🔗📝 raft

 

love to memorize sutta passages, should not be compulsory

love to memorize sutta passages, should not be compulsory

 

Excerpt from Bk. Subhuti's blog on memorizing Dhammapada

https://americanmonk.org/memorizing-the-bhikkhuni-patimokkha/

Next on my list to memorize is 32,000 syllables worth of suttas (teachings of The Buddha).

  While it sounds difficult, the texts were geared for memorization and there are many repetitions.

  We are also memorizing the entire Dhammapada at II T during the next two years with a rate of one verse per day.

   Slowly but surely, the task will be fulfilled.

  While memorizing texts is not easy, nor is it my favorite thing to do as a monk, it is something that needs to be done.

  Generally speaking, I’m quite happy with my monk life and I feel so blessed for this bhikkhu life to the point that if I talk about my gratitude for this life long enough, my voice starts to quiver and tears start to roll.

  These tasks are a small debt to pay, and it is all part of the package.

  Furthermore, these learning exercises and achievements are mentioned by the ancient commentaries4.  

  They are wise and I can see the benefits.

Frankk: I find that really sad

Any kid in grade school  forced to memorize or study works they did not care for, like Shakespeare, or forced to play a musical instrument or play a sport they did not enjoy, can tell you with universal and timeless wisdom that this is not the best way to get people to appreciate a subject.

I memorized a few verses from Dhammapada, ones that resonated. 

I would definitely not appreciate having to memorize the entire collection.

The Dhammapada wasn't designed to teach a gradual step by step descriptive path to Nirvana.

Compulsory memorization of the entire Dhammapada simply for the sake of exercise, does not have much practical application, except as a party trick to pretend to be a  fortune cookie dispensing machine. 

I memorized the 5th chapter of Sutta Nipata, it took about a year, because that chapter resonates and is eminently useful for daily contemplation. 

I would not appreciate if forced to memorize the entire Sutta Nipata, not because it's not useful, but because I've already memorized much of the material it covers from other suttas. 

It would be a waste of valuable memory and mental capacity to memorize redundant material. 

I'm a big proponent of the oral tradition method, of memorizing important teachings, reciting and reflecting on them daily, hourly, continuously.

You learn and absorb Dhamma much more deeply this way.

But forcing people to memorize things they don't want to, is not the way.

The right way

The right way, is for the student to realize the value of the Dhamma, and realize the benefit that can be realized from memorizing important passages. 

No one should be telling you to memorize.

I regard the Dhamma as the greatest treasure, and memorizing crucial sutta passages is like memorizing a Dhamma treasure map. 

You wouldn't leave a treasure map in the library, just fuzzily memorize a general idea of the map, and retrieve the map from the library a few times a year would you? 

Someone else would have the treasure map borrowed when you needed it.

Someone else would steal the map from the library.

Some infidel would deface the map with graffiti, cut out crucial portions, and draw intentional mistakes on to it to lead you to fake treasure.

What would a sensible person do?

You would memorize the map in all its detail as quickly as you can, recite it and visualize and reflect on it daily. 

Then no one can take the Dhamma away from you.

If you're doing it right, Dhamma appreciation should produce pīti-sam-bojjhanga, awakening factor of rapture

The raft is the noble eightfold path for crossing over the ocean of suffering and reaching the island of Nirvana. 

The Dhamma you take with you on the raft should resonate, should be meaningful and useful to you every day, every moment, and it should bring you great joy.

The Raft ☸🚣‍

🔗📝notes on 'samatha'

From DPD

samatha 1.1

masc. (+gen) stilling (of); serenity (of); calming (of); settling (of); peace (of); (comm) mental unification [√sam + a + tha] ✓

samatha 1.2

masc. (+gen) (vinaya) settlement (of); deciding (of); appeasement (of); adjudication (of) [√sam + a + tha] ✓

samatha 2.1

nt. (+gen) evenness (of); balance (of); equilibrium (of) [sama + tha] ✓

Common wrong views on samatha

⛔samatha is not equivalent to samādhi!

⛔samādhi is not "stillness"! Stillness is an essential ingredient, but Samādhi is undistractible lucidity, and one can do vipassana while in states of samādhi such as the four jhānas, and first three formless attainments. Samādhi contains both samatha and vipassana within, they operate simultaneously.
✅If you had to find the closest synonym to samatha, it wouldn't be samādhi, it would be 

4👑☸ → STED → 7sb☀️ → 5🌊 passaddhi-sam-bojjh-aṅgassa  the passaddhi (pacification awakening factor)

My preferred translation term for 'samatha'

I like 'stilling (of)' the best, because the English word 'still' contains the letters 's' and 't', and so does 'samatha'. So it helps you remember the pāḷi and english correspondence.

But in practice, I'll usually use 'serenity', because unfortunately Ajahn Brahm in modern times has popularized a (wrong) interpretation of samādhi as "stillness". 

So because it's important to distinguish samādhi from samatha, I usually go with 'serenity'.

forum discussion

https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/49950/sensing-vs-knowing-inhalation-and-exhalation-in-anapana-according-to-goenka-trad/49965?noredirect=1#comment80524_49965

No, the main purpose of breath meditation is not to develop samatha. Collection of sutta passages on breath meditation here: https://lucid24.org/sted/16aps/index.html The main purpose is to counter the tendency for most people to engage in senseless thinking. Breath awareness is a way to root your attention in a skillful Dharma and prevent the mind from wandering in unprofitable directions.

So in whatever way one can be aware of the breath, at the nostrils, abdomen, in any body part, or the whole body simultaneously, as long as it brings the awareness to the breath and any skillful Dharma and away from the mind's tendency to become deluded and wandering, then the purpose has been served.

Step 3 of the the 16 steps is also important to understand correctly. 'sabba kāya patisaṁvedi', is to become senstive to the sensation of breath in the entire physical body. Not restricted to nostril, or abdomen, or any other small part.

answered 6 hours ago

frankk

1,84244 silver badges1313 bronze badges

• What is your definition of Samatha? I always just translated it as concentration, any kind of concentration. 

  – Lowbrow

   3 hours ago
• DPD (digtal pali dict.) has:samatha 1.1 masc. (+gen) stilling (of); serenity (of); calming (of); settling (of); peace (of); (comm) mental unification [√sam + a + tha] ✓ grammarexamplesdeclensionroot familycompound familyfrequencyfeedback samatha 1.2 masc. (+gen) (vinaya) settlement (of); deciding (of); appeasement (of); adjudication (of) [√sam + a + tha] ✓ 

  – frankk

   3 mins ago       
• samatha is an important ingredient of samādhi, but it is not equivalent to it. samādhi ("concentration") in EBT (early buddhism) means the mind is undistractible, lucid (seeing reality clearly without distortion). Samatha, if you wanted to equate it with something, would more closely match the passadhi awakening factor (pacification, deep relaxation). 

  – frankk

   just