I have to admit to being a bit weary of joining “which word” conversations, as there can be such a range of ways in which particular words resonate with particular people and the variety of meanings, significances and connotations folk load onto them can be quite broad.
Having said this, to put forward another aspect of the case, to me the question around whether revulsion is suitable or not isn’t at all to do with rejecting the difficult and unpleasant, but rather what it implies about the equanimity, or stability of mind of the individual concerned. Revulsion isn’t a million miles away from aversion and I imagine there’s reasonable consensus that we’re not interested in going after aversion and that such a quality would be seen as a disruptive mental factor which inhibits spiritual wisdom arising.
Both linguistically and in practice, I can only guess, but there certainly does appear to me to be an implication that with nibbida we’re talking about quite a spiritually refined - all be it strong - quality and revulsion is perhaps too shaky and closely connected to hatred to reflect that. But then of course, as we’ve seen the problem with some of the other words is that they are too weak. I vote for everyone finding out directly and not needing to bother with these pesky words!
Possibly. Ajhan Brahmali suggested ‘repulsion’ in one of his talks- almost an automatic reaction to seeing the truth of suffering (dukkha sacca) to a deep degree, in fleeting phenomena which arose and passed away, which I thought was quite good.
Yes, thanks, Mat. Again for me, language is just problematic and there simply are no perfect answers (I can’t say how delighted I am that my reasonably hopeless position isn’t more widely held as we’d all be bereft of these glorious translations).
I personally quite like fatigue that LXNDR suggested above, but all the others have their merits as well. Mostly, I just wanted to note that, I didn’t think it was because of a will to deny the difficult and unpleasant that revulsion isn’t felt to be quite right by some.
It depends a little on what associations you have with fatigue, for me it is exhaustion to the point of not being willing/able to engage with a thing any more. But again, as per my point above about words meaning different things to different people, I totally get that it doesn’t work for you.
At Savatthi. There the Blessed One said: "From an inconstruable beginning comes transmigration. A beginning point is not evident, though beings hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving are transmigrating & wandering on. When you see someone who has fallen on hard times, overwhelmed with hard times, you should conclude: ‘We, too, have experienced just this sort of thing in the course of that long, long time.’
“Why is that? From an inconstruable beginning comes transmigration. A beginning point is not evident, though beings hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving are transmigrating & wandering on. Long have you thus experienced stress, experienced pain, experienced loss, swelling the cemeteries — enough to become disenchanted with all fabricated things, enough to become dispassionate, enough to be released.” SN15.11
Disclaimer: the most likely words (collocates) are a statistical phenomenon, but the “analysis” provided in this post is my own subjective interpretation after looking at the contexts the likely words are found in. You can find the collocates and contexts by using the link below if you want to draw your own conclusions.
people, politics, voters, public, war, party, years, americans, state, time
fed up with:
people, americans, politicians, public, voters, crime, way , government, congress, country
repulsed:
attacks, attack, idea, people, sight, time, man, troops, attempt, invasion
The first three seem to be mainly about institutions and more abstract things, while repulsed seems to be about more concrete things; repulsing an actual attack or being repulsed by an idea or a sight.
repulsion vs. revulsion:
repulsion:
attraction, fascination, force, atoms, fear, horror, feelings, forces, fact, energy
Some interesting differences here; attraction comes from science but also in the expression “attraction and repulsion” to describe emotional ambivalence, “fascination and repulsion” like towards a car crash. But it’s also used in physics, force, atoms, etc.
Revulsion seems to be mainly used in the sense of disgust.
“Revulsion” is certainly an inappropriate translation.
Since “nibbidā” originates from the verb ‘nibbindati’ which literally means ‘to be satiated’, in the sense ‘to have enough of’, it’s literally ‘satiety’ (having enough of, being ‘fed up’ with’), or in a more figurative sense ‘disgust’.
By far the most common use being in phrases such as “turn his head in disgust” or “her face contorted in disgust”. Sensitivity seems to come from the psychological term “disgust sensitivity”.
The post you linked to seems to argue that nibbidā isn’t aversion for the world. Yet, the analysis there concludes in an English word that is used to convey the strongest sense of aversion so far.
I’d be interested to hear of evidence that looking at word origins gives a good indication of meaning, or equal/better indications than other methods.
Much thanks for that explanation, Nibbanka. It’s adds a very welcomed nuance to my conception of nibbidā.
ADDED:
Just to put an extra word in relation to Erik’s very fair and sensible line of inquiry re word origins and how they pertain to intended meaning in a particular context; the reason why Nibbanka’s addition really gives an interesting thread for me to twirl around in considering nibbidā is because by coincidence I recently happened to read an10.109 in which the Buddha describes the ten fold path as a noble purgative. I’m definitely only partaking in associative, free-styling here and have nothing to say about the most suitable method of arriving at the most appropriate meaning/translation; it’s just that in the privacy of my own mind I find it a useful conceptual tool.
