Applying the Pali Instructions

[Mark Foote]

Here's the first part of a post I wrote recently, on my own site:

 

stirling said:

 

First jhana is concentration on the sensation of piti. There is still thought. I don't think it is possible that thought and one-pointedness co-exist.

 

Gautama equated “right concentration” with “one-pointedness of mind”:

 

And what… is the (noble) right concentration with the causal associations, with the accompaniments?  It is right view, right purpose, right speech, right action, right mode of livelihood, right endeavor, right mindfulness.  Whatever one-pointedness of mind is accompanied by these seven components, this… is called the (noble) right concentration with the causal associations and the accompaniments.  

 

(MN III 71, Pali Text Society vol III p 114; similar at SN V 17; “noble” substituted for Ariyan; emphasis added)

 

 

That implies that “one-pointedness of mind” is present in any “right concentration”, including the first. 

 

There are also sermons where Gautama spoke of “one-pointedness” in conjunction with the first concentration:

 

Herein… the (noble) disciple, making self-surrender the object of (their) thought, lays hold of concentration, lays hold of one-pointedness.  (The disciple), aloof from sensuality, aloof from evil conditions, enters on the first trance, which is accompanied by thought initial and sustained, which is born of solitude, easeful and zestful, and abides therein.  

 

(SN V 198, Pali Text Society vol V p 174; “noble” substituted for Ariyan; Horner’s “initial” substituted for Woodward’s “directed”)

 

 

I would say that one-pointedness depends in part on the sense of gravity, and that along with a sense of gravity comes a feeling of momentum.  That feeling of momentum can underlie a train of thought, so that one-pointedness can in effect be rejoined as the thoughts conclude, rather than re-initiated.

 

If Gautama is to be believed, thoughts don’t cease in concentration, even with the final concentration (MN III 121; 108-109). What does cease is volition in thinking, beginning in the first concentration with volition in the formulation of speech, and ending in the final concentration with volition in the actions of feeling and perceiving.

 

As might be expected with the cessation of volition in speech, thought in the first concentration comes out of a particular necessity:

 

… the thought comes out of necessity in the free placement of attention in the movement of breath. When a presence of mind is retained as the placement of attention shifts, then the natural tendency toward the free placement of attention draws out thoughts initial and sustained, and brings on the stages of concentration…

(Shunryu Suzuki on Shikantaza and the Theravadin Stages)

 

 

Gautama described the feeling of the first concentration with a metaphor about a “bath-ball”:

 

… just as a handy bathman or attendant might strew bath-powder in some copper basin and, gradually sprinkling water, knead it together so that the bath-ball gathered up the moisture, became enveloped in moisture and saturated both in and out, but did not ooze moisture; even so, (a person) steeps, drenches, fills, and suffuses this body with zest and ease, born of solitude, so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded by this lone-born zest and ease.

 

(Pali Text Society AN III 25-28, Vol. III p 18-19, see also MN III 92-93, PTS p 132-134)

  

 

I’ve written about the “bath-ball”:

 

If I were kneading soap powder into a ball in a copper vessel, I would have one hand kneading soap and one hand on the vessel. The press of the hand kneading soap would find something of an opposite pressure from the hand holding the vessel, even if the bottom of the vessel were resting on the ground.

 

More particularly:
 

… the exercise becomes in part the distinction of the direction of turn that I’m feeling at the location of awareness… that distinction allows the appropriate counter from everything that surrounds the place of awareness.

 

I would say that gravity and handedness (I’m right-handed) are the source of my feeling of outward force at the location of awareness, and the activity of the muscles of posture in response to the stretch of ligaments is the source of the counter.
 

Omori Sogen, a Rinzai Zen teacher, spoke about centrifugal and centripetal forces connected with seated meditation:
 

Thus, by means of the equilibrium of the centrifugal and the centripetal force, the whole body is brought to a state of zero and spiritual power will pervade the whole body intensely.
 

(“An Introduction to Zen Training”, Omori Sogen, p 61)

 

(Common Ground; “metaphor” in place of “analogy”)

 

I’ve also written about Gautama’s choice of words in the second half of his “bath-ball” metaphor:

 

Words like “steeps” and “drenches” convey a sense of gravity, while the phrase “not one particle of the body that is not pervaded” speaks to the “one-pointedness” of attention, even as the body is suffused.

 

(ibid)

My experience of “zest and ease” (Pali “piti” and “sukha”) depends on my experience of the senses connected with balance, particularly the sense of gravity:
  

If I can find a way to experience gravity in the placement of attention as the source of activity in my posture, and particular ligaments as the source of the reciprocity in that activity, then I have an ease.

