Parinibbāyati achieved during life and not at the end of life and break up of the body

[NgXinZhao]

@Green

It is no quality at all to become a living zombi or some automaton.

A philosophical zombie is one recent thought experiment by philosophers to think that could there be a person who only behave externally as if they are conscious and have a mind, but actually inside, there’s no consciousness at all? Since we can have the intuition that this mindless zombie, which from the outside cannot be distinguished from a person with consciousness is nevertheless totally different is used to debunk behavior materialism, that is the mind is what is seen from behavior or some other kind of materialism.

By jumping to this when I say there’s no self, but there’s only mind and matter, it seems that you are equating very strongly to self = mind. When I said no self, I do not mean no mind. I do not mean the philosophical zombie above. Feelings, perception, volition, consciousness are there, they are not denied to exist, they are just not to be seen as a self.

The awakened ones would say living in a way without a sense of self is much more liberating and happy compared to having to lug the baggage of self conception along.

@knigarian

Your suffering is just conventional reality, ultimately there is no such thing as suffering

It’s a whole other debate about usage of the conventional vs ultimate truth, I still find it very useful and it fits in many suttas. Like arahants can use the term “self” without misunderstanding it. I am pretty sure that conventional truth vs ultimate truth doesn’t say that suffering is only conventional, since the 4 noble truths are impersonal, they are the language of ultimate truth as well. Thus the words of the Buddha, it is only suffering that arises and ceases, (implying no self, no one there).

@yeshe.tenley

Yes, I’m aware. Thank you. I don’t think that sutta says anything about the death of an enlightened being.

I just read the sutta in the Pali before I see this topic, just nice.

@NgXinZhao

“Now what, bhikkhus, is the Nibbāna-element with no residue left? Here a bhikkhu is an arahant … completely released through final knowledge. For him, here in this very life, all that is experienced, not being delighted in, will be extinguished. That, bhikkhus, is called the Nibbāna-element with no residue left.

For them, everything that’s felt, being no longer relished, will become cool right here.
Tassa idheva, bhikkhave, sabbavedayitāni anabhinanditāni sīti bhavissanti.

I think the key is will become cool. It means not in the present life, but is a future tense, and the Pali verb supports it. So it means after death, everything becomes cooled. “Right here” I think it means the realization that there will be no more future life is known right in this life. Seeing the difference between the two as well, there’s no mention of the 5 sense faculties (why not 6? I dunno) for the Nibbāna element without remainder. It strongly suggests that without remainder is not within the time of living for the arahant.

@yeshe.tenley

If you believe mind and matter are interdependent, then I’m not sure how you could say that conservation of matter/energy doesn’t apply in some fashion to mind as well.

Not every law which governs matter needs to govern the mind as well. Eg. location is not a property of the mind. Also, the cessation of perception and feeling is basically no mind, just body left, as well as the Brahma realm of non-percipient being shows that mind can totally cease and the body is still there.

I would be critical of people using the term energy to describe what a mind is and then use the physics law of conservation of energy to somehow show that rebirth is there. First of all, to show conservation, we need a way to quantify what is mental energy, how is it transferred between chemical energy, mental energy and heat and so on. As well as this blocks the notion of Nibbana as total cessation, ending of rebirth. If mind must go on, rebirth must exist, if mind cannot not go on, rebirth cannot end.

[Green]

@Sunyo

Also AN4.23: “From the night when the Realized One understands the supreme perfect awakening until the night he becomes fully extinguished—in the element of extinguishment with nothing left over—everything he speaks, says, and expresses is real, not otherwise.”

Do we talk about an extinguishing fire as a fire coming fully extinguished in the element of extinguishment without nothing remaining?

It is like the sutta’s do not want to say that all ceases without anything remaing making such a weird and complex statement about a mere cessation at death.

[Green]

@yeshe.tenley

The word normal means “typical or expected” and in this sense, yes, ignorance is expected. However, this does not mean that ignorance is necessary or advantageous. Precisely the opposite. Luckily, there is an escape from this situation rooted in ignorance.

Ignorance is not necessary for survival or happiness. Ignorance is the enemy of happiness and giving up ignorance is the way to true happiness.

Hi there,

It is conceivable that in the past there might have been a sentient being or specie, maybe human like, be born without me and mine making architecture of the mind. The reason we do not see this specie living now is because it was not equiped for life on Earth. As a specie it died out. Humans with a sense of me, mine, my self survived. They had the necessary mental architecture for living on Earth. It is merely a condition for survival, in my opinion. Oke, this is no spiritual perspective, but i cannot ignore it. I feel this is truthful.

