Saññā-vedayita-nirodhaṃ

STED (smd 9) Saññā-vedayita-nirodhaṃ

STED (smd 9) Perception-feeling-cessation

sabbaso neva-saññā-nāsaññā-(a)yatanaṃ samatikkamma	(with) complete Neither-perception-nor-non-perception-dimension's transcending,
Saññā-vedayita-nirodhaṃ upasampajja viharati	Perception-feeling-cessation, (he) enters, dwells

Is it possible to emerge from this attainment without becoming Ariya?

GNL asked: Bhante, what to say about the concept of a definitive liberation (nippariyāyenā nibbānaṃ) lying beyond the threshold of attainment and transcending of the dimension of neither perception nor non-perception (nevasaññānāsaññāyatanaṃ), as found in AN9.47 and other suttas of AN's 9th chapter?

Ven. Brahmali: I would say this is just one particular way of looking at the process of liberation, that is, by focusing on samatha. None of these attainments is actually required, apart from the ending of the corruptions (the āsavās) at the very end. Yet going though the immaterial attainments seems to be a valid way of reaching the end of the path. Somewhere along the way you are likely to become a stream-enterer, but the particular point at which this happens will depend on the nature of your spiritual qualities. The combination of stream-entry and taking samatha to its peak will then enable you to attain the end of perception and feeling (saññā-vedayita-nirodha) and also the end of the āsavas.

It is interesting that the end of perception and feeling almost invariably is paired with the end of the āsavas in the suttas. You get the impression that seeing everything cease is a very powerful foundation for insight, as one would expect. Yet despite this strong correlation between the two, it does not seem to be absolute. There is at least one sutta (AN 5.166) where the end of perception of feeling does not immediately lead to the end of the āsavas, but instead you go on to another rebirth. But this sutta is really just minor variation. Overall it is clear that the end of perception and feeling is a very profound attainment that will normally result in the deepest possible insight.

So no, I don't think it is there just to support the description of the Buddha's final passing away in DN 16.

Question on Bhante's comment:
It is interesting that the end of perception and feeling almost invariably is paired with the end of the āsavas in the suttas. You get the impression that seeing everything cease is a very powerful foundation for insight, as one would expect. Yet despite this strong correlation between the two, it does not seem to be absolute. There is at least one sutta (AN 5.166) where the end of perception of feeling does not immediately lead to the end of the āsavas, but instead you go on to another rebirth. But this sutta is really just minor variation. Overall it is clear that the end of perception and feeling is a very profound attainment that will normally result in the deepest possible insight.

Bhante, Is the realm that they're born into a non-returner brahma realm? In other words, if one is able to enter and emerge from SVN (perceptions feelings cessation), the possibilities are:
1. they immediately become an arahant
2. they immediately become a non-returner, and may attain arahantship in the rest of their human life
3. neither case 1 or 2, they are reborn in a brahma realm where they are not a non-returner or ariya

Is case 3 possible?
I'm seen plenty of passages where after emerging from SVN, asavas are destroyed (arahantship). There are plenty of passages where nothing is stated about what happens after emerging from SVN.

I think from Bodhi's footnotes, the only possibilites are arahantship or non-returner. Is this true according to EBT, or is that based on commentaries?

AN 5.166 emerging, attains non-returner, not arahant this life

Then the Blessed One addressed the bhikkhus: “Here, bhikkhus, a bhikkhu accomplished in virtuous behavior, concentration, and wisdom might enter and emerge from the cessation of perception and feeling. If he does not reach final knowledge in this very life, then, having been reborn among a certain group of mind-made [deities] that transcend the company of devas that subsist on edible food, he might [again] enter and emerge from the cessation of perception and feeling. There is this possibility.” This is what the Blessed One said. Having said this, the Fortunate One got up from his seat and entered his dwelling. [195]

Is case 3 possible?

Well, the sutta itself says nothing about anāgāmīs (non-returners), but rebirth in the brahmāloka (the brahmā world) seems implied by the word “mind-made”: “having been reborn among a certain group of mind-made [deities] that transcend the company of devas that subsist on edible food.” Moreover, the description “accomplished in … wisdom” normally refers to stream-enterers. (In fact I am not aware that it can refer to anything else.) And any ariyan who gets reborn in the brahmā world is at the very least a jhānānāgāmī. (These are non-returners because of jhāna attainment, not the usual kind of non-returners who have eliminated the five lower fetters.) So it looks like case 3 is possible.

