Paṭik(k)ūlamanasikāra[1] is aPāli term that is generally translated as "reflections on repulsiveness". It refers to a traditionalBuddhist meditation whereby thirty-one parts of the body are contemplated in a variety of ways. In addition to developingsati (mindfulness) andsamādhi (concentration), this form ofmeditation is considered conducive to overcoming desire and lust. Along with cemetery contemplations such as the contemplation of thenine stages of decay, this type of meditation is one of the two meditations on "the foul" or "unattractive" (Pāli:asubha).[2]
Paṭikkūla (Pāli) literally means "against" (paṭi) "the slope" or "embankment" (kūla) and has been translated adjectivally as "averse, objectionable, contrary, disagreeable" and, in its nounal form, as "loathsomeness, impurity".[3]
Manasikāra (Pāli), derived frommanasi (locative ofmana thus, loosely, "in mind" or "in thought") andkaroti ("to make" or "to bring into") and has been translated as "attention" or "pondering" or "fixed thought".[4]
In contemporary translations, the compound termpaṭikkūla-manasikāra is generally translated as "reflections on repulsiveness" or, adding contextual clarity at the expense of literal accuracy, "reflections on repulsiveness of the body".[5] Alternate translations include "attention directed to repulsiveness"[6] and "realisation of the impurity of the body".[7]
This type of meditation is traditionally mentioned as an "antidote" to sensual passion.[8] This is also one of the "four protective meditations", along withanussati (recollection of the Buddha),mettā (benevolence) practice and recollection of death.[9]
In individual discourses, this type of contemplation is identified as a contributor to a variety of mundane and transcendental goals. For instance, in theGirimananda Sutta (AN 10.60),Ananda's recitation of this and other contemplations immediately cures an ailing monk.[10] In theSampasadaniya Sutta (DN 28), Ven.Sariputta declares that meditating on these 31 body parts leads to "the attainment of vision, in four ways", and briefly outlines how this method can be used as a springboard by which one "comes to know the unbroken stream of human consciousness that is not established either in this world or in the next".[11] In addition, in theIddhipāda-samyutta'sVibhanga Sutta (SN 51.20), this meditation subject is used to develop the four bases of power (iddhipāda) by which one is able to achieve liberation from suffering.[12]
While the Pali Canon invariably includes this form of contemplation in its various lists ofmindfulness meditation techniques,[13] the compendious fifth-centuryVisuddhimagga identifies this type of contemplation (along withanapanasati) as one of the few body-directed meditations particularly suited to the development of samādhi (Vism. VIII, 43).[14]
In a few discourses, these 31 body parts are contextualized within the framework of themahābhūta (the elements) so that the earth element is exemplified by the body parts from head hair to feces, and the water element is exemplified by bile through urine.[16]
A few other discourses preface contemplation of these 31 body parts in the following manner: "Herein ... a monk contemplates this body upward from the soles of the feet, downward from the top of the hair, enclosed in skin, as being full of many impurities."[17]
The 31 identified body parts inpātikūlamanasikāra contemplation are the same as the first 31 body parts identified in the "Dvattimsakara" ("32 Parts [of the Body]") verse (Khp. 3) regularly recited by monks.[18] The thirty-second body part identified in the latter verse is the brain (matthaluṅga).[19] The Visuddhimagga suggests the enumeration of the 31 body parts implicitly includes the brain inaṭṭhimiñjaṃ, which is traditionally translated as "bone marrow".[20]
A canonical formulation of how to meditate on these is:
"Just as if a sack with openings at both ends were full of various kinds of grain – wheat, rice, mung beans, kidney beans, sesame seeds, husked rice – and a man with good eyesight, pouring it out, were to reflect, 'This is wheat. This is rice. These are mung beans. These are kidney beans. These are sesame seeds. This is husked rice'; in the same way, the monk reflects on this very body from the soles of the feet on up, from the crown of the head on down, surrounded by skin and full of various kinds of unclean things [as identified in the above enumeration of bodily organs and fluids]...."[21]
