Inattention

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Inattention (Skt. asaṃprajanya; Tib. ཤེས་བཞིན་མིན་པ་, Wyl. shes bzhin min pa) — one of the fifty-one mental states defined in Abhidharma literature. According to the Compendium of Abhidharma, it belongs to the subgroup of the twenty subsidiary destructive emotions.

Definitions

In the Khenjuk, Mipham Rinpoche says:

  • Tib. ཤེས་བཞིན་མིན་པ་ནི་ཉོན་མོངས་དང་མཚུངས་པར་ལྡན་པ་གཡེང་བའི་ཤེས་རབ་སྟེ།སྒོ་གསུམ་གྱི་སྤྱོད་པ་ལ་ཤེས་བཞིན་དུ་མི་འཇུག་པར་བབ་བབ་ཏུ་འཇུག་པ་སྟེ་ལྟུང་བ་འབྱུང་བའི་རྟེན་བྱེད་པའོ།
  • Inattention is intelligence which is distracted and concurrent with destructive emotions. It results in hasty and mindless engagement in the actions of one’s body, speech and mind, without attention or vigilance, and so forms the support for downfalls to occur. (Rigpa Translations)
  • Non-alertness [inattention] is the distracted discrimination accompanying a disturbing emotion. It results in hasty and mindless engagement in the actions of the three doors without alertness, and so forms the support for downfalls to occur. (Erik Pema Kunsang)

Alternative Translations

  • unalertness (Tony Duff)