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Nirvana

NirvanaNoobNirvanaNoob
edited April 2009 in Buddhism Basics
I don't know if I've asked this before but what happens when you achieve it? Do you just like dissapear? Can it happen when you are alive? Can it happen after you die?

Comments

  • PalzangPalzang Veteran
    edited April 2009
    Nirvana is just samsara viewed through enlightened eyes.

    Palzang
  • JasonJason God Emperor Arrakis Moderator
    edited April 2009
    Nibbana is defined in the Pali Canon as the extinction of greed, hatred and delusion (SN 38.1) and the cessation of suffering (SN 56.11). You don't disappear when you achieve it. You achieve it while alive.
  • jlljll Veteran
    a monk explains nibbana.
    http://diydharma.org/nibbana-ajahn-brahmavamso
    NirvanaNoob said:

    I don't know if I've asked this before but what happens when you achieve it? Do you just like dissapear? Can it happen when you are alive? Can it happen after you die?

  • musicmusic
    Jason said:

    Nibbana is defined in the Pali Canon as the extinction of greed, hatred and delusion (SN 38.1) and the cessation of suffering (SN 56.11). You don't disappear when you achieve it. You achieve it while alive.

    While the body is alive, isn't there contact with sense objects, and hence perception, feeling etc.? So wouldn't 'nirvana in the body' be a contradiction in terms?
  • kowtaaiakowtaaia
    edited September 2012
    NirvanaNoob said:

    I don't know if I've asked this before but what happens when you achieve it? Do you just like dissapear? Can it happen when you are alive? Can it happen after you die?

    Achieving is completing, finishing something. So, Nibbana is not the achievement. ("I exhort you, monks: All fabrications are subject to decay. Bring about completion by being heedful." SN 6.15)
    Get it?

    The point is for the state to be manifest while the body is alive.
  • JasonJason God Emperor Arrakis Moderator
    edited September 2012
    music said:

    Jason said:

    Nibbana is defined in the Pali Canon as the extinction of greed, hatred and delusion (SN 38.1) and the cessation of suffering (SN 56.11). You don't disappear when you achieve it. You achieve it while alive.

    While the body is alive, isn't there contact with sense objects, and hence perception, feeling etc.? So wouldn't 'nirvana in the body' be a contradiction in terms?
    There's no contradiction as far as I can see. Nibbana is defined as the extinction of greed, hatred, and delusion (SN 38.1), and 'nirvana in the body' as you call it is analogous to the 'unbinding property with fuel remaining' (sa-upadisesa-nibbana-dhatu). See Iti 44:
    This was said by the Blessed One, said by the Arahant, so I have heard: "Monks, there are these two forms of the Unbinding property. Which two? The Unbinding property with fuel remaining, & the Unbinding property with no fuel remaining.

    And what is the Unbinding property with fuel remaining? There is the case where a monk is an arahant whose fermentations have ended, who has reached fulfillment, finished the task, laid down the burden, attained the true goal, ended the fetter of becoming, and is released through right gnosis. His five sense faculties still remain and, owing to their being intact, he is cognizant of the agreeable & the disagreeable, and is sensitive to pleasure & pain. His ending of passion, aversion, & delusion is termed the Unbinding property with fuel remaining.

    And what is the Unbinding property with no fuel remaining? There is the case where a monk is an arahant whose fermentations have ended, who has reached fulfillment, finished the task, laid down the burden, attained the true goal, ended the fetter of becoming, and is released through right gnosis. For him, all that is sensed, being unrelished, will grow cold right here. This is termed the Unbinding property with no fuel remaining."


    These two proclaimed
    by the one with vision,
    Unbinding properties the one independent,
    the one who is Such:
    one property, here in this life
    with fuel remaining
    from the destruction
    of the guide to becoming,
    and that with no fuel remaining,
    after this life,
    in which all becoming
    totally ceases.

    Those who know
    this state uncompounded,
    their minds released
    through the destruction
    of the guide to becoming,
    they, attaining the Teaching's core,
    pleased with ending,
    have abandoned all becoming:
    they, the Such.
  • evolveevolve Explorer
    it's the fruit of the part where you're all like 'oh'
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