In regards to this and other body-centered meditation objects, theSatipatthana Sutta (DN 22) provides the following additional context and expected results:
In this way [a monk] remains focused internally on the body in & of itself, or externally on the body in & of itself, or both internally & externally on the body in & of itself. Or he remains focused on the phenomenon of origination with regard to the body, on the phenomenon of passing away with regard to the body, or on the phenomenon of origination & passing away with regard to the body. Or his mindfulness that 'There is a body' is maintained to the extent of knowledge & remembrance. And he remains independent, unsustained by (notclinging to) anything in the world...."[22]
According to the post-canonical Paliatthakatha (commentary) on theSatipatthana Sutta, one can develop "seven kinds of skill in study" regarding these meditation objects through:
repetition of the body parts verbally
repetition of the body parts mentally
discerning the body parts individually in terms of each one's color
discerning the body parts individually in terms of each one's shape
discerning if a body part is above or below the navel (or both)
discerning the body part's spatial location
spatially and functionally juxtaposing two body parts[23]
The name for this type of meditation is found in the sectional titles used in theMahasatipatthana Sutta (Dīgha Nikāya 22) and theSatipatthana Sutta (MN 10), where the contemplation of the 32 body parts is entitled,Paṭikkūla-manasikāra-pabbaṃ (which, word-for-word, can be translated as "repulsiveness-reflection-section"). Subsequently, in the post-canonicalVisuddhimagga and other atthakatha works,paṭikkūlamanasikāra is explicitly used when referring to this technique.[24]
This form of meditation is mentioned in the followingsuttas in thePāli Canon (listed in order ofnikāya and then sutta number within nikaya):[25][26]
Elsewhere inPali literature, this type of meditation is discussed extensively in the post-canonicalVisuddhimagga (Vism. VIII, 44-145).[35]
In several of these sources, this meditation is identified as one of a variety of meditations on the body along with, for instance, the mindfulness of breathing (seeAnapanasati Sutta).[36]
^The Sinhalese SLTPTipitaka and Rhys Davids & Stede (1921-5), p. 393, spell this termpaṭikkūlamanasikāra (with two k's) while the Burmese CSCD tipitaka and VRI (1996), p. 10, spell itpaṭikūlamanasikāra (with one k).
^Nānamoli (1998), p. 110,n. 16, which references the Anapanasati Sutta and the Visuddhimagga, Ch. VI, VIII. "The foul" is Nānamoli's translation forasubha. Anālayo (2017), p. 46, translatesasubha as "unattractive": "... besides speaking of the body as impure [Pali:asuci], the early Buddhist discourses at times use an alternative qualification of the body as 'unattractive',asubha, when introducing the standard description of its anatomical parts." Anālayo's associated footnote cites, for example,AN 10.60. Anālayo further contextualizes this by underscoring that Early Buddhist texts refer to the body in negative, neutral and positive ways (e.g., as a means for embodying virtue, as the vehicle for contemplative joy).
^See, for instance,Udāyi Sutta (AN 6.39) (SLTP, n.d.) where contemplation of the 31 body parts is said to "remove sensual passion" (kāmarāgassa pahānāya). In addition, in Thanissaro (1994), "Translator's Introduction", Thanissaro states: "[Khuddakapatha] Passage 3 [which enumerates 32 body parts] gives preliminary guidance [to monastic novices] in the contemplation of the body, a meditation exercise designed to overcome lust."
^Buddhaghosa (1999), p. 235. That this form of meditation is particularly useful for what is known as "access concentration" is perhaps indirectly reflected in the comments of contemporaryvipassana masterS.N. Goenka who suggests that, unlike true vipassana, this type of contemplation deals with "imagination or intellectualisation". Goenka thus reserves its use for "some cases, when the mind is very dull or agitated" and thus the mind is unable to follow the breath or more refined sensations. He concludes: "Of course, when the actual practice of Vipassana starts, there should be no aversion towards this ugly body. It is just observed as it is –yathābhūta. It is observed as body, with sensations arising and passing. The meditator is now onthe path." (Goenka, n.d.).
