The cessation of perception and feelings: a temporary nibbāna?

Essays
21

You’re right. That was a little hasty of me. Good catch. But … my main objection stands, nonetheless. And, better put, it is this:

There is a distinction in profundity between reflecting on khandas which have ceased during a lapse of unconsciousness and bearing witness to the abandoning and falling away of those khandas.

It is a drastically different situation when a “person” (because we know that non-Arahants can also enter the cessation attainment) bears witness to the abandoning of the consciousness aggregate.

Because, as far as my understanding goes, having born witness to the abandoning of the consciousness aggregate, that person should see that perception loses its foothold on the sentient being. And, simultaneously, feeling loses a foothold on the sentient being.

When perception and feeling no longer support the clinging aggregates, form no longer has a foothold. This is just the old rehashing of:

Consciousness where nothing appears,
infinite, luminous all-round—
that’s where water and earth,
fire and air find no footing

The liberation from form is the liberation from feeling. So, I would maintain that a moment by moment experience where the khandas sequentially drop off in that manner is far more profound than a case where a person is reflecting on a period where one can say, “there was no experience of form, feeling, perception, etc that I can remember. “

(As opposed to, “I distinctly recall the way that the consciousness aggregate dropped off; the perception aggregate; the feeling aggregate; and then the form aggregate - all dropped off, one by one).

Where the matter gets “ineffable” is pinning down the nature of the observer in that state, I would assert anyway. But the continuum of aggregate abandonment is sequential, I would assert, and in as much as the final dropping of form is profoundly liberating, the name “cessation of perception and feeling” is adequate and sufficient to describe the effects.

It’s far more descriptive, IMO, when left simply as “cessation of perception and feeling” - which encompasses the dropping of the form aggregate during the experience in a way that using “cessation of awareness and experience” makes far harder to appreciate.

That may be the case. But it’s at the stage of asking “what is liberated?” Maybe it’s just the khandas themselves which are liberated from each other? Presumably this leaves “nothing” or “no-self” as the viable distinction?

Well. Aren’t we dabbling in notions of “emptiness” at this stage? Doesn’t the “emptiness of emptiness” preclude a type of essence?

With “ineffable” I’m just referring to nailing down the status of the observer. Maybe it is a case of the emptiness of emptiness being liberated. The “ineffable” aspect, to me, is our inability to express the state in words (not an inability to reach it).

Another hasty form of expression on my behalf. And uneducated as you’ve pointed out.

Simply because “perception and feeling” are the aggregates which have lost their foothold.

However, if that’s the case, I’m better off asking and I would like to know if saññā and vedayita have counterparts in the five “khandas” expression which are more narrow?

If the khanada formulations do express “perception” and “feeling” in a more specific and technical sense, it would be in that same vein that I would prefer to adhere to the translation I’m used to.

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22

Hi,

I don’t consider a sequential cessation of the khandhas to be more profound. It would perhaps be slower but not deeper. Either way, that it not matter, because such a sequential cessation is not possible. As I said in the essay, saññā, vedanā, and viññāṇa are intrinsically linked. See MN43:

"Feeling, perception, and consciousness, friend—these states are conjoined, not disjoined, and it is impossible to separate each of these states from the others in order to describe the difference between them. For what one feels, that one perceives; and what one perceives, that one cognizes. That is why these states are conjoined, not disjoined, and it is impossible to separate each of these states from the others in order to describe the difference between them.”

The three describe different aspects of awareness, but in the end they are so closely connected they are inseparable. You can’t have consciousness without perception and feeling. You can’t even describe which aspects exactly are feeling or which are consciousness or perception, without also involving the others.

So, since consciousness ceases along with perception and feeling, my translation ‘cessation of awareness and what is experienced’ doesn’t make a fundamental difference. In fact, I use this translation exactly to bring home this point, which is somewhat lost in the usual translation.

Explanations of translations would be part of the footnotes, which I haven’t included in the essay here because of the limited format of a discussion board. But here are some references:

  • Sue Hamilton, Identity and Experience says: "Throughout the Sutta[s] the word saññā is used in the sense of ‘consciousness’ "
  • Childers, Pali-English Dictionary, and Digital Pāli Dictionary indeed gloss saññā as ‘consciousness’ and ‘awareness’, among others including ‘perception’
  • Dictionaries also gloss vedayita as ‘experienced’
  • Ven Thanissaro in A Burden off the Mind has: “nothing whatsoever is sensed (experienced) at all” with brackets in the original
  • Ven Sujato notes at DN1: "Feeling is part of the fundamental structure of consciousness. This argument comes through more clearly in Pali, for the word for ‘feeling’ (vedanā) is derived from and still lies close to the sense of ‘knowing, experiencing’.”
  • A.K. Warder in Indian Buddhism translates vedanā as ‘experience’ throughout, with some explanation in the preface/foreword.

