A topic that
aroused a good deal of interest at the latest Vipassana Teachers’ Conference (April at IMS) was 'the sacred’. As in ‘What
is it?’ ‘Is it a useful reference?’ ‘How do we teach it?’ The interest centred
around the distinction between meditation as a system that one does, and the
meditative domain that can, over time, open. There thought and the world of the
senses dissolve, and the will to do quietens down – so how to speak about such
a ceasing, and of what value is it? Well, rather than being something way out
there, maybe it’s closer than we think.
Witness the
dialogue between two arahants, Maha Kotthita and Ven. Sāriputta:
Maha Kotthita: Friend, is there anything which exists after the
dispassionate cessation of the six spheres of sense-contact?
Sāriputta: Do not say that,
friend.
M.K:Then, friend, there is nothing which exists after the dispassionate
cessation of the six spheres of sense-contact?
S: Do not say that, friend.
M.K: Then there both is and is not ... neither is nor is not ... after
the dispassionate cessation of the six spheres of sense-contact?
S: Do not say that, friend.
M.K: ...Then how is this matter of which I speak to be regarded?
S: Friend, in saying that there
is...is not...is and is not...neither is nor is not anything which exists, one
is making a conceptual proliferation over that which cannot be conceived.
Friend, as long as one operates in terms of the six spheres of sense-contact,
there will be conceptual proliferation. But, friend, with the dispassionate
cessation of the six spheres of sense-contact, there is a calming down of
conceptual proliferation. (A.4,174)
‘Conceptual
proliferation’, papañca, is the process whereby an idea,
impression or principle arising in our minds, is conceived to be some real
thing that occurs, or could occur, ‘out there’. It’s not just an intellectual
process: we do it all the time when we project characteristics onto other
people based on our biases. As when in the act of seeing another person, we
attribute (or remove) value based on their clothes, their skin colour, and so
on. And through papañca we create our own personhood and
its future out of moods and impressions. Then the mind gets stuck on what it
has fabricated and makes an emotional tangle out of what we should, might and
shouldn’t, be. In this way an impression gets solidified into a
three-dimensional reality that overwhelms awareness and extends into the
future. This reflex is something that an Awakened One has terminated:
'Humankind delights in proliferation, the Tathāgata does not proliferate' (Dhp. 254)'... having seen what can be seen, the Tathāgata does not conceive the
seen, does not conceive the unseen, does not conceive what can be seen, does
not conceive one who sees.' (A.4.24)
However given
the message that ‘cessation’ doesn’t mean that there’s nothing, ‘sacred’ might
well be an acceptable word to place as a flag on that experience; it conveys a
profundity and a depth of value – not ‘out there’, but to be sensed in oneself.
Naturally,
there are reservations. If you're looking to resolve issues in terms of our
social environment, references to the ‘ceasing of contact’ sounds like a
sidetrack. Like it’s about spacing out and not dealing with the realities of
everyday life. Then again, quite a few Dhamma practitioners are people who have
abandoned conventional religion because of its adherence to ritual, and its
obedience to the will of the divine – as administered by a fallible hierarchy
of priests. Organised religion does by and large conceptually proliferate on
the nature of the world, how it was created, why we’re born and what happens
when we die; and holds its images and rituals to be the sacred rather than
supports to realise it. Worse still, religion has too often been coopted to
support the socio-political status quo. As a consequence then, there can be a
reluctance to trust in anything other than the evidence of one’s eyes and the
power of reasoning: ‘Think for yourself, don’t just follow a tradition’ is a
common paraphrase of the 'Kalāma' sutta (A.3.65).
The
authenticity is laudable, but what to be authentic about? Strings of slippery
words? The gossamer weave of thought? Disorientation? Well, as was the case
with the Kalāmas, what is sure is that we all need some standards
and values to orient our minds and actions around in a turbulent world, absence
just won’t do. (There’s enough of that already.) So: ‘Be your own authority,
figure it out for yourself?’ Not quite. Read more carefully, the Kalāma
sutta advises us not to follow blindly: oral
tradition, a lineage of teaching, hearsay, a collection of scriptures, logical
reasoning, inferential reasoning, reasoned cogitation, or acceptance of a view
after pondering it, or by the skill of a speaker, or out of loyalty to one’s
teacher. In other words just about everything, including one’s own intellect.
On the other hand, the sutta does encourages us to put the need to find meaning
to the test of direct personal experience. Then if one senses an action or
inclination as blameless and ‘praised by the wise’, it should be followed;
otherwise, not. So what is needed doesn't come through blind rejection of
guidelines, or compulsively holding on to them. Beautifully, there is an
orientation we can trust: the Dhamma of direct personal experience, beyond
logic; and experienced by ‘the wise’. Because here’s an intelligence that goes
deeper than the tides of debate and theory.
‘This Dhamma that I have discovered is
deep, hard to see, hard to understand, peaceful and sublime, not within the
sphere of reasoning, subtle, to be experienced by the wise …. that is, the
stilling of all sankhāra [activations, mental formations], the relinquishment of all acquisitions, the
destruction of craving, dispassion, cessation, nibbāna.’
