"Since ancient times, Ledi Sayadaw taught:
'Seeing paramatha (ultimate reality) daily but not finding it,
Encountering it daily but not knowing it,
Hearing it daily but not finding it,
Meeting it daily but not knowing it.'
Isn't it taught that 'Not knowing the five aggregates, one lives upside down.
Dogs, pigs, buffalos, and cattle walk upside down with their five aggregates.'?
Due to wrong attention to these aggregates, don't unwholesome actions arise through body, speech, and mind? When they arise, isn't it taught 'kammabhava-paccaya jāti' (kamma-becoming conditions birth)? That's birth in lower realms - how frightening it is!
With right attention:
Samādāna-sīla and Sampatta-sīla lead to human and deva births
Samuccheda-sīla belongs to Noble Ones - the stream-enterers and once-returners, you see? Only this sīla is truly valuable.
Isn't this worth analyzing?
Let's consider from practical experience
Let's think as humans now
What did all the Buddhas teach about?
The concept of non-existence:
Non-existence means humans, devas, brahmas, beings.
What doesn't exist?
Isn't it taught that humans, devas, brahmas, beings don't exist?
That's what Buddha taught about non-existence of humans, devas, brahmas, beings.
However people don't believe it.
They say they believe because Buddha taught it
But they don't really believe
If they believed, would they still commit unwholesome actions through body, speech, and mind?
These transgressions happen because of disbelief
Has the concept of beings disappeared or not?
No, it hasn't
Just saying 'humans don't exist, devas don't exist' isn't enough - we need to understand how they don't exist, you see?
Don't we need to explain this non-existence?
Look from Rajamuni Buddha temple
Can't you see Shunshi village?
Can't you see Gangaw in the west?
Looking east, you see Gangaw town.
Enter through the village gate
Do you see a village or houses?
Do you see a village or people?
From Rajamuni Buddha, you see a village, but entering through the gate, do you see a village or houses?
Do you see a village or people?
The village isn't found because it doesn't exist.
But don't we still conceive of it as a village? Don't we take it as existing?
What we see are houses
Those houses - tin-roofed, wooden
Remove the tin, pile it up
Remove the wooden parts, pile them
Make beams, pile them
Remove the floors, pile them
Remove the levels
Remove the rafters
Remove the posts, pile them
Is it a house or piles of wood and bamboo?
Before it appeared as a house
Now it's piles of wood
Is it a house or piles of wood?
With Vipassana wisdom, which only appears with Buddha's teaching, touch and examine:
Do you find piles of wood or hardness?
Do you find houses or hardness?
Do you find villages or hardness?
Do you find towns or hardness?
Is knowing hardness self or body-consciousness?
Isn't body-consciousness a mental phenomenon?
Isn't hardness a physical phenomenon?
These are mind and matter.
So is it piles of wood or mind-and-matter?
Is it a house or mind-and-matter?
Is it a village or mind-and-matter?
Is it a town or mind-and-matter?
See, none of what we conceive is found
But don't we still conceive it? Don't we still take it as existing?
We only find mind-and-matter
Do we still find what we conceived?
Why don't we find it? (Because it doesn't exist, Venerable Sir)
That's what we need to believe.
Isn't this worth studying?"
Encountering it daily but not knowing it,
Hearing it daily but not finding it,
Meeting it daily but not knowing it.'
Isn't it taught that 'Not knowing the five aggregates, one lives upside down.
Dogs, pigs, buffalos, and cattle walk upside down with their five aggregates.'?
Due to wrong attention to these aggregates, don't unwholesome actions arise through body, speech, and mind? When they arise, isn't it taught 'kammabhava-paccaya jāti' (kamma-becoming conditions birth)? That's birth in lower realms - how frightening it is!
With right attention:
Samādāna-sīla and Sampatta-sīla lead to human and deva births
Samuccheda-sīla belongs to Noble Ones - the stream-enterers and once-returners, you see? Only this sīla is truly valuable.
Isn't this worth analyzing?
Let's consider from practical experience
Let's think as humans now
What did all the Buddhas teach about?
The concept of non-existence:
Non-existence means humans, devas, brahmas, beings.
What doesn't exist?
Isn't it taught that humans, devas, brahmas, beings don't exist?
That's what Buddha taught about non-existence of humans, devas, brahmas, beings.
However people don't believe it.
They say they believe because Buddha taught it
But they don't really believe
If they believed, would they still commit unwholesome actions through body, speech, and mind?
These transgressions happen because of disbelief
Has the concept of beings disappeared or not?
No, it hasn't
Just saying 'humans don't exist, devas don't exist' isn't enough - we need to understand how they don't exist, you see?
Don't we need to explain this non-existence?
Look from Rajamuni Buddha temple
Can't you see Shunshi village?
Can't you see Gangaw in the west?
Looking east, you see Gangaw town.
Enter through the village gate
Do you see a village or houses?
Do you see a village or people?
From Rajamuni Buddha, you see a village, but entering through the gate, do you see a village or houses?
Do you see a village or people?
The village isn't found because it doesn't exist.
But don't we still conceive of it as a village? Don't we take it as existing?
What we see are houses
Those houses - tin-roofed, wooden
Remove the tin, pile it up
Remove the wooden parts, pile them
Make beams, pile them
Remove the floors, pile them
Remove the levels
Remove the rafters
Remove the posts, pile them
Is it a house or piles of wood and bamboo?
Before it appeared as a house
Now it's piles of wood
Is it a house or piles of wood?
With Vipassana wisdom, which only appears with Buddha's teaching, touch and examine:
Do you find piles of wood or hardness?
Do you find houses or hardness?
Do you find villages or hardness?
Do you find towns or hardness?
Is knowing hardness self or body-consciousness?
Isn't body-consciousness a mental phenomenon?
Isn't hardness a physical phenomenon?
These are mind and matter.
So is it piles of wood or mind-and-matter?
Is it a house or mind-and-matter?
Is it a village or mind-and-matter?
Is it a town or mind-and-matter?
See, none of what we conceive is found
But don't we still conceive it? Don't we still take it as existing?
We only find mind-and-matter
Do we still find what we conceived?
Why don't we find it? (Because it doesn't exist, Venerable Sir)
That's what we need to believe.
Isn't this worth studying?"
