Day 7 May Retreat Talk MN149 /MN77 Suttas with Delson Armstrong

Today we'll be reading from Majjhima Nikaya 149. This is the Mahasalayatanika Sutta, the great six-fold base. Thus have I heard. On one occasion the Blessed One was living at Savati in Jeta's Grove, Anathapindaka's Park. There he addressed the bhikkhus thus: "Bhikkhus." "Venerable sir," they replied. The Blessed One said this: "Bhikkhus, I shall teach you a discourse on the great six-fold base. Listen and attend closely to what I shall say."

So when that happens, it says that one is inflamed by lust for the eye, for forms, for eye consciousness, for eye contact, for the feeling. So what is it that one doesn't know and see as it actually is, in relation to the I, to forms, to contact, to I-consciousness, to feeling? What is it that you don't see? What is it that you don't know and see?

"When one abides inflamed by lust, fettered, infatuated, contemplating gratification, then the five aggregates affected by craving and clinging are built up for oneself in the future. So when one abides inflamed by lust, that is to say, when one has a lustful intention, when the intention is rooted in craving or aversion, taking it to be personal, when the formations are fettered by that craving, when the mind is infatuated with it, contemplating the gratification."

How do I satisfy my craving? How do I let go of my pain, that this is my pain, that this pain is me? So when that happens, the five aggregates are built up for oneself in the future. What does that mean? There is becoming, there is renewal of existence. The thing about the five aggregates is they are not stationary. They are always arising and passing away. Just as you see consciousness arise and pass away at infinite consciousness, formations arise and pass away, feeling and perceptions arise and pass away, form arises and passes away. It might not be that apparent, but obviously if you see, all throughout your life, form has changed.

The way you see things, the different sense bases that you have, they too change dependent upon causes and conditions. So when they change, are they getting further rooted by craving and clinging? Are they getting further affected by craving and clinging? That is to say, namely, are the formations being fettered, being hindered, fettered by craving and hindered by ignorance?

When that happens, there can be craving and clinging. So here, when he says "inflamed by lust," that's the craving, that's the craving or perversion. "Infatuated, contemplating gratification," that is the clinging, contemplating gratification: "This is me, this is mine, this is myself. How do I get more of this?" Then the five aggregates affected by clinging and craving are built up for oneself in the future.

So that's the renewal of being, the bhava, the becoming, which then leads to birth, and action and reaction. And one's craving, which brings renewal of being, is accompanied by delight and lust, and delights in this and that increases. So every time you are inflamed by that craving, every time you act upon that craving, you are further strengthening it. Every time you act upon it, every time you act upon the aversion and the identification, you are further strengthening it, so that in the next future period, in the next future moment,

when that same experience arises, your mind almost automatically inclines towards having craving for it anyway, unless you have wisdom and see what that is as it actually is. And therefore, let it go through the 6R's, and don't add further fuel to that craving. Don't add further fuel for those formations to arise. You decondition the craving when you 6R, and recondition the mind towards the wholesome, towards wisdom.

And therefore, once bodily and mental troubles increase, one's bodily and mental torments increase, one's bodily and mental fevers increase, and one experiences bodily and mental suffering. Does this sound familiar? When you sit for a long period of time, what happens? Mind is trying too hard. It's tensing up. It's not able to relax. There's pain that arises. Mind looks at that pain and says, "This is me, this is mine, this is myself." Whether it's bodily pain or meditation pain, it sees it for what it is not, which is seeing it as something that's permanent, seeing it as something that's mine. But as soon as you 6R those notions and let go and soften the mind,

pull back a little bit. Don't try so hard, don't push so much. Pull back, keep the mind open, keep the awareness open, relax, soften. When you do this, you realize that the pain has disappeared. It goes away because there's no longer any craving or aversion related to that pain. When one does not know and see the ear as it actually is, when one does not know and see the nose as it actually is, when one does not know and see the tongue as it actually is, when one does not know and see the body as it actually is, when one does not know and see the mind as it actually is, one experiences bodily and mental suffering.

towards craving, towards aversion, towards ignorance, and so on. When you pay attention, when you have mindfulness, whenever you use the 6R's, you let go of that craving. You let go of those underlying tendencies. And then you're seeing things as they are. You see the I as being impersonal. You see this whole process as being impersonal. So when you don't take it personally, then you don't have craving. Then you don't have aversion. Then you don't have clinging. Then you don't have becoming. Then you don't have birth or reaction. "When one abides unenflamed by lust, unfettered, uninfatuated, contemplating danger, then the five aggregates affected by clinging and craving are diminished for oneself in the future. And one's craving, which brings renewal of being, is accompanied by delight and lust, and delights in this or that is abandoned."

