Ch. 26 - Discussion on Nibbāna and Jhāna

So What is Peace?

Nibbana is the Unconditioned State that Lies beyond Conditioned Experience

Jhāna Consciousness is a State of Unification of the mind with the Object Upon which it is Concentrated

We are Ripened for Path Knowledge when we Delight in the Idea of Letting Go

[This discourse was given on a five month retreat for the purposes of clearing up the vagueness on what is and what is not jhāna and what is Nibbāna.]

So What is Peace?

So, it’s pollution, I would say. We pollute the peace of the world with our mental noise. If you could hear the noise of everyone’s mind and how it is drowning out in them the supreme stillness and peace that is lying just behind it, you too would say that this mind is pollution.

That’s one way to look at it. Our obsession with ourselves pollutes the planet in every way. Not only does it cause you to behave in ways that are an impingement on the natural balance and order of things, but energetically it makes so much noise. This obsessive energy disturbs so many things. It is like a sort of violence done to the serenity and order of things. I don’t really know how to describe it, this noise that your mind makes when you are not talking.

So anyway, I’ve been looking at ways to help you try be rid of it. But essentially it’s the vipassanā practice that you are now doing that becomes the cause for you to just relinquish this aspect of yourselves, this clinging to and obsession with ideas of self. Yesterday I talked about that suffering which is the result of kamma and that suffering which is the result of your obsession with yourself. You must start to see it like that. Because that’s all there is in the way of you being at peace.

So what is peace? The Buddha was quite clear that peace was either the momentary cessation of suffering experienced in jhāna or the causal cessation of suffering experienced by the realisation of Nibbāna. Some people would say that it’s bad form to talk about practising to achieve Nibbāna. Nibbāna, as the goal of your meditation practice, is almost a dirty word in modern western Buddhist approach. But you’ve got to realise, that is why the Buddha did what he did. He didn’t teach Dhamma to make people feel better about themselves, he taught Dhamma for the realisation of the cessation of suffering.

So I’m not going to feel bad about the fact that what we are looking at in this retreat is the path to Nibbāna. There are lots of ways to practise meditation that would bring great benefit to you and of course we are going to look at the practice in the context of, “How is the practice of meditation going to improve the quality of my daily life?”

But, beyond that, if you practise to realise Nibbāna and actually realise it, that is a huge supramundane achievement that is reached by only a few. So don’t feel under too much pressure to do it, if this idea of relinquishing self completely really violates your ego at this stage. Meditate instead for the purposes of making peace with your ego.

But, if you are hoping to achieve the causal cessation of suffering, then you need to realise that knowing Nibbāna is that, and that it is not just some sort of loosely defined meditative experience that we might come to one day. We were just talking at tea about this and actually I think that Nibbāna is often a poorly defined term within the context of meditation and spiritual cultivation in general. Considering that it is the very reason that the Buddha taught Dhamma, I think is quite extraordinary that it is often so poorly defined or vaguely elucidated.

Take, for example, the book we were reading at tea time. The book was about the Eightfold Noble Path, but when it came to Path Knowledge there was absolutely no proper explanation as to what Nibbāna is. The only thing it had to say on the subject was that jhāna is an ever increasing state of happiness until you come to a happiness beyond jhāna which is Nibbāna. The suggestion here is that Nibbāna is a state that one day you might come to as you pass through ever increasing states of happiness in your meditation. The realisation of Nibbāna is not something that happens in the domain of the mundane. It’s not something that you sort of walk up to and one day think, “Ah, yes, maybe I know this Nibbāna now.”

Coming to know Nibbāna or Path Knowledge is a process that performs a function upon the way your mind works – it cuts off at the root the very causes of suffering. This is both a profound experience for one who reaches this state and a profound notion to even contemplate.

Nibbana is the Unconditioned State that Lies beyond Conditioned Experience

So let’s be clear what this Nibbāna is. Nibbāna itself is the unconditioned state which lies beyond the domain of our conditioned experience, both material and mental. It is the coming to know Nibbāna directly, experientially within meditation that performs the function of cutting off in stages both the causes of suffering and the kamma that leads to rebirth in the conditioned realms of existence. It is for this reason that it is often referred to as the deathless state. It is the seeing and experiencing of this state that performs the function of the quantum purification of the mind, and not the reflection and contemplation upon what Nibbāna might be.

