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How is Qi Energy used in Buddhist practice?
Ive seen television programmes and videos of buddhist shaolin monks who perfom incredible techniques such as breaking iron bars with their heads, impaling themselves with spears, throwing needles through glasses windows etc.
It was said that these monks create, harness and use Qi Energy which makes it possible for them to perform these techniques. I have two questions:

What is this Qi Energy?
Is it a strong and profound level of concentration like the Jhanas in Theravada Buddhism?

Thank you for your time.
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-1 Because I think that this a traditional Chinese concept and not a Buddhist concept, and so I'm not sure that it's on-topic here. Questions pertaining to the martial arts aspect of Shaolin might be better asked on Martial Arts.SE.

Isn't Qi Energy related to Qigong? If so Wikipedia describes Qigong as "According to Daoist, Buddhist, and Confucian philosophy, respectively, qigong allows access to higher realms of awareness, awakens one's "true nature", and helps develop human potential.". Seems somewhat related.

@Robin. In this quote its says that Qi Energy is strengthned in Qigong: http://www.qigonghealing.com/qigong/whatis.html. "Qigong (also spelled Ch'i Kung) is a powerful system of healing and energy medicine from China. It is the art and science of using breathing techniques, gentle movement, and meditation to cleanse, strengthen, and circulate the life energy (qi). Qigong practice leads to better health and vitality and a tranquil state of mind".

@Chris. As far as i understand Qi energy is trained during Qigong and Qigong is used by buddhist shaolin monks. When that is said i will take your advice and try posting the question in the Martial Arts SE. Thanks.

@Robin111 Qi is related to Qigong (or vice versa). What you quoted sounds to me like an interesting claim made by a fan of Qigong. Feel free to upvote the question if you think it's useful (note that I haven't tried close the question).

I also found the following on Wikipedia: Qigong history -- [...] in the 7th century AD. Meditative practice was emphasized and a series of qigong exercises known as the Yijin Jing ("Muscle/Tendon Change Classic") was attributed to Bodhidharma. The Chinese martial arts community eventually identify this Yijing Jing as one of the secret training methods in Shaolin martial arts.

@Chris. I posted the question in the Martial Arts SE. I will delete it here.

Why isn't this related to Buddhism then? At least with an edit such as "How is Qi Energy used in Buddhist practice?"

@Robin. Thanks for the edit suggestion. It does make the question more in line with our site. I will make the edit.

You don't have to delete: I was just voicing my opinion that it might be off-topic. If you leave it open then you might get an answer, perhaps from Ahmed for example if he sees this (and in fact you could guarantee he'd see it, by posting a comment under his answer to reference this question, saying that you'd like to know more about the "chi" he referred to in his answer).

@Chris. Thanks for the advice. I will try to do that.

@Robin111 I suspected that it wasn't related to Buddhism, because in my (limited) experience it's more related to Traditional Chinese Medicine, also to Chinese Martial Arts, perhaps especially Tai Chi, not to mention Qi Gong, also Daoism. I admit I know less than I'd like to about Chinese Buddhism so I don't want to close this question. I withdrew my downvote after the recent edit.

if anything, this question is on topic because a newcomer might look here thinking chi is a Buddhist concept. As a bonus, Ahmed's answer below provides a Buddhist perspective on the subject.

"How is chi used in Buddhist practice?"
Buddha ignored the fascination people had with all this and classified it as "the five elements" knowing that even the slightest attraction to these low physical phenomena would waste people's time and detract from the many more worthwhile goals. You don't have to know anything about chi in Buddhism because in Buddhism the method of true awareness is enough to dissolve all blockages and problems that might come up.
This is why so many uneducated Buddhist monks who didn't know anything about any of the other traditions still won the prize of Enlightenment! One of them was the patriarch of the Zen school, whom other jealous disciples tried to hunt down..
In those times, monks would be all too interested in those things, at the expense of understanding one's True Mind, which is beyond body and mind... If Buddha even mentioned the word chi, there would be a million and one distracting questions popping into people's head at those times--that would probably derail people's focus entirely... which is why Gautama supposedly returned as Padmasambhava and created the Tibetan school--much much later after the heart of Buddhism was established. (Tibetan school by the way is still aligned with Buddhism but has an integrated focus on the wisdom-energies.)
Nonetheless, chi is related to different karmic habits that we have and once these energies are dissolved the personality characteristic is also transformed--and vice versa.
Buddhism aims at a much higher target than physical perfection, beyond even physical immortality, and this is why it is possible in Buddhism to go beyond the body to transform the mind at its root, attaining things that are definitely Buddhist ("non-common supermundane achievements") and other things that are beyond form but common to all spiritual schools ("common supermundane achievements").
Buddhism aims at the highest possible level: transforming the 8th consciousness, the storehouse of karmas from our endless lives... becoming a radiant actualized Buddha helping all beings win Awakening, becoming free from cycles like birth-and-death and suffering. To Buddhism, these super-powers are nothing but wasting time developing tricks, totally distracted from our human and spiritual problem. That is, unless it is for skillful means (see the parable of the burning house).
With that Buddhist warning aside, to answer your first question, there are many different types of chi, based on various organs. This falls within the realm of TCM and there are many uses to knowing such things, especially in diagnosing one's body. I would love to have an intuitive TCM doctor analyze my sitting posture--lots of constructive advice can be gained from that!
So what is chi in related to Buddhist practice and meditation? How can we make use of such learnings to motivate our Buddhist practice?
The Taoists have mapped out a timeline for what the excellent cultivators and Buddhists go through:
jing > chi > shen > emptiness >> Tao
When one practices Buddhism 100% correctly (celibacy + samatha-powered vipassana), this process happens automatically all the way to "seeing the Tao"/bodhisattvahood.
Due to one's celibacy, one has stored up jing (semen) which after 3 months of jhana eventually starts to transform into chi. One will feel less hungry and can fast for a long time. One is qualified to do the things posted in the picture. Eventually after at least a year like this, one's chi will transform to shen. For several years this process will continue, one's sleep needs will drastically reduce. After even more refined letting go, one will be at the stage of "emptiness" free from dualities and one step away from turning around and "seeing the Tao"
Also, the Taoists have fancier, more interesting names than this - I'm just summarizing.
I recommend the dense book "How to Measure and Deepen Your Spiritual Realization" for a complete understanding of this subject of energetics and where your concern on energetics absolutely must stop in order to progress and not subconsciously focus on lower things and hold yourself back from awakening the formless, nondual prajna wisdom.
Whether one is a monastic or a layman, in this day and age there is a lot of confusing bioenergetics fascination so it is important to clear up this matter for yourself because even if I say "just study Buddhism, and keep noting, all that fancy stuff is nothing they will lose it after they die"... you are still curious and vulnerable to false information--especially since you want to be able to do cool things like be free of sexual desire (when your jing is full), no longer need to ingest food (when chi is full), and no longer need to sleep (when shen is full)... at the best false information + fixation might lead to nonbeneficial/retarding practices and at the worst, a painful fiery death (I refer you to the Buddhist story of Hakuin).
2nd question: yes, it is a result of staying in that state. After achieving the 1st jhana on a mental level, one must reside in this state until the body completes transforming. After one's body and mind are in sync (this may take a few months if one achieved jhana/insight quickly), one's state will stabilize (and one can go to even higher states more easily)... and one can feel and train one's chi to do various tricks--beneficial and harmful. One can also ignore those lateral pathways and continue on the Buddhist journey.
Go here for more nondenominational info and definitions.
Also read "Master Huai-Chin Nan - Internal Martial Arts Nei-Gong" to have all your chi-related questions answered, especially related to Buddhist practice.
The dense book I mentioned earlier has excellent case studies as well on how chi manifested in different practitioners' lives.

The words "Jing, qi, and shen" are introduced e.g. here: Three Treasures (traditional Chinese medicine)

@Ahmed. Thanks a lot for the insights and references. I appreciate it.

@Lanka Pleasure to answer, thanks for an excellent question. I also recommend Tao & Longevity by Master Nan as a primer on this subject, it is an easy read with many direct answers on bioenergetics.

@Ahmed. Thank you that sounds great:) I suspect this stuff should be practiced in order to fully understand, right? Im a theravada buddhist d i stick with this method only, so i guess my understanding of Qigong and Qi energy will be merely "intellectual".

@Lanka All True Dharma Practitioners (practicing 4 Noble Truths including 3 trainings) no matter what tradition they feel they "belong" to, go through this specific set of physical phenomena, whether they are conscious of it or not. The intellectual knowing of many of these things can be beneficial for such a person because then one will not be alarmed when such things happen but just let go and stay centered and aware. Natural manifestation of these energies is a sign of progress but unnecessary alarm or attraction can halt the spiritual progress or even scare away some practitioners.

@Ahmed. Is it the same as the 16 stages of insight in Theravada?

@Lanka 16 stages is a larger "map" so to speak that has not yet been mapped the taoist stages of physiospiritual development. I recommend "mastering the core teachings", a hardcore theravadin book to understand this concept of maps and interrelation

@Ahmed Hello Ahmed I wonder if you still can newer some of the questions related to this. Consdering the post is old. I have been trying to find relation of qi and Buddhism for so long so long finally I found this forum. And what amazing explanation Ahmed. Are you available to help more?

@Jyotish For any qi related question, I recommend Master Nan and Bill Bodri's biggest works. Go to meditationexpert.com for a wealth of free stuff. Those are the golden answers to all psychophysical gong-fu for any tradition, especially Buddhism. But yeah I'm open to good questions.

