Because we have a desire for the objects of the six senses, mind included, we grasp, we latch on to, we become attached. We start hankering after, or wishing to avoid, these six different objects in the world. What is it that we desire? We desire pleasant sights and sounds, pleasant tastes and smells, pleasant touch sensations and thoughts, or we desire to get rid of unpleasant objects. Craving means desiring, hankering after objects. Conditioned by contact, there arises feeling that is, the quality of pleasantness, unpleasantness or neutrality.īecause of feeling arises craving. Whether it is contact through the five physical sense doors or through the mind, feeling is always present, and is called, therefore, a common mental factor. Feeling means the quality of pleasantness, unpleasantness, or neither pleasantness nor unpleasantness involved in every mind moment, in every moment of contact. Because of the contact between the eye and color, the ear and sound, and the other senses and their objects, there arises feeling. Contact involves the coming together of an object through its appropriate sense door and the consciousness of either seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, or thinking.Ĭonditioned by the senses, contact comes into being. Because of that arise all the six spheres of the senses, the five physical senses and the mind, which in turn conditions the arising of contact, contact between the sense organ and its appropriate object: the eye and color, the car and sound, nose and smell, tongue and taste, body and sensation, mind and thoughts or ideas. Rebirth consciousness at the moment of conception conditions the arising of mind-body phenomena. This is during development of the embryo, before birth. Finally, because of the mind-body phenomena arising, the sense spheres develop. Because of the first moment of consciousness in this life arise the whole mind-body phenomena, all the elements of matter, all the factors of mind. And because of karmic formations arises rebirth consciousness, the beginning of this life. Because of ignorance there were all kinds of actions, all kinds of karmic formations. Volition or intention is like the seed rebirth consciousness, like the sprouting of that seed – a cause and – effect conditioned relationship. Because ignorance conditioned the energy of karmic activity in our last life, rebirth consciousness arises at the moment of conception. The third link is rebirth consciousness that is, the first moment of consciousness in this life. Because we do not perceive things clearly, because we do not perceive the fact of suffering and its cause and the way out, that force of ignorance conditions the next link in the chain: volitional actions of body, speech, and mind motivated by wholesome or unwholesome mental factors. And the karmic force of these actions conditions the third link in the chain. Volitional activity is conditioned by ignorance because we don’t understand the truth, we are involved in all kinds of actions. Ignorance means not knowing the truth, not understanding the Dharma, ignorance of the four noble truths. The first two have to do with causes in the last life which condition birth in this one. There are twelve links in this Law of Dependent Origination. The insight into all the links of the chain of existence is expressed in what is called the Law of Dependent Origination. Perhaps the most profound part of the Buddha’s teaching is the description of how this wheel of life, death and rebirth continues rolling on. There is no realm of existence in which these realities do not exist, and it is the sole purpose of the Buddha’s enlightenment to penetrate into their root causes. It is because of the mystery of birth, old age and death that Buddhas arise in the world.
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