Bond with Diṭṭhi Rope and Carrying Away by Tanhā Water

revised on 2019-12-02

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Dhamma Talks by Mogok Sayadaw; no date noted

Before contemplating diṭṭhi with vipassanā; it’s necessary to clear away its influence beforehand. If you have the I/me and then you have mine. Therefore if you have diṭṭhi and taṇhā will follow. Diṭṭhi is binding a person and taṇhā river/water carrying him down stream.

Therefore even he is seeing the river bank and he can’t climb up on it. Even though it is taṇhā water which carried him down towards the four woeful planes, he can’t free himself from it because of been bound with diṭṭhi rope. We were carrying away randomly by taṇhā water in the whole saṁsāra. We’ll encounter with big waves and whirl pools.

The five sense objects were floods (ogha). Therefore you have to be sunk in them. The whirlpool is also pulling you in and sinking you down. Here you don’t need to be afraid of the flood and taṇhā. You have to be fear of bound with the diṭṭhi rope. Therefore the Buddha said that diṭṭhi was very important.

D.A. process makes you sink and sensual objects make you in dizziness. Taṇhā is carrying you away down there. Diṭṭhi makes you without energy and power. It was also making you missed with the Buddha and the Dhamma. Taṇhā also has not the power to carry you away if you conquer diṭṭhi.

Also you are not going into the whirlpool and flood. And there is no more sinking in the D.A. process. Therefore diṭṭhi is very important. It opposes the good and holy dhammas. It was for this reason that the Buddha taught us to abandon diṭṭhi first by giving the similes of head on fire and the inflicting by spears.

Wholesome dhammas can give the result of Nibbāna as supportive conditions. But we don’t attain it because of mixing up with diṭṭhi. If you are making merits for the purpose of Nibbāna, then don’t mix up with diṭṭhi.

(Sayadaw continued for dispelling diṭṭhi with the five khandhas). Viewing the khandha wrongly as a living being is diṭṭhi. Bound with its rope strongly and be not able to take it off, it is diṭṭhupādāna – clinging the five khandhas as me. You are not free from the four woeful planes if this diṭṭhi is not falling off.

Showing with the D.A. process; diṭṭhupādāna → kamma → painful birth. And the Buddha continued to say that it will freed from the four woeful planes if diṭṭhi had been fallen off. Therefore diṭṭhi has to be fallen away. The reason why diṭṭhi arises from the five khandhas is not clear about the sammuti sacca and the pramattha sacca – conventional and ultimate truths.

(For this point, Sayadaw gave the example of a woman who was becoming with sorrow lamentation, pain and grief with the death of her husband) This comes from not understanding about these five truths. The reason is overcoming by the conventional truth.

The five khandhas are disappearing for her and becoming sorrow, lamentation, and crying as I have lost my husband. This is crying for the non-existing thing; crying for the atta – the husband. Her non-existence husband was disappearing. This is the most difficult thing to deal with. (Worldlings are really in the state of super-craziness. Ariyans will laugh amusingly by pressing their bellies).

You all were in the whole saṁsāra had troubles, difficulties and died. And all were oppressing and tormenting by the non-existing things. Beaten with the non-existing stick, in reality can never die (But people die with sorrow, lamentation, pain and grief by the non-existing things).

You must clear about the five khandhas, also about sammuti and paramattha if you want to strip off diṭṭhi. There were eight causes to teach on conventional truths; three causes (i.e., three universal characteristics) for the ultimate truths. Teach sammuti for the sake of shame and fear of wrong doings (hiri and ottappa dhammas), etc.

Not knowing the five khandhas analytically and penetratingly, and diṭṭhi will not fall off. There are three kinds of analytical and penetrative knowledges/knowing. These are: ñāta pariññā, tīraṇa pariññā and pahāna pariññā respectively (i.e., knowledges of theory, practice and result).

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revised on 2019-12-02; cited from https://oba.org.tw/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=4362&p=36300#p36300 (posted on 2019-04-12)

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• Content of Part 11 on "Dhamma Talks by Mogok Sayadaw"

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• Content of "Dhamma Talks by Mogok Sayadaw"

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• Content of Publications of Ven. Uttamo

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