Venerable Sir, what is the difference between Right View and supermundane Right View (lokuttara sammā-diṭṭhi)?

What the Bhikkhu mentioned above was about the mundane Right View―the worldly Right View.1 No matter how much you incorporate worldly Right View in your life, what you receive as a result is nothing but rebirth in a fortunate destination; that is, in a heavenly or human plane.2 During the dispensations of past buddhas that you have passed, you have failed to take your thinking beyond worldly Right-view. Simply as a result, revered-you have contented yourself with merely getting rebirth in a fortunate destination by making use of Right View. Where worldly Right View is wisely contemplated with penetrative insight (vipassanā): that is where supermundane Right View (lokuttara sammā-diṭṭhi) arises.

Now you think, no matter how much you live with faith and confidence in the triple-gem, what do you get as a result? Just rebirth in a fortunate destination. At the moment of death, as your last mind, your death-consciousness, what if you remembered the Buddha, or a supreme quality of the Buddha? What would happen then? You would get a life in a fortunate plane as a celestial being or human being. Are these heavenly or human pleasures and creature comforts permanent or impermanent? Impermanent.

Reflecting wisely on the impermanence of these very saṅkhāras if you are skilful to behold as impermanent the said image, the said supreme quality of the Buddha that springs to mind as the last consciousness on your death bed, there you have reached the supermundane Right View. This penetrative supermundane Right View is what hurls you into the fruit of stream-entry; it is what thrusts you to see the impermanence of the five clinging aggregates, the pañca-upādānakkhandha―form, feeling, perception, volition, and consciousness.3

However much you give alms―dāna―and practise moral precepts―sīla―with belief in karma and karma-results, what do you get as a result? Rebirth in a fortunate destination. Is that rebirth in a fortunate plane permanent or impermanent? Impermanent.

When you keep yourself from attaching to saṅkhāras by thus reflecting wisely on their impermanence, it is there that supermundane Right View lies. Due to giving alms or practising moral precepts, suppose you envision a celestial plane, a deva, a dazzling light or a beautiful flower grove as your death-consciousness at the moment of death, and perceive those forms (rūpas) as impermanent, or perceive the mind arisen due to those forms as impermanent. The constituent factors of penetrative insight arising at that point will be a feature of supermundane Right View.

If you become attached to saṅkhāras, you’ll be reborn in a fortunate destination, which is a result of worldly Right-view. But if you see the impermanence of saṅkhāras, supermundane Right View will form. It will steer you to extinction (nirodha) of ‘becoming’ by letting penetrative insight-wisdom (vipassanā paññā) arise in you.

Imagine you carried your mother and father on your back and attended to them and cared for them all your life. What would you get out of attending to parents? Rebirth in a fortunate destination. Is that rebirth in a fortunate plane permanent or impermanent? Impermanent.

Think leisurely; how much you must have attended to your mother and father in saŋsāra. But you only received rebirth in a fortunate plane which is bound to be impermanent. Once that merit peters out, you will tumble down to the fourfold-hell again. So, while attending to parents, seeing the impermanence of those wholesome-saṅkhāras, suppose you keep yourself from becoming attached to those saṅkhāras; suppose you develop disenchantment (nibbidā) about those saṅkhāras: there, when you see the impermanence of the five clinging aggregates, the supermundane Right View becomes meaningful in you.

Revered-you, having formed saddhā in the triple-gem, giving alms, practising moral precepts, attending to parents, holding the belief there is dependently originated rebirth, seeing there are beings born spontaneously, holding the belief there have been noble beings who attained the fruits of the path in the past, seeing with wisdom that all such saṅkhāras are changing, are impermanent, the view of penetrative insight you form without attaching to or clinging to such saṅkhāras is the characteristic of supermundane Right View. When you turn Right View into a supermundane Right View, the remaining seven constituent steps of the whole Noble Eightfold Path develop in you as the supermundane Noble Eightfold Path, which cultivates penetrative insight-wisdom.

First revered-you strengthen yourself in the worldly Noble Eightfold Path. [Then] those saṅkhāras will elevate you onto the fortunate destinations of rebirth. Reminiscing constantly about the fortunate plane and the wholesome action, having made them the springboard, and perceiving that they are but impermanent, are only a saṅkhāra, cultivate penetrative insight-wisdom. That would be the essence of both supermundane Right View and supermundane Noble Eightfold Path.

1 There are 2 kinds of each of the 8 steps of the Noble Eightfold Path, as mundane (lokiya) and supermundane (lokuttara). The latter is associated with developed states of consciousness with wisdom that leads to attaining of the supermundane fruits of the paths. Buddha explains: “I tell you, o monks, there are 2 kinds of right view: the understanding that it is good to give alms and offerings, that both good and evil actions will bear fruit and will be followed by results, that there is rebirth in next life... ... This, o monks, is a view which, though still subject to the cankers, is meritorious, yields worldly fruits, and brings good results. But whatever there is of wisdom, of penetration, of right view conjoined with the path, this is called the supermundane right view (lokuttara-sammā-diṭṭhi), which is not of the world (mundane), but which is supermundane and conjoined with the path”. (Ref. Mahā Cattārisaka Sutta – Majjimā Nikāya 117)

2 The above reference that “mundane Right View brings a rebirth in a fortunate destination” should not be taken to mean that every being born in a human or heavenly world is of Right View. It simply alludes to the fact that mundane Right View and its resulting karma yields only worldly fruits. Under the phenomenon of dependent-origination, the cause for ‘rebirth’ is ‘becoming,’ the cause for ‘becoming’ is ‘clinging’ and so on…

3 Pañca-upādānakkhandha means the five aggregates that are the objects of clinging. These five aggregates ostensibly appear to the ignorant man as his soul or ego or self and thus he clings to them. But for the sake of readability, they are rendered here ‘the five clinging aggregates’ for short. (It mustn’t be misunderstood that the aggregates themselves ‘cling’ to anything).