In the jhana formula, there are 4 specific words that superficially read as though they refer to ‘impermanence’ however obviously they each must have their own special meaning in the context, namely:
stilling (vūpasamā) of applied and sustained thought
fading away (virāgā) of rapture
abandoning (pahānā) of pleasure and pain
disappearance (atthaṅgamā) of joy and grief
Why does the joiner “of” need to be used? Why cannot the joiner be “towards” or “in relation to”, which would render: “Dispassion towards passion” (which makes perfect sense)?
While we’re at it, could we do a grammatical analysis of the third jhana?
Pītiyā ca virāgā upekkhako ca viharati
virāgā must be an ablative, right? and since it’s a list (2x ca) the otherwise more vague pītiyā is probably also an ablative.
“coming from (ablative) joy (piti) and dispassion (viraga) the close observer (literal) / indifferent one (common) (upekkhako) dwells”
sato ca sampajāno sukhañ·ca kāyena paṭisaṃvedeti
both sato and sampajano would be adjective nominatives, sukham is the accusative object, kayena is instrumental.
“remembering/mindful and clearly understanding he experiences well-being, with/using the body”
Especially kayena is too often neglected as an instrumental and casually taken as a locative meaning. Sure, it can be taken that way. I would doubt it though and would take the instrumental literally.
in the 2nd jhana citta already got unified, so it seems to be a step back to feel the body again
kayena in a locative meaning would be easier to accept if it had occurred in the first jhanas already, but it didn’t
So, something new is introduced here, something that comes after the unification of the mind. And I propose as a possibility that here the actual insight practice starts, as it is well established that in the suttas it’s first samatha and then vipassana. Well, we’ve reached samadhi in the second jhana, so it seems fitting that we turn to a dispassionate observation now. The object? I’d say the body/kaya. Hence kayena.
Thanks but this is too difficult for me. I am not very bright when it comes to grammar.
My point was if ‘virāgā’ means ‘fading away’, it is simply referring to impermanence, thus, if so, why are the different words ‘vūpasamā’, ‘pahānā’ & ‘atthaṅgamā’ used?
These different words make me think ‘dispassion’ is the meaning however if this is grammatically impossible, I must accept that.
I understand this to mean you personally (kaya used idiomatically) experience the jhana which you heard about before from the noble persons (ie others who have entered third jhana before you).
Such ideas occur more often. Take for example SN 48.50.
I’m sorry, I don’t understand. SN 48.50 doesn’t refer to the third jhana or kaya. What do you have in mind?[quote=“Sunyo, post:26, topic:3714”]
experience the jhana which you heard about before from the noble persons
[/quote]
That also I don’t understand I’m afraid. Of course we develop the jhanas because we heard of them from others. Left to our own devices we would look for sensual or philosophical enjoyment only.
What I mean to say is, simply put, another understanding of the jhanas. That in the 1st we joyfully enlarge on the concentration upon an object, that in the 2nd that concentration is fulfilled, and that in the 3rd we investigate the nature of the body.
This would mean a loop in the practice - a coarse satipatthana practice before the jhanas, and a refined one in the jhanas - which in turn refines the next satipatthana-practice before the jhanas. But this kind of loop should in itself not be surprising. After all the path begins with coarse samma-ditthi and culminates in the pañña of refined samma-ditthi. Equally the sense-restraint at the beginning of the gradual path finds a refined echo in pahānasaññā (giving up), virágasaññā, and nirodhasaññā - which of course will feed into the ‘normal’ practice of sense restraint.
There is little in the suttas to back up these practice feedback loops (and the little that is there represents an absolute minority). So this is just a think and practice piece…
on the contrary, i believe SN 46.2 , SN 46.3, SN 45.1 show exactly what happens when we apply 7 bojjhanga and noble eightfold path moment by moment. and since those 2 models are so fundamental and mentioned everywhere, this should be the absolute majority rather than perceived as a minority. it’s just that the buddha doesn’t use the words “feedback loop” and “exponential growth of improvement” from constant application of those feedback loops. but between those 3 suttas cited above, and the numerous suttas iexplicitly stating and/or by simile leaving no doubt that satipatthana should be applied every moment of consciousness, with zero tolerance for defilements, feedback loop application is built in to the EBT.
