Author Topic: The 5 Aggregates  (Read 8571 times)

KhedrubGyatso

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The 5 Aggregates
« on: February 24, 2012, 04:24:42 AM »
In the medium scope of the Lamrim, we are taught the 5 aggregates of a living being.

They are :
1. Physical Form
2. Feeling
3. Perception
4. Mental formations
5. Consciousness

How does understanding the above help us deal with life's problems ?
In the case of human condition, how are the above aggregates related to our attitudes /personalities? Eg  our E.Q. or emotional well being?

Midakpa

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #1 on: February 25, 2012, 03:30:20 AM »
The five aggregates or skandhas are the physical and mental components of personality and of sensory experience (1 physical [the body], and 4 mental). Skandhas are no different from natural phenomena that continuously arise and pass away. We can't find any substantial and continuous self-entity in the five aggregates. Therefore they are said to be "anatta" (not-self). The aggregates are said to be tools that the kleshas (delusions) use to construct and maintain the world of samsara. 

Once we understand this, it is easier to eliminate the kleshas. Our emotional well-being depends on the removal of our delusions. Delusions like ignorance, anger, attachment, pride, and jealousy are negative emotions that dictate the activities of the five aggregates. Once the the aggregates are free of these defiling influences, they can then work solely at the command of Dharma. For example, when a person becomes an arhat, he has eliminated the kleshas, but the five skandhas remain components of his personality for the rest of his life. When he passes away, his citta no longer has any connection with the five skandhas.

hope rainbow

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #2 on: February 26, 2012, 04:13:22 PM »
The five aggregates or skandhas are the physical and mental components of personality and of sensory experience (1 physical [the body], and 4 mental).

Skandhas are no different from natural phenomena that continuously arise and pass away.

We can't find any substantial and continuous self-entity in the five aggregates.
Therefore they are said to be "anatta" (not-self).

The aggregates are said to be tools that the kleshas (delusions) use to construct and maintain the world of samsara. 

Once we understand this, it is easier to eliminate the kleshas.

Our emotional well-being depends on the removal of our delusions.
Delusions like ignorance, anger, attachment, pride, and jealousy are negative emotions that dictate the activities of the five aggregates.

Once the the aggregates are free of these defiling influences, they can then work solely at the command of Dharma.

For example, when a person becomes an arhat, he has eliminated the kleshas, but the five skandhas remain components of his personality for the rest of his life.
When he passes away, his citta no longer has any connection with the five skandhas.

Thank you Midakpa.
Probably the shortest and most concice explanation on the 5 aggregates I have come across.
I must have read it 10 times already by now... Thank you, I'll read it again.

Often we focus too much on understanding how the aggregates work together as a dynamic set rather than focus on their deluded origin and on the benefit of removing their causes.

KhedrubGyatso

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #3 on: February 28, 2012, 03:30:51 AM »
Thank you midakpa for concise explanation of 5 aggregates.

Here is a more relational description  which can help us understand and deal with our human issues better.

Body : Our body is really a very vulnerable object to receive pain due to its physical constituents and highly developed nervous system. We can die from almost anything, even from the water or food we take or from the air we breathe. Recognizing this makes us not take our body for granted , hence we should always keep fit. A fit and healthy body  will influence our mind positively and vice versa due to the close relationship between mind and body.

Feeling : This contributes to the  emotional quotient of our personality in terms of what is pleasant, unpleasant and neutral.

Perception: This is the conceptualising aggregate, contributing to the  intelligent quotient  which enables us to discriminate objects. We can change our perception of things through correct awareness and hence correct view of reality to free us from all kinds of suffering.

Other Mental factors: This is the  volitional , or karmically active aggregate which creates happiness or unhappiness  through operation of one's will power.Therefore it is the moral aggregate which gives humans a conscience and which is what makes us human and can become a Buddha.