The Pali word nibbidā is often found in contexts in the canon which refer to the human body. We saw it above in the Anguttara Nikaya passage about the impermanence of the body. The way nibbidā is translated frequently tends to further the view that the early Buddhist attitude towards the body was negative. Nibbidā can mean ‘disgust’, ‘revulsion’, ‘indifference’ or ‘disenchantment’. In contexts where it must mean ‘indifference’ or ‘disenchantment’, translating it as ‘disgust’ or ‘revulsion’ is highly misleading. In the Pali Text Society translation of Volume V of the Samyutta Nikaya, for example, a translation by Woodward includes the following: “These seven limbs of wisdom . . . conduce to downright revulsion (ekantanibbidā), to dispassion, to cessation, to calm, to full comprehension, to the wisdom, to Nibbāna”. Nibbidā frequently occurs in this phrase, and in my opinion it cannot here mean anything other than ‘indifference’ or ‘dis-enchantment’: ‘downright revulsion’, directed towards the body or anything else, would be a karmically unwholesome, and therefore binding, volition quite inappropriate for a bhikkhu at this stage of the path. To use the words from another of Woodward’s translations, it would be one of the “evil, unprofitable states which come to be because of wrong views”. Even if one were to understand the qualities referred to in this sentence, disgust or indifference, dispassion, cessation, calm, full comprehension, wisdom, Nirvana, as being qualities which are acquired sequentially, it seems highly improbable to me that disgust would immediately precede so many other qualities which are more associated with detachment. Woodward repeats the translation of nibbidā as “downright revulsion” throughout his translations for the Pali Text Society. E. M. Hare translates nibbidā in the same context as "complete or as “complete weariness”. T W. Rhys Davids, however, translates it as “detachment”.
There are a multitude of similar examples of translations which are misleading about the attitude towards the body, but these will suffice to make my point. Scholarly works other than translations can be just as misleading in statements about the body, possibly because they have relied on the translations.
Nibbindati [nis+vindati, vid2] to get wearied of (c. loc.); to have enough of, be satiated, turn away from, to be disgusted with. In two roots A. vind: prs. nibbindati etc. usually in combn withvirajjati & vimuccati (cp. nibbāna III. 2). Vin i.35; S ii.94; iv.86, 140; A v.3; Dh 277 sq.; It 33; J i.267; Miln 235, 244; Sdhp 612. ppr. nibbindaŋ
The stock phrase used in contexts which refer to nibbidā, is aṭṭiyati harāyati jigucchati, (“he is troubled , ashamed, disgusted (with)” is explained as follows:
Aṭṭiyati means “(one is) troubled, distressed, horrified , worried, bored, incommoded , pained” and is the denominative of aṭṭa (Skt ārta), “hurt, afflicted, tormented, desperate” (Sn 694). The Commentary on the Ambalaṭṭhika Rāhulovāda Sutta (M 61) glosses aṭṭiyitabbaṁ as aṭṭena pīḷitena bhavitabbaṁ, “one should be distressed, (feel) harassed” (MA 3:129). The Majjhima Commentary on the Vitakkasaṇṭhāna Sutta (M 20) explains aṭṭiyeyya as “(he) would be troubled” (aṭṭo dukkhito bhāveyya, MA 2: 90). The Vinaya Commentary says that one reflects in such a situation, thus, “now when will I be free from the sickness?” ( kadā nu kho gilānato muccissāmâ ti aṭṭiyanti, VA 467).
Harāyati, meaning “ashamed,” is the denominative of hiri (moral shame). The Majjhima Commentary glosses harāyeyya as lajjeyya, “one would be ashamed ” (MA 2:90), and harāyitabbaṁ as lajjitabbaṁ, “one should be ashamed” (MA 3:129).
Jigucchati (Skt jugutsati), “he shuns, avoids, loathes, detests, is revulsed at, is repelled by, is disgusted with, sickened by, horrified at,” is the desiderative (expressing desire) or reduplicative (expressing repetitiveness) of the root “gup”, “to protect.” The Majjhima Commentary explains jigucchitabbaṁ as gūthaṁ disvā viya jigucchā uppādetabbā, “ one should arouse disgust (in oneself) as if looking at dung ” (MA 3:129).
It must be appreciated that nibbida is a emotion resulting from insight into phenomena (Anattalakkhana sutta). To speculate on that emotion, without the insight, is to me a bit fraught, as these things go.
That’s generally the position I come from, too, but it might be worth separating out reflection from speculation. With nibbidā in spotlight, I do rather have the feeling there may be a great deal of use in turning over the particular point, because (for my own two pence worth) it seems to point to a key part of the whole deal: some order of natural ‘giving up of’ reflex on account of fully recognising the toxicity of the once cherished thing.
While I’m totally, with you on leaving aside too much speculation of the actual nibbidā experience, I do, in fact, find it a bit helpful to draw from ideas of the basic notion and apply it to more mundane things that are within my field of experience.
I very much like this one because it is a constructive attitude where one has experienced all that the world has to offer and realise this will not fulfill his desire for ultimate happiness so one is ready to look elsewhere.
All these word pairs main meanings are different (according to COCA). I don’t see how this can be explained by a straightforward connection between the words. I don’t see why satiety couldn’t drift significantly from satiate in meaning and use.
I’m not saying that ‘disgust’ or ‘fed up with’ is a bad or wrong translation, I’m just questioning the method used to find a translation.
I guess I just want to bring the issue of methodology into the discussion. What are actually good ways to find out what a word means? I don’t have the answer to this of course, it just seems like an important question
Edit: * enchant and enchanted may not be so different in use after all. I was thrown off by Sinatra’s “Some Enchanted Evening” making ‘evening’ the top collocate for enchanted
Here’s another description of repulsion (nibbida) from the Mahasi Sayadaw.
Knowledge of Disgust (nibbida nana)
Seeing thus the misery in conditioned things (formations), his mind finds no delight in those miserable things but is entirely disgusted with them. At times, his mind becomes, as it were, discontented and listless. Even so he does not give up the practice of insight, but spends his time continuously engaging in it. He therefore should know that this state of mind is not dissatisfaction with meditation, but is precisely the “knowledge of disgust” that has the aspect of being disgusted with the formations. Even if he directs his thought to the happiest sort of life and existence, or to the most pleasant and desirable objects, his mind will not take delight in them, will find no satisfaction in them. On the contrary, his mind will incline and lean and tend only towards Nibbana. Therefore the following thought will arise in him between moments of noticing: “The ceasing of all formations that are dissolving from moment to moment — that alone is happiness.”
