What this chapter covers: This chapter describes the first stage of insight purification: learning to see mind and body (nama-rupa) clearly as they actually are. The meditator defines what is mental and what is material, sees that there is no “self” apart from these processes, and understands how mind and body depend on each other to function.
Getting Started
Earlier (Chapter 14), it was said that after perfecting virtue and concentration — the “roots” of practice — the meditator should strengthen knowledge through study and questioning. Purification of virtue (the four-fold discipline beginning with the monastic code) was covered in Chapters 1 and 2. Purification of consciousness (the eight deep absorptions plus access concentration) was covered in Chapters 3 through 13.
With those foundations in place, we now turn to the five purifications that form the “trunk” of the path:
- Purification of view
- Purification by overcoming doubt
- Purification by knowledge and vision of what is and is not the path
- Purification by knowledge and vision of the way
- Purification by knowledge and vision
Purification of view means correctly seeing mentality and materiality (nama-rupa) — mind and body — as they actually are.
How to Define Mind and Body
Starting from Concentration
If your main practice has been concentration, emerge from any deep absorption except the highest formless state. Then examine the factors of that absorption — applied thought, sustained thought, joy, happiness, and one-pointedness — along with the mental states that accompany them, such as feeling and perception.
Define all of these together as “mentality” — the mental side — because the mind always bends toward its object.
Next, investigate what supports these mental states. Like a man who spots a snake in his house and follows it to find its den, trace your mental experience back to its physical support — the heart-base. Then discern the four great elements (earth, water, fire, air) that make up that physical support, along with all the other forms of matter derived from them.
Define all of this as “materiality” — the bodily side — because it is constantly disturbed by cold, heat, hunger, and so on.
Finally, bring these two definitions together: “This bending toward objects is mentality. This being disturbed and shaped is materiality. Together they are mentality-materiality — mind and body.”
Starting from Direct Observation
If your main practice is pure insight (without prior deep absorption), or if you simply prefer this approach, begin by discerning the four great elements in your own body, either briefly or in detail, using the methods from Chapter 11.
When the elements become clear in their true characteristics, the various kinds of matter throughout the body become plain — in head hair, body hair, nails, teeth, skin, and all thirty-two parts of the body. Each part contains matter originated by action (kamma), by nutriment, by temperature, and by consciousness.
Background Note: Matter in the body is analysed into “groups” of inseparable qualities. The most basic group contains eight qualities: the four great elements plus colour, smell, taste, and nutritive essence. Larger groups add qualities like life, body-sensitivity, or sex. Different parts of the body contain different combinations depending on what originated them.
When you have discerned all this material form, the immaterial states — consciousness and its companions — become plain through the sense doors. You recognise the eighty-one kinds of everyday consciousness and the mental factors that always accompany them: contact, feeling, perception, intention, vitality, steadiness of mind, and attention.
Taking all the material states together under the characteristic of “being disturbed,” you see them as materiality. Taking all the immaterial states together under the characteristic of “bending toward an object,” you see them as mentality.
Alternative Frameworks
The same definition of mind and body can be reached through several traditional frameworks:
Through the eighteen elements: The five sense-sensitivities (eye, ear, nose, tongue, body) and their five kinds of sense-objects make ten material elements. The remaining material states fall under the mental-data element. The seven types of consciousness element and the mental factors associated with them make up the mental side. So ten-and-a-half elements are materiality and seven-and-a-half are mentality.
Through the twelve bases: The five sense-bases and their five object-bases, plus part of the mental-data base, are materiality. The mind base and the rest of the mental-data base are mentality. So ten-and-a-half bases are materiality and one-and-a-half are mentality.
Through the five aggregates: All material form is the form aggregate. Feeling, perception, mental formations, and consciousness are the four immaterial aggregates. The form aggregate is materiality. The four immaterial aggregates are mentality.
The simplest approach: “Any kind of materiality whatever consists of the four great elements and the matter derived from them.” And the mind base together with part of the mental-data base is mentality. “This mentality and this materiality are called mentality-materiality.”
When the Mental Side Is Hard to See
If you have discerned materiality but the mental side remains unclear due to its subtlety, do not give up. Go back and discern materiality again and again with greater clarity.
The clearer materiality becomes, the more the mental states that take it as their object will reveal themselves naturally.
Think of it like cleaning a dirty mirror. A man looking for his reflection in a grimy mirror does not throw the mirror away. He polishes it again and again, and the reflection appears by itself once the glass is clean.
Or think of pressing sesame seeds for oil. One or two pressings may yield nothing. But wetting the flour again and again with hot water and pressing steadily, clear oil eventually flows out.
Or think of clarifying muddy water with a clearing nut. One rub does nothing. But rubbing the nut again and again, the fine mud settles and the water becomes transparent.
In the same way, keep returning to materiality. As it becomes definite and disentangled, the opposing mental hindrances subside. Your consciousness clears like water above settled mud. The mental states reveal themselves.
Three Doorways to Seeing the Mental Side
Once your discernment of materiality is thoroughly clear, the immaterial states become evident through one of three doorways:
Through contact: When you discern that the earth element has the characteristic of hardness, the first thing you notice is contact — the meeting of sense, object, and consciousness. From there, feeling, perception, intention, and consciousness all become evident.
Through feeling: Instead of contact, you first notice the feeling that experiences the element — pleasant, painful, or neutral. From that, you trace out perception, contact, intention, and consciousness.
Through consciousness: You first notice the knowing itself — the consciousness that cognises the object. From there, feeling, perception, contact, and intention all become clear.
