In the past I’ve written in some detail on the Buddha’s goal of extinguishment (nirvāṇa/nibbāna). It seems I inadvertently created a kind of niche for myself, since I still regularly get technical questions about the matter. In this essay I will answer the question whether nibbāna is something that is experienced.
If by nibbāna we mean the extinguishment of greed, hatred, and delusion, then the answer is simple: this can be experienced by the enlightened being. But nibbāna can also refer to the cessation of the sense faculties when the enlightened being passes away—also called parinibbāna. The question is whether the latter still involves some kind of experience.
The chapter on the six senses in the Saṃyutta Nikāya contains a discourse named the Kāmaguṇa Sutta. Here the Buddha says:
The Buddha then gets up and enters his dwelling.
The phrase “you should understand the case” (āyatana veditabba) has also been translated along the lines of “you should experience that sphere”. This is then believed to describe a realm or state that is experienced after the six senses cease.[2] This realm or state is equated to nibbāna.
If the passage indeed encouraged something to be experienced (veditabba) outside of the six senses, it would be unique. I am not aware of a comparable instruction anywhere else in the early Buddhist texts. When words derived from vedeti refer to experiences, they are always limited to the six senses.[3] What’s more, extinguishment is described contrariwise, namely as “nothing is experienced”, natthi vedayitaṃ.[4] (Since enlightened beings still experience things, this specifically refers to extinguishment after death, just as the “case” of the Kāmaguṇa Sutta.)
There are also problems of translation with “you should experience that sphere”. Veditabba does not mean ‘to be experienced’.[5] The PTS Pali-English Dictionary glosses veditabba just as “to be understood or known”. Childers and Warder give similar definitions.[6] The Sanskrit equivalent veditavya is similarly defined by Monier-Williams and Cappeller.[7] None of them include ‘to be experienced’ or equivalents.
Veditabba is a participle of the verb vedeti. This verb has two main meanings: ‘to know/understand’ and ‘to feel/experience’. So based on etymology alone, veditabba could indeed be translated as ‘to be experienced’. However, words acquire their meaning from usage, not from mere etymology. And in a comprehensive search of the Sutta Piṭaka I was unable to find a single unambiguous instance where veditabba actually means ‘to be experienced’. I only found cases where it means ‘to be known/understood’. Some examples are:
- to know your enemies,
- to understand that what Brahmins say is false,
- to understand things through faith or reasoning
- to know facts about people,
- to understand suffering and its causes.[8]
There are dozens of similar cases. An illustrative one is: “People should be understood (veditabba) to be twofold: as those to be associated with and those not to be associated with.”[9] This is then explained as knowing (jaññā) which people lead to wholesome qualities and which to unwholesome ones. Another illustrative case says you should understand (veditabba) that some things that are experienced (vedayita) are the result of sickness, others of karma.[10]
A famous case is: “The Teaching (dhamma) is well-taught by the Buddha, verifiable in this life, immediately effective, inviting confirmation, conducive, and can be understood by the wise for themselves (paccattaṃ veditabbo viññūhi).” This case is admittedly less clear, and the translation ‘can be experienced’ is commonly used.[11] However, ‘can be understood’ (or alternatively ‘can be known/realized’) again seems a better fit. The word dhamma has a wide range of meanings. Here it refers to the Buddha’s teaching. This is clarified when the famous statement is followed by: “We see no Teacher who teaches such a conducive Teaching (dhamma), apart from the Buddha.”[12] Now, the Buddha’s well-taught Teaching is not to be experienced; it is to be understood. For one, it encompasses suffering and its origin, the experience of which is highly discouraged! We should understand (the Buddha’s teachings on) suffering and its origin, not experience them. One discourse mentions the famous statement and then adds: “May they understand (ājāneyyuṃ) the Teaching.”[13] Another discourse explains that the well-taught Teaching can be understood after it is heard.[14] Still elsewhere the Buddha asks whether mendicants speak according to what they have known (ñātaṃ) for themselves. When they reply that they do, he explains that he has guided them with his Teaching which is well-taught and so forth, which can understood by the wise for themselves.[15]
If the reader is not convinced that ‘to be understood’ is the correct reading in this famous case, it is at least a possible one. In that event, this case would be ambiguous and not favor one meaning of veditabba over the other. We should then interpret it in light of the cases that are not ambiguous. And in those cases veditabba always means ‘to be understood’.
