Direct Insight cannot occur without having a conceptual framework to facilitate it ⏳
Contemporary Buddhist literature commonly conveys two ideas about insight that have become almost axioms in the popular understanding of Buddhism. The first is that insight is exclusively nonconceptual and nondiscursive, a type of cognition that defies all the laws of logical thought; the second, that insight arises spontaneously, through an act of pure intuition as sudden and instantaneous as a brilliant flash of lightning. If insight defies all the laws of thought, it cannot be approached by any type of conceptual activity but can arise only when the rational, discriminative, conceptual activity of the mind has been stultified. And this stopping of conceptualization, somewhat like the demolition of a building, must be a rapid one, an undermining of thought not previously prepared for by any gradual maturation of understanding. Thus, in the popular understanding of Buddhism, insight defies rationality and easily slides off into “crazy wisdom,” an incomprehensible, mind-boggling way of relating to the world that dances at the thin edge between super-rationality and madness.
Such ideas about insight receive no support at all from the teachings of the Nikayas. First, far from arising spontaneously, insight in the Nikayas is emphatically conditioned, arisen from an underlying matrix of causes and conditions. And second, insight is not bare intuition, but a careful, discriminative understanding that at certain stages involves precise conceptual operations. These domains, known in the Pali commentaries as “the soil of wisdom”, must be thoroughly investigated and understood through conceptual understanding before direct, non conceptual insight can effectively accomplish his work. To master them requires analysis, discrimination, and dicernment. One must be able to abstract from the overwhelming mass of facts certain basic patterns fundemental to all experience and use these patterns as templates for contemplation of ones own experience.
The conditional basis for Insight is laid down in the three-tier structure of the Buddhist training. In the three divisions of the Buddhist path, moral discipline functions as the basis for concentration and concentration as the basis for Insight. Thus the immediate condition for the arising of Insight is concentration. As the Buddha often says: “Develop concentration, monks. One who is concentrated sees things as they really are.” To “see things as they really are” is the work of Insight; the immediate basis for this correct seeing is concentration. Since concentration depends on proper bodily, verbal, and mental conduct, moral discipline too is a condition for Insight. From this, we can see that Insight does not arise automatically on the basis of concentration but depends upon a clear and precise conceptual understanding of the Dhamma induced by study, reflection, and deep contemplation of the teachings.
References
- Bodhi, Bhikkhu. (2005). In the Buddha’s Words An Anthology of Discourses From the Pali Canon Chapter VIII. MASTERING THE MIND (Location 5214). Somerville, MA: Wisdom Publications.
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Type:🔴 Tags: Philosophy / Psychology / Yoga Status:☀️