I think that in order to be a monist, you have to be a realist to start out with. An idealist needs to ground his idealism in a theory of knowledge that reduces “oneness” to a mere category of thought, having no meaning outside of the world of perceptions. Such was totally unheard of at the Buddha’s time.
It seems we have only two possibilities for what that “stuff” can be: physical or mental. If it’s physical, we are back to dualism, which we agree is not satisfactory. If it’s mental, then the external world – including the objects of the senses – are in some way the appearance of mind. Not the mind of the experiencer of the object, but some other mind. MN28 does not force us to conclude that the sense objects are physical.
Yes, if you are not a committed materialist, then this is all fine. For a committed materialist, however, even core teachings such as rebirth will be rejected. And if materialism stop you from accepting the Buddha’s teachings, it will not be sufficient to say that the Dhamma “takes us away from this kind of philosophy”. They are more committed to their philosophical views than the Dhamma. (This includes pretty much all of so-called secular Buddhism.) For such people it can be useful to show that materialism, and indeed dualism, is not the end of story. There are alternatives.
It is not clear to me whether we disagree or whether we are talking past each other.
Well, the “physical” aspect of the body is still there when you die, and so energy/matter is conserved. This is true even if this “physical” aspect is ultimately mental.
As for the rest of your questions, idealism has satisfactory responses to all of them. Instead of me – a non-philosopher – trying to explain this to you in clumsy way, you might be better off reading up on idealism. A good place to start is the Essentia Foundation website, which has a course on idealism, here. (Be aware, however, that the philosophy they present is not compatible with Buddhism in all respects. Still, it will give you some insight into this general view of the world.)
Sort of, but really the emphasis is on experience. So right down to the smallest thing that can be directly experienced.
Exactly! In fact these are pure phenomenal consciousness, not at all meta consciousness. Meta consciousness happens only in the mind.
Not necessarily. Meta consciousness is often quite automatic and full of distortion. Papañca (mental proliferation driven by ignorance), for instance, is a kind of meta consciousness.
Yes, I think this is correct.
I think idealism already existed at the time. When the suttas speak of the wrong view of the world and the self being the same, they might be referring to an idealist ontology where the external world is just the appearance of inner experience.
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I’m aware of the essentia foundation and the work of Kastrup, but that is a form of monism and infers a universal consciousness akin to Vedanta. That video explains that more than one mind can inhabit a body and that all individuals are akin to dissociative identity disorders of a universal mind. 
I may still have been editing my post while you were replying. This is getting a bit off topic, but I’ll reply briefly.
In this context (and most contexts) ‘ceasing’ means ending forever. For an enlightened being, since there is no rebirth, there will be no next body. That is how it differs from non-enlightened beings.
There are multiple ways to think about this, but for me it comes back to the Buddha taking the “inner perspective” again. He’s not concerned with describing the physical world but with the being. Although in the physical world the body might remain in some way, from the “inner perspective” we could say everything ceases at the moment the enlightened being passes away, including the body.
I’m not sure if these are the only two possibilities. Either way, I don’t agree that dualism isn’t satisfactory, nor do I say that it is. I said I am not defending it (here), because I think the specific makeup of the external world is not relevant to Buddha-dhamma in general, but especially not to these definitions about “the world” and “only suffering”. (As long, as, I agree, one is not a pure materialist like Ajita Keskambala and such, because then it turns into annihilationism.)
Perhaps SN35.228 and SN35.229 help to clarify what I think the general intent of suttas like SN35.116 is. In the latter the six sense spheres are “called ‘the world’ in the training of the Noble One”. In the former two they are “called ‘the ocean’ in the training of the Noble One.” But this doesn’t tell us anything what the physical ocean really is. That is to say, the message is not that the ocean is in some way created by the six senses. It is just a pragmatic, didactic instruction: another way to think about ‘ocean’. It’s much the same with the redefinition of ‘the world’.
