[Buddha-l] Re: there he goes again (sam harris)

[Joy Vriens]

>>I quite like 'direct path', since I definitely see directness, no  
>>intermediary, and simplicity (as the opposite of complexity) as  
>>Buddhist objectives and as criteria that can again be applied to  
>>Buddhism, which some later schools (e.g. ch'an) have actually tried  
>>to do. 
 
>Well, I quite like 'direct path' too for the reasons you give. But  
>there is no such meaning as 'without intermediary' nor much  
>connotation of 'simplicity' in ekaayano. 

Ain't that tough luck! I keep saying I ought to have been there at the time the Buddha's words were written down... 

>>Sorry for my ignorance, but is this because jhaanas can be pretty  
>>'blind' without the apport of vipassana etc. and are the  
>>satipa.t.thaana considered as as sort of blend: a combination of  
>>focussing and knowing? 
 
>This seems to be indeed what is intended, but it makes no sense  
>(except perhaps for the very highest stages of insight). The jhaanas  
>are precisely a process of developing mindfulness and clear  
>comprehension, as is quite clear from the formulae of the successive  
>jhaanas. 

:-) Quite. 

If only the Tibetans would have  had access to the Pali canon. They could have spared themselves centuries of polemics on the prevalence of the one over the other. I also do remember distinctly Eliade writing about an opposition between dhammayogins and jhaayins. So where could that misunderstanding have come from?