Re: Question on ṭhānesu from Mahāparinibbāna commentary

Dear Dmytro,

Thanks very much for this reference. In the Vsm he uses the word jhānika, "belonging to the first jhāna, etc.," so I guess "grounds" or "bases" is a good translation

On paricchedākāsa Vsm (5.24) uses the word paricchinnākāsa rather than paricchedākāsa, but they come from the same word, so obviously the same thing.

Thanks very much for your help. One other question on this passage: when the commentary says (DN-a 2, 594 last line)

bhagavā pana jhānaṃ samāpajjitvā jhānā vuṭṭhāya jhānaṅgāni paccavekkhitvā bhavaṅgacittena abyākatena dukkhasaccena parinibbāyi.

"The Bhagavan after entering the (fourth) jhāna, and arising from the jhāna, after observing the jhāna factors (the thirteen grounds already mentioned) entered parinibbāna, with the life-continuum mind unaffected (avyākata) by the truth of suffering."

I am wondering what the word avyākata means in this context? According to the CPD the meaning is "indeterminate" "undecided" but those definitions don't seem to fit here. Is the sense of this line that the dukkhasacca is not relevant/has no effect at the level of the bhavaṅgacitta?

Thanks again for your help,

Mettā,

Bryan

On Wednesday, September 5, 2018, 5:15:53 AM NDT, Dmytro Ivakhnenko aavuso@... [palistudy] <palistudy@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

Dear Bryan,

See Visuddhimagga III, 107. For example, the fourth jhana can be reached on the basis of ten kasinas, fourth divine abiding and four arūpa attainments - hence fifteen grounds altogether.

Limited space is one of Visuddhimagga kasina-mandalas.

Best wishes, Dmytro

Ср, 5 вер. 2018, 02:11 користувач Bryan Levman bryan.levman@... [palistudy] <palistudy@yahoogroups.com> пише:

Dear Pāli friends,

In the Mahāparinibbānasutta, the Buddha enters parinibbāna from the fourth jhāna after going from first to the ninth jhāna (cesssation) and back down again to the first, and up to the fourth (DN 2, 156).

The commentary (Sv 2, 594) talks about this last run through jhānas one to four:

ettha bhagavā catuvīsatiyā ṭhānesu paṭhamajjhānaṃ samāpajji, terasasu ṭhānesu dutiyajjhānaṃ, tathā tatiyajjhānaṃ, pannarasasu ṭhānesu catutthajjhānaṃ samāpajji.

“Here the Bhagavan entered into the first jhāna in twenty-four ṭhānesu, the second jhāna in thirteen ṭhānesu, the third jhāna in thirteen, and he entered the fourth jhāna in fifteen ṭhānesu.

My question is, what does ṭhānesu mean? and how would one translate catuvīsatiyā ṭhānesu? nothing I have come up with makes much sense. It seems that the twenty-four ṭhānas are subsumed somehow by the jhānas, so perhaps “He entered the first jhāna contaning 24 attributes/characteristics. But I don’t know of any canonical reference to the first jhāna containing such. Or perhaps it means “grounds”, viz., “he entered the first jhāna which had 24 grounds”, but again, I don’t know.Or perhaps "in twenty-four stages"?

The twenty-four ṭhānas are given in the same commentary as the ten asubha (foulness) meditations (similar to the cemetery meditations in the Satipaṭṭhana), the thirty-two parts of the body meditation, the eight kasiṇa meditations, the first three of the brahma-vihāra meditations (love, compassion and joy), in-and-out-breathing meditation and limit of space (paricchedakāse). if you count the 32 body-parts as one meditation (which it is), this adds up to twenty-four.

Cone lists several meanings for ṭhāna (situation, position, state, occasion, occurrence, attribute, characteristic, quality, ground, basis, reason, cause, stance, standpoint, condition), none of which seem to quite fit here.

Any ideas as to how to translate catuvīsatiyā ṭhānesu? and how does it make sense doctrinally? Thirdly, does anyone know what paricchedakāse means? Literally, it means “limit-space” and I know there was some controversy in the Kathāvatthu as to whether space had any limit or not. But I’m not familiar with any meditation on that point.

Thanks for your help,

Bryan