With ‘the world’ there are clearly some phenomenological connotations, because the six senses are also “that with which you perceive the world”, so when they cease, “the world” in a sense ceases as well. But I don’t think this tells us anything about the metaphysical constitution of the world or whether it is a mental creation, any more than the redefinition of ‘the ocean’ does tell us about the constitution of the ocean.
But neither are they created by the mind
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If you wish to convince a materialist, dualism will generally not do.
Referring to the suttas will not convince a committed materialist. Broader philosophical arguments are required. Again, this is not a small problem. So many “Buddhists” in the West reject rebirth because of their philosophical commitments.
Right. We don’t need any clear idea about the “metaphysical constitution of the world”. This is not what the Dhamma is about. It’s a blind alley. But what we do need is to show that there are good, better, alternatives to materialism and also to dualism.
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Hi Ajahn I am not trained in Western philosophy, — or any philosophy apart from Buddhist — so I can’t make very informed comments. But I believe phenomenology is a solid approach, and I believe it is the main approach of the suttas.
Basically, phenomenology is interested in subjective experience, and in not over-stepping the boundaries of our experience by creating comfortable assumptions about some external realm, which is just another idea in our mind. But it is not solipsism nor is it idealism.
Buddhism is saying that rebirth is something that can be experienced and accessed through empirical study of subjective experience (i.e. phenomenology), and that these experiences are shaped by certain principles like kamma. It also uses tests like reading other’s minds, and then using clairvoyance to confirm that one correctly assessed the direction of the being’s mind, or in the being later revealing and clarifying their thoughts to you which confirms you correctly comprehended their mind. This means that there is input that arrives into our experience by various means which help confirm certain principles about it.
In this phenomenological view, it’s not really a question of what kind of ‘substance’ the world is made of. It simply comes down to the fact that beings experience a dynamic world, including one with external inputs, subjectively. But this subjective world follows clear observable principles with consequences. The most basic interest of Buddhism, of course, is dukkha: we can know that we suffer, regardless of whatever kind of metaphysic we hold. I believe the suttas make this argument clear when they say that even extreme nihilistic teachers would not deny something that is a basic experiential truth, because it would be foolish of them.
If we are living in a reality where there is suffering, and that suffering can be seen to entail a perpetual wandering on of temporary, transient existences, and it can also be seen to arise, be shaped, and cease according to certain governing principles, then that is all we need to know. This comes up with kamma: the Buddha says that by observing the effects of certain intentional actions, one can see that they have an effect on e.g. one’s birth and life conditions.
If this is a mere projection of the mind(s), so be it; if it is the mind going into a physical realm located within our physical realm somewhere, so be it. Actually, I’d argue that all of these fall within the undeclared points, and all that we can declare is the experiential reality of this dukkha, its arising, and its ceasing according to specific cultivation.
As for people being skeptical of this, I think the Buddha’s approach is not to propose some other arbitrary model, but rather to point out the flaws in the model other’s hold which prevents them from seeing the raw reality of experience. For example, someone may object and say that they only see evidence for a physical world with animals, plants, etc. — no other special beings. One counter (MN 99 I believe) is that this is like a blind person denying there are colors (which are true insofar as they are real experiences) just because they cannot see them. Another is the Pāyāsi Sutta: we can see that there are in fact other planets, so how do we not know that there are beings on those planets that were reborn from here? And since time works differently there, the fact that they do not confirm is not a valid reason to disprove this.
The above is, in fact, the strategy of the Pāyāsi Sutta debating skeptics of rebirth: the sutta does not argue a proof of rebirth, rather, it argues to disprove categorical denials of rebirth, thereby leaving open the fact that this is a possible reality. I think we can learn something from this today, even if the arguments seem unrelatable at first.
Even if we were to observe the mind having an active effect on “reality,” it doesn’t prove ‘idealism.’ It just proves the experiential/phenomenological reality that the mind is one of the governing principles of our own experience in which that occurred. I think there is something much more profound than agnosticism in the undeclared points or statements about ‘the world’: the Buddha is pointing to the fact that there are certain fundamental limits on our experience due to its very nature, and to go beyond those limits by formulating views only entangles us further in it. We miss the forest of the four noble truths for the “trees.”
