Boonkanjanaram Meditation Center

What Is Buddhism ?
b) Where is nibbana ?

Nibbana is not a place. It's not anywhere. Nobody, even one who has superpower can tell where nibbana is. Nibbana is not in heaven; it is like the wind: you only know it by its effects. Nibbana is the object of a very special path moment. It is a mind object of this path moment.

The ordinary person is saturated in defilement, but when he does vipassana practice and vipassana wisdom occurs, his mind becomes purified. This is called path moment and path fruition. These two have nibbana as an object (the 14th and 15th of the 16 vipassana knowledges = nana or 'yanas' in Thai).

Nibbana is not mind. It's just the object of mind. When vipassana wisdom is very strong, the mind of the ordinary person changes to the mind of the Noble One. This change is called path moment. It is followed immediately by path fruition. Both have nibbana as their object. When the cause of suffering is extinguished, suffering (the result) is extinguished by the particular path moment for that path. The four paths to enlightenment are stream-winner, once returner, non-returner, and fully-enlightened or Perfect One (the Arahant). There are ten fetters keeping us from full enlightenment:

1) Wrong view of self
2) Doubt about the Buddha's teaching
3) Adherence to rites and rituals
	(There refer to any belief that any ceremony such as lighting incense or any ritual behavior or worship can lead to nibbana.)
4) Sensual desire
5) Hatred
6) Desire for fine material existence
7) Desire for immaterial existence
	(Fine material existence is an existence where there is still body. Immaterial existence is where there is only nama. So both of these fetters (6 and 7) refer to craving for types of heavenly existence.)
8) Pride
9) Restlessness
10) Ignorance

Thus, for the First Path, the stream-winner path-moment erases the first three fetters; for the Second Path, the once-returner path-moment weakens the next two fetters; for the Third Path, the non-returner path-moment erases the two weakened fetters; and for the Fourth Path, the arahatta path moment erases the five remaining fetters.