--- nina van gorkom <nilo@...> wrote:

> Here is a text which may be of interest:
> Puggala pa~n`natti, Human Types, the fourth book of
> the Abhidhamma. I have
> only the PTS translation:
> Division of Human Types by four. In this sectiopn it
> is asked:
> 1. How does a person attain the inner tranquillity
> of mind but not the
> higher wisdom of insight into things?
> 2. How does a person attain the higher wisdom of
> insight into things but not
> the inner tranquillity of mind ?
> 3. How does a person attain both?
> 4. How does a person attain neither?

Hi Nina,
Just as the aspirant would not aim for #4 as their
goal (neither tranquility nor insight), it would also
be a mistake to take #1 or #2 as their goal. If there
were actual arahants who only attain higher wisdom of
insight without inner tranquillity (which I highly
doubt, despite what some literature say), they are a
statistical anomaly, not a model we should try to
emulate. I would also venture to guess that those
arahants who were allegedly dry insight probably
attempted to cultivate a complete path (i.e. including
jhanas), but somehow just ended up that way despite
their best efforts.

As far as giving different discourses to different
audience, there are pretty much only these categories:
1) laypeople: talk about cultivating virtue. On a few
rare instances, for those with little dust in their
eye, they get to hear some stuff usually reserved for
ordained.
2) monks: gradual training - start out with vinaya
(discipline/morality/virtue), then move on to
concentration and insight (jhanas, right view,
anatta).
There is no third category where the Buddha describes
a dry insight only path without mastering tranquillity
and jhana practice.

If there were, one would think that would be the
dominant theme in the whole canon, since everyone
loves a short cut, and the Buddha is not known for
repeatedly asking us to do some kind of practice that
is unessential.

Through looking at the whole body of suttas, there is
also this overwhelming implication that right
mindfulness and right view can not possibly come to
the level needed for liberating insight unless right
concentration reaches its culmination. No one is
trying to argue that the jhanic effects and
supernormal powers are the goals. But the vehicle in
which we take to reach the culmination of right
concentration is jhanas, I don't even see how that is
debatable.

How can we overlook the Blessed one's repeated
exhortations in the overwhelming number of pali
suttas? Again and again, he says, "Practice jhanas, do
not be heedless, here is a root of a tree, empty hut,
you know what to do. Two things one must do: give
unremitting effort, and strive to attain whatever
unattained state that can be won with human endeavor."


I am always baffled when I encounter earnest
Buddhists who have the luxury of devoting 2 or more
hours of day to their practice but do not attempt
jhana or at least some kind of tranquillity meditation
(whether sitting, standing, walking) for a
significant proportion of that time.
As I get older, and death approaches rapidly, I
constantly assess my priorities on the path, and try
to target what is really crucial. In fact, to this
day, I'm still only on lesson 2 of the Gair book, and
chapter 4 of the de Silva book, despite my earnest
desire to learn more Pali. Why? Because of priorities.
We really have to carefully examine the 8fold path and
discern which factors to which we should devote most
of our time (at whatever phase of the path we happen
to be). In my case, I spent most of the today sitting
at the root of a tree with my legs crossed, just as
the buddha recommends about 5 billion (*) times in the
canon. When the moment of death arives, what am I
going to need more, expertise in Pali, or razor sharp
one pointed concentration? When that moment comes, I
intend to tell Mara to kiss my ass while I witness the
arising and cessation of 5 aggregates for the final
time.

-fk

(*) not an exact figure



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