Many people will tell you that so-called Qi doesn't exist: that it has never been observed scientifically.
The "superhuman" performances you saw or heard about came from Chinese street performers' gimmicks in the old days. For example, A bulky guy would have a heavy slate laid on his belly and let people smash it with a hammer. Then he would stand up and start selling elixirs to the audience that were supposed to give you super human strength. It's just tricks plus physical conditioning. Not sure why the monks picked up and carried on this "glorious" tradition. I guess it's because that real martial arts the monks used to practice were for killing or maiming your opponents. That's why they practiced weapon-based martial arts styles such as sticks and spears. However, the dawn of of the age of gunpowder-propelled weapons rendered their martial arts obsolete.

In Zen, it's actually quite important.  The whole purpose of deep, abdominal breathing is to raise qi in the lower dan tien/hara.  This allows for deeper concentration and the ability to sit through discomfort.  At it's core, what a monk does on the cushion is really no different than what you see martial artists doing (the authentic ones, anyway).  All that differs is its application.  In martial arts, cultivated qi is used externally.  In meditation, it's directed internally.
Now all this isn't to say that there is some magical substance known as qi that allows people to perform superhuman feats.  Personally, I'm of the mind qi is just a convenient umbrella term for some of the phenomenology associated with meditative practice.  Be that as it may, it still plays a roll in some forms of Buddhism.

Hello here Ahmed seems to be saying that the Taoist goal and Buddhist goal are the same or at least the practice of either leads to the same goal which here Ahmed says in reference to the Taoist map as Tao. I am a little confused here. It would depend obviously on how to is defined and what practices are done but buddha clearly stated that vipassana is the only way. There are many variations of vjapshyana but do the Daoists have this practice at all? Their Tao is more like that of an eternalism view whereas when I was told by my teacher that when Buddhists talk about Tao that is free from these two extremes. Their lack of right view is also characterized by incorrect views in rebirth,  realms, role of deities and so on which obviously would not be the case if they were enlightened as per Buddhist way.

That's a reasonable question, but please re-post it (perhaps copy-and-paste it) as a new question (not post it here because it is not an answer to the current question). Use the Ask Question link to post a new question. When you write the question, you can start it using text like this In [this answer](http://buddhism.stackexchange.com/a/9335/254), Ahmed seems to be saying that etc. so that your question is linked to Admed's answer (or I can edit it to fix the link after you post it). When you do that, give your question a title as well.

There's no way (no place) for people to answer your question if you post it here as an answer; and people are more likely to notice that there even is a new question, if it's posted as a question instead of as an answer.

Qi Energy can be compared to mechanical pneumatic equipment that uses air to lift, move or destroy heavy & hard objects.
Where as the Jhanas refine the breathing until the breathing completely disappears.
Therefore, the Jhanas in Theravada Buddhism are not related to Qi Energy & are in fact the opposite of cultivating Qi Energy.

In-&-out breaths are the body fabricator
MN 44

He trains himself, 'I will breathe in calming body fabricator.' He trains himself, 'I will breathe out calming body fabricator.'
MN 118

When one has attained the fourth jhāna, in-and-out breathing has been stilled.
SN 36.11


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What is the benefit of staying with one method, lineage or Dharma tradition?
I've been thinking around this recently ... we are privileged as a generation to have access to so much information - contemplative methods, traditions, teachers, books etc. How does this inform our Dharma - finding and sticking to one method, tradition, lineage or ... studying and practicing many in a more eclectic way?

This is a bit of a leading question: I wonder whether any answers might have been different, if the title had been "What are possible disadvantages of staying with one...".

This leads to great breadth, but little depth. If you want to get to the depth of a practice, where the true wisdom is, you need to stick to a practice and see it through. As Goenka said, if you are looking for water, you dig a well. But you don't start digging a well, stop digging down after 2 feet, then start a new well. Over and over again like this, you will never find the water that you are looking for. You must dig down deep to the depth that the water table is at. So you may start one or two wells, but you don't stop digging until you've gone to sufficient depth to know there is no water there.

Great quote :-)

I agree totally with what Ryan posted and would like to add that even though you have the energy and time to practice, you still have to have the wisdom to penetrate all the different teachings.
It is possible and I know of a few people who are really gifted with insight and wisdom who could do one practice, move over to another to continue and moved to the yet another to further their practice.
Few are those who thoroughly understood all the three traditions and just see it as different tools.
To use the the Goenka analogy we dig the same hole but use different tools according to what we encounter on the way. Using the best tools that can do the job most effectively, and they progressed very fast.
Very few indeed are those who posses those abilities and what's more they can teach their students who possess different tendencies and abilities different techniques according to type.
Needless to say the Buddha is one of the foremost, a teacher of men and gods!

The Buddha taught a handful of leaves but the amount of things he could have taught was like the amount of leaves in an entire forest . He didn't teach all these things he could have taught because none but the handful of leaves he picked could lead one to the transcendence of suffering. It's not about grabbing hold of a whole lotta teachings, It's about letting go of a whole lotta everything. Metta :)

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Mahayana and Non-dualism
Would it be true to say that cultivation of a non-dualistic view is more important in Mahayana Buddhism than Hinayana?

What's Hinayana?

I used the term Hinayana to refer to the earliest schools of Buddhism. As mentioned by @Samadhi below, even although Theravada is associated with the early schools of Buddhism it is not the same as Hinayana. Mahayana (Greater Vehicle) Buddhist thought was a later historical development and the Mahayana commentators referred to earlier Buddhist schools as Hinayana (Lesser Vehicle). There are no Hinayana schools left.

Nice discussion of the term here - http://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/2949/what-is-observing-the-precepts-in-a-hinayana-way-or-a-mahayana-way

I am inclined to answer your question, but I would like to know what you mean by 'view'. Do you mean (1) 'perspective', or (2) 'realization', or (3) something else?

@Tenzin Dorje by 'view' I mean - the understanding that unfolds about the true nature of reality as realization deepens. So in this sense it's a combination of 1 & 2 but I'm also alluding to the emphasis placed right at the very beginning of practices in Mahayana that full enlightenment is a human beings fundamental state i.e. nothing to polish or refine.

The two traditions are different in that Mahayana uses a transformation process, that is, we try to "be" a bodhisattva which means incorporating their virtues and their mind. So we try to have a non-dualistic view. We don't get it in the beginning so we continue to refine our views. Question what do we do with hate and craving in Mahayana?
In the Theravada (which is similar to, but, is not hinayana) tradition it is a development process which means we deal with greed, hate and delusion until we eventually automatically come to posses a non-dualistic view.
Some people find transformation easier, rewarding and enjoyable, while others find development easier, rewarding and enjoyable.
Which do you prefer tea or coffee to quench your thirst?
nb similary with Vajrayana.

So, in Theravada you're occasionally aware of greed, hate and delusion, and deal with them as they occur, and therefore end up with a non-dualistic view? And how is that different in Mahayana: is it that in Mahayana we try to incorporate their virtues, whereas in Theravada we try to eliminate the 'three poisons'?

To deal with greed, hate and delusion, or to eliminate the "three poisons" requires the purification of views, by seeing the 3 marks of existence, anicca, dukkha, anatta and obtained the view of no-self. etc..See the Seven Stages of Purification. In Mahayana in incorporating their virtues we have to have a non-dualistic view so can be equanimous or compassionate.

Put it another way incorporating their virtues involve refining views and conduct until the three poisons are eliminated and that requires wisdom. To put it in yet another way you either sculp (Mahayana) or you assemble(Theravada) to end up with a "noble being".

Non duality is to be realized rather than "cultivated".
Non duality and emptiness are the same.

We're looking for long answers that provide some explanation and context. Don't just give a one-line answer; explain why your answer is right, ideally with citations. Answers that don't include explanations may be removed.

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Is Rupa an Experience?
I have never been clear on the exact nature of rupa. Is rupa the experience of the physical, is rupa not experiential but instead it's what is in 3D space and is there whether or not it's being experienced(like how most people view material reality before practicing Dhamma) or can rupa be both  experiential and not experiential(conceptual?) at the same time? We are supposed to see reality through our individual experience but it seems to me that rupa might not be an "experiential reality kind of teaching". Is rupa only about  when we are experiencing "hardness","coldness","wetness" when we touch an ice cube or is rupa the "formation" of the ice cube or could Rupa just be the concept of the ice cube?  How I interpreted the teachings on rupa told me rupa might be  conceptual at times and ultimate at other times but really I don't know. -Thank You :)

Rupa is also known as the 1st aggregate - the aggregate of material form. Here are some notes on it by Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi:

"...This includes all the material factors of existence, every type of material phenomena. The most important of these is the body, the physical organism through which one experiences the world. The Buddha analyses the aggregate of material form into two basic substances..."

There is also an audio dhamma talk by him on "The Five Aggregates".

Here is a quote from the book "What Buddhists Believe" by Ven. K. Sri Dhammananda, p. 111:

Mind and Matter (Nama-Rupa)
‘What is mind? No matter. What is matter? Never mind.’
ACCORDING to Buddhism, life is a combination of mind (nama) and matter (rupa). Mind consists of the combination of sensations, perceptions, volitional activities and consciousness. Matter consists of the combination of the four elements of solidity, fluidity, motion and heat.
  Life is the co-existence of mind and matter. Decay is the lack of co-ordination of mind and matter. Death is the separation of mind and matter. Rebirth is the recombination of mind and matter. After the passing away of the physical body (matter), the mental forces (mind) recombine and assume a new combination in a different material form and condition another existence.
The relation of mind to matter is like the relation of a battery to an engine of a motor car. The battery helps to start the engine. The engine helps to charge the battery. The combination helps to run the motor car. In the same manner, matter helps the mind to function and the mind helps to set matter in motion.
Buddhism teaches that life is not the property of matter alone, and that the life-process continues or flows as a result of cause and effect. The mental and material elements that compose sentient beings from amoeba to elephant and also to man, existed previously in other forms.
Although some people hold the view that life originates in matter alone, the greatest scientists have accepted that mind precedes matter in order for life to originate. In Buddhism, this concept is called ‘relinking consciousness’.
  Each of us, in the ultimate sense, is mind and matter, a compound of mental and material phenomena, and nothing more. Apart from these realities that go to form the nama-rupa compound, there is no self, or soul. The mind part of the compound is what experiences an object. The matter part does not experience anything. When the body is injured, it is not the body that feels the pain, but the mental side. When we are hungry it is not the stomach that feels the hunger but the mind. However, mind cannot eat the food to ease the hunger. The mind and its factors, make the body digest the food. Thus neither the nama nor the rupa has any efficient power of its own. One is dependent on the other; one supports the other. Both mind and matter arise because of conditions and perish immediately, and this is happening every moment of our lives. By studying and experiencing these realities we will get insight into: (1) what we truly are; (2) what we find around us; (3) how and why we react to what is within and around us; and (4) what we should aspire to reach as a spiritual goal.
To gain insight into the nature of the psycho-physical life is to realise that life is an illusion, a mirage or a bubble, a mere process of becoming and dissolving, or arising and passing away. Whatever exists, arises from causes and conditions. When the causes and conditions cease to be, the thing will cease to exist.