Prior to the realisation of Nibbāna, our stream of experience has only ever known conditioned states and so when we practise for the purification of mind and the gradual cutting off of suffering that is the practice of vipassanā, we experience only an incremental letting go of attachment, craving and clinging, to these states. But when we see beyond them, at the moment of Path Knowledge, that which is unconditioned, unchanging, boundless, that state of Nibbāna itself, the completeness of this experience performs the function of cutting off at a quantum level, our clinging to conditioned states. You have now been meditating for long enough on this retreat to begin to glimpse what this might actually mean and what the implications of this would actually be, even if you haven’t yet seen Nibbāna for yourself.

So you will know yourselves that merely to contemplate it, in no way has the capacity to perform the function which I have just described. So you must understand that the seeing, knowing and the experiencing of Nibbāna is something extraordinary, supramundane, and in no way ordinary or mundane. It is discrete. It is beyond the mundane and it’s not to be thought that knowing Nibbāna or reaching Nibbāna as it is often described in modern texts, is something that comes just because you meditate long enough, or if you get enough bliss in your meditation. It is not in any way conditioned by your meditation and even if it is through meditating that you come to see Nibbāna, it has nothing to do with your meditative experience.

It is an experience that you get which is beyond the domain of your previous conditioned experience. It is not something that is commonly achieved. You should not assume that it is experienced by that many people and it seems that a lot of people teaching Dhamma would quite possibly not have experienced it.

So you should not think that, if you do not realise Nibbāna yourself, you have failed. There are people who have been teaching Dhamma for years who do not have Path Knowledge. I’m not saying whether that is right or wrong, I’m merely saying that if you expect this achievement of yourself, you may be putting yourself under unnecessary pressure. Furthermore, you should not expect that the realisation of Nibbāna will be any achievement for the ego.

Having said that, if you are going to go all the way and make that determination in this life or if you have made that determination already in this life or a previous life, then this time here and now on this long retreat, could be a candidate for being one of the times that it would happen. As you reach the culmination of a long and sustained period of practice like this, your ego will either be ready to let go or it won’t, and this will have nothing to do with the meditative stability that you’ve reached here so far. Rather, it will be the result of insight that you’ve come to through various means in this or in previous lives.

Your practice and your pursuit of happiness from now, which is what the rest of this retreat is really about, could be pursued through vipassanā ñāṇa, which cuts off the roots of suffering gradually, or supramundane knowledge that realises Nibbāna, that cuts off the roots of suffering suddenly and at a quantum level. You could also pursue happiness through the purification of mind, which is to develop that mental stability which is unshaken through samādhi and mindfulness. Both of those two things you are now ripe for developing because of all the preparatory work you’ve done over the last three and a half months. You might expect to get some success from your concentration and some of you have already had good success with your concentration.

It is worth reflecting on the fact that in the same way that there is often a vagueness and a lack of clarity surrounding the idea of Nibbāna, so too there is often a vagueness which leads to a misunderstanding of what jhāna actually is. For example, some commentators would suggest that jhāna is a state that is reached in meditation when the jhāna factors arise and become apparent. This is not what jhāna is. Jhāna is a very discrete state of consciousness, of awareness, that is beyond the ordinary, that has a profound effect on one who achieves it, though different to that of Nibbāna. Where Nibbāna constitutes the causal cessation of suffering, the entry into jhāna constitutes the momentary cessation of suffering as we have already discussed.

Jhāna Consciousness is a State of Unification of the mind with the Object Upon which it is Concentrated

Why is it the momentary cessation of suffering? Jhāna consciousness is a state of absorption or unification of the mind with the object upon which it is concentrated. What do we mean by this word unification? Between every moment of ordinary consciousness and the next, there is the momentary arising of bhavaṅga. It is the arising of this bhavaṅga and the mental states therein that sustain within us the sense that it is me that is experiencing this moment. Even when we concentrate for sustained periods on a single object, and even when the jhāna factors begin to arise, bhavaṅga continues to appear between each moment of consciousness, continuing to give the sense that it is me who is experiencing this moment of bliss, of happiness, of peace or equanimity, of concentration. This is not jhāna.

