SN 22.81 and the distinctly buddhist teachings found in it

[Dhabba]

Hello @Sunyo! I’m really grateful and glad we can continue the discussion.

I choose to respond to you in this thread of my mine instead. That way the line of reasoning becomes even clearer, not only for you but maybe also for others reading it.

@Sunyo

Anyway, I came back to give a further source I just stumbled upon, just for reference. Analayo wrote in The Signless and the Deathless:

“It might not be, and it might not be for me.

It will not be, and it will not be for me!”

[…] The dictum given in the above form apparently presents a reformulation of an aspiration employed by some ancient Indian practitioners who […] seem to pertain to the category of annihilationists […]. The decisive difference, compared to the dictum in the above instruction, is that the annihilationist version reads “I might not be” and “I will not be.” From a Buddhist perspective, there is no self in the first place that needs to be annihilated, therefore what should be annihilated is much rather clinging to self-notions. The successful completion of such annihilation with full awakening also does not require waiting for the time of one’s death. Hence, in the Buddhist version of the dictum, the “I” is dropped and the aspiration becomes simply “it might not be” and “it will not be,” […].

Context is everything, when the Buddha uses the altered annihilationism formula in SN22.55 and changes the
”I to ”It” - “‘It might not be, and it might not be mine. It will not be, and it will not be mine.’
this is solely for teaching how to NOT regard the five aggregates as self, right? Other wrong views are still bound to show up even when adhering to this 100%, which is very evident in SN 22.81

The Buddha even praises outsiders with the same type of ”annihilationism” formula in AN 10.29 (This time with I and not It) just like in SN 22.81:

”This is the best of the convictions of outsiders, that is: ‘I might not be, and it might not be mine. I will not be, and it will not be mine.’ When someone has such a view, you can expect that they will be repulsed by continued existence, and they will not be repulsed by the cessation of continued existence.

But when adressing those already on the buddhist path in SN 22.81 who already do not regard the five aggreagates as self the Buddha is using the same annihilationism formula once again as in AN 10.29 but in a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT context and how this type of reasoning, given the context, it is actually a wrong view that needs to be given up.

@Sunyo

Either way we interpret SN22.81 (and on further thought I prefer the second), it doesn’t support your reading of it. The view called ‘annihilationism’ just isn’t described as the cessation of the self-less, I-less aggregates: it’s described as the cessation of an ‘I’ in “I will not be”. If annihilationism instead meant the cessation of mere aggregates and not of an ‘I’, it should say something like “consciousness will not be” or “it will not be”.

You do actually understand the context/interpretation of SN 22.81 perfectly, eventhough you say my reading of it is has no support when it comes to annihilationism
but your answer is in reality ”my” view too!

Because you wrote the following yourself when replying:

@Sunyo

So some eternalists do not regard the five aggregates as a self but still imagine an eternal self in something else. Similarly, some annihilationists see an annihilated “I” or self in something else than the five aggregates:

Since you yourself do not regard the five aggregates as self, in your view the ”I” or self can only cease to be thanks to something else than the five aggregates….
Nibbāna?

The difference between the eternalists in SN 22.81 and your current view is the following: They do not regard the five aggregates as self but still imagine an eternal self in something else (Nibbāna), just like them you also do not regard the five aggregates as self and see an already non-existent “I” or self finally coming to a permanent end in something else than the five aggregates - Nibbāna.

Given the context of SN 22.81, isn’t this EXACTLY your point of view that the Buddha describes? A view the Buddha says one should give up by saying:

Perhaps they don’t regard form or feeling or perception or choices or consciousness as self. Nor do they have such a view: ‘The self and the cosmos are one and the same. After passing away I will be permanent, everlasting, eternal, and imperishable.’ Still, they have such a view: ‘I might not be, and it might not be mine. I will not be, and it will not be mine.’ But that annihilationist view is just a conditioned phenomenon.

@Sunyo

This point is actually addressed in the Yamaka Sutta (SN22.85), which is relevant because it is all about the wrong view of annihilationism. It asks Yamaka if he thinks there is actually an annihilated “Tathagata” (referring to a self) outside of the five aggregates. Yamaka says no and in the end rightly concludes that what happens at the death of an arahant is the just cessation of the five aggregates.

Why would Yamaka even have his harmful misconceptions in the first place if it weren’t for the fact that we, even to this day, have eternalism-buddhists, annihilationist-buddhists and plently of other wrong views being formulated as the absolute truth?
These various views are bound to spring up in the mind for ANY buddhist practioner, right?
We can’t really blame anyone irrespective of which wrong view it happens to be. So one should really be very humble and careful in explaining what Nibbāna is and is not, instead of thinking the current view one might have on the path is actually the one and only true one.

I would now like to ask the following regarding the already mentioned Yamakasutta SN 22.85:

And after hearing this teaching by Venerable Sāriputta, my mind is freed from the defilements by not grasping.”
Idañca pana me āyasmato sāriputtassa dhammadesanaṁ sutvā anupādāya āsavehi cittaṁ vimuttan”ti.

Is cittaṁ the same and identical to viññāṇaṁ?

Where is cittaṁ when you let go of saññā/viññāṇaṁ/saṅkhārā/vedanā?