So when you are attentive in that moment, in any given moment, and see things as they are, with equanimity, not getting pushed or pulled in one direction, understanding this as an impersonal process, craving won't arise, clinging won't arise, becoming won't arise. And that means that the five aggregates, which continue to renew because they continue to arise and pass away, but what does not continue to renew is the clinging and the craving that affects them. So the formations that arise weaken in terms of the fettered craving that's in them. In other words, every time you make a choice to see whatever experience you're experiencing as being impersonal, then the formations that arise will not be fettered by craving, will not be hindered by ignorance.

Instead, there will be formations rooted in wisdom, in clarity, in mindfulness. Therefore, ignorance starts to be ground away. Craving starts to be ground away. And conceit starts to be ground away. Which means the formations that do have the craving in them, that do have the conceit in them, that do have the ignorance in them, start to weaken through non-activation, through non-use.

But the formations that arise, that are rooted in wisdom, rooted in non-greed, non-hatred, and non-delusion, they get to be strengthened. Once they strengthen, then the consciousness that arises will see things as they are and continue to see them as they are. So that's why the next set of aggregates that arise will have a little less craving in them, will have less clinging in them. And eventually, all craving and clinging will fade away.

That happens when you destroy ignorance, craving, wrong views, conceit, and ignorance. The view of such a person, as this, is right view. When someone sees things as they actually are and does not take them personally, right view is guiding them in that moment. His intention is right intention. That intention does not hold on to anything. It doesn't take anything personally. It has loving kindness. It has compassion.

His effort is right effort. You use the 6R's whenever that arises. His mindfulness is right mindfulness. You are observing how your mind's attention moves from one thing to the other. His collectedness is right collectedness. Your mind becomes stabilised in an object. It becomes collected and it experiences jhana. But his bodily action, his verbal action, and his livelihood have already been well purified earlier.

Why is that? Because he's keeping his precepts. He's using right speech. He's using right action. He's making choices rooted in keeping the precepts. He's refraining from killing and harming living beings with intention, or intentionally. He's refraining from taking what is not given. He's refraining from using harsh and false speech. He's refraining from sensual misconduct. He's refraining from indulging in intoxicants, which means that because of that, his mind is already purified. His mind being purified, then right view starts to come into his foreground. He's able to see things as they are. But if his mind is distracted, because he's not keeping precepts, because someone is not keeping precepts, their mind becomes agitated.

Because they're agitated, there's a veil of ignorance in front of their eyes. And they're not actually able to see things as they are. They don't even have the proper mindfulness, the proper collectedness to be able to even begin to see that. But once you start to keep precepts, your mind becomes unagitated. Your mind becomes less agitated.

And because of that, what arises is joy, happiness, gladness in the Dhamma. And now you take the intention, or you have the intention of seeing things as they are and letting them go. And so you're able to use right effort by using the six Rs. And as you do this more and more, right view comes into place more and more. Right intention starts to become strengthened.

Mindfulness becomes sharper and collectedness becomes deeper. Thus, this Noble Eightfold Path comes to fulfillment in him by development. When he develops this Noble Eightfold Path, before we continue, let's talk about the Eightfold Path itself. What is the Eightfold Path? Right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right collectedness. What is right view?

Right view is understanding the First Noble Truth of suffering. It's abandoning or knowing the cause and condition for suffering. It's knowing the cessation of suffering. And it's knowing what is the way leading to the cessation of suffering. Right view is also mundane. It understands that there is causality and conditionality. That for every action there is a consequence.

It understands that there is something known as rebirth, or at least has an open mind to see, to be able to investigate into what is rebirth, to investigate into what is the arising and passing way of consciousness. It doesn't close off that possibility. It says, okay, I might not believe it, but I want to see if it's true or not for myself.

That's also part of mundane right view. Mundane right view also includes understanding that there is mother and father. That is to say that there is gratitude for one's parents, even if one's parents have not been so great. Because they brought you into this world so that you could experience, or you have the potential to experience, Nibbana. That's the greatest thing that they could give you, is the possibility, the potential for you to be able to experience Nibbana. Just for that alone, if you have gratitude, forget about everything else, that in itself purifies the mind, that lets go a lot of resentment, that lets go a lot of discontentment.

So having this mundane right view allows the mind to be in a healthy state of mind. The super mundane right view is the application of the Four Noble Truths, the understanding of the Four Noble Truths. There is right intention. There's three things to right intention. Nekkhama, which means renunciation. Non-ill will, which is cultivated through loving-kindness. And non-harmlessness, or non-cruelty, which is cultivated through compassion.

So right intention is all about letting go, abandoning, deconstructing. Not constructing things for yourself that create further suffering, but rather seeing things as they are and letting them go. This is the mundane right intention. The super mundane is that which is of the liberated mind, that is to say that it is automatic. There is a mundane right view, which is you have to continue to apply right intention, you have to continue to incline your mind towards the wholesome, but eventually that becomes automatic.

