Aniccā vata saṅkhārā
Uppāda vaya dhamminō
Uuppajjitvā nirujjhanti
Tesaṃ vūpa samō sukhō
Conditions are impermanent,
their nature is to rise and fall;
having arisen, they cease;
their stilling is true bliss.
Parinibbānasutta:
Final Extinguishment (SN 6.15),
translation by Ven. Bhikkhu Sujato
Saṅkhārā is one of the main terms in the Buddha’s Teaching, and it has three meanings depending on the context.
All saṅkhārā are aniccā (impermanent): aniccā vata saṅkhārā — impermanent are compounded things, sabbe saṅkhārā aniccā ti — impermanent are all conditioned things. In this sense, sankhāra refers to what has arisen from causes. What arises from causes? Everything except Nibbāna arises from causes. Or, we can say, everything that exists in saṃsāra arises due to causes. The body and mind, everything we see, hear, smell, touch, taste, and сognize — all of this is sankhāra, all of this arises from causes, all of this is impermanent. All things, all mental factors — these are all sankhāra.
Sabbe saṅkhārā aniccā ti — all saṅkhārā are impermanent, yadā paññāya passati — if a person knows this through wisdom, as it is, then this is the path to liberation. This is the first meaning of sankhāra — it is what arises from causes. Everything that exists in saṃsāra is sankhāra.
Sabbe saṅkhārā aniccā ti yadā paññāya passati
All conditions are impermanent — when this is seen with wisdom.
Maggavagga: The Path (Dhp 274), translation by Ven. Bhikkhu Sujato
The next meaning is in the context of pañcakkhandhā, the five aggregates. The five aggregates, or pañcakkhandhā, are:1.rūpakkhandha — the aggregate of form;2.vedanākkhandha — the aggregate of sensations;3.saññākkhandha — the aggregate of perceptions;4.saṅkhārakkhandha — the aggregate of mental formations;5.viññāṇakkhandha — the aggregate of consciousness.
In this context, saṅkhārā refers to the volitional constructs of the mind. To understand the information from our sense organs, certain constructs (or sankhāra can also be translated as fabrications, determinations) arise in the mind. Sankhāra are part of the experience of every being, including Buddhas and arahants. But for us, there is good or bad in them, whereas for the enlightened ones, there is no difference — they are simply sankhāra.
The next definition is in the context of paṭicca-samuppāda, dependent origination: avijjāpaccayā saṅkhārā; saṅkhārapaccayā viññāṇaṁ. Avijjā is ignorance: avijjāpaccayā saṅkhārā — because of ignorance, saṅkhārā arise. Saṅkhārapaccayā viññāṇaṁ — because of sankhārā, consciousness arises.
In this context, there are three types of saṅkhārā: puññābhisaṅkhārā, apuññābhisaṅkhārā, and āneñjābhisaṅkhārā. Puññābhisaṅkhārā are wholesome kamma, or wholesome mental constructs; apuññābhisaṅkhārā are unwholesome; āneñjābhisaṅkhārā are kamma for higher levels of samādhi (concentration, tranquility), not for our world of kāma-loka (the world of sensual pleasures). Whatever we think about in the world will be either kusalā or akusalā sankhāra.
Today I want to talk about saṅkhārā in the context of dependent origination. My goal is to give you some knowledge and understanding that you can see through your own experience, that you can use in your meditation, and that will help you deeply understand yourself.
How do you think we can see the saṅkhāra arising from ignorance? It is our inner conversation or our thinking. Sometimes sankhāra appear as images in the mind, as representations: for example, when we are angry, we imagine something. Or if we have been criticized, we start hearing those words in our mind as if it is happening right now. All these images, representations, words in our mind — they are all our sankhārā.
Usually, saṅkhāra appears as an inner conversation. If a person wants to see themselves, they need to see their inner conversation, their mind, their thoughts. There is no other system to see oneself. Suppose I start observing myself, and the mind starts saying: “Look at how you’re sitting, look at what you did, you are this, you are good, you are bad.” The mind speaks, and we observe. And these thoughts occurring in the mind — that is the “I,” the atta. It is there that the “I” appears. But in the Teachings, it is said that there is no self, anattā. To begin to understand this even a little, we need to see ourselves.
If we want to see ourselves, we need to go back and see what the mind is saying. But as long as we are talking, as long as we are constantly busy with tasks, we have no time to look at ourselves. To look at ourselves, we need to set aside all other activities. As long as we are reading, listening, looking at the external world, we will not have the vision of ourselves. When we are silent and observe, then in this silence we begin to see ourselves.