^English is from the Thanissaro (2000) translation ofMahasatipatthana Sutta (DN 22). Note that, in Thanissaro (1994), some words are translated differently, e.g., "muscle" instead of "flesh", and "lymph" instead of "pus". Also, Thanissaro (1994) translatesvakkaṃ as "spleen" andpihakaṃ as "kidney"; thus, compared to Thanissaro (2000), effectively inverting these anatomical objects in the English translations. Note also correction to entrails and mesentery instead of small/large intestine, based on their descriptions in the Visuddhimagga. The Pali is from La Trobe University (n.d.)'s SLTP version of DN 22, BJT page 446, athttp://www.chaf.lib.latrobe.edu.au/dcd/tipitika.php?title=&record=2612. These 31 body parts are grouped onto six lines consistent with their traditional representation in Pali as shown in MettaNet-Lanka (n.d.) Sinhala SLTP text athttp://www.metta.lk/tipitaka/2Sutta-Pitaka/5Khuddaka-Nikaya/01Khuddakapatha/01-Khuddakapatha-p1.html#Three and VRI (n.d.) Burmese CSCD text athttp://www.tipitaka.org/romn/cscd/s0501m.mul2.xml.
^SeeMN 28, MN 62 and MN 140. See below for more information regarding these discourses.
^Piyadassi (1999a) translation ofAN 10.60. This preface can also be found, e.g., inSN 51.20 (Thanissaro, 1997b).
^Piyadassi (1999b). This is consistent with on-line Sinhala SLTP texts. The on-line Burmese CSCD includes the brain after "feces" (karīsaṃ).
^According to Hamilton (2001), pp. 23-4, in theSutta Pitaka, the brain is added to the traditional list of 31 body parts only in theKhuddaka Nikaya and there only twice: in the aforementionedKhp. 3 and inPaṭis I.6. Hamilton also identifies a similar, abbreviated, differently ordered list that includes the brain inSn 199 (see, e.g.,Thanissaro, 1996); Hamilton attributes the differences between the traditional list of 31 or 32 body parts and theSutta Nipata text to the latter being in verse.
^Buddhaghosa (1999), Vism. VIII, 44. Given Buddhaghosa's inclusion of the brain inaṭṭhimiñjaṃ could lead one to infer that this Pali term might refer to something other than bone marrow in some contexts (e.g., the nervous system).
^Thanissaro (2000). (Parenthetical expression is in the original translation.)
^Soma (2003), pp. 101-2. The commentary mentioned here is the Papañcasudani, attributed toBuddhaghosa and thus presumably written in the 5th century CE. This is similar to what is found inVism. VIII, 48-60 (Buddhaghosa, 1999, pp. 237-9).
^abcdThree of these discourses – MN 28, MN 62 and MN 140 – mention the 31 bodily organs in the context of either four or five great elements (mahābhūta), which, strictly speaking, in the(Mahā)Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta is the basis for a separate meditation frompaṭikkūla-manasikāra contemplation. For example, based on commentarial statements,paṭikkūla-manasikāra contemplation could entail spatial awareness of each of the bodily organs or fluids, and is traditionally used as an antidote to lust; on the other hand, contemplation on the elements emphasizes the tactile experiences of solidity, liquidity, heat and air, and serves as a basis for developing equanimity and insight into not-self (anatta) (e.g., see MN 28).
^Nyanasatta (1994). This discourse is virtually the same as the Mahasatipatthana Sutta (Thanissaro, 2000) except that the latter's extended exposition on theFour Noble Truths is absent from the Satipatthana Sutta.
Hamilton, Sue (2001).Identity and Experience: The Constitution of the Human Being according to Early Buddhism. Oxford: Luzac Oriental.ISBN1-898942-23-4.
Nanamoli, Bhikkhu (trans.) (1998).Mindfulness of Breathing (Anapanasati): Buddhist Texts from the Pali Canon and Extracts from the Pali Commentaries. Kandy, Sri Lanka: Buddhist Publication Society.ISBN955-24-0167-4.
Vipassana Research Institute (VRI) (1996).Mahasatipatthana Sutta: The Great Discourse on the Establishing of Awareness. Seattle, WA: Vipassana Research Publications of America.ISBN0-9649484-0-0.
Walshe, Maurice (trans.) (1995).The Long Discourses of the Buddha: A Translation of the Digha Nikaya. Boston: Wisdom Pubs.ISBN0-86171-103-3.
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