In practice me and mine-making prevents a lot of suffering, harm, misery. I know it is me who will reap the results of deeds. So, i abandon uwholesome deeds, etc.

I also do not think there is really a person on Earth who has not me and mine making at all. I also do not see this absent in the Buddha i destillate from the sutta’s. He also conceived that he would reap results of deeds. I also believe that this sense of self is not wrong. Even is this self is not an atta, it remains true that one will reap the results of deeds in a personal way and one also attains liberation in a personal way, according the sutta’s. Even when we would be some kind of stream of vinnana’, which i feel is mere a limited perspective, even then it is wise and not ignorant to think about this stream as me and mine. It is foolish to see it totally as not me and not mine. A sense of self is very normal and advantageous. It prevents a lot of suffering.

In practice all beings, even a Buddha, live protecting the body and mind from harm. This implies a sense of self and me and mine making. Mere impersonal processes will not do this. Why would an impersonal feeling, sense moment, formation even care for welbeing or uprooting ignorance? All suffering and cessation of suffering is based upon a sense of a self, and me and mine making.

So, now i have figured it all out

[NgXinZhao]

@Green

In practice me and mine-making prevents a lot of suffering, harm, misery. I know it is me who will reap the results of deeds. So, i abandon uwholesome deeds, etc.

In morality usage, the concept of conventional self is used and shouldn’t be simply abandoned for those who might think the wrong view that since there’s no self, there’s no one to bear kamma.

From the perspective of ultimate truth of no self, the kamma is done via the volitional formations, the other 4 aggregates are the recipients of the results of past kamma. In this way it can be seen that morality and the notion of no self doesn’t have to be contradictory, it just is not the usual way people see things, so to beginners, just using conventional self as a useful concept for them to be established in morality is the usual approach. Until they dig deeper and discover the perspective of ultimate truth and how morality can work without self.

For the enlightened ones, there being realized that there is no self to protect, there is no cause for aversion or hate, realized that there is no self to hoard after plesant feelings, there’s no cause for greed and lust to arise. Thus the roots of evil are gone, and their morality is pure, without needing a sense of self to maintain.

The enlightened ones (according to classical theravada) from arahant onwards do not make new kamma. So they only reap past kamma. Since volition is kamma and ignorance is the cause for volition, the arahants having eradicated ignorance is incapable of creating new kamma. Whatever they do, it cannot be evil as the roots of evil are eradicated for them; but whatever good they do like teaching the dhamma, it doesn’t bear any good result for them (other than the conventional cause and effect of them possibly getting famous).

EBT perspective, from Bhante Aggacitta, he would regard arahant can still do kamma, just that the results of it doesn’t go beyond this life. Like they eat, and thus their body is prolonged in the state of living.

There’s a sutta which shows the Buddha lean his body away from a yakkha with needle skin, which the yakkha asked: AN10.3

Then Spiky went up to the Buddha and leaned up against his body, but the Buddha pulled away.

Then Spiky said to the Buddha, “Are you afraid, ascetic?”

“No, sir, I’m not afraid. But your touch is nasty.”

From this it can be seen that the Buddha even without a sense of self is able to choose to avoid needless physical suffering. So arahants are not helpless even against physical suffering, and having removed all sense of self, they are freed from mental suffering. It is actually the sense of self which causes suffering, and the perspective from evolution point of view that it prevents suffering is one of the many delusions to overcome, and makes the Buddha’s dhamma so hard to understand for worldly beings.

Robert Wright in his Buddhism and Modern Psychology course said that evolution is designed to propagate genes, it doesn’t optimize for the happiness of the individuals. The Dhamma is going against the stream of the world, for seeing that there’s actually a better way than to submit to the law of biology, evolution, etc and to end it all, ending all conditionalities, ending all suffering.

[knigarian]

@NgXinZhao

Thus the words of the Buddha, it is only suffering that arises and ceases, (implying no self, no one there).

Suttas say that Tathagata is not to be found even now and here, this is perhaps what you mean. If so that’s fine, I have no any objections. You seem to understand that

"The reason why the Tathāgata is not to be found (even here and now) is that he is rūpa-, vedanā-, saññā-, sankhāra-, and viññāna-sankhāya vimutto (ibid. 1 <S.iv,378-9>), i.e. free from reckoning as matter, feeling, perception, determinations, or consciousness.

But if you understand that, you should understand that puttujhana, in this sense, actually and in truth is to be found."

