La Vallée Poussin Musīla and Nārada. The Path - Gampo Abbey

Musıla and N›rada. The Path of Nirv›˚a: by Louis de La Vallée Poussin
• ‘Equipoise of cessation’ is one of six unconditioned phenomena (asa˙sk¸ta) in the list of One
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Hundred Factors: a way of designating suchness (tathat›), Siddhi by Hsüan-tsang, 75.
• The Mah›s›˙ghikas do not count the ‘equipoise of cessation’ in their list of nine
unconditioned phenomena (asa˙sk˛ra), but definitely the four formless equipoises (asa˙sk¸tas
4-7), see Masuda, Treatise of Vasumitra, 29 (Asia Major, II, 1925).
a. Aºguttara, IV, 454:
What is needed for there to be nirv›˚a-in-this-life? – The practitioners enter into the first
meditation… into the fourth formless equipoise: that is what the Blessed One calls,
figuratively, nirv›˚a-in-this-life. The practitioners enter into the ‘equipoise of cessation’, and
their fluxes have been destroyed by the vision of discrimination (paññ›ya disv›): that is what
the Blessed One calls, not figuratively (nippariy›yena), nirv›˚a-in-this-life.
Aºguttara, IV, 414:
⁄›riputra says to the monastics: “Happiness is nirv›˚a! Happiness is nirv›na!”
Ud›yin asks: “But what is happiness in nirv›˚a wherein there is no sensation?”
⁄›riputra answers: “The happiness of nirv›˚a is that there is no sensation in nirv›˚a.”
For the monastics who have entered into the first meditation, any conception
connected with the world of desire (k›ma) is trouble, a suffering. [The happiness of the first
meditation consists of the elimination of this conception.] By this distinction (imin›
pariy›yena), we can know how nirv›˚a is happiness. – And so on up to the monastics who
enter the fourth formless equipoise. – Going beyond the fourth formless equipoise, the
monastics enter into the ‘equipoise of cessation’ and their fluxes have been destroyed by the
vision of discrimination: by this distinction we also may know how nirv›˚a is happiness.
[An unexpected conclusion which is at variance, it seems, with sÒtra IV, 454.]
b. Visuddhimagga, 705.
Why do practitioners enter into this equipoise? Wishing for the breaking of the procession of
existence (or of the conditioning forces, sa˙sk›ras), they enter into it hoping: “Already in the
present existence, having become free from mind, attaining cessation (nirodha), nirv›˚a, we
will pass the time happily (di˛˛heva dhamme acittak› hutv› nirodha˙ nibb›na˙ patv› sukha˙
vihariss›m›ti)”.
c. She Zan Aung, in Compendium, 70.
If the practitioners are not satisfied with the mere intuition of nirv›˚a that accompanies the
possession of the fruit of a perfect being (arhat), they can enter into the ‘equipoise of
cessation’; they can enjoy nirv›˚a already in the present existence (di˛˛hadhammanibb›na);
they can partially enjoy nirv›˚a. When the practitioners emerge from concentration in the