212: Beautiful Consciousness of Sensuous Realms (Kamavacara Sobhana Citta)

 Sayar Myat presents the twenty-four beautiful consciousnesses (sobhana citta) of the sensuous realm, divided into wholesome, resultant, and functional groups. Through simple storylines, he explains how wholesome consciousness arises with joy, wisdom, spontaneity, or prompting, and how these moments are free from unwholesome states. He then describes how beautiful resultant consciousness appears as the fruit of past wholesome actions, and how beautiful functional consciousness operates in Buddhas and Arahants—pure actions without kammic effect. This talk offers a clear, practical guide to understanding how wholesome roots shape the mind and support the path to wisdom. 

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Sayar Myat: 0:02

Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa,Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa, Namo tassa bhagavato arahato samma sambuddhassa. Theravada Buddhism series, Dhamma talk number thirty-five. Beautiful consciousness of sensuous realm. Kama vasara sobana citta. There are twenty-four beautiful consciousness in sensuous realm. They consist of wholesome, resultant and functional groups. Each group consists of eight kinds of consciousness. The first group is 'beautiful wholesome consciousness sabana kusala citta'. We are going to explain about these eight consciousness of this group one by one with a little storyline. The storyline goes like this . Someone joyfully perform a helpful beneficial service, understanding that it is wholesome and connected to kamma and its result, spontaneously and without prompting. What it is is- someone does a good deed joyfully, happily, and at the same time, the person knows that deed is related to kamma, causal relationship. Meaning if one does a good deed, there will be a good result. That's understanding. And at the same time, he simply jumped up and do it without thinking twice, spontaneously. The person did that without being pushed or urged or coerced. So that's a storyline. And that represents the first consciousness of this wholesome group. Joyful, meaning pleasant feeling, understanding, meaning knowledge or wisdom. Spontaneously without being pushed, pressed, or urged. Those three factors are the key points of this first consciousness. The second one- Joyfully wholesome, joyful. And also there's the understanding. Connection to the law of kamma. But this time the person has to think twice. Should I do it? Shouldn't I do it? Or a friend. Push him. Go ahead, do it. That's great. Good. That's a difference between the first and the second consciousness. First one- spontaneously. Second one- is after prompting, pressing. And the third consciousness of the same group. Someone performs the same good deed, good act, joyfully, without prompting, and also without understanding that this is connected to wholesome karma. Doing the same deed joyfully without being pushed, but this time he has no understanding that the act is connected to kamma. That's the third one. The fourth consciousness. They are the same as the first four. Except the feelings. The first four is done with pleasant feeling, joy and happiness. And this second set of four is done with neutral feeling instead of being joyful. So that's a difference. So altogether, eight consciousness under the beautiful wholesome consciousness group. When these eight types of consciousness arise, there are no unwholesome mental states in the mind. When you do at that particular moment, there is no unwholesome states in your mind. Therefore, these consciousness inhibit the unwholesome mental states or defilements and produce good result. This consciousness arises in the unenlightened persons and also in a partially enlightened noble person. Meaning the first stream winner, once returner, and non-returner, the first three noble persons. Whenever we perform a meritorious deed or action, deed, speech, and thought. Do not occur in Arhants because their actions are purely functional, and those actions do not produce any new kamma because they have abandoned craving and ignorance. So we explain the eight types of beautiful wholesome consciousness. The first group. Meaning they have a generosity, loving kindness, and wisdom. So if you remember talk on the ahetuga, citta, rootless consciousness. They also belong to the this sense sphere or sensuous realm. Beautiful consciousness belong to the sense sphere or sensuous realm. Both are in the same realm. These eighteen rootless consciousness, as the name indicated, they have no roots. But the beautiful consciousness has roots, which means they have a good nature. To differentiate from rootless resultant consciousness, we put the word sahetuka 'with roots' as a prefix in Pali. Normally is beautiful resultant consciousness, but to differentiate it, we ended up with roots. Just for clarity. These are the result of the eight beautiful wholesome consciousness of the sense sphear. The first set is the action, kamma, producing activities. The second set is the result of those actions. However, these arise mainly in the sensuous realms. But it may occur in the minds of the Brahma of form, sphere, and formless sphere. They appear only in the sensuous realms because they are the results of the eight beautiful, wholesome consciousness. They have no kamma producing power. So these resultant consciousness, beautiful resultant consciousness with roots arises only in the sense sphere. That's a key point. Even though you may find it in the Brahma, here and there. Beautiful functional consciousness with roots that the third group. This time is functional consciousness. At the same time, we still added that little prefix 'with roots'. And Pali, sahetuka sobana kiriya citta. We put that prefix to differentiate from the three rootless functional consciousness. If you remember those three in the Ahetuka Citta talk. Those are the three. That's a key point. But this functional group arises only in Buddha, Silent Buddha, and Arhant. Those are the two key points. When Arhant does good action, wholesome action, consciousness with pleasurable feeling and wisdom will arise. When they do good things, you feel good, and there's a wisdom. They arise together. But such actions of Arhant do not produce kamma because those actions do not have the kamma producing power. That is why it is called functional. These functional consciousness arises and disappear without leaving any potential to give result. That is because the Buddha and the other hearts have destroyed craving and ignorance. They have no attachment to any form of effects. They simply do it without the slightest trace of expectation. Their acts become just an act. Functional acts means simply doing. And also doing means they merely arise, accomplish some necessary functions, and that consciousness disappeared or passed away without leaving any residue. That's what doing means. Consciousness arise, do what is necessary and it disappear without leaving any residue because they have no expectation. Arahants laugh or smile with five types of consciousness. Full consciousness from the beautiful sense sphere, functional consciousness, and one from the functional rootless consciousness. Ordinary people laugh or smile with eight kinds of consciousness- full, pleasurable, great rooted consciousness and full, pleasant, wholesome sensphere consciousness. So this give a brief summary of the twenty-four beautiful consciousness of senes sphere. May you be able to understand these in theory and able to bridge with your practice so that your wisdom may become sharper along the journey towards Nibbana. Thank you very much.