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Explain how it is possible for one to attain nibbana just by hearing dhamma from the lord
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Explain Why the buddha when he was a child, attained jhana easily naturally effortlessly unintentionally without guidances and instructions at all while the adult buddha even used mortification like holding breath and starvation with guidances and instructions from his former jain gurus but without result/jhana at all even though he have attained the dimension of neither perception nor non perception
so this is zero effort vs severe grueling effort and it’s not me that said that
Mn 36
"Then I thought, Whatever ascetics and brahmins have experienced painful, sharp, severe, acute feelings due to overexertion—whether in the past, future, or present—this is as far as it goes, no-one has done more than this. But I have not achieved any superhuman distinction in knowledge and vision worthy of the noble ones by this severe, grueling work.
Could there be another path to awakening?
- explain this sutta
Dn 21
“She did bow, lord of gods, and I remember what she said. I also remember that it was the sound of your chariot wheels that pulled me out of that immersion.”
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explain why sound is a thorn in the first jhana if sound can’t even be sensed at all let alone disturbing or thorning them
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explain the meaning of this sutta
An9.34
“First, take a mendicant who, quite secluded from sensual pleasures … enters and remains in the first absorption. While a mendicant is in such a meditation, should perceptions and attentions accompanied by sensual pleasures beset them, that’s an affliction for them”
- explain why there is no jhana in this sutta
An4.190
“And how has a monk attained to the imperturbable? It’s when a monk—going totally beyond perceptions of form, with the ending of perceptions of impingement, not focusing on perceptions of diversity—aware that ‘space is infinite’, enters and remains in the dimension of infinite space. Going totally beyond the dimension of infinite space, aware that ‘consciousness is infinite’, he enters and remains in the dimension of infinite consciousness. Going totally beyond the dimension of infinite consciousness, aware that ‘there is nothing at all’, he enters and remains in the dimension of nothingness. Going totally beyond the dimension of nothingness, he enters and remains in the dimension of neither perception nor non-perception. That’s how a monk has attained to the imperturbable.”
- explain the meaning of this sutta
Mn66
"Take a mendicant who, quite secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unskillful qualities, enters and remains in the first absorption.This belongs to the perturbable, I say. And what there belongs to the perturbable? Whatever placing of the mind and keeping it connected has not ceased there is what belongs to the perturbable.
Take a mendicant who, giving up pleasure and pain, enters and remains in the fourth absorption. This belongs to the imperturbable"
- explain why the buddha condemns the ability to not hear sound in this sutta if indeed jhana is necessary
Mn152
"Uttara, does Pārāsariya teach his disciples the development of the faculties?”
“He does, Master Gotama.”
“But how does he teach it?”
“Master Gotama, it’s when the eye sees no sight and the ear hears no sound. That’s how Pārāsariya teaches his disciples the development of the faculties.”
“In that case, Uttara, a blind person and a deaf person will have developed faculties according to what Pārāsariya says. For a blind person sees no sight with the eye and a deaf person hears no sound with the ear.” When he said this, Uttara sat silent, embarrassed, shoulders drooping, downcast, depressed, with nothing to say.
Knowing this, the Buddha addressed Venerable Ānanda, “Ānanda, the development of the faculties taught by Pārāsariya is quite different from the supreme development of the faculties in the training of the Noble One.”
“Now is the time, Blessed One! Now is the time, Holy One. Let the Buddha teach the supreme development of the faculties in the training of the Noble One. The mendicants will listen and remember it.”
“Well then, Ānanda, listen and pay close attention, I will speak.”
“Yes, sir,” Ānanda replied. The Buddha said this:
“And how, Ānanda, is there the supreme development of the faculties in the training of the Noble One? When a mendicant sees a sight with their eyes, liking, disliking, and both liking and disliking come up in them. They understand: ‘Liking, disliking, and both liking and disliking have come up in me. That’s conditioned, coarse, and dependently originated. But this is peaceful and sublime, namely equanimity.’ Then the liking, disliking, and both liking and disliking that came up in them cease, and equanimity becomes stabilized. It’s like how a person with good sight might open their eyes then shut them; or might shut their eyes then open them. Such is the speed, the swiftness, the ease with which any liking, disliking, and both liking and disliking at all that came up in them cease, and equanimity becomes stabilized"
- Explain The fourth jhana simile for how you can wrap mental body or even breath body with cloth if indeed that’s possible
An9.34
“Furthermore, giving up pleasure and pain, and ending former happiness and sadness, a mendicant enters and remains in the fourth absorption. It is without pleasure or pain, with pure equanimity and mindfulness. They sit spreading their body through with pure bright mind. There’s no part of the body that’s not spread with pure bright mind. It’s like someone sitting wrapped from head to foot with white cloth. There’s no part of the body that’s not spread over with white cloth. In the same way, they sit spreading their body through with pure bright mind. There’s no part of the body that’s not spread with pure bright mind. This is the fourth way to develop noble right immersion with five factors.”
- Explain how it is possible for one who has difficulty to enter jhana to abide in equanimity if indeed jhana is necessary to get equanimity
Mn12
"I would make my bed in a charnel ground, with the bones of the dead for a pillow. Then the cowboys would come up to me. They’d spit and piss on me, throw mud on me, even poke sticks in my ears. But I don’t recall ever having a bad thought about them. Such was my abiding in equanimity
But Sāriputta, I did not achieve any superhuman distinction in knowledge and vision worthy of the noble ones by that conduct, that practice, that grueling work. Why is that? Because I didn’t achieve that noble wisdom that’s noble and emancipating, and which leads someone who practices it to the complete ending of suffering."
- Explain how it was possible to buddha to hear what ananda said while in imperturbable concentration
Ud 3.3
"For a third time, as the night was getting late, in the last watch of the night, Ānanda got up from his seat, arranged his robe over one shoulder, raised his joined palms toward the Buddha and said, “Sir, the night is getting late. It is the last watch of the night; dawn stirs, bringing joy to the night, and the visiting mendicants have been sitting long. Sir, please greet the visiting mendicants.”
Then the Buddha emerged from that immersion and addressed Ānanda,
“If you’d known, Ānanda, you wouldn’t have said so much. Both I and these five hundred mendicants have been sitting in imperturbable meditation"