The problem you are having is in taking dukkha to be mental only. This is a lopsided view of the Dhamma, but quite popular in modern times. There never was an individual who clings. There is only dukkha that arises, and dukkha which passes away.
pain is not directly dukkha. In the arhant there is no clinging to body neither its phyisical pain, and dukkha cannot be present
Note the physical pain arise like a rupa phenomena. Even if we don’t wish to accept this fact in Dhamma terms, anyway we will be forced to accept it because also the world show this. There are pathologies (1 in every 25,000 live births) of people who don’t experience physical pain:
while it happens in common people just because some kamma, the disjoinment of the body and mind appearing inside the Suttas becomes no special challenge for the understanding neither a supranormal acceptance.
This is about nama and rupa. The arhant experience the difference and there is pain but no dukkha .
Why is it in the 1st Noble Truth then? You are directly contradicting the Master’s teaching here.
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because the Noble Truths are for us, no for the arhants. Dhamma teaching is only for the people who are not in the other shore.
To us, pain is always dukkha.
The 1st Noble Truth is a list of things which are dukkha. In there there is physical and mental pain. If your exegesis were true, pain wouldn’t be in there. Only mental domanassa would be.
The Buddha had a body and mind. It was dependently originated. It originated in past ignorance, so how can it now be anything but a mass of dukkha?
Why it shouldn’t be there when physical pain is dukkha to us?. This is a fact of the conditional experience of the reality, our reality,
it is a mass of conditioned arising dukkha, until there is the cease taught by the Buddha: :
"…with the remainderless fading away and cessation of ignorance comes cessation of volitional formations; with the cessation of volitional formations, cessation of consciousness…. Such is the cessation of this whole mass of suffering.’”
and after that cease there is no more dukkha. And what happens is what appear in SN 12.17:
“How is it then, Master Gotama: is there no suffering?”
“It is not that there is no suffering, Kassapa; there is suffering.”
“Then is it that Master Gotama does not know and see suffering?”
“It is not that I do not know and see suffering, Kassapa. I know suffering, I see suffering.”
You have been arguing that pain isn’t dukkha, but it’s our mental reaction to it which is.
Was the Buddha’s body originated by ignorance, yes or no? He did still have a body after all.
Furthermore if pain isn’t dukkha why then would the Buddha have to enter into meditation to get away from it, if it’s completely non-dukkha to him according to you?
yes, because there is ignorance and then our reactions are with akusala factors and so on.
You and RobertK both have a high knowledge of Dhamma. I’m starting to suspect if maybe you are bored and getting some entertainment with me…
you know the Buddha was born like Siddharta and he had ignorance. When there is birth of a human being there is ignorance and the acquisition of a gross -self which include rupa. The rupa of the body should follow its own kamma course until its decay.
The aggregate of form is the only aggregate with a cause not related with nama:
“Monk, the four great existents (earth, water, fire, & wind) are the cause, the four great existents the condition, for the delineation of the aggregate of form. Contact is the cause, contact the condition, for the delineation of the aggregate of feeling. Contact is the cause, contact the condition, for the delineation of the aggregate of perception. Contact is the cause, contact the condition, for the delineation of the aggregate of fabrications. Name-&-form is the cause, name-&-form the condition, for the delineation of the aggregate of consciousness.”
MN 109
yes, according the Suttas it was to avoid the troubles of physical pain.
I don’t have a remote idea about how it could be experienced, although when there are injuries or illnesses also there are many related phenomena in the body to impede the normal activity (inflammations, fatigue, clumsiness, slow motion, fever… The survival reactions developed by the body to protect itself. And even without dukkha such changes can force an stop and a rest.
It would be interesting knowing the case of those few person who cannot experience physical pain. Sure this is not the same thing, although there is that relation in a disjoinment of mind and body regarding pain.
In which case, it shouldn’t be in the 1st NT but it is there. Therefore, pain itself is dukkha. Its not just our mental reactions to things, although that is obviously a big part of it. And no, I’m not playing with you at all.
you know the Buddha was born like Siddharta and he had ignorance. When there is birth of a human being there is ignorance and the acquisition of a gross -self which include rupa. The rupa of the body should follow its own kamma course until its decay.
The aggregate of form is the only aggregate with a cause not related with nama:
That there was past ignorance is key here. In the past, for him, there was ignorance. With ignorance comes a mind and body, both of which are dukkha. Whilst walking around teaching the Dhamma he experienced those dhammas, which arose because of dependent origination. Whatever is dependently originated is dukkha.
yes, according the Suttas it was to avoid the troubles of physical pain.