 

The feeling of ease I get is accompanied by a feeling of clarity, a clarity that has a certain energy. I would guess that energy is Gautama’s “zest”.

 

("To Enjoy Our Life")

 

 

Gautama said:

 

… a good (person] reflects thus: “Lack of desire even for the attainment of the first meditation has been spoken of by [me]; for whatever (one) imagines it to be, it is otherwise” [Similarly for the second, third, and fourth initial meditative states, and for the attainments of the first four further meditative states].

 

(MN III 42-45, Pali Text Society Vol III p 92-94)

 

I go on to write about the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th initial concentrations on my site:

https://zenmudra.com/applying-the-pali-instructions-anm/

 

 

As I say at the close of the piece, just let me know if there’s anything I can clarify.

 

 

Edited July 23 by Mark Foote

[stirling]

I have already responded to your comments regarding one pointedness, Right Concentration, etc. here:

 

 

I'm comfortable with my answers on that thread. Maybe you should be quoting my responses if you are quoting me as part of your thoughts here? Actually, does it seem fair to quote me without context on your website? 

 

I still think you are confusing instruction on the Jhanas, which is a very specific set of practices, with general meditation. They are NOT the same, nor are they interchangeable, IMHO.

 

Quote

 

The pattern of thought Gautama identified as his way of living seems natural enough to me. Here are the highlights:

 

1) Relax the activity of the body in inhalation and exhalation;

2) Find a feeling of ease and calm the senses connected with balance, in inhalation and exhalation;

3) Appreciate and detach from thought, in inhalation and exhalation;

4) Look to the free location of consciousness for the automatic activity of inhalation and exhalation.

 

 

I won't say that I think this is what Guatama intended, but it looks fine as a practice. I think most meditators will find that consciousness is already free and breath is already automatic activity once thought is detached.

Edited July 23 by stirling
Added verbosity.

[Mark Foote]

7 hours ago, stirling said:

I have already responded to your comments regarding one pointedness, Right Concentration, etc. here:

 

 

I'm comfortable with my answers on that thread. Maybe you should be quoting my responses if you are quoting me as part of your thoughts here? Actually, does it seem fair to quote me without context on your website? 

 

I still think you are confusing instruction on the Jhanas, which is a very specific set of practices, with general meditation. They are NOT the same, nor are they interchangeable, IMHO.

 

 

I won't say that I think this is what Guatama intended, but it looks fine as a practice. I think most meditators will find that consciousness is already free and breath is already automatic activity once thought is detached.
 

If you are not happy with the things I quoted, and you think "stirling" is too identifying, then I'll take steps to anonymize the quotes.  My assumption was that "stirling" would not identify you, but I haven't tried to look you up!

Maybe I can address some of your responses about "one--pointedness", here.

 

If the Noble Eightfold Path's "Right Samadhi" is necessary for "one-pointedness" then I would have to be "formless", since the only way to perfect the Noble Eightfold Path is enlightenment. Perhaps it is a broader term and does simply mean uninterrupted focus. 

 

Regarding the path:

 

As to this… right view comes first. And how … does right view come first? Right purpose… proceeds from right view, right speech proceeds from right purpose; right action proceeds from right speech; right mode of livelihood proceeds from right action; right endeavor proceeds from right mode of livelihood; right mindfulness proceeds from right endeavor; right concentration proceeds from right mindfulness; right knowledge proceeds from right concentration; right freedom proceeds from right knowledge. In this way the learner’s course is possessed of eight components, the perfected one’s of ten components.

(MN III 117, 76; Pali Text Society Vol III p 119; emphasis added)
 

 

That says that the "the perfected one" still has a course to follow, just it's a ten-fold course instead of eight-fold.

The "Access to Insight" site makes statements without attribution--the one about the jhanas among them.  That's not from the Pali sermons. 

In a sense you're right, laying hold of one-pointedness is the coordination of activity in the movement of breath by the free location of consciousness.  That's different from activity in the movement of breath solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness, yet both depend on the free location of consciousness.  The question I've had for a lot of  years is how to practice the transition, yet that is precisely Gautama's teaching with regard to the first four concentrations and the sign of the concentration--at least, as far as I can tell.

You might like my treatment of "actualizing the fundamental point", from Genjo Koan ("Take the Backward Step"). I make the distinction between "coordination of activity by" and "solely by virtue of" based on Dogen's statements, there.