As I indicated before, it’s just a matter of translation. If we were native Pāli speakers, we would not be having this discussion, because the terms would have had other implications to us. To say saññā and vedanā cease would have been to say awareness ceases, effectively.

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23

Fair enough. I won’t argue that, as a point of translation, you’re well within your rights.

I will however respectfully take my leave due to what I see is an irreconcilable difference of opinions regarding these two different vantages on the cessation attainment.

Thank you for the discussion. :pray:

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24

Sanna as mental factor is described as that mental factor that is able to see the unique characteristics of a sense-object. For example different kind of woods. Sanna is able to see and distinguish these differences. Based upon this it can lable some wood as oak and other as maple etc. And when the mind sees some wood later on, it is able to recognise this aha this is oak wood i see.

This is the function of sanna. It is connected with meaning, labeling, associating, memory, recognising, signs. It is not that sanna is the ability to perceive. Such is seen as the ability of mind.
So, also, when sanna ceases, i believe this cannot be understood as the cessation of awareness or mind or the ability to perceive.

Also with the cessation of vinnana’s one cannot say that all knowing ability is now gone.

So, inconsistencies seem to arise when 1. sanna is understood as the ability to perceive, and 2. the assumption that there is only knowing via the senses (vinnana).

25

I realize I’ve already bowed out of this discussion, but it occurred to me that we haven’t touched on whether the Self (or our mistaken conception of the Self) takes part in “awareness” and “experience”? If it does to what extent does that “Self fabrication” still exist in the “cessation of awareness and experince”? In other words, can conceit still exist inside the cessation attainment? If it cannot, then why do we require further discernment outside of the cessation attainment?

It seems to me that the fabrication of the Self is something altogether different than verbal fabrications; bodily fabrications; and mental fabrications. The Buddha hasn’t denied that the three main fabrications were “real”. But he did deny a factual existence to the self. And yet the self is what creates “conceit”.

26

only with clinging as condition (SN22.83)

‘Reverend Ānanda, the notion “I am” occurs because of grasping, not by not grasping. Grasping what? The notion “I am” occurs because of grasping form, feeling, perception, choices, and consciousness, not by not grasping.

I do not think one must think about sanna and vedana being absent temporary as a cessation of awareness or knowing but i believe as the most pure awareness there is. Abiding in a pure awareness, a pure knowing. But not like a knowing that we often experience and is connected to the senses. This knowing is not felt. This is my best guess.

Not possible. No conceivings, no conceit.

Mind or awareness or knowing is never ever, not even for a wordling, all the time a self-awareness.
Not at all. Being self-aware arises always. It arises due to clinging to khandha’s as me, mine, my self.
In practice one can immediately notice how all changes when one becomes self-aware. The burden of this notion “I am” immediately is felt.

Dispassion for the world is happiness
for one who has gone beyond sensual pleasures.
But dispelling the conceit ‘I am’
is truly the ultimate happiness.” (Ud2.1)

We all know the absence of the conceit ‘I am’ very well. That is also why we know that with its presence a burden arises.

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27

Do we? It appears that the absence of conceit is the goal of the path. I very much doubt that we all have reached that goal.

In response: my current of thought rests on the idea that we can “delight” in Nibbana.

So, it appears that the capacity of the Self to reflect on even Nibbana is a choice to do so. Abandoning even the propensity to delight in Nibbana appears to be an act of the will.

And those who “delight” in Nibbana are not free. After death they do not enter into paranibbana.

However, those who enter the cessation attainment appear (if Bhikkhu @Sunyo is correct) to have no choice and, indeed, no control over what occurs (how the formations end).

In all the attainments, including Nibbana itself, we appear to have the ability to delight in them (not merely reflect on them afterwards). The propensity of the Self to exist appears to be the reason that we can “delight” in anything.

And if the cessation attainment does in fact wipe out even the nuanced Self reflection of “I both am and am not”, then it would be the goal and there would be no reason to incline the mind towards a further goal after the attainment.

However the attainment is not the goal and we do have to incline the mind towards Nibbana afterwards. So how can that attainment be the extinction of all awareness and experience?

