{"id":2578,"date":"2026-03-09T09:30:23","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T16:30:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zenmudra.com\/zazen-notes\/?p=2578"},"modified":"2026-03-31T09:59:36","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T16:59:36","slug":"theravadin-tradition-versus-early-buddhist-texts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenmudra.com\/zazen-notes\/?p=2578","title":{"rendered":"Theravadin Tradition Versus Early Buddhist Texts"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>A book<\/a> by Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra, an ordained Theravadin monk, addresses the primary difference between long-time Theravadin teachings and those of the early Buddhist texts (the EBTs).<\/p>\n

Kum\u0101ra writes that modern Theravadin teachings rely heavily on the separation of vipassana (insight) from samatha\/jhana (concentration), a separation that transforms two conjoined components of the path into two distinct paths to enlightenment.<\/p>\n

Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra saw the separation of vipassana and samatha\/jhana as a consequence of the existence of two different understandings of sam\u0101dhi, or immersive concentration. He pointed out that the split is at least as old as a commentary on the EBT\u2019s called the \u201cVisuddhimagga\u201d (written in about the 5th<\/sup> century C. E.):<\/p>\n

To sum up, the \u201csam\u0101dhi\u201d of the Suttas (EBT\u2019s) is about concentrating the mind itself, while the \u201csam\u0101dhi\u201d of the Visuddhimagga is about concentrating on an object.<\/p>\n

(What You Might Not Know About Jhana and Samadhi<\/a>, p 35)<\/p>\n

Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra asserted that the Visuddhimagga interpretation was based on a translation of the Pali word \u201cekaggat\u0101\u201d:<\/p>\n

For a long time in Therav\u0101da Buddhism, ekaggat\u0101 has been commonly translated as \u201cone pointedness\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u2026 \u201cOne-pointedness\u201d has gained such wide acceptance as the translation for ekaggat\u0101 that most people don\u2019t question it. So, people who assume it means \u201cfixing of close, undivided attention on a spatially limited location\u201d, and believe it\u2019s necessary, will try to practice that.<\/p>\n

(ibid, p 42)<\/p>\n

Kum\u0101ra researched the Pali language components of \u201cekaggat\u0101\u201d, and came up with a new translation:<\/p>\n

The P\u0101li word has three parts: eka (one), agga, and t\u0101 (-ness). So clearly this common translation takes agga to mean \u201cpointed\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u2026 Actually, \u201cagga\u201d has another meaning, as a contracted form of \u201cag\u0101ra\u201d. \u2026 it\u2019s literally \u201cempty place\u201d, with ag\u0101ra being simply \u201cplace\u201d.<\/p>\n

Could this other meaning of agga, i.e. \u201cplace\u201d, be the actual meaning in \u201cekaggat\u0101\u201d?<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s join the parts: ekaggat\u0101 = eka (one) + agga (place) + t\u0101 (ness) = \u201cone-place-ness\u201d or \u201cone-placedness\u201d (modelling after \u201cone-pointedness\u201d).<\/p>\n

(ibid, p 45)<\/p>\n

Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra implied that \u201cone pointedness\u201d belongs to the sam\u0101dhi of \u201cconcentrating on an object\u201d, while \u201cone-placedness\u201d belongs to the sam\u0101dhi of \u201cconcentrating the mind itself\u2019.<\/p>\n

The two terms refer to the same phenomena. When a person is acutely self-aware, consciousness has a singular location, and that singularity remains constant even if the location of consciousness shifts.<\/p>\n

Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra was unsatisfied with his translation of \u201cekaggat\u0101\u201d:<\/p>\n

Although I consider \u201cone-placedness\u201d very accurate, it may sound clumsy in English. So, I propose an idiomatic translation: stillness.<\/p>\n

(ibid, p 45)<\/p>\n

\u201cEkaggat\u0101\u201d is indeed associated with stillness in the early Buddhist texts, but only with a particular kind of stillness, the stillness of activity by choice.<\/p>\n

Gautama\u2019s teachings on the subject must be pieced together from sermons in different volumes of the EBT\u2019s. The situation has been well-described by one Bhikku Bodhi:<\/p>\n

\u2026 not only are the texts themselves composed in a clipped laconic style that mocks our thirst for conceptual completeness, but their meaning often seems to rest upon a deep underlying groundwork of interconnected ideas that is nowhere stated baldly in a way that might guide interpretation \u2026 the nik\u0101yas (EBT sermons) embed the basic principles of doctrine in a multitude of short, often elusive discourses that draw upon and allude to the underlying system without explicitly spelling it out. To determine the principles one has to extract them piecemeal, by considering in juxtaposition a wide assortment of texts.<\/p>\n

