The Difference Between Suppressing and Eradicating Afflictions

Suppressing afflictions and eradicating afflictions are two different concepts, representing two different levels of practice, and the difference between them is great, or even immense. Those who cultivate non-Buddhist meditation often attain very high levels of meditative concentration (samādhi); they seem to have eradicated sexual desire, and many of them do not give rise to thoughts even upon seeing sensual objects. However, after death they still transmigrate through birth and death; after taking on a new body, the desire for sexual lust arises again, and then they take rebirth in the womb because of that sexual desire. Without realizing the fruits of the path, the so-called eradication of sexual desire is not true eradication but merely suppression, a temporary non-manifestation. Once meditative concentration fades away, sexual desire immediately reappears.