MN 13 The Greater Discourse on Suffering - Majjhima Series w/ Delson Armstrong

So, we're going to continue starting with Majjhima Nikaya 13. This is Maha Dukkha Khandha Sutta, the greater discourse on the mass of suffering. Thus have I heard, on one occasion the Blessed One was living at Savatthi in Jeta's Grove, Anathapindika's park. Then when it was morning, a number of bhikkhus dressed and, taking their bowls and outer robes, went into Savatthi for alms.

Then they thought, it is still too early to wander for alms in Savatthi. Suppose we went to the park of the Wanderers of other sects. So they went to the park of the Wanderers of other sects and exchanged greetings with the Wanderers. When this courteous and amiable talk was finished, they sat down at one side. The wanderer said to them, friends, the recluse Gautama describes the full understanding of sensual pleasures, as we do so too.

The recluse Gautama describes the full understanding of material form, as we do so too. The recluse Gautama describes the full understanding of feelings, and we do so too. What then is the distinction here, friends? What is the variance? What is the difference between the recluse Gautama's teaching of the Dhamma and ours, between his instructions and ours? So at the time of the Buddha, there were other recluses. There were other Brahmins and teachers who taught something similar.

But the Buddha obviously always gives a certain kind of spin on things, and it is always within the context and the confines of the Four Noble Truths. So what's missing primarily in other traditions is that understanding of suffering, because other traditions may have that, but it could be secondary. I can tell you from my own experience, a lot of the traditions are about experiencing a oneness or unity with a certain kind of element that's known as brahman, and so that presupposes that there is a self there to unite with. The distinction here, primarily as we'll see, is that the Buddha always looks at it from the perspective of suffering and the end of suffering, and it's really letting go of that presupposition that there is a self to begin with. It's easier said than done, but that is the reality of the situation. That is how, if we start to

train in accordance with the Dhamma, in accordance with the Eightfold Path, and start to let go, we start to see that that self that we have is just a construct. It's an avatar that we may take on for the purpose of transacting and interacting with the world, but nothing more. And that really what happens. Then those bhikkhus neither approved nor disapproved of the wanderer's words. Without doing either, they rose from their seats and went away thinking, we shall come to understand the meaning of these words in the Blessed One's presence.

When they had wandered for alms in Savatthi and had returned from their alms round, after the meal they went to the Blessed One, and after paying homage to him, they sat down at one side and told him what had taken place. The Blessed One said, feelings. Being questioned thus, wanderers of other sects will fail to account for the matter, and what is more, they will get into difficulties.

Why is that? Because it is not their province. Because I see no one in the world with its gods, its maras, and its brahmas, in this generation with its recluses and brahmins, with its princes and its people, who could satisfy the mind with reply to these questions, except for the Tathagata or his disciple or one who has learned it from them. So now we'll go into sensual pleasures.

And what bhikkhus is the gratification in the case of sensual pleasures? Because there are these five chords of sensual pleasure. What are the five? Forms cognizable by the eye that are wished for, desired, agreeable, and likable. Connected with sensual desire and provocative of lust. Sounds cognizable by the ear. Odors cognizable by the nose. Flavors cognizable by the tongue. Tangibles cognizable by the body that are wished for, desired, agreeable, and likable.

Connected with sensual desire and provocative of lust. These are the five chords of sensual pleasure. the pleasure and joy that arise dependent on these five chords of sensual pleasure are the gratification in the case of sensual pleasure so here the buddha is saying that the dimension in which we experience sensual pleasures is by virtue of the fact that it has to do with the senses is with the eyes the ears the nose the tongue and the body and if you recall which is the penetrative discourse, there the Buddha talks about it. He says, it's not the pretty little things that are the sensual pleasures. It's the craving or the intention rooted in the craving.

So when he says that it's the sensual pleasures, that's not the problem. We were talking the other day about a sutta which talks about nirvana with remainder and nirvana without remainder. And in that case, there was a question that arose regarding does a fully awakened being experience pain or pleasure? And they do, because it's not like they're dead. It's not like they've become robots.

It's not like their senses no longer function. It's that the delight, the desire, the craving, the egoic structure of me, mine, myself, the grasping of conceit has burned away and no longer functions in their mind. So they'll still experience pleasure and they'll say, this feels good, this feels great. And that's not the issue. The issue really is the grasping of those sensual pleasures to remain, because we've identified with them as me. And what, bhikkhus, is the danger in the case of sensual pleasures? Here, bhikkhus, on account of the craft by which a clansman makes a living, whether checking or accounting or calculating or farming or trading or husbandry or archery or the royal service or whatever craft it may be, he has to face cold.

