Insight on the Spiral Path
Below is an excerpt from my forthcoming book… © Mahabodhi Burton 7 minute read This excerpt is from Chapter 10 and follows on from The Fourth Dhyana. Vipassana meditation In general, vipassana meditation takes place on a firm foundation of samatha meditation. ‘Vipasyana, the insight method of meditation, reveals our self and our world as they are beyond our assumptions and self-referencing emotions. It is direct experience, not abstract understanding, and contrasts with samatha methods such as mindfulness of breathing that prepare the mind for vipasyana by cultivating profound concentration and strong, positive emotional integration. Vipasyana is generally preceded by samatha practice, because if concentration is wavering, the mind will be unable to rest in the special object of vipasyana meditation. And when insight comes, a stock of calm, strength and happiness is needed in order to absorb its revelatory, visionary impact.’[1] Hence: In dependence on concentration there arises knowledge and vision of things as they really are (yathabhutajnanadarshana) Knowledge and vision of things as they really are On the basis of the fourth dhyana, the monk is now ready to reflect on the nature of reality. ‘Then with the mind composed, quite purified, quite clarified, without blemish, without defilement, grown pliant and workable, fixed, immovable, he directs his mind to …’[2] To some extent we have already been reflecting on the way that things are; in the sense of understanding that the bottom line for all sentient beings is that they desire happiness and do not want to suffer, and that the way that happiness is brought about is through wanting it for all beings—in the cultivation of metta towards them—and in bringing mindfulness to the situation to see precisely what needs to happen in order to bring it about. And we saw that we needed to understand how the mechanism of Conditionality pervaded all aspects of that process, so that a constructive approach to overcoming suffering could be followed, as represented by the dhyanas. With insight—or wisdom—practice, we now come to explore the more destructive aspect of Conditionality; the fact that whatever we possess; create; love; are attached to, to the extent that it exists in Samsara; Unenlightened Conditioned Existence, will eventually fall apart. This truth is expressed in the three laksanas (Sanskrit: trilakshana; Pali: tilakkhana), or marks of Conditioned Existence; that all such phenomena are impermanent (anicca), insubstantial (anatta) and thus unsatisfactory (dukkha). To understand how the former fits in with the latter, it will be useful to consider a metaphor. The Anatta Doctrine and the potential hill[3] The Buddha was born 2,500 years ago in India, into a...
The fourth dhyana
Below is an excerpt from my forthcoming book… © Mahabodhi Burton 7 minute read This excerpt is from Chapter 10 and follows on from The Third Dhyana. Concentration Fourth dhyana In the fourth dhyana the experience of happiness fades and is replaced by one-pointed concentration; the monk has now developed the qualities of mindfulness and equanimity to an unshakeable degree; there are now no situations under which he can be distracted from being mindful or skilful by the experience of pleasure or pain, he is therefore as mindful and skilful as he possibly can be. His whole being is practically absorbed in bringing about Awakening—for himself and for others, and he is ready to deal with things as they really are. ‘Furthermore, with the giving up of (attention to) pleasure and pain and the earlier disappearance of elation and distress, the meditator enters into and abides in the fourth dhyana, which is beyond pleasure or pain and purified by equanimity and mindfulness. And they sit suffusing this very body with a completely pure and translucent mind, so that there is no place in their body that is not suffused with a completely pure and translucent mind.’[1] The Buddha gives a simile for the fourth dhyana of a man wrapped in a clean white sheet after having taken a bath: ‘Suppose a man were to sit enveloped from the head down with a white cloth, so that there would be no place in his body that was not enveloped with the white cloth. In this way, the practitioner sits suffusing their body with a completely pure and translucent mind, so that there is no place in their body that is not suffused with a completely pure and translucent mind.’[2] I have used ‘unshakeability’ as the quality characteristic of the fourth dhyana because it is at this stage that the meditator develops equanimity. The fourth dhyana subsumes within itself all of the qualities of the third dhyana, in that the person is unquestionably skilful, but what is added to that is that the monk’s skilfulness is maintained under ALL circumstances; whatever pleasure or pain they are experiencing, they remain in distracted; their focus of care and awareness is undiluted by anything that they might experience. The mind in the fourth dhyana is described as being ‘completely pure’ (Pali: parisuddha). We normally understand purity in terms of the essence of a person being unsullied, but while such essences feature in Hinduism and in other theistic religions, Buddhism does not recognize them (it only recognizes impermanent phenomena), therefore we need another explanation. The Samanaphala Sutta teaches that the mind in the fourth dhyana...
The Dhyanas
Below is an excerpt from my forthcoming book… © Mahabodhi Burton 6 minute read This excerpt is from Chapter 10 and follows on from The Spiral Path. Samatha meditation The traditional understanding of meditation is that it is the way we work directly on our mind and emotions in order to bring happiness into the world and overcome suffering, for ourselves and others. What we are going to do is first look at samatha or calming meditation and then at vipassana or insight meditation. The literal translation of samatha is ‘calm abiding’;[1] but by calm we don’t just mean unruffled; the implication is much broader than that. The dhyanas Successful samatha meditation is represented by the dhyanas. It could be argued that all Buddhist meditation is meditation on ethics and nothing else, leading as it does to increasingly skilful mental states; symbolized by dhyana. The first and most basic of the dhyanas is described by the Buddha as ‘secluded from unskilful mental states’; the others building upon it, in the sense of being states of increasing skilfulness. In the highest—the fourth dhyana—the meditator is completely focused on Awakening for themselves and others; acting on that vision with power and robustness fortified by equanimity. The hindrances to meditation are five states that in one way or another are un-conducive to bringing happiness into the world. Two concern the mind or body being unready to be skilful because of their energies being too high or too low; with ‘restlessness and anxiety’ the energy in the mind or body is too high to be able to focus clearly; with ‘sloth and torpor’ it is too weak to be useful. The other hindrances to meditation are ‘(irrational) doubt’, ‘sense desire’ and ‘ill-will’; unskilful mental states which I will explore later on. Once the hindrances are completely eradicated one enters into the full mental absorption of the dhyanas, which are, in all likelihood, a —systematisation imposed upon the Buddha’s meditation experience by monks compiling the Buddhist texts at a later date.[2] And while those texts mention eight dhyanas— it is clear that only the first four refer to the Buddha’s experience.[3] The dhyanas are basically a ‘schematic’, representing the four stages a person has to go through in order to be as skilful as they can be and also to clearly see things as they really are, and are exclusively Buddhist.[4] The main thrust of the dhyanas is they manifest increasing mindfulness and skilfulness of mind and body, with two outcomes: The monk maximizes the skilfulness–and thus happiness, brought into the world for himself and others. He makes himself as...