At the moment of entering into jhāna the mind ‘unifies’ itself with the object and at this moment the bhavaṅga consciousness is cut off. There is no arising of awareness anywhere but upon the object. There is no awareness at the sense doors and so no capacity to know objects impinging at the sense doors. There is a complete seclusion of the mind from all external forms and all internal distraction and mental noise, but more importantly, there is at this moment the complete absence of any sense of self, or me, or that I am experiencing this. So we call it the ‘unification of the knower, the knowing and the known’.

If you have experienced this you will understand exactly what I mean. If you haven’t this will probably sound confusing. Perhaps that is an indication in itself that jhāna is an extraordinary, not ordinary, state of consciousness. So maybe you can achieve jhāna, maybe you cannot. But realise that the practices you are practising here are not ordinary. The way that you are practising and the sort of milestones that we’re setting as staging posts are not ordinary.

They are ones that we take from the Visuddhimagga. The Visuddhimagga is an extremely exhaustive and comprehensive manual for the practice of meditation and there are no grey areas in this text as to whether this might be this or this might be that. Eventually you get to a stage which is jhāna and eventually you get to a stage which is Path Knowledge and these are both called change-of-lineage consciousness, for they change the domain in which your mind is operating. This either happens or it does not happen, there is no vagueness and they are not vague or loosely defined states. Achieving either of them is a great distinction in our practice and takes perseverance, patience and sustained effort.

So you might be at the edge of your capacity now, you might feel you can’t take any more insight, or you cannot hammer away at formations for much longer without much more stability of mind, a much deeper concentration than you’ve got. But you are really, really well prepared to practice vipassanā. Sure, you could be better prepared – you could have done all the eight attainments and you could have broken nāma and rūpa down into their ultimate states in even more detail.

We are Ripened for Path Knowledge when we Delight in the Idea of letting Go

But you are not meditating on concepts any more, which means you can practise vipassanā and whilst meditating on dhammas as they are, you can see how it is. With enough concentration and mindfulness, it is possible that you might come to see cessation. You may, you may not, but you might be inclined to think that to do so is normal. It’s not. In fact, it was quite a shock to read that book at tea time and realise that those who might be commentating on the practice or teaching it, may not be clear as to what actually the process of coming to know Nibbāna might be. It was always the wish of the Buddha that we should practise for the realisation of Nibbāna, but this need not necessarily be the case for all of you.

There are many many people practising meditation where Nibbāna is not the goal and, for them, this may be totally appropriate. So no one should be meditating with a feeling that they are under pressure to attain anything. There are lots of other reasons we should meditate, and countless other benefits along the way and that’s the point I want to make here. There are lots of other states of happiness that can be reached along the way before we come to the summation of the path which is the realisation of Nibbāna. It may well be considerably less painful and certainly it will feel less of a violation to one’s ego.

It’s important to understand that one of the principal signs that one is ready for the ripening of Path Knowledge is that we would delight in the idea of letting go of our sense of self completely. If this reflection causes any sense of trepidation, fear, anxiety or causes you to doubt or to pull back in any way, then you should not put yourself under pressure by saying, “This Nibbāna must be realised by me.” Path Knowledge is only ever realised as a tremendous sense of release and relief and by one who has delighted in the anticipation of the prospect of finally being free of self or ego.

Some of you will still have many worldly aspirations you seek to fulfil and so it is appropriate that you practise simply for the purpose of refining your aspirations and working towards them as virtuously as you possibly can. In your meditation you are beginning to experience peace and deep serenity, deep tranquillity, deep equanimity and concentration. You will find extraordinary access to these states because of all the hard work you’ve done and that concentration may well be something you can bring to distinction, if you put forth right effort now. So wherever you are at personally, be sure to make peace with your heartfelt aspirations so that you progress joyfully and blissfully.