Vipassana Meditation

Lectures on Insight Meditation

by Chanmyay Sayadaw | 22,042 words

Vipassana Meditation: English lectures on Insight Meditation By venerable Chanmyay Sayadaw U Janakabhivamsa....

Part 4 - Purification By Overcoming Doubt

The fourth is Purification by Overcoming Doubt (Kankhavitarana visuddhi). Kankha means doubt, visuddhi means purification by overcoming doubt. When a meditator has attained the second stage of insight knowledge - Knowledge of Cause and Effect (Paccayapariggaha nana), he no longer has doubts about his past existence. Thus, he overcomes doubt. This is purification by overcoming doubt.

To attain this knowledge he has to observe every intention, wish or want before every action or movement. All actions are preceded by intention, wishing or wanting. That is why we have to be mindful of every intention before every action or movement. When we have an intention to lift our foot, we should note it as intending, intending, then lifting, lifting. When we have an intention to bend our arm, we should note intending, intending, then bending, bending. While we are eating, we have an intention to open our mouth to take food, then first of all, we should note intending, intending, then opening, opening. In the act of opening the mouth, the intention is the cause, and the opening of the mouth is the effect.

Without wishing or wanting to come here, could you come here? Then what is the cause and what the effect? The act of coming is the effect, the intention is the cause. Then why do you sit on the chair? Yes, it is the intention that makes you sit on the chair. Is there any sitter? If you think there is a person who sits on the chair, then we should bring a corpse from the hospital and make it sit on the chair.

It cannot sit because there is no intention. It is only intention, the mental process, that causes an action or movement. So is the sitting posture a man or a woman, a samanera or a bhikkhu? It is none of these. In the sitting posture, there is a physical process supported by the wind element (vayyo dhatu - the internal and external wind element). Sitting is a physical process.

So if we want to sit, first of all, we have to note intending, intending, then sitting, sitting, sitting. All the sitting movements must be observed after we have noted intention. When we bend our arm, we must first of all note the intention, then the movements of bending the arm. When we stretch out our arm, first of all, we must note intention, then the movements of stretching as stretching, stretching, stretching. When our concentration is deep enough, by being aware of intention and the actions that follow it, we come to realise that nothing arises without a cause. Everything arises depending on a cause.

Therefore, a so called person, a man or a woman is just the process of cause and effect. There is no doer, no one that does anything. If we believe that there is a person who does the sitting, it is called Sakkaya ditthi or Atta di!tht (wrong view of a doer). If we thoroughly realise the cause and effect relationship, what we realise is just a natural process. Then there is no person that became a president, there is no person that became a king. Then what existed in the past? In the past. there existed only the process of cause and effect. Then we have no doubt about our past existence. In this way, we can overcome doubts about our past existence - so, this is known as purification by overcoming doubt (Kankhavitarana visuddhi).

Some meditators find it difficult to observe intention before every action because they are not patient enough. To observe, we must be patient with our actions or movements so that we can observe the intention before every action or movement. When we observe intention before lifting our foot. we will come to realise how the intention is related to the lifting of the foot. Then again, when we observe intention before the pushing of the foot, we will come to realise how intention is related to the pushing movement of the foot. When we observe the intention before the dropping of the foot, we will also come to realise how the intention is related to the dropping movement of the foot and so on. When we come to realise this relationship of cause and effect, we have almost completely realised the Law of Cause and Effect. By this realisation we overcome doubt as to whether there is any personality or entity which is everlasting in us. Then what really exists is just the process of cause and effect.

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