The difference is in upādāna. And now the very being of puthujjana - with upādāna as condition bhava - is a state of dhukkha, it is the first noble truth. Notion of selfhood, which is ignorance on reflexive level and conceit “I am” are dependent on ignorance. But if we can consider that the state of arahat = true health, subjectivity, belief that one is a person living in the world is a serious mental sickness.

Introduction dialectic of conventional / ultimate reality implicates that ultimately sickness doesn’t exist, and it may mean that it is proposed by one who misunderstood the treatment prescribed by the Lord Buddha, who not fully comprehended and understood that nibbana is cessation of being now and here - that is the third noble truth.

But since you seem to be satisfied with your present understanding and its verbal descriptions, that’s fine. There is no need to continue this exchange and waste our time just enough to notice certain disagreement.

[Green]

@NgXinZhao

Feelings, perception, volition, consciousness are there, they are not denied to exist, they are just not to be seen as a self.

I know, they are said to be seen as a stream of mere impersonal processes. I do not believe this happens. I do not believe this is the implication or result of not being attached. Not being attached means that one is fully personal, authentic, sensitive, warm-hearted. Impersonal processes are cold.

[NgXinZhao]

@Green

Impersonal processes are cold.

It’s all impersonal anyway, but cold is opposite of metta, and the other 3 Brahma vihara.

And the arahants are able to exhibit these qualities without need for a sense of self.

I think perhaps there are some mental concepts to break down.

1. Cold means no love, but
2. Love doesn’t always need attachment.
3. Love is actually loving kindness plus attachment.
4. The attachment part needs a sense of self to exist, but,
5. Loving kindness, metta doesn’t need a sense of self to be exhibited.

Thus, the end product of ending all sense of self, attachment (all which are also impersonal processes) doesn’t entail being cold, but it entails eliminating the suffering part of the equation in conventional love, to transform love into pure loving kindness, love without conditionality.

If one finds one’s own practice is going towards coldness, it could be a sign of numbness of emotions, or lacking mindfulness of feelings, and practicing equanimity the wrong way.

[NgXinZhao]

@knigarian

But if you understand that, you should understand that puttujhana, in this sense, actually and in truth is to be found."

The difference is in upādāna. And now the very being of puthujjana - with upādāna as condition bhava - is a state of dhukkha, it is the first noble truth.

Since you’re generous with my understanding, I shall attempt to do the same for yours as well.

My first impulse is that there’s no self even for the non-enlightened ones. But then I see that you mean bhava, existence, or becoming, which is also not self. Thus I get what you mean. Indeed, ending of craving, clinging, thus becoming is done for the arahants, but not before. Ultimate truth at least according to Abhidhamma usage is aimed at trying to frame the dhamma without needing to use the term of self, so the terms of the dependent originations are indeed useful and valid still in ultimate truth level. Ultimate truth in Mahayana is another thing, I usually mean ultimate truth in the Theravada sense.

[Green]

@NgXinZhao

In morality usage, the concept of conventional self is used and shouldn’t be simply abandoned for those who might think the wrong view that since there’s no self, there’s no one to bear kamma.

The sutta’s also teach that one must develop and get trapped in ideas that there is no self. I feel this is very wise.

The sutta’s also teach that the Buddha was concerned that starting to teach would come with a burden for him. I feel this clearly shows that an awakened one also still conceives a future me who will reap results of deeds.

I do accept that pure morals do not relie on a sense of ego and cannot be habitual too, but are rooted in the deathless, the empty nature of the mind, detachment. Its most natural expression is pure moral. Immorality is never the natural expression of the mind. It is always the expression of adventitious defilements ruling the mind.

@NgXinZhao

The Dhamma is going against the stream of the world, for seeing that there’s actually a better way than to submit to the law of biology, evolution, etc and to end it all, ending all conditionalities, ending all suffering.

If this really means that the Dhamma is in the world to erase all lifestreams, to bring them all to an end without anything remaining, i cannot help but to feel it is evil. It is such an extreme. It implies that Buddha taught…it is better to cease totally without anything remaining then to feel, see, sense, perceive, live, exist.

My heart does not accept this. Not as some goal of a holy life, nor as what Buddha taught. Maybe that last is wishful thinking, but i am not gonna take refuge in a teacher and teaching that delights in a mere cessation because life comes with suffering. It also comes with a lot of other things too. Life is a mystery, that is just the truth. That life is a mystery is not some romantic idea. What do we really know about life? We do not even know rebirth exist. We do not know even know how kamma works. Often we only pretent knowledge. Almost always.

