Seeing does not pay attention to shape and form

We learn through the Abhidhamma that seeing arises in a process or series of cittas which all experience the same object, that is, visible object. A process of cittas experiencing an object through a sense-door is followed by a process of cittas experiencing that object through the mind-door. Visible object is experienced through the eye-door and after the eye-door process has been completed that object is experienced through the mind-door. After that there can be other mind-door processes of cittas which think of a concept of shape and form, of a whole, of a thing or a person. Seeing experiences what is visible, and it experiences it through the eyesense. Seeing does not pay attention to shape and form. The cittas which pay attention to shape and form arise later on. When we know that something is a house or when we recognize a person there is thinking of concepts conditioned by remembrance of former experiences, and this is different from seeing. Seeing does not pay attention to beauty or ugliness, at the moment of seeing there is no like or dislike.

Shortly after seeing has fallen away, kusala cittas or akusala cittas arise in that same eye-door process. Thus, even before we know what it is that was seen, kusala cittas or akusala cittas arise on account of the object; these types arise because of their own conditions. There is not one moment of them but seven moments and they are called “javana-cittas”, which can be translated as the cittas that “run through” the object. When a sense-door process has been completed it is followed by a mind-door process with seven javana-cittas, kusala cittas or akusala cittas. If there are other mind-door processes of cittas which think of concepts, there are also in these processes kusala cittas or akusala cittas.

The cittas which think of concepts are akusala cittas if their objective is not dana, síla or bhavana, mental development. We cannot think of concepts with cittas which are neither kusala nor akusala. We may wonder why it is necessary to learn about the different processes of cittas and the objects that are experienced by citta. It may all seem abstract. However, we can find out that everything that is taught in the Abhidhamma occurs in our daily life. There are time and again seeing, attachment to seeing and to visible object, attachment to the people and things we think of, and we can find out that attachment brings sorrow. A more precise knowledge of the different cittas and also of akusala citta and kusala citta will help us to develop more wholesomeness.