..續本文上一頁d taken all these things to be a self, and that the result was so much birth and consequent suffering. The cause was so much controlling and doing and craving (tanha). Wriggling through Samsara, wriggling towards happiness, wriggling away from pain, always trying to control the world. It”s not what one would like to see. However, through the experience of the jhanas, and the surmounting of conditioning, one has gone beyond all of that. It is not what one has been taught. It is what one has seen, it is what one has actually experienced. This is the brilliance of the Buddha”s teaching of anatta. It goes right to the heart of everything.
They say that the Dhamma is the source. One is not going outwards to its consequences, one is not getting lost in papanca (mental proliferation). One is going right in to the very middle, the very essence, and the very heart of the atta, what one takes to be ”me”. From the body into the mind, from the mind into ”the doer”, from ”the doer” into ”the knower”, one can then see that one is not ”the knower”. It”s just causes and conditions. That”s all it is, just a process. Then one will understand why the Buddha said that he doesn”t teach annihilation. Annihilation means that there is some thing there that existed, which is now destroyed. Nor did he teach eternalism (that there is some thing there that is never destroyed). He taught the Middle Way, namely Dependent Origination.
The process that one has taken to be a self for all these lifetimes is just an empty process. Cause effect, cause effect, cause effect - just a process. "When there is this, this comes into being. With the cessation of that, that ceases." That is the heart of the Buddha”s teaching. Everything is subject to that law. If one can see everything as being subject to that law, then one has seen fully into the nature of anatta. Samsara has been mortally wounded; and one will soon make an end of all birth, old age, death and suffering. If, however, there is just a tiny bit left, which one hasn”t seen, just a tiny bit - that can keep one stuck in Samsara for aeons. Sabbe-dhamma-anatta”ti. The whole bloody lot!
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[1] Dhamma discourse given by Ajahn Brahmavamso at Bodhinyana Monastery on 19th September 2001, during the annual three-month Rains Retreat.
[2] The five hindrances are: sensual desire, ill will, sloth-and-torpor, restlessness-and-remorse, and doubt. In the suttas these are said to be the ”nutriment” for ignorance (AN 10, 61).
[3] References to suttas: AN = Anguttara Nikaya, MN = Majjhima Nikaya, DN = Digha Nikaya, SN = Samyutta Nikaya (references to book number, then sutta number).
[4] These are the five khandhas, or ”groups of existence”, which the Buddha taught compose the entirety of sentient human existence.
[5] In Buddhism there are 5 core precepts, (moral codes) for wholesome bodily and verbal conduct, which are undertaken; to abstain from: killing, stealing, sexual misconduct (ie. adultery), false speech, and intoxicants like alcohol, which give rise to heedlessness. For monastics the main additional precepts are: celibacy and not handling money.
[6] Jhanas - deep states of meditative ”absorption”, where the mind becomes united with one object for long periods of time. In these states the five hindrances have been abandoned. The mind dwells within itself and in these states of refined bliss there is no impingement at all from the five external senses.
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