9.8 Of Sound as purely Mental (KV9.8)

Controverted Point: That sound is nothing more than a diffusion of initial and sustained mental application.

Theravādin: If this be true, you must affirm no less that sounds from mental contact are solely an irradiation of mental contact; that such as are from feeling are solely an irradiation of feeling. So also for such as are from perception, volition, thought in general, mindfulness, understanding. This you will not do.

Must you not also affirm of a sound that is an irradiation of mental application, that it is none the less to be cognized by hearing, impinges on the ear, comes into the auditory avenue? This you deny; you affirm that such a sound is not cognizable by hearing, etc. How then can you speak of it as sound?

The Points of Controversy, an English translation of the Pali Abhidhamma Kathāvatthu. Translated by Shwe Zan Aung and C.A.F. Rhys Davids. First published by Pali Text Society, 1915.

This SuttaCentral edition was prepared by Manfred Wierich and Ven. Vimala and proofread by Josephine Tobin. Some changes were introduced:

Abbreviations, i.e., those of cited works and the participants in the controversies, were expanded.

Cross-references were linked.

Some typographic changes were introduced, among others, i.e.: the phonetic symbol “ŋ” was changed to the Pāli diacritical letter “ṃ”, “ô” to “o”, single quotes to double quotes, and “:—” to “:”.

Letter-spacing with fixed spaces was replaced with bold font.

The corrigenda were merged into the text. Some could not be resolved, though.

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