It's really true, Jeffrey - the jhanas are much more than signposts. I'm thinking of how meditative absorption lead to saturation throughout the day (and night), which has the tendency to slow the mind and actually still it when we turn our attention to the bliss, joy and ecstasy - or, at least, that's something I'm noticing more and more. This is probably a "sign" that second jhana is available off the cushion, due to repeated immersions in absorption that leads to saturation. With the pace of mind-activity slowed, it's easier to be self-reflective (mindful), to see where clinging and craving are happening, and to let them go.
I can also see how a training takes place through meditative absorption, and that this could be preparation for OOB experience (arupa jhanas). I'm to the point where, after my before-bed meditation, I lay down in shivasana and allow the charisms to engage again on my way into sleep, and it's clear that there is some sort of transformative process at work. We'll see where it goes during the time I have left this lifetime.
You make a number of excellent points, and I am reminded that we met on a non-dual forum about 2 decades ago, where non-dualists propose maintaining one's attention on the here and now becomes non-dual, and I agree, but as you and I have experienced a daily practice of deep meditation that produces some of the jhanas has a saturation effect which means at least part of our waking, day-to-day life can be saturated with at least some of the components of the jhanas as found in our daily deep meditation practice, which was a point that only you on the non-dual forums experienced because you had been meditating deeply on a consistent basis before we met, but they don't tend to meditate. So, my argument to the non-dualists is, if you don't meditate then your "non-dualism" is just superficial.
Jhanananda and Michael,
Thank you for the discussion. I remember reading somewhere that the four brahma viharas are included in the jhanas. If this is correct, then it means that jhanas are some kind of divine / god's abodes.
As we refer to the brahma viharas here is, they are some of the fruit "phala" that is the product of deep meditation that produces the 8 stages of samma-samadhi, but they are not the only fruit described in the Pali Canon, but interestingly Greco-Roman Christianity has a reference for the brahma viharas in their discussion on the "spiritual fruit" and "we know a tree by its fruit" is a direct reference to them, and we argue a reference to the rest of the "fruit" that are described in the Pali Canon, and if we examine historical references to other Eurasian religions we find very similar concepts were moving all over Eurasia at the time, so they were not invented by Christianity, but appropriated by them.
Also, our point here is the question of which comes first? We argue it is by following a dedicated contemplative life, which we find is precisely defined by the Noble Eightfold Path, when it is properly understood to include the 8 stages of samma-samadhi, that the brahma viharas and other "fruit" are the product of correctly following a dedicated contemplative life, which is precisely defined by the Noble Eightfold Path.
