Lokuttara cittas - Is nibbana the annihilation of life?

A.

Nibbāna is the destruction of lobha, dosa and moha. Is that not something

positive?

B.

I agree that the eradication of defilements is probably the highest attainable

goal in one's life. But is no more rebirth not sorrowful?

A.

It depends on the way you see life. As we have seen, life is nāma-elements

and rūpa-elements which arise and fall away. Can nāma and rūpa which arise

and fall away be true happiness?

  B. I think that life can give us much joy, in spite of dark moments.

A.

True, there are moments of what we call happiness, but these moments arise

and fall away, they are extremely short. We can make ourselves believe that

life is good and that it should continue, or, we can search for the truth in

order to see things as they are. It depends on what we really want in life: to

be ignorant or to know the truth.

If we develop insight we will see more and more the impermanence and the

unsatisfactoriness of life. Then the ideas we used to have about life and

happiness will be changed. The ariyan knows that what the non-ariyan takes

for happiness is dukkha; the non-ariyan takes for misery what the ariyan

knows is happiness. The development of wisdom brings a kind of happiness

which is different from what one used to take for happiness.

B.

I do not like the idea of extinction of life.

A.

If one still clings to the 'self' one is anxious about what will happen to the 'self

after one's death. For the arahat the question does not occur what will

happen after his death; he has no more defilements and thus he has no more

clinging to life.

People who are not ariyans cannot understand yet what nibbāna is. If we

cannot experience yet the true nature of the dhammas which arise and fall

away, we cannot experience the dhamma which does not arise and fall away,

the unconditioned dhamma.