Consciousness: This is the awareness and basis of all our experiences . Without this aggregate, we become a vegetable.


hope rainbow

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #4 on: February 29, 2012, 05:34:37 AM »
Thank you midakpa for concise explanation of 5 aggregates.

Here is a more relational description  which can help us understand and deal with our human issues better.

Body : Our body is really a very vulnerable object to receive pain due to its physical constituents and highly developed nervous system. We can die from almost anything, even from the water or food we take or from the air we breathe. Recognizing this makes us not take our body for granted , hence we should always keep fit. A fit and healthy body  will influence our mind positively and vice versa due to the close relationship between mind and body.

Feeling : This contributes to the  emotional quotient of our personality in terms of what is pleasant, unpleasant and neutral.

Perception: This is the conceptualising aggregate, contributing to the  intelligent quotient  which enables us to discriminate objects. We can change our perception of things through correct awareness and hence correct view of reality to free us from all kinds of suffering.

Other Mental factors: This is the  volitional , or karmically active aggregate which creates happiness or unhappiness  through operation of one's will power.Therefore it is the moral aggregate which gives humans a conscience and which is what makes us human and can become a Buddha.

Consciousness: This is the awareness and basis of all our experiences . Without this aggregate, we become a vegetable.

Thank you KG.
Do we keep any of these aggregates when we die?
Do we keep our consciousness for example?
Or is it that the aggregates all dissolve to be recreated in another body?

In other words: is there a difference between mindstream and consciousness, and feelings...
Obviously the body is to be left behind.... but is there like a "dream-body" sort of thing?

Then when one enters the womb, how do they aggregates form, do they form all at once or is consciousness arising later in the process?

Thank you KG


Midakpa

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #5 on: March 03, 2012, 02:08:36 AM »
I like KhedrubGyatso's way of associating the EQ to the aggregate of feeling, the IQ to the aggregate of perception and the mental factors to the moral aggregate. It makes it easier to understand and relate to.

I find Hope Rainbow's questions to KG quite challenging. Unless we have some realisations, we can rely only on what is taught by Buddhist masters or from books on the subject matter.

I'll try to answer the questions with my limited knowledge of dharma.

Do we keep our aggregates when we die? According to Alistair Shearer (in "Buddha the Intelligent Heart"), "At the time of death, the grouping of mental formations that constitute what we call an individual mind leaves the disintegrating gross physical shell and moves to the subtler levels of creation. From here, at the time determined by its constituent elements, the bundle of mental tendencies will again return to the material plane as the seed-energy of whatever physical form is appropriate to the unfolding of its potential in the next incarnation."

Do we keep our consciousness when we die?   Yes, the mind (consciousness) that leaves the body at death is the same mind that takes a new body in its next rebirth.

Do all aggregates dissolve to be recreated in another body? Maybe you mean the elements that dissolve. There are many books that describe the death process, for eg. Sogyal Rinpoche's "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying". Aggregates do not dissolve, but they can be purified. Actually our liberation depends on our ability to purify and transcend them.

Is there a difference between mindstream and consciousness and feelings? I think mindstream and consciousness may be similar but consciousness and feelings are different aggregates although they are both mental. We can talk about our own mindstream and the need to purify it etc, but the mindstream or the mind of enlightened beings are already pure because they have no karma. I read somewhere that  karma and mind are inseparable. As long as you have mind, you have karma. Once karma is exhausted, mind ends and becomes Dharmakaya, which is absence of karma.  This mind is in fact none other than ultimate bodhicitta. So as long as we have mind, we have to take rebirth, as long as we have karma, we are trapped in samsara.

Is there a "dream-body"?  I'm not sure what you mean. But I hope someone can explain what happens in the bardo. In Buddhism there is no concept of a "soul" entity. When one dies, one goes to the bardo as a formless being. This being may still have the mental aggregates but obviously not the physical one.

