What is the Cause of
Ignorance? From which conditions
arises ignorance?
First: Ignorance is not seeing and
not knowing the 4 Noble Truths fully!
As a near and proximate cause:
Ignorance comes into being caused & conditioned by the 5 hindrances!
That is right here & now:
Ignorance grows up caused by desire & lust...
Ignorance arises caused by aversion & ill-will...
Ignorance emerges caused by lethargy & laziness...
Ignorance appears caused by restlessness & regret...
Ignorance comes into being caused by doubt & uncertainty...
And!:
As a remote and subtle cause:
Conditioned by mental fermentation (asava) does ignorance come into being:
That is multi-factorially, on the long-term, as a deeply hidden latent tendency:
Ignorance is caused by the mental fermentation linked with sense-desire.
Ignorance is caused by the mental fermentation associated with views.
Ignorance is caused by the mental fermentation coupled with new becoming.
Ignorance is caused by the mental fermentation joined with ignorance itself!
Ignorance thus grows more ignorance in a fatal positively self-enhanced
feedback-loop!
Sutta references: AN X 61, AN X 62
Bhikkhus, a beginning of ignorance cannot be pointed out in this way:
Before this point in time, there was no ignorance, it came into existence
afterwards.
But, Bhikkhus, it can be pointed out in this way: Caused by this, ignorance
comes to be.
Bhikkhus, I tell you, ignorance too has a causing condition!
What is the causing condition of ignorance?
The five mental hindrances is the reply...
And in MN 9:
And what is ignorance, what is the origin of ignorance, what is the ceasing
of ignorance,
what is the way leading to the ceasing of ignorance?
Not knowing about suffering, not knowing about the origin of suffering, not
knowing about
the ceasing of suffering, not knowing about the way leading to the ceasing
of suffering,
this is called ignorance! With the arising of the mental fermentations,
there is the arising
of ignorance. With the ceasing of the mental fermentations, there is ceasing
of ignorance!
The way leading to the ceasing of ignorance is just this Noble Eightfold
Path: That is;
Right view, right motivation, right speech, right action, right livelihood,
right effort and
right concentration.
For Details on the 3 Mental Fermentations (āsava)
please see:
http://What-Buddha-Said.net/library/DPPN/wtb/a/aasava.htm
http://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/The_Proximate_Cause.htm
http://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/II/Cause_of_Ignorance.htm
http://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/II/The_Three_Fermentations.htm
http://What-Buddha-Said.net/drops/III/Freed_from_Fermentation.htm