Is this true according to EBT, or is that based on commentaries?

It seems to be commentarial. Yet if the suttas limit case 3 to the jhānānāgāmīs, then this very close to the commentarial position.

Invulnerability during attainment

MN 50 they tried to cremate previous Buddha

MN 50

Of all the disciples of the Buddha Kakusandha,	Yāvatā kho pana, pāpima, kakusandhassa bhagavato arahato sammāsambuddhassa sāvakā.
none were the equal of Venerable Vidhura in teaching Dhamma.	Tesu na ca koci āyasmatā vidhurena samasamo hoti yadidaṃ dhammadesanāya.
And that’s how he came to be known as Vidhura.	Iminā kho evaṃ, pāpima, pariyāyena āyasmato vidhurassa vidhuroteva samaññā udapādi.
But when Venerable Sañjīva had gone to a wilderness, or to the root of a tree, or to an empty hut, he easily attained the cessation of perception and feeling.	Āyasmā pana, pāpima, sañjīvo araññagatopi rukkhamūlagatopi suññāgāragatopi appakasireneva saññāvedayitanirodhaṃ samāpajjati.
Once upon a time, Sañjīva was sitting at the root of a certain tree having attained the cessation of perception and feeling.	Bhūtapubbaṃ, pāpima, āyasmā sañjīvo aññatarasmiṃ rukkhamūle saññāvedayitanirodhaṃ samāpanno nisinno hoti.
Some cowherds, shepherds, farmers, and passers-by saw him sitting there	Addasaṃsu kho, pāpima, gopālakā pasupālakā kassakā pathāvino āyasmantaṃ sañjīvaṃ aññatarasmiṃ rukkhamūle saññāvedayitanirodhaṃ samāpannaṃ nisinnaṃ;
and said:	disvāna tesaṃ etadahosi:
‘It’s incredible, it’s amazing!	‘acchariyaṃ vata bho, abbhutaṃ vata, bho.
This ascetic passed away while sitting.	Ayaṃ samaṇo nisinnakova kālaṅkato.
We should cremate him.’	Handa naṃ dahāmā’ti.
They collected grass, wood, and cow-dung, heaped it all on Sañjīva’s body, set it on fire, and left.	Atha kho te, pāpima, gopālakā pasupālakā kassakā pathāvino tiṇañca kaṭṭhañca gomayañca saṅkaḍḍhitvā āyasmato sañjīvassa kāye upacinitvā aggiṃ datvā pakkamiṃsu.
Then, when the night had passed, Sañjīva emerged from that attainment, shook out his robes, and, since it was morning, he robed up and entered the village for alms.	Atha kho, pāpima, āyasmā sañjīvo tassā rattiyā accayena tāya samāpattiyā vuṭṭhahitvā cīvarāni papphoṭetvā pubbaṇhasamayaṃ nivāsetvā pattacīvaramādāya gāmaṃ piṇḍāya pāvisi.
Those cowherds, shepherds, farmers, and passers-by saw him wandering for alms	Addasaṃsu kho te, pāpima, gopālakā pasupālakā kassakā pathāvino āyasmantaṃ sañjīvaṃ piṇḍāya carantaṃ;
and said:	disvāna nesaṃ etadahosi:
‘It’s incredible, it’s amazing!	‘acchariyaṃ vata bho, abbhutaṃ vata, bho.
This ascetic passed away while sitting, and now he has come back to life!’	Ayaṃ samaṇo nisinnakova kālaṅkato, svāyaṃ paṭisañjīvito’ti.
And that’s how he came to be known as Sañjīva.	Iminā kho evaṃ, pāpima, pariyāyena āyasmato sañjīvassa sañjīvoteva samaññā udapādi.

KN Ud 4.4 sariputta receives mighty blow to head from yakkha

KN Ud 4.4
9Then the yakkha taking no notice of that other yakkha, gave a blow on the elder venerable Sāriputta’s head: it was such a great blow that with that blow a seven, or seven and a half cubit Nāga elephant might have been felled, or a great mountain top might have been burst open.

10Then that yakkha calling out: “I’m burning, I’m burning” right there and then fell into the Great Hell.