Just some ideas.
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which he says is possible - he mentions why things like the five aggregates were chosen and says its because their arising, passing, etc. is VISIBLE.
This is the madhyamika method (one of them, there are two - at least - schools). The simple yogacara argument to this was that because it didn’t contain positivism (which I think is incorrect) it was driving people toward false understandings and producing nihilism (which madhyamika is not).
I am out on them, because in Japanese Buddhism the two systems blend, and so I have to step aside and leave that one to the old masters.
This sounds like countering those who say they have proved or have evidence for the invalidity of rebirth by pointing the metaphysical and ontological assumptions they necessarily make and refuting those assumptions through reduction ad absurdum. Is that what you have in mind?
Good! We need credible alternatives to materialism. What matters is that these alternatives exist, not which one is ultimately correct. In fact, as we all seem to agree, which one is ultimately correct, if any, is beside the point.
I think what works will depend on the person one is debating with. Some people will be satisfied if the flaws in their own view is exposed. Other people will need alternatives that they can hold onto, at least as a stepping-stone to a deeper understanding. We need views. We cannot live without them. We need things to hold on to until we see things for ourselves.
I do not wish to “prove” idealism. I merely wish to investigate whether it might be compatible with early Buddhism. Ven. @Sunyo has been arguing that is is not. I am not convinced. The “proof” of idealism does not lie in whether the mind has an effect on “reality”, but whether that reality is in some sense mental. Just as I probably have little or no effect on your mind, so it is not to be expected that I will have an effect on any other reality outside of my own five khandhas.
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Ven. @Sunyo, my previous reply was not quite fair. I did say I was interested in whether idealism is compatible with early Buddhism, but I did not respond to your arguments that it is not. So let me press the argument a bit further to see whether you are actually right. If idealism is not compatible with Early Buddhism, then we should obviously discard it.
Idealism does not say that the world is created by the five senses, merely that the world is also mental in some sense. If the world is a mind different from mine - as in the case of a different person - then obviously the world is not created by the senses.
I agree. But equally, I do not think it says that the world is definitely not mental.
When I see a living body, I know there is a mind behind the appearance. When I see the external world, idealism suggests there might be mind behind that appearance too. I might not be able to prove it, but that does not mean it’s not a possibility.
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Bhante, let’s say you see an external world, the other person also sees an external world. What I am asking is, is it the same larger mind that is responsible for both, in one world system?
When you say seeing a living body presumably this this includes the hair on his/her head, but what about the hair on Barber room floor, which mind is behind that?
Anyway it’s difficult to get a good picture of how you are thinking about this drop by drop. I think we need an essay, especially how you view dependent origination and so forth.
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Perhaps! But I have to admit it is very speculative.
I don’t really want to defend idealism. I don’t know if it is right. The truth might well be something else. My point is more to try to look at the world in a different way. It dislodges the sense that we know what we are talking about. Things are just very uncertain. We are so very conditioned and it is hard to see alternatives. I am speaking from personal experience! Just bringing out the alternatives makes it clear how little we actually know.
If you are interested in understanding more about idealism, I would suggest you follow the link I provided above. Here is it again. I am not the right person to defend it in detail.
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Well, this discussion certainly has gone places I didn’t expect it to. 
I don’t think about these things much, exactly because I think they are irrelevant to the Buddhadhamma. But if it helps to clarify my opening post, perhaps it’s worth engaging the discussion a bit longer, because what I said there I think actually does matter a lot to the Dhamma.
But why would we, bhante? Regarding materialism, I am not concerned with convincing others, and, as a staunch ex-materialist myself, I know the way to change people’s mind is not through defending another metaphysical philosophy. The Buddha also doesn’t go about it in that way, which actually illustrates the point I’m trying to make! 
And regarding dualism, I personally don’t see any major problems with it—by which I mean, it may be technically wrong or have some philosophical difficulties I’m unaware of, but I don’t see any significant ways in which it would be incompatible with essential aspects of the Dhamma like rebirth, suffering, anatta, liberation, etc.
