On not-self, existence, and ontological strategies

Essays
203

Note the presence of the word pain. So, dukkha. Not the clinging, grasping forms of dukkha, true, but painful sensations are a form of dukkha since the khandhas are still present in a living arahant.

SN21.2 I believe refers to the arising of sorrow, lamentation, etc. from the standpoint of Sariputta’s mind being free of all greed, anger, ignorance, and clinging, so no dukkha or distress in terms of reactivity in the mind or afflictive mental states. But I’m in no position to take a firm stand on Sariputta’s realization. :slightly_smiling_face:

And from SN22.86: Dukkhameva uppajjamānaṁ uppajjati, dukkhaṁ nirujjhamānaṁ nirujjhatī
What arises is only suffering arising, what ceases is only suffering ceasing.
This is how right view is defined. Ettāvatā kho, kaccāna, sammādiṭṭhi hoti.

Since all conditions are suffering (sabbe sankhāra dukkha) and SN56.11 “In brief, the five grasping aggregates are suffering” (pañcupādānakkhandhā dukkhā), and only the cessation/extinguishment of all this is the ending of all dukkha, how can the presence of the khandas while an arahant is still alive be utterly free of all dukkha, such as physical pain?
In fact, the presence of the khandhas themselves are a form of dukkha in the living arahant because “What arises is only suffering arising, what ceases is only suffering ceasing.”

Although there is no reacting with the “additional” dukkha of grasping, aversion, or other forms of reactivity, physical pain is a form of dukkha – even if it’s not experienced as me or mine by the arahant, because pain is conditional and final nibbāna is of course without conditions.

With respect and all best :pray:

204

Agree!
I’ve enjoyed, and benefited from, this site and appreciate the opportunity to meet and share Dhamma with people. :slightly_smiling_face:

Best wishes for your new thread – I’ll look forward to reading it.

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205

Ajahn Thanissaro has a collection of essays in a book called the Karma of Questions:

Five Piles of Bricks is where he discusses citta outside of time and space.

From what I gather, it is outside of time and space because time and space are bound up with the aggregates and inconstance. Another way to think about it is that if the deathless is not inconstant, then it is outside of time and space. You can’t have time or space without change.

References to quotes in his passage:
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an10/an10.081.than.html
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/study/khandha.html

206

The key is in the five grasping aggregates. Post awakening, it is no longer the five grasping aggregates, but just the aggregates. An Arahant is not free of physical pain. However, neither do they suffer. Otherwise the most expedient thing for an Arahant to do post awakening would be to jump off a cliff and die, or sit in meditative bliss and never get up.

It is in the four noble truths.

The third one is the end of suffering.
The fourth, the path to the end of suffering is the eightfold path. If death was a prerequisite for the end of suffering, presumably it would have been the nine-fold path. Follow the first eight, and then either die or stay in meditative absorption until death.

207

Well, some of this is about subtly different definitions of dukkha.

In either case, the Buddha, in the 4NTs directly speaks about the ending of rebirth as the complete cessation of dukkha. Meaning some dukkha remains when the aggregates are present.

From SN56.11 - Now this is the noble truth of the origin of suffering. It’s the craving that leads to future rebirth, mixed up with relishing and greed, taking pleasure in various different realms. That is, yāyaṁ taṇhā ponobbhavikā…
ponobbhavikā means rebirth

Whatever labels we choose to use, there is liberation while the khandas are still present, which includes whatever dukkha is intrinsically associated with them and the final liberation of last death-no rebirth, parinibbāna, extinguishment no cessation of all dukhha.

The “grasping khandas” were grasped in a prior life or existence – that’s why they’re experienced now. While an arahant no longer grasps them now, meaning there will be no further becoming or existence after death, the khandas are still present while the arahant is alive and physical pain is a form of dukkha.

The arahants are happy in their current liberation from the defilements and ignorance , enjoy their metta and compassion, and because they know that this is their last life – the last time they have to endure the khandas.
“This is my last birth; now there is no re-becoming” ayam antimā jāti, natthi dāni punabbhavo - MN 26

208

I think we will have to agree to disagree on this one. The highlighted portion is what I mean when I say that clinging (or craving if preferred) is suffering. An unawakened being is born moment to moment as the cling to various things and assimilates those things as self. The awakened being, in contrast stops being born at the moment of awakening in every sense of the word (moment to moment, and physical rebirth). The aggregates continue on for a while, only to separate at death and never come back together again.

