SuttaCentral
Nibbana is the great goal of Buddhism.
Although there are many hints, what it really ‘is’ cannot be described by the conditioned world.
So, surely, the role of faith or saddhā is of tremendous importance here. Trusting and believing that the goal is worth the journey is a major component of practice. In fact, doubt is one of the first 3 fetters.
A very common case involves those who mistake the aggregates as a group for the self; maybe this is even the most common case? If you believe the aggregates exist in a way that a self does not, then it is easy to see how the view forms that the aggregates taken as a group are the self. 
In the Pali suttas, it is frequently stated that the 5 aggregates should not be taken as self, me, or mine.
It is, however, the reflexive and natural point of view.
‘These are my thoughts’, ‘that’s my leg’.
So the Dhamma can seem quite counterintuitive.
A rational and mindful approach of mind is stated in DN22. It is to have an eye for how mind can feel very different from moment to moment or day to day. It can be felt as extremely contracted or as open as the sky; rigid or flexible, freed and unfreed, supreme and not supreme, expansive, non-expensive etc (DN22)
This describes states of mind. Those can rapidly change.
These states of mind, they arise and cease, day in day out. It depends on what defilement come flowing (AN1.51) in the mind. A worried mind feels very different from a mind without worries.
The mind with hate really becomes very narrow, restricted, heavily burdened. The same with greed and delusion. Like defilement they coarsen the mind. These mind states are mentally felt, as it were, and often also bodily ofcourse in bodily tension etc.
But what happens when there is no greed at all, no hate at all, no delusion at all incoming?
Is that pure mind still felt like the angry mind can be felt, or the jalous mind etc?
Is it really an aggregation?
Is this pure mind, mind without limits (AN10.81), still a state of mind that can be seen coming and going
I do believe there’s a sutta that says when any one of the aggregates is taken up, all are. I can’t remember where, except that it’s likely in the SN. I think some of the difference you are pointing to goes back to the language thing we just began to touch upon. It’s one thing to just say “that’s my leg,” it’s another thing to embrace that leg as an essential part constituting the whole marvelous me, you or whoever.
We see this type of identification occurring all over the place. In many different ways. As well, just as an FYI on the topic of medieval POV, there was a belief that an ugly person was ugly by virtue, and a beautiful person was beautiful by virtue. Even today, we see a witch with a big warty nose, she’s bad. That’s all there is to it. The evil music plays, the villain in black twitching his moustache comes out. You know it. He’s bad. The blond super hero with the golden aura and wings descends from the heavens. Oh swoon. Rescued!
I’m pretty sure if I lost my leg, I would be in for some kind of rehab making sure to ease whatever adjustments were necessary. This stuff is called trauma for a reason.
For the most part, for mostly everybody, the idea that one’s body parts can be regarded like random twigs and leaves on the periphery of one’s awareness, with zero sense of appropriation, as the Buddha instructs, is inconceivable.
It’s very hard to confront such things, and figure out how to ‘practice’ them. So it’s not surprising that so much of Buddhist chat lists are devoted to higher jhanas, what may happen is other planes of existence, whether things are really real, and various other things that have nothing to do with one’s situation in the here and now.
Lol Stephen, I recognize that you’re being 100% serious and I hear your concerns, but sometimes humour can ease the way …
I do not doubt that Nibbana is worth the journey but for me this has nothing to do with striving for a mere cessation without anything remaining.
Indeed, but it is also quit obvious that one must not take this to extreme and not treat sickness, not use medicine, and have no concern for the body at all while alive. That will surely not end suffering.
I Agree 
Yes, and then i lived a moral life and as a results i am reborn in a heaven surrounded by most beautiful deva’s who are really loving to bring me a good time 
or i have great powers, the power to rule etc.
My God…like life is really all about humans and their needs. Why is heaven and hell not described from the perspective of a cow or a swan or an eel. For an eel a swamp with death decaying and stinking bodies is heaven.
I am not sure what you mean a by “which some buddhist also see as something temporary,” can you further elaborate. In Theravada, Arahant is highest attainment. Arahant attains Nibbana which is asankhata.
In short, there is the interpretation that there are only formations and temporary states. Only a constructed reality. There is nothing that escapes construction, aggregation, they teach.
Also the arahant still suffers pains, weakness, illness, discomfort of an old body etc. Although it is said that this does not really burden the arahant mentally, due to the bodily suffering, arahanthood is not considered the total cessation of suffering.
That will never be felt, experienced, perceived, known by anyone. But that total cessation of suffering refers to the cessation of the state of a living arahant. That special mindstream without lobha, dosa and moha arising in it. When also that mindstream ends, extinguished like a fire that is not fed anymore by oxigen and wood, without any possibility to arise again, THAT is seen as the full, complete, definitive end of suffering…a mere cessation without anything remaining.
