THE BODY IS VERY IMPORTANT TO CONSIDER. Most of our desires are bound up with it. Looking around us, we can see a world that is in the grips of sexual craving and frantic in its adoration of the human form. As meditators, we must face up to the challenges posed by our own sexuality, which stems from a deep-seated craving for sensual gratification. During meditation, this defilement is the most significant obstacle to our progress. The deeper we dig into body contemplation, the more evident this becomes. No other form of kilesa drags more on the mind, nor exerts greater power over the mind than the defilement of sexual craving. Since this craving is rooted in the human body, exposing its true nature will gradually loosen the mind’s tenacious grasp on the body.
对治淫欲最好的方法是身念住，修行身念住成功与否是以心对淫欲的减轻来衡量。一步一步地，智慧把身体的真相揭开，在过程中切断并摧毁根深蒂固的执着，使心境逐渐更加自由和开放。要真正彻底明白它们的意义，禅修者必须自己体验这些成果，我尝试描述的话将会带来副作用——它们会造成无益的期待。这些成果完全在禅修者心中产生，并且依据个人的个性和气质而有所不同。只须全心把注意力放在修行的因，让修行的果自己成熟。它们成熟时，你会确切清楚地明白，这是自然的道理。
Body contemplation is the best antidote for sexual attraction. Successful body practice is measured by a reduction in the mind’s sexual desires. Step by step, wisdom unmasks the reality of the body, cutting off and destroying deep-rooted attachments in the process. This results in an increasingly free and open mental state. To fully understand their significance, meditators must experience these results for themselves. It would be counter-productive for me to try to describe them—that would only lead to fruitless speculation. These results arise exclusively within a meditator’s mind, and are unique to that person’s character and temperament. Simply focus all your attention on the practical causes and let the results of that effort arise as they will. When they do, you will know them with undeniable clarity. This is a natural principle.
When body contemplation reaches the stage where reason and result become fully integrated with wisdom, one becomes completely absorbed in these investigations both day and night. It’s truly extraordinary. Wisdom moves through the body with such speed and agility, and displays such ingenuity in its contemplative techniques, that it seems to spin relentlessly in and out and around every part, every aspect of the body, delving into each nook and cranny to discover the truth. At this stage of the practice, wisdom begins to surface automatically, becoming truly habitual in manifesting itself. Because it’s so quick and incisive, it can catch up with even the most subtle kilesas, and disable even the most indomitable ones. Wisdom at this level is extremely daring and adventurous. It is like a mountain torrent crashing through a narrow canyon: nothing can deter its course. Wisdom bursts forth to meet every challenge to crave and to cling that is presented by the kilesas. Because its adversary is so tenacious, wisdom’s battle with sexual craving resembles a full-scale war. For this reason, only a bold and uncompromising strategy will succeed. There is only one appropriate course of action—an all out struggle; and the meditator will know this instinctively.
当身念住的禅修进入理性和成绩两者与智慧完美结合的阶段，禅者会日夜不停完全沉渗在观察身体，这点实在特殊。智慧以那种速度和灵巧在身体移动，展现出那么富有创造力的分别思维技巧，它似乎无休止地在身体内外每一部位、每一层面转动，潜入每一隐蔽处和缝隙发掘真相。在这个阶段的修行，智慧的运作开始成为惯性，自动显现。由于它是那么的迅速和锐利，以至可以追上最微细的烦恼，熄灭即使是最顽强的烦恼。这个阶段的智慧极端的大胆并勇于尝试，就像暴发的山洪冲入峡谷般，冲向烦恼所显现的执着和贪染，没有任何东西可以改变其前进。由于对手是那么难缠，智慧与淫欲的搏斗形成一场全面的战争。这样的局面，只有勇猛和不妥协的策略才能获胜，结果只有一个适合的行动——拼尽全力的斗争，禅修者本能地知道这一点。
When wisdom begins to master the body, it will constantly modify its investigative techniques so that it will not fall prey to the tricks of the kilesas. Wisdom will try to keep one step ahead of the kilesas, constantly looking for new openings and constantly adjusting its tactics: sometimes shifting emphasis, sometimes pursuing subtle variations in technique.
