Dharma Sunday: Nidana Sutta: Causes
Carlita
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"And what is right view? Knowledge with regard to stress, knowledge with regard to the origination of stress, knowledge with regard to the cessation of stress, knowledge with regard to the way of practice leading to the cessation of stress: This is called right view." — DN 22
This is a commentary (copyright notice automatically attached) for the Nibana Sutta in which, in relation to right actions, explains in brief that wrong causes or origination of actions are greed, aversion, and delusion. While, right causes or constructive ones is the direct opposite.
THE NIDANA SUTTA – ENDING THE DEFILEMENTS by John Haspel
This text was copied from Becoming-Buddha.com. If you found this helpful, please visit our website for more Dhamma articles. All content is copyright 2017 by John Haspel and is distributed under a Creative Commons 4.0 license. Here is a link to the full article: The Nidana Sutta – Ending The Defilements | Becoming Buddha
Eight-Fold Path: Right Action
Perceiving constancy in the inconstant,
pleasure in the stressful,
self in what's not-self,
attractiveness in the unattractive,
beings, destroyed by wrong-view,
go mad, out of their minds.
Bound to Mara's yoke,
from the yoke they find no rest.
Beings go on to the wandering-on,
leading to birth & death.
But when Awakened Ones
arise in the world,
bringing light to the world,
they proclaim the Dhamma
leading to the stilling of stress.
When those with discernment listen,
they regain their senses,
seeing the inconstant as inconstant,
the stressful as stressful,
what's not-self as not-self,
the unattractive as unattractive.
Undertaking right view,
they transcend all stress & suffering.
~AN 4:49
Eight-fold: Right Mindfulness
This is somewhat a long and interesting sutta. It's best to get the point as a whole rather than excerpts. It talks about how to contemplate (meditate and be mindful) on different topics The Buddha discussed with his monks and head disciple. I had been listening to a Dharma talk a couple days ago called Meditation by Bante Sujato and I think he spoke how we use meditation to try and cure "all" ills. For example, if we have wrong speech, we meditate. If we had wrong action, we meditate. It is fine to meditate, and it doesn't cure the ills unless it is replaced with the opposite. So, if you are gaining merits and help other living beings in how you relate to them, if you do a destructive action replace it with a right or constructive one. If you made a destructive intention. Replace it with a constructive one.
Contemplation of impermanence.
Contemplation of anatta (absence of a permanent self or soul).
Contemplation of foulness (asubha).
Contemplation of disadvantage (danger).
Contemplation of abandonment.
Contemplation of detachment.
Contemplation of cessation.
Contemplation of distaste for the whole world.
Contemplation of impermanence of all component things.
Mindfulness of in-breathing and out-breathing.
I found this video that clarifies more about right view in relation to different levels of consciousness in layman's terms. Evolution of Consciousness.
Ajahn Brahmali discusses the basic but complicated view of what consciousness is. In relation to right view, how does this help your understanding of consciousness? Is there something new you learned?
Understanding and application of Right View.
Weekly Application
What did you do to apply last week's Sunday Dharma into your daily routine?
Be specific. Reflect. Have fun; be serious. Meditate.
Comments
I’m finding that almost always now when I find myself encountering stress that when I look at my mind there are things, causes that I have not yet let go of. But it takes me a lot of time to gain these insights, often I encounter stress and it is only in the analysis a week later that I discover what it was that was at the root of it.
Sometimes a form of struggle, or an assertion of individual value, or fear of being cold, or a fear of having to make do with little. Quite primal things sometimes. But I find restfulness of the breath in meditation often brings me to a point where I can let it go.
Still finding cessation of stress is often not as simple as just reaching right view through contemplation of the N8FP.
I soooo not like the word "Stress" as translation to "Dukkha."
It fails to convey the multifarious nuances of a word that covers distress, frustration, unease, unsatisfactoriness, adversity, suffering...
https://dharmawheel.net/viewtopic.php?t=3461
Many thanks @DhammaDragon
Deserves its own thread ... which I will create
Ah no need ... it can go here: http://newbuddhist.com/discussion/comment/523068/#Comment_523068
Actually, I created a new thread, and combined another thread too. Your comment is at the bottom...
http://newbuddhist.com/discussion/20801/a-few-basic-terms#latest
And here I was thinking I rather liked that translation because it matches up so well with some of my experiences around unsatisfactoriness in my life.
I've noticed Thanissao use the phrase "stress & suffering." I think he means it synonymously, intending to encompass the gamut. But he also leaves out "suffering" a lot. In some contexts he may deem it too strong a word. I think he uses one or the other formulation based on audience, purpose and whatever other random factor might have seemed relevant to him at the time. For myself "dukkha" is one of those words better left untranslated, grasped conceptually but groked by pointing to it as it happens. Of course, were I tasked with teaching or translating, I might feel differently.
In one Dharma talk the monk even said "right concentration" is not interpreted correctly. Its originally right samadhi. He explains it as a universality of all other Folds embody. Id say wholeness or holistic clear universal awareness.
Would decaying be a closer word. Cyclic decay (decation-though not a word. Just sounds right.
) or declination (A condition inferior to an earlier condition; a gradual falling off from a better state.) Eh.
@Carlita, heh. That's another one I too prefer untranslated. I haven't listened to the hour long talk yet, but I think of samadhi as steady unification, synthesis, symbiosis, integration, harmony, The Borg, "hive mind", everything working together toward a single purpose, like a formation of birds flying in the same direction, turning in unison, landing in unison, taking off in unison, some left behind. "Concentration" does really capture my own understanding either.
Here is the talk on the eightfold. I didnt list it. Its in the Eight Fold by Bhante Sujato its about an hour. Take your time.
Thank you, @lobster and @federica for rekindling that old thread by dear @Citta.
It does deserve to be kept alive and comes in handy for quick reference.
I remember @Citta always bandying about the word "Papanca!" when he wanted to rap our knuckles over some nonsense, lol
Like @Snakeskin said above, I also think "Dukkha" is a term that colloquially among Buddhists is better left untranslated, as well as "Samadhi."
@Kerome: I am not sure about "Stress" being quite that right as translation for "Dukkha."
Dukkha is more often a sort of deep sense of unsatisfactoriness, sorrow, grief, running through our lives.
Very much like Baudelaire's "Spleen," to think of a term our forebears used a lot before "Stress" became the new black.
Right Concentration is "Sammasamadhi" in Pali (sorry, but I cannot tap the different inflections of "a" on my tablet: there is a straight bar over the "a" in "-ma" in both "samma" and "samadhi").
According to MN 44, "Samadhi" in this context IS "concentration:"
But Right Concentration is viewed as the result deep psychological and mental training.
It presupposes a detached observation and a letting go of our thoughts, a casting aside of the Five Hindrances, attaining the Four Jhanas and leading a pure life:
And then:
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.027.than.html
Continuing in the context of sammāsamādhi, MN 117 qualifies cittassa ekaggatā:
MN 44. That’s gotta be among the best FAQs ever written.
Things to Study
[ ] …
[ ] MN 44
Thanks for pointing that out.
Another way to use concentration is a specialized skill or area of study. So the concentration of ending suffering would be the seven fold while the eight combining it all as a specialization.
Good insight.
Is that the mysterious fourth type of person?
https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an04/an04.170.than.html