Oke, see me as a beginner, as someone with a strong sense of self. So deluded that the poor guy cannot delight in the cessation of mere impersonal processes. I am oke with that. But i can only advice that it is not possible to convince me that aiming at mere cessation is a holy goal or represent a holy life. For me it represents ultimate ego-centrism. I am sorry, but i cannot even imagine that some peope can really think or believe that aiming at a mere cessation without anything remaining can be a goal of the holy life. For me this feels so absurd. If this means that i am 100% deluded and are Buddha’s greatest fool, well, so be it. Let me be that fool.

[Green]

@NgXinZhao

If one finds one’s own practice is going towards coldness, it could be a sign of numbness of emotions, or lacking mindfulness of feelings, and practicing equanimity the wrong way.

Thanks, but what do you feel is the ground, the basis, the foundation of the arahants metta?

[yeshe.tenley]

@Green

I also do not think there is really a person on Earth who has not me and mine making at all. I also do not see this absent in the Buddha i destillate from the sutta’s.

Perhaps your view is too narrow then? There is a jataka tale of the prince and the hungry tiger. Are you aware of it? Do you believe it is possible to generate such an expansive mind where the distinction of “I” and “mine” breaks down to such an extent that one cares for others as oneself?

Some humans have been known to exhibit such selflessness as to sacrifice their lives for the sake of others. To hold others as precious as they do themself. In such a mind don’t you think the “I” and “mine” making has broken down?

[Green]

@yeshe.tenley

Some humans have been known to exhibit such selflessness as to sacrifice their lives for the sake of others. To hold others as precious as they do themself. In such a mind don’t you think the “I” and “mine” making has broken down?

Yes, but this is also just a moment. I recognise such moments myself too. Maybe we all do. Probably not so extreme as giving our life but still we as humans are capable of selfless deeds in a way we do not even think about our own welbeing (something the sutta-Buddha does not advice).

It does not mean that one is always selfless and without me and mine making and is not capable of doing egocentric deeds, right? So your example cannot ne considered as something that undermines what i said.

It is also possible you idealize the Buddha, Yeshe. Make some imaginairy superhero of him. A Mythical Person? But what do we really know about the Buddha? I feel it is only the path of honesty, sincerity, integer, uprightness to admit that there is a lot of uncertainty, a lot of personal guessing, wishing, desiring, hoping, going on in our minds regarding our ideas of what or who the Buddha was/is.

The path of the sincere is not about the Buddha but about ourselves. What is our life? How do we suffer? How do we live. What do we feel as the goal of our life? What choices we make. What is going on in our lives?

The Buddha can be said to be a buddhist because once in a former life he took refuge in a Buddha. I feel this is also probably legend. Probably he was just a (special) human, but just like you and me, finding himself in a world of uncertainty, lacking a sense of protection, safety, home. A person just like almost all humans in inner conflict, in crises, awakened to the truth of suffering. That can have such a deep impact. I believe it had a deep impact on the Buddha. He sought an escape out of this inner distrust, this inner crises, this lack of feeling safe and grounded, this looseness.

But what do we know about all this? Nothing for sure. i think we rely on ideas, pictures, ideals, conceivings, hopes and wishes etc. But i do not see it as my task to be a good buddhist.

[Jasudho]

@yeshe.tenley

This is another sutta which I don’t understand and have no explanation for.

Also MN 140:
“He understands: ‘On the dissolution of the body, with the ending of life, all that is felt, not being delighted in, will become cool right here.’ Bhikkhu, just as an oil-lamp burns in dependence on oil and a wick, and when the oil and wick are used up, if it does not get any more fuel, it is extinguished from lack of fuel;…”

[yeshe.tenley]

MN 140 does not seem problematic to conceptual understanding to my very finite mind in the way AN 4.23 does which Venerable helpfully pointed out. My best feeble guess at this point is that the term means different things in different contexts much as paranibbana does in this thread?

[Green]

@Jasudho

Also MN 140:
“He understands: ‘On the dissolution of the body, with the ending of life, all that is felt, not being delighted in, will become cool right here.’ Bhikkhu, just as an oil-lamp burns in dependence on oil and a wick, and when the oil and wick are used up, if it does not get any more fuel, it is extinguished from lack of fuel;…”

Yes, it becomes cool…that seems to imply…no mere cessation.
What remains is coolness and all agitation (fire like) is gone

Now i have figured it all out.