For those who meditate, who participate in retreats, often the most difficult thing is to maintain silence. They think that the hardest part is sitting, but then they realize that keeping silent is even more difficult. When people are silent, they become aware of their mind, and the mind becomes very loud, making their suffering visible to them. When we see our suffering, we want to stop it. Everyone wants to stop their inner suffering, even if just a little, and we all have our own methods for this.
How do we usually cope with them? We distract ourselves. We either look at something, listen to something, or talk. Before the advent of gadgets and the internet, people bought newspapers and books and constantly read them. Even earlier, people just went outside and talked — these conversations distracted them from their suffering. That’s why people constantly need to be doing something; if they are not occupied, their suffering increases. For example, an elderly woman is sitting at home, she has no tasks that she must do. But what does she do? She sews, knits, keeps herself busy. When she does this, she may not listen to her inner dialogue. It is still audible, but at least she distracts herself a little. This inner voice is suffering.
In the Buddha’s Teachings, three types of suffering are explained:
- dukkha dukkha;
- vipariṇāma dukkha;
- saṅkhāra dukkha.
Dukkha dukkha is the painful sensations in the body: headache, stomach ache, pain in the legs and back when sitting, etc. In fact, this suffering is almost always present; we are always a little cold or hot, a little uncomfortable, and so on.
Vipariṇāma dukkha is the suffering of change. For example, we cannot just eat once; we want to eat again later. Why do we constantly need to eat, wash, brush our teeth, and get treatment again and again? Because everything is constantly changing. The body is constantly changing, and we need to continuously maintain it — this is suffering. Imagine how much food we have eaten just in this lifetime. And we need to work endlessly, clean endlessly, cook endlessly, fix our things endlessly, and treat our body endlessly. Due to changes, we always have tasks to do, and this is dukkha, suffering.
These first two types of suffering seem significant to us, we think they are abundant, but in reality, their proportion is negligible compared to the third type of suffering. People suffer most not from the body and not from changes, but from the mind — this is saṅkhāra dukkha.
For example, medical procedures: suppose a tooth needs to be extracted. A person can suffer from the very moment they learn that they will need an extraction. The extraction itself and the pain during the process are one thing, but people can think about it for a long time, be very afraid, and suffer. These thoughts, these saṅkhārā, affect the body, intensifying physical pain and possibly exacerbating illnesses. This is sankhāra dukkha, the primary type of suffering for us.
For example, aging itself is vipariṇāma dukkha: the body becomes weaker, there are more illnesses, hair falls out, and the senses weaken. But much greater suffering occurs in the mind from thoughts about this. “I am becoming unattractive, I am weak, how can I prevent my hair from turning gray or falling out?” — these saṅkhārā arising in the mind bring immense suffering. And what happens next, according to dependent origination: saṅkhārapaccayā viññāṇaṁ — because of sankhāra, consciousness arises. What the mind thinks, what sankhāra appear in the mind, that will be the consciousness (viññāṇa).
For example, in the morning it was cold, and the mind becomes aware of this. It’s not just cold, the thinking begins: “Oh, it’s so cold, it’s so bad.” After this, the mind realizes that everything is bad. As a result, the whole body changes to match the mind, and we begin to perceive the world differently. And the mind changes too: all mental factors change.
Viññāṇapaccayā nāmarūpaṁ: because of consciousness, mind and body, or mentality-materiality (nāmarūpa) arise. Nāmarūpapaccayā saḷāyatanaṁ: because of mentality-materiality, the six spheres of perception, or the six sense organs, or bases (saḷāyatana) arise. After the mind, the six sense organs change, and we become ready to perceive a bad, cold world.
For example, in late autumn someone says, “The first snow is coming soon.” People usually perceive this with joy: there will soon be no more dirt, everything will become white and beautiful, and the holidays are coming. But for a poor person who has no heating at home, or for a person who is allergic to the cold, this will be suffering. Their internal saṅkhārā will be different, and as the saṅkhārā are, so will be the consciousness (viññāṇa), so will be the mentality-materiality (nāmarūpa). As the mentality-materiality is, so will be the sense organs, or the six spheres of perception (saḷāyatana).
In reality, most of a person’s suffering is mental suffering, saṅkhāra dukkha. Because of our inner suffering, we do not see the happiness that we already have now. For example, we are comfortable right now, and that is pleasant, but usually, people cannot feel this. When we open a window and feel the fresh breeze, it is pleasant. When we pour tea, its smell and taste are pleasant. But we do not feel this pleasantness because of our inner suffering: there is an endless inner dialogue in the mind. If we look closely at this dialogue, what is it? It is our ignorance, our craving, our aversion.
