Bhante & Dharma friends,

My apologies for digressing.

In the course of learning meditation, I have often heard the analogy of sawing, that
is watching the point of sawing and not watching the saw.

Is this from the Visuddhimagga or is it a meditation saw (pun intended).

In Dhamma,

Piya

Bhante Sujato wrote:

> Dear Ven Yuttadhammo, Dmytro, and all
>
> > > It means "leading to only one place", i.e. Nibbana. For another
> > > context see Mahasihanada sutta (MN I 74):
>
> Is there anywhere in the Pali where Nibbana is referred to as
> the 'one'? As far as i know, this term had been so thouroughly
> subsumed by the Vedic tradition (ekam sat, etc.) that the Buddha
> studiously avoided using it for Nibbana, but was happy to use it in
> samaadhi contexts. As i mentioned before, the only significant
> meaning of eka in satipatthana contexts is 'one pointedness of
> mind'.
>
> Thanks to Ven Yuttadhammo for his many interesting quotes. There are
> other quotes in the Sanskrit, too. In one place it is given as the
> name of a Brahmanical text, explained by Sankara as niitisastra. The
> conclusion seems to be that there are many different meanings
> of 'ekaayana', so we should look to see which is relevant in the
> satipatthana context.
>
> In the Brahmanical scriptures, the other meanings (single path,
> etc.) only seem to occur in direct contexts (as also in the Jataka
> examples), not in the mystic/spiritual/meditative contexts. There,
> the meanings seems to be, as i said before, 'convergence'. Since the
> suttas virtually tell us to read this phrase in Brahmanical context,
> i think we can be as confident as can be expected that this is the
> right meaning here.
>
> Again, it is a complex textual argument, but try this as an
> experiment. Leave aside the Satipatthana Sutta, and go back to the
> Satipatthana Samyutta. See how the term 'ekaayana' is used there -
> you can even do a statistical analysis. This will demonstrate just
> how important the Brahmanical context is. The Chinese versions
> substantially reinforce this.
>
> in Dhamma
> Bhante Sujato
>
>
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