As greater and greater proficiency is achieved, there comes a time when all attachment to one’s own body and to that of others appears to have vanished. In truth, a lingering attachment still remains; it has only gone into hiding. It has not been totally eliminated. Take careful note of this. It may feel as though it is eliminated, but actually it is concealed from view by the power of the asubha practice. So don’t be complacent. Keep upgrading your arsenal—mindfulness, wisdom and diligence—to meet the challenge. Mentally place the whole mass of body parts in front of you and focus on it intently. This is your body. What will happen to it? By now wisdom is so swift and decisive that in no time at all it will break up and disintegrate before your eyes. Each time you spread the body out before you—whether it is your body or someone else’s—wisdom will immediately begin to break it apart and destroy it. By now this action has become habitual.
智慧掌控身体之后，它会不断改变观察的技巧，以便不被烦恼的伎俩逮着。智慧会尝试比烦恼抢先一步，不断找寻新缺口并不断调整它的手段：有时改变侧重点，有时是技巧的微细变化。
当功夫越来越熟练时，会来到所有对自己与其他人身体的执着看来消失了的一点。实际上，一个依依不舍的执着还遗留着，它只是躲起来罢了，没有被彻底消除掉。好好注意这点，它让人觉得已消除了，其实是被不净观的力量所覆盖而不被观察到。所以不要自满，加强你的武装——念住、智慧和精进——来面对挑战。用心力把整个身体摆在你前面，仔细地专注于它：这是你的身体，它会发生什么呢？智慧现在是那么的迅速和果断，它会在你眼前立刻把那具身体分解粉碎，每一次你把身体展现在前面——不管是你自己还是别人的身体——智慧会立刻分解摧毁它。此时，这个行动已变成一种惯性。
In the end, when wisdom has achieved maximum proficiency at penetrating to the core of the body’s repulsive nature, you must place the entire disgusting mess of flesh and blood and bones in front of you and ask yourself: From where does this feeling of revulsion emanate? What is the real source of this repulsiveness? Concentrate on the disgusting sight before you and see what happens. You are now closing in on the truth of the matter. At this crucial stage in asubha contemplation, you must not allow wisdom to break the body apart and destroy it.
Fix the repulsive image clearly in your mind and watch closely to detect any movement in the repulsive feeling. You have evoked a feeling of revulsion for it: Where does that feeling originate? From where does it come? Who or what assumes that flesh, blood and bones are disgusting? They are as they are, existing in their own natural state. Who is it that conjures up feelings of revulsion at their sight? Fix your attention on it. Where will the repulsiveness go? Wherever it moves, be prepared to follow its direction.
最终，当智慧洞察身体不净本质的核心达到最大的纯熟度时，你必须把整团令人厌恶的肉、血和骨头摆在前面然后自问：这令人厌恶的感觉从哪里流露出来？这厌恶感的真正根源是什么？专注于眼前令人厌恶的情景看会发生什么。你现在正逼近整件事的真相了。在不净观这关键的阶段，你千万别让智慧把身体分解毁灭，把厌恶的影像固定在心中，仔细观察去追踪厌恶感的任何动静。你对它挑起厌恶的感觉：这感觉的根源在哪里？它从哪里来？谁或什么假设这肉、血和骨头令人厌恶？它们只是它们的样子，以它们自然的样子存在，是谁看到它们时呈现厌恶感于脑际？把你的注意力固定在这点。这厌恶会到哪里去？不管它移向哪里，准备好追随它的方向。
The decisive phase of body contemplation has been reached. This is the point where the root-cause of sexual craving is uprooted once and for all. As you focus exclusively on the repulsiveness evoked by the asubha contemplation, your revulsion of the image before you will slowly, gradually contract inward until it is fully absorbed by the mind. On its own, without any prompting, it will recede into the mind, returning to its source of origin. This is the decisive moment in the practice of body contemplation, the moment when a final verdict is reached about the relationship between the kilesa of sexual craving and its primary object, the physical body. When the mind’s knowing presence fully absorbs the repulsiveness, internalizing the feeling of revulsion, a profound realization suddenly occurs: The mind itself produces feelings of revulsion, the mind itself produces feelings of attraction; the mind alone creates ugliness and the mind alone creates beauty.