11Venerable Mahāmoggallāna saw with his divine-eye, which is purified, and surpasses that of normal men, that yakkha giving a blow on venerable Sāriputta’s head. And after seeing it, he went to venerable Sāriputta, and after going, he said this to venerable Sāriputta: “Can you bear up, venerable friend? Can you carry on? Do you have any pain?”

12“I can bear up, friend Moggallāna; I can carry on, friend Moggallāna, but I have a little pain on my head.”

13“Wonderful, friend Sāriputta, marvellous, friend Sāriputta, such is the venerable Sāriputta’s great power and great majesty. Here, friend Sāriputta, a certain yakkha gave a blow on your head: it was such a great blow, that with that blow a seven, or seven and a half cubit Nāga elephant might have been felled, or a great mountain top might have been burst open. But then venerable Sāriputta said this: ‘I can bear up, friend Moggallāna; I can carry on, friend Moggallāna, but I have a little pain on my head.’ ”

14“Wonderful, friend Moggallāna, marvellous, friend Moggallāna, such is the venerable Mahāmoggallāna’s great power and great majesty, in as much as he can even see a yakkha, whereas we at present do not even see a mud-demon!”

But the sutta doesn’t actually say what kind of meditative attainment Ven. Sariputta was in:

Then at that time venerable Sāriputta, on a moonlight night, with his hair freshly shaved off, was sitting in the open air, having attained a certain concentration.

essay from Ven. Sunyo, briefly describes many relevant suttas to smd9

frankk: note, I don’t agree with some of his views, but sutta ref. Descriptions are useful.
https://discourse.suttacentral.net/t/the-cessation-of-perception-and-feelings-a-temporary-nibbana/33324/2
In AN ^9.34 Venerable Sāriputta tells Venerable Udayī that extinguishment (nibbāna), when nothing is experienced (or ‘felt’), is pleasant (sukha).
Because enlightened beings still have experiences, this refers not the extinguishment of the mind’s defilements at enlightenment but to the extinguishment of existence at death, also known as parinibbāna, ‘full extinguishment’.
Sāriputta continues, explaining to Udayī how to understand that this extinguishment is pleasant.
He first says it can be understood through an experience of the first jhāna.
He similarly goes through the higher states of meditation:
first the other three jhānas, then the four formless states, and ending with the cessation of perception and feeling—saññāvedayitanirodha in Pāli, which I translate as ‘the cessation of awareness and what is experienced’.
Through this state too, one can understand how extinguishment is pleasant.

There are two things I wish to highlight here.
First, when explaining how to understand that extinguishment is pleasant, the cessation of awareness and what is experienced is the final meditative state Sāriputta mentions.
This is noteworthy, for if extinguishment was something even more pleasant than this state, something somehow beyond it, we should expect it to be mentioned separately too.
For what better way to understand that extinguishment is pleasant than through an experience of extinguishment itself?
(Now, Sāriputta does mention enlightenment at the very end of the discourse, but this is the extinguishment of the defilements, which as mentioned is not the absence of experiences he mentions at the start and explains thereafter.
)

Second, at the start of the discourse Sāriputta says full extinguishment is the absence of anything experienced, while at the end he mentions the meditative state of the cessation of awareness and what is experienced, where there also is nothing experienced.
There is a simple conclusion we can draw from this:
the subjective “experience” of these two states—the cessation of existence and the cessation of awareness and what is experienced—is identical.
Although the former is a permanent situation after death and the latter a temporary state of meditation, both involve a stopping of all mental processes and all awareness.
Liberally speaking, we might call the cessation of awareness and what is experienced a temporary extinguishment of existence, a foretaste of parinibbāna in this life.
(A similar connection has been made by Louis de La Vallée Poussin, Lambert Schmithausen, Paul J.
Griffiths, Alexander Wynne, Peter Harvey, and others.
)

Sāriputta’s exchange with Udayī in AN ^9.34 is not the only reason for these conclusions:

In AN ^9.47 the Buddha says the four jhānas and the four formless states are “extinguishment visible in this life in a provisional sense”, whereas the cessation of awareness and what is experienced is “extinguishment visible in this life in a non-provisional sense”.

