AN 8.30 B. Sujato, the pāḷi time lord, uses Vism. redefinition of vitakka and time travels back to Buddha's time

 

B. Bodhi translation of relevant section of AN 8.30

Therefore, Anuruddha, also reflect on this eighth thought (vitakka) of a great person:
(8) ‘This Dhamma is for one who delights in non-proliferation, who takes delight in nonproliferation, not for one who delights in proliferation, who takes delight in proliferation.’
1693

“When, Anuruddha, you reflect on these eight thoughts of a great person, then, as much as you wish, secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unwholesome states, [230] you will enter and dwell in the first jhāna, which consists of rapture and pleasure born of seclusion, accompanied by thought and examination.

“When you reflect on these eight thoughts of a great person, then, as much as you wish, with the subsiding of thought and examination, you will enter and dwell in the second jhāna, which has internal placidity and unification of mind and consists of rapture and pleasure born of concentration, without thought and examination. (vitakka and vicāra)

 AN 8.30 B. Sujato, the pāḷi time lord, uses Vism. redefinition of vitakka 

Buddhaghosa, who wrote Vism.,about 1000 years after the Buddha died, 

redefined vitakka from "thinking" to "not thinking", 

redefined 'body' into "not a body, a collection of mental factors", 

redefined jhāna from blissful physical meditation where thought happens in first jhāna and subverbal mental processing and vipassana happens in higher jhānas, 

redefined into "jhāna = disembodied mental paralysis" where vipassana isn't possible until one emerges from that frozen state.

B. Sujato, who claims to be translating and interpreting according to EBT (early buddhist teachings), uses his powers as a pāḷi time lord, travel to Vism. times, borrow Buddhaghosa's LBT (late buddhist teachings) redefinition of jhāna and vitakka, and then time travels back to Buddha's time to switch out the Buddha's vitakka with "placing the mind" in his "translation" of AN 8.30

‘This teaching is for those who don’t enjoy proliferating and don’t like to proliferate, not for those who enjoy proliferating and like to proliferate.’‘nippapañcārāmassāyaṁ dhammo nippapañcaratino, nāyaṁ dhammo papañcārāmassa papañcaratino’ti.

First you’ll reflect on these eight thoughts of a great man. Then whenever you want, quite secluded from sensual pleasures, secluded from unskillful qualities, you’ll enter and remain in the first absorption, which has the rapture and bliss born of seclusion, while placing the mind and keeping it connected.Yato kho tvaṁ, anuruddha, ime aṭṭha mahāpurisavitakke vitakkessasi, tato tvaṁ, anuruddha, yāvadeva ākaṅkhissasi, vivicceva kāmehi vivicca akusalehi dhammehi savitakkaṁ savicāraṁ vivekajaṁ pītisukhaṁ paṭhamaṁ jhānaṁ upasampajja viharissasi.

You’ll enter and remain in the second absorption, which has the rapture and bliss born of immersion, with internal clarity and mind at one, without placing the mind and keeping it connected.Yato kho tvaṁ, anuruddha, ime aṭṭha mahāpurisavitakke vitakkessasi, tato tvaṁ, anuruddha, yāvadeva ākaṅkhissasi, vitakkavicārānaṁ vūpasamā ajjhattaṁ sampasādanaṁ cetaso ekodibhāvaṁ avitakkaṁ avicāraṁ samādhijaṁ pītisukhaṁ dutiyaṁ jhānaṁ upasampajja viharissasi.

What is especially deranged about this...

When you study AN 8.30 carefully, it's clear, as in MN 18, MN 19, MN 20, 

The Buddha (or the elders who organized his teachings) very intentionally designed these sutta to gloss vitakka and how it works in first and second jhāna, giving you  concrete examples of what kind of verbal thoughts one thinks in first jhāna.

Because the Buddha uses vitakka for those eight thoughts, and then immediately goes into standard first jhāna formula (which uses the same vitakka).

But since B. Sujato doesn't like the Buddha's definition of vitakka and jhāna, 

he borrows Vism's redefinition which came 1000 years after the Buddha,  

and then using his powers as a pāḷi time lord, 

switches the Buddha's vitakka with one from a corrupted future.

Instead of properly attributing his vitakka to LBT Vism. redefinition,

Sujato then falsely claims he came up with that interpretation of vitakka based purely on EBT (early buddhist teaching).

As of this date, it seems the vast majority of lay followers, monks, nuns,

sit there quietly and accept Sujato's translation and interpretation of vitakka in 4 jhānas without complaint,

despite a mountain of evidence (see  V&V💭 ) proving malfeasance.

Forum discussion

Spirited_Ad8737• wrote:


The metaphor of time travel makes sense.

One thing I've learned from editing diachronic studies of ancient Hebrew and Greek is that it's considered methodologically unsound, to say the least, to take meanings from a later stratum of an ancient language and project them onto earlier strata.

That's bad enough in itself. But in this case, it's being taken a step further.

The original meaning and the 1000-year-later radically different redefined meaning are even supposed to coexist almost adjacent to each other in the same early-stratum paragraph. To me, that strains all credibility.

This case is similar to how kaya, in kayagatasati sutta, is supposed to be redefined (anachronistically) in one single line (breathing sensitive to the whole body), while being surrounded on both sides by kaya in clearly physical bodily contexts (breathing, postures, physical actions, the organs of the body, a rotting corpse).

In both cases, without any signal about the radical and fleeting redefinition of the key term.

And in both cases the key terms being redefined on the fly are in the very titles of the suttas in question.

It seems rather like a proliferation of Ptolemaic epicycles.

Frankk responding to challenge that his V&V analysis is just an opinion

https://www.reddit.com/r/theravada/comments/1cow5qm/comment/l3pvcu0/

But it's a lot more than that. You can look at every single instance of vitakka in the EBT suttas, and in LBT. I have. Many times. Through KN Pe, Abhidamma Vb., Vimuttimagga, all are consistent with EBT vitakka (verbal thought). Even in Vism., outside of the redefinition of jhāna and redefinition of vitakka inside the first jhana redefintion as "striking and threshing at the visual kasina", the rest of Vism. uses vitakka in it's normal EBT usage, as verbal thought. For example, to enter any Vism. "jhāna", one first has verbal thought, "earth kasina, earth kasina". Same thing with starting formless attainment, infinite space. One first starts with verbally thinking, "earth kasina". They use the word vitakka just like the Buddha did. Only inside first jhāna redefintion do that redefine vitakka to be the same as what Sujato is claiming is in the EBT.

Also, the tone of your wording sounds uncertain, as if the redefinition of vitakka is controversial, debatable, and you're just expressing one valid opinion among others.

This is not the case. Vitakka absolutely means verbal thought in the EBT, and anyone who actually bothers to look at every occurrence will find that to be the case. It doesn't take that long, especially since I've done the work for you with a digital search and compiled a list and even highlighted the word 'vitakka' everywhere.
V&V all : every. single. reference. to vitakka in the suttas

https://lucid24.org/sted/8aam/8samadhi/vitakka/all/index.html