So, given the apparent universal precedence for veditabba to mean ‘to be known/understood’, the theoretical ‘to be experienced’ can be rejected also for the Kāmaguṇa Sutta. Its commentary agrees. It glosses veditabba as jānitabba, which unambiguously means ‘to be known/understood’.
The Kāmaguṇa Sutta has a Chinese parallel in the Saṃyukta Āgama, translated from a now-lost Indian manuscript by Guṇabhadra.[16] Corresponding to veditabba it has 當覺知. In other Āgama texts this also means ‘should understand/realize’, in the sense of understanding/realizing something new.[17] For example, another Saṃyukta Āgama discourse uses the same phrase with respect to the origin and cessation of old age and death, where its Pali parallel has pajānāti, ‘understand’.[18] A Dīrgha Āgama discourse says one should understand/realize (當覺知) that some people who look like friends are actually enemies, just like its Pali parallel, which uses veditabba.[19]
Still more tellingly, the parallel to the Kāmaguṇa Sutta says: “You should understand those six sense spheres (當覺六入處)”. This also indicates that 當覺—a short form of 當覺知—describes an understanding, since it is unlikely that the Buddha would instruct his followers to experience the six senses. (Even if ‘six’ (六) is an erroneous insertion by the Chinese translator, it still shows that he understood 當覺 to mean ‘should understand’, not ‘should experience’.)
The parallel therefore confirms that veditabba means ‘to be understood’.
How about āyatana? In the phrase āyatana veditabba this term has been taken to indicate a realm or sphere of experience outside the senses—even by some who correctly interpret veditabba as ‘to be understood’.[20] Āyatana has a range of meanings, among which ‘realm’ and ‘sphere’ in a literal sense, such as in the expression ‘realms of the forest’ (arañña-āyatanas).[21] But the word also has more abstract meanings such as ‘case’, as glossed by the Critical Pāli Dictionary. The commentary to the Kāmaguṇa Sutta explains āyatana as kāraṇa, which in the commentarial literature usually means ‘cause/reason’ but according to dictionaries can also mean ‘case’.[22]
Other passages illustrate the less concrete meanings of the word āyatana. For instance, householders can use their wealth in different appropriate spheres (āyatanas), including for the happiness of their family and for religious donations.[23] Drunkenness is said to be a “sphere” for bad deeds.[24] The Sīgālovāda Sutta mentions susceptibility (āyatana) to illness when drinking alcohol.[25] Here āyatana certainly does not refer to a literal realm or sphere. It means something like ‘option’, or ‘occasion’ or ‘opportunity’, as dictionaries also suggest.[26] It is a bit like how in English something can be within the realm of possibility. The word āyatana has a similar meaning in other contexts, such as in ‘opportunities for liberation’ (vimutti-āyatanas).[27] Quite tellingly, the Pañcattaya Sutta calls the theory of annihilationism, among other wrong views, an āyatana.[28] This proves that āyatana by itself has no experiential meaning. Annihilation can be regarded as the very antithesis of that! The meaning here is again something like ‘case’. Annihilationism is one of the cases of wrong view.
Venerable Dhammadinnā correctly translates veditabba in the Kāmaguṇa Sutta as ‘should be known’ but still maintains that āyatana implies an “experiential domain”.[29] It is left “intentionally untranslated” in this context, but in context of the opportunities for liberation, Venerable Dhammadinnā does translate āyatana as ‘occasion’, which is explained to mean ‘circumstance’. I see no good reason why such a meaning cannot also apply to the Kāmaguṇa Sutta, without it implying an experience.
Dhammadinnā argues that the process leading to liberation implies experience, and that therefore āyatana also implies experience. But this conclusion does not follow. Consider the English word ‘occasion’, which is chosen as a translation. This word can be used in diverging contexts, sometimes concerning experience and other times not. But even in context of experience, the word itself does not inherently imply an experience. The same is true for its Pali counterpart. Even when the wider context implies experience, this does not tell us anything about the meaning of āyatana in and of itself.
Venerable Dhammadinnā makes a similar argument based on The First Discourse on Extinguishment from the Udāna. Here the Buddha says (in my translation):
The āyatanas of unbounded space and so forth are the formless spheres/states.[31] The āyatana when there is no earth and so forth refers to extinguishment, just like the āyatana of the Kāmaguṇa Sutta. It particularly refers to extinguishment after death, because the living enlightened being can still experience the four elements and the formless states, still is in this world, and still has an abiding. These things only end when they pass away.
