Greetings Sylvester,
Hee, hee. !?!
I think you misunderstood my point. We are not refering to the micro level here; namely the sense-consciousness process, with its lots of form + sense (in our case mind base) = contact - but instead to the macro level, as in here (AN 9.43):
How could you touch these dimensions with your body?
Sure there is always a modicum (avasiṭṭha) of “body” present, as long as you live.
Let me give you a silly illustration of the latter - when you are jogging, you are “thinking” with your head and your feet, so to speak. But when you are purely thinking , you are not thinking with your feet anymore. Yet your feet are there. There is always this modicum of feet “in you”. Yet you don’t use that to think.
In this metaphor, citta is your head, and mano is your feet.
This is exactly what Bhuddistic Emptiness (Suññata) is all about - emptiness and the modicum - The active process on one side, and the emptiness and its modicum on the other.
In our case, we are confronted to the contradiction of having a kāyasakkhī sutta stating a rather full body involvement in the higher dimensions of the higher jhanas. Which would include mano, the kapellmeister.
However, in these dimensions, mano is gone (just an inactive modicum).
Enters back citta I.
We are back to using citta. But a citta I (a macro citta) - not the citta II (the micro citta, that involves the mental mano). A citta I, as in MN 44/SN 41.6 (see above posts - the “cosmological” citta, as you stated previously, when you agreed on the possibility of two different qualities of citta).
Yet a citta I that has been “actualized” through the sphere of senses. A higher citta I that “knows” now the Noble Truths. An appeased citta I with a token amount of saṅkhāra.
Because citta I, at inception, (coming from ignorance), was roaring with a huge saṅkhāra (viz. the desire to know).
But now, this citta knows the Noble Truths, and it is appeased. This citta I does not need mano anymore, to orchestrate phenomenas from the senses. For it knows.
Because there is a contradiction in AN 9.43 (without parallel) - because this sutta includes mano in citta I - I say “goodbye AN without SA parallels”. Because I have found along the years, that there are no contradiction in the Teaching, when you stick to the Nikayas with parallels in SA.
And I am betraying no school here. Just making things less schismatic, and less confounding.
[quote=“Sylvester, post:17, topic:4096”]
it appears that SA 936’s 身作證 would correspond to the Pali kāyena sacchikaroti. Why would that translate into the substantive noun “body witness” (kāyasakkhī)?
[/quote]So what you mean here, is to translate the Pali in Chinese, and retranslate the Chinese in the Pali? - in two different contextual suttas??.
Where do we stop the confusion here?
You have to remain in the above context.
身作證 in SA 936 does not have the same context than in AN 9.43 - might it be verbal or adnominal.
SA 936 is about liberation of mind, for instance; which in its practicality is the “bodily” awakening to the truth that there is no “I” - this is a micro level concretism. A bodily concretism.
The Chinese translator, in this case is right to include body (身-shēn) in the equation.
cetovimutti is a bodily processes; using mano.
You have to be more precise with your references. More contextual.
And may I ask you to be be kind enough to use the fabulous utility provided by suttacentral, that allows to underline even a specific sentence in a all text. That would be swell.
We should not rely too much on the Chinese as a proof of what the Pali or Sanskrit might have wanted to convey. Does Bhikkhu Bodhi’s translation of pañña by “wisdom”, make it a definitive proof that pañña means wisdom? That would be responsively silly.
And it is certainly not because Guṇabhadra translated it as 智 zhì or 智慧 zhìhuì (wisdom,) that it makes a definite proof of it.
Moreover, 智 zhì having the connotation of “knowing;” Thanissaro is much more closer with his “discernment”, when it comes to translating pañña. Much more accurate and fine. Particularly within the context of the early Nikayas, and especially in the sutra-aṅga part.
Sorry to say, but you are adding confusion; not clearness to the discussion.
Translation, (as well as written transmission of oral knowledge,) will always remain interpretative.
We should not rely too much on the grammar either; to the point of being some “alt-write”. As Sujato rightly once said: [quote=“sujato, post:52, topic:3714”](there is a) problem with relying overly on grammar. Grammar is a blunt instrument. … The sense is determined rather by syntax and context.[/quote]
So, let’s stick with the context; and wonder why there are these contextual contradictions on which we could spend eons arguing.
Mudita.
Late edit of some significance:
Two celestial planes of existence of the rupa-loka, that correspond to the the second and third jhana, are respectively called appamanabha and appamanasubha. This is where you end up, if you die having attained one of these Jhanas. You become an appamanabha or an appamanasubha.
Strangely enough, there is already an “insignificant” (appa) amount of mano in both. How much less, should one have, when one reaches the arupa-loka?
Nada, I suppose. Or barely a tiny tiny modicum, just for life sake.
My take. For I am not really sure that appamana means “an insignificant amount of mano”. But if it does, it would be just one more proof of what’s been said above.
No active mano - no active body.
Also (as a somewhat summary):
Kāya uses the six senses; including mano that is mental.
Sāmisā (carnal) is concerned with only five senses; excluding mano.
Mano being a low-level (micro) mental instrument, so to speak - part of citta II.
Also, properly speaking, body should not involve cetasika; at least when it comes to feelings (cetasika vedanā). As per SN 36.6 and its strict parallel on the subject (SA 470).
The “micro” feeling born of contact (the clinging-feeling that is vedanā nidāna - and not the “macro” feeling that is in saṇkhāra nidāna,) involves mental mano, and indeed the all mental citta II (cetasika), which includes mano.
In the configuration of an instructed noble disciple, citta I is transcending citta II (the cetasika phenomena). The mental, higher nature of citta I, is dropping out the mano part of citta I, as well as the cetasika part of citta I.
The instructed noble disciple feels a body feeling; and not a debased citta I feeling.
All this to say that body should involve (mental) mano, but not the (mental) citta part (cetasika) of citta I.
Makes sense?