You reference Anguttara Nikaya 9.36--had to google, but I found the sermon--the sermon does not number the further concentrations, as you have. I find it intriguing that Gautama didn't number the further states, significant in some way but I can't say what. 

 

You wrote:

 

I still think you are confusing instruction on the Jhanas, which is a very specific set of practices, with general meditation. They are NOT the same, nor are they interchangeable, IMHO.

 

From your lineage:

Of course, to have good shikantaza, we have preparatory zazen. You know, from old, old time, you know, we have that technical term, konpunjo. Konpunjo means “to enter,” you know. That is started from Theravada practice, you know. To prepare for the first stage or second stage or third stage, they practice some special practice. Those practice is not the practice of the first stage or second stage or third stage, but to prepare for those stages. 

(“The Background of Shikantaza”, Shunryu Suzuki; San Francisco, February 22, 1970; transcript from shunryusuzuki.com)

 

But usually in counting breathing or following breathing, you feel as if you are doing something, you know– you are following breathing, and you are counting breathing. This is, you know, why counting breathing or following breathing practice is, you know, for us it is some preparation– preparatory practice for shikantaza because for most people it is rather difficult to sit, you know, just to sit.

(ibid)
 

 

As I wrote in "Applying the Pali Instructions": 

Ceasing the exercise of volition while mindful of inhalation and exhalation only occurs when the activity of inhalation and exhalation is solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness. 
 

 

That cessation is exactly "just sitting", to me.

You wrote:

 

The entire field of experience is ultimately awareness, so it rests everywhere. I can look in between breaths, but it isn't any kind of special location. If it was enlightenment it would persist even during breath, or anything else. In any moment feeling and perceiving are constant, though the experience of a "self" that perceives them is gone. 

 

I haven't experienced the conscious cessation of volition in feeling and perceiving.  I do write about the first of the further states, here.  The rest I can't really claim to have known directly.

Did you get this far in my post?--
 

Suppose that you have climbed to the top of a hundred-foot pole, and are told to let go and advance one step further without holding bodily life dear. In such a situation, if you say that you can practice the Buddha-Way only when you are alive, you are not really following your teacher. Consider this carefully. 

( “Shobogenzo-zuimonki: Sayings of Eihei Dogen Zenji, recorded by Koun Ejo”, 1-13, tr Shohaku Okumura, Soto-Shu Shumucho p 45-46)

 

Complete relinquishment of volitive activity in the body involves letting go of the activity of breath while yet conscious of the need to inhale and exhale.  That can feel like letting go of life itself.
 

The location of consciousness in the third concentration is the place from which to “advance one step further”. That location may shift and move, yet that is the place where automatic activity in the movement of breath can be engendered solely by virtue of the location of consciousness.

 

That's one of the reasons I thanked you in my last remark on the "very unpopular opinions" thread (Posted Friday at 02:21 PM (edited)).  Very helpful, for me.

 

 

Edited July 24 by Mark Foote

[stirling]

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

If you are not happy with the things I quoted, and you think "stirling" is too identifying, then I'll take steps to anonymize the quotes.  My assumption was that "stirling" would not identify you, but I haven't tried to look you up!

 

I like to imagine a few might know me here now, and of course you link out to your site where someone feasibly might go venture, so...

 

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

Maybe I can address some of your responses about "one--pointedness", here.

 

If the Noble Eightfold Path's "Right Samadhi" is necessary for "one-pointedness" then I would have to be "formless", since the only way to perfect the Noble Eightfold Path is enlightenment. Perhaps it is a broader term and does simply mean uninterrupted focus. 

 

Regarding the path:

 

As to this… right view comes first. And how … does right view come first? Right purpose… proceeds from right view, right speech proceeds from right purpose; right action proceeds from right speech; right mode of livelihood proceeds from right action; right endeavor proceeds from right mode of livelihood; right mindfulness proceeds from right endeavor; right concentration proceeds from right mindfulness; right knowledge proceeds from right concentration; right freedom proceeds from right knowledge. In this way the learner’s course is possessed of eight components, the perfected one’s of ten components.

(MN III 117, 76; Pali Text Society Vol III p 119; emphasis added)

 

That says that the "the perfected one" still has a course to follow, just it's a ten-fold course instead of eight-fold.

