Audio recorded at Buddha House Adelaide. Transcript auto-generated and AI-corrected; may contain errors.
About this talk. In this 37-minute commentary, Geshe Pema Tsering dissects feeling — the first of the five omnipresent mental factors — through its several classifications: body versus mind feeling, contaminated (afflictive) versus uncontaminated, and the basic triad of ease, suffering, and equanimity expanded to five by separating sensory from mental versions. To anchor the contaminated/uncontaminated distinction, he explains the three types of Arhat (hearer, solitary realizer, fully awakened Buddha) and the five paths each must traverse toward liberation. A Q&A closes on two precise points: what it means for a mental factor to be unmanifest but still existent, illustrated by eye awareness in a dark room, and whether a being can attain Arhat status before later entering the Bodhisattva path. Suited to students in a structured mind-and-cognition curriculum.
File metadata (for organising)
File: 02 MC 2001 09 25.mp3
UUID: 08275e4d-e586-450a-b9f7-406b2df53b9e
Teacher: Geshe Pema Tsering
Collection: Mind and Cognition (Geshe Pema Tsering)
Date: 2001-09-25
Recorded at: Buddha House Adelaide
Duration: 37.3 minutes
Words: ~2,166
And then if there were no discrimination, there would be no imputation of convention. For instance, like reflecting this is sound or this is form, this is blue, this is red, and so on. So, if there was no intention, there would be no engagement of the object. And if there were no attention, the mind would not be directed. So, if there were no attention, then there would be no the mind would not be directed to its focus.
In fact, the mind would not be able to take an object as an object if there was no attention. And if there were no contact, there would be no generation of the feeling of ease or suffering, etcetera. So, in fact, if there were no contact, then feeling could not arise. And then there’d be no generation of different types of feeling. So, in fact, for consciousness to engage its object, it must also possess these five mental factors as retinue of it, concordant with it in order for consciousness to function.
So, in fact, even though these five must exist, there’s no necessity that they must manifestly exist in at any particular time. So there are various times at which these five ever functioning or five omnipresent mental factors exist, but they don’t manifestly exist. And in fact they exist on a subtler level, a non active level. For instance, at the time of the process of death, during the process of death or in cessation equipoise or when one is fainting and so forth, during that time, even though consciousness exists, feeling, etc, also exists, but it’s not actually manifest or active. So at those times, even though the five omnipresent mental factors exist, they are said to be not manifest but existent.
So then, for the first of the five, feeling, then there is a definition and classification of feeling. So the definition of feeling is cognition differentiating experience. Then if classified, there are various ways of classifying feeling. So there’s a classification of feeling into three or a classification of feeling into five. There’s also a classification into two.
So three different types of classification. So, the first classification of feeling is feeling into two, and that is like body feeling and mind feeling. So the first one here, body feeling, refers to the five types of sense awareness which are feeling. So, that body feeling then is equivalent to external feeling. Then mind feeling is also called internal feeling.
Then also we have a further division into two, feeling as profane feeling and the second as sacred feeling. So profane feeling here is equivalent to contaminated feeling. Whereas, sacred feeling is really equivalent to uncontaminated feeling. So here contaminated feeling here has this term contaminated, and contaminated here refers to the afflictions. So therefore contaminated feeling refers to afflictive feeling or feeling associated with the afflictions, and then uncontaminated feeling is also feeling which is not associated with the afflictions.
An example of feeling not associated with the afflictions is the feeling, for instance, of an arahat or a foe destroyer. So then, also for uncontaminated feeling, that can be also positive from the point of view of the feeling of a Buddha, a fully awakened Buddha, or also for a bodhisattva on the eighth ground and above, where their feelings can be asserted to be uncontaminated feeling. Anyway, is some debate on these issues. So then there’s various debates that arise. For instance, for a particular bodhisattva who’s attained the first ground, because they haven’t fully eliminated all afflictions, they can have contaminated feeling or afflicted feeling.
But if in fact they’ve, prior to attaining the first ground, the bodhisattva stage, they attained the state of a Hīnayāna Arhat, then their feeling is uncontaminated when they attain the first ground body sattva stage. So here in fact, when contaminated and uncontaminated feeling is spoken about, it’s really referring there to the afflictive and non afflictive feeling. So for instance, an Arhat or a Foe Destroyer, a being who has attained liberation, overcomes affliction, so therefore they don’t have afflictive feeling, they don’t have contaminated feeling. So I think everyone here understands what an arahat or a liberated being or a foe destroyer is, don’t they? So, in fact, we need to understand what a foe destroyer or an Arhat actually is.
So here, the term Arhat means foe or enemy destroyer. Firstly, we need to understand what enemy is. So the enemy here is the afflictions. So the second part, destroyer there, in Tibetan meaning is is a word that’s used to designate someone who’s destroyed the afflictions, destroyed the enemy. So having destroyed the afflictions is the meaning of arhat.
So in fact, there are three types of Arhat or enemy destroyer. There is the lesser vehicle, which has two types. That is the hearer enemy destroyer. There is the solitary realizer enemy destroyer, and then there is the great vehicle enemy destroyer. So really, there’s three types.
So in fact, for the hearer path, there are five paths. There is the path of accumulation, the path of preparation, the path of seeing, the path of meditation and the path of no more learning. So the hearer enemy destroyer is a being who has attained the fifth of the five hearer paths. That is the hearer path of no more learning. Then the solitary realizer, enemy destroyer or foe destroyer, for the explanation of that state, then initially we talk about the five paths of the solitary realizer, which are like the former five, the solitary realizer paths of accumulation, preparation, seeing, meditation, and no more learning.