(S.6.1)
What can
‘know’ cessation? And if the wise are made so by their ability to navigate
where sankhāra go still, what about clear thinking? Even a cursory
glance at the scriptures makes it clear that the Buddha talked a lot; he could
extemporize in poetry, narrate fables, come to decisions about training
principles, and debate with great skill. Yet the Buddha’s vocation is worthy of
honour: it is a dispensation that was selfless, authentic, not seeking praise
or gain, and offering both ethical guidance and meditative realisation. A
teaching that is something we can practise and check out for ourselves. This Dhamma
may go beyond the sphere of reasoning, but it’s highly reasonable and amenable
to a verbal transmission. ‘A Tathāgata has arisen in the world
who teaches a Dhamma that’s directly ascertained, timeless, encouraging
inquiry, relevant, personally realisable, and discerned by the wise’_is the
standard recollection. That’s pretty sacred too. But it’s hardly the ceasing of
‘mental’ activity, or mental formations, at least according to how we would
understand ‘mind’.
To resolve any
apparent contradictions, I would return to that ‘knowing’ and comment that the
contemporary definition of mind locates it in our heads as the thought system.
But the Pali texts have a different understanding. Thoughts are vacisankhāra (articulations,
or ‘verbal formations’) and emotions are cittasankhāra (activations
and formations of citta); and they are all learned,
acquired and the results of kamma. ‘Citta’ on the other hand is the
awareness that such content occurs in. Although it is prone to activation ( for
good or bad), and is for the average person often engaged with them, it, and it
alone, carries sacred intelligence.
In itself, citta
may be difficult to define, but its track is a crucial matter: ‘_ Though
one’s (former) body be devoured by crows … when a person’s citta has
been strengthened for a long time by faith, virtue, learning, generosity and
wisdom – that goes upward, goes to distinction.’ (S.55.21).
Citta
is able to turn away from the khandhā of
constructed experience and be directed to ‘the deathless element, thus: “This is
peaceful, this is sublime, that is, the stilling of all sankhāra … nibbāna.”’ (M.64,
A.9.36). Although
‘nothing
can do you so much harm as an misdirected citta’,(Dhammapada
42) 'This
is the Deathless, namely the liberation of citta through not clinging.’ (M
106.13 ) This is because: ‘For a long time this citta has been defiled by lust,
hatred, and delusion. Through defilement of citta, beings are defiled; through
cleansing citta, beings are purified.’(S.22.100) It can be
directed, it shines at moments of realisation, its vibrancy and constrictions
can be sensed in our bodies, and although the processes with which it is
involved make it sound like a soul or a self, citta can’t be traced as an object –
because our presence stands behind the grasp of the conceiving mind. But
annihilation of citta isn’t what cessation is about.
Liberation of citta from sankhāra
is the project. Now that’s a precious orientation, that’s Dhamma, that’s sacred.
It may then be
more accurate to say that when the wise still their sankhāra,
they still any pre-existing attitudes; then if there’s something that needs to
be said, they let speech occur; otherwise, they stay silent.
Another way of
highlighting citta
is to note that it’s not a thing at all, but this ‘knowing’;
it’s our subjective presence, the irreducible basis of our experience. Although
all ideas and mind-states are objects that can be subjectively known as
agreeable, disagreeable and changeable, the knowing of them is citta.
So while constantly experiencing this subjectivity, we can’t discern it as an
object – hence it is measured in terms of whatever obscures and mars it, by the
love and hate and fear that oppress it, by the radiance that adorns it in meditative
absorption, or by sense of release that occurs when hindrances abate or are
cleared. Moreover, in fully bringing forth the loving qualities of this citta
a person becomes ’brahma’ - divine. (A 3, 67; A 4,198).
(For the secular mind-set, this takes some swallowing.) But also Through the
development and purification of this relational awareness, one is ‘Buddha’ (M
91.31, 32, 33). From this pure intelligence, void of personal bias, attitudes,
and craving, the Tathāgata rightly speaks, without papañca, of course.
The
alternative to this dead-end of objectification sits in the awareness before reasoning
occur. The Way to the sacred doesn’t open through attempting to define it but
through those attitudes and actions towards others and to oneself that lessen
the tangle of suffering. Through wise relationship: citta is revealed and purified through relating to what arises. Such is the teaching of the Buddha:
ethics, goodwill, dispassion, and a mindful and fearless honesty about how
things are. Without this unshakeable alignment, citta is lost in selfhood,
enmeshed in its tangle, in danger, and no refuge. So, in terms of the process
of practice, we are encouraged to be more gracious, more clear with regard to
what arises; less prone to self-criticism and despair; less fearful, grasping
and driven: all this elevates Dhamma beyond the scenario of ‘me’ and ‘trying to
get it right.’ Or even being ‘right’. It is a Way that includes body, speech
and mind in a temple free from bias, failure or gain. In such a domain we are
no longer faulty systems to be set straight, damaged machines to be fixed, or
cantankerous creatures to be domesticated and ordered, but a potential for the
embodiment of values and for the purification of attitude and response. Right
here. Only then there can be the revealing of what is beyond our creation and
control. When there are no objects to be known, debated, made sacrosanct, there
is an experience of complete inclusion.
He
has no notion of 'recluse' or ' brahmin' or ' I am better' or I am equal' or '
I am inferior.' (A.4,185) … when he thinks, he thinks only of his own welfare,
the welfare of others … the welfare of the whole world. (A.
4,186)
Can anything
be more sacred than that?