Could you quote more specifically @frankk? I couldn’t find it in the suttas you mentioned. The suttas in general are for many of us a big projection field where we are likely to find our opinion if we just look hard enough. That’s why I would like to see things really spelled out (kind of) beyond doubt.
I haven’t searched specifically, but what we don’t find I think is the order:
satipatthana → jhana 1 & 2 —> satipatthana again —> upekkha (3 & 4).
It’s in most cases it’s just: sati → jhanas → arupas/knowledges.
or the five steps: gladness - piti - sukha - samadhi - upekkha
A big exception I found is AN 6.29. Here we have the order:
jhana 1,2,3 —> perception of light —> body contemplation (32 parts/corpse) —> jhana 4
But this can hardly be seen as representative - as much as I’d like it to…
because there are so many ideas floating around that are ‘according to’ the suttas (actually scholars and meditation teachers too) I would like to see as a standard the distinction between: 1.consistently in the suttas 2.in single suttas 3.interpretation based on the suttas (kind of like a movie based on a real story).
The 2nd and 3rd are not bad or anything, they are just not consistently in the suttas, that’s all. In my practice I feel I have do things that are not in the suttas, because they don’t provide the whole picture.
But independent from that it is necessary to establish the 1st, which is, what the suttas consistently present
It’s a little late, but I hope this can still be discussed.
I agree that virāgā is ablative. It seems to me that all of the translations have consistently rendered pītiyā here as a genitive, giving therefore “with the fading away of zest”.
Here, I’m not so certain that the ca is acting like a copulative “and”. It appears to be functioning like “moreover”. Oddly enough, the ca is not found in a Sanskrit parallel -
Sa prīter-virāgād-upekṣako viharati | smṛtaḥ saṁprajānan sukhaṁ ca kāyena pratisaṁvedayati |
Expanding on my previous post about the polysemy of ātman, what seems to have happened is that while ātman’s meaning as “body” was gradually supplanted by kāya, in turn kāya retained much of its older connection with ātman, especially the reflexive use of ātman as “myself”, “himself” etc. This seems to show up in sakkāya.
Kāya, in fact, veers very closely to the older Vedic meaning of “Self” in its appearance as manomaya kāya, where the kāya here is typically interpreted to refer to a physical body. But, a quick look at how a synonym is used in DN 9 should dispel that notion. There, instead of manomaya kāya, we have manomaya attapaṭilābha (mind-made acquisition of self). You will see that the definition of manomaya attapaṭilābha in DN 9 is the same as the definition of manomaya kāya in other suttas. So, it would seem that kāya does hark back to its Vedic roots as ātman.
Of course, the Buddha ends by suggesting that this “acquisition of self” is just a worldly convention, which He uses without grasping to it.
For me, applying Ockham, it would be the simplest to assume for both the same case, i.e. an ablative. What forces me to see one as ablative, the other as genitive?
…
So ‘kaya’ would basically mean ‘the base I identify my self with’ and would switch from body, to an immaterial identification to an abstract atman according to the context?
Literally kaya is of course not the body but again a term for ‘group’ or ‘collection’, but puuh, again I ask myself: why would the buddha, or anyone, confuse people with totally different applications for the same word? I have the same issue with dhamma & dhamma - one should allegedly mean ‘teaching’, the other ‘mental phenomena’ - I don’t get it.
You mean that “pīti is a thorn for the third jhana”?
I would argue quite the contrary. The simple ablative interpretation would be “coming from”, i.e. “coming from pīti”, meaning “coming from the pīti of the 2nd jhana”. If that is what you mean I read it as confirmation.