209

The Buddha says that craving is a cause of suffering, and does not limit suffering to craving itself. Just as he explained in the first noble truth.

But sure, let’s agree to disagree. That’s fine and I offer my best wishes to you.

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210

I don’t think anybody would deny that the five aggregates are dukkha whether or not there is grasping in regards to them — all that arises is dukkha, and they are no exception. However, to suggest that the arahant suffers on account of them is to equate the arahant with the aggregates. Do you suffer when someone steps on random twigs that have nothing to do with you? When all craving/upādāna is given up, the arahant ceases to suffer because “the arahant” has stepped out / escaped from that which is suffering.

Throughout the suttas, the upādāna is consistently defined as the greed/lust/passion/clinging in regards to the five aggregates. Very rarely there may be a more broad usage, almost always likely a case of repetition or editing error, but we can’t say with certainty of course. See MN 109, SN 22.48, MN 44, MN 28, SN 22.22, etc.

Clearly then, sokaparidevadukkhadomanassupāyāsā are given up in the arahant who dwells free of anxiety on account of that, due to their non-identification and non-measuring in terms of the aggregates.

To measure the arahant in regards to that which is dukkha is to do exactly what they are free of. Likewise, to assume that the arahant is still born is to identify them with that which is born. However, as is evident from the above sampling of suttas (and many others in the same samyutta), as well as in SN 22.85, the arahant cannot be found in this very life because any reckoning of them in terms of the aggregates is mistaken. SN 5.10, SN 23.2, SN 1.20, etc. elaborate that a ‘sentient being’ is defined as the clinging/greed in regards to the aggregates, and that this no longer applies to the arahant; the definitions of jāti/jarāmarana specifically say they apply to sentient beings (see SN 12.2, DN 15, etc.). SN 1.9, Snp 5.16, MN 11, and MN 140 are some examples of more suttas that explicitly discuss how the arahant is free of death even in the present existence—and thus they have no yearning or anxiety—because that which dies does not apply to them.

There’s more concentrated discussion of this in the khandhasamyutta. Point being, this argument that the arahant suffers is based in a view of arahant=aggregates. This is not supported at all by the discourses.

With mettā

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211

Thanks.

Actually, agree with everything you wrote.
My point, perhaps not expressed very clearly, is that while the arahant cannot be found, is free of clinging and difilements, and does not suffer as non-arahants do, the rupa khandha is still present and “active” so the kaya will feel pain.

I can’t recall the exact sutta, but I’m sure you’ll know it – when the Buddha asked Sariputta to give a Dhamma talk beacuse he said there was back pain and he wanted to rest, for example.
Clearly, the Buddha was not disturbed beyond the sheer physical sensations and there was no clinging, aversion, ahamkara, etc.
So if we want to say there was no dukkha – fine.
If we agree the khandhas are active until parinibbana and kaya-pain is a form of discomfort and that is a form of dukkha, then that’s a way of seeing dukkha until full cessation.

212

Hello,

I agree with what you mentioned. However, there are related contents in the suttas which I cannot yet understand and reconcile - that of suicides of arahants. For example SN 35.87.

In this case, Channa appeared to be suffering and wanted to end his life, which he did, despite Ven Sariputta’s gentle reminder to him to contemplate on anatta. There were suggestions that by ending his life it could have relieved others from duties/agony by taking care of him, but that was not stated and could be assumptions.

Kind Regards.

213

SN 22.48 says there non-grasping khandha and grasping khandha.

214

There is a difference between “suffering” and being completely physically debilitated. Try to imagine, even today, when people are slowing dying of cancer, for example , a doctors must keep giving them increasing doses of morphine. Yet, in the Buddha’s time, it seems possible there was no such effective pain-killers.

“Gentle reminder” or “insult”? Channa gently reminded Venerable Sariputta:

Moreover, friend, for a long time the Teacher has been served by me in an agreeable way, not in a disagreeable way; for it is proper for a disciple to serve the Teacher in an agreeable way, not in a disagreeable way. Remember this, friend Sāriputta: the bhikkhu Channa will use the knife blamelessly.”

The Buddha then confirmed what Channa said to Sariputta; thus showing Sariputta was wrong to assume Channa was a puthujjana.