That becomes the default mode of functioning for the liberated mind, and that's the super mundane right intention. So the right speech, right speech is basically the acronym that I use, is THINK, T-H-I-N-K. Think before you speak. And how do you understand that? That is basically knowing if it's the right time or not to say what you're going to say. Timeliness.

H is honesty. Is what you're going to say true or not true? Do you know it to be true or untrue? I is for intention. What is the intention behind what you're going to say? Is it intentionally wholesome or intentionally unwholesome? N is for necessity. Is it necessary, is it beneficial for yourself and the other party concerned?

And K is for kindness. Can you say it with loving kindness? There's a sutta in the dining hall, which is the Abheya Sutta. If you read that, you'll have more clarity on what this means. You speak when things are factual, and you can say it with kindness, when it's the right time, and when it's beneficial, and so on.

This is right speech. Right action is refraining from breaking the precepts, refraining from killing and harming, refraining from taking what is not given, refraining from sexual misconduct. And it doesn't really say that, but it is implied that you refrain from indulging in any intoxicants, because that's implied in right mindfulness. In order for you to have right mindfulness, you don't have intoxicants in you, because intoxicants will lead to a mind that is unmindful, to a mind that is inattentive, which can cause the mind to break the other precepts.

Right livelihood. So now when we talk about right livelihood, there's the right livelihood for the monastics and there's the right livelihood for the lay people. The right livelihood for monastics is that they abstain from certain things. They abstain from anything that gets in the way of what they became monastics for. Why does a person go forth? What do they go forth for? Why do they go forth from the home life to the homeless life?

For the realization of Nibbana. Anything that prevents you from that, anything else. So wrong livelihood includes things like for a monastic to tell the future, fortune telling, creating amulets, and all kinds of interesting and colorful things that have nothing to do with the path, that have nothing to do with actually attaining Nibbana. For laypeople, there are five types of wrong livelihood.

That is to say, dealing or having to do with trade that deals in human trafficking, in poisons, in weapons, in alcohol, and in meat. Then there is right mindfulness. So when we talk about right mindfulness, as opposed to wrong mindfulness, right mindfulness is elaborated in the Satipatthana Sutta: understanding body, feelings, consciousness or mind, and phenomena, but not understanding them insofar as mindfully eating, mindfully walking, mindfully resting and all that. You're mindful not of the actual action. You're mindful of: is there present craving or aversion in the mind? So simply put, right mindfulness is remembering to observe how mind's attention moves from one thing to the other. So when you are walking, where is your mind?

When you are eating, where is your mind? When you walk up the stairs, where is your mind? When you're driving, where is your mind? When you're writing an email, where is your mind? When you're reading a book, where is your mind? When you're watching a movie, where is your mind? Sometimes people watch an entire two-hour movie and don't even realize what they've been watching, because their mind is just all over the place.

Or they might actually seem to be listening to a person, but their mind is all over the place. Their eyes are just glazed over. So even when you're listening, where is your mind? What is it doing? Is there craving? Is there aversion? What's happening there? So observing mind's attention, remembering to observe it. Right collectedness.

Right-collectedness is the four jhanas. Right-collectedness is getting to the first jhana, getting to the second jhana, getting to the third jhana, getting to the fourth jhana. And then the formless attainments that arise from the fourth jhana: infinite space, infinite consciousness, nothingness, neither perception nor non-perception. But right-collectedness means that the mind doesn't become one-pointed. It's not absorbed in its object of meditation.

It's using the object of meditation like an anchor. It's like this is the planet, this is the object, here is your attention, and it orbits around the object of meditation. It doesn't land on it and become it, it doesn't unify with it, it doesn't become one with it, it's just using that as a way to understand itself.

So right collectedness is all about the yoking of serenity and insight, of Samatha and Vipassana, together. When he develops this Noble Eightfold Path, the four foundations of mindfulness also come to fulfillment in him by development. So whenever you're following the Eightfold Path, you're also fulfilling the Four Foundations of Mindfulness. When you have right mindfulness, you are following the Four Foundations of Mindfulness.

The Four Kinds of Right Effort also come to fulfillment in him by development. What are the Four Kinds of Right Effort? The six Rs. So right effort, whenever you apply right effort, you are fulfilling the four kinds of effort, right effort. So the four right efforts are: the unarisen unwholesome states, you see that, you abandon the unwholesome states, you generate a wholesome state of mind, and you maintain a wholesome state of mind. That's happening whenever you do the six Rs. You generate, you cultivate, and then you maintain.

So with right effort also, there is a mundane and super mundane. The mundane is the four kinds of effort. The super mundane is effortlessness. Because for the liberated mind, is there anything to 6R? Liberated mind just sees things as they are, unimpeded by craving, unimpeded by ignorance, unimpeded by conceit, unimpeded by wrong views. So there's no need to 6R. It's just seeing things as they are. So that right effort is not even effort, it's just effortless seeing.

