Advance Buddhism Question, Explain the stage of Neither Perception nor Non-Perception?

Question

I believe this is what is called Niroda Sanya in Pali. When you become an Arahath, your mind recognizes signal of Neither Perception nor Non-Perception that would stop the creation of Karma by eliminating Asrava. As long as you have Asrava, you cannot terminate the formation of Karma from Vinnyana. Hence, you broke the circle of life.

Buddha explains our life by taking an example from a seed.

Vinnyana is the seed, karma is the soil, and desire is water. When you eliminate the desire to your six senses made by Vinnyana (mind, body, tongue, eyes, nose, ears), you stopped adding water to the seed to grow. Just like an oil lamp, it will not glow once the oil and the wick is burnt off.

Thus, you attain the state of Nirvana because the seed will not grow again without water.

Any comments or suggestions? Please don’t give any rude answers if you don’t know what I am talking.

Answer 1

Dear Peter,
I think there are not many people in the world that can give a good explanation to your question.Only an Arahant can answer that question;of course there are many text books explanations which I am not going to give it to you as they are very academic and without 'feeling'.
Go and take up meditation under a good teacher.Hope one day you could answer that question yourself.

Metta to all.

Answer 2

This question is very deep, and so is the answer.

To be honest, as a student of Buddhism, I have not been studying or practicing Buddhism long enough to provide you with an adequate enough answer.
You did made an excellent attempt yourself, probably much better than the answer I could have provided you.
I encourage you to be under a Theravadan Teacher, monk or lama, especially since you're already at this stage in your Buddhist practice. We, as students of Buddhism are only able to learn just so much, on our own.
But with the humbly teachable attitude which you have, you'll learn so much more under the guidance of a teacher/monk, to further your Buddhist practices.
If your a student of Tibetan Buddhism, then
please talk to a monk at the temple you go to, asking humbly if you can be his student.

You ask excellent, thought provoking questions on Buddhism, and/or meditation, which I always look forward to reading and answering. Time only permits me to answer just so many questions a day though, with
working 60 hrs a week at the Hospital {am an R.N. with major in Psychology), taking two night classes, and married with 2 wonderful children. I'm sure you can relate.

Thank You for giving me the opportunity to respond to your excellent question. Gave ya a star.

Have a great week, and coming weekend.

With Metta.

Answer 3

The formless realm is divided into

attainment in meditation on the void
attainment in meditation on consciousness
attainment in meditation on nothingness
and attainment leading to a state of neither perception nor non-perception

Attachment in the formless realm:

When wrong view with its concomitant grasping no longer contaminates the realm of desire and the realm of form, rebirth in the formless realm follows. That sphere is free from form (body); there is only the knowing consciousness and, therefore, we speak of clinging to the formless realm. Denizens of that realm are no longer preoccupied with matter or material. The Dhyanas and the Dharma are their repast and their bliss.

Heart Sutra

Answer 4

I like the other respondant using The Heart of Transcendental Knowledge as the source for his/her answer. After all, this is the heart of transcendental knowledge we are talking about and is the Second Turning of the Wheel. Because this Heart Sutra is so condensed, it is necessarily packed with information and not easily "unpacked" and then summarized. Though my education and experience may lead me to use different terminology, and our desired outcome may be slightly different - the eradication of obstructions to liberation and the removal of obstructions and stains preventing the perfect omniscience of a fully enlightened buddha (Hinayana, small scope; Mahayana, Great Scope, respectively) - there are shared paths. The First Turning of the Wheel dealt with The Four Noble Truths which are two pairs of causes and results. Understanding the subtleties of the Four Noble Truths is foundational to understanding The Blessed Mother, The Heart of the Perfection of Wisdom. True suffering(s), True origin(s), true cessation(s), true path(s). The First and Thrid Noble Truth are the results of the Second and Fourth Noble Truth. There are eight sets of realizations in Maitreya's Abhisamayalankara "Filigree of Realization" that correspond to the Four Noble Truths. There is also the Sixteen Characteristics of the Four Noble Truths and the 70 Topics, all concerned with The Four Noble Truths or expounding on the Scriptural Doctrine of The Buddha. However, there is the Realizational Doctrine of Arya Nagarjuna - say, "The Precious Garland;" or even Chapter 9 of Shantideva's "A Guide to the Bodhisattvas Way of Life" where these topics are covered at length. I am the garbageman compared with these realized beings dissertations on these topics. Anyway, your question seems to be concerned with abiding in perception/samsara or abiding in non-perception/nirvana, whereas the Madhyamika (Middle Way) tenet systems would propose abiding in neither extreme (of nihilism or eternalism.) The Cittamatrin (Mind Only) school and Prasangika (Consequence) school of Madhyamika might seem at variance on these topics but are an excellent entry point for discriminating between conventional and ultimate truths, which are central to understanding The Four Noble Truths and The Heart Sutra. After all, once you take a topic as the object of observation you have to know what is looking at "it," and what is to be posited or refuted through the various types of meditation. So, at the root of all these afflictions is attachment, and what is at the root of attachment? Ignorance! Self-grasping ignorance that of "I," as in "I" am at the center of "my" universe and "my" opinion is most important to "me," and "my" happiness is more important than "yours" and "his" and "hers." Take a mountain, for example. If you were standing on a mountain and looking at another mountain, the one you are on is "this" mountain and the one you are looking at is "that" mountain. If you were to then climb down the first and climb up the second, the one you would be standing on would be "this" mountain and the one you were standing on would then be "that" mountain. It's changeable, impermanent. Not fixed. It is non-abiding in either extreme. It is Madhyamika - The Middle Way. It would also serve us well to study The Twelve Links of Dependent Arising - this is a shared topic as well and central to understanding the Four Noble Truths and by extension The Heart Sutra. After all, you can't refute what you can't refute and the remedy is itself remedied by itself! So, The Twelve Links are skimmed over so fast, karma is skimmed over so fast. The Four Noble Truths are skimmed over so fast, The Heart Sutra is skimmed over so fast, it is no wonder then, that The Buddha's Differentiation of Topics would be sklimmed over so fast, too! Anyway, start again with true suffering. The suffering of suffering, the suffering of change, the pervasive, compounded suffering. However suffering is enumerated, there is suffering. This suffering is a result of origin. The Buddha taught suffering first because it is the only thing that can create the desire to be free of it from the person taking the suffering as its object of observation! So, we have this suffering - the suffering of aging and dying right up to the suffering of birth. These are the first and last of The Twelve Links. Likening it to a garden, the fundamental ground (I am not clear about this but some schools posit a "storehouse" (vinaya) for these seeds of action (karma) through the three doors of body, speech and mind) is the soil and so forth...Anyway, the "I" is the problem. The senses are the problem. You can't say they don't exist because they do, this is their conventionality. You can't say they do exist (ultimately) because they don't. They are impermanent, they are subject to the three: production, abiding and cessation. They are all products and they are likewise produced in the consciousness that percieves them and the consciousness itself is produced moment to moment. It's the self-grasping (and by extension the self-cherishing) that is at the root of all the trouble in the world. Attachment is another biggie. It is the cause of all the trouble and strife. We can find happiness, though, in trying to remember that our death is certain, the time of our death, however, is not certain. Death, itself, is our constant companion, and he has no master! All of these various (tragic) comedies we can see all around us are our reminder to wake up, to not grasp at all we see, hear, touch, taste, smell, and think. I hope this helps. I am my most precious Teacher's worst student.

Answer 5

there is nothing to attain.