"Form is Emptiness. Emptiness is Form." So refreshing!

Well when you knock yourself against something hard? Do you feel the hardness?
When you drop something from you hand because it is too hot or too cold to hold, do you feel the heat?
Well rupa is made up of the 4 great elements (mahabhuta) of pathavi(earth element -hardness), apo (water element - cohesiveness),  tejo(heat) and vayo (air element - motion). What you have sensed above would be the characteristic of one of the 4 elements of rupa.
Eye-object and the other sense-objects - which are derived matter -can only be sensed by their sense organ's sensitivity.
The rest of the secondary derived matter can only be sensed by the mind. Below are more details of rupa.
These are secondary derived matter:

In the Abhidhamma Pitaka and later Pali literature, rūpa is further analyzed in terms of ten or twenty-three or twenty-four types of secondary or derived (upādā) matter. In the list of ten types of secondary matter, the following are identified:
eye
ear
nose
tongue
body[5]
form
sound
odour
taste
touch[6]

If twenty-four secondary types are enumerated, then the following fifteen are added to the first nine of the above ten:
femininity
masculinity or virility
life or vitality
heart or heart-basis
physical indications (movements that indicate intentions)
vocal indications
space element
physical lightness or buoyancy
physical yieldingness or plasticity
physical handiness or wieldiness
physical grouping or integration
physical extension or maintenance
physical aging or decay
physical impermanence
food

Even though there are 28 paramattha rupas, they do not arise in isolation. At least some arise together. And they vanish together. They have to arise on mahabhuta rupas and they co exist in a form called rupa kalapa. There are 21 rupa kalapas. 9 kalapas are kammaja rupa kalapas, 6 are cittaja, 4 are utuja and 2 are aharaja rupa kalapas...etc
All other rupas that is 5 pasada rupas and 16 sukhuma rupa or subtle materials are all sensed by mind only; that is 5 pasada rupas and 16 sukhuma rupa can never be sensed by any of eye, ear, nose, tongue, and body.
More on rupa
Mahabhuta rupas are four great elements. They are pathavi or solidity, tejo or temperature, apo or liquidity, and vayo or movement or resistence.
Pathavi is earth element. It is the nature that is firmness or hardness or softness which depends on density and organisation between and among atoms, molecules, compounds, and complexes of materials from science sense. Its nature can be sensed through kaya pasada rupa that exist in the body and pathavi will be perceived as hardness softness of materials.
Tejo is the nature that can be known by sensing through the body as warmness or coldness or anything like that which serves as temperature. While temperature is a word, the true nature of tejo can clearly be sensed by the body. Any matter in conventional sense has a temperature and this can be sensed by the body.
Apo is the nature that unites the materials.
It is cohesion.
It is flowability,
it is spreadability,
it is stickiness,
it is driness wetness state of materials in conventional sense.

But the true nature of apo cannot be sensed through the body. It can only be sensed through mind sense door.
Vayo is the nature that pushes or pulls materials together.
It is compressibility repressibility.
It is supportiveness through pressure.
It is movement.
It is motion.
It is resilience.

The true nature of vayo can be sensed through the body.

I'm sorry if this answer is ignorant but I think you're asking whether form has an existence independent of one's experience of it.
Like asking, "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"
My guess is that non-self (by which, I don't mean "they're not me", I mean "they are not themselves") implies that a form doesn't have any independent existence as that form.
In summary:

Rupa means 'appearance'
I guess that that appearance is experienced (by senses and/or mind)
I guess it seems to me unlikely that experienced-appearance has (independent) existence (outside experience) (because if I describe what I see then without me there's no description).
Whether the thing-described (whose appearance I experience) has some (independent) existence also seems to me unlikely (I suppose that would be some projection/fabrication on my part, similar to the "chariot" being a reification)

I'm not sure of the above: hopefully someone will explain what's wrong about it if it is wrong or what else it's missing (or if it doesn't answer the question you were asking).

See this question here and my answer to it: http://buddhism.stackexchange.com/questions/9063/is-lack-of-inherent-existence-the-same-as-not-real/9069#9069. Is any of that what you mean?

Yes some of that is what I mean. For example if you replace "tree" in your answer with "form of tree" or "appearance of tree" then that's similar to what I'm arguing here. One sentence in your answer would be problematic in mine here, i.e. you say, "That does not mean that they are not real" whereas in my answer I think I was arguing are "forms" (or more specifically "things-which-have-form") are reified rather than real. Then you quote explanations of emptiness which is probably what I'm trying to say  (I say "probably" because I'm not completely certain of the definition of "emptiness" yet).

Emptiness means that things to not have inherent existence, i.e. they do not exist as stand alone units. They are conditioned by other causes and thereby only exists as reflections of other things. Here is a video on emptiness by Ven. Yuttadhammo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JfhtBG28dEA&app=desktop

@Lanka I guess the thing that bother me in my answer above is "independent": I thought the question was, "do forms exist independent of their being experienced?" ... and I'm not sure that's what sunyata means ... perhaps sunyata means "independent of the conditions in which they exist", which isn't necessarily quite the same thing ... however I can't think about it too much without it becoming a thicket of views. :-)

@Lanka I think you're right that that is a related question. Samadhi and I both tried to answer that question too.

My advice would be to not think too heavily on stuff like this since conceptual thinking can be detrimental for understanding the true nature of reality. Previously in my life, i.e. before buddhism i loved to "analyze-stuff-to-death" such as the origins of the universe etc. But now i know what the risks of that is. As the Buddha said thinking about these things (which have no answer unless one is a Buddha) will only leave the mind agigated and unsuitable for clear seeing. Just a personal advice.

So many great answers in this and the linked questions! Lots to consider. But I think that this is essentially a simple question and should have a simple answer. I tried to ask it before here, got good answers.
My answer is: "The realm of Experience ("reality") is a hologram of light, with no screen and no projector." Carry that around and see if it reveals anything for you. But I think that this question is about words and concepts, and so has the potential to become "vexatious".


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Noting craving for food : Ven. Mahasi Saydaw tradition
Practice : Ven.Mahasi Sayadaw

I mostly practice "daily life" meditation and I found this specific question very important ( I have got some illnesses due to this too)
I get intention to eat when I see "sweets" even I'm not hungry . Also eat more if it is a food I really "like" .
So I use mental notes "Craving  , Craving " and "liking , liking " respectively .
Sometimes it passes away . But mostly it moves to " intending , intending " and then "eating" steps.
"Suppressing" works temporally but I know this is not the purpose of meditation.
I always try my best to follow below instructions,
 - When you look at the food, looking, seeing.

 - When you arrange the food, arranging.

 - When you bring the food to the mouth, bringing.

 - When you bend the neck forwards, bending.

 - When the food touches the mouth, touching.

 - When placing the food in the mouth, placing.

 - When the mouth closes, closing.

 - When withdrawing the hand, withdrawing.

 - Should the hand touch the plate, touching.

 - When straightening the neck, straightening.

 - When in the act of chewing, chewing.

 **- When you are aware of the taste, knowing.**

 - When swallowing the food, swallowing.

 - While swallowing the food, should the food be felt touching the sides    of the gullet, touching.

And I found "- When you are aware of the taste, knowing" is extremely momentary compare to other steps (relatively longer when having a beverage like coffee or soft drink) . Sometimes I miss that step completely .
How should I handle "intention"(cetanaha) of eating without "suppressing"?

Could you explain the term 'Daily Life Meditation'? Do you not practice sitting meditation?

I have a question regarding the "suppression" aspect of your question.  What exactly do you mean by suppression? In vipassana we look at reality as it is thereby not suppressing stuff. In samatha the hindrances are suppressed, suspended but they are not weakened. In vipassana the hindrances are weakened. It might take a long time, even lifetimes before they are done away with. The time-aspect is not that important. Whats important is that by observing and noting the defilements they are weakened since one sees them for what they are - phenomena that arise and cease on their own accord.

@Lanka moving noting to another object such as walking after few noting of craving on food . So I see "Craving" is the most prominent at that time but I intentionally I move to another object ; in this case walking .

@TheDarkKnightRules I do not practice sitting meditation but daily activities .

@Lanka that's what I was wondering too, as I started typing up a response. Can you suppress an action you haven't even taken up yet? It seems like "not suppressing", in this instance, is a justification to giving into, and acting on the craving and carrying through with the act of eating itself, instead of just continuing to note craving?

@Ryan absolutely right . this what most of the time happens to me. But alternatively I tried changing my noting to another object such as "walking" . This what I meant by "suppressing "

@nish1013 You should definitely practice sitting meditation as well. I've been practicing sitting and walking now for several weeks. As I have nothing to do at the moment, I'm able to practice 5-6 hours a day. Even then still, it seems to me that being mindful during daily activities is quite tough compared to doing so while sitting. I would think adding sitting meditation into your practice would help tremendously in seeing these phenomenon arise and cease and help you gain better insight into them.