I don’t have a remote idea about how it could be experienced, although when there are injuries or illnesses also there are many related phenomena in the body to impede the normal activity (inflammations, fatigue, clumsiness, slow motion, fever… The survival reactions developed by the body to protect itself. And even without dukkha such changes can force an stop and a rest.
It would be interesting knowing the case of those few person who cannot experience physical pain. Sure this is not the same thing, although there is that relation in a disjoinment of mind and body regarding pain.
Which doesn’t make sense according to your exegesis. If physical pain wasn’t dukkha at all for him, there would be no need to enter a refined meditative state to gain some respite from it. It does make sense though if pain itself is dukkha, which is what he taught in the 4NT.
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Glad we agree that the three marks are inherent to existence.
But why do you think saṅkhāradukkhatā doesn’t apply to Buddha and arahats?
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From Milindapanha
Translation by U Pu
p.98
QUESTION WHETHER OR NOT ONE WHO WILL NOT BE REBORN EXPERIENCES ANY DISAGREEABLE
FEELING
(patisandahanapuggalavediyapanha)
4. King Milinda said: “Does an individual (arahat) who will not be reborn, O Venerable Nagasena, experience any disagreeable feeling (dukkha vedana)?’’
The Elder replied: “Some disagreeable feeling he experience and some, not.”
“Which (disagreeable feeling) does he experience and which does he not?”
“He experiences, O King, the bodily disagreeable feeling (kayika dukkha vedana) but not the mentally disagreeable feeling (cetasika dukkha vedana).”
“How does he, O Venerable One, experience the bodily disagreeable feeling, but not the mentally disagreeable feeling?”
“Whatsoever, O King, is the causal factor that brings about the experiencing of the bodily disagreeable feeling, the presence of such a factor conduces to one experiencing the bodily disagreeable feeling. Whatsoever is the causal factor that brings about the experiencing of the mentally disagreeable feeling, the absence of such a factor conduces to one not experiencing the mentally disagreeable feeling. The Exalted Buddha has, O King, declared: ‘The one (arahat) that will not be reborn, experiences only the bodily disagreeable feeling, but not the mentally disagreeable feeling.” (So explained the Elder.)
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Yes. 
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pain itself is dukkha for us, for those who the 4NT are applied.
This is no for the arhant. The arhant doesn’t have to realize the 4NT neither the path for the eradication of dukkha appearing inside the 4NT. It was already accomplished.
The 4NT are only a teaching to realize what the arhant already has realized.
Whilst walking around teaching the Dhamma he experience the anatta of dhammas and the cease of dependent origination.
The experience of Reality according dependent origination is the delusion of Reality, our reality. The arhant has realized the teaching of the Buddha and the cease of dependent origination.
Dependent origination is the experience of a Reality conditioned by ignorance. And then: “From the cessation of ignorance comes the cessation of fabrications From the cessation of fabrications …Such is the cessation of this entire mass of suffering & stress.”
there is no contradiction when reading the Buddha was in bad health or he was aware about the necessity of rest, a meditation or even medical attention. It doesn’t mean that dukkha was present in the Buddha like some materialist/secularists explain.
As I tried to explain with Suttas and examples, there is a disjointment between the physical pain and mind. And then there is no dukkha because the physical pain.
Do we experience dukkha when seeing a TV film with killed people?. If there is detachment there is no dukkha. We could say that the killing in itself is dukkha but then the question would be : dukkha exists in Who?
Dukkha is not a dhamma. There is no possibility of dukkha without the clinging to an existing -self to sustain dukkha. We can name that TV image “dukkha” but this is just the sustaining of a concept, this is not the description of a reality with dukkha.
I want to remember that the thread is originated in the claim Buddha and Arhants still have dukkha to be eradicated according those new EBT interprets. They say that only after death dukkha is eradicated in Buddha and arhants. This is a wrong view, at least to me.
therefore, How can you agree about the Buddha and arhants still have dukkha to be eradicated at death like those EBT people says?
because dukkha is completely eradicated in both Buddha and arhants.
saṅkhāradukkhatā only exists for the arhant in the terms of SN 12.27:
“Then is it that Master Gotama does not know and see suffering?”
“It is not that I do not know and see suffering, Kassapa. I know suffering, I see suffering.”
they know and see suffering but without experience of suffering. Such thing is not possible after the cease of ignorance, consciousnes… clinging, becoming and so on.