(Bodhi, \u201cMus\u012bla and N\u0101rada revisited: seeking the key to interpretation,\u201d in (edd) Blackburn & Samuels, Approaching the Dhamma, Buddhist Texts and Practice in South and Southeast Asia, Pariyatti, 2003; parenthetical added)<\/p>\n

Here are Gautama\u2019s teachings on intentional activity, on activity by choice, and the cessation of that activity:<\/p>\n

It is intention that I call deeds. For after making a choice one acts by way of body, speech, and mind.<\/p>\n

(AN 6.63, tr. Bhikkyu Sujato; Pali Text Society [PTS] vol III p 294)<\/p>\n

And what are choices?\u00a0There are three kinds of choices.\u00a0Choices by way of body, speech, and mind. These are called choices.<\/p>\n

(SN 12.2, tr. Bhikkyu Sujato)<\/p>\n

The Pali Text Society translated the above passage with \u201cactivities\u201d in place of \u201cchoices\u201d:<\/p>\n

And what are the activities?\u00a0 These are the three activities:\u2013those of deed, speech and mind.\u00a0 These are activities.<\/p>\n

(SN 12.2; tr. PTS F. L. Woodward, Vol II p 4)<\/p>\n

The \u201cactivities\u201d of the Pali Text Society\u2019s translation are the intentional actions of body, speech, and mind, the actions that follow from choice.<\/p>\n

Gautama declared that the \u201cactivities\u201d become still, or \u201ccease\u201d, in particular states of concentration:<\/p>\n

\u2026I have seen that the ceasing of the activities is gradual. When one has attained the first trance, speech has ceased. When one has attained the second trance, thought initial and sustained has ceased. When one has attained the third trance, zest has ceased. When one has attained the fourth trance, inbreathing and outbreathing have ceased\u2026 Both perception and feeling have ceased when one has attained the cessation of perception and feeling.<\/p>\n

(SN 36.11, tr. PTS vol IV p 146)<\/p>\n

Gautama addressed the cessation of \u201cactivity\u201d in speech directly, declaring that in the first concentration (or \u201ctrance\u201d), \u201cspeech has ceased\u201d.<\/p>\n

However, instead of addressing the cessation of \u201cactivity\u201d in the body directly, Gautama declared that in the fourth concentration, \u201cinbreathing and outbreathing have ceased\u201d. Instead of addressing the cessation of \u201cactivity\u201d in the mind, he declared that in the final concentration, \u201cperception and feeling have ceased\u201d.<\/p>\n

Perception and feeling are often undertaken by choice, so \u201cthe cessation of perception and feeling\u201d could well represent the cessation of choice in the action of the mind. Inbreathing and outbreathing, on the other hand, are very seldom undertaken by choice, so \u201cthe cessation of inbreathing and outbreathing\u201d cannot immediately be seen to represent the cessation of choice in the action of the body.<\/p>\n

Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra offered his own explanation of the cessation of inbreathing and outbreathing, an explanation that did not mention intention or choice, but that did accord with his interpretation of ekaggat\u0101 as \u201cstillness\u201d:<\/p>\n

In the case of concentrating on breathing, the breathing gradually becomes regular, long and pleasant. It\u2019s very likeable. Due to the lack of energy use, the breathing naturally becomes shorter and subtler, until it stops. If one doesn\u2019t worry about that, it\u2019s possible to stay with that subtle sensation of no breathing.<\/p>\n

Some of the above can be connected to the Suttas: the attention to breathing and the no breathing: \u201cFor one engaged in the fourth jhana, in-and-out breathing has ceased.\u201d (Rahogata Sutta, SN36.11)<\/p>\n

(What You Might Not Know About Jhana and Samadhi<\/a>, p 29)<\/p>\n

There is another explanation of \u201cthe cessation of inbreathing and outbreathing\u201d, one that concerns the cessation of choice in the actions of the body through concentration.<\/p>\n

Gautama began his instructions on concentration with a metaphor for the first concentration:<\/p>\n

\u2026 just as a handy bathman or attendant might strew bath-powder in some copper basin and, gradually sprinkling water, knead it together so that the bath-ball gathered up the moisture, became enveloped in moisture and saturated both in and out, but did not ooze moisture; even so, (a person) steeps, drenches, fills, and suffuses this body with zest and ease, born of solitude, so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded by this lone-born zest and ease.<\/p>\n

(AN 5.28, tr. PTS vol. III pp 18-19)<\/p>\n

The \u201cbath-ball\u201d is a metaphor for consciousness, at such time as a person becomes acutely self-aware. A person gathers and firms the \u201cone-place-ness\u201d (\u201cone-pointedness\u201d) of consciousness by extending zest and ease such that \u201cthere is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded\u201d by the feelings of zest and ease.<\/p>\n

As I wrote previously:<\/p>\n

Words like \u201csteeps\u201d and \u201cdrenches\u201d convey that the weight of the body accompanies the feelings of zest and ease.<\/p>\n