@Nish. The phenomena that arise are not "yours". They are just phenomena that arise and cease. If 2 or more phenomena occurs at the same time then you can note the strongest one of them. If its the craving then note that. If its the walking then note that. If you find yourself having a preference in choosing which phenomena to note, then note that preference like "prefering, prefering" or "wanting, wanting". I would also recommend combining your everyday-mindfulness with sitting meditation. It will make you know how to note and what to note. Meditating in everyday life is a progression....

... Sitting meditation is like our "practice". We practice for different reasons one of them is to be ready for reality, meaning to be prepared to be meditating while doing our everyday-stuff. Sitting meditation will help you a lot. What help me a lot in my everyday is moving slower. I mean really slow. By moving slow you have good time to note and observe every movement. It do take a lot longer to do stuff but the benefit is that you can be mindfull about a lot more this way.

@Lanka What help me a lot in my everyday is moving slower. I mean really slow Speaking of "moving meditation" and physical existence, and seeing your interest in the Chinese martial arts, it's possible you might enjoy learning Tai Chi sometime if you ever get the chance to find a sufficiently expert teacher. That can be really, really slow. For example during the 2nd minute of this video (which shows a beginner practice) he takes only two or three steps in one minute.

When I first started to learn Tai Chi in my '30s I thought, "Isn't it strange, there are all those schools I went to for so long, and this is the first time anyone has tried to teach me how to walk."

@Lanka "The phenomena that arise are not "yours". They are just phenomena that arise and cease. If 2 or more phenomena occurs at the same time then you can note the strongest one of them. If its the craving then note that." the problem I have is noting "craving" most of the time did not stop there but end up on eating action . So I was tended to "suppress" the noting something else that is not  the strongest . Which doesn't sound right .

I'm pretty sure that is a mistake in the text; it should read "tasting", not "knowing"

@yuttadhammo founded here http://www.buddhanet.net/m_part1.htm

@Nish. I think you could try ask another user in here about it. Im afraid im out of answers/options regarding the question. My advice would be to observe and note whatever arises from the 5 aggregates. It sounds to me as you might be dealing with the 4th hindrance which is restlessness and worry or the 5th hindrance which is doubt. If you like we can continue in chat.

@Chris. Should we take the tai chi talk in the chat? This thread is becomming too long.

This doesn't quite answer the question, but because you said "I have got some illnesses due to this too" ...
I find I'm bad with sweets. After I eat a sweet biscuit, I want another! After I eat a slice of bread, I want another!
Apparently some people get addicted.

Consider alcohol, for example: many people are able to drink a glass or two regularly; some people aren't able to drink one glass, they want to drink the whole bottle, they want to drink several bottles, they don't want to stop. For people who are unable to moderate their drinking it's better to not drink at all.
Or cigarettes: I heard of someone who used to have one cigarette per day. She was, perhaps not an addict? But for many people who smoke, once they start they can't stop.

So, sweets and bread, a month or two ago I stopped eating them altogether: which is better for me. If I don't think of those foods (sugar and wheat) as "mine" any more if see them, then I don't start to eat them and then it's not difficult to stop (because I already successfully stopped a few months ago). Like looking at meat, I don't find it attractive: the thought doesn't occur, "suppose I were to put that in my mouth and taste that ...", I lack any intention so there's never contact.
It's also easier to break contact if it's not around. If I stop buying meat, buying cigarettes, buying alcohol, buying bread, having biscuits in the cupboard and soft-drinks in the fridge, then it becomes easier not have them and to then be unable to stop having them.
For what it's worth when I quit eating meat (a long time ago) I found I'd still get hungry, so I learned to eat other things instead. If your intention when you eat is satiety and nutrition (which I think is canonical: wanting to remove the feeling of hunger but without causing a subsequent feeling such as feeling over-full) it's better to choose things other than sugar: e.g. vegetables, fibre, protein, fat, water, and traces of minerals and vitamins.

The Bhikkhuni Sutta explains 'eating to destroy old feelings [of hunger] and not create new feelings [from overeating]',

"'This body, sister, comes into being through food. And yet it is by relying on food that food is to be abandoned.' Thus was it said. And in reference to what was it said? There is the case, sister, where a monk, considering it thoughtfully, takes food — not playfully, nor for intoxication, nor for putting on bulk, nor for beautification — but simply for the survival & continuance of this body, for ending its afflictions, for the support of the holy life, [thinking,] 'Thus will I destroy old feelings [of hunger] and not create new feelings [from overeating]. I will maintain myself, be blameless, & live in comfort.' Then he eventually abandons food, having relied on food. 'This body, sister, comes into being through food. And yet it is by relying on food that food is to be abandoned.' Thus was it said, and in reference to this was it said.

I suppose there's one other thing I should say, about breaking the chain or changing the connection between "liking" and "intending": which is that maybe not everything you 'like' is good for you; and that craving is known to be a cause of dukkha.
Now you have experience of the consequences of "eating when I see sweets even I'm not hungry". Perhaps you see disadvantage or dissatisfaction in that (health problems for example). So maybe when the thought occurs, "I see a sweet: suppose I were to eat it..." then maybe you ought to have some 'second thoughts' about it: like, "... that would not be satisfying, I could eat it and then I would still want another"; or, "... I would feel remorse"; or something like that.

Chris, is this the canonical reference you mentioned? AN4.37

It was the description of eating in AN 4.159 that I was remembering. Thanks for asking.

It is not Mahasi noting, but the core of the Buddha's teaching: Dependent origination(D0) and others.
Depending on contact feeling arises, depending on feeling craving arises, depending on craving, clinging arises, depending on clinging becoming (this is when intention arises and action(kamma) begins.
The first point is contact, don't go near food when it is not meal time!
For your mindfulness is not strong enough yet!
When feeling, craving arises you still have the choice of breaking away from contact with the food (move physically or mentally away)for clinging to arise. All this comes from the very basic practice which the Buddha taught guarding the senses or sense door.
If you have strong attachment for food there is a practice recommended by the Buddha contemplation of the foulness of food, that the end product of eaten food is faeces. See food as also only the four great elements..and other insight practices to actually deal with the craving.

Samadhi, do you have a good link for Dependent origination? That might be helpful to your answer.

@Robin111 - Thanks for the suggestions. I have added a few more links that would be helpful.


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Are there any references in the Pali canon to the experience of death?
Are there any references in the Pali canon to the experience of death and what one can expect? I looked for a similar question and couldn't find one, so apologies if this is redundant.

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.060.than.html

Just edited the title so it describes the content of the question - hope that's OK

Death perspective from the Abhidhamma point of view:
Notes:

"Death is the temporary end of a temporary phenomenon." By death is meant the extinction of psychic life (jīvitindriya), heat (usma = tejodhātu), and consciousness (viññāna), of one individual in a particular existence. Death is not the complete annihilation of a being. Death in one place means birth in another place, just as, in conventional terms, the rising of the sun in one place means the setting of the sun in another place.
What are commonly understood to be natural deaths due to old age may be classed under this category.

To each of the various planes of existence is naturally assigned a definite age-limit, irrespective of the potential energy of the Reproductive Kamma that has yet to run. One must, however, succumb to death when the maximum age-limit is reached. It may also be said that if the Reproductive Kamma is extremely powerful, the Karmic energy rematerializes itself on the same plane, or on some higher plane as in the case of the devas.

As a rule the thought, volition, or desire, which was extremely strong during lifetime becomes predominant at the moment of death, and conditions the subsequent birth. In this last thought-moment is present a special potentiality. When the potential energy of this Reproductive Kamma is exhausted, the organic activities of the material form, in which is corporealized the life-force, cease even before the approach of old age.
If a person is born at a time when the age-limit is 80 years, and he dies at 80 owing to the exhaustion of the potential force of his Reproductive Kamma, his death is due to the simultaneous expiration of both age and Kamma.
There are powerful actions which suddenly cut off the force of the Reproductive Kamma, even before the expiration of the life-term. A more powerful opposing force, for instance, can check the path of a flying arrow and bring it down to the ground. Similarly, a very powerful Kammic force of the past is capable of nullifying the potential energy of the dying reproductive (janaka) thought-moment, and thus destroy the life of a being. The death of Devadatta was due to an upacchedaka kamma which he committed during his lifetime.

The first three types of death are collectively called kālamarana (timely death), and the last one is known as akālamarana (untimely death).
An oil lamp, for instance, may be extinguished owing to any of the following four causes, namely, the exhaustion of the wick, the exhaustion of oil, simultaneous exhaustion of both wick and oil, and some extraneous cause like the gust of a wind. Death of a person may similarly be caused by any of the aforesaid four ways.

As a person is about to die, a good or bad action may present itself before his mind's eye. It may be either a meritorious or a demeritorious Weighty action (garuka kamma), such as jhānas (ecstasies), or parricide etc. They are so powerful that they totally eclipse all other actions, and appear very vividly before the mental eye. If there is no Weighty action, he may take for his object of the dying thought a Kamma done or remembered immediately before death (āsanna kamma).

If it is a past action, strictly speaking, it is the good or bad thought experienced at the moment of performing the action, that recurs at the death-moment.

Kamma nimitta is any sight, sound, smell, taste, touch or idea which was obtained at the time of the commission of the Kamma, such as knives in the case of a butcher, patients in the case of a physician, flowers in the case of a devotee, etc.
By gati nimitta is meant some sign of the place where he is to take birth, an event which invariably happens to dying persons. When these indications of the future birth occur, and if they are bad, they can be turned into good. This is done by influencing the thoughts of the dying person, so that his good thoughts may now act as the Proximate Kamma and counteract the influence of the Reproductive Kamma which would otherwise affect his subsequent birth.

