The power of citta: without it nothing could appear

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(Excerpt from the Dhamma discussion with Ajahn Sujin on Zoom - Sat Mar 25th 2023)

0:00 - The power of citta: without it nothing could appear
[Sarah] We're discussing a lot about the importance of understanding citta, any kind of citta but including any kind of vipaka even bhavanga cittas.

[A. Sujin] If there's no understanding of citta, can there be the letting go of the idea of self? For example, how can we understand the moment of vipaka? And kusala or akusala as cittas accompanied by different cetasikas? That's why we think about the conditions or the factors of citta and the object of citta, but what about the citta itself? Usually we think about other things, no understanding of citta. It's so very powerful in the sense that without it nothing could appear, there couldn't be anything at all.

But there is a reality which ignores, just learning about vipaka cittas and kusala cittas and akusala cittas, but in truth what is its nature, what we call nama, that which arises without any shape or form or any kind of rupa, but how is it, just experiencing an object! We are not used, we are not acquainted to understand that at all because usually in life what appears appears through six doorways, eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body. And then thinking and liking and disliking, but the reality which is the chief of experiencing an object is not known.

1:58 - Bhavanga: no object appearing but it's there experiencing an object
That's why even we talk about the citta which is vipaka, if we don't talk about the moment of birth, what is there? There must be the reality which experiences an object, arising, the beginning of life, a personality is there beginning from that moment on and on, unexpectedly what will happen in life from birth to death. But what is it at moment of birth? The reality which experiences an object, unknown object! Unknown object, so it's so very difficult to imagine and to think about a moment like that because it's just there, no object appearing at all, but it's there, experiencing an object.

So now, before seeing [process] what is there? A reality which arises and experiences [the] unknown object, before the object is seen or is heard and so on, different moments. So we learn about the vipaka because at that moment it conditions [a] different personality from then on, how come without conditions, at moment of birth? That's why we learn little by little that even it experiences an object, no matter it arises with such and such cetasikas or what and what, but it's that which arises and experiences the object, different from cetasikas and rupas and anything at all.

That's why, [when we] learn to understand the reality which experiences, we don't talk about the object, otherwise we['d] think of the object, like: seeing, it sees, but the object appears, what is seen? Visible object. And what is that which sees? And then we talk about the vipaka because we have to understand what is called or what is vipaka, the first moment in life, birth moment and bhavanga and so on. Learn to understand the reality which arises just to experience an object, when there's no condition for it to experience that which is seen, it's that which experiences the unknown object, and when there's no condition for it to experience sound, it's there experiencing the unknown object.

That's why we learn to understand closer and closer, so when we talk about the very close, the closest, we don't talk about the place, but we talk about the characteristic of that which is there, so very close. What else is there if [it's] not that which experiences an object. That's why all these words can be condition for wise consideration about the truth of what is there from moment to moment in life, from the first moment of life and then on and on, to understand whether it's true or not, the object is known at moment of birth and on and on until there's seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting.

5:22 - The object of the first process in life, the beginning of waking up to know the reality
And later on we learn that the first process [of life] (after patisandhi citta, rebirth consciousness), is the thinking, mind door process, because it's the moment of beginning to experience what is there. It begins to wake up to know the reality, it's that which experiences the unknown object because it's not clear because the first process in life, mind door process, what is the object at that moment? The accumulation of such and such, the accumulation of all kinds of realities, like kusala and akusala, conditions moments of thinking of one object, with what? Ignorance, no understanding of what is there. So, learn to understand the moment when it experience the unknown object, and then, when there is the object appearing, it experiences [it] with no understanding of that object, but the characteristic of avijja is not the characteristic of the citta which arises just to experience, but what is there with, at moment of thinking? No understanding. So avijja is there.

That's why just learn to understand that which can be known and that which cannot be known, but it's there as that which cannot be known. For example the first process, who knows that it is with attachment, ignorance and attachment, instantly, to that object which does not appear but it's there, whatever is there is the object of attachment and ignorance. That's why we learn to understand what is there in life that has been going on until this moment, that moment of experiencing comes from [the] moment when there's no object appearing at all.

7:34 - Popping up out of the stream
So, it's just the stream of what is conditioned to arise, experiencing the unknown object, until time comes for the process to experience, one process at a time and one then the stream (of bhavanga cittas, life continuum), unknown [object] again... And this is life, unknown, unexpected[ly]. That's why even the word which seems so very simple, but the truth is that it's so subtle and pañña is so keen to understand that.

For example, what is there now? Just popped up, who knows? No right understanding to know what is there, [so,] how can it be known as it pops up? But when pañña is there, understanding more and more of one characteristic at a time, at moment of that object is experienced and then gone, the other reality pops up. So, each word becomes clearer and clearer when there is a little more understanding and stage by stage: pariyatti and patipatti and pativedha, unexpectedly, beyond expectation of the truth, which is not like it is now, but they are there from moment to moment, the moment of the stream of that which experiences the unknown object and then the moment when it experiences an object, not the same moment at all, but it's that which arises and falls away until conditioned to experience such object through such doorway.

9:17 - Something all the time
And this is what we can consider whether it's true or not, to be firm confidence of the truth of: no-one at all, little by little. Otherwise, how could there be the letting go of the idea of selves or things, something all the time?