what the heck is stream entry?
Aug. 25th, 2019 11:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cattasallaBeen awhile since I've posted! I've been moving, out of my temporary but necessary stay with my parents into my own apartment again, coinciding with a major shift in career from research meteorology to data science. And the Dhamma is my ever-constant companion.
I've clarified my goals in recent weeks, and decided that I really do want it, and I think I can do it: I think I can reach stream entry in this very lifetime. The suttas certainly say it is possible for lay people, and those coming out of the Thai Forest tradition, such as Thanissaro Bhikkhu, give a very clear path from zero to awakening. Even Gil Fronsdal will venture to discuss it every once in awhile. Ajahn Chah said to his monastic students that if they hadn't reached stream entry within five years of practice, they had been wasting their time. All this adds up to me thinking it is a doable goal!
But what does it mean?
In the ancient Buddhist tradition, the original path to awakening was that of the arahant, and stream entry begins that path. This contrasts from the Mahāyāna path of the bodhisattva, who intends to eventually become a full-blown Buddha. The arahant does not intend to ever become a Buddha, but instead seeks to reach awakening on their own. There's lots of theory surrounding this, and I'll touch on my thoughts a bit later, but that's the mythological backdrop.
The idea is that there are various fetters, chains that bind us to repeated existence, to our endless wandering through saṃsāra. The various levels of awakening, of which there are four, each breaks a set of these chains. The first level is stream entry, which breaks the fetters of doubt, of attachment to habitual ritual, and of views of self, that is, of identifying as some thing or another. The stream enterer has at most seven lifetimes left before they reach full awakening and arahantship, says the Buddha. The second is the once returner, who will return to our world once more. Next is the non-returner, who will arise in one of the higher realms but never again in this world. And finally, there is the arahant.
What this hinges on is an experience of the Deathless. The Deathless is equivalent to what is popularly called nirvāṇa. It is the end of the wandering through the cycles of birth and death; it is the complete and final end of all stress, discomfort, and suffering. It is the annihilation of the self. Considering that most of us experience the world through our selves, it's impossible for us to imagine what that state must be like. We must take it on faith that such a state even exists, if we choose to believe in it. (Indeed, without such a soteriological belief, Buddhism is really just a super-advanced form of psychotherapy, which is not knock its employment for strictly healing purposes...for that it is undeniably powerful.) And, indeed, as long as we are taking that on faith, we have the capacity for doubt--doubt in the Buddha's Great Awakening as a real thing that happened and that we can attain.
From what I can gather by reading those who I think have reached it, or who at least talk about it in great detail as if they have first-hand knowledge, is that it first requires progressing through the various stages of insight knowledges. There are different formulations of this particular post-canonical list given, but it boils down to seeing, at an experiential level, that all things are constantly arising and passing away. It's described as being like having one's body turn into sand and spill away, among other things. With this insight knowledge, one gradually becomes disenchanted, even disgusted, with the conventional way we have of assigning any degree of stability to what is inherently unstable. This leads to a turning away, and abandonment. Until even the desire to abandon is abandoned, even the intention to abandon is abandoned. And, apparently, at that point, the Deathless dawns.
After that, apparently everything is different...but also the same.
As far as how it relates to Mahāyāna thought, I'm not entirely sure. I'm sure someone else, much smarter than I, has written on this and I hope to run into that some day. I don't have a great deal of familiarity with Mahāyāna thought (although I have a plan to rectify this), but it seems to me that it might be the case that what gets described as stream entry is not too dissimilar from satōri in Zen. I could easily be mistaken, though.
At any rate, this seems like a concrete goal on the Path that I can reach, and I declare my intent to do so.
I've clarified my goals in recent weeks, and decided that I really do want it, and I think I can do it: I think I can reach stream entry in this very lifetime. The suttas certainly say it is possible for lay people, and those coming out of the Thai Forest tradition, such as Thanissaro Bhikkhu, give a very clear path from zero to awakening. Even Gil Fronsdal will venture to discuss it every once in awhile. Ajahn Chah said to his monastic students that if they hadn't reached stream entry within five years of practice, they had been wasting their time. All this adds up to me thinking it is a doable goal!
But what does it mean?
In the ancient Buddhist tradition, the original path to awakening was that of the arahant, and stream entry begins that path. This contrasts from the Mahāyāna path of the bodhisattva, who intends to eventually become a full-blown Buddha. The arahant does not intend to ever become a Buddha, but instead seeks to reach awakening on their own. There's lots of theory surrounding this, and I'll touch on my thoughts a bit later, but that's the mythological backdrop.
The idea is that there are various fetters, chains that bind us to repeated existence, to our endless wandering through saṃsāra. The various levels of awakening, of which there are four, each breaks a set of these chains. The first level is stream entry, which breaks the fetters of doubt, of attachment to habitual ritual, and of views of self, that is, of identifying as some thing or another. The stream enterer has at most seven lifetimes left before they reach full awakening and arahantship, says the Buddha. The second is the once returner, who will return to our world once more. Next is the non-returner, who will arise in one of the higher realms but never again in this world. And finally, there is the arahant.
What this hinges on is an experience of the Deathless. The Deathless is equivalent to what is popularly called nirvāṇa. It is the end of the wandering through the cycles of birth and death; it is the complete and final end of all stress, discomfort, and suffering. It is the annihilation of the self. Considering that most of us experience the world through our selves, it's impossible for us to imagine what that state must be like. We must take it on faith that such a state even exists, if we choose to believe in it. (Indeed, without such a soteriological belief, Buddhism is really just a super-advanced form of psychotherapy, which is not knock its employment for strictly healing purposes...for that it is undeniably powerful.) And, indeed, as long as we are taking that on faith, we have the capacity for doubt--doubt in the Buddha's Great Awakening as a real thing that happened and that we can attain.
From what I can gather by reading those who I think have reached it, or who at least talk about it in great detail as if they have first-hand knowledge, is that it first requires progressing through the various stages of insight knowledges. There are different formulations of this particular post-canonical list given, but it boils down to seeing, at an experiential level, that all things are constantly arising and passing away. It's described as being like having one's body turn into sand and spill away, among other things. With this insight knowledge, one gradually becomes disenchanted, even disgusted, with the conventional way we have of assigning any degree of stability to what is inherently unstable. This leads to a turning away, and abandonment. Until even the desire to abandon is abandoned, even the intention to abandon is abandoned. And, apparently, at that point, the Deathless dawns.
After that, apparently everything is different...but also the same.
As far as how it relates to Mahāyāna thought, I'm not entirely sure. I'm sure someone else, much smarter than I, has written on this and I hope to run into that some day. I don't have a great deal of familiarity with Mahāyāna thought (although I have a plan to rectify this), but it seems to me that it might be the case that what gets described as stream entry is not too dissimilar from satōri in Zen. I could easily be mistaken, though.
At any rate, this seems like a concrete goal on the Path that I can reach, and I declare my intent to do so.