These qualities do not really exist in the external physical world. The mind merely projects these attributes onto the objects it perceives and then deceives itself into believing that they are beautiful or ugly, attractive or repulsive. In truth, the mind paints elaborate pictures all the time—pictures of oneself and pictures of the external world. It then falls for its own mental imagery, believing it to be real.
这时来到身念住的关键阶段，这是把淫欲的根源一劳永逸地消除的时刻。全面专注在不净观引起的厌恶感时，你对面前影像的厌恶会慢慢地、逐渐地往内收缩，直到完全渗入心中。没有任何引导，它自己会慢慢收缩入心中，回到它原本的根源。这是修身念住的关键性时刻，这是来到对淫欲烦恼与它的主要对象——身体——之间的关系最终裁决的时刻。当心的能知完全渗透入厌恶，把这厌恶感内化，一个深刻的觉悟会突然发生：心自己制造厌恶，心自己制造喜爱，心独自制造丑陋，并且心独自制造漂亮。这些性质并不真正存在于外在的物质世界，心只是投射这些属性于它所认知的对象，然后自己欺骗自己相信它们漂亮或丑陋，喜爱或厌恶。实际上，心无时无刻不在描绘图画——自己和外在世界的图像，然后自己陷落自己的幻想中，相信它们是真的。
At this point the meditator understands the truth with absolute certainty: The mind itself generates repulsion and attraction. The previous focus of the investigation—the pile of flesh and blood and bones—has no inherent repulsiveness whatsoever. Intrinsically, the human body is neither disgusting nor pleasing. Instead, it is the mind that conjures up these feelings and then projects them on the images that are in front of us. Once wisdom penetrates this deception with absolute clarity, the mind immediately relinquishes all external perceptions of beauty and ugliness, and turns inward to concentrate on the source of such notions. The mind itself is the perpetrator and the victim of these deceptions; the deceiver and the deceived.
Only the mind, and nothing else, paints pictures of beauty and ugliness. So the asubha images that the meditator has been focusing on as separate and external objects, are absorbed into the mind where they merge with the revulsion created by the mind. Both are, in fact, one and the same thing. When this realization occurs, the mind lets go of external images, lets go of external forms, and in doing so lets go of sexual attraction.
在这点禅修者彻底清楚地明白真相，心本身制造厌恶和喜爱，之前观察的焦点——那堆肉、血和骨头——内在没有厌恶或什么。从本质上而言，人的身体并不令人厌恶或喜爱，是心制造出这些感觉，然后把这些感觉投射到我们前面的影像上。一旦智慧绝对清晰地看穿这欺骗的把戏，心立刻放弃所有漂亮或丑恶的外在看法，向内转去专注这观念的根源。心自己是这欺骗的犯罪者也是被害者，是欺骗者也是被骗者。除了心，没有其他的东西会描绘漂亮和丑恶的图像。所以被禅修者作为分开和外在的专注对象的不净影像渗透入心中，与由心制造的厌恶融合。其实，这两者都是同一个东西。觉悟发生时，心放下外在的影像、外在的相，这样做的同时它也放下了淫欲。
Sexual attraction is rooted in perceptions of the human body. When the real basis of these perceptions is exposed, it completely undermines their validity; and the external, as we know it, collapses and our attachment to it ceases of its own accord. The defiling influence of sexual attraction—which has ridden roughshod over the mind since time immemorial, luring the mind to grasp at birth and so experience death continuously for eons—this insidious craving is now powerless. The mind has now passed beyond its influence: It is now free.
淫欲根植于对人体的看法，当这些看法的真正根本被暴露出来，对它的认同就完全破坏掉。就如我们所知道的外在崩溃了，我们对它的执着也自行消失。淫欲的杂染影响——从无始以来就粗暴地对待心、多少劫以来诱惑心紧抓着生，使心因此而经历死——这个潜伏着的执着现在已失去力量。心现在已超越它的影响，已自由了。