Venerable Dhammadinnā argues: “This passage clearly shows that the same experiential terminology [āyatana] encompasses […] the immaterial [or ‘formless’] spheres and that which transcends them, namely Nirvāṇa.”[32] It is true that the passage uses āyatana for both the formless states and extinguishment. But does this shared terminology show that extinguishment is also an experience, akin to the formless states? Again, this does not follow. Even in the formless states, the term āyatana by itself does not imply an experience. It is the whole expression, such as “the sphere of unbounded consciousness”, along with the wider context, which implies experience, not just the word āyatana. But even if āyatana on its own would imply experience in the formless states, the word is flexible in meaning, as we have seen. The Buddha could simply be using it with two different meanings in the same passage. He may even be playing with words, as he often does.
Let’s also not forget that the entire point of the passage is that extinguishment is completely different from the formless states. So it seems ill-advised to conclude, based on this very passage, that they have something in common!
If we use such reasoning, we should also apply it consistently. But some discourses call two other things “āyatanas”: (1) the realm of the impercipient beings and (2) the meditative attainment of cessation, fully named ‘the cessation of awareness and what’s experienced’ (or ‘cessation of perception and feeling’). In these discourses the connection with the formless states is much closer as well: these two āyatanas are not opposed to the formless states; they happen in a list alongside them.[33] Yet, even this does not indicate that the two āyatanas are using “the same experiential terminology” as the formless states. Ancient and modern commentators widely accept that there is no experience for meditators in the attainment of cessation and for the impercipient beings.[34] So we should not conclude that these two things involve experiences simply because, just like the formless states, they use the word āyatana. Similarly, we should not conclude that extinguishment is an experience simply because it is called an āyatana in connection with the formless states.
Lastly, Venerable Dhammadinnā introduces a statement from the Saḷāyatana-vibhaṅga Sutta, which is taken to refer to extinguishment:
First of all, if this would refer to extinguishment, that still would not prove that it is an experience. The attainment of cessation is also described as an āyatana that one “attains and abides in”.
However, I am not convinced that the passage refers to extinguishment in the first place. It references supreme liberationS of the noble ones. These are plural, and apparently they are attained not just by the fully enlightened but by noble ones in general. Extinguishment would be referred to in the singular, and in the early texts it is always limited to the fully enlightened. Other noble ones know what extinguishment is, but they haven’t yet attained it.[36]
The supreme liberations are described with similar terminology as states of samādhi, namely “attain and abide in”. So they could also be meditative states: primarily the jhanas, formless states, and the attainment of cessation. These states are also called liberations, even though they are temporary. For example, there is the phrase “he attains and abides in a liberation of mind”.[37] There is also a reoccurring list of eight meditative liberations, which include the formless states—and the jhanas as well, although under another name.[38] And just like the formless states and the attainment of cessation, the jhanas are also called āyatanas.[39]
In the Cūḷavedalla Sutta the same longing for supreme liberations indeed occurs in the middle of an exposition of the four jhanas, taking the place of where we usually find the second and third.[40] The attainment of extinguishment happens only later, as the abandonment of ignorance after the fourth jhana. The desire to abide in the same āyatana as the noble ones is also reminiscent of the standard formula of the third jhana: “of which the noble ones declare, ‘Equanimous and mindful, one abides in bliss.’”[41]
Finally, the Saḷāyatana-vibhaṅga Sutta says that the longing for supreme liberations, when unfulfilled, results in sadness. I see no reason why such sadness would be limited just to a failure to achieve extinguishment and not also include states of meditation such as the jhanas.
But, we might wonder, if the supreme liberations are various states of meditation, then why is the longed-for āyatana in the singular? The reason may be very simple: the person can only abide in one of these liberations at a time. They would not wonder something like: “Oh, when will I attain and abide in both the first and second jhana?”
All that aside, even if extinguishment was intended to be included in the supreme liberations, it could only be the cessation of the defilements at enlightenment. It would not include parinibbāna, the cessation of the six senses referred to by the Kāmaguṇa Sutta, since it is certainly not something the noble ones “currently attain and dwell in”. The senses only cease at the passing away of the enlightened ones, and thereafter they don’t dwell in anything.
With all that clarified, we can return to the Kāmaguṇa Sutta itself. The Buddha says: “You should understand the case (āyatana) when the sense of sight ceases and perceptions of sights fade away”, and so on for the other senses. Given the range of meanings of āyatana, this statement is potentially ambiguous in Pali. After the Buddha leaves for his dwelling, the attending mendicants indeed ask Venerable Ānanda for clarification. But Ānanda simply responds:
At the end of the discourse the Buddha praises Ānanda’s wisdom. He himself would have answered in the same way.