What about right mindfulness? In the mundane right mindfulness, you have to apply, you have to actually do it, remember to observe how mind's attention moves from one thing to the other. But in the liberated mind, in the super mundane right mindfulness, the mind is always mindful, it's always aware, it's always observing. What about right collectedness? There's a mundane and super mundane.

In right collectedness, all you're doing is intentionalizing to get into the jhanas. You do that even with the super mundane, but the difference is the super mundane is without any taints. There's no craving for that jhana. There's no identification with that jhana. There's no sense of "I am in that jhana," "this jhana is mine," or "this jhana is me." The four bases for spiritual power also come to fulfillment in him by development. So what are the four bases for spiritual power? First of all, what is spiritual power?

They talk about it as psychic faculties, or psychic powers, or super mundane powers. And there are basically six higher powers that are mentioned. There is the power to manipulate material objects and things like that. There's the divine ear, for example, being able to hear in a far distance, being able to hear what's going on in the Deva realms, listening to all their parties and gossip and stuff that's going on there.

Then there's the divine eye, where you can actually see into the arising and passing away of beings, being able to see into celestial realms, being able to see otherworldly beings over here, and so on and so forth. Then there's reading others' minds, being able to understand what kind of mind is present. Is that mind distracted or not distracted? Is that mind having anger or doesn't have anger? Is that mind happy or unhappy? And so on and so forth.

And then there is seeing past lives, seeing into your past lives, so being able to go back into the past and being able to see what lives were there, and this allows you to have a deeper understanding of karma, a deeper understanding of rebirth, a deeper understanding of dependent origination. So I think those were the first five I mentioned. That is the manipulation of material objects. That includes being in two places at the same time and all these other things that they talk about. There is reading other people's minds. There is the divine ear. There is the divine eye. There's recounting all of your different past lives. But the sixth one is the destruction of the taints.

That's considered to be a higher power, but that is a higher power only in relation to the arahants. So there are different types of arahants. There are arahants who have all the six higher powers. There are arahants who only have the destruction of the taints and the threefold knowledge. And there are arahants who have one or more of these higher powers, but they will always have the destruction of the taints.

So that means you always need these four bases for spiritual power. So what are the four bases for spiritual power? You need chanda, you need consciousness, you need mindfulness, and you need what's known as vimamsa. Let me make sure that's correct. Yeah, you need the zeal, that is the chanda. Chanda is a wholesome desire, a wholesome inclination to incline the mind towards jhana. Every time you incline the mind towards nibbana, that is chanda.

But it's about having the inclination towards it, but not getting obsessed by it. So, setting the intention and then letting it go and just continuing on. Then you need energy, so that is the right effort. You need the right effort for this. Then you need... Due to the purity of mind. So you need the mind itself, obviously.

That's consciousness. Otherwise, what are you developing psychic powers for? So you need a mind. And then you need investigation. So that's the vimamsa that we're talking about. Investigation means what is present in mind and what is not present in mind. These are the four bases for spiritual power. So you need the chanda, the zeal. You need the effort. You need the mind itself. And you need the investigation. How are these fulfilled by the Eightfold Path?

How is chanda fulfilled by the Eightfold Path? Right intention, because it's a cultivated intention. It's an intention of inclining towards that which is wholesome. How is effort? Right effort. What about the mind itself, consciousness itself? It's present throughout the entire Eightfold Path. You need a mind in order to follow the Eightfold Path. You need consciousness. And then investigation. What about investigation?

That's mindfulness. Because whenever you recognize something, what are you doing? You're mindful that mind was distracted. You're aware, you're attentive, you're paying attention. You're observing how mind's attention moved. And the investigation of states is aware that there is a distracted mind. So what does investigation of states mean? I'll get into that a little deeper. But investigation of states is basically knowing that the mind is in this state or in that state. That's basically it.

The five faculties also come to fulfillment in him by development. The five powers also come to fulfillment in him by development. Now, the five faculties and the five powers are identical. So the faculties are mindfulness, faith, energy, collectedness, and wisdom. So let's start with faith. How does faith become fulfilled? Right, that's having confidence in the Buddha, the Dhamma and the Sangha, but through the Eightfold Path. Right view fulfills that. Right view fulfills faith. What about energy? Right effort. What about mindfulness? Right, mindfulness.

How about collectedness? Right, collectedness. How about wisdom? Right, view. So what's the difference between the five faculties and the five powers? Right, because it's the same thing, right? The five faculties are basically the same as the five powers. It's identical in terms of the listing. So what's the difference between them? Faculties are the way through which the powers flow.

So you're developing mindfulness and then that becomes a strength. You're developing effort and then that becomes your strength. You're developing collectedness and that becomes your strength. You're developing faith and that becomes your strength. You're developing wisdom and that becomes your strength. In other words, one is in that sense a path and the other is a fruition, meaning you're developing these things through the faculties and then you have them as powers.