As you said, Ajahn, the term ‘idealism’ is used in various ways. But it isn’t clear to me how you are using it. It seems to me you are shifting definition, which may explain why we could be talking past one another.
I thought you meant to say non-mental “stuff” doesn’t exist at all, only mental stuff. Because, you started the discussion by saying “rocks and tables are experiences” and “it does not make any sense to say that there are rocks or tables independent of the observer.” When I clarified that by “rocks and chairs” I meant not mental constructs but any kind of stuff, even if it’s just energy, you said: “We have only two possibilities for what that ‘stuff’ can be: physical or mental”. You specifically opposed dualism, which assumes some physical stuff exists. So I concluded that ‘stuff’ in your speculative assumption may be purely mental. This view, that only mental reality exist, I think is called monist idealism, though correct me if I’m wrong. (But let’s call it that, even if I am! 
)
However, now you say reality is in some sense mental, which seems to allow certain non-mental things to exist too, even if they can’t be accurately described or even known. You also said: “My point is that the external world is ultimately unknowable and therefore irrelevant. […] we don’t really know much about the world ‘outside’.” This also seems to say some external world may exist, even if it can’t be known for sure. This view I think is called epistemological idealism.
Exactly which of the two are you trying to find compatibility for in the suttas? Because they seem very different. The first is much more committal than the latter.
Either way, I wasn’t specifically arguing that idealism is incompatible with early Buddhism, as you assume. My argument was merely that the suttas aren’t concerned with these matters. To show that, I indicated that idealism—and I assumed we were talking about the monist kind at that point—isn’t the general outlook of the suttas and that they “don’t teach [monist] idealism”. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they are absolutely incompatible with it. To have absolute incompatibility, we would need some direct metaphysical statement to the contrary, which would be the exact kind of thing that in my view goes beyond Buddhadhamma. You seemed to agree with that.
I did say that there are some indications in the suttas that things are assumed to exist outside of consciousness/outside of minds, but I also said those are not metaphysical teachings. Still, these statements do seem to reflect the general assumptions of enlightened beings, which at least indicates monist idealism isn’t the general outlook of the early Buddhists. But perhaps it simply is not the general outlook, exactly because it doesn’t matter to the Buddhadhamma. That is different from the suttas being strictly incompatible with it. The assumption of an external, non-mental reality may just be a pragmatic way to teach or speak, for example. Or perhaps enlightened beings can still wrongly assume such a reality without it making a difference to their liberation or to the Dhamma in general.
I hope that clarifies what I tried to say.
But I could argue further against idealism in the suttas, with the understanding that they contain no absolute metaphysical denial of monist idealism but just general assumptions that seem to go against it, assumed for whatever reason. (For clarity, with this I’m not intending to specifically defend mind-body dualism.)
One passage I mentioned was MN28, where Sāriputta seems to assume external forms, sounds, etc. exist before consciousness arises. It is particularly relevant, because it discusses the relationship between consciousness and externals: “If internally the eye is intact and external forms come into its range, but there is no corresponding conscious engagement, then there is no manifestation of the corresponding section of consciousness.” You replied to this, saying:
I don’t disagree with this. In fact, I think the suttas would directly support this. But Sāriputta’s assumption is that the external forms also exist even when we are not seeing them. At least, that is the most natural way to read the passage at first glance. But how would that work, if only mental things exist? What kind of mind would be behind these things at that time?
I also mentioned SN12.51, which says that enlightened beings understand “only bodily remains are left” after they pass away. The statement comes from the perspective of the enlightened beings themselves, not from the third-person perspective of others. So the most natural reading is that they assume that after they die, some bodily remains will be left in the physical world. It is very awkward to read it in a monist way, that bodily remains are left in some of mental form instead of a physical one.
Further, in MN43 a meditator is said to come back out of the cessation of perception and feeling because, in contrast to dead people, “their vitality is not spent; their warmth is not dissipated”. That is to say, the physical body is still alive, even if all mental processes have temporarily ceased. If reality was purely mental, how do we interpret this? What kind of vitality and warmth do they have at that point, if not something outside of the mind?
