No, this is not correct based simply on personal experiences.
MN 10 was not really meant to be a meditation manual, and the concept of a meditation manual didn’t exist in those early times. It is the wish of modern people to find some text to take as a meditation manual. We want to be able to grab a book off the shelf, that is just for “meditation”, and ignore the other stuff.
But that’s not really how the early Buddhist community did things. The Buddha generally gave discourses on topics. One of those topics was the four bases of mindfulness, and one specific practice that fits within that framework is mindfulness of breathing. Both of those topics are covered in the SA/SN, and they have their own samyuttas.
Some modern meditation traditions, and modern people, seem to have some laser focus on just one or two texts, like MN 10, or MN 118, but there is no evidence that those texts were meant to have any central role within the canon. For example, for mindfulness of breathing, the Anapana Samyutta covers that topic in more depth than MN 118, so there is no major canon dependency on MN 118. Likewise, the bases of mindfulness are covered in the Satipatthana Samyutta.
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Some of the poetry is more dry. Some is far less dry. Here are examples of the less dry:
I did not say that. I am saying that when there are different possible interpretations of text experience is the only thing left to decide between them. Deference to authority is useless if you want to understand something.
If you do not find the poetry useful, fine. I find it helpful. More often than not, my “oh that is what that means” moments come from connecting meditative experiences to the poetry.
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I second this. And I believe that the paranormal stuff is optional as soon as other core parts of the teaching can be shown to be coherent and hold up philosophically and scientifically.
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Textual criticism (but not experiences in meditation) is still the only thing left to decide between them.
Deference to authority is essentially useful and important, if you want to understand the texts in textual studies, such as studies in EBT, which writers are required to express their views in an objective, scholarly, and scientifically open-minded manner, using a tone of language appropriate to that manner.
If I am able to empirically or at least methodologically reproduce the findings of a text, textual criticism becomes irrelevant. As do authorities, because they can only disqualify themselves by denying an empirical finding.
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Are you possible able to empirically or methodologically reproduce the findings of a text without textual criticism?
Without hermeneutics no, without textual criticism yes.
If a text according to my understanding says that “a” is the case and I am able to empirically reproduce “a”, I have found “a” to be the case.
Whether that text evolved or how, or whether its original author meant to convey a completely different matter - I have nevertheless discovered “a” thanks to my interpretation of the text. The circumstances of its authorship, while still being of interest, become of secondary importance.
I see. So, you consider this is “without hermeneutics no, without textual criticism yes” to empirically/methodologically reproduce the findings of a text without textual criticism. Good on you!
I think one could see the Satipatthana Sutta and Anapanasati sutta as meditation manuals. Or broadening the view, the whole of the Pitakas are a meditation manual, if by that we mean “manual for liberation.”
I think there is a genius in the sparseness of granular instruction in the suttas. It forces the practitioner to figure things out for themselves, to find out what works for their particular inclinications. The true meditation manual is the one you figure out by doing the practice. It is ever-changing, ever-evolving, in a word: living.
More has been lost than has been retained.
I usually think of it as the Buddha focused on teaching us the prerequisites that naturally lead to meditation. When the correct conditions are there, meditation is not difficult. This is outlined in AN 10.2.
Then, such as in the anapannasati sutta, he gives us what I think of as the landmarks that we will experience as our meditation deepens.
Perhaps a step by step manual is too “stiff” and inflexible to be widely applicable to everyone. Setting up the conditions for meditation through sila is universal, and then meditation will happen naturally.
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“What happens on the cushion stays on the cushion”.
This is a very fitting sutta. I think we are inclined to hear what we want to hear, not what we need to hear, and the suttas may be telling us the latter.