We want that new iPhone or new Samsung phone or whatever it is. We want the latest gadget. We want that latest watch. We want that particular perfume. We want to have that experience of going to that particular location. Well, all of this costs resources, and these resources come generally in the form of money. And to earn money, we must take up a trade or a craft.

And in that process, we deal with many different things. And so in the pursuit of that particular sensual pleasure, in pursuit of that particular experience, we have to deal with the cold. We have to deal with getting stuck in traffic. We have to deal with waiting on the phone for something. I mean, this sounds terrible, but it's nothing compared to what people were probably doing back in the time of the Buddha. It was much more difficult. But regardless, we still feel stressed about things. We have deadlines, we have this, we have that, all of these things, for what? For the pursuit of sensual pleasures.

So what if you're doing something and you get fired, or your company that you work for goes underwater, or the economy tanks, or whatever it might be, and you don't make a profit on your business, or you don't do this or you don't do that? What happens? In the pursuit of that sensual pleasure, now you're dealing with being wrecked in the stock market, crypto market, being swindled by somebody, or, you know, being fired, or whatever it is. So the fruits of your efforts don't come to be, and that in itself is sorrow and lamentation. Now, if property comes to the clansman while he works and strives and makes an effort thus, he experiences pain and grief in protecting it.

'How shall neither kings nor thieves make off with my property, nor fire burn it, nor water sweep it away, nor hateful heirs make off with it?' And he guards and protects his property. And as he guards and protects his property, kings or thieves make off with it, or fire burns it, or water sweeps it away, or hateful heirs make off with it.

And he sorrows, grieves, and laments. He weeps, beating his Now this too is a danger in the case of sensual pleasures, a mass of suffering visible here and now, the cause being simply sensual pleasures. So here he talks about where somebody does earn money, somebody has amassed maybe a small fortune or whatever. Now how do I keep it away from the hands of the government? Protect my money. How do I keep it in the bank when I have all these fees? How do I deal with it if somebody steals it? What if I get into a Ponzi scheme? What if this happens, what if that happens? Or I've got people and friends who pretend to be friends because of the money that I have, or who are just using me for whatever it is for their own gain. Or I have hateful heirs, cheeky children who basically aren't really interested in spending time with me, but just using me so that they can get an inheritance.

So there's many different things that we think about when it comes to these resources, and we identify with them. Again, with sensual pleasures as the cause, sensual pleasures as the source, sensual pleasures as the basis, the cause being simply sensual pleasures. Kings quarrel with kings, nobles with nobles, Brahmins with Brahmins, householders with householders, mother quarrels with son, son with mother, father with son, son with father, brother quarrels with brother, brother with sister, sister with brother, friend with friend. And here in their quarrels, brawls and disputes, they attack each other with fists, clods, sticks or knives, whereby they incur death or deadly suffering.

Now this too is a danger in the case of sensual pleasures, a mass of suffering here and now, being simply sensual pleasures. Money, money as they say, is the root of all evil. Well, to a certain extent it is, because when people get greedy, when people start to eye that gold or what's in the account or what's in the safe, people might deceive one another. There are battles fought for resources.

All the wars that we fought in the last century are a war for resources. There is, it's really, that's what it is. We talk about ideologies, that's one aspect. But ultimately, every greedy little politician that's there is just looking for, how do I make more money out of this? And every supplier of a missile and other warfare technology is like, how do we line our pockets more? That's one aspect of it. Specific sensual pleasure can lead to breaking of other precepts, including harming one another, harming other people, again with sensual pleasures as the cause. Men would take swords and shields and buckle on bows and quivers, and they charge into battle amassed in double array, with arrows and spears flying and swords flashing, and there they are wounded by arrows and spears. Their heads are cut off by swords, whereby they incur death or deadly suffering.

Now this too is a danger in the case of sensual pleasures. A mass of suffering here and now, the cause being simply sensual pleasures. Absolutely. We just talked about this. It's any kind of sensual pleasure, for whatever resources, for whatever, because those resources allow us to experience more sensual pleasures. And no leader, no king, no politician, no person, as long as they're alive and they have a brain in the sense basis, will be immune to the idea of having more and more and more, unless they let go. But the beauty of that is, if they do let go, they'll no longer be leaders and kings and politicians, because they'll see through the emptiness of it all.

But alas, this is the world we live in, and this is the world we will continue to live in. Idealists who think that this will change, I have news for you: samsara is beginningless and it is endless, and it is a package deal. In samsara you will be bound to experience these things, whether from afar, directly or indirectly. So the best way to deal with samsara is get the heck out. That's it. Again, with sensual pleasures as the cause, men take swords and shields and buckle on bows and quivers, and they charge slippery bastions with arrows and spears flying and swords flashing. And there they are wounded by arrows and spears and splashed with boiling liquids and crushed under heavy weights, and their heads are cut off by swords, whereby they incur death or deadly suffering.