Also, what are “external signs (nimittas)” as opposed to “this body with consciousness”, for example in SN22.91? Does that not naturally seem to speak of some external reality beyond consciousness? Or MN28, which talks about the external elements as if they are things existing independently in the world.
There will be more passages like this, since most of these I just came up with on the fly. We can read all such passages differently, exactly as I said, so you don’t have to explain how you would. But we have to judge for ourselves how likely things would have been phrased in these ways if monist idealism was considered a serious possibility by early Buddhists. I think it’s not very likely myself.
The sutta about “the ocean in the training of the Noble One” I didn’t bring up as a passage that, like the above, specifically goes against idealism. It was a counter-example to the assumption that suttas about “the world” point at idealism (or even phenomenology more generally). As with ‘ocean’, the Buddha is giving the term ‘world’ a new meaning that is relevant to the training of the Noble One, in large part exactly to draw us away from metaphysics about the external world. The external world isn’t relevant, but one’s personal existence, the so-called “world” of the six senses, is.
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Just to address this briefly, what you’ve described is basically phenomenology, as I understand it, not a counter-example. This is from the beginning of the Wikipedia article:
Phenomenology is the philosophical study of objectivity and reality (more generally) as subjectively lived and experienced. It seeks to investigate the universal features of consciousness while avoiding assumptions about the external world, aiming to describe phenomena as they appear to the subject, and to explore the meaning and significance of the lived experiences.
Some phenomenologists were annihilationists, others had a belief in the afterlife. So the approach does not inherently deny or confirm these concepts. To talk about the arising of consciousness and contact within oneself dependent on certain conditions is phenomenology—even if it means talking about how external things may come into range but not be noticed by us (as in MN 28)—, whereas to focus on quarks and atoms from a ‘third-person’ perspective is the opposite of phenomenology. So it is not the same as saying “only subjective experience exists” or denying that things have an impact on our experience outside of pure subjective appearances. It’s just not interested in pretending we can step ‘outside of consciousness’ for some kind of ‘third-person’ experience, and then embracing that and turning to investigate our lived experience of that fully.
I’m not informed enough (or interested enough) to be able to compare and contrast the similarities with early Buddhism. But from what I do know there are clear parallels.
- mettā
(P.S.: the section in MN 28 on sights in range not giving rise to consciousness is unique to this sutta, and it is not found in the Chinese Āgama parallel, which only talks about the normal arising or non-arising of consciousness. It’s also put on the lips of Sāriputta, never the Buddha, who is a stand in for many early Abhidhamma ideas seeping into the suttas. This is not to say the passage is wrong, but I wouldn’t build a thesis around it in either direction TBH).
OK, but people are different. You cannot always gauge others’ reactions based on how you would react. Not everyone is going to change their minds for the same reasons.
I see a lot of people changing their minds about materialism these days, whether they are Buddhist or not. There are no doubt many reason for this, but I especially see two. (1) People are beginning to see that materialism is not able to give a satisfactory explanation of the mind. (2) There are other explanations that seem to explain both mind and matter in a satisfactory way.
True, but then materialism was not a mainstream view at that time. People were not bound by a dominant philosophical view of materialism the way many people seem to be now. If enough people say something is true, then we tend to follow along. It’s hard to argue against majorities and hegemonic ideas.
It is generally rejected in philosophy because of the difficulty in explaining how two fundamentally different “substances” interact with each other. Perhaps this is not as insurmountable as some claim, but it is a mainstream view, which makes it hard to argue against, unless you have some really good grounds.
Yes, this has been the position I have been taking all along - for the sake of the argument.
LOL! 
Whatever, but I believe the “monist” part is redundant. All idealism is monist.
I just meant that mind can take many forms.
We are all experiencing something, and our experiences match each others’, which is what enables us to communicate about our shared reality. So there seems to be something “out there”, but that “something” may just be another instance of mind.