Being Ready for Anything
Below is an excerpt from my forthcoming book… © Mahabodhi Burton 6 minute read This excerpt is taken from the chapter ‘Kindness front and centre‘ and follows on from The Five Paths as cumulative. Being ‘ready for anything’ Once the five powers have been attained the monk’s ‘spiritual personality’ has been rounded off and made unshakeable; it Is completely oriented towards a dharmic perspective. Once his spiritual faculties are powers, he is ‘fully equipped’ in terms of personal qualities and skills to do whatever work is necessary to attain Nirvana, and thus traditionally is seen as guaranteed to attain Nirvana within seven lifetimes and is known as a Stream Entrant;[1] on the Spiral Path a stage known as ‘Knowledge and Vision of Things as They Really Are’ (yathabhuta-nanadassana). On the Path of Accumulation, the monk accumulates ‘knowledge and merit’, making effort to understand how things are and to develop skill in practice. On the Path of Preparation, he goes for refuge more deeply, turning the spotlight on himself, and preparing to face ‘Things as They Really Are’ through balancing and intensifying his practice. By the time his mindfulness has become an unshakable power, he is able to turn it unblinkingly to anything and everything he chooses, and thus he commences the Path of Seeing. In physics, power is defined as ‘the ability to do work:’ the monk is now ready and able to do the spiritual spadework involved in seeing into the nature of reality; importantly taking on board and working creatively with his deep inner tendencies to Unawakening (anusaya). He has no ‘spiritual weaknesses;’ therefore, Reality cannot shake his mindfulness, confidence, wisdom, meditative concentration and ethical robustness; and whereas before he could only maintain mindfulness under certain conducive conditions, now there are no conditions under which he cannot maintain it. The Path of Seeing, and the remaining two paths, develop this insight all the way to Nirvana. Prior to stream entry, three ‘fetters’ held the monk back: The belief that there are elements within himself that are fixed and unchanging (Skt. satkayadrsti) The tendency to view practice as an end in itself (Skt. silavrata paramarsha) implying ‘going through the motions’ in his practice Vestiges of doubt that the Dharma is the way forward (Skt. vicikitsha) Sangharakshita paraphrases these as superficiality, habit and vagueness. At stream entry these fetters are gone; the monk is guaranteed to attain Awakening because he possesses 1) confidence in his ability to change, 2) wholehearted application to change, 3) clarity in the means to change. Right View Before stream entry the monk entertained one or more wrong views;[2]...
The Five Paths as cumulative
Below is an excerpt from my forthcoming book… © Mahabodhi Burton 5 minute read This excerpt is taken from the chapter ‘Kindness front and centre‘ and follows on from Remembering Loving Kindness. The Five Paths as cumulative The simplest formulation of the Buddhist path is the Threefold Way, consisting of Ethics, Meditation and Wisdom. We try to be ethical by following Buddhist precepts in our daily life, for instance by being kind, generous, content, truthful and mindful. To intensify this practice, we then meditate. When we practice samatha meditations—such as the mindfulness of breathing and the metta bhavana—we cultivate skilful mental states that lead us into dhyana, where our mind and emotions are both highly skilful and have been made ready to take in reality; thus, dhyana provides the conditions for developing wisdom. Mindfulness as a foundation Let’s now look more closely at the Five Paths and how they might be cumulative, correlating with the Threefold Way. As we saw, the Five Paths seem to literally build upon the Satipatthana Sutta because the four foundations of mindfulness are the first element of the Path of Accumulation. The four bases of success When we start to make progress with the four foundations of mindfulness, we attain to the four bases of success; states of samadhi that are naturally associated with each foundation, namely: Mindfulness of body; our desire or intention (chanda) becomes more integrated and focused[1] Mindfulness of feeling; our skilful vigour / ethical robustness (viriya) becomes well established Mindfulness of mind; our mind (citta) becomes firmly established in the skilful Mindfulness of views; our investigation (vimamsa) of views is deep and thorough Mindfulness as a spiritual faculty These states of samadhi form the basis for the cultivation–as we transition to the Path of Preparation—of the five spiritual faculties, both of which naturally correlate with the cultivation of the four foundations of mindfulness,[2] and with the Threefold Way. It is logical to assume that: The spiritual faculty of Meditative Concentration will be developed through practising mindfulness of body[3] The spiritual faculty of Ethical Robustness – and ethical practice – will be developed through practising mindfulness of feeling[4] The spiritual faculty of Confidence – and meditation practice – will be developed through practising mindfulness of mind[5] The spiritual faculty of Wisdom will be developed through practising mindfulness of views[6] We can see this correlation in the following diagram and table: The fullsome development of the ‘Spiritual Personality’ Mindfulness as a spiritual faculty addresses two needs at this stage: the need for an increasing focus on the Three Jewels,...
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