differentiating pīti and sukha in 4 jhānas, corrupted by Vism.

It's a great simile, and very accurate. Here's how Vism. and late Theravada Abhidhamma corrupt it to mean something entirely different than a straightforward EBT (early buddhist text) interpretation. Actually, vism. is ambiguous exactly when sukha occurs, but in atthasalini they definitely say sukha is AFTER the drinking and immersion in water is when sukha takes place, killing physical sukha and turning it purely into a mental factor. The standard jhana formula similes, AN 5.28, sukha would be physical pleasure, explicitly confirmed by AN 5.28 commentary as well, older than the Atthasalini, and which Vism. goes out of their way to avoid even mentioning AN 5.28 similes and that commentary.

Re: looking for citation, pīti and sukha of 4 jhānas compared to dying of thirst, seeing water in distance, and drinking

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Post by Nicolas » Fri Sep 20, 2019 8:26 am

Visuddhimagga, chapter IV, The First Jhāna, Ñāṇamoli translation wrote:And wherever the two are associated, happiness is the contentedness at getting a desirable object, and bliss is the actual experiencing of it when got. Where there is happiness there is bliss (pleasure); but where there is bliss there is not necessarily happiness. Happiness is included in the formations aggregate; bliss is included in the feeling aggregate. If a man, exhausted in a desert, saw or heard about a pond on the edge of a wood, he would have happiness; if he went into the wood’s shade and used the water, he would have bliss. And it should be understood that this is said because they are obvious on such occasions.

Atthasālinī, Part IV, I. Of the Summary of Conscious States, Maung Tin translation wrote:Rapture is like a weary traveler in the desert in summer, who hears of, or sees water or a shady wood. Ease is like his enjoying the water or entering the forest shade. For a man who, traveling along the path through a great desert and overcome by the heat is thirsty and desirous of drink, if he saw a man on the way, would ask, "Where is water?" The other would say, "Beyond the wood is a dense forest with a natural lake. Go there, and you will get some." He hearing these words would be glad and delighted. Going onwards, be would see men with wet clothes and hair, hear the sound of wild fowl and pea-fowl, etc., see the dense forest of green like a net of jewels by the edge of the natural lake, he would see the water lily, the lotus, the white lily, etc., growing in the lake, he would see the clear transparent water, he would be all the more glad and delighted, would descend into the natural lake, bathe and drink at pleasure and, his oppression being allayed, he would eat the fibers and stalks of the lilies, adorn himself with the blue lotus, carry on his shoulders the roots of the mandalaka, ascend from the lake, put on his clothes, dry the bathing cloth in the sun, and in the cool shade where the breeze blew ever so gently lay himself down and say: "O bliss! O bliss!" Thus should this illustration be applied: — The time of gladness and delight from when he heard of the natural lake and the dense forest till he saw the water is like piti having the manner of gladness and delight at the object in view. The time when, after his bath and drink be laid himself down in the cool shade, saying, "O bliss! O bliss!" etc., is the sense of sukha grown strong, established in that mode of enjoying the taste of the object.

elsewhere in the thread:
by Dhammanando » Fri Sep 20, 2019 8:45 am

The Visuddhimagga (PoP. ch. IV. 100; also Dhs-a. 117):
Kantārakhinnassa vanantudakadassanasavanesu viya pīti. Vanacchāyāpavesanaudakaparibhogesu viya sukhaṃ.

Pīti is like when a man exhausted in a desert sees or hears about a pond on the edge of a wood. Sukha is like the man's going into the shade of the wood and using the water.

dhs-a is Atthasālinī, a commentary on Dhammasangani (one of the 7 abhdihamma books)

• Pīti is never referred to as a vedanā in any Pali text whatever.

• In the Suttanta Piṭaka pīti is never really defined, except by a list of ten synonyms (i.e., pāmojjaṃ, modanā, āmodanā, pamodanā, hāso, pahāso, vitti, tuṭṭhi, odagyaṃ and attamanatā cittassa), given in the Niddesa and Paṭisambhidāmagga.

• The classification of pīti as an item in saṅkhārakkhandha doesn't originate with the commentaries but goes back to the Abhidhamma Piṭaka's Dhammasaṅgaṇī and Vibhaṅga.

• That the second ānāpānassati tetrad corresponds to vedanānupassanā doesn't oblige us to conclude that the pītipaṭisaṃvedī in this tetrad is a vedanā, for the tetrad also includes cittasaṅkhārapaṭisaṃvedī. Cittasaṅkhārā includes saññā, which is certainly not a vedanā.

Re: looking for citation, pīti and sukha of 4 jhānas compared to dying of thirst, seeing water in distance, and drinking

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Post by frank k » Sat Sep 21, 2019 10:27 am

pleasure (of the citta),

that part in parenthesis is your own interpolation.
It's clearly sukha vedana, and sukha vedana originates from the physical, discussed in detail in many suttas of vedana samyutta SN 36.
Just as the dart sutta says, first one feels a physical pleasure sukha, then multiple darts of mental sukha follows.
The EBT jedi went out of their way to point out the physicality of sukha.
Look at SN 36.11, it's also in the vedana samyutta, and look at how passaddhi is treated. Unlike the 'vupasama' and 'nirodha' repetitions for the 9 gradual samadhi, the passadhi is only numbered 6! They deliberately withheld the arupa samadhis, to emphasize kāya and sukha vedana for the four jhanas and 7 awakening factors, are physical FIRST and foremost. mental sukha may follow dependent on that.

ToVincent wrote: ↑

Sat Sep 21, 2019 9:44 am

frank k wrote: ↑

Sat Sep 21, 2019 6:37 am

... kayassa sukhino. (SN 46.3, among about 50 other references).

Really! ?!?!

This is the usual extract:

Pītimanassa kāyo passambhati.
Passaddhakāyo sukhaṃ vediyati.
Sukhino cittaṃ samādhiyati.
Samāhite citte dhammā pātubhavanti.

With the pleasure (of the mano), the body becomes tranquil.
One tranquil in body experiences pleasure (of the citta).
A sukhino citta becomes established.
In a citta that is established (定), phenomena become manifest.
.
.