In the Buddha’s Teachings, it is explained that we are sugati: gati means birth, su means good. We are beings who have attained a good birth. We have happiness here, but we do not see it. We constantly suffer in our minds. If a person truly recognizes their suffering, they can get rid of it. We must see the suffering within ourselves.
Suppose we see a bad person and begin to judge and criticize them. And now, for us, there is a bad person whom we are looking at and judging. And while we are looking at them, we do not see our own suffering. Our suffering is our judgment, our anger, our aversion, our ill-will. If a person truly sees these saṅkhārā, they will want to stop them. But to see them and to want to stop them, wisdom is needed. And one must understand, at least a little, what it means to rest from sankhāra.
When there are few thoughts in the mind, the mind rests. When there are too many thoughts, memories, plans, when the mind begins to discuss and criticize everyone — this is very burdensome. The mind is constantly discussing something, planning something, or remembering something — all these saṅkhārā arising from ignorance are suffering. And all these thoughts require energy, and this is why we get so tired.
However, we need to understand that states of mind where thinking is completely absent are not the goal of our practice. The Buddha never encouraged such states of mind; he warned against attachment to them. We need to use thinking, but we need to use it correctly, to contemplate wisely (yoniso manasikāra).
“Mister Gotama, it’s when the eye sees no sight and the ear hears no sound.That’s how Pārāsariya teaches his disciples the development of the faculties.”
“In that case, Uttara, a blind person and a deaf person will have developed faculties according to what Pārāsariya says. For a blind person sees no sight with the eye and a deaf person hears no sound with the ear.”
Indriyabhāvanāsutta: The Development of the Faculties (MN 152),
translation by Ven. Bhikkhu Sujato
Without these saṅkhārā arising from ignorance, greed, and ill-will, a person can rest: they can simply drink tea without running old thoughts in circles. Feeling the warmth and firmness of the cup, smelling and tasting the tea — this is also mindfulness. But if a person starts comparing this tea to some other tea, or planning where and what tea to buy next, thinking about how much it will cost — these thoughts require energy, and we do not feel the taste of the tea, we lose our lifetime this way.
You can simply sit, observe your breath, observe the sensations in your body, observe your posture, and the position of your body. You can walk mindfully, observing how your foot lifts and lowers, how it touches the ground. Observe sensations as sensations, thoughts as thoughts. This will all be meditation. When we see thoughts as thoughts, there is no suffering.
The First Noble Truth is suffering, dukkha, and we must be aware of our suffering. The extent to which we are aware of our suffering is the extent to which we will have peace. We can free ourselves from suffering, but as long as we seek the causes of our suffering in the external world, we do not truly see it. We must look at ourselves, at our own saṅkhārā.
There are different types of saṅkhārā. There are wholesome saṅkhārā (kusalā), such as kindness, generosity, and rejoicing (muditā). They bring us merits that yield wholesome fruits. There are also unwholesome (akusalā) sankhāra: anger, greed, envy, pride. There are many of them, and they will bring us unwholesome fruits. Sometimes we may consider certain sankhāra to be wholesome, but if we look at them closely, we find envy, greed, pride. Yet, they may seem like justice or protection to us. We have many mental defilements, and all of them are suffering.
If we look very deeply, even wholesome thoughts are suffering. But here we need to be very careful and cautious. Sometimes people become only slightly acquainted with the Teachings and think that since the Buddha said to let go of everything, both wholesome and unwholesome, then they do not need to practice generosity, kindness, or morality, and so on. But that way, they will never be free from suffering. Morality (sīla) and generosity (dāna) are the foundation of our entire practice; we cannot build anything if we do not have this foundation, and we cannot develop our mind without it.
First of all, we must get rid of the unwholesome: greed, anger, hatred, pride, envy, and the like. To get rid of this, we must develop wholesome thoughts, wholesome qualities — they are like medicine for a disease, like an antidote to unwholesome states of mind. When morality, generosity, and other wholesome qualities are developed, mindfulness and wisdom will also develop. Only after this can a person develop supramundane wisdom, and only then will they understand that both the wholesome and the unwholesome are suffering, and that it is possible to be free from all of it, but this is a very high level.
