What Nibbana is Not
In this chapter I will explain enlightenment as the buddha meant it to be taught, that is, with precision and clarity. I will also describe the final parts of the process during which it occurs. But first I will comment on what nibbana is not.
Dumbing Down Nibbana
Whenever Buddhism becomes fashionable, there is a tendency to change the meaning of nibbana to suit more people. The pressures born of popularity will bend the truth to make it more accomodating. Teachings are very well recieved when they tell people only what they want to hear.Furthermore, vanity induces some Dhamma teachers to explain nibbana in ways that do not challenge their own unenlightened state. This all leads to a dumbing down of nibbana.
One can read in modern buddhist literature that enlightenment is nothing more than passive submission to the way things seem to be (as distinguished from the way things are, seen only after jhana). Or that the unconditioned is merely the easily accessible mindfulness-in-the-moment, within which anything goes-absolutely anything. Or that the deathless state is simply a nondual awareness, a rejection of all distinctions, and an affirmation that all is one and benign. The supreme goal of buddhism then becomes little more than the art of living in a less troubled way, a hopeless surrender to the ups and downs of life, and a denial of dukkha as inherent in all forms of existence. It is like a neurotic prisoner celebrating his incarceration instead of seeking a way out. Such dumbed down Dhamma may feel warm and fuzzy, but it is a gross understatement of the real nibbana. And those who buy into such enchanting distortions will find they have bought a lemon.
Banana Nibbana
When I was a teenager, I asked many Christian teachers to explain the meaning of god. Either they would tell me what it was not or they would give me an answer that was unintelligible. For example, they would say God is "the ineffible" or "the ultimate reality" or "the ground of all being" or "infinite conciousness" or "the pure knowing".
Later I asked many Buddhist teachers to explain the meaning of nibbana. Either they would tell me what it was not or they would give me an answer that was unintelligible. For instance, they would say nibbana is "the ineffible" or "the ultimate reality" or "the ground of all being" or "infinite conciousness" or "the pure knowing". Then insight arose: I've heard such mumbo-jumbo somewhere before! For the very same reasons i rejected meaningless descriptions of god as a youth, so even now I reject all the gobbledygook descriptions of the Buddhist nibbana.
Some definitions of nibbana are plain oxymorons, such as, for example, "non manifest conciousness" or "attuning to the ungraspable". Conciousness is that essential part of the cognitive process that makes experience manifest, so "nonmanifest conciousness" actually means "nonmanifesting manifesting" or "unconcious consciousness" which is nonsense.One can only attune to what is possible for the mind to grasp, so the latter definition becomes "attuning to the unattunable" or "grasping the ungraspable". These and other similar descriptions are mere foolishness dressed up as wisdom.
The underlying problem is that it is very embarrassing to a Buddhist not to have a clear idea of what nibbana is. It is like getting on a bus and not quite being sure where the bus is going. It is worse when your non buddhist friends ask you to describe where you are heading on your buddhist journey. So, many Buddhists resort to obfuscation, meaning bamboozling their audience with unusual combinations of mystical sounding phrases. For if your listeners dont understand what you're saying, then there is a good chance that they'll think it profound and consider you wise!
Such crooked descriptions of nibbana are so lacking in straight forwardness, so bent out of line, that I call them "banana nibbana". Experience tells us that, when one knows a thing well and has frequent and direct experience with it, then one will be able to supply a clear, detailed, and starightforward description. Mystification is the sure sign that the speaker does not know what they're talking about.
Demystified Nibbana
The Remainderless Cessation of Body and Mind
In the time of the Buddha, even simple villagers understood the meaning of nibbana. For nibbana was the word used in common usage for an oil lamp being extinguished (see Ratana Sutta, Sn 235). When the oil was used up, or the wick had burned out, or a wind carried the heat away, the villagers would say that the flame had been "nibbana-ed". Nibbana was the word used in ordinary usage that described the remainderless ending of a natural process, whether it was a simple flame, or this complex body and mind..or a fashionable curiosity box. When one penetrates to the heart of this insight, then there is nothing at all to lose and nothing to be annihilated. Only when there is some persistent entity there to begin with can we use the word annihilation. But for the remainderless ending of the empty natural process, we call it cessation. Nibbana is the empty and natural process of body and mind doing its cessation thing.