And again, like the previous, the solitary realizer, enemy destroyer, has attained the solitary realizer path of no more learning. Then also for the great vehicle, there is also five paths. That is the great vehicle path of accumulation, preparation, seeing, meditation and no more learning. And the great vehicle, enemy destroyer, is a being who has attained the great vehicle path of no more learning, and that being is a Buddha, a fully awakened Buddha. So everyone understands the meaning here of Arhat or enemy destroyer.
So, in fact, here the enemy destroyer is one that’s overcome the enemy, which is the afflictions, and there are those different types that were just mentioned. So for those particular beings, those three types of enemy destroyer, all that they have in their continuum is uncontaminated feeling or non afflictive feeling. Of course, have not attained that type of feeling yet. So again, there is a fivefold classification of feeling. So, in fact, then we have initially a division into three types of feeling.
That is the feeling of ease or bliss, then of suffering and then the feeling of equanimity. So there’s a three fold division of feeling. Then also that can be expanded into a fivefold classification. And in fact, the fivefold classification includes the threefold classification. So the fivefold classification of feeling is ease and mental ease, suffering and mental suffering or mental unease, and equanimity.
So there are those five types of feeling. If we condense those down, then there’s the three types ease, suffering and equanimity. Expand them, then there’s five types. So here, in fact, when we talk about mental ease, that is ease that occurs as mental awareness, a feeling of mental awareness, which is mental awareness. So this fivefold division therefore has firstly ease and suffering.
Those two ease and suffering really talk about external feelings of ease and suffering. That is, feelings associated with the five sense awarenesses. Mental ease is the positive feeling that occurs along with mental awareness or mental consciousness, and mental unease is the negative feeling that occurs in the retinue of mental consciousness. And then we also have equanimity, so making five. That’s fine So is feeling okay?
Sorry? Did you understand the divisions of feeling? So that completes the five types of feeling. So, are there any questions? There’s a few minutes left, so it’s time for some questions.
Yes. So these are certainly the five omnipresent can be unmanifest, you know, in various points as well as all the other mental factors can also be manifest or unmanifest. Then what is the difference between being unmanifest and non existent? Well, firstly, Geshe-la was saying that when something is unmanifest it does exist there, but it exists more in a latent state where it’s latent, its potential is there to be active, but it’s not actually active. But it’s not non existent.
It’s existing in a latent way. Yeah, it’s there but it’s not actually acting to experience the object. It’s not actively experiencing or engaging its object, but it exists. It still is there, but it’s not doing much work. An example here of a latent type of awareness is if we turn the lights off, we wouldn’t be able to see the objects in the room, but it wouldn’t mean that the eye awareness did not exist at that period.
Eye awareness is still existent, but until the light comes on, it’s not really able to function, not really able to discern objects. You had another question there as well. Also for something like attachment, it’s either manifest or from time to time it becomes unmanifest. But even when it’s unmanifest, it still continues to exist. In other words, provided that the seeds of attachment still exist in the mental continuum, we haven’t abandoned attachment.
And so we can assume it’s still there, whether it’s manifest or unmanifest. In abandoning attachment, we have to abandon attachment along with the seeds of the latent predispositions of attachment. Otherwise, attachment can still be generated. It can still manifest. So, in fact, an enemy destroyer, an arahat, a liberated being, is one who does eliminate all attachment and its seeds.
So they, in fact, no longer have attachment. Is that okay? In fact, the attachment couldn’t be said to be a what? An omnipresent mental factor because attachment doesn’t doesn’t go along with every state of mind. In fact, attachment only goes along with certain minds.
It’s unlike the omnipresent mental factors which are there with every type of mind no matter what it is. But attachment arises along with particular types of mind or in relation to particular types of mind and not others. For instance, at times there’s attachment, at times there’s hatred and so on. During the time of attachment, hatred doesn’t arise. During the time of hatred, attachment doesn’t arise in relation to that object and the main mind that it’s concordant with.
So therefore they’re not omnipresent. Turn this way. Is that okay? Yeah. Yeah.
Anyone else have a question? Is there a name Is there a name for that person? Right. The four The last four perfections. Okay.
So, in fact, you’re asking whether there can be someone that’s eliminated all the afflictions, has become a bodhisattva but has not yet completed the last four perfections. That is possible. It is possible for someone to overcome all the afflictions but not as yet to have overcome what are called the obscurations to omniscience, which only a Buddha overcomes. So it’s possible for a particular person to begin to enter the path of the lesser vehicle first, say, and become a hearer enemy destroyer or a foe destroyer, and eliminate completely all the afflictions, then after that become a bodhisattva to enter the Bodhisattva path and progress through to, say, the sixth ground Bodhisattva level where they are practicing the perfection of wisdom and so on. But still they have further four perfections to accomplish.
So such a being is possible. Oh, first it means you’re a lower vehicle then you become a great vehicle, bodhisattva. Perfection. So your question is, can you actually go to the, say, the level of a sixth ground bodhisattva and then enter the lesser vehicle. Yep.
Well, it has to be one of the three yanas. There’s nothing outside of the three yanas, the three vehicles. In fact, there is just those three possibilities for an enemy destroyer, either the hearer, the solitary realiser or the great vehicle. And for the two earlier ones, there is not a great deal of difference. In fact, the solitary realizer is asserted to attain a higher level, slightly higher level of understanding of selflessness than the hearer enemy destroyer.
But those two only overcome the afflictions completely. They don’t abandon the obscurations to omniscience, which only the great vehicle does. Otherwise, outside of those three, there’s no third there’s no fourth type of arahat or foe destroyer. So whichever type of enemy destroyer it is or or they are, they have to be included in those three. It has to be the hearer enemy destroyer, solitary realizer enemy destroyer, or a great vehicle enemy destroyer.
There’s no other possibility. Yes. Only them. Yes. Is it that okay?
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.