It may seem strange that Ānanda’s “detailed meaning” is even shorter than the Buddha’s “brief summary”. But I think this is on purpose. The “case” the Buddha referred to is simply the cessation of the six senses itself, so there is little more for Ānanda to say about it.[42] With his brief answer, he indicates that the mendicants shouldn’t look for a deeper meaning behind the word āyatana. The Buddha was just speaking about the cessation of the six senses itself, not about some experience beyond them. As the commentary says: “What was said refers to the cessation of the six senses, which is called ‘extinguishment’.” It does not refer to some experiential domain outside of the six senses, as some argue.
If the āyatana in question were to be experienced, then Ānanda’s answer would be very inadequate. He should not explain this by saying that the Buddha was referring to the cessation of the six senses. This would tell us nothing new at all, let alone about the meaning of āyatana. Ānanda should instead say that the Buddha was describing some sort of experience. It is not difficult to say something like this (as modern commentators show) and it would have been a perfect occasion for Ānanda to do so. After all, the other mendicants asked him for a further explanation, and his reply is supposed to be “detailed”.
But Ānanda just mentions the cessation of the senses, nothing more. So, unless we substitute our own explanation of the ambiguous term āyatana for the explanation actually given in the discourse, this further indicates that with āyatana veditabba the Buddha is not encouraging an experience outside of the six senses. He is encouraging us to understand the cessation of the six senses themselves.
The Saṃyukta Āgama parallel confirms this. Here the Buddha does not conclude “you should understand that case” but “you should understand those six sense spheres”.[43] His instruction is also different. Notably, it includes a teaching on sense impressions (or ‘contact’) that is absent from the Pali:
Just as in the Pali version, the Buddha then enters his dwelling.
In the Pali, the paragraph starting with “therefore you should understand” follows an instruction on the need for diligence for mendicants who are intent on their own well-being. The commentary tries to make sense of this. It argues that the “case” should be understood because thereafter there is no more need for diligence. This explanation is forced, and it wrongly assumes that the understanding amounts to full enlightenment. The first paragraph of the Chinese parallel makes a much more logical connection with the following “therefore”. An equivalent paragraph has likely been lost in the Pali.
Venerable Ānalayo translates the Chinese parallel quite differently, particularly the second and third paragraph:
I am skeptical of this translation on a number of grounds. Firstly, 離 can mean ‘apart from’ but also ‘are removed’, as in my translation. The Pali equivalent virajjati (‘fade away’) and variant manuscript reading nirujjhati (‘cease’) are closer to the latter.
Secondly, in this translation the second paragraph does not form a logical causal connection with the first. The first paragraph states that experiences of sight depend on seeing forms with the eye. From this it is logical to conclude—as in my translation—that therefore, if the eye ceases, perceptions of forms will be removed. It is not logical to conclude that therefore one should realize a sphere apart from perceptions of forms.
Thirdly and most importantly, in his translation Venerable Anālayo is “emending 六入處 to 入處”, thus removing 六 (‘six’).[47] This is based on the assumption that the translator Guṇabhadra inserted it because he misunderstood his original source manuscript—not only missing its message but also failing to tell a grammatical singular from a plural. That manuscript being lost, this is speculation. A bigger issue, however, is that the emendation has a significant semantic impact. The resulting translation aligns with Venerable Anālayo’s idea that there is a “sphere of experiencing Nirvāṇa”, “a conscious experience that involves the cessation of the six sense spheres”.[48] Even if this idea itself were right, the unemended text just does not support it. It unambiguously says that the six sense spheres should be understood. This is what Guṇabhadra himself had in mind at least, even if his source manuscript would have said something different.
In the unemended Chinese text it is clear that the Buddha does not want a sphere outside of the six senses to be experienced. He instead wants the cessation of the six senses to be understood. This is confirmed when the mendicants repeat the Buddha’s teaching to Ānanda:
Just like in the Pali, Ānanda then explains that the Buddha was simply referring to the cessation of the six senses:
Venerable Anālayo’s translation is again quite different (with brackets in the original):
In this translation the quote following “he said” is not a full sentence, since it only has a subject (“the sphere wherein …”) to which no verbs apply. Similar to before, it also does not form a logical explanation of the brief teaching “in regard to the cessation of the six sense-spheres”.