Too, is a danger in the case of sensual pleasures, a mass of suffering here and now, the cause being simply sensual pleasures. So he's just going into the depths of all the stuff people get into. Again, with sensual pleasures as the cause, men break into houses, plunder wealth, commit burglary, ambush highways, seduce others' wives, and when they are caught, kings have many kinds of tortures inflicted on them. This is the karma.

The kings have them flogged with whips, beaten with canes, beaten with clubs. They have their hands cut off, their feet cut off, their hands and feet cut off, the ears cut off, their noses cut off, the ears and noses cut off. They have them subject to the porridge pot. Don't know what that is. To polished shell shave. Don't know what that is. Sounds like some very creative torture devices. To the flaming hand, to the blades of grass, to the bark dress, to the antelope, to the meat hooks, to the coins, to the lye-pickling, to the pivoting pin, to the rolled-up peleese. I don't know how to pronounce that. Anyway, and they have them splashed with boiling oil, and they have them thrown to be devoured by dogs, and they have them impaled alive on stakes, and they have their heads cut off with swords, whereby they incur death or deadly suffering.

Now this too is a danger in the case of sensual pleasures, a mass of suffering here and now, and the cause being simply sensual pleasures. Again, with sensual pleasures as the cause, sensual pleasures as the source, sensual pleasures as the basis, the cause being simply sensual pleasures, people indulge in misconduct of body, speech and mind. Having done so, on the dissolution of the body after death, they reappear in states of deprivation, in an unhappy destination.

The more that happens, the more precepts we break, the more agitated the mind becomes. The more agitated the mind becomes, forget about the next life. In this very life, the mind is restless. The mind is suffering. The mind is, it's interesting, because we live in a world where the mind has low grade levels of suffering and people are just used to it, and depression. But the real reason for it is, with the exception of something happening in the brain or whatever it is, generally it's because of our behavior, generally it's because of our actions, generally it's because of our habits. That's what creates our future. And so here the Buddha is saying, when we do these things in the pursuit of sensual pleasures by breaking precepts, then all we deal with is that agitation, the guilt, the sense of, I shouldn't have done that.

And eventually it catches up to us, to a point where if we talk about the next life, it can lead to a mind that's agitated, which leads to a realm that is unhappy. And what is the escape in the case of sensual pleasures? Removal of desire and lust, and abandonment of desire and lust for sensual pleasures. This is the escape in the case of sensual pleasures.

So the escape is the removal of desire and lust and the abandonment of that. In other words, the 6R's, right effort. The recognizing here is an identification of the sensual pleasure. Here is the agitation due to the mind wanting to own that sensual pleasure. The mind becoming obsessed by what can I get when I have that shiny thing or that new experience.

And noticing the tension in the mind and body and letting it go. And what do we experience in that process? We experience a profound peace that is not conditioned by owning, but conditioned by letting go, which leads to the unconditioned. Those recluses and brahmins who do not understand as it actually is the gratification as gratification, the danger as danger, so unless somebody is talking about this, then, as the Buddha says, no one has really talked about it in this particular formula. And the escape as escape in the case of sensual pleasures can either themselves fully understand sensual pleasures or instruct one another so that he can fully understand sensual pleasures. That is possible.

So unless you understand it from this formula, you can't explain it. Or you can't fully understand it. And what, bhikkhus, is the gratification in the case of material form? So this is, remember, this is the cultural aspect of the time of the Buddha. We live in a different time. To take it as it actually is, which is, at that time, didn't have the kind of perspectives that we've taken here. It says, suppose there were a girl, and look, this is very male-centric, so let's just go with it. Don't just forget about all the other stuff. Just look at the sutta as it is. Suppose there were a girl of the noble class or the Brahmin class or of householder stock, in her 15th or 16th year, neither too tall nor too thin nor too fat, neither too dark nor too fair.

Is her beauty and loveliness then at its height? Yes, Venerable Sir. That beauty and love, and its qualities, and it's just exact and everything. So now it's very beautiful. It's beautiful to see. It's beautiful to possess, right? So here the Buddha is using the perspective or the example of somebody being attracted to a beautiful person. And in this case, not objectifying the person, we're saying also this can happen in the case of beautiful objects. Is the danger in the case of material form. Later, one might see that same woman here at 80, 90, or 100 years, aged, as crooked as a roof bracket, doubled up, supported by a walking stick, tottering, frail, her youth gone, her teeth broken, gray-haired, scanty-haired, bald, wrinkled, with limbs all blotchy.