In the 1st jhana we have 'vivekajaṃ’
In the 2nd 'vitakkavicārānaṃ vūpasamā’
and in the third it would be ‘pītiyā ca virāgā’ - coming from pīti and the application of dispassion…
Can you show again where exactly Olivelle exactly develops this? I don’t find it convincing yet I have to say. I would like to see a passage that would clearly discourage a reading of ‘kayena’ as instrumental ‘with the body’ and forces me to read it differently.
kāyena paramasaccaṃ sacchikaroti
he realises with his body the highest truth - AN 4.113
I don’t see for example why this should not simply express what it says, i.e. ‘with the body’ / ‘using the body (as a tool)’ → _instrument_al
one of the things i’ve discovered about practicing the EBT according to the oral tradition, that is memorizing many pieces of important suttas relevant to practice, they’re often quite short and seemingly terse without explanation. however, when reflected on repeatedly, you start connecting the dots and it’s as if the Buddha was giving a live commentary as your practice deepens.
connecting the dots doesn’t necessarily mean making a subjective interpretation. for example, in AN 4.14 samvara sutta, the verse at the end links ātāpi with the practice of the 4 aspects of samma padhana (which is defined the same as samma vayamo). also in the samyutta for 5 bala or 5 indriya i believe also links ātāpi the same way. so then looking in the standard definition for samma sati which has ātāpi in the refrain 4 times for each satipatthana, it’s practically an explicit declaration that right effort works hand in hand with right mindfulness.
the simile of the frontier makes a similar point, with the gatekeeper representing mindfulness, and right effort representing the army that handles the unwanted visitors that the gatekeeper notices.
i used to wonder why there are so many suttas that are so short and terse. now that i’m practicing the same way as the first disciples (listening, memorizing, reflecting what was memorized repeatedly), i understand. if you give a long discourse as in the DN or MN, it just overwhelms them with too much data that they can’t remember the important points clearly.
so getting back to the feedback loop, when you compare the body of important passages that show how intertwined the factors of the noble eightfold path are, then when examining a sutta such as such as MN 78, where right effort is explicitly purifying all 8 factors, at least to me the EBT just screams out feedback loops everywhere that reinforce and compound the improvement.
There is a bit of a problem in reading the zest in the ablative, as if it were in conjunction (ca) with virāgā. For you to interpret the passage to mean “coming from (ablative) joy (piti) and dispassion (viraga)”, won’t the Pali have to read as -
pītiyā ca virāgā ca…
Might Warder’s explanation at p.27 of this ca as functioning to connect 2 phrases be simpler than reading this ca as connecting 2 words?
I don’t think I mentioned that Olivelle developed the idea of the connection between body and kāya, as he was writing about the Upanisads’ treatment of ātman. If memory does not fail me, I think Steven Collins has also written about this, but I can’t remember where.
If you are interested in Olivelle’s point about body and ātman, you can find it on page 22 of The Early Upanisads - Annotated Text and Translation.
Does your resistance to reading the instrumental kāyena in an idiomatic fashion mean that Pali is bereft of idiomatic expressions? How would you read kālaṃ karoti?
How would you deal with those passages where one touches the formless attainments “with the body”? Eg -
ekacco puggalo ye te santā vimokkhā atikkamma rūpe āruppā te na kāyena phusitvā viharati
eg MN 70
Is there anything so objectionable with the suggestion that kāyena here is just an idiomatic expression pointing towards “personally”?
My resistance against idiomatic expressions comes from a feeling of loss. Semantic hell opens up and suddenly anything could mean anything. So that is my discomfort with idiomatic readings, and first I would try to make a sense out of a literal reading. Metaphorical uses are luckily easier - for example ‘tanha’ is clearly not the thirst for water, the context demands a broader reach of the word.
A more rational reason is that at the time of the pali edition, when a dialect and a language had to be decided on, the sangha was already spread over a large area and was surely meant to be spread even further. So the editors would have had an interest in keeping the language simple, conservative and not full of idiomatic expressions. Of course we are not fully aware of the language we use or when we use idioms. But these slips don’t occur randomly, they are hidden in highly common expressions, so a criterion would be to find the same idiom in a characteristic way, both in the pali texts and other contemporary indic texts, e.g. panini or the earliest upanishads, the mahabharata and the ramayana, so thanks for the Olivelle reference.
Early translations would be of course also a strong indication for an idiomatic expression. Do you find it in Chinese?