 

Yes, they are practices for learners, but they are impossible for the learner to perfect. They are perfected when enlightenment makes them fully understood through prajna, adding the additional two:

 

Quote

In the Mahācattārīsaka Sutta[29][30] which appears in the Chinese and Pali canons, the Buddha explains that cultivation of the noble eightfold path of a learner leads to the development of two further paths of the Arahants, which are right knowledge, or insight (sammā-ñāṇa), and right liberation, or release (sammā-vimutti).[31] These two factors fall under the category of wisdom (paññā).[32]

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_Eightfold_Path#The_eight_divisions

 

 

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

 

In a sense you're right, laying hold of one-pointedness is the coordination of activity in the movement of breath by the free location of consciousness.  That's different from activity in the movement of breath solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness, yet both depend on the free location of consciousness.  The question I've had for a lot of years is how to practice the transition, yet that is precisely Gautama's teaching with regard to the first four concentrations and the sign of the concentration--at least, as far as I can tell.

 

I know that this is your theory, but it has nothing to do with the jhanas. You should really give jhana practice a go, Mark, and once you have a few under your belt see how they compare. 

 

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

You reference Anguttara Nikaya 9.36--had to google, but I found the sermon--the sermon does not number the further concentrations, as you have. I find it intriguing that Gautama didn't number the further states, significant in some way but I can't say what. 

 

I think to anybody who knows the jhanas the references are clear.

 

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

You wrote:

 

I still think you are confusing instruction on the Jhanas, which is a very specific set of practices, with general meditation. They are NOT the same, nor are they interchangeable, IMHO.

 

From your lineage:

Of course, to have good shikantaza, we have preparatory zazen. You know, from old, old time, you know, we have that technical term, konpunjo. Konpunjo means “to enter,” you know. That is started from Theravada practice, you know. To prepare for the first stage or second stage or third stage, they practice some special practice. Those practice is not the practice of the first stage or second stage or third stage, but to prepare for those stages. 

(“The Background of Shikantaza”, Shunryu Suzuki; San Francisco, February 22, 1970; transcript from shunryusuzuki.com)
 

But usually in counting breathing or following breathing, you feel as if you are doing something, you know– you are following breathing, and you are counting breathing. This is, you know, why counting breathing or following breathing practice is, you know, for us it is some preparation– preparatory practice for shikantaza because for most people it is rather difficult to sit, you know, just to sit.

(ibid)

 

The preparatory practice for the jhanas is "access concentration":

 

Quote

The path to entering the jhanas begins with what is called access concentration: being fully with the object of meditation and not becoming distracted even if there are wispy background thoughts. If your practice is anapanasati—mindfulness of breathing—you may recognize access concentration when the breath becomes very subtle; instead of a normal breath, you notice your breath has become very shallow. It may even seem that you’ve stopped breathing altogether. These are signs that you’ve likely arrived at access concentration.

 

https://www.lionsroar.com/entering-the-jhanas/

 

Sorry... it's Leigh Brassington. He DOES know what he is talking about, in my experience. Did I share with your that he has taught the jhanas at Tassajara a number of times? He actually taught BOTH of my Zen teachers, as well as some quite well known ones I would share if I could remember who. Maybe one was Steve Stucky?

 

 

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

As I wrote in "Applying the Pali Instructions": 

Ceasing the exercise of volition while mindful of inhalation and exhalation only occurs when the activity of inhalation and exhalation is solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness. 
 

 

That cessation is exactly "just sitting", to me.

 

Just sitting is just sitting to me.  Once mind drops out, it should be free of any contrived ideas or activity about what you are doing. 

 

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

You wrote:

 

The entire field of experience is ultimately awareness, so it rests everywhere. I can look in between breaths, but it isn't any kind of special location. If it was enlightenment it would persist even during breath, or anything else. In any moment feeling and perceiving are constant, though the experience of a "self" that perceives them is gone. 

 

I haven't experienced the conscious cessation of volition in feeling and perceiving.  I do write about the first of the further states, here.  The rest I can't really claim to have known directly.

Did you get this far in my post?--
 

Suppose that you have climbed to the top of a hundred-foot pole, and are told to let go and advance one step further without holding bodily life dear. In such a situation, if you say that you can practice the Buddha-Way only when you are alive, you are not really following your teacher. Consider this carefully. 

( “Shobogenzo-zuimonki: Sayings of Eihei Dogen Zenji, recorded by Koun Ejo”, 1-13, tr Shohaku Okumura, Soto-Shu Shumucho p 45-46)

 

Complete relinquishment of volitive activity in the body involves letting go of the activity of breath while yet conscious of the need to inhale and exhale.  That can feel like letting go of life itself.
 