These symbols of one's destiny may be hellish fires, forests, mountainous regions, mother's womb, celestial mansions, etc.
The Kamma is presented to the mind-door. Kamma nimitta may be presented to any of the six doors according to circumstances. Gati nimitta, being always a physical sight, is presented to the mind-door as a dream.

Taking one of the aforesaid objects, a thought-process runs its course even if the death be an instantaneous one. It is said that even the fly which is crushed by a hammer on the anvil also experiences such a thought-process before it actually dies.

So if we practice jhanas (ecstasies), which is a weighty action (garuka kamma), we are destined to have that as the death nimitta, and reborn in the Brahma realm, unless other garuka kamma nimmitta intervenes.

I do not know of any references to the Pali Canon.
But i can point you to a great video dhamma talk by Ven. Yuttadhammo. Its called "Preparing for Death". I think this video will give you some knowledge about death from a buddhist perspective.
In here Ven. Yuttadhammo talks about the concept of death and how to prepare for it. I will not say much more about it since its much better explained in the video.

Thank you Lanka. I was actually watching this which was what prompted me to ask. So I agree, it is a great dhamma talk!

Welcome. I found another video on Death. This is by Ajahn Brahmali. I havent seen it yet though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_1bTSNpDb4

Here is another great video by Ven. Yuttadhammo called "Nature of Reality (Death, Rebirth and Reincarnation): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XClIR19eufc

@Update. I just finished the dhamma talk by Ajahn Brahmali and its a really good one with several death-references to suttas in the samyutta- and anguttara nikaya. I definitely recommend this talk.


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According to Dependent Origination ..dependent on feeling, craving arises, are there exceptions?
Are there exceptions that pleasant feeling is not followed by craving, and unpleasant feeling not followed by aversion?
I understand cases where when one is mindful, feeling does not lead to craving. Feeling just arises and ceases.
Another way of phrasing the question is: apart from absence of craving/aversion or arising of craving/aversion, does pleasant and unpleasant feeling lead to something else, or it does not lead to something else?

Craving or feeling arises and ceases?

I would wonder if there's any hidden craving arising and ceasing  right in front of me.

If there is craving you'll see it because it will then lead on to clinging and then progress to becoming. It you don't see it then you have just stayed with feeling.

@Samadhi. I think the answer is in your question when mentioning that when one is mindful then one can stop the process at the stage of feeling. That could be done by e.g. using the noting-method. When noting one is staying objective and one then sees ultimate reality without any extrapolations or creation of concepts.

@lanka. I edited my question to make it clearer.- thanks.

A pleasant feeling might be followed by a smile -- the Buddha smiled sometimes. An unpleasant feeling might be followed by disenchantment -- e.g. meditation on dead corpses.
A feeling alone is not a cause. It's a condition. So it's not that there are exceptions. It seems to me that grasping feeling -> craving as a deterministic chain, upon matching with reality, it begs for exceptions.  And these are probably uncountable, and thus, possibly unrelated to what paṭiccasamuppāda is conveying?

Paticca Samuppada doesn't even include aversion. But that doesn't mean Vedana(feeling) doesn't lead to aversion. Just that in Paticca Samuppada we are focusing on what keeps us bound to Samsara.
But if you talk about it in general, Vedana can lead to ignorance, craving and aversion. If the feeling is pleasant, craving is prominent. If the feeling is unpleasant, aversion is prominent. If the feeling is neutral, ignorance is prominent. Ignorance is present in all 3 instances.

Dependent origination, just like the Four Noble Truths help to explain causality, cause and effect, karmic law.
http://www.buddhanet.net/funbud12.htm
Let us take a few examples that establish the nature of dependent origination. Let us take first an example used by the Buddha Himself. The Buddha has said the flame in an oil lamp burns dependent upon the oil and the wick. When the oil and the wick are present, the flame in an oil lamp burns. If either of these is absent, the flame will cease to burn. This example illustrates the principle of dependent origination with respect to a flame in an oil lamp. Let us take the example of the sprout. Dependent upon the seed, earth, water, air and sunlight the sprout arises. There are in fact innumerable examples of dependent origination because there is no existing phenomenon that is not the effect of dependent origination. All these phenomena arise dependent upon a number of causal factors. Very simply, this is the principle of dependent origination.
So, you can't have an emotion, feeling or thought without there being certain factors to create the phenomena- dependent origination. So, if you seek wholesomeness, then we need to practice wholesomeness because we know the relationship of cause and effect!!
Not sure if this is exactly what you wanted.
I hope it has been of some help.
Metta.

When ignorance is present, dependent on feeling, craving/aversion arises, pleasant/unpleasant feeling always leads to craving/aversion, without exceptions.
When ignorance is not present, dependent on feeling, craving/aversion does not arise, pleasant/unpleasant feeling does not lead to craving/aversion, pleasant/unpleasant feeling leads to feeling, without exceptions.
Craving/aversion arises from feeling. Feeling arises from our 6 senses. 6 senses arise from our body. Our body arises from our birth. Our birth arises from our ignorance.
If we end our ignorance in this body, the chain of dependent origination is broken. Craving/aversion ceases, but the rest remains until our body dies. When our body dies, no birth will follow because craving/aversion ceased. Without birth, no body will arise, no 6 senses will arise and no feeling will arise.
What will arise? Our true nature will arise. What is our true nature? Eternal bliss.

"Our true nature will arise" -- this is a more controversial remark -- nirvana being unconditioned, does not arise, etc. I understand it could be a loose way of conveying meaning (eg "knowledge arises") or a specific view of a particular tradition (which)? That aside, great answer!

You are right. Nirvana does not arise. It does not become. It does not not become. What happens to a fully liberated being after death cannot be described. Whatever we say, we would be totally wrong. It transcends everything. And even this is wrong.

There are exceptions to the chain of dependent origination and it is in the Culavedallla Sutta in which former husband Visakha questions nun Dhammadina. Here is the excerpts:

In what way is pleasant feeling pleasant, lady, and in what way painful?"
"Pleasant feeling is pleasant in remaining, & painful in changing, friend Visakha. Painful feeling is painful in remaining & pleasant in changing. Neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling is pleasant in occurring together with knowledge, and painful in occurring without knowledge."
"What latent tendency lies latent in pleasant feeling? What latent tendency lies latent in painful feeling? What latent tendency lies latent in neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling?"
"The latent tendency to passion lies latent in pleasant feeling. The latent tendency to irritation lies latent in painful feeling. The latent tendency to ignorance lies latent in neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling."
"Does the latent tendency to passion lie latent in all pleasant feeling? Does the latent tendency to irritation lie latent in all painful feeling? Does the latent tendency to ignorance lie latent in all neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling?"
"No...."
"What is to be abandoned in pleasant feeling? What is to be abandoned in painful feeling? What is to be abandoned in neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling?"
"The latent tendency to passion is to be abandoned in pleasant feeling. The latent tendency to irritation is to be abandoned in painful feeling. The latent tendency to ignorance is to be abandoned in neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling."
"Is the latent tendency to passion to be abandoned in all pleasant feeling? Is the latent tendency to irritation to be abandoned in all painful feeling? Is the latent tendency to ignorance to be abandoned in all neither-pleasant-nor-painful feeling?"
"No .... There is the case where a monk -- quite withdrawn from sensuality, withdrawn from unskillful qualities -- enters & remains in the first jhana: rapture & pleasure born from withdrawal, accompanied by directed thought & evaluation. With that he abandons passion. No latent tendency to passion lies latent there.[4] There is the case where a monk considers, 'O when will I enter & remain in the sphere that those who are noble now enter & remain in?' And as he thus nurses this yearning for the unexcelled liberations, there arises within him sorrow based on that yearning. With that he abandons irritation. No latent tendency to irritation lies latent there.[5] There is the case where a monk, with the abandoning of pleasure & pain -- as with the earlier disappearance of elation & distress -- enters & remains in the fourth jhana: purity of equanimity & mindfulness, neither pleasure nor pain. With that he abandons ignorance. No latent tendency to ignorance lies latent there."

Depending on contact, feeling arises, depending on feeling, rapture (piti) & pleasure (sukha) arises, accompanied by direct thought (vitakka) and evaluation(vicara) - first jhanna factors. With that he abandons passion (*becomes an Arahant).
And as he thus nurses this yearning for the unexcelled liberations, there arises within him sorrow based on that yearning (disenchantment). With that he abandons irritation(*becomes an Anagami).
..enters & remains in the fourth jhana: purity of equanimity & mindfulness, neither pleasure nor pain. With that he abandons ignorance(* becomes an Arahant).

The twelve links of dependent origination are talking about necessary conditions, not sufficient conditions, so when it says "With feeling as a condition craving arises" the meaning of this is not that feeling always produces craving, but rather that feeling is a necessary condition for craving, and that without it, craving cannot occur.


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Why does insight lead to to compassion?
Am I correct in asserting that an increasing level of insight into the true nature of things leads to compassion. Or to put it another way insight is a condition for compassion. From my reading it seems that that is true and the more one practices the more one experiences compassion for other beings.
Assuming that is true, how does that occur? It has never been obvious to me how insight and compassion are connected. Or am I wrong and they are not connected at all and they are different aspects to the Buddhist path that are developed separately.

"com-passion" = "suffering with" - to put yourself in the place of another. Quote by Victor Weisskopf: "Human existence is based upon two pillars: Compassion and knowledge. Compassion without knowledge is ineffective; knowledge without compassion is inhuman." So the real question is, prove you are not a robot. Or evil.

I think compassion can exist without insight if the consciousness has cultivated it in past lifetimes.

I don't speak from a state of insight, so this is more of a guess. From what I have read, Insight is really a state of experiencing non-duality. So perhaps when we realize that the boundaries between us and others are illusory, then compassion for others (just like have compassion for ourselves) could develop naturally.