They are inherent in the mind after you have developed them, cultivated them, and perfected them. The seven enlightenment factors also come to fulfillment in him by development. How do the seven enlightenment factors come? So let's figure out what the enlightenment factors are: mindfulness, investigation of states, energy, joy, tranquility, collectedness, and equanimity. Right? Every time, remember what I said: every time you use the six R's, what are you doing? You're activating the enlightenment factors.

When you recognize, you become mindful. You remember to observe that mind's attention is moving. Remember to observe how it's moving. Every time you recognize, you're also having the investigation of states, because now you recognize that the mind is distracted. It went from being collected to becoming distracted. That's all investigation of states is. That's why the investigation of states is the antidote to the hindrance of doubt. What is the hindrance of doubt?

Am I doing this correctly? What state am I in? Do I have a wholesome state or an unwholesome state? What kind of, what's going on here? When you have investigation of states, you know for yourself what's actually going on. You know that you're doing it correctly. You know that you are in a wholesome state of mind. You know if you're distracted or not distracted, and so on.

What about energy? When you release your attention from that distraction, you're letting go of that distraction, so you're using effort. So energy is another word for effort. They call it striving, they call it this and that, but I would just call it effort. It's just applying right effort, the application of right effort. When you relax, you're activating tranquility. When you re-smile, you're activating joy. When you return to your object of meditation, you're activating collectedness.

Now notice there, there was tranquility and then there was joy, instead of the other way around. I said this before, joy and tranquility can be interchangeable. When there is joy, the mind is relaxed. When the mind is relaxed, it's able to experience joy. If the mind is constricted, if the mind is anxious, if the mind is worried, if the mind is sad, it can't experience joy. But as soon as you relax the mind and open it up, it can experience joy. And when you feel joyful, you're also relaxed.

You're also happy and relaxed. And when you return, you will have collectedness. What about equanimity? Equanimity is fulfilled by the application of the six R's, because you're seeing things as they are, not getting pulled by the hindrance, not getting distracted by the hindrance, not getting pushed by the hindrance, not having any craving or resistance towards it. You're just seeing, oh, here's a hindrance, six R's. That's how equanimity is fulfilled.

So right effort, the activation of the enlightenment factors, is part of right effort. And therefore, that is how it comes to fulfillment through the Noble Eightfold Path. These two things, serenity and insight, occur in him yoked evenly together. Which means, if you have the Eightfold Path, if you are cultivating the Eightfold Path, you're keeping your precepts, you're maintaining those precepts, you're committing to keeping them.

And then you have right mindfulness and right collectedness, using right effort. And you develop and perfect right view with insight, with understanding. That means you have evenly yoked together serenity and insight. So you need that collectedness, you need the meditation, you need samadhi. Oftentimes there will be a question, which is: can you have insight without samadhi? Can you have insight without collectedness, without meditation, without going into jhana?

The simple answer to that is, it's called the Eightfold Path, not the Seventhfold Path. So it's inherent, it's implicit, it's important, it's imperative that you have jhana, that you have collectedness, that you have the right kind of jhana, in order for you to experience liberation, in order for you to experience awakening. He fully understands by direct knowledge those things that should be fully understood by direct knowledge. He abandons by direct knowledge those things that should be abandoned by direct knowledge. He develops by direct knowledge those things that should be developed by direct knowledge. He realizes by direct knowledge those things that should be realized by direct knowledge.

And what things should be fully understood by direct knowledge? The answer to that is the five aggregates affected by craving and clinging. That is the material form aggregate affected by craving and clinging. The feeling aggregate affected by craving and clinging. The perception aggregate affected by craving and clinging. The formations aggregate affected by craving and clinging. The consciousness aggregate affected by craving and clinging. These are the things that should be fully understood by direct knowledge.

Whenever they say the word understand or understood, it means to actually see things as they are, to experience them as they are. Seeing the arising and passing away doesn't mean you have to investigate and look at it. Like, when is the arising of this? When is the passing away of this? It's just observing. Letting the mind observe.

And then it will be apparent to the mind when the collectedness is good, when the mindfulness is sharp and clear. That is why when you get into infinite consciousness, what do you see? You see the arising and passing away of consciousnesses. Because you're not doing anything there. Your mind is just letting go. Your mind is letting go on subtler and subtler levels, and your mind is collected even deeper, and your mindfulness is even sharper. And so now you're starting to see the arising and passing away. You don't intentionalize that you see it. You don't do anything there. You're just being aware. You're just watching the movie.

So what are you watching the movie of here? The arising and passing away of the aggregates. You understand for yourself, as it actually is, that this form that you have is impermanent. That this feeling that you have is impermanent. That this perception that you have is impermanent. That the formations that are there are impermanent and consciousness is impermanent.

