Thanks for your good question.
Some delay in answering because of work.
Op 1 sep 2013, om 00:08 heeft a6a44357 het volgende geschreven:
My question is as follows, "When I or somebody meditates on say using the
breath, this is called Mindfulness of the breath, right?". So I am puzzeled
when you say, " It can only arise when there are the right conditions,
namely, listening and considering the Dhamma over and over again."
I suppose I'm missing something please explain, thank you.
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N: We have to distinguish samatha and vipassanaa. The aim of samatha is being away from sense objects and attachment to them. Vipassana: development of understanding of all realities in daily life. Depending on accumulations people develop samatha, or vipassanaa or both.
The Buddha did not speak only of mindfulness of breath, he also spoke about seeing, hearing, all sense-cognitions and the defilements arising on account of them.
They are ordinary realities of daily life but we know so little about them. We think that it is I or self who is seeing, hearing or thinking.
Before hearing the Dhamma we did not know that it is citta, moment of consciousness that sees, and another citta that hears or thinks. We did not know that attachment is akusala, we did not see the value of kusala.
Through reading, studying, hearing, considering, we learn that kusala does not harm oneself, someone else or both. We can verify this in daily life. Gradually we understand that kindness is more beneficial then being angry with someone who insults us. In this way understanding accumulates, it grows. But very slowly. There will be more intellectual understanding of the Dhamma and this can condition later on higher levels of understanding. These higher levels are direct understanding of the truth and enlightenment, when the unconditioned element, nibbaana, is experienced and defilements eradicated stage by stage.
Pariyatti is intellectual understanding, always pertaining to the reality appearing at this moment. This will lead to pa.tipatti, the development of direct understanding, namely, satipa.t.thaana, and this to pativedha, direct realization of the truth. It all takes lives, aeons, but it is best to develop more understanding of seeing, visible object, all that appears now. Otherwise we might have desire for what has not come yet.
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Nina.