Not all people believe that this interpretation is right 
You are right to say that Arahant still suffer physical pain this is due to their past kamma being born as human. This is what we call Nibbana with residue. Also you right to say that total cessation of suffering refers to the cessation of the state of a living arahant. This is Nibbana without residue.
DN16
2.23. And during the Rains the Lord was attacked by a severe sickness, with sharp pains as if he were about to die. But he endured all this mindfully, clearly aware and without complaining. He thought: ‘It is not fitting that I should attain final Nibbāna without addressing my followers and taking leave of the order of monks.
There is the believe that unconditioned (asankhata) is a negation of condition (sankhata) while not self (anatta) is a negation of self. It gives an impression that the condition (sankhata) and uncondition depends on each other to exist as without the other (sankhata) it will not exist (asankhata).
If that is the point that Nibbana will be dependent on a cause, then it would not be asankhata. Likewise this is the same for anatta. Asankhata is not opposite or negation of sankhata, it is just a term to describe Nibbana. As said, Nibbana is beyond description as it is beyond the five aggregates.
If this exist, that arise. If this cease, that cease. Is about attaining enlightenment where all the aggregates ceased. Which is again asankhata.
Hi AshKC - may I call you Ash? -
Thanks for thinking of me. I am not too worried about all this stuff related to nibbana and tend to work and think at a completely different level about completely different things, but I do find your conversation interesting. I can totally see how people get confused over the idea of nibbana as unconditioned and how to get from the conditioned to the unconditioned. It seems to me that answer should be in the suttas, or - whoops - what a gap, hey!
I look forward to seeing what everyone comes up as you all become more and more expert at the suttas.
Yes, what Buddha meant (i believe): In practice one cannot seperate feeling/sensations, perceptions and conscious moments of this or that (vinnana’s).
So, when the awareness of a certain sound arises, this perception of that sound, that is the arising of ear-vinnana’s in the mind. So, the coming and going we notice, is the coming and going of vinnana’s. Vinnana’s, as it were, represent the movement part of the mind. At least, it gives the impression of movement, of coming and going of plans, intentions, thoughts, emotions, sounds, smells etc.
Buddha instructs to see any formations arising in the mind as not me, not mine, not my self and as anicca, dukkha and anatta. If this is realised progressively, mind starts to enter (only by way of speech) into a more and more stable and empty stillness. The mind becomes more and more stable (or tamed ).
The tendency of mind to get lost (grasp at) in her own projections (vinnana’s) weakens.
One can now say, i believe, wisdom of the nature of mind starts to develop. There is a stillness, there is noise. There is the element or aspect of coming and going, an element of movement (vinnana;s arising and ceasing) and there is the aspect of non-movement, of stillness, a space like emptiness an openess, not seen arising and ceasing. Both are aspects of mind, sankhata and asankhata, i believe.
Now knowledge of minds nature becomes more complete because, in general, minds stillness, minds empty and total dispassionate nature, uninclined, that what is never seen coming and going, is often ignored because the obsession with movement (vinnana’s) is so strong.
There is a huge tendency to neglect minds stilled, open and empty nature.
Gradually the knowledge of minds nature evolves while the knowledge of both aspects, sankhata and asankhata, deepens.
There seems to be a taboe to talk about minds stilled, empty and unlimited nature while the sutta’s do speak about it.
I believe the simile of the sea is great to talk about minds nature. A movement part, waves, but also a very deep stilled part, unaffected, unagitated, not influenced by wind.
[on ven. Maha Bua’s stance on citta in the original thread:] This is misunderstood all the time, i feel.
I dare to say it’s not.
His recollections of ven. Mun’s encounters with previous Buddha’s and arahants, of which ven. Maha Bua claimed no knowledge himself, to me are clear that he either considers continuous existence of these Buddha’s and arahants, or that he views these Buddha’s and arahants are beyond time and able to communicate with a monk in the 1930’s/40’s, or that these passages are extremely mistranslated by the people who wrote the English version of the book. I doubt the latter.
At the same time there is the book recollecting the story of the white robed nun who was visited by ven. Mun in the night of his death, which appears to indicate that there was no continued existence of ven. Mun after this.
All this gives me the impression that ven. Maha Bua struggled to reconcile his view on ultimate reality (which includes these Buddha’s and arahants communicating with ven. Mun) and the traditional teachings where parinibbana marks the definite end of all stress.
There seems to be a taboe to talk about minds stilled, empty and unlimited nature while the sutta’s do speak about it.
I dare speak of it, but not with the notion that this is lasting beyond the end of the aggregates.