When one enters the womb, how do the aggregates form, do they form all at once or is consciousness arising late in the process? From my limited understanding, I think the consciousness is already there when the embryo forms. We carry with us from life to life the vicious circle of repeated patterns of thought, feeling and behaviour that keep us in samsara. So the aggregates are not formed in the body. Karma follows us like a shadow , remember?

KhedrubGyatso

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #6 on: March 03, 2012, 08:14:36 AM »
Thanks midkakpa for answering HR's questions for me! I don't have much to add here . This topic is already getting  very technical.
I am not so sure that mind and karma is inseparable. Karma is not mind but the operation of a special instance of the causal laws whereby engaging in negative actions are the causes  and the misery we experience is the result. If karma is mind , inseparable then we cannot purify it.

hope rainbow

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #7 on: March 03, 2012, 08:56:04 AM »
Thank you Midkakpa and KG for your replies.

I keep going back to the 5 aggregates again and again, because I find it a rather complex topic to understand. Especially as they work together in a dynamic and constantly changing process.

Your posts have helped me. Thank you.

I googled some more on the topic and found this quotation on
http://www.bibliotheque-dhagpo-kagyu.org/en/doss/abhi6.php:

from the Buddha:
"MATTER IS LIKE FOAM,
SENSATION LIKE A BUBBLE,
PERCEPTION LIKE A MIRAGE,
FORMATIONS LIKE A BANANA TREE,
AND CONSCIENCE LIKE AN ILLUSION."

This refering to the 5 aggregates as:
1. Physical Form (matter)
2. Feeling (sensation)
3. Perception
4. Mental formations
5. Consciousness

This is then commented like this on the refered website:

« The meaning of these words is:
the absence of self,
of impurity,
of a lack of satisfaction,
an absence of solidity
and of substantialness.»
Asanga: The Anthology of Special Topics of Knowledge, translated and commented by Walpola Rahula


Midakpa

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #8 on: March 03, 2012, 03:49:34 PM »
Dear KhedrubGyatso,

Even if mind and karma are different, why can't mind be purified?

Dear Hope Rainbow,

Thank you for sharing the quotation from the Buddha. It is short but very profound. The imagery makes one reflect and gets closer to the truth. A few lines from the Buddha are more effective than a whole book full of commentaries and technicalities. Sometimes, I think it's good to go back to the source. Was is Pabongka Rinpoche who said that if you want to know where the river comes from, you have to trace it back to its source?

buddhalovely

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Re: The 5 Aggregates
« Reply #9 on: November 03, 2012, 01:39:06 PM »
There are several schools of thoughts that teach the five aggregates. There is noticeably what we call "Buddhism" in a broad sense that we should rather call: "BUDDHISM (S) ". Likewise, there are also"HINDUISM (S) ". In short, this is what, in therav?da, we call Brahmanism (s). That is to say religions, philosophies and systems of thoughts that conceive of an underlying unity, the ultimate and transcend truth. Those ones sometimes expound to us the five aggregates. These five aggregates are divided between two categories. We find, on one hand, the category of purely material phenomena and the category of purely mental phenomena on the other.

The aggregate of matter.
There is therefore the aggregate of matter, the material aggregate, the aggregate of material propensities, material activities and phenomena. It is the sole representative of the material category.
The other category is the one of mental, immaterial phenomena. There are four aggregates that take part into this second category of mental or immaterial phenomena.

The aggregate of sensations.
The first of the four aggregates is the aggregate of sensations, which is the capacity to feel what is pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.

The aggregate of perception.
The aggregate of perception is the faculty to perceive, to memorise. It is precisely at this stage that the memorisation process does begin.

The aggregate of formations
Then we find the aggregate of formations. We number fifty-two of them altogether. Formations, or volitional formations as we also sometimes call them, are properties of consciousness.

The aggregate of consciousness.
Consciousness is the fourth immaterial aggregate, this is the faculty to know. As soon as consciousness comes to know an object, it does know it in a certain manner, it knows it to be endowed with certain properties. This way through which consciousness knows an object is the aggregate of consciousness.