lobha
Greed, attachment
[ LOH-ba ]
Seeing it in life
Lobha sticks to its object like resin. It ranges from subtle inclination to gross craving and is the root of 8 unwholesome cittas.
In short
Clinging to objects — first unwholesome root.
The analysis
Lobha is the first unwholesome root, the mental factor that reaches toward and sticks to its object — the texts compare it to a smear of oil that clings to whatever it touches. It roots eight of the twelve unwholesome cittas and ranges from a nearly imperceptible inclination toward a pleasant thought to gross, desperate craving. Lobha is not the pleasant feeling itself (that's vedanā) — it's the grasping response that can, but doesn't have to, follow a pleasant feeling.
Where it sits
Lobha is the cetasika-level name for what taṇhā describes at the doctrinal-chain level; the two overlap heavily but sit in different lists. Where vedanā is neutral ground — feeling arises regardless — lobha is one of the two directions a mind can lean from there, toward the object rather than away from it.
The extra scroll past the point where anything new was actually being learned. Not curiosity anymore by then — lobha, quietly recruiting one more moment before the app closes.
Commonly mistaken for
Desire in general. Chanda (wholesome or neutral desire-to-act) is a separate cetasika; wanting to finish a task well is chanda, not lobha.
A character flaw. Lobha arises and passes with specific cittas; a mind that has produced lobha-rooted cittas today can produce alobha-rooted ones an hour later.
Abhidhammattha Saṅgaha II; Mūlapariyāya Sutta (MN 1).
Related terms