I am talking about the first. But just to be clear, I don’t have any personal commitment. I am just trying to see if it works. When I say, “My point is that the external world is ultimately unknowable and therefore irrelevant. […] we don’t really know much about the world ‘outside’” it’s just to create an opening for idealism.
I am disappointed! 
I thought I might get some serious resistance! Instead it seems we see things in much the same way. How boring! But also quite peaceful …
So again, we agree. Hmmm, something doesn’t feel right …
I am not so sure about this. All sorts of statements may have metaphysical implications. For instance, rebirth excludes materialism.
Yes. But then other minds also exist independent of my mind. If the external world is the appearance of other minds, then the appearance too exists independent of my mind.
This is a good one! For once, I am not sure if I have a satisfactory idealist answer. In the classical idealism of the Vedas, one could argue that at death the illusion of a separation between the self and the world has been dissolved, which would mean one could still see remnants of the old self after death. Those remnants would now be part of the visible universe, just as the self has “merged” with the universal mind. However, this does not work in Buddhism, where there is no world spirit to which one returns at death. So perhaps that’s it for idealism. But then again, perhaps not …
Another good one! This is why it’s good to engage with you!
So, I am happy with this! From my point of view, we don’t need to take this any further. If there are good idealist retorts to the examples you have given and I happen come upon them, then I shall bring it up here. Otherwise I am happy to conclude at this point. Thank you for indulging me!
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Not necessarily Bhante, to some people views are dearer to them than their children. You used the word ‘speculative’ , I would use ’ constrained imagination’. Who knows what a staunch materialist philosopher can devise, say with an analogy of a pen-drive and a term like dark-matter and so forth.
Who wins will determined by who gets the biggest applause, actually in this day and age who appears to get the biggest applause.
I am always a bit anxious about this because why would a phenomenological approach not lead to more delusion? Many feel it does. For example, how we remember things is often not what really happened. Those testimonies are often not reliable.
Does a phenemonological approach not create her own perspective with her own truths? But is this not merely true and valid from that pespective? Can we really see this as reliable knowledge?
For example, is it really true that such thing as the stilling of all formations really exist? Or is it only a stilling from an inner perspective, while, in fact this stilling of formations only shows the limitations of the mind to really penetrate most subtle formations? Is a descent into emptiness a real emptiness?
Or is emptiness merely the phenemenological experience/taste of the subconcious? What does it even mean that we can experience peace, stilling? Are we at that moment totally deluded about how things really are?
Or, from our experience seen space looks empty, but science learns it is not empty at all. So, what is reliable knowledge? If i, suppose, are able to abandon all inner fetters, does this mean i must know the truth and have reliable knowledge?
I am sometimes anxious that we only create stories, create knowledge that is only valid and true from a certain perspective.
That is why i tend to believe that an inner perspective on how things happen, arise, cease etc. is also just an inner perspective. We must not see this as some absolute truth or knowledge. I believe it is foolish to suggest that one now knows things as they really are. No, how they are from that inner perspective.
I tend to believe Buddha said.…i declare only suffering and its cessation …because he did not want to suggest that he declared or knew the absolute truth about life.
Because everything impermanent is simultaneously formed. The formed consciousness is included in cause-and-effect relationships and serves as the basis for the emergence of physical and mental sensations - pleasant, neutral and painful. Due to the fact that sensations and their causes are impermanent, happiness is replaced by suffering and vice versa. This mixture of pain and pleasure is suffering. Clinging or lack of clinging does not cancel the painful, overwhelming nature of the painful sensation. Its characteristics are as follows. And due to the impermanence of conditions, it will appear every now and then as long as formations exist as the basis for their appearance. Either before the existence of formations as the painfulness of the process of producing formations, or during formations or after formations as dukkha the result of variability.
SN13.133
“Sister, the arahants maintain that when the eye exists there is pleasure and pain, and when the eye does not exist there is no pleasure and pain. The arahants maintain that when the ear exists there is pleasure and pain, and when the ear does not exist there is no pleasure and pain…. The arahants maintain that when the mind exists there is pleasure and pain, and when the mind does not exist there is no pleasure and pain.”
