Venerable Bhikkhu Kumara and dear Mahinda,
Op 20-jan-2012, om 7:02 heeft Mahinda Palihawadana het volgende
geschreven:

> It's very encouraging to hear this about Bhiikhu Bodhi. I was
> always a bit
> disappointed with the excessive reliance on commentaries that we
> can see in
> the work of Bhikkhus Nyanatiloka, Nanaponika and Bodhi.
>

---------
N: Let us say it depends on the reader what benefit he finds in the
commentaries. Any teaching that can help me to understand the true
characteristics of realities I find beneficial. Certainly, the
commentaries are most helpful for me and they are in complete
accordance with the Tipi.taka. What do they emphasize: develop
understanding of the present reality so that there will be detachment
from the idea of self.
Quoting something I wrote before:

At the very beginning of the Visuddhimagga (Ch I, 1) we read:
�When a wise man, established well in Virtue,
Develops Consciousness and Understanding,
Then as a bhikkhu ardent and sagacious
He succeeds in disentangling this tangle (S I, 13)�
It is said that tangle is a term for the network of craving.

The final verse of this section of the Vis. is an exhortation to the
development of sati sampaja~n~na: : 'Let a wise man (pa.n.dito) with
mindfulness, so practise...' . The text states: 'always mindful,
sadaa sato'.
Without awareness and understanding of the dhamma appearing now one
will not understand the Dependent Origination and not disentangle the
triple round, the tangle of ignorance and craving.

The Sammohavinodanii, Dispeller of Delusion, also deals with the
Dependent Origination in a similar wording and it gives at the end of
the Abhidhamma Division (p. 262) an exhortation to develop the way
leading out of the cycle:
<[Therefore] in accordance with the Order
Consisting of Competency-Learning-Reflection-Practice
The wise act always in regard thereto
for there is nothing other than that which more needs to be done.>
As we read in the subco. to the mahaanidaanasutta as to the first two
stages of tender insight, these <do not come about by the mere first
interpretation of phenomena, but by the recurrent arising of
knowledge about them called � repeated understanding�.>
This reminds us to persevere with the development of understanding of
all dhammas appearing in our daily life. There is nothing other than
that which more needs to be done.
---------
Nina.



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