..續本文上一頁o deal with. Sounds are hardly registered, when we are asked to listen to something else. The fourth hindrance of Restlessness, and its special case of Remorse (inner restlessness due to bad conduct), is like the over-demanding boss in your office who never gives you enough time to finish a project properly. The fifth hindrance is Doubt, which interrupts the gathering of data with premature questions. Before we have fully experienced the seen, heard, sensed or cognized, doubt interferes with the process, like a cocky student interrupting the teacher with a question in the midst of the lecture. You should now be able to appreciate that it is these Five Hindrances that distort perception, corrupt the thinking and maintain a deluded view.

　　It is well known among serious students of Buddhism that the only way to suppress these Five Hindrances is through the practice of Jhāna. As it says in the Nalakapāna Sutta (MN 68), in one who does not attain a Jhāna, the Five Hindrances (plus discontent and weariness) invade the mind and remain. Anything less than Jhāna is not powerful and lasting enough to suppress the Five Hindrances sufficiently. So, even if you are practising bare mindfulness, with the Five Hindrances still active at a subconscious level, you are not seeing things as they truly are, you are seeing things as they seem, distorted by these Five Hindrances.

　　Thus, in order to fulfil the Buddha”s Teaching to Bāhiya and Venerable Mālunkyaputta, in order that ”in the seen will be merely what is seen, in the heard will be merely what is heard, in the sensed will be merely what is sensed, and in the cognized will merely be what is cognized” – the Five hindrances have to be suppressed and that means Jhāna!

　　Seeing Things as They Truly Are

　　It is true that the Five Hindrances become suppressed just prior to Jhāna, in what the commentaries accurately call upacāra samādhi, ”stillness of mind at the threshold of Jhāna” (my own translation). So, how can you know for sure that these insidious Five Hindrances, which usually operate at a subconscious level, are fully suppressed

　　 How do you know if you are in upacāra samādhi

　　 The acid test for upacāra samādhi is that you can move effortlessly over the threshold into first Jhāna! In upacāra samādhi, there is no obstacle, no hindrance, between you and Jhāna. In just the same way, you know that you are standing on the threshold of a house when there is nothing between you and the room inside, when you can enter the room easily. If you can”t enter Jhāna, the Five Hindrances are still there. So, to make sure they are gone, you try entering a Jhāna, and you enter.

　　When the mind emerges from the Jhāna, it rests on the threshold, in upacāra samādhi, for a long time. Just like when you leave a house, you stand on the threshold again. It is at this point, during the period immediately after a Jhāna experience, when the Five Hindrances no longer invade the mind and remain (according to the above mentioned Nalakapāna Sutta), that one is finally able to practise ”in the seen is merely what is seen, in the heard is merely what is heard, in the sensed is merely what is sensed, and in the cognized is merely what is cognized”. As the Buddha repeatedly said (e.g. AN 6.50), only as a result of Jhāna (sammā samādhi) does one see things as they are (yathā-bhūta-Яānadassanam) and not as they seem.

　　The End of a View of Self

　　An experience of a Jhāna can blow you apart. What do I mean by that

　　 I mean that the data supplied by the Jhāna experience, contemplated just after in upacāra samādhi when the hindrances cannot distort anything, destroys the delusion of self, soul, me and mine.

　　In the first Jhāna mostly, and in the higher Jhānas completely, the potential to do, will, choice, what I call ”the doer”, has disappeare…

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