Furthermore, this translation assumes that in the Chinese text the statement on the mind is not a complete sentence, that it is partly elided. We have to add “the sphere wherein” from the statement on the eye to it, otherwise we’re left with a dangling clause: “The mind sense-sphere ceases and which then is apart from perception of mental objects.” But the character for ‘sphere’ (處) comes after ‘eye’ (眼), not before, so it naturally falls within the elisions (the “…”) and does not carry over till the end. In other words, the text has the usual structure where a sentence is written in full both before and after the elisions. The translation does not follow this structure.
In this translation ‘sphere’ is included for the mind (in “mind sense-sphere”, 意入處) but no equivalent is included for any of the other five senses, including the eye. The statements about the ear, nose, tongue, and body are elided in the original, hence ‘sphere’ is naturally lacking for these four. However, the statement about the eye is not elided, so 處 must be part of 眼處, i.e. ‘eye-sphere’. Compare a statement from the Madhyama Āgama: “eye-sphere … ear … nose … tongue … body … mind-sphere” (眼處, 耳, 鼻, 舌, 身, 意處).[49] Venerable Anālayo separated ‘sphere’ from ‘eye’, which again makes space for some sphere apart from from the six senses. But the resulting translation is awkward at best.
My translation employs ‘sphere’ more consistently: “When the eye-sphere (眼處) ceases, then perceptions of form will be removed. When the ear … the nose … the tongue … the body … When the mind-sphere (意入處) ceases, then perceptions of mental phenomena will be removed.”[50] This renders two slightly different expressions both as ‘sphere’: 處 and 入處. The Āgamas usually refer to the sense spheres as 入處, but sometimes just as 處, as in the statement from the Madhyama Āgama.[51] Ānanda’s statement uses the two expressions synonymously. He rephrases the earlier statement given to him by the mendicants. Their version does not mention any spheres but just the eye (眼) and mind (意). So in Ānanda’s rephrasing 處 and 入處 are inserted in parallel. This means they both refer to a sense sphere, instead of the latter referring to a sense sphere and the former to some non-sense sphere of extinguishment. (No pun intended.)
The slightly inconsistent terminology for the eye sphere (眼處) and the mind (sense)-sphere (意入處) is interesting, but it’s not problematic for my translation. This level of inconsistency is far from unique in the Āgamas. Earlier in the discourse Venerable Anālayo also translates 入處 not as ‘sense-sphere’ but just as ‘sphere’. Here it is presumed to describe a sphere outside the six senses. Later on the solitary 處 is interpreted in this same sense. This translation therefore suffers from the same inconsistency between 入處 and 處, just in a different way. And arguably it suffers more, because throughout the Āgamas 入處 repeatedly refers to the six sense spheres, not to a sphere outside of them.[52]
So far I have shown that:
- Veditabba does not mean ‘to be experienced’; it means ‘to be understood’.
- Āyatana does not always mean a sphere of experience; it can mean a general case or situation.
- The “case” that is to be understood in the Kāmaguṇa Sutta is the cessation of the six senses itself; it is not some experience separate from them.
- The Chinese parallel does not speak about experiencing a sphere separate from the six senses, either; it speaks about understanding the cessation of the six senses.
Note that in and of itself the translation ‘to be understood’ does not rule out the possibility that the cessation of the six senses leaves some kind of experience. It could technically be the case (āyatana) that there is an experience outside of the senses, and that this is what is to be understood (veditabba). I think the Kāmaguṇa Sutta and its parallel already indicate that this is not actually meant, let alone other texts. But the possibility is worth highlighting. Objectively, the translation ‘to be understood’ is not biased towards a particular view of nibbāna. It leaves room for various interpretations. This is not the case for ‘to be experienced’. Therefore, if the meaning of veditabba were ambiguous, a neutral translator should use ‘to be understood’.
However, I think I have shown that the meaning is not ambiguous. The textual evidence is strongly in favor of ‘to be understood’. This is what veditabba consistently means elsewhere.
The translation ‘to be experienced’ faces an additional issue: it does not match the description of nibbāna as “nothing is experienced” (natthi vedayita).[53] Those who argue that nibbāna should be experienced (veditabba) have to somehow align these two conflicting descriptions.