“Suppose there was a person traveling along the road. They’d see a large deluge, whose near shore was dubious and perilous, while the far shore was a sanctuary free of peril. But there was no ferryboat or bridge for crossing over. They’d think, ‘Why don’t I gather grass, sticks, branches, and leaves and make a raft? Riding on the raft, and paddling with my hands and feet, I can safely reach the far shore.’ And so they’d do exactly that. And when they’d crossed over to the far shore, they’d think, ‘This raft has been very helpful to me. Riding on the raft, and paddling with my hands and feet, I have safely crossed over to the far shore. Why don’t I hoist it on my head or pick it up on my shoulder and go wherever I want?’
What do you think, mendicants? Would that person be doing what should be done with that raft?”
“No, sir.”
“And what, mendicants, should that person do with the raft? When they’d crossed over they should think, ‘This raft has been very helpful to me. …Why don’t I beach it on dry land or set it adrift on the water and go wherever I want?’ That’s what that person should do with the raft.
In the same way, I have taught a simile of the teaching as a raft: for crossing over, not for holding on. By understanding the simile of the raft, you will even give up the Teachings, let alone what is against the teachings.”
Alagaddūpamasutta: The Simile of the Cobra (MN 22),
translation by Ven. Bhikkhu Sujato
But at the initial level, we must see our saṅkhārā, our suffering. Practice helps us protect our mind. For example, generosity and morality help us develop wholesome thoughts, wholesome qualities of mind.
Meditation helps us develop the mind and keep it focused on a wholesome object, such as kindness. Kindness can also be an object for meditation, and in this way, we can develop our mind. When we think about kindness, the five hindrances diminish, and harmony, composure, joy, concentration, and one-pointedness of mind arise — wholesome qualities emerge. And then a person truly feels good. It is as if the house was dirty, cluttered, and we cleaned it well; the house becomes clean, tidy, spacious, bright, fresh, and it is pleasant to live there. The same will be with a wholesome mind.
This is samādhi — mental composure, concentration, mental harmony, and tranquility. But samādhi can be lost at any moment because we still have ignorance (avijjā). When samādhi develops, our ignorance simply hides from us, and when ignorance reappears, we can instantly lose our samādhi. Therefore, if we have developed some level of samādhi, we must immediately practice vipassanā to see ourselves, our suffering, the causes of suffering, how it arises, and how we create our own suffering. Then wisdom arises, which is: understanding how suffering arises, the cause of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the Path leading to the cessation of suffering.
What we do, how we practice, must correspond to the Teachings; only in this way can we understand that we are on the right path. And this wisdom will not be lost. Due to ignorance, unwholesome thoughts may arise, causing us to lose mental peace, but with wisdom, we can see our unwholesome thoughts as our suffering, and we will want to get rid of it and be able to work further on it. We will not think that the external world is wrong, that the surrounding people are wrong, that society is wrong, and that we need to do something about it.
We constantly seek to attain happiness by changing the world. But with wisdom, we understand that we need to change ourselves. Suffering arises in me, not somewhere in the world, and it ceases in me. We need to see this difference, and for that, we must understand what saṅkhārā are and how they arise. We must see this in ourselves. If at any level our sankhārā arising from ignorance subside, we will experience happiness. If all sankhārā arising from ignorance disappear completely, that will be Nibbāna: sabba saṅkhāra samatho — the calming of all sankhārā is one of the descriptions of Nibbāna.
During meditation, saṅkhārā are our mental defilements, our thoughts, our inner sorrows, our sufferings. Or, put differently, they are our kamma. We are constantly creating new kamma, and it constantly affects us. If a person needs to be aware of themselves, to observe themselves, they must pay attention to their thoughts, they must be aware of sankhārā.
I wish you to develop your wisdom, mindfulness, and wholesome qualities of mind. May the merits from listening to this Dhamma help you to be free from suffering!
And what, bhikkhus, is old kamma? The eye is old kamma, to be seen as generated and fashioned by volition, as something to be felt. The ear is old kamma …The mind is old kamma, to be seen as generated and fashioned by volition, as something to be felt. This is called old kamma.
And what, bhikkhus is new kamma? Whatever action one does now by body, speech, or mind. This is called new kamma.
And what, bhikkhus, is the cessation of kamma? When one reaches liberation through the cessation of bodily action, verbal action, and mental action, this is called the cessation of kamma.
And what, bhikkhus, is the way leading to the cessation of kamma? It is this Noble Eightfold Path; that is, right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration.
Kammanirodhasutta: Kamma (SN 35.146), translation by Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi
RU 
EN