Questionable Ultimate Reality | Discussion 

Very happy it might have been helpful

That's a good question. Maybe it would be a good one for a Dhamma discussion. One can take dukkha vedana as one's meditation topic when in pain. There'a a good description of that practice in this talk.... ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-UlWrEW5LlD0.htmlsi=bEQqQtWV6OKdj4Xn However, it's quite important to cultivate meditation as a part of one's lifestyle when one is healthy. This gives one the skill to use it when illness comes.

Isolating one aspect of the teaching will make it difficult to see one's flaws

Very happy it might have been helpful. The suttas point us to something very practical -- the suffering in our own lives. Whether the cosmos are finite, infinite, etc. is not really important in searching for an end to suffering.

Sadhu

The suttas referred to in this talk showed teachings of the Buddha, which could be interpreted as having two levels of reality. It then offered an explanation as to how these teachings could be interpreted apart from positing an elaborate ultimate reality. Different schools were mentioned because there is a history behind the development of the Abhidhamma. In the centuries after the Buddha, Indian Buddhism developed a trend of composing new texts. The development of the Abhidhammas is part of the earliest phase of this process. The Theravadan Abhidhamma is only one of many. It took positions in opposition to competing early Buddhist schools. One of these positions is that there is no self. This position is hard to distinguish from fatalism. If there is no self, then everything is an impersonal chain of phenomena. In this chain, every effect would have a previous cause. With no room for conscious choice, there would no room for altering the chain of causes and effects in the system. Then, where would the Buddha's teaching on kamma, effort, development, etc. fit in? The position has many inconsistencies. In fact, it was this position of no self that allowed Adi Shankara to defeat Buddhism in India. He exposed the position's inconsistencies and argued for a self along Hindu lines. So, this position -- codified in the Abhidhamma -- seems to have eventually made a major contribution to the destruction of Buddhism in it's homeland. The Buddha's position on self and not self is more subtle. The Buddha talk about the self as an activity. Creating a self is something that we do. In Pali, it's called ahankara mamankara. In MN 22, the Buddha also says that for there to be a self, there should be the idea of what belongs to a self and vice-versa. In other words, we create an identity through the things we attach to. When there is no attachment, there nothing by which a person can be idenified. Exists, doesn't exist, both and neither don't apply. This is what lies beyond the all. The Buddha refers to it in many ways, one of which is Nibbana. A less known way that he refers to it is as 'anidassana vinyana' or 'surfaceless consciousness' (MN 49). So, the position on 'no self' is subtle in the suttas. It is not that the Abhidhamma is something completely bad. In fact, it references impermanence and other concepts, which can serve as topics for meditation. Howerver, it's definitions of ultimate reality have the potential to distract one from the goal at hand. One may spend one's time trying memorize the characteristics of 'ultimate' reality and then 'see' it one's meditation. This can serve as a potent distraction from searching for the causes of suffering in one's own attachments/addictions. These things are often blatantly obvious, but difficult to overcome. One sees Nibbana through the overcoming of one's addictions. When one sees samsara with dispassion, disjoined from it, then one sees reality correctly.

See the following references... *www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/selvesnotself.html *ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-wKgAyt9eqY0.htmlsi=M_RD0y9JmwmDy7vV

Dear Bhante, thanks you for such a detailed response. Cheers..

Anumodana for the kind words, Eliel. It's interesting that in the Canon the Buddha refers to these vipassana topics as 'sanyas'. It's a good pointer of how they're to be used for release.

@@DhammaVinayaPatipada 🙏 ☸️🙏