SN 35.236.
“Bhikkhus, when there are hands, picking up and putting down are discerned. When there are feet, coming and going are discerned. When there are limbs, bending and stretching are discerned. When there is the belly, hunger and thirst are discerned.
“So too, bhikkhus, when there is the eye, pleasure and pain arise internally with eye-contact as condition. When there is the ear, pleasure and pain arise internally with ear-contact as condition…. When there is the mind, pleasure and pain arise internally with mind-contact as condition.
“When, bhikkhus, there are no hands, picking up and putting down are not discerned. When there are no feet, coming and going are not discerned. When there are no limbs, bending and stretching are not discerned. When there is no belly, hunger and thirst are not discerned.
“So too, bhikkhus, when there is no eye, no pleasure and pain arise internally with eye-contact as condition. When there is no ear, no pleasure and pain arise internally with ear-contact as condition…. When there is no mind, no pleasure and pain arise internally with mind-contact as condition.”
DN 15
“Ānanda, on the occasion when one experiences a pleasant feeling one does not, on that same occasion, experience a painful feeling or a neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling; on that occasion one experiences only a pleasant feeling. On the occasion when one experiences a painful feeling one does not, on that same occasion, experience a pleasant feeling or a neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling; on that occasion one experiences only a painful feeling. On the occasion when one experiences a neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling one does not, on that same occasion, experience a pleasant feeling or a painful feeling; on that occasion one experiences only a neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling.
“Ānanda, pleasant feeling is impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, subject to destruction, falling away, fading out, and ceasing. Painful feeling is impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, subject to destruction, falling away, fading out, and ceasing. Neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling is impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, subject to destruction, falling away, fading out, and ceasing.
“If, when experiencing a pleasant feeling, one thinks: ‘This is my self,’ then with the ceasing of that pleasant feeling one thinks: ‘My self has disappeared.’ If, when experiencing a painful feeling, one thinks: ‘This is my self,’ then with the ceasing of that painful feeling one thinks: ‘My self has disappeared.’ If, when experiencing a neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling, one thinks: ‘This is my self,’ then with the ceasing of that neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling one thinks: ‘My self has disappeared.’
“Thus one who says ‘Feeling is my self’ considers as self something which, even here and now, is impermanent, a mixture of pleasure and pain, and subject to arising and falling away. Therefore, Ānanda, because of this it is not acceptable to consider: ‘Feeling is my self.’
AN 3.61
“And what, bhikkhus, is the noble truth of suffering? Birth is suffering, old age is suffering, illness is suffering, death is suffering;
It is indicated here that the emergence, that is, the birth of something, is suffering; change, that is, the old age of something is suffering; breakdown, deformation, destruction, that is, the disease of something is suffering. And finally, the final destruction, that is, the death of something, is suffering. Birth, illness, aging and death occur both momentarily and throughout a lifetime and also a series of lives. This is the all-encompassing law of impermanence associated with suffering. And I described and substantiated the most obvious essence of this connection through the production of vedana in connection with the impermanence of formations in the suttas above.
If conditioned things are not grasped at they cannot lead to suffering. If non-grasping at conditioned things still leads to suffering, then there can be no end to suffering. It is by not-grasping at and not-craving for the conditioned that an end to suffering can be made. The world’s pretty things are just the world’s pretty things. It is grasping at and craving for them that leads to suffering. To realize not-grasping and not-craving for the world’s pretty things is to make an end to suffering.
Greedy intention is a person’s sensual pleasure.
The world’s pretty things aren’t sensual pleasures.
Greedy intention is a person’s sensual pleasure.
The world’s pretty things stay just as they are,
but a wise one removes desire for them.AN 6.63
The world’s pretty things cannot be inherently suffering. If they were, then there could be no end to suffering. An arahant cannot make an end to the world’s pretty things. An arahant can make an end to grasping at and craving after them. It is that non-grasping and non-craving that makes an end of suffering. The world’s pretty things stay just as they are.