I think that Parag's comment about boundaries between self and other being illusory should be the answer. Can I be unconcerned if my hand is in a fire because it is not my brain? "I" must come to represent all and everyone.

When one gains insight into how reality functions, i.e. the 3 signs of existence and one experiences how mental and physical phenomena are unsatisfactory and suffering then one gains a great deal of compassion for other beings.
One realizes that all other beings in conditioned existence is "suffering" from the same illness and that the Buddhas medicine can be applied for everyone to gain emancipation.
When one experiences that reality is oppressive and concealed Dukkha and one sees other beings who has not gotten these insights, then great and deep compassion arises because one understands that everyone is in the same boat. Especially when seeing other beings trying to achieve happiness by clinging to phenomena that will slip away and become dukkha a profound level of compassion arises.

Through the practice of insight hate is reduced, craving is reduced and the 4 Brahma Viharas develops as a result of those reduction, i.e Metta(loving kindness), Karuna (compassion), Mudita (joy in the joy of others) and Upekkha ( Equnamity).
Now the far enemies of the 4 Brahma Viharas are:

Metta - ill-will
Karuna - cruelty
Mudita - Envy
Upekkha - Craving/Aversion

And through the insight practice of reducing hate and craving, ill-will is reduced, good-will increases; cruelty is reduced, harmlessness increases, envy is reduced, sympathetic joy increases, craving/aversion is reduced equanimity increases.
Compassion was more highly praised by the Buddha:

because it is the root of so many other virtues. The Jàtakamàlà says, ‘Compassion gives birth to all the other virtues just as cooling rain makes the crops grow. When a person is compassionate he has no desire to harm his neighbour, his body, speech and mind are purified, concern for one’s neighbour’s welfare increases and states like kindness, patience, happiness and good reputation grow. Being calm, the compassionate person does not arouse fear in the minds’ of others, he is trusted like a kinsman, he is not agitated by the passions, and quenched by the waters of compassion, the fire of hatred does not blaze in his heart…Remembering this strive to develop compassion towards others, as if they were yourself or your offspring.’

Great answer +1. I especially like that you mentioned the 4 Brahma Viharas and the far enemies of them and the compassion-reference of the Buddha.

Thanks for the answer - obviously a number of people found it useful but i still don't see it. You say - 'practice of insight hate is reduced, craving is reduced' - but how and why? I could have an insight that says that all beings are not-self/impermenant etc... (to  give a crude example) and that could lead me to conclude that I shouldn't care about myself or anyone? Why do seeing the three marks of existence (for instance) make one compassionate? Sorry to nag away at this point but it is non-obvious to me.

@crab bucket - Please post "Why do seeing the three marks of existence.. as another question so that others and I have room to answer. Thanks

Very fair point - I'll post a refined question when i get a moment

1 When our ignorance is removed, our suffering ends.
2 When our suffering ends, the true nature of things is known.
3 When the true nature of things is known, the true nature of beings is known.
4 When the true nature of beings is known, the cause of suffering in beings is known.
5 When the cause of suffering in beings is known, the strive of beings to end suffering is clearly seen.
6 When the strive of beings to end suffering is clearly seen, our compassion for all beings arises.

When you begin to see the interdependence and interconnectedness of all beings through meditation you will also begin to see that we all suffer.  Naturally you do not want to suffer yourself, and see that others are suffering too, this begins to arise some compassion for 'their' sufferings... that's all.

Hi Sean and welcome to Buddhism.SE. We've put together some information to help you get started here.

Isn't compassion just a byproduct of the selflessness or egolessness that is a byproduct of a lot of insight?

"A candle was made to become entirely flame." (Rumi) Rather than talking about byproducts, I would say that wherever one begins in practice, it will eventually become all-consuming. Light any corner of a house on fire and the whole thing will burn down.

"insight" typically is a short-hand way of saying "insight into the true nature of Reality" or "insight into the true nature of our situation"
So if insight (by meditating on selflessness, for example) leads one to see definitively, directly, and intuitively that there is no separate self, then the aims of the many and the aims of the nominal "individual" are seen as overlapping to say the least.
So what's the real condition?
In a sentence, all sentient beings want happiness / freedom from suffering.  They don't wish to suffer, they wish to be happy.
Insight can lead to an experiential understanding of this, which is where insight into selflessness of all dharmas yields its fruit so-to-speak.
Selflessness can be demonstrated by various shapes of reasoning.  The computer monitor you see is not really "a computer monitor" because it's made of many separate parts.  Each part is itself not a computer monitor, you have the shell, the screen, the stand, the cable.  The shell is not a monitor, the stand is not a monitor, etc.  So where is the monitor?
Similarly, we can apply this clear and logical reasoning to a separate, independent, lasting self and see that truly no phenomenon has self-ity.  Some might jump to the conclusion and say "well then everything is one!" but that is also excess talk.  One is a word that comes up in dependence on the concept of Many and, therefore as dependent upon each other, neither one exists nor not-exists in the middle free of extremes.
The logical part must always be supported by and footed in the understanding that we don't want to suffer.  From the largest man to the smallest insect, from the whales to the birds, all beings are day-and-night avoiding pain (or perceived pain) and working toward happiness (or the skewed cultural reinforcement of what happiness should look like).
Insight into the situation gives us compassion, which is a fundamental aspect of clarity.  Much like a person watching the inner workings of a clock, when we see the cyclic functioning of samsara, we feel for the beings who are trapped in unwholesome cycles.  Furthermore, the only separation between us and other beings is really just our karmic histories/trajectories.  Had we accomplished the same deeds and thoughts as other beings we would be on their exact paths, and thus knowing that we could just as easily be in switched places with others is another key element in understanding selflessness, which in turn gives the incipient awareness of true compassion.
Compassion (yearning for and acting for the end of all beings' sufferings) and Wisdom (that realizes emptiness) are what makes a Buddha.

Animals only try to escape pain when it arises, I don't think they go around fearing it as humans do. Neither do they plot their happiness. Those qualities are uniquely ours.

If they do not plot happiness and fear pain, then how can they be trained?

Process of insight up roots Loba, Dosa, Moha 1st and hence as you practice you are left with more Aloba, Adosa, Amoha and Ahetuka states of mind. In addition 5 hindrances also fall away of which ill will is diminishments cases more competition.
When liberated you are left Ahetuka but still evil roots are no more hence relatively compassionate with someone who has ill will and the evil roots.


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What is a "sutta statement" or "sutta action"?
In this answer yuttadhammo wrote,

If you want an abhidhamma answer, you have to speak in abhidhamma terms. "Wishing for pain to go away" is a sutta statement. It involves a wisher, and describes a sutta action.

I think it might mean 'thread' ... or possibly 'sleep' ... or a type of description of reality that's found in the suttas, as opposed to the description of reality found in the Abhidhamma?
If you answer please assume that I have looked at the abhidhamma but never read it.

The Sutta Pitaka deals with conventional reality, i.e. concepts such as "a man, woman, person, a wisher" etc.
The Abhidhamma Pitaka deals with ultimate reality, i.e. Citta, Cetasika, Rupa, Nibbana. These are "abhidhamma terms".
Here is a quote on Abhidhamma by Ven. K. Sri. Dhammanda, p. 107-108:

"The Abhidharma deals with realities existing in the ultimate sense, or paramattha dhamma in Pali. There are four such realities:
1. Citta, mind or consciousness, defined as ‘that which knows or experiences’ an object. Citta occurs as distinct momentary states of consciousness.
2. Cetasika, the mental factors that arise and occur along with the citta.
3. Rupa, physical phenomenon or material form.
4. Nirvana, the unconditioned state of bliss which is the final
  goal.
Citta, the cetasika, and rupa are conditioned realities. They arise because of conditions, and will disappear when the conditions sustaining them cease to continue to do so. They are impermanent states. Nirvana, on the other hand, is an unconditioned reality. It does not arise and, therefore, does not fall away. These four realities can be experienced regardless of the names we may choose to give them. Other than these realities, everything—be they within ourselves or without, whether in the past, present or future, whether coarse or subtle, low or lofty, far or near—is a concept and not the ultimate reality."

So you're saying that a "sutta" statement or action means the same thing as a "conventional" statement or action. I hadn't heard "sutta" used in that way before.

Sorry, yeah, it's a bit esoteric, but that's how we talk about the various teachings of the Buddha - they often have to be understood in context. If the context is the suttas, then they may not be applicable to ultimate reality, or if the context is the vinaya, then they may not be directly related to the practice in the suttas.


text:
How is samsara nirvana?
How is samsara nirvana? I have heard this mentioned in a couple books recently, but they never go into much detail.

From what I understand Nirvana is a different "portion" of reality than samsara. You might say they comprise two different spheres of experience?

Ok I wasn't sure if nirvana was complete harmony with samsara or whether the idea of nirvana is samara

Well technically, the "idea of nirvana" is part of samara, in that such an idea is subject to arising and ceasing. Complete harmony with samsara is in a sense the path leading to nirvana. But as far as I understand, they're two distinct experiences.

perhaps you could clarify your question somewhat though, I'm not entirely sure i understand what it is you're asking. hence why I'm only commenting on the question instead of answering it.

it depends on who you ask in what tradition, i think...

Hi patrickbarker and welcome to Buddhism.SE. We've put together some information to help you get started here.

Like a child who finally wakes up from his nightmare and knows now that the frightening images were false.

