..續本文上一頁ell, taste, touch and ideation will be broad and wide open. The water will be clear, and the light brilliant. We”ll be able to know all around us.
In the same way, those who are to know death clearly have to begin by practicing concentration as a foundation for developing liberating insight. How do the five sorts of above-mentioned sensation arise
What are their causes
How do they disappear
How do physical and mental feelings arise
How do they disappear
What are their causes
How do labels and concepts arise
What are their causes
How do they disappear
How do mental fashionings arise
What are their causes
How do they disappear
How does consciousness arise by way of the senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch, and ideation
What are its causes
How does it disappear
Altogether there are four levels to each of the five aggregates (khandhas): external and internal, staying in place and streaming outward. These can be known at all times, but only people who have the discernment that comes from training the mind in tranquillity and insight meditation will be able to know death on this level.
The discernment that arises in this way has been termed pubbenivasanussati-ñana, i.e., understanding past sensations, future sensations, and sensations in the present. These sensations differ in the way they arise and pass away. To know this is to have mastered one cognitive skill.
Cutupapata-ñana: With discernment of this sort, we”re able to keep track of the states of our own mind as they arise and disappear, sometimes good as they arise and good as they disappear, sometimes bad as they arise and bad as they disappear, sometimes good as they arise and bad as they disappear, sometimes bad as they arise and good as they disappear. To be able to keep track in this way is to know states of being and birth.
Asavakkhaya-ñana: When the discernment of this skill arises, it leads to disenchantment with the way sensations and mental acts arise and disappear and then arise again, simply circling about: coarser sensations going through the cycle slowly, more refined sensations going quickly; coarser mental acts going slowly, more refined mental acts going quickly. When you can keep track of this, you know one form of stress. Now focus attention back on your own mind to see whether or not it”s neutral at that moment. If the mind approves of its knowledge or of the things it knows, that”s kamasukhallikanuyoga — indulgence in pleasure. If the mind disapproves of its knowledge or of the things it knows, that”s attakilamathanuyoga, indulgence in self-infliction. Once you”ve seen this, make the mind neutral toward whatever it may know: That moment of awareness is the mental state forming the Path. When the Path arises, the causes of stress disband. Try your best to keep that mental state going. Follow that train of awareness as much as you can. The mind when it”s in that state is said to be developing the Path — and at whatever moment the Path stands firm, disbanding and relinquishing occur.
When you can do this, you reach the level where you know death clearly. People who know death in this way are then able to reduce the number of their own deaths. Some of the Noble Ones have seven more deaths ahead of them, some have only one more, others go beyond death entirely. These Noble Ones are people who understand birth and death, and for this reason have only a few deaths left to them. Ordinary people who understand their own birth and death on this level are hard to find. Common, ordinary birth and death aren”t especially necessary; but people who don”t understand the Dhamma have to put up with birth and death as a common thing.
So whoever is to know death on this level will have to develop the cognitive skill that comes f…
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