The location of consciousness in the third concentration is the place from which to “advance one step further”. That location may shift and move, yet that is the place where automatic activity in the movement of breath can be engendered solely by virtue of the location of consciousness.

 

That's one of the reasons I thanked you in my last remark on the "very unpopular opinions" thread (Posted Friday at 02:21 PM (edited)).  Very helpful, for me.

 

I'm glad to be helpful. Honestly, I am hoping to be helpful when I post on your threads. 

 

One step further than:

 

Quote

...letting go of the activity of breath while yet conscious of the need to inhale and exhale.

 

...is to drop the "consciousness of need". In the jhanas, awareness of breathing, or a need to, or even the feeling of being in the body drops off when you get into the formless ones, the arupa jhanas.

 

It is interesting to see your ideas evolve, Mark.

[Mark Foote]

21 hours ago, stirling said:

 

I like to imagine a few might know me here now, and of course you link out to your site where someone feasibly might go venture, so...
 

The lines now read:

 

On The Dao Bums forum site, someone wrote:

 

and:

 

The “Dao Bums” member continued:

 

Thanks.  I think it actually reads better.

 

21 hours ago, stirling said:

 

... you may recognize access concentration when the breath becomes very subtle; instead of a normal breath, you notice your breath has become very shallow. It may even seem that you’ve stopped breathing altogether. These are signs that you’ve likely arrived at access concentration.

https://www.lionsroar.com/entering-the-jhanas/

 

Sorry... it's Leigh Brassington. He DOES know what he is talking about, in my experience. Did I share with your that he has taught the jhanas at Tassajara a number of times? He actually taught BOTH of my Zen teachers, as well as some quite well known ones I would share if I could remember who. Maybe one was Steve Stucky?
 

 

 

Brassington could be talking about the same thing I'm talking about, when I say:

laying hold of one-pointedness is the coordination of activity in the movement of breath by the free location of consciousness.

 

Some background for you, as to how I arrive at that:
 

You are not your body, but you are the consciousness in the body, because of which you have the awareness of “I am”. It is without words, just pure beingness. Meditation means you have to hold consciousness by itself. The consciousness should give attention to itself.
 

(Gaitonde, Mohan [2017]. Self – Love: The Original Dream [Shri Nisargadatta Maharaj’s Direct Pointers to Reality]. Mumbai: Zen Publications. ISBN 978-9385902833)
 

“The consciousness should give attention to itself”—in thirteenth-century Japan, Eihei Dogen wrote:
 

Therefore, …take the backward step of turning the light and shining it back.
 

(“Fukan zazengi” Tenpuku version; tr. Carl Bielefeldt, “Dogen’s Manuals of Zen Meditation”, p 176)

 

That’s a poetic way to say “the consciousness should give attention to itself”.
 

I used to talk about the location of consciousness, but a friend of mine would always respond that for him, consciousness has no specific location. As a result, I switched to writing about the placement of attention:
 

There can… come a moment when the movement of breath necessitates the placement of attention at a certain location in the body, or at a series of locations, with the ability to remain awake as the location of attention shifts retained through the exercise of presence.
 

(A Way of Living)

 

In his “Genjo Koan”, Dogen wrote:
 

When you find your place where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point.
 

(“Genjo Koan [Actualizing the Fundamental Point]”, tr. Tanahashi)

 

Given a presence of mind that can “hold consciousness by itself”, activity in the body begins to coordinate by virtue of the sense of place associated with consciousness.  A relationship between the free location of consciousness and activity in the body comes forward, and as that relationship comes forward, “practice occurs”.  Through such practice, the placement of consciousness is manifested in the activity of the body.
 

Dogen continued:
 

When you find your way at this moment, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point…

(ibid)

 

“When you find your way at this moment”, activity takes place solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness. A relationship between the freedom of consciousness and the automatic activity of the body comes forward, and as that relationship comes forward, practice occurs. Through such practice, the placement of consciousness is manifested as the activity of the body.

 

("Take the Backward Step")

 

 

I don't think it's useful to talk about the breath becoming subtle, though.  Useful is to talk about the placement of attention by necessity in the movement of breath, and the free location of consciousness.
 

 

21 hours ago, stirling said:

 

Just sitting is just sitting to me.  Once mind drops out, it should be free of any contrived ideas or activity about what you are doing. 
 

 

 

Yes.  But again:

 

Ceasing the exercise of volition while mindful of inhalation and exhalation only occurs when the activity of inhalation and exhalation is solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness.