215

Channa is a pretty interesting character, Channo means to have a secret or cover something up, and SN35.87 (and MN144 the copy of the sutta in MN) suggests at the end that Channa was particularly friendly with certain householders.

mittakulāni suhajjakulāni upavajjakulānī this phrase is unique to the two copies of this sutta.

Channa is a much more popular figure in the Vinaya than the Nikayas;

Bu Ss 7 and Bu Ss 12 both feature him, first chopping down a sacred tree after a householder agrees to make a dwelling for him, and then for being difficult to correct.

Channa is then evasive at Bu Pc 12 and at Bu Pc 19 we learn that his “special friend” is a government official, and in addition to chopping down a sacred tree for the dwelling, it was also so big and the plaster so fancy that the roof collapsed!

next at Bu Pc 54 Channa is told off and just does the thing again to piss off the other monks!

next at Bu Pc 71 Channa refuses to follow a rule until he has heard it from an expert.

Anyway, Channa comes up too often to go through all his appearances in the Vinaya, however, the tldr backstory about it appears to be:

Channa was a shithead, who had a “special friendship” with a government official, chopped down a sacred tree in a grove to build a fancy house, acted like a politician about it, and eventually committed suicide.

SN35.87 asserts he was an arahant. He doesn’t sound like much of a human being, let alone an arahant.

I would not be basing my understanding of the profundities of the dhamma on him.

Metta.

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216

The above sounds unsubstantiated.

Btw, awesome post with the Vinaya references. I never knew of them. :pray:t2:

217

Tradition holds that these were different people who simply shared the name “Channa”:

https://www.palikanon.com/english/pali_names/c/channa.htm

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218

Ooh thanks for the link! Seems an odd thing for the tradition to hold tho doesn’t it? given the basic picture in Vin is of a Channa with a “special friend” and the Sutta raises the “special friend”?

Also as usual Buddhaghosa is fantastically creative in giving us the idea that it was after he slit his throat but before he actually died that he awakened, hence capable of both having “special friends” and the Buddha endorsing his arahantship.

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219

The above sounds unsubstantiated.

220

When someone lays down this body and takes up another body, I call them ‘blameworthy’.
Yo kho, sāriputta, tañca kāyaṁ nikkhipati, aññañca kāyaṁ upādiyati, tamahaṁ saupavajjoti vadāmi.
But the mendicant Channa did no such thing.
Taṁ channassa bhikkhuno natthi.

You should remember this: ‘The mendicant Channa slit his wrists blamelessly.’”
‘Anupavajjaṁ channena bhikkhunā satthaṁ āharitan’ti—
evametaṁ, sāriputta, dhārehī”ti.

Are you saying the above does not imply arahanthood?

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221

To me, it says nothing more than Channa passed away without attachment (upādiyati).

upādiyati

to take hold of, to grasp, cling to, show attachment (to the world), cp. upādāna

Surely, a stream-enterer can pass away without attachment; even though the underlying tendencies of the stream-enterer are not yet uprooted. SN 22.22 has a similar teaching:

“The five aggregates are indeed burdens,
“Bhārā have pañcakkhandhā,
and the person is the bearer of the burden.
bhārahāro ca puggalo;
Picking up the burden is suffering in the world,
Bhārādānaṁ dukhaṁ loke,
and putting the burden down is happiness.
bhāranikkhepanaṁ sukhaṁ.

When the heavy burden is put down
Nikkhipitvā garuṁ bhāraṁ,
without picking up another,
aññaṁ bhāraṁ anādiya;

SN 22.22

anādiyanta
negative adjective

  1. takes, accepts, receives; takes up, undertakes; appropriates; seizes, grasps

Note: the word “kaya” does not literally mean “physical body” or “rupa”. I recall there was a topic about this, here: 'Kāya' and 'body' in context. It seems a ‘kaya’ can be any ‘group’ of aggregates, including mere mental ideas. Thus, when SN 35.87 says Channa did not attach to another ‘kaya’, it could simply mean Channa pass away without wishing for rebirth in heaven or some other type of mental attachment. Personally, I don’t read the sutta saying the Buddha said Channa was not ‘reincarnated’ into a new physical body again. But I could be wrong. :saluting_face:

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222

Not particularly, considering that the “naughty” Channa was alive at the Parinibbana and the “suicidal” Channa died before the Buddha.

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