In MN ⁶⁶ the Buddha encourages his disciples to surpass the first jhāna to attain the second, surpass the second to attain the third, and so on, finally surpassing the last formless state of neither-awareness-nor-nonawareness (or ‘neither-perception-nor-nonperception’) to attain the cessation of awareness and what is experienced.
Then he stops and says, since he recommends surpassing even neither-awareness-nor-nonawareness, there is no single attachment that he does not recommend giving up.
There is no mention of giving up the cessation of awareness and what is experienced to attain extinguishment.
This indicates there is nothing left in the cessation of awareness and what is experienced that could still be attached to, nothing that, aside from its duration, subjectively distinguishes it from parinibbāna.

MN ¹⁰⁵ says disciples should break their attachment to the state of nothingness (the second-to-last formless state) if they are intent on the state of neither-awareness-nor-nonawareness (the last formless state).
And they should break their attachment to the state of neither-awareness-nor-nonawareness if they are intent on extinguishment.
Here the cessation of awareness and what is experienced is replaced by extinguishment, because in this meditative state there exists nothing that is still to be left behind at parinibbāna.

In SN ^14.11 the attainment of neither-awareness-nor-nonawareness is said to have a residue of created things (saṅkhāras), while the cessation of awareness and what is experienced, just like parinibbāna, does not.
It is “an attainment of cessation” (nirodha-samāpatti).

In AN ^9.31/DN ³³ there are nine progressive steps of cessation, with the cessation of awareness and what is experienced being the last.
In AN ^9.60–61 this state is called “cessation in a non-provisional sense”, meaning that for the meditator there is nothing remaining that can still cease at that time, nothing that temporarily differentiates it from parinibbāna.

In an inspired utterance at Ud 8.1, a comprehensive list of things absent in parinibbāna refers to form, mentions all formless states explicitly, but omits the cessation of awareness and what is experienced.
This is because parinibbāna is a permanent version of this cessation.

In KN Iti 51, there are three properties (dhātus):
the formless, the formed (which here must include the sensual realm), and cessation.
The latter property is explained as extinguishment, but it is also the only property of the three that can encompass the cessation of awareness and what is experienced, which in SN ^14.11 is also called a dhātu that is attained through cessation.

MN ⁵⁹ and SN ^36.19-20 describe a progression through higher and higher types of sukha.
The cessation of awareness and what is experienced is the final step, also being called sukha, even though nothing is experienced there.

According to MN ³¹, there is no abiding more comfortable than the cessation of awareness and what is experienced.

MA 168 says the cessation of awareness and what is experienced transcends all suffering.

Since the cessation of awareness and what is experienced is also succinctly called “the attainment of cessation”, I will hereafter use this term as well.
In some of the texts just mentioned, this attainment is followed by the wisdom of enlightenment, each time stated as, “and seeing with understanding (or ‘wisdom’, paññā), their defilements (āsavas) come to an end”.
This initially seems to allow for another interpretation of these texts.
We could for example interpret “cessation in a non-provisional sense”, the last step in the sequence of meditative cessation, to refer to enlightenment instead of the attainment of cessation.
However, elsewhere, such as in AN ^9.31, the same progressive steps of cessation simply end in the attainment of cessation, with no mention of enlightenment.
Therefore, the cessation in a non-provisional sense refers to the cessation of awareness and what is experienced itself, not to enlightenment.

In other cases too, although enlightenment is sometimes added as a result of the attainment of cessation, it should be considered separately.
The most comfortable abiding, for example, is the attainment of cessation itself—not enlightenment, even though the discourse which gives this description mentions the ending of the defilements directly after the attainment of cessation.
This is reinforced by the fact that even for the enlightened ones the four jhānas are called blissful abidings, let alone the deeper states of meditation.
In DN ¹⁶ we are also told that in his old age the Buddha could only find comfort from his painful body through states of samādhi where certain feelings had ceased.
So enlightenment itself did not provide him the deepest comfort.

