Nibbāna
The unconditional happiness that constitutes the goal of Buddhist practice.
Recommended Works
Monographs
-
The Island: An Anthology of the Buddha’s Teachings on Nibbāna (2009) – Ajahn Pasanno and Ajahn Amaro
A compendium of ‘essence’ teachings on nibbāna, as they appear in the Pāli Canon and in contemporary traditions. My most highly recommended book for anyone who wants to know what Nibbāna is.
-
Gives a thorough summary of how nibbāna evolved as a concept in ancient India as a reaction to the ideas of rival sects.
Booklets
-
Western writers too readily described Buddhism as a nihilistic doctrine teaching annihilation as its highest goal, a view these writers condemned as philosophically absurd and ethically reprehensible. Similar statements still sometimes appear in prejudiced non-Buddhist literature. The pendular reaction to that view was the conception of Nibbāna as existence. It was now interpreted in the light of already familiar religious and philosophical notions [such] as pure being, pure consciousness, pure self or some other metaphysical concept.
-
of all the attempts to describe the etymology of the word nibbāna, the closest is the one Buddhaghosa proposed in The Path of Purification: Un- (nir) + binding (vāna): Unbinding
-
nibbāna is not a destination after death.
-
deliverance from saṃsāra, i.e., the sorrow-laden round of existence, cannot consist in the re-absorption into an eternal Absolute which is at the root of all manifoldness, but can only be achieved by a complete extinguishing of all factors which condition the processes constituting life and world.
See also:
Canonical Works
-
A Jain follower espouses a version of fatalism which the Buddha then refutes.
-
Gain and loss, disrepute and fame,
blame and praise, pleasure and pain:
these conditions that people meet
are impermanent, transient, and subject to change. -
The Buddha refuses to perform miracles for a layman, explaining that this is not the right way to inspire faith. He goes on to tell the story of a monk’s misguided quest for spiritual answers, an answer the Buddha ultimately gives in one of the most profound poems of the Canon.
-
The Buddha defines nibbāna and gives 44 synonyms for it.
-
The ignorant dullard who creates acquisition
encounters suffering again and again.
Therefore, understanding, one should not create acquisition, of contemplating it as the genesis and origin of suffering. -
The Buddha gives pithy answers to Upasīva about the path to liberation and the status of anāgāmīs and arahants.
-
a perilous flood has arisen,
for those oppressed by old age and death,
let me declare an island to you.
Owning nothing, taking nothing:
this is the island with nothing further.
I call this [island] ‘nibbāna,’
the extinction of old age and death. -
who sees within, without “there’s nought”,
of such a one, what knowledge known
how will such a one be led?
See also:
Articles
-
If someone gives up this body to continue with another body, I say that this is indeed a serious fault. If someone has given up this body and does not continue with another body, I do not say that this is a serious fault.
-
Bhikkhu Analayo gives a careful, textual study of the supposed luminous nature of the mind in early Buddhism.
-
The magga, then, is not a ‘path’ as a series of steps, but a particular way of approach, a way of operating, an orientation that is fully equipped only when it has eight factors. It can then do its work of perfecting noble sīla, then noble samādhi and then noble paññā.
-
the main force of the nikāyas is to discount speculation about nibbāna. It is the summum bonum. To seek to know more is to manufacture obstacles. By the time of the early Abhidhamma the situation is much clearer. The whole Buddhist tradition is agreed that nibbāna is the unconditioned
-
On the basis of Prajnavarman’s and Nagarjuna’s citations and of Vasubandhu’s and Asanga’s lists, it seems that parallels to the Pali Asankhatasamyutta were indeed transmitted by the (Mula-)Sarvastivadins and perhaps other schools, even though they have not been preserved in Chinese translation.
-
the Nikāyas do not see Nibbāna as a form of consciousness, including such exceptional kinds of consciousness as anidassana viññāṇa and appatiṭṭhita viññāṇa. Nor can Nibbāna be regarded as equivalent to mind, or any particular state of mind.
See also:
Essays
-
Be free from even so much as a single thought that is deceived
-
A short description of what it’s like to be an arahant, along with an admonishment to practice diligently, delivered near the end of Luangta’s life.
-
A condensed transcript of The Buddha’s Teaching As It Is lecture six, this short essay gives a definition and typology of nibbāna.
See also:
Audio/Video
-
“What’s next?” doesn’t apply to one who has let go of everything.
-
A solid, scholastic introduction to what it means to graduate from Buddhist practice.
-
There are only two things you need to realize the path: the first is to start practicing and the second is to not stop.
A short talk on Stream Entry and the stages of Awakening, and on having faith without expectations.