What does that lead to? That leads to the perception of dukkha. That leads to the perception of the impersonal nature of all things. That leads to equanimity, seeing things as they are. That leads to disenchantment, and that leads to dispassion, and that leads to cessation. And what things should be abandoned by direct knowledge? Ignorance and craving for being.

These are the things that should be abandoned by direct knowledge. So what is ignorance? Ignorance is not knowing about the four noble truths. Once you start to access right effort and apply right effort, once you start to cultivate the 6R's, you start to become more mindful. You start to become more attentive. You start to see things as they are. And ignorance starts to be whittled away.

What about the craving for being? What does that mean? So right now what the Buddha is talking about is there is that person who is unenflamed by lust and aversion. So that is the anagami. So that is why he's saying what has to be abandoned by direct knowledge is the craving for being. So first you eliminate sensual desire, sensual craving and aversion. Then the craving for being goes away. What is the craving for being? The craving to be in a certain state of mind. The craving to be in the jhana. The craving for existence. Craving to be this or that.

You let go of that. And what things should be developed by direct knowledge? Serenity and insight. These are the things that should be developed by direct knowledge. And what things should be realized by direct knowledge? True knowledge and deliverance. These are the things that should be realized by direct knowledge. So what is true knowledge and deliverance? When you experience cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness, then the mind emerges from that, makes contact with Nibbana, experiences release, and therefore is delivered from certain kinds of fetters. Eventually, it's fully delivered. That is to say, it is fully released. It is fully liberated. And there is the true knowledge. What is the true knowledge?

The wisdom, the insight into the impersonal nature of things. The wisdom and insight of dependent origination. And then there is the true knowledge that mind is liberated. Rebirth is ended. There is no more coming to be. What had to be done has been done. That is what the Blessed One said. The bhikkhus were satisfied and delighted in the Blessed One's words.

Questions? All right. This is right before when you were at the table. Oh, yeah. All right, let's go through this. So this is the Maha Sakula Sakul Udayi Sutta, the Greater Discourse to Sakul Udayin, Sutta number 77, Majjhima Nikaya 77. This is page 638, section 8, starting from number 22. "Again Udayin, I have proclaimed to my disciples the way to develop the eight liberations." I'll read it first and we'll go through it. Possessed of material form, one sees forms. This is the first liberation.

Not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally. This is the second liberation. One is resolved upon the beautiful. This is the third liberation. With the complete surmounting of perceptions of form, with the disappearance of perceptions of sensory impact, with non-attention to perceptions of diversity, aware that space is infinite, one enters upon and abides in the base of infinite space. This is the fourth liberation.

By completely surmounting the base of infinite space, aware that consciousness is infinite, one enters upon and abides in the base of infinite consciousness. This is the fifth liberation. By completely surmounting the base of infinite consciousness, aware that there is nothing, one enters upon and abides in the base of nothingness. This is the sixth liberation. By completely surmounting the base of nothingness, one enters upon and abides in the base of neither perception nor non-perception.

This is the seventh liberation. By completely surmounting the base of neither perception nor non-perception, one enters upon and abides in the cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness. This is the eighth liberation. And thereby many disciples of mine abide having reached the consummation and perfection of direct knowledge. So let's talk about the first liberation. Possessed of material form, one sees forms.

That kind of makes sense, right? Possessed of material form, one sees forms. This is actually talking about going through the Asubha practices. So you look at the body, you look at the different elements of the body. So possessed of material form, one sees the different forms. One sees the body, one sees the skeleton, the bones, one sees the lungs, one sees the heart, one sees all of these different things.

This is the first liberation. Liberation from? Sensual craving. Liberation from identification. So it's not the first genre. It's not the first genre. Then not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally. What does that mean? How do you see forms, how do you not see internally, but see externally? In concentration. Kasinas. That's exactly it. So not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally.

In other words, now you have taken that kasina and you have expanded it. First of all, the word kasina, a lot of people take that to mean I have to take this kasina. I have to take, for example, the fire element. I look at the candle flame. I take the flickering flame and then I put it here and then I see into it and it's a nimitta and then I become concentrated on it and then I go into it and then I experience whatever it might be. But kasina comes from the Sanskrit word kritsna, k-r-i-t-s-n-a, kritsna, which means expansion, which means whole, w-h-o-l-e. So we're actually taking this whatever kasina it is, the red kasina, the blue kasina, the yellow kasina, the white kasina, the fire kasina, the water kasina, whatever kasina it is, and you're expanding it. So what does that mean, and you're expanding it, what are you doing?

You're radiating. You're expanding it. You're starting to get into infinite space. So this allows you to go into infinite space. Right. As long as you're not one-pointed. The other way of doing it, which is basically the concentration part of it, which is you take that and you become super focused on that, and then you develop... How would you expand a red circle? Just by looking at it. You look at it, and it just expands.