Some bite the bullet and admit the situation is “paradoxical” and “would be hard to explain”.[54] Others argue that veditabba means ‘to be experienced’ but that natthi vedayita refers only to “absence of feeling tones”.[55] It is assumed that there is a particular experience which is devoid of so-called feeling tones. This experience is included in veditabba but not in vedayita. A semantic distinction is made between these two words: veditabba refers to experience in general, vedayita only to “felt experience”.
This is not supported by further textual evidence, however. It is not shown that discourses other than the disputed Kāmaguṇa Sutta make a distinction between felt experience and experience in general. And it would be hard to show this, because the actual situation is the opposite. When verb forms of vedeti carry the meaning ‘to experience’ (instead of ‘to understand’), they always imply feelings (vedanā).[56] From the perspective of the early Buddhist texts, to feel is to experience and to experience is to feel. Expressions such as “I don’t feel anything” are possible in English, but for the Buddha experiences that are neither pleasant nor painful are included feelings, too.
Whenever we are conscious, there is always some kind of feeling, however subtle.[57] As the Buddha said: “And what are you conscious of with that consciousness? You are conscious of what is pleasant, painful, or neutral (literally, ‘neither-pleasant-nor-painful’).”[58] Feelings are intrinsically connected to consciousness, to such an extent that “it is impossible to disconnect them from one another and point out the exact difference between them”.[59] So when there are no “feeling tones”, there also is no consciousness. In a study of vedanā in early Buddhism, Font Clos accordingly concludes: “Feeling [according to the early texts] is a key element of our experiential apparatus, which always has this affective-hedonic dimension. Feeling is only absent in a deep meditative state devoid of phenomenal experience, called the ‘cessation of perception and feeling’. Accordingly, all main surviving abhidharma systems consider feeling a universal dharma, that is, present in all types of consciousness.”[60]
Put differently, from the perspective of the early Buddhists and the Abhidharmikas, “felt experience” is just as pleonastic as “conscious experience”, and “unfelt experience” would be just as nonsensical as “unconscious experience”.
Those who limit vedayita to “feeling tones” also do not explain why they do so, why vedayita cannot also refer to experience in general, like they assume for veditabba. For lack of space I will not elaborate here, but the texts indicate that this is exactly what vedayita refers to. As Polak concluded: “Vedayita must refer to conscious experience in its entirety, and not merely its affective tone.”[61]
There is a simpler resolution to the conflict between the two terms. After the six senses cease, nothing is experienced (natthi vedayita), and this is what is to be understood (veditabba). This creates neither a paradox nor an artificial division between felt experience and unfelt experience.
That concludes the main message of this essay. But before closing, I want to briefly explain what the understanding of the cessation of the six senses amounts to. This will also further illustrate the meaning of veditabba.
The Kāmaguṇa Sutta describes the cessation of perceptions in a “case” that is to be understood (veditabba). Now consider a statement from the Nibbedhika Sutta: “The cessation of perceptions should be understood (veditabba).”[62] The Buddha clarifies this means one should understand (pajānāti) this cessation. He also explains what the understanding entails: “When sense impression (or ‘contact’) ceases, perceptions will cease.”
The same principle is explained in more detail in the Mahānidāna Sutta, again with the word veditabba. Here it is with reference to feelings instead of perceptions, but since the two are intrinsically connected, the underlying principle is the same:
The dependence of feelings on sense impressions is a standard tenet of Dependent Arising. Sense impressions in turn rely on the six senses. So if the six senses cease, feelings will cease too:
As we’ve seen, the Chinese parallel of the Kāmaguṇa Sutta describes the same principles: “Dependent on seeing sights with the eye, feelings arise within. […] Therefore, […] if the eye ceases, perceptions of sights will be removed.” In other words, when there are no six senses to “contact” or “impinge” things, then there will be no feelings and no perceptions.
This cessation is the “case” (āyatana) that is to be understood in the Kāmaguna Sutta. It is not a unique description of an experience outside of the senses; it is a standard teaching on the cessation of experience when the senses cease.
But when does this “case” happen, this situation when the senses cease? It has been tentatively suggested to be the cessation of awareness and what’s experienced (or ‘cessation of perception and feeling’).[65] In this state there are indeed no perceptions, and it is also called an āyatana. However, the sense faculties themselves still exist during its attainment.[66] Only perceptions cease, not the sense of sight and so forth. During all other states of meditation, too, the senses themselves haven’t ceased.