The weight of the body sensed at a particular point in the body can shift the body\u2019s center of gravity, and a shift in the body\u2019s center of gravity can result in what Moshe Feldenkrais termed \u201creflex movement\u201d. Feldenkrais described how \u201creflex movement\u201d can be engaged in standing up from a chair:<\/p>\n

\u2026When the center of gravity has really moved forward over the feet a reflex movement will originate in the old nervous system and straighten the legs; this automatic movement will not be felt as an effort at all.<\/p>\n

(\u201cAwareness Through Movement\u201d, Moshe Feldenkrais, p 78)<\/p>\n

\u201cDrenching\u201d the body \u201cso that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded\u201d with zest and ease allows the weight of the body and \u201cone-pointedness\u201d to effect \u201creflex movement\u201d in the activity of the body.<\/p>\n

In falling asleep, the mind can sometimes react to hypnagogic sleep paralysis with an attempt to reassert control over the muscles of the body, causing a \u201chypnic jerk\u201d. The extension of a weighted zest and ease can pre-empt the tendency to reassert voluntary control in the induction of concentration, and make possible a conscious experience of \u201creflex movement\u201d in inhalation and exhalation.<\/p>\n

(Just to Sit<\/a>)<\/p>\n

A moment-to-moment conscious experience of \u201creflex movement\u201d in inhalation and exhalation is \u201cthe cessation of inbreathing and outbreathing\u201d, the cessation of the fourth concentration.<\/p>\n

Gautama described the extension of a \u201cpurity by the pureness of (one\u2019s) mind\u201d in the fourth concentration:<\/p>\n

\u2026 seated, (one) suffuses (one\u2019s) body with purity by the pureness of (one\u2019s) mind so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded with purity by the pureness of (one\u2019s) mind.<\/p>\n

(AN 5.28, tr. PTS vol. III pp 18-19, parentheticals paraphrase original)<\/p>\n

\u201cThe pureness of mind\u201d is the pureness of the mind without any will or intent to act in the body, and the extension of such purity \u201cso that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded\u201d allows the action of the body to take place as \u201creflex movement\u201d.<\/p>\n

In his book, Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra wrote about the separation of vipassana (insight) from samatha\/jhana (concentration) in Theravadin teachings. He traced the separation to the Theravadin interpretation of samadhi as \u201cconcentrating on an object\u201d, rather than \u201cconcentrating the mind itself\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ekaggat\u0101, or \u201cone-pointedness\u201d, continues to be described as \u201cconcentrating on an object\u201d in Theravadin teaching (as here)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, I would guess that:<\/p>\n

\u2026 most respected Buddhist teachers experience the \u201cfive limbs\u201d of concentration regularly, and most practice a mindfulness very much like the mindfulness that made up Gautama\u2019s way of living.<\/p>\n

(One Way or Another<\/a>)<\/p>\n

The \u201cfive limbs\u201d were the four concentrations together with an overview of the body (the \u201csurvey-sign\u201d) taken after the fourth concentration (AN 5.28, tr. PTS vol. III pp 18-19). The mindfulness that made up Gautama\u2019s way of living was \u201cthe mindfulness of inbreathing and outbreathing\u201d, a mindfulness that included the mindfulness of cessation in the course of inhalation and exhalation (SN 54.8, 54.11, tr. Pali Text Society vol V p 284, 298; MN 118).<\/p>\n

How could a Buddhist teacher experience the \u201cfive limbs\u201d regularly and practice a way of living like Gautama\u2019s, yet not describe their experience as such?<\/p>\n

Evidence suggests that the left hemisphere (of the brain) tends to create inferences and explanations to resolve uncertainty. As Gazzaniga suggested over two decades ago, the left hemisphere is an interpreter (Gazzaniga,\u00a01989<\/a>). \u2026 its inferences do not necessarily have to be correct, or even plausible in some cases, as long as they bridge gaps in information and create a cohesive story.<\/p>\n

(\u201cDivergent hemispheric reasoning strategies: reducing uncertainty versus resolving inconsistency\u201d, Nicole Marinsek,\u00a0Benjamin O Turner,\u00a0Michael Gazzaniga,\u00a0Michael B Miller, Front Hum Neurosci. 2014 Oct 21;8:839)<\/p>\n

My own inferences regarding the four concentrations and Gautama\u2019s way of living may be found collected under the title, A Natural Mindfulness<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A book by Bhikkyu Kum\u0101ra, an ordained Theravadin monk, addresses the primary difference between long-time Theravadin teachings and those of the early Buddhist texts (the EBTs). Kum\u0101ra writes that modern Theravadin teachings rely heavily on the separation of vipassana (insight) from samatha\/jhana (concentration), a separation that transforms two conjoined components of the path into two … <\/p>\n

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