Yeah. Instead of becoming pinpointing on it. And this is a practice that they actually did? Yeah. If you go to 1.2.1, Majjhima Nikaya 1.2.1, the Buddha talks about the perception of earth and so on. So there he's referring to the earth kasina, and then he expands, and then you go into infinite space. So surmounting perceptions of form and so on. Yeah, this is the second liberation. One is resolved only upon the beautiful. What's the beautiful? Jhana, the first four jhanas, but specifically the fourth jhana. So this is

the third liberation the fourth Jonah with the complete surmounting of perception so the rest you know infinite space infinite consciousness nothingness neither perception non-perception cessation of perception feeling and consciousness yeah don't start This looks like a concentration path, not a truth path, I mean the first steps. The first step is the asubha practice, right? That is looking at the different parts of the body and so on and so forth. Is that second foundation like this as well? That's first. That's first. The body.

Yeah, body as body, yeah. So, before I answer that, let me answer his question. So, what you're asking is the Asubha practice. Well, so far I haven't heard of anyone doing the Asubha practices of you in TWIM. So maybe we could, somebody could contemplate the idea and just know the nature of the body. You don't need to concentrate on it. You just know there's skin and there's, and at some point, insight arises like, that's all, there's only skin. Well, on the first one, I agree, but the kasinas part, how can you do it? I don't know. The kasina is the one that it looks to me a concentration. Because that's the way it's been taught, which is you take that and then you make that a nimitta, and then you just concentrate on it.

You could smile and let it just expand. And if your mind wanders, let it go and come back. Especially the radiating out. Radiating out keeps the mind expansive rather than concentration. So it could be... You want to try it? No. I believe it's better if you try it. More chances of success. So the question was about the beautiful.

Yeah. What was the question? Why is this fourth jhana? Because there are Sutta references to talking about He inclines the mind to the beautiful, which is the fourth jhana. No, just the fourth. Only the fourth. Have you heard some of the Burmese, they talk about liberation by beauty or liberation by ugly? And I wonder if that's like Visuddhimagga stuff. Liberation by or liberation from?

I've only heard it. I tried to research it and I couldn't find anything. It sounds like it's getting to equanimity, liberation from that which is beautiful and ugly. That is to say, not getting craved for or not getting any aversion towards. I did hear it described as dedicating yourself to see the beauty in everything or dedicating yourself to see the ugly or the putrefaction in everything. So that could be seeing the repulsive and the unrepulsive, the unrepulsive and the repulsive, which we talked about a few days ago, which was like being able to see that and then letting go of any greed for it or hatred for it and so on. I'm still looking for the first three jhanas.

Looking for the first three jhanas? Because if three was four, where did the first three go? The first three jhanas. He enters directly to the fourth. He enters directly to the fourth. What happens, where's the rest? He goes directly to the fourth. Right. It's not that these liberations are... let's first understand what he means by liberations here. When you say liberation, it doesn't mean in terms of an attainment. It's a temporary liberation. Whenever you get into jhana, whenever you get into collectedness, whenever you get into a formless attainment, that means your mind is rid of the five hindrances. It is liberated from the five hindrances.

So this is one way the Buddha talks about the liberations. He's talked about it in here, he's talked about it in Digha Nikaya a couple of times, a few times in Digha Nikaya. And what he's talking about here is that there's different ways to liberate the mind. Why is this the first liberation? Seeing the Asubha practice. Because it's liberating you from the attachment to the body. Liberating you from the sensual craving to the body.

The kasina practice, how does that liberate you? It liberates you from the sense of form. It's liberating you from any sense of form. It's expansive. The fourth jhana, what is it liberating you from? Now, actually, since you bring this up, each of the eight jhanas are also temporary liberations. What does the first jhana liberate you from? The five hindrances. It liberates you from the five hindrances.

It liberates you from having to talk. Because you don't talk when you're in the first jhana. What about the second jhana? What does it liberate you from? Verbal formations. Now you let go of intentionalizing things. It's just everything is flowing. What about the third jhana? What does it liberate you from? Piti, joy. Because joy can be seen too coarse of a feeling.

The fourth jhana liberates you from sukha. So now you have just equanimity. No, ekaggata is a unified mind. It means a mind that is orbiting its object. So ekaggata is present, but that's just basically a mind that is single-minded. That means it's just staying with its object. That's all it is. It's been collected. So what else is the fourth jhana liberating you from, though? Yes, it's liberating you from, let's say, the joy and the sukha. body. So when I say that the jhanas are levels of cessation, they're basically levels of cessation because they cease certain formations. And what are the three types of formations?