Some scholars even suggest that the statement on the ending of the defilements may be a later addition to certain instances of the cessation of awareness and what is experienced.
For example, in MN ¹¹¹, the Anupada Sutta (a discourse with many late elements), the statement is clearly out of place.
It technically says Sāriputta only emerged from the attainment of cessation after seeing with understanding the ending of the defilements.
This would mean that during the attainment he still had access to some rather complex cognitive functions, which is not possible.
As Griffiths writes in On Being Mindless:
“Wisdom [occurs] after the attainment of cessation, which has already been shown to be a condition in which no mental events are possible, much less the kind of complex intellectual analysis denoted by the term ‘wisdom’.”
Sāriputta’s defilements might indeed have ended, but he could not have understood so at the time.
AN ^9.36 even specifically explains one has to emerge from the attainment of cessation before the knowledge of enlightenment is possible.
The commentary to the Anupada Sutta thus states that “the elders of India” said Sāriputta emerged from the attainment of cessation first, before becoming enlightened.
But this is not what the discourse literally says, leading to the conclusion that the statement on the ending of the defilements which follows the attainment of cessation, is inauthentic.
Or otherwise, that it was meant to be interpreted loosely.

A comparison between Pāli and Chinese parallels supports a late inclusion of the statement too, because it is sometimes present in the texts of one tradition but not in that of another.
MA 97 includes it in the eight liberations, but the parallels at DA 13 and DN ¹⁵ do not;
MA 163 includes it, but MN ¹³⁷ does not.
During the recitation of the original discourses, there seems to have been confusion about when to include this statement and when not.

In addition to this, according to AN ^5.166 it is possible to attain the state of cessation without becoming enlightened.
Accordingly, the statement on the defilements is not always mentioned after the attainment of cessation.
When the Buddha describes the progression through successively higher types of sukha, for instance, he simply ends with the attainment of cessation, not mentioning the ending of the defilements.
This sets a precedence for similar statements, like that on the most comfortable abiding, to also refer to this state of meditation, not to enlightenment.
In his thorough study of the cessation of awareness and what is experienced, Griffiths therefore also writes:
“In the early texts […] there are extremely positive evaluations of the attainment of cessation.
[It] is explicitly identified with Nirvana as it is experienced in the practitioner’s present life, and [it] is described as a ‘comfortable abode’ than which there is nothing greater or more excellent.”

To return to my earlier observations, Griffiths continues:
“Buddhaghosa also appears to identify the attainment of cessation with Nirvana, at least insofar as this can be experienced while still alive.”
This refers to the Visuddhimagga, which says:
“And why do they attain it [that is, the cessation of awareness and what is experienced]?
They attain it being dissatisfied with the occurrence and dissolution of created things (saṅkhāras), thinking:
‘Let us dwell in bliss (sukha), attaining the cessation that is extinguishment, being without mind in this life.’
” The Visuddhimagga’s description “without mind” (acittakā) is accurate.
Although the name of the state only refers to the cessation of saññā (‘awareness/perception’) and vedayita (‘what is experienced/felt’), also ceasing temporarily in this state is all viññāṇa (‘consciousness’), because according to MN ⁴³ consciousness is inseparable from perceptions and feelings.
Since there is no consciousness, there is no mental activity in this state, not even equanimity, according to SN ^48.40. A person who has attained this state differs from a dead body, because they still have vitality and heat in their body, and from the outside their faculties look “clear”, say MN ⁴³ and SN ^41.6. They don’t differ in mind, temporarily.

At this point I have to disagree with Venerable Anālayo, who in The Signless and the Deathless writes:
“unconsciousness, to all appearances involving a complete cessation of the mind and experience through any of the six senses, is not reckoned a form of happiness [sukha] in the early discourses”.
Instead of considering the oft-mentioned cessation of awareness and what is experienced (or ‘cessation of perception and feeling’)—which is explicitly called sukha—he bases this conclusion on the obscure impercipient/unaware divine beings (asañña-satta devas).
These gods are mentioned only in a handful of discourses, in passages which provide little context or description.
I personally doubt whether they exist at all, as they seem somewhat of an artificial abstraction.
AN ^5.116 describes certain gods attaining a temporary cessation of awareness while living in a certain heaven realm, but these are not the impercipient beings.
It is harder to imagine how beings would be reborn in a realm where there is no awareness from the moment of birth until death.
Nevertheless, even if these impercipient beings were prevalent in the canon and their nature transparent, it remains questionable why Venerable Anālayo leaves the cessation of awareness and what is experienced unconsidered, because if being without perception (asañña) is considered as unconsciousness (which is correct), then surely so too is having no perception and feelings.
So when considering whether unconsciousness is reckoned as happiness in the early discourses, the attainment of cessation should also be taken into account.