Whichever doorway opens first, work with it. But only begin this investigation of the mental side after your discernment of materiality is already solid. If you leave off materiality too soon — after only one or two material states have become clear — you will lose your footing, like a mountain cow that slips off a steep path. But if you build on a firm foundation, the practice grows and matures.
No Being Apart from Mind and Body
Having defined the four immaterial aggregates as mentality and the four great elements with their derived matter as materiality, the meditator now sees all experience in terms of this pair alone.
Like opening a box with a knife, like splitting a twin palm-fruit in two, he divides everything into mentality and materiality. And he concludes: apart from this mind and body, there is nothing else — no being, no person, no god, no creator.
To strengthen this understanding, he confirms it with the Buddha’s teachings:
Just as with the assembly of parts The word “chariot” is used, So, when the aggregates are present, “A being” is said by convention.
And again: “Just as when a space is enclosed with timber, creepers, grass, and clay, there comes to be the term ‘house,’ so too, when a space is enclosed with bones, sinews, flesh, and skin, there comes to be the term ‘material form.’”
And this verse:
It is suffering alone that rises, Suffering that remains, suffering that departs. Nothing rises other than suffering, And nothing ceases other than suffering.
In hundreds of discourses, only mentality-materiality is described — not a being, not a person. Just as “chariot” is a conventional label for an arrangement of axles, wheels, and poles — and “house” for an arrangement of walls and roof — and “fist” for fingers placed a certain way — and “lute” for body and strings — and “army” for elephants, horses, and soldiers — and “city” for walls and buildings — and “tree” for trunk, branches, and foliage — so too, “a being” or “a person” is a conventional label for the five aggregates.
In the ultimate sense, when each component is examined, there is no being that could serve as a basis for the assumption “I am.” There is only mentality-materiality.
The vision of one who sees this way is called correct vision.
The Danger of Denying This
When someone rejects this correct vision and assumes a permanent being exists, they fall into one of two traps. If they conclude this being is never destroyed, they fall into the eternalist view. If they conclude it is eventually annihilated, they fall into the annihilationist view.
The Buddha said: “There are two kinds of view. Some hold back and some overreach. Only those with eyes see.” Those who love existence hold back from the teaching of cessation. Those who are disgusted by existence overreach into the belief that the self is cut off at death. But one who sees what has arisen as arisen — and enters the way of dispassion, fading of greed, and cessation — that one truly sees.
The Marionette
Therefore, just as a marionette is empty, soulless, and without any intention of its own — yet through the combination of strings and wood it seems to walk, stand, and act with purpose — so too, mentality-materiality is empty, soulless, and without any intention of its own. Through the combination of mind and body together, it seems to act with purpose and interest. But it only seems so.
Hence the Ancients said:
The mental and material are really here, But here there is no human being to be found, For it is void and merely fashioned like a doll — Just suffering piled up like grass and sticks.
How Mind and Body Depend on Each Other
This can be explained further through the analogy of two sheaves of reeds propped against each other. Each one supports the other. When one falls, the other falls too. In the same way, mentality and materiality exist as an interdependent pair. Each gives the other support. When one breaks up at death, the other breaks up too.
Hence the Ancients said:
The mental and material Are twins and each supports the other; When one breaks up they both break up Through mutual conditionality.
The drum and its sound. When a drum is struck, sound occurs. The drum is one thing and the sound is another. They are not mixed together. The drum is empty of the sound; the sound is empty of the drum. Yet the sound depends on the drum. In the same way, materiality is one thing and mentality is another. They are not mixed together. Mentality is empty of materiality; materiality is empty of mentality. Yet mentality arises depending on materiality, just as sound arises depending on the drum.
Hence the Ancients said:
The group of five based on contact comes not from the eye, Or from things seen, or something in between; Due to a cause it comes to be, and formed as well, Just as the sound that issues from a beaten drum.
This verse is then repeated for each of the six senses — ear and sound, nose and smell, tongue and taste, body and touch, mind-base and mental objects — each time concluding:
Due to a cause it comes to be, and formed as well, Just as the sound that issues from a beaten drum.
The blind man and the cripple. Mentality has no power to act on its own. It cannot eat, drink, speak, or move. And materiality has no power to act on its own. It has no desire to eat, drink, speak, or move. But when supported by materiality, mentality occurs. And when supported by mentality, materiality occurs.
To explain this, the Ancients gave the following story. A blind man and a cripple both wanted to travel. The blind man said, “I have strong legs but no eyes to see the path.” The cripple said, “I have sharp eyes but no legs to walk.” So the blind man lifted the cripple onto his shoulders. Sitting there, the cripple called out directions: “Go left. Now right. Now left again.”
Neither the blind man nor the cripple could travel alone. But by supporting each other, they went wherever they wished.
So too, mentality and materiality cannot arise by their own power. But there is nothing to prevent them from functioning when they support each other.
Hence the Ancients said:
They cannot come to be by their own strength, Or yet maintain themselves by their own strength; Relying for support on other states, Weak in themselves, and formed, they come to be.
And just as men depend upon A boat for traversing the sea, So does the mental body need The matter-body for occurrence. And as the boat depends upon The men for traversing the sea, So does the matter-body need The mental body for occurrence. Depending each upon the other, The boat and men go on the sea. And so do mind and matter both Depend the one upon the other.
Summary
The correct vision of mentality and materiality — established on the ground of non-confusion by overcoming the perception of “a being” — is what is meant by purification of view. Other terms for it are “defining of mentality-materiality” and “delimitation of formations.”
This is the eighteenth chapter, “The Description of Purification of View,” in the section on the Development of Understanding in the Path of Purification, composed for the purpose of gladdening good people.