Lessons In Practical Buddhism - Sirimangalo.Org

knowledge, “I am freed!”
– MN 74
This is nirodhasaññā, the knowledge of the cessation of
suffering that comes when you let go, when you don’t have
the craving; when you don’t cling, because you’ve let go. So
this is seven.
sabbaloke anabhiratasaññā
Number eight is sabbaloke anabhiratasaññā, seeing that
birth in the sensual realms, as a human, even as an angel,
birth as a brahma in the material brahma realms, like a ball
of light or a god with form, or birth in the immaterial brahma
realms of infinite space, infinite consciousness or
nothingness, or total quietude of mind, not even seeming to
have perception, seeing that all of these are undesirable; not
wanting to be born as a human again, not wanting to be born
in heaven, seeing that rebirth itself has no benefit. This one,
I think, is quite difficult. A person really must be an arahant
to experience this perception, so at this stage in the practice,
it is more than we can hope for. We don’t have to worry so
much, but we understand it, and at the very least, we give
up the world that we’re in, for example the world of being
born as a non-Buddhist, being born as a wicked child, with
temper tantrums when we were young, mean to our parents
who tried their best to love and look after us, who was nasty
to our teachers and who got in all sorts of trouble. We try
our best to not make the mistakes that we made before. We
become disenchanted with where we have come from. At
the very least, we can give up our desire for such worldly
evil.
Even a sotāpanna can come back and be born as a human;
though it seems more likely that a sotāpanna would be born
in heaven given their purity of mind. Either way, they
haven’t given up their desire to be reborn. What they have
given up, however, is the defilements of mind that could lead
them to be reborn in a world of suffering – the animal, ghost
or hell worlds. We should all try our best to see clearly
enough to at least recognize the fact that life in any of these
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