As I see it, there are four types of conceit:

  • I am
  • I am not
  • I neither am nor am not
  • I both am and am not

And those higher conceits rest on their respective planes of existence. In the attainments, we find the substrate for the first three types of conceit. It’s clear how those attainments support the first three types of conceit.

And we have the cessation of perception and feeling as the final attainment and, just, the conceit of “I both am and am not”, having not been accounted for. So, the math appears to say that the cessation attainment should support the final type of conceit. And Nibbana itself would wipe out all four types of conceit.

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28

^^^^^ Great post! :+1: ^^^^^

Ties very well with the various self-views found in MN 2

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29

We have, but we only have not reached that state in which conceit never arises anymore unvoluntairy.
No mind is intrinsically conceited.

See SN22.89. The most subtle aspect of asmi mana, can be wiped out by being mindful and acutely aware of the rise and fall of khandha’s. No sannavedayitanirodha needed.

To see the rise and fall of vinnana’s means that one is acutely mindful and aware: 1. when the mind or knowing starts to engage with the senses (clinging) and if not. This is i believe, seeing the rise and fall of vinnana’s. It is not about being conscious or unconscious, absent or present.

Cannot. There is no conceit in cessation. Please ask teachers. I say it is impossible.

I believe, the only function of deep meditative states is that they reveal the subtlety and peace of mindin a direct way , its unburdeness, its pleasure here and now. They are doors to the deathless. They can inspire to make an end to all defilements, the fires in the mind. They cannot remove defilements. But they can open the eyes about how subtle, peaceful a mind without defilements is. And that way they are doors to the deathless. That wisdom of the empty, peaceful, unburdened nature of a mind that will help removing defilements and can be very inspiring.

But abiding in whatever state does not do this job. It is not like this…‘when i abide in rupa or arupa jhana my defilements will naturally be removed’.

Whatever one directly experiences and one is a body wittness of, that even can lead to the growth of defilements. Especially superiority conceit. The problem is always that people do want to be something and someone, and they love to see themselves as the possessors of peace, of awakening, love, wisdom, knowledge, and they even practice to become a possessor!..while that shows they have not understood the teachings.

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30

Flashback to my first post

Where are these gods mentioned? Or is there anywhere in any ancient text that classifies the conditions required to be “reborn” there or how many years they live there like how it’s described with other devas? No relevant search results results for “saññavedayitanirodha AND vassa/kappa/deva”, so I don’t think it makes sense to be reborn to a non-state, like how it doesn’t make sense to be reborn into nirvana.

The main difference I see is wisdom. One can be without perception and feeling and doesn’t understand that wisdom and has the potential to suffer afterwards.

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31

That’s the “only” function? What about favourable rebirth?

However, entry into jhana is precipitated by abandoning the hinderances, isn’t it?

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32

Hi,

In my view, with the unskillful qualities (akusala dhamma) abandoned in the first jhana, the sense of self and conceit are gone there already. But they are gone temporarily. That is the important difference with enlightenment, when these things are gone forever.

In the states of samadhi (including the cessation attainment) they are gone because the mind is too still for such activities; after enlightenment they are gone because of direct insight.

One can still have conceit and a sense of self regarding the states of samadhi, but only after one comes out, not during the attainment itself. That is why they are so powerful and even the first jhana is said to be a foundation for full enlightenment.

They are mentioned occasionally. I don’t have a list of references at hand, but not much is said. Most discriptive is a sutta (in DN I believe) that says these gods die as soon as perception arises. As I indicated, I also don’t know exactly what to make of this from a non-textual, common-sense point of view. That, combined with the fact that they are not described in much detail in the texts, I think should make us hesitant about making weighty conclusions based on these beings like Ven. Analayo does.

33

The desire to be reborn in high realms is not favourable, right? High rebirths are even threated as the Bait of Mara. Mara intoxicates beings with the prospect of a long happy life in high realms.

My understanding of this is: Jhana is approached by surpressing defilements temporary to arise due to the combination of consciously applied volition and concentration of the mental vinnana. If one enters jhana it is like this applied volition and concentration falls away. In jhana there is not anymore an element of that same volition but to approach it seems to be a requisite.

I see jhana as the state in which one is temporary cut off from inner drift, passions, subconscious fermentations. It is like one is temporary cut of from the bagage one has collected in so many years, the dirt, the darkness, the drifts, the instincts, the subconscious tendencies.