There is no Reality arising conditioned by ignorance and giving rise to dukkha. Please also read my previous answer to @Ceiswr
I suspect the core of the the apparent disagreement is in what I wrote to @Ceiswr:
Dukkha is not a dhamma. There is no possibility of dukkha without the clinging to an existing -self to sustain dukkha. We can name that TV image “dukkha” but this is just the sustaining of a concept, this is not the description of a reality with dukkha.
If you or @Ceiswr check any contradiction please explain this with detail. I would be glad to know. .
All dhammas have the nature (dhammā) of dukkha.
All dhammas have the nature of anatta (no dukkha)
Then?
Dear Zerotime,
thank you for continuing the discussion.
What is new EBT? The points I put forward I try to ensure are ancient orthodox Theravada, given of course that Dhamma is deep and I may make errors at times.
Just trying to understand this. Are you saying that while alive the Buddha and arahats had no consciousness, vinnana? (Did they also have no salayatana, the sense bases?)
You are basing this on Paṭiccasamuppāda I think.
Avijjāpaccayā, bhikkhave, saṅkhārā;
saṅkhārapaccayā viññāṇaṁ;
Consciousness is a condition for name and form.
viññāṇapaccayā nāmarūpaṁ;
Name and form are conditions for the six sense fields.
nāmarūpapaccayā saḷāyatanaṁ;
The six sense fields are conditions for contact.
saḷāyatanapaccayā phasso;
Contact is a condition for feeling.
But the orthodox view is that while the arahats have indeed eliminated igorance and craving there is still the remnant of the fire of samsara, the cooling embers, until khandha parinibbana.
That is why there is sopadisesa nibbana-dhatu and anupadisesa nibbana-dhatu (final extinguishment).
If the Buddha and arahats had no consciousness, vinnana, they could not see or hear or think .
Or perhaps you think they had a special type of seening, hearing, tasting , touching, thinking that is not viññāṇa khanda? Please explain.
On the other hand you cite Nina Van Gorkom’s book on Abhidhamma.
This is all true. However, kiriya cittas and vipaka cittas are just as much sankhara dukkha as any other citta.
So certainly there is a difference between the arahat and others in that the javana process is with kiriya cittas rather then the akusala and kusala cittas of the non-arahat. Thus they are not making new kamma, not adding fuel, they are no longer extending samsara. But still they have to wait until final khandha parinibbana until the khandas -which include vinnana, finally cease. Then all that is left is the physical remains.
It is good to remember that Buddha or arahats are just conventional terms,useful designations. In the deepest sense there are only conditioned moments of arising and ceasing - dukkha. Sunnata.
You might like to read this thread about Yamaka -who wrongly thought there was a being who was annihilated
.> Bodhi: Spk: If he had thought, “Formations arise and cease; a simple process of
formations reaches nonoccurrence, this would not be a view (diṭṭhigata) but
> knowledge in accordance with the Teaching .But since he thought, A being is
annihilated and destroyed,” this becomes a view. What follows is paralleled by
MN I 130-31 and I 256-57.
152 Spk: At the end of this teaching on the three characteristics Yamaka became
a stream-enterer. Sāriputta asks the following questions to examine him and to
get him to show that he has given up his wrong view.
Spk glosses tathāgata here as “a being” (satta), which I think does not quite
hit the mark. I take the subject of the discussion to be, not a being in general, but
the arahant conceived as a being, as a substantial self. Thus the catechism will
show that Yamaka has abandoned his identity view (sakkāyadiṭṭhi) regarding the
arahant, and therewith his view of the arahant as a self that undergoes
annihilation. We find a similar transition from the arahant (vimuttacitta bhikkhu)
to the Tathāgata at MN I 140,3-7 and I 486-88.
The three marks (characteristics), tilakkhana only apply to actual dhammas, realities. Concepts like TV or self are not included.
Right, the three marks, anicca, dukkha and anatta are characteristics of dhammas, the nature of dhammas, not dhammas themselves:
Vism XXI note 4.“These modes, [that is, the three characteristics,] are not included in the aggregates because they are states without individual essence (asabháva-dhammá); and they are not separate from the aggregates because they are unapprehendable without the aggregates. But they should be understood as appropriate conceptual differences (paññatti-visesá) that are reason for differentiation in the explaining of dangers in the five aggregates, and which are allowable by common usage in respect of the five aggregates” (Vism-mhþ 825).
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A post was split to a new topic: While alive, the Buddha and arahats had already cessation of consciousness?