..续本文上一页nced or is now experiencing, and it can”t say that there isn”t. Thus it falls into absorption in the sense of neither perception nor non-perception.

　　All four levels of arupa jhana have a sense of pleasure and well-being as their common basis. Beginning with the first level, there is an extremely fine and subtle sense of pleasure, but your understanding of it isn”t true. What this means is that you can”t yet let go of your understanding of it. You simply remain focused and absorbed in it, without trying to find out its causes. The mind at this point doesn”t feel inclined to reason or investigate, because the sense of pleasure is relaxed and exquisite beyond measure.

　　So if you want to escape beyond all suffering and stress, you should practice focusing from one level of arupa jhana to another, in and out, back and forth, over and over, until you are skilled at it. Then investigate, searching for the causes and underlying factors until you can know that, "Here the mind is stuck on the act of labeling — here it is stuck on the act of mental fashioning — here it is stuck on the act of consciousness."

　　Consciousness is the underlying factor for name and form, or physical and mental phenomena. Physical and mental phenomena, by their nature, contain each other within themselves. Once you understand this, focus on the internal sense of the form of the body. Consider it through and through so that it becomes more and more refined until the mind is absolutely firm, absorbed in a single preoccupation, either on the sensual level (a sensory image of the body) or on the formless level. Keep the mind fixed, and then examine that particular preoccupation until you see how it arises and passes away — but don”t go assuming yourself to be what arises and passes away. Keep the mind neutral and unaffected, and in this way you will be able to know the truth.

　　The way in which the four levels of rupa jhana and the four levels of arupa jhana are fashioned can be put briefly as follows: Focus on any one of the four properties making up the sense of the form of the body (earth, water, fire, and wind). This is rupa jhana. The one object you focus on can take you all the way to the fourth level, with the various levels differing only in the nature of the act of focusing. As for arupa jhana, it comes from rupa jhana. In other words, you take the sense of physical pleasure coming from rupa jhana as your starting point and then focus exclusively on that pleasure as your object. This can also take you all the way to the fourth level — absorption in the sense of neither perception nor non-perception — with the various levels differing only in their point of view. Or, to put it in plain English, you focus (1) on the body and (2) on the mind.

　　Rupa jhana is like a mango; arupa jhana, like the mango”s taste. A mango has a shape, but no one can see the shape of its taste, because it”s something subtle and refined. This is why people who don”t practice in line with the levels of concentration go astray in the way they understand things. Some people even believe that death is annihilation. This sort of view comes from the fact that they are so blind that they can”t find themselves. And since they can”t find themselves, they decide that death is annihilation. This is like the fool who believes that when a fire goes out, fire has been annihilated. Those who have looked into the matter, though, say that fire hasn”t been annihilated, and they can even start it up again without having to use glowing embers the way ordinary people do.

　　In the same way, a person”s mind and body are not annihilated at death. Take a blatant example: When a man dies and is cremated, people say that his body no longer exists. But actually its elements are still there. The earth is still earth j…

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