From a Zen standpoint, the unification of samsara and nirvana cannot be comprehended by the discriminating mind.  Don't worry if you are having problems!  In fact, the more you try to rationalize it, the farther away you will be from truly comprehending it (to paraphrase Seng T'san's Hsin Hsin Ming).
If you aren't a Zen student, this is going to sound a lot like the mumbo jumbo the school is famous for.  Apologies in advance!  All the same, putting samsara up against nirvana, and trying to see the distinction, is a product of the small mind.  Likewise, trying to intellectualize how they are the same is to miss what is meant by nirvana (and samsara too for that matter!).  Thinking will get you nowhere.  Only direct insight will show you the place where the boundaries between the two break down.  Emptiness must first be apprehended.  One then looks deeply into that emptiness.  Coming out of profound emptiness, and back to world of form, one directly perceives how the two are not distinct.  This is enlightenment.  And it takes years on the cushion to get there!  It also takes deep faith and trust.  Once that realization is reached, however, you know it just as well as the feeling of the shirt on your back.

Deep faith yes.  Trust yes.  Study the perfection of wisdom sutras and try and sit everyday and you shall certainly apprehend the unapprehendable.

First there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is.
Great post, this is about a perspective shift that happens at a more primal level than the intellect.

The The Jewel Ornament Of Liberation (which I have only begun to read) has some paragraphs near its beginning which juxtapose samsara with nirvana:

In general, all phenomena are included in the two categories of samsara and nirvana. That which is called samsara is empty by nature, a confused projection. Its defining characteristic is that it manifests as suffering. That which is called nirvana is also empty by nature, but all the confused projections are exhausted and dissipated. Its defining characteristic is freedom from all suffering.

And:

III. HEARER FAMILY
The family of Hearers consists of those who fear samsara and yearn to achieve nirvana, but who have little compassion. It has been said:

One who is afraid upon seeing the suffering of samsara
    And yearns to achieve nirvana
    But has little interest in benefitting sentient beings—
    These three are the marks of the Hearer family

IV. SOLITARY REALIZER FAMILY
The Solitary Realizer family includes those who possess the above three attributes and in addition are arrogant, keep their masters’ identities secret, and prefer to stay in solitary places. It has been said:

Fear at the thought of samsara, yearning for nirvana,
    Little compassion, arrogance,
    Secretive about their teachers, and enjoying solitude—
    A wise one should understand that these are the marks of the Solitary Realizer family

So these two families, the Hearers and the Solitary Realizers, engage in their respective vehicles and even though they achieve the results of their practices, these results are not the final nirvana. How do they abide when they achieve their fruits? They maintain unafflicted states of meditative concentration, but those states are based on the psychic imprint of ignorance. Since their meditative concentrations are unafflicted, they believe that they have achieved nirvana and remain that way.
If their states are not the final nirvana, then one might argue that the Buddha should not have taught these two paths. Is there a reason the Buddha should teach such paths? Yes. For example, suppose great merchants from this Jambudvipa are traveling the ocean searching for jewels. After many months at sea, in some desolate place, they become completely tired and exhausted and think, “There is no way to get the jewels now”. When they feel discouraged and prepare to turn back, the merchant captain manifests a huge island through his miracle power and lets all his followers rest there. After a few days, when they are fully rested and relaxed, the captain says, “We have not achieved our goal. Now we should go farther to get our jewels.”
Similarly, sentient beings without courage are frightened when they hear about the Buddha’s wisdom. They believe attaining Buddhahood is a great hardship, and think, “I have no ability to do this.” There are other people who are not interested in entering the path, or who enter the path but turn back. To counter these problems, Buddha presented these two paths, and allows them to rest in these states.
As said in the White Lotus of Sublime Dharma Sutra:

Likewise, all the Hearers
    Think that they achieved nirvana,
    But they have not achieved the final nirvana
    Revealed by the Buddha
    They are only resting

How I understand it, "what is" seen as divided is samsara (with self, non-self etc) and seen as undivided is nirvana (with no independent self etc). So samsara and nirvana are the same stuff viewed differently, in other words samsara is the superficial view and nirvana is the deep view of the same stuff.

There is this beautiful story, once Buddha preached to some of his disciples when they ask about Nirvana.
They asked from Buddha, "Blessed one, please tell us what Nirvana looks like, feels like. So we can try to attain it." Buddha said nothing. They asked several times and Buddha continued his silence. When these disciples went out, he preaches others below story.

When I am (Buddha) going on a journey, I saw this house full of
  flames. It is burning so badly with everything in it. And I saw
  some people still in there. I went to this burning house, open the
  door and said them, "This house is burning. Please come out". Instead
  of coming out, these people asked me, How is outside, is it raining?
  will there be a place for us if we leave this house etc". So I didn't
  tell them anything. Just came out.

Any source for this story?

Nope. I heard it on the TV.

This is the story in a poem. But it is in 'Sinhala'. http://www.w3lanka.com/2014/12/blog-post_28.html . This poem is by Bertolt Brecht. Here is a link. https://whatdoesdemocracylooklike.wordpress.com/2011/07/11/bertolt-brechts-interpretation-of-the-buddhas-parable-of-the-burning-house/. But I couldn't find any reference where lord Buddha preaches this. The above given article says it's from Lotus Sutra.

Prajñāpāramitā Hṛdaya sūtra: « There is no suffering, no cause of
  suffering, no end to suffering, no path to follow »
Where beauty is, then there is ugliness;
   where right is, also
  there is wrong.
  Knowledge and ignorance are interdependent;
  delusion and enlightenment condition each other.
  Since olden
  times it has been so.
  How could it be otherwise now?
  Wanting to get rid of one and grab the other
  is merely realizing
  a scene of stupidity.
  Even if you speak of the wonder of it all,
  how do you deal with each thing changing?
-Ryokan

As @Nemo says this is the highest truth that is grasped fully only by self-realization. It would be ineffectual to explain it. This being the case, why did the enlightened ones speak about it?
For two reasons.
Firstly, these quotes are mysterious statements designed to awake in one the deep introspection that leads one to awakening.
Secondly they act as sign posts to dispel doubt when such contrary views are realised for oneself.
These were expressed more frequently in Japanese Zen in times when the monastic order had become excessively institutionalised, and monks started to expect the laity to honour, respect and feed them as if they laity were a lower order of being. At this time the enlightened ones recalled these views to show the right way. It is not meant as a a ridicule or insult of tradition, but a gentle nudge to not forget the ideals and get caught in value judgements and dualistic discursive convention.

Outwardly they pretend to be superior, praying on the gullibility of
  old peasant women and congratulating themselves on their cleverness.
  Alas! Will they ever come to their senses? A monk would sooner walk
  among a pride of mother tigers than tread the path of fame and
  fortune.

The Vimalakirti sutra is important and well known in the Mahayana tradition, and is famous for expressing this higher ideal.
The story in the sutra is Vimalakirti, the lay Buddhist known to be a Bodhisattva falls ill, and he uses it as a convenient excuse to teach everyone who visits him. Even in his period of convalescence he spreads the truth of the Bodhisattva way.

Manjushri rides on the lion
  Samanthabhadra mounts the elephant
  Ghosa enters nirvana on his jeweled seat
  And Vimalakirti lies ill on his bed

Here Ryokan compares the sick bed of Vimalakirti to the mounts of fabled Buddhist teachers. In his sickness Vimalakirti embodies the Bodhisattva's grasp of non-duality, using it to teach many.

Samsara and nirvana are subjective points of view. Each is experienced by you by means of your mind. Whether something is pleasant or unpleasaant is a subjective judgement created by the 5 skandas, which are your own personal, unique, and subjective sensations, perceptions, mental formations, and consciousness. The objective world "out there" is devoid of your subjective skandas.

Welcome to Buddhism Q&A, @Virginia Lyons

Samsara is Nirvana in at least two senses:
Nirvana is achieved here, in this world (="samsara"). We don't fly to another planet or go to other dimension when we achieve Nirvana; our perception changes, and so does our subjective reality.
Samsara is Nirvana because we should stop trying to escape. Trying to escape "this" is what makes it Samsara. The idea of otherworldly Nirvana is exactly the kind of craving that leads to suffering. Samsara is Nirvana means one has stopped craving. That is called cessation.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
What puts out the mind
Suppose we call "extinction" (by which I mean nirvana or final nirvana) whatever puts out the wandering mind / mental states.
What reasons are there for supposing it does so after the mind wanders, not before or during?
I suppose (as no sort of authority) saying it does so inside the mind is eternalism, or before - annihilationism. But I'm interested in the question not as a facet of Buddhist doctrine: but the question of whether we "die" in the sense the atheist attaches to death.

Your first question (first two paragraphs) read as, "What reasons are there for supposing that extinction puts out the wandering mind after the mind?". That's repeated in the second-last paragraph, "If the mind goes out after the mind". That's not easy to understand, are there any extra/missing words implied, like "after the mind what?"