The “case” also is not enlightenment, because enlightened beings still have the six senses, even the Buddha. As Sāriputta said:
The “case” that is to be understood is instead the passing away of the enlightened being, which is when the senses completely and finally cease. As the Buddha describes the insight of the enlightened:
‘Trained’ translates asekha, which refers to the enlightened. They know that the six senses will cease (nirujjhissanti) in the future, when they pass away. The nature and inevitability of this cessation are already known by all noble ones, however, not just the fully enlightened. They all understand the “case” when the six senses cease. But the fully enlightened are distinguished by knowing that they will not get reborn at all, that “no other six faculties will arise anywhere in any way”.
The six senses will cease after the life in which ignorance and craving are fully abandoned. As a discourse called The Foolish and Wise says:
After the enlightened being passes away, all experiences cease, and only their corpse will be left. This is also something they have understood:
That the “cooling off” of experiences refers to their cessation is confirmed by parallels to this passage in other languages. For example, from a Sanskrit fragment: “all that is experienced will cease without remnant”. From a Madhyamaka Āgama discourse: “all that is experienced will be extinguished and will cease, becoming cool”.[71]
The complete understanding of the “case” of the Kāmaguṇa Sutta includes all of the above. The noble ones understand not just what the cessation of the six senses entails, they also how it comes about, and that it will come about. They understand that if ignorance and craving cease, there will be no rebirth and hence no more sense faculties. Then there will be no more sense impressions and hence no experience. And when there is no experience, there can be no suffering, not even bodily. In effect, the “case” encompasses the entire cessation sequence of Dependent Arising, from the cessation of ignorance to the cessation of suffering.
Although the cessation of the senses is not directly experienced, knowledge of their cessation isn’t just some intellectual idea, either. It is a transformative insight into the nature of the body and mind, which itself comes as a profound experience. Exactly how a practitioner can come to this insight, that is a matter for another time.
SN 35.117 ↩︎
For example, Ṭhānissaro 1993 p.35 translates “that dimension should be experienced”, which p.10 argues “point[s] to [a] realm—where the six senses & their objects cease—which can be experienced”. Anālayo 2023 p.74 translates “sphere which is to be experienced” and based on this argues that nibbāna “is a conscious experience that involves the cessation of the six sense spheres.” See also Nhan & Tuan p.153. The full phrase is actually se āyatane veditabbe, but the pronoun se and the inflection -e are not important for our discussion. ↩︎
For example, SN 22.79 limits vedeti to pleasant, painful, and neutral feelings: “It feels (or ‘experiences’, vedeti); that’s why it’s called ‘feeling’ (vedanā). And what does it feel? It feels what is pleasant, painful, and neutral.” SN 22.57 limits vedanā to the six senses. ↩︎
AN 9.34 ↩︎
As Sujato 2024a argues: “It [veditabba] refers to an understanding […], not to a direct experience.” Bodhi 2000 also translates “should be understood”. ↩︎
PED under vedeti, Childers under vidati, and Warder p.105. DPD does include “must be experienced” under veditabba but the only example given for this meaning is paccattaṃ veditabbo viññūhi, which I discuss later. ↩︎
Monier-Williams under veditavya: “1. to be learnt or known or understood; 2. mfn. to be known or recognized as, to be taken for, to be meant Kāś.”; Cappeller under veditavya: “to be known”. ↩︎
DN 31 at III 185; MN 84 at II 89; SN 35.153; AN 4.192; AN 6.63 ↩︎
AN 9.6 ↩︎
SN 36.21 ↩︎