But once out of jhana one again re-connects to this and one is again in flames, and maybe even running in all directions for some coolness. But jhana can inspire. It is also revealing how relaxed and unburdened states of mind there are. But i feel it is still quit mental. Not liberation of the heart.
It is, as it were, not a heartfelt joy which liberation is, i believe.

I do not believe that abiding in jhana an sich is purifying. But what one sees, what reveals, that can be conducive

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34

Not favourable? Where do you suppose non-returners go to finish off the job?

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35

That has nothing to do with a desire for high rebirth.

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36

You can’t imagine a scenario where one is told they’ll be reborn in the pure abodes if they practice fourth jhana? And if they are reborn in the pure abodes they’re destined to end suffering? And that wouldn’t be a cause for desire to be reborn there? Or even a motivation when practicing fourth jhana?

37

Maybe some people do desire such things. I do not know.

I think it is tricky to rely on the idea that until death one will have the ability to enter and abide in jhana. Sutta’s make this disclaimer, maybe you have seen this? I think that it is really possible that while healthy one might easily enter jhana, but when becoming sick, with pains, with an afflicted body, with weakening abilites (also samadhi as power) one must not be surprised this ability to enter and abide in jhana also gets lost.

38

In the abhidhamma model, there’s still consciousness there, called supramundane consciousness which takes nibbāna as an object. Since nibbāna is the cessation of all conditioned things without any more arising, could be said of seeing cessation.

This is not the same as cessation of perception and feeling.

As Bhante Aggacitta’s booklet listed clearly, the path and fruit mind moments are just apparent cessation.

As for experiencing (body contact/body witness) nibbāna, it’s only arahants that can do it. As stream winners see the water in the well and arahants drink the water.

You and Bhante Aggacitta disagree on how to map the state mentioned by Sāriputta where he is perceiving nibbāna is the cessation of existence as seeing nibbāna (by Ven. @Sunyo) or as contact with the body (Bhante Aggacitta).

My observation is that perceiving nibbāna is still having 5 aggregates there, at least of perception, feeling, consciousness, which are impermanent, and thus suffering to that degree.

Nirodha samāpatti however doesn’t have these 4 aggregates of mind, and thus should have less suffering, but subjectively zero suffering, as there’s no mind to be the subject. The only suffering it has compared to Parinibbāna is that it’s temporary, impermanent.

So one can compare and contrast nibbāna with remainder vs nibbāna without remainder. With remainder still has 5 aggregates, still has suffering to that degree.

Parinibbāna or nibbāna without remainder has no 5 aggregates and thus is a higher happiness than nibbāna with remainder.

Given that nibbāna is the supreme bliss, we could say that parinibbāna is the real, pure Nibbāna. And it shouldn’t be of lower happiness than the cessation of perception and feeling, where it’s also already no mind. Thus any mapping attempt by anyone to say that parinibbāna is some sort of perception/consciousness of nibbāna or knowing Nibbāna etc as like when the arahant is still alive or similar to the abhidhammic model of path and fruition consciousness, then it’s not tenable.

Just also have to be careful not to make an ontologically positive thing or anything of the parinibbāna as cessation of all, forever.

39

the nature of cessation of perception and feeling is not nibbana. There is no deathless element in the cessation of perception and feeling. Check the sources.

Awaiting death for nibbana is the drawing of a -self delusional border between the body and the outside reality. However, the 4 elements of the aggregate of form building the body and the outer reality, are lacking of that border. It is the -self delusion what builds that.

A delusional image to stop the body activity to conceive nibbana is ignoring the body is an impersonal activity of the 4 great elements. These elements pervades the whole Reality including the own body. This is the aggregate of Form. And an arhant had realized such -self constructions with the Form to be a delusion, even before reaching the arhanthood.

To help to dismantle these delusional limits for a -self, one can read inside the Suttas the Buddha teachings to realize the nature of the aggregate of form like the activity and changes of the 4 great elements. The final stop of movements in the carcass is just another aspect of that activity, and it doesn’t have relation with realizing nibbana.

At least I understand that somebody is not really engaged in this Path until he awaken in the morning thinking that there is an experience of consciousness, and not thinking that he inhabits a planet.

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40

If I remember it correctly, I have read that the Sarvastivada Abhidharma classify the state of impercipient (asanna-samapatti) experienced by impercipient beings as a meditative stage of the cessation of awareness developed after attaining jhana IV by non-Buddhist ascetics.

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