’Absolu, qui reparaît cependant toujours et vient les troubler dans leur repos.’ – - J. Grenier, op. cit., p. 44. (‘The positivists do nothing but exorcize the spectre of the Absolute, which however always reappears and comes to trouble them in their sleep.’) For Grenier, the Absolute is not (as with Bradley) the totality of experiences, but is to be reached at the very heart of personality by a thought transcending the relativity of all things, perceiving therein a void (pp. 100-1). Precisely—and what, ultimately, is this Absolute but avijjā, self-dependent and without first beginning? And what, therefore, does the Buddha teach but that this Absolute is not absolute, that it can be brought to an end? See A NOTE ON PATICCASAMUPPĀDA §§24 & 25.