For example, Bodhi 2012 translates “to be personally experienced by the wise”. However, Bodhi 2015 p.80 has “to be personally realized by the wise”, commenting that it refers to “knowledge and understanding”. ↩︎
DN 19 at II 222 ↩︎
SN 16.3 ↩︎
SN 16.3 ↩︎
MN 38 at I 265 ↩︎
SĀ 211 ↩︎
This was pointed out to me by Charles Patton, whom I also thank for his input on various other points in this essay. ↩︎
SĀ 355, with parallel at SN 12.28 ↩︎
DĀ 16 at 71a, with parallel at DN 31 at III 185 ↩︎
Compare for example Dhammadinnā 2021 p.114 and Anālayo 2013 n.63. ↩︎
MN 25 ↩︎
DOP and DPD under kāraṇa ↩︎
AN 4.61 ↩︎
Snp 2.14 ↩︎
DN 31 at III 183, as translated by Walshe and Sujato 2024b ↩︎
PED and DPD under āyatana ↩︎
AN 5.26 ↩︎
MN 102 at II 233 ↩︎
Dhammadinnā 2021 p.111–116 ↩︎
Ud 8.1 ↩︎
Normally I translate āyatana as ‘state’ in context of the formless attainments, but for sake of comparison I use ‘sphere’ here. ↩︎
Dhammadinnā 2021 p.115; see also Dhammadinnā 2024 and Anālayo 2023 p.77 ↩︎
For example AN 9.43 and DN 15 at at II 69 ↩︎
Ancient commentators: ADKB 4.56, TSS 154, and Vism 705 (translated respectively by De La Vallée Poussin p.631, Sastri p.359, and Ñāṇamoli p.738). Examples of modern scholars: Ledi p.55, Stcherbatsky p.52, Kalupahana p.77, Nyanatiloka, Gunaratana p.203, Griffiths p.9–13, Ñāṇavīra p.337, Crangle p.241, Collins p.230, Bronkhorst p.50, Harvey p.332, Sharf p.144, Tilakaratne p.313, and Ñāṇadīpa p.75. ↩︎
MN 137 at III 219 ↩︎
Compare the simile of the water in the well at SN 12.68. ↩︎
AN 2.36 ↩︎
DN 15 at II 71, DN 16 at II 112, DN 33 at III 261, DN 34 at III 288, MN 77 at II 13, and AN 8.66. ↩︎
For example in AN 9.43 ↩︎
MN 44 at I 304 ↩︎
For example SN 45.8 ↩︎
See also Sujato 2024a: “‘That dimension [āyatana] where the eye ceases’ […] is just another way of talking about cessation.” ↩︎
On these differences see also Choong p.75. ↩︎
於彼入處當覺知, 若眼滅, 色想則離, 耳, 鼻, 舌, 身, 意滅, 法想則離. Here 六 (‘six’) is omitted, but that 入處 refers to the sense spheres can be deduced from a later statement which includes 六 but which in all other aspects is virtually identical: 當覺六入處, 若彼眼滅, 色想則離, 耳, 鼻, 舌, 身, 意滅, 法想則離. ↩︎
SĀ 211, translation with assistance from Charles Patton ↩︎
SĀ 211, Anālayo 2016 p.34 ↩︎
Anālayo 2016 p.34 n.64 ↩︎
Anālayo 2016 p.34 n.64 and Anālayo 2023 p.75 ↩︎
MĀ 86 at 562b ↩︎
Compare also Đức Thắng. ↩︎
See DDB under 六入: “[…] the six organs of sense producing sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch, and thought (or mental presentations). […] Also translated as 六處 and 六入處.” ↩︎
See DDB under 入處: “Senses: The realms of the activity of the sensory organs, of which there are six. The two words in this compound are, in this senses [sic.], synonyms that are not usually placed together.” ↩︎
AN 9.34 ↩︎
Ṭhānissaro 2019 p.6 ↩︎
Anālayo 2023 p.126 ↩︎
See SN 22.79: “It feels (vedeti), that is why it is called ‘feeling’ (vedanā).” ↩︎
See also Sujato 2024b n.877 on DN 15 at II 67: “Feeling is part of the fundamental structure of consciousness. This argument comes through more clearly in Pali, for the word for ‘feeling’ (vedanā) is derived from and still lies close to the sense of ‘knowing, experiencing’.” The argument in DN 15 is that there can be no self devoid of vedanā. This makes sense if vedanā includes all experience. For what self can there be that is devoid of experience? ↩︎
MN 140 at III 242 ↩︎
MN 43 at I 293 ↩︎
Font Clos p.27 ↩︎
Polak. While recognizing that vedayita includes all conscious experience, Polak still concludes there is some “sentience” outside of the aggregates. For this Polak presents no convincing evidence from the suttas, however, but instead resorts to “Buddhist psychology” and cognitive science. ↩︎
AN 6.63 ↩︎
DN 15 at II 61 ↩︎
SN 12.1 ↩︎
For example by Brahmāli n.96, who, however, also thinks parinibbāna is the more likely referent. ↩︎
See MN 43 at I 296, SN 41.6, and MĀ 210 at 789b. ↩︎
SN 35.232 ↩︎
SN 48.53 ↩︎
SN 12.19 ↩︎
SN 12.51 ↩︎
SF 159, parallel to SN 12.51; MĀ 162 at 692a, parallel to MN 140 ↩︎
Thanks Venerable.
Mine just a little less clear, perhaps 
Thanks Bhante