Enlightenment - Experiencing or thinking about nibbana
B. Is enlightenment or the experience of nibbāna the same as thinking about nibbāna?
A.
Is the direct experience of the characteristics of nāma and rūpa the same as
thinking about them?
B.
No, it is different.
A.
Even so is the direct experience of nibbāna different from thinking about it.
B.
Through which door does the person who attains enlightenment experience
nibbāna?
A.
Nibbāna cannot be experienced through any of the five senses, it is
experienced through the mind-door.
B.
Objects which contact the five sense-doors or the mind-door are experienced
by cittas arising in processes of citta. What is the process of cittas like which
experience nibbāna? How many cittas experience nibbāna directly?
A.
The person who is about to attain enlightenment has developed the
knowledge of conditioned realities in the practice of vipassanā. He has
realized the characteristics of nāma and rūpa more and more clearly and he
experiences their arising and falling away. Paññā has been developed to the
degree that it can realize the nāma and rūpa which present themselves
through the six doors as aniccā (impermanent), dukkha and anattā (not
self). In the process during which enlightenment is attained, the mano-
dvārāvajjana-citta (mind-door-adverting-consciousness) takes as its object
one of the three characteristics of reality: aniccā, dukkha or anattā.
B.
I understand that anicca, dukkha and anattā are three aspects of the truth of
conditioned realities. Thus, if one sees one aspect, one also sees the other
aspects. Why can one not experience the three characteristics at the same
time?
A.
Cittas can experience only one object at a time. It depends on one's
accumulations which of the three characteristics is realized in the process of
cittas during which enlightenment is attained: one person views the reality
appearing at that moment as anicca, another as dukkha, and another again
as anatta.
The mano-dvārāvajjana-citta of that process adverts to one of these three
characteristics and is then succeeded by three or four cittas which are not yet
lokuttara cittas. but mahā-kusala cittas (kusala cittas of the sensuous plane
of consciousness), accompanied by paññā. The first mahā-kusala citta is
called parikamma, and it still has the same object as the mano-dvārāvajjana
-citta. If the mano-dvārāvajjana-citta had anicca as the object, parikamma
realizes the characteristic of aniccā.