 

 

21 hours ago, stirling said:

 

I'm glad to be helpful. Honestly, I am hoping to be helpful when I post on your threads. 

 

One step further than:

...letting go of the activity of breath while yet conscious of the need to inhale and exhale.

 

...is to drop the "consciousness of need". In the jhanas, awareness of breathing, or a need to, or even the feeling of being in the body drops off when you get into the formless ones, the arupa jhanas.
 

 

My husband is a spear fisherman and he can hold his breath underwater for almost four minutes. He was trained to do so in a manner similar to how they train Navy Seals. They are able to do relaxation techniques and override their body’s impulse to panic. I’m not sure if everyone can accomplish this or if they are outliers. But one important point that I think fits into the topic here. They have to be wary of something called shallow water blackout. They will hold their breath without the panic response literally until they pass out underwater, and drown (even if they are only sitting on the bottom of a pool with a foot or two of water above them).

(The Case of the Suffocating Woman”, posted on Slate Star Codex April 5, 2017 by Scott Alexander; http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/04/05/the-case-of-the-suffocating-woman/; commenter “liz”, April 5, 2017 at 10:41 am)
 

 

21 hours ago, stirling said:

 

It is interesting to see your ideas evolve, Mark.
 

I had occasion to reread all the posts on my own website since 2010, a couple of years back--I was abandoning my hand-written PHP site, in favor of WordPress. Some of the posts were border-line, but in the end, I kept them all.  I think there's a consistency, more of a filling in than an evolving--how it seems to me.

Thanks for your responses, stirling.  They really have been helpful to me, even if I disagree with you about a good many things.  Ha ha!  

 

[silent thunder]

To take elements of an ongoing conversation and quote it away from the conversation and recreate/replace in another environment  it where it lacks context and becomes a one sided commentary seems a tad disrespectful and disingenuous.

[Mark Foote]

On 7/25/2024 at 8:56 AM, silent thunder said:

To take elements of an ongoing conversation and quote it away from the conversation and recreate/replace in another environment  it where it lacks context and becomes a one sided commentary seems a tad disrespectful and disingenuous.
 

I think my last thread garnered exactly zero comments, silent thunder.  That's also been the fate of the original topic post here, apart from stirling's comments.  

I apologize.  The topic of this thread is applying the Pali instructions for the initial concentrations, and I offered my take on the instructions for the first concentration, plus a link for my take on the rest.

In the conversation with stirling, I wrote about my experience of the basics:

 

... laying hold of one-pointedness is the coordination of activity in the movement of breath by the free location of consciousness.  That's different from activity in the movement of breath solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness, yet both depend on the free location of consciousness.  The question I've had for a lot of years is how to practice the transition, yet that is precisely Gautama's teaching with regard to the first four concentrations and the sign of the concentration--at least, as far as I can tell.

To that statement, stirling replied: 

I know that this is your theory, but it has nothing to do with the jhanas.

 

He also wrote:

 

I still think you are confusing instruction on the Jhanas, which is a very specific set of practices, with general meditation. They are NOT the same, nor are they interchangeable, IMHO.

 

 

These are most excellent comments, and I'm sorry they are buried in the thread. 

Maybe I should have titled the thread, "Are the Pali instructions on concentration, instructions on zazen?"

I did cite Shunryu Suzuki:
 

Of course, to have good shikantaza, we have preparatory zazen. You know, from old, old time, you know, we have that technical term, konpunjo. Konpunjo means “to enter,” you know. That is started from Theravada practice, you know. To prepare for the first stage or second stage or third stage, they practice some special practice. Those practice is not the practice of the first stage or second stage or third stage, but to prepare for those stages. 

(“The Background of Shikantaza”, Shunryu Suzuki; San Francisco, February 22, 1970; transcript from shunryusuzuki.com)

 

But usually in counting breathing or following breathing, you feel as if you are doing something, you know– you are following breathing, and you are counting breathing. This is, you know, why counting breathing or following breathing practice is, you know, for us it is some preparation– preparatory practice for shikantaza because for most people it is rather difficult to sit, you know, just to sit.

(ibid)

 

Stirling wrote:

Just sitting is just sitting to me.  Once mind drops out, it should be free of any contrived ideas or activity about what you are doing. 

 

And I responded:

 

Ceasing the exercise of volition while mindful of inhalation and exhalation only occurs when the activity of inhalation and exhalation is solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness.

 

 

That's where the thread stands. 

 

Edited July 26 by Mark Foote