The Teachings of Ajahn Suchart.
17 November 2023
“The four aggregates.”
Layperson: “I was reading about the four aggregates.
When meditating, which of these four aggregates do we actually train?”
Than Ajahn: “The nāma (the four mental aggregates) come in groups. They come together. They don’t come separately, so they work in unison. Each aggregate is doing a different function. The viññāṇa aggregate is the one that receives information from the senses: from the eyes, ears, nose, tongue and body. So, the mind will know what it’s seeing or hearing. This is the working of viññāṇa aggregate. Viññāṇa is translated as the consciousness.
Once the mind receives the information, then it processes the information with saññā (memory or perception). It will try to identify the picture that it sees or the sound that it hears: who is this person? what is this sound? This is the working of saññā aggregate.
Saññā is translated as perception or memory.
After you recognize the picture or the sound, you know whether it is something you like or something you dislike. You will have vedanā (feeling) arises. If you perceive it as something you like, you’ll feel good. If you perceive it as something you don’t like, you’ll feel bad. There are three different vedanā: good feelings, bad feelings and neutral feelings.
Then, once feeling arises, the fourth aggregate comes into action, the saṅkhāra (volition) aggregate. You will start to think, ‘What should I do with the information that I have?’ If you like the information, you will move towards that information. You want to be close to that information. Like when you see somebody you like, you want to be close to that person. You’ll tell the body,
‘Let’s get closer to that person.’ If you don’t like that person, your thought will say, ‘It’s better to stay away from that person.’
So, the aggregates work together and they work very fast. They are like computers. All happen in an instant.
What I said is dissecting the process, but when the aggregates are working, they work very fast.
What you have to be careful of is the fourth aggregate.
You almost can’t change the working of the other three aggregates. But you can change the working of the fourth aggregate. For instance, if you see something you dislike and you want to do something bad towards it, you can still stop your action if you know that doing something bad towards it is not good for you. You can stop your saṅkhāra, your thought.
The tool that can stop your thought is mindfulness. This is the reason why we practice mindfulness. It is for us to have the ability to stop our thoughts when we’re thinking in the wrong way, when we’re thinking in the way that will hurt us. For example, when you see something you like but you don’t have money to buy it, and so when you think of stealing it, you should stop this thought because you know this action is bad.
The one who knows this action is bad or good is wisdom or insight. You learn this wisdom from the Buddha. When you listen to Dhamma talks, the Buddha tells you, ‘You have to keep the precepts because keeping the precepts is good for you. It will protect you from getting into trouble.’ For example, when you want to steal something, then you say, ‘I cannot steal it because it’s bad for me.
When I steal, I will run into trouble.’ So, you have to have wisdom, then you know what to do with the things that you come into contact with.”
From: “Dhamma in English to layperson from Italy, Feb 8, 2018.”
By Ajahn Suchart Abhijāto
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