Can you clarify?  Death happens moment by moment, mind by mind arising and ceasing...

i tried to clarify a little... i was only suggesting that when something stops after it has stopped moving then that movement isn't all there is to the thing. obviously that's not a rigorous explanation of there being something other than temporary phenomenal states, but yeah i dunno

When one is dealing with Nibbana, one is dealing with ultimate reality. Asking questions with words such as "we" implies that there is a person or being that dies, meaning one is dealing with conventional reality. Nibbana is unconditioned and an ultimate reality, which is why the question makes no sense to ask. At least not in this framework.

i think the question makes sense if it can be assumed that "we" can be reduced to a different framework, i'm not saying it's a question that conducive to ending suffering, i'm specifically asking on the nature of atheist death

Suppose we call "extinction" (by which I mean nirvana or final nirvana) whatever puts out the wandering mind / mental states.
I think the first paragraph, "extinction or nirvana is whatever puts out the mind", suggests that nirvana has been reified and is seen as an agent which acts to put out the mind.
FWIW I don't know that it's that: I see it as a description of a state (perhaps a state of mind), not an agent: it's the state-of-being-extinguished (or of having-been-extinguished), not the agent-which-does-the-extinguishing. It's like the difference between Enlightenment (which is a noun) and enlightened (which is an adjective).
Also the word "extinguish" comes I think from the analogy of a flame: if you look at it, a flame appears to cling to what it's burning ... if it's burning a match or a log, the flame kind of clings to and dances around the wood.
I think that the "nirvana is an extinguishing" analogy comes from saying, "what would happen to a flame if it stopped clinging to its fuel source?"
So if you're asking "what puts out the mind" then that's like asking "how do you attain nirvana or become enlightened", and I think that the answer to that is "Buddhist practice" e.g. the Noble Eightfold Path (or something else though maybe perhaps similar in later versions of Buddhism).

you might like to add extinction of greed, hate and delusion, which are the fuel. :)
In case it would help you to know, there's some debate about "what is the fuel?" in the analogy.
Wikipedia's Nirvana with and without remainder of fuel references Gombridge. On page 66 of Gombridge's How Buddhism Began (in a chapter titled "Metaphor, allegory, satire") he claims that:

He showed in an earlier paper of his that the "three fires" was a reference to the (literally) three fires which a brahmin householder was expected to keep alight.
Later generations of Buddhists weren't interested in debates with Vedic brahmans and forgot the origin of the metaphor.
In later (e.g. Mahayana) times the "three fires" became associated with the "three poisons".

You can maybe kind of see that:

Wikipedia's Three fires (Buddhism) link redirects to the three poisons
The comments/conversation underneath this answer suggest that the "three poisons" are more central in a later version of Buddhism than an earlier version.

In contrast, the following suggest that it's the khandhas which are the fuel:

In Five Piles of Bricks – The Khandhas as Burden & Path
Thanissaro Bhikkhu writes,

The Buddha introduced the concept of the khandhas in his first sermon in response to the first of these questions. His short definition of suffering was "the five clinging-khandhas." This fairly cryptic phrase can be fleshed out by drawing on other passages in the canon.
The five khandhas are bundles or piles of form, feeling, perception, fabrications, and consciousness. None of the texts explain why the Buddha used the word khandha to describe these things. The meaning of "tree trunk" may be relevant to the pervasive fire imagery in the canon — nibbana being extinguishing of the fires of passion, aversion, and delusion — but none of the texts explicitly make this connection.

In The Fire Sermon the Buddha asks, "What is burning?" and answers, that sense organs (e.g. eye), form, sense-contact, sense-consciousness, etc., are burning with the fires of lust and hate and delusion.

So apparently the three poisons are the three fires, but the khandhas (to which these fires cling) are the fuel.

is nirvana categorically not an agent?
Well, who knows, right? That's how I categorized it. If other people think I'm wrong then hopefully they won't let me mislead you, and will instead downvote this answer, or post a comment or post an alternative answer (currently it appears that two people agreed with it). Some people didn't understand your question though, which might be why it doesn't have more answers.
FWIW I think that maybe later schools of Buddhism might 'reify' more:

Later schools might (I don't know) see "Buddha-nature" as an agent.
Buried in Wikipedia's Buddha-nature article is the following quote,

The Lankavatara-sutra contains tathagata-garba thought, but also warns against reification of the idea of Buddha-nature, and presents it as an aid to attaining awakening:

Is not this Tathagata-garbha taught by the Blessed One the same as the ego-substance taught by the philosophers? The ego as taught by the philosophers is an eternal creator, unqualified, omnipresent, and imperishable.
The Blessed One replied: [...] it is emptiness, reality-limit, Nirvana, being unborn, unqualified, and devoid of will-effort; the reason why the Tathagatas [...] teach the doctrine pointing to the Tathagata-garba is to make the ignorant cast aside their fear when they listen to the teaching of egolessness and to have them realise the state of non-discrimination and imagelessness

Would you say that "egolessness, non-discrimination and imagelessness" can be "categorized as an agent"? I'd say no, that's not an agent. That might be splitting hairs though, because although not an "agent" I could call it a "condition". The theory of Dependent Origination (and the second noble truth) emphasizes that things are conditioned/conditional/dependent, they arise or don't arise depending on certain conditions. Perhaps the condition could be called an "agent", if it causes or allows something, but maybe it's not "acting" or "taking an active role", not a doer of an action, not a subject of active verb, it is "devoid of will-effort".
I think that, certainly, some view Bodhisattvas as agents.
There are other 'states' which I view as being more 'active' than nirvana (although they're still just 'states' and not 'agents' themselves): i.e. the brahmavihāras (or appamaññā) i.e. the states like 'metta' and so on.
Gombridge also claims that nirvana is viewed differently between Mahayana versus earlier schools.

I hope it is not too farfetched
  to suggest that this may have contributed to an important
  development in the Mahayana: that it came to separate nirvana
  from bodhi, ‘awakening’ to the truth, Enlightenment, and to put a
  lower value on the former (Gombrich, 1992d). Originally nirvana
  and bodhi refer to the same thing; they merely use different
  metaphors for the experience. But the Mahayana tradition
  separated them and considered that nirvana referred only
  to the extinction of craving (= passion and hatred), with the
  resultant escape from the cycle of rebirth. This interpretation
  ignores the third fire, delusion: the extinction of delusion is of
  course in the early texts identical with what can be positively
  expressed as gnosis, Enlightenment.

After all that, it's still difficult to be sure of what nirvana is w.r.t. death. Wikipedia summarizes it as follows (and includes a lot of quotes to support that summary),

What happens with one who has reached nirvana after death is an unanswerable question. The five aggregates vanish, but there does not remain a mere "nothingness."

*... puts out the wandering mind / mental states.
And even apart from whether it's an agent, I don't know that nirvana (assuming you attain nirvana during your life, which is the only time you can attain it) "puts out the wandering mind / mental states".
The bit I mentioned earlier, above, about fire, suggests that nirvana puts out clinging (or craving), and/or that putting out of craving results in nirvana.
The mind continues (that's part of the "burden" that's talked about, which people put down when they die). Whether you'd call it a "wandering" mind I'm not sure. Ability to concentrate (right mindfulness, right concentration) are part of the eightfold path, so maybe not "wandering".
On the other hand some people (even before nirvana) are said to acquire unusual types of special knowledge so in a way perhaps you could say that their mind is able "wander" even further than usual (e.g. to see things far away, to view past lives, etc.) – but maybe just this last paragraph is "Buddhist doctrine" and contradicts what you asked for i.e. an "atheistic" view.

@ChrisW...you might like to add extinction of greed, hate and delusion, which are the fuel. :)

chris, no i don't think i'm asking that - i meant to ask about atheistic death !

is nirvana categorically not an agent ?

@Samadhi Thanks for the suggestion. I added to the answer to try to address that.

i don't think i'm asking that - i meant to ask about atheistic death ! @user3293056 I'm sorry I didn't understand your question then: to some extent Buddhism is inherently atheist so I kind of ignored or didn't understand what you meant by an "atheistic" death. In fact I didn't understand the second or third paragraphs, but thought that maybe I understood (but disagreed with) the first paragraph, and that my misunderstanding the 2nd and 3rd was because they followed from the 1st; so I only really tried to address the first.

As to the question "die in the sense atheist attaches to death".
The answer is no .i.e. complete extinction, total annihilation, because there is the unborn which is deathless.
"Death has no (ultimate) reality.".. is the correct view ("who" dies?).

"reality" ?
lots of atheists at least may believe in things that aren't born.. as to "who dies" i find it unnecessary obfuscatory

@user3293056 - Is self necessary or unnecessary, real or unreal? Well you edited "away" your previous statement - "death has no reality" and I just added (ultimate).


text:
What is the difference between craving and clinging?
Considering the 12 nidanas

Ignorance
Mental Volitions
Consciousness
"Name" and "Form"
The six senses
Contact
Feelings
Craving
Clinging
Becoming
Birth
Suffering and Death

What is the difference between craving and clinging? They seem very similar to me. It would be helpful if someone could reference the original Pali and draw out the nuances of these terms.
Many Thanks

To give a quick example, If you see a pretty actress on tv, you might start to like her. That is craving. Compare that to the feeling you have towards your girlfriend or wife. Some people mistake clinging as a stronger version of craving but it is not.  You might even enjoy seeing the actress in a love scene with an actor. But you will be shocked to see your wife or gf making love to another man. That is because of clinging :)

@SankhaKulathantille it sounds like a summary could be: Craving is useless and Clinging is actually self-defeating. This reminds me of the distinction between Envy (wanting what you do not have) and Jealousy fear of losing what you do have), which so many people get entirely mixed up. Some people want to see their wife with another man. Perversity? Testing their attachments?

@nocomprende both craving and clinging are useless and detrimental.
Wanting to see your wife with another is probably a result of a more perverse clinging to the lustful sensation itself which causes one to see the wife merely as a tool to derive sexual pleasure. Not as a human being.

Craving is when the baby reaches with desire for the pacifier and clinging is when the baby has the pacifier and won't let it go.
To distinguish craving from clinging, Buddhaghosa uses the following metaphor in this source:

"Craving is the aspiring to an object that one has not yet reached,
  like a thief's stretching out his hand in the dark; clinging is the
  grasping of an object that one has reached, like the thief's grasping
  his objective.... They are the roots of the suffering due to seeking
  and guarding."

+1 for the metaphor by Buddhaghosa.

Repeated craving becomes clinging. Another name for clinging is attachment.
Craving:
3 Types of craving:

Sensual craving
Craving to be
Craving not to be

Attachment:
Once attachment forms it's painful to sever.

We protect our object of attachment.
We like to be with our object of attachment.
We pine when we are apart from our object of attachment.

There are 4 types of attachments:

Sensual attachment
Attachment to views
Attachment to our idea of self
Attachment to rites & rituals

Of all of these, Attachment to Views is probably the hardest to uproot, maybe harder than drug addiction (a form of Sensual Craving).