Verbal, bodily, mental formations. So when you're in the first jhana, you stop talking. In the second jhana, you let go of the verbal formations in the third jhana you let go of the joy in the fourth jhana you let go of bodily formations right and then in the fifth jhana you let go of anybody itself it's just mine letting go of any contact not paying attention non-attention to that the sixth jhana or infinite consciousness you're no longer perceiving infinite space in nothingness you're no longer perceiving infinite consciousness. Neither perception or non-perception, you're no longer perceiving nothingness. Cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness, that ceases neither perception or non-perception, but it ceases mental formations.

The cessation of perception and feeling, which means mental formations are feeling and perception. So mental formations completely cease at the cessation of perception, feeling, and consciousness. Let's try it. Let's see what it says here. Again, Udayin, I have proclaimed to my disciples the way to develop the eight bases for transcendence. Perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally, limited, fair, and ugly. By transcending them, one perceives thus, I know, I see. This is the first base for transcendence.

So too, not perceiving forms internally, one sees forms externally with blue luminosity. By transcending them, one sees thus, I know, I see. This is the fifth base for transcendence. Not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally, yellow, of yellow color, yellow in appearance, with yellow luminosity. Like a kanikara flower, which is yellow, of yellow color, yellow in appearance, with yellow luminosity. Or just like Benares cloth, smoothened on both sides, which is yellow, of yellow color, yellow in appearance, with yellow luminosity. So too, not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally, with yellow luminosity. By transcending them, one perceives thus, I know, I see. This is the sixth base for transcendence. Not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally.

Red, of red color, red in appearance, with red luminosity. Just like a hibiscus flower, which is red, of red color, red in appearance, with red luminosity. Or just like Benares cloth, smoothened on both sides, which is red, of red color, red in appearance, with red luminosity. So too, not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally with red luminosity. By transcending them, one perceives thus, I know, I see. This is the seventh base for transcendence. Not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally, white, of white color, white in appearance, with white luminosity.

Just like the morning star, which is white, of white color, white in appearance, with white luminosity, or just like Benares cloth, smoothened on both sides, which is white, of white color, white in appearance, with white luminosity. So too, not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally, with white luminosity. By transcending them, one perceives thus, I know, I see. This is the eighth base for transcendence, and thereby many disciples of mine abide having reached the consummation and perfection of direct knowledge.

So somebody made notes on this, right, the other day? What are those notes? Sorry. I don't understand anything. I know. It looked like the new color monitor by Apple or something. I'm sorry, but I'm completely lost. What was it about? The Eight Bases for Transcendence. This is what it's called. Yes. So, what are the notes? Notes or your remarks? My remarks. I remember last poem. It was about... Yeah. Yeah. All right, let's do this. Perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally.

Limited, fair, and ugly. That's the first one. Perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally. Immeasurable, fair, and ugly. That's the second one. Not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally. Limited, fair, and ugly. That's the third one. Not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally, immeasurable, fair, and ugly. So these are the four. Let's talk about these four.

Perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally, limited, fair, and ugly. The way I'm looking at this is when we talk about limited, that is to say, limited by form. When he talks about immeasurable, he's talking about that which is outside of form. But here he's talking about the immeasurable, which is the Brahma-viharas. So when he talks about perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally. Limited, fair, and ugly. These are the first four jhanas. When he says fair and ugly, he's talking about with equanimity.

Not getting pulled or pushed by that which is beautiful or ugly. When he talks about perceiving form internally, one sees externally immeasurable, fair and ugly, here he's talking about the Brahma Viharas. That's a magic treat. Not perceiving forms internally, one sees forms externally. Limited, fair, and ugly. This is the third base. Not perceiving form internally, one sees forms externally. Immeasurable, fair, and ugly. So in this case also, he's talking about jhanas, the first four jhanas. But when he talks about the immeasurable here, he's talking about the formless attainments.

So first you have the first four jhanas, then you have the four brahma-viharas, and you have the four jhanas again, and then you have the four formless attainments. What about the red, yellow, or the blue, yellow, red, and white? What does that mean? What he's talking about is the attainments, the four attainments. So the blue represents the sotapanna, the yellow represents the sakadagami, the red is the anagami, and the white is the arahant. I think blue, yellow and red. There's a reason why he uses these colors and we're talking about it in this way, because the Buddha refers to these noble persons as ascetics. There are the Blue Lotus ascetics, there are the Yellow Lotus ascetics, there are the Red Lotus ascetics and there are the White Lotus ascetics.

So the blue represents the sotapannas, the yellow represents the sakadagamis, the red the anagamis, and the white the arahants. So why lotus, though? Lotus grows in the mud. Lotus grows in the mud. And remains untainted by the mud. But why the alabra and saka? I mean, I know it related. Was there a red lotus? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's more of a cultural thing, which is you had these different colored lotuses, and the Buddha primarily said about these particular may beings inhabiting space and earth, devas and nagas of mighty power, share this merit of ours, may they long protect the Buddha's dispensation. Sadhu, sadhu, sadhu.