So the material form does not necessarily justify the personality, right? In this case, we can talk about it from the perspective of having that brand new car or that brand new watch, brand new phone. And what do you find out? Next year, there's a new model in its place. And so it's like, hmm, do I really like this thing now? Or that car starts giving you trouble. That car starts to break down. That phone starts to break down. That computer starts to get a virus and it starts to break down. That watch, that you thought was nice and shiny, the experience of being gratified by that lasts maybe for about 10 hours, or a day, or two days.

It's like, oh, everybody else has that. It's not a big deal. So material form, you have to understand, that's the impermanence of it. That is the danger of it. That relates to everything: material form, feeling, perception, intention, and consciousness. So that is the danger. Again, one might see that same woman afflicted, suffering, and gravely ill, lying fouled in her own urine and excrement, some and sat down by others. What do you think? Has her former beauty and loveliness vanished and the danger become evident? Yes, venerable sir, because this too is a danger in the case of material form. So he's just hammering the understanding that it is impermanent. Things fall apart, people fall apart. The pretty things that we have around us, the technology we have around us, it falls apart.

This is the escape in the case of material form. So again, using the 6R's, noticing. And it's more than that. It is the wisdom to see that indeed the thing that you want, the thing that you want to possess, will one day fall apart. The person you want to have a relationship with, the person that you want to have sexual union with, might one day die. They no longer love you, might one day leave you, might one day suddenly have a different kind of personality that no longer jives with you. And now you've got to suffer a whole 30 years with them or 40 years with them. So there's many different ways of looking at it that allow you to see, do I really want this thing?

Do I really want this person? Do I really want whatever it is? Or can I be in that experience of having it without holding on to it, with a process of egoic identification? Can I remove the idea that I own this thing, or that this person belongs to me, and therefore I have a sort of desire, obsession to control how things should be? Can I let go of that and still be able to enjoy it? But you start to learn to deal with it in any case. The removal of it is to let go of it, and by letting go of it, using wisdom to see all conditioned phenomena, including material form being conditioned, is subject to change, is unstable, possesses instability, and therefore liable to cause suffering in the end, and therefore not to be seen as me, mine, or myself.

So the Buddha is saying the best form of feeling is a feeling that you have when you are in jhana, because it is not dependent upon sensual pleasures, which are so fickle and feeble. The mind experiencing jhana, in this case, therein is one of the highest gratifications. Likewise, again with the stilling of applied and sustained thought, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the second jhana. With the fading away as well of rapture, he abides in the third jhana. With the abandoning of pleasure and pain, he enters upon and abides in the fourth jhana. On such an occasion, he does not choose for his own affliction, or for another's affliction, or for the affliction of both, because in the pursuit of good feelings, we may have affliction towards others, ourselves, or towards both.

But here, this is harmless. We're just letting go and being happy within ourselves and enjoying the highest gratification in the case of feelings, which have no affliction for others. Now, if some idiot chooses to be offended because you can go into jhanas, then that's his stupidity. That has nothing to do with you. So on that occasion, he feels only feeling that is free from affliction. The highest gratification in the case of feelings is freedom from affliction, I say. And what, bhikkhus, is the danger in the case of feelings? Feelings are impermanent, suffering, and subject to change. That is the danger in the case of feelings. Very self-explanatory. Condition, condition, by letting go, and they change based on whether the mind is focused or not, based on whether the mind is collected or not. And so, being impermanent, the liability of suffering is there, that they change and they don't continue to be there. So that is the danger. And what, bhikkhus, is the escape in the case of feelings? It is the removal of desire and lust. The abandonment of desire and lust for feelings.

This is the escape in the case of feelings. So the removal of the I, the me, the mind in reference to the experience of jhanas or any meditative state is the escape, because you're just seeing them as stepping stones to nibbana. Now, the funny thing is everybody wants nibbana but nobody knows what it is. It is joy and bliss and unending relief and the unconditioned and the refuge, the shelter and the auspicious and the other shore and, you know, the ultimate and the absolute, and all of these wonderful pointers which create concepts in the mind.

I would say that if liberation and awakening hit you in the face, you wouldn't know it. Real, true awakening is the disappearance of the self. There is nothing to know. The knowledge of being liberated comes afterwards, and that is different from liberation itself. So the idea is to let go, engaging with the jhanas as I am meditating, but rather to be a witness, to just observe the process happening. Sit back and enjoy the show.

It's only then that one can fully explain to another and fully understand what the Buddha is speaking of. That is what the Blessed One said. The Bhikkhus were satisfied and delighted in the Blessed One's words. May suffering ones be suffering free, and the fear-struck fearless be. May the grieving shed all grief, and may all beings find relief.

May all beings share this merit that we have thus acquired for the acquisition of all kinds of happiness. 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. Thank you everyone, I'll see you next week, take care. Thank you very much.