[Jasudho]

Hi,

MN140 was cited because you said that to “become cool” applied to the Buddha’s awakening and not to death. The sutta doesn’t support this view.

But, as we have shared, context does matter and so parinibbāna is in fact used in different ways in the suttas, sometimes to the extinguishment of greed, anger, and ignorance – probably the most common “description” of nibbāna in the suttas along with the phrases about the ending of rebirth, and to the final death without rebirth of an arahant.

[Green]

@yeshe.tenley

Some humans have been known to exhibit such selflessness as to sacrifice their lives for the sake of others. To hold others as precious as they do themself. In such a mind don’t you think the “I” and “mine” making has broken down?

Is it so difficult to understand that a child that does not learn to see body and mind as me, mine and develops no sense of self at all regarding body, feelings, will, emotions, needs etc. is all but enlightend. She/he is in the hospital all the time. His/her life is just complete chaos. It is not ahealthy situation at all.

Do you know, believe, think that the instincts that protect the body arise with a sense of self as necessary condition?

[Jasudho]

@Jasudho

with the ending of life, all that is felt [ sabbavedayitāni], not being delighted in, will become cool right here

" sabbavedayitāni" can point not just to feeling but to all experience. So the line points to the cooling, cessation, of all experience.

@Green

it becomes cool…that seems to imply…no mere cessation.

But all experience would include experiencing

@Green

What remains is coolness and all agitation (fire like) is gone

So the sutta says all feeling/experience ends: "it is extinguished from lack of fuel;…” but you say that experience of coolness and no-agitation remains.

[yeshe.tenley]

@Jasudho

MN140 was cited because you said that to “become cool” applied to the Buddha’s awakening and not to death. The sutta doesn’t support this view.

The adjective sīti is indeed used in the way you describe, but it is also used to describe the state of extinguishment in this very life through not grasping as in AN 10.29:

Though I state and assert this, certain ascetics and brahmins misrepresent me with the false, hollow, lying, untruthful claim:
Evaṁvādiṁ kho maṁ, bhikkhave, evamakkhāyiṁ eke samaṇabrāhmaṇā asatā tucchā musā abhūtena abbhācikkhanti:
‘The ascetic Gotama doesn’t advocate the complete understanding of sensual pleasures, forms, or feelings.’
‘samaṇo gotamo na kāmānaṁ pariññaṁ paññāpeti, na rūpānaṁ pariññaṁ paññāpeti, na vedanānaṁ pariññaṁ paññāpetī’ti.
But I do advocate the complete understanding of sensual pleasures, forms, and feelings. And I advocate complete extinguishment by not grasping in this very life, wishless, extinguished, and cooled.”
Kāmānañcāhaṁ, bhikkhave, pariññaṁ paññāpemi, rūpānañca pariññaṁ paññāpemi, vedanānañca pariññaṁ paññāpemi, diṭṭheva dhamme nicchāto nibbuto sītibhūto anupādā parinibbānaṁ paññāpemī”ti.

Yes, context does matter and it appears this language is also figurative and not always literally referring to the cooling of the body upon physical death. It does so refer in MN 140, but not in AN 10.29 above.

[yeshe.tenley]

@Green

It is also possible you idealize the Buddha, Yeshe. Make some imaginairy superhero of him. A Mythical Person? But what do we really know about the Buddha? I feel it is only the path of honesty, sincerity, integer, uprightness to admit that there is a lot of uncertainty, a lot of personal guessing, wishing, desiring, hoping, going on in our minds regarding our ideas of what or who the Buddha was/is.

Yes, I no doubt regard the Teacher as a spiritual superhero and one I greatly admire and lookup to. Also, I do have doubt and uncertainty and I try my best to admit as such when I am uncertain. I also have faith in the Buddhas, the Dhamma, and the Sangha as refuge and wish to cultivate this faith. It is strengthened by experience practicing and taking the advice given by the Teacher and the Sangha and thus I have some confidence that what they point to is true and accomplishable.

The majority of my doubt is in my own ability to follow the footsteps of my spiritual heroes. I try not to let this doubt dissuade me or unduly influence me however. I’ve never met the Teacher, but I have met many a fellow disciple who embody the dhamma far better than I and practice selflessness to an almost incomprehensible degree compared to my meager attempts. They tell me that I too can develop and cultivate such a mind through gradual and sincere practice. I strive to not waste this precious advice, but to actualize it.

However, this is getting off topic. If you wish to discuss more hero worship and the limits of what is practically accomplishable or who the Teacher was versus myth, I’d please kindly ask that you open a new topic. Thank you.