Is a Buddha able to withstand physical pain?
Has he not mastered the art of letting go?
What's the origin of physical pain?
Is thought the origin of physical pain?
What do you mean by withstand?
That's, I think, an important question here.
You mean not experience physical pain?
No, withstand doesn't mean that.
So I'm going to go by what...
You're literally asking, and so of course, yes, the Buddha is able to master, to withstand physical pain, because yes, he has mastered the art of letting go.
But it kind of sounds like you might be asking whether he doesn't have physical pain, and that's not true.
There are, I think, five things that the Buddha is unable to prevent.
Death is one.
the activities of the body, urinating and defecating and so on.
And physical pain, I'm not sure if it's in the list, but physical pain is certainly something that's part of the physical processes.
The Buddha cannot stop the physical processes.
Now, to some extent, the Buddha can suppress physical ailments.
Like there's the case where when the Buddha was getting close to passing away, he got very sick
but he suppressed the sickness because he knew that he still had some work to do, not because he didn't want to feel the pain, but because the sickness would get in the way of him finishing his task.
And so he suppressed it in order to finish his teaching.
There's another case where he didn't do that, when Devadatta dropped a rock on him, and he laid down and was mindful, and Dr. Jivaka came to him
and put some medicine on his foot and then left him.
The Buddha was in great pain.
I think the Buddha was in great pain and Jyotika was amazed that the Buddha was able to withstand the pain.
So it's a neat thing to read if you can go and find that.
But then he forgot.
And then he had to leave.
He said, I'll be back in an hour or something to take the medicine off the leg.
And he went into the city to perform some duties.
And he was a little bit late.
And so on his way out, as he was getting to the city gate, they closed the city gate before he got to it.
And so he wasn't able to leave the city.
And the Buddha was lying there with this medicine and Jivaka was really worried because if the medicine didn't come off there would be problems, it was too strong or something like that.
It had to be taken off.
And so in the morning he rushed to the Buddha but by that time the Buddha had understood the situation and told Ananda to take the medicine off.
He said, Jivaka won't be able to come back tonight.
Take the medicine off.
So Ananda took it off.
So the point being is, according to that passage, we understand that the Buddha didn't suppress the pain or wasn't interested at all in getting rid of the pain, but allowed Tevukka to put this medicine on it to heal it or do whatever.
And then the last part is, taught the origin of physical pain.
Not directly, but indirectly.
Because without thought you can't be born.
Thought maybe is not exactly the right word, but without intention you can't be born and therefore cannot have pain.
But pain is caused by physical, directly caused by the physical.
Of course it only gives
It only gives a feeling of pain.
It only gives a feeling of pain in the mind.
Veda Naya is a mental Jeta Sita.
So without the mind, you don't feel pain.
If there's only the body, there's no pain in the body.
Sorry, there's no feeling of pain.
There might be physical pain, but without the mind present, there would be no feeling of it.