Moreover, the few canonical descriptions we have of the impercipient beings in fact indicate they were considered to be in an attainment of the cessation of awareness and what is experienced—although as a long-lasting realm of rebirth instead of a relatively short state of meditation.
In AN ^9.24/DN ³³ they are directly said to be without awareness and without experiences (or ‘without perception and feeling’, asaññino appaṭisaṁvedino).
Less directly but just as illustrative, the discourses also list various places of rebirth:
first seven abodes for consciousness ending with the three formless heavens of unbounded space, unbounded consciousness, and nothingness, followed by the state of neither-awareness-nor-nonawareness—and then the state of impercipient beings (asaññasatta-āyatanaṁ).
From this listing, we can only conclude the latter refers to beings that are reborn in the state of saññāvedayitanirodha.
As said, this state is explicitly called sukha.
So even if we only considered these impercipient beings and not the more fleeting meditative state attainable by others, the observation that the early discourses do not reckon unconsciousness as sukha, is still incorrect.

Venerable Anālayo makes a further statement based on that observation:
“Had the early Buddhist conception of supreme happiness been just about the absence of anything felt, perceived, or cognized, then the condition [of these impercipient beings] of being completely unconscious would have deserved being reckoned at least a form of happiness.”
The implicit conclusion is, because the condition of these beings is not reckoned as happiness (sukha), the complete cessation of awareness cannot have been the goal of the early Buddhists.
But even if we were to accept the incorrect premise, this is an unsound argument, because it expects the discourses to say one specific thing (the impercipient beings are sukha) in order for something else (the goal is the cessation of awareness) to be true.
It is a false dilemma which, for one, does not leave open the possibility that these beings aren’t called sukha for another reason, like them being barely described in the first place.
Since they are so frugally detailed, it should be no surprise they aren’t explicitly said to be a form of sukha.
This probably applies to various other heavenly realms just the same.

In the discourses there is every indication that full extinguishment at death does entail the cessation of all that is felt, perceived, and cognized.
The cessation of awareness and what is experienced (saññāvedayitanirodha) is one of these indications.
Not only is it closely connected to full extinguishment, if such a cessation can happen temporarily, this leaves no room for parinibbāna to be anything more than this.
What I mean is, if we acknowledge that unconsciousness is possible, how could parinibbāna be a kind of lasting, unconditioned awareness?
This awareness would disappear when falling into unconsciousness and arise again when gaining consciousness.
Which makes it a dependently arisen phenomenon, just like all other consciousness.

Even setting aside saññāvedayitanirodha, consider deep sleep.
Nibbāna cannot be a kind of unchanging awareness, because then enlightened beings would lose it when going to bed and gain it again the next morning.
For clarity, sleep is not equal to an attainment of saññāvedayitanirodha.
Firstly, while asleep we can still be awakened by sounds, which indicates a certain kind of subtle consciousness is still functioning.
Someone in the attainment of cessation cannot be withdrawn from it in such a way.
Secondly, sleep is the result of physical processes, while saññāvedayitanirodha is a result of a mental process, namely the mind letting go of itself.
Thirdly, a cessation of consciousness is only properly called saññāvedayitanirodha when it is the result of ascending through the jhānas and formless states.
For instance, the realization of stream entry is also preceded by a temporary cessation of all consciousness, which is similar to saññāvedayitanirodha.
But because it is not the result of ascending through these stages of samādhi, it is not saññāvedayitanirodha itself.

As a final observation, any temporary cessation of awareness, whether that of the stream winner or saññāvedayitanirodha, should not be equated to extinguishment proper.
Although phenomenologically—that is, from a subjective point of view—they are temporarily identical, in the early texts extinguishment proper has lasting results.
This is true for both kinds of extinguishment:
the extinguishment at enlightenment is the permanent cessation of the defilements, the extinguishment of existence at death is the permanent cessation of existence.
So, although in modern discourse the stream winner is sometimes said to have attained nibbāna and the cessation of awareness and what is experienced is sometimes called nibbāna, in the early texts the term nibbāna is on the whole reserved for enlightened beings.
In other words, although liberally speaking we can say saññāvedayitanirodha is a kind of temporary nibbāna, in the general language of the early texts there is no such thing as a temporary nibbāna.

4👑☸ Cattāri Ariya-saccaṃ 四聖諦