Hell, this stilled and empty mind not even lasting in this life, also not for arahants.
As ven. Mun put it about the mind (translated): Thinking, yet not dwelling on its thoughts.
This does not mean there is no stillness to which the mind can return, bringing it to stillness is just a shift of focus.
But again … it does not last, the nature of the mind is to think.
All this will end with parinibbana.
That’s my understanding about the few things I know about ven. Maha Bua and ven. Mun.
Oke, i base my opinion on a video i saw on youtube in which he shares his experiences and knowledge and upon the book arahattamagga-phala. He clearly teaches the end of rebirth but he also teaches:
“The basis of death exists precisely in the citta, as death and birth are both present within it. The citta itself is never born and never dies. Rather, the defiling influences that infiltrate and permeate the citta keep us in a repetitious cycle of birth, death and rebirth. Do you understand?”
So, it is very important to understand that this buddist teachers does not depart from the idea that even personal existence is real. We live in completely mind-made reality. Our current mindset that we are here and now humans is mind-made, based upon identification, defilements, wrong views, not knowing the truth.
It are the defilements that make us believe that our personal individual existence is ultimately real. This defiled mindset, not seeing the truth, is what makes us believe birth and death are not within the citta. Because we believe that we are the body and we are vinnana, and when that end, that is considered as death, and when that arises that is considered as birth. But this is all based upon grasping and identifying with khandha’s. This all wrong view from the beginning.
But i think it is good to end this here or continue in a seperate topic?
What does it mean for you that mind can be detached from vinnana?
I’m wondering about something, which might be a little far fetched. Dawned to me last night.
The suttas beyond doubt. show a huge influence of beliefs (views) in states of future existence combined with mental states and meditative states.
Even the neither/nor state is related to a state of future existence, and those who do not experience full release in this life after cessation are said to end up in some heavenly abode.
Now if we draw this further, we might (perhaps) come to the conclusion that the Hindu Moksha and cessation are easily grasped as the same thing, yet the Buddha pointed out that even the cessation meditative experience is conditioned and impermanent (we agree on that). With that whatever future state will be achieved it’s based on conditions and once those conditions run out (just as fire runs out of fuel) it can’t sustain.
This, seen the right way, opens another escape, being disenchantment and dispassion for any future existence.
At the same time the cessation experience shows something else: when “the all” comes to an end there is peace, the ultimate bliss. This removes fear of non-existence right at that point, since it’s know that peace is achieved right there at parinibbana.
I am aware that this leaves some open questions on self/non-self.
I consider that we agree that the aggregates are subject to change, stressful and non-self.
I also consider that we agree that after the death of an arahant there is no continued existence (contrary to the view of vens. Thanissaro and Maha Bua.
I am also aware that without the aggregates it’s impossible to point to a self (as the Buddha has shown in a couple of examples).
Yet to state that there is a definite answer to the self/no-self question - without creating stress due to wrong view, I’m not sure that’s correct.
Or perhaps, to put it different, someone beyond stream entry knows the answer, yet the question will to arise in such a person anymore.
Or am I stretching things too much here?
[edit] bringing the discussion on ven Maha Bua’s teaching to the spin-off.
Because discussion, apparantly, are allowed here, i want to share with you that it is not right to think about Maha Boowa’s citta, the deathless, as an continued existence. Also Maha Boowa really teaches the end of rebirth or any continued existence or any future bhava.
This is misunderstood all the time, i feel.
The clue is, individuality or personal existence, here and now, has never been real or some ultimate truth. It was, is and will be all the time mere a strong impression build up in the mind. Caused by grasping and identifying with the 5 khandha’s. A mind made ‘reality’ or impression.
We failed to see this truth, difficult to see, in endless lifes. Identification with khandha’s makes us live, life after life, with a very strong conviction that individual existence is ultimately real. Belief in the absolute reality of our individual existence comes with a lot of anxiety, with fears, with craving to exist, not to exist, craving pleasure. But when the Truth is seen that individuality is not ultimately real, and is also a mind-made construct, based upon avijja and tanha, the whole system breaks down that always supported the protectiveness we show, the fears, anxiety, instincts, desires, burdens.
So, the positon of Maha Boowa and ( i maybe also Thanissaro) are misunderstood. They are not about a continued existence after death. They are about not seeing, not knowing that our sense of personal existence, individual existence, is a mind-made reality, conditionally arising in the mind, but has never been ultimately real. Not any moment.
Being constantly trapped in a mindset in which individual existence is felt, experienced, seen, known as ultimately real that is in fact the avijja that support the tanha and that support to be reborn again and again. This mindset is what supports all anusaya, all asava, all tanha.
If this discussion is not allowed here, i hope this reply will be moved. Sorry for that.