[(c) The Four Modes of Progress (catasso pațipadā).]1 [176] Which are the states that are good? When, that he may attain to the heavens of Form, he cultivates the way [thereto], aloof from sensuous desires, aloof from evil ideas, and so, by earth-gazing, enters into and abides in the First Jhāna. progress being painful and intuition sluggish-then the contact 2 . . . the balance that arises these . are states that are good. [177] 3 [or] when . . . he . . . so enters into and 1 A. ii, 149 f.; v, 63. It has been seen that, before the several stages of Jhāna could be attained to, the student had to purge and discipline himself in specific ways-elimination of all attention to mundane matters, elimination of reflection on these, and so on. The special stage of Jhāna supervened after each act of self-control and intensified abstraction. In these processes there was an earlier and a subsequent stage called--at least in the later books-up a cara and a p pa na respectively. The effective cognition linking these two was an exercise of p a ñ ñ ă which, in the text, is known as abhiññā (“intuition "), probably the intuitive or subconscious fetch of the mind to compass the desired a p p a na, or conception. Now, whether the preparatory abstraction was easy or difficult, and whether the constructive generalizing effort was sluggish or vigorous, depended on the moral temperament and the mental ability respectively of the individual student (Asl. 182-4). See the double explanation in A. ii, 149-52, where the swiftness or sluggishness of intuition in both accounts depends on the acuteness or flabbiness of the five faculties of faith, energy, mindfulness, concentration, insight. The ease or difficulty in selfabstraction depends, in the first explanation, on whether the student is by nature passionate, malignant, dull, or the reverse of these three. In the second account progress is painful if he have filled his consciousness with the disciplinary concepts of the Foul Things (vide below, § 263), Disgust with the World, Impermanence and Death; easy if he simply work out the Four Jhanas. On the varying import of a b hiññā, lit. super-knowledge (which occurs in no other connexion in the present work), see Dialogues of the Buddha, iii, 257. On upacara and a p panā, see Yogavacara's Manual, p. xi; Visuddhi Magga, 137 f.; Comp. 55, 129. 2 Cf. § 1. 3 The same question is to be understood as repeated in each section. abides in the First Jhana intuition quick . . . ... progress being painful, but [178]... [or] when . . . he . . SO enters into and abides in the First Jhāna intuition sluggish [179] . . . [or] when abides in the First Jhana intuition quick-then the ... progress being easy and contact, etc. . . the balance that arises these . . . are states that are good. [180] These four combinations are repeated in the case of the 2nd to the 4th Jhanas on the Fourfold System, and of the 2nd to the 5th on the Fivefold System. [Here end] the Four Modes of Progress. [(d) The Four Objects of Thought (cattari ārammaņā ni).]1 [181] Which are the states that are good? When, that he may attain to the heavens of Form, he cultivates the way [thereto], and so, aloof from sensuous desires, aloof from evil ideas, by earth-gazing, enters into and abides in the First Jhana (the first rapt meditation), wherein is application and sustaining of thought, which is born of solitude, and is full of zest and ease, but which is limited, and has a limited object of thought then the [182]. . . [or] when . . . the First Jhana 3 is limited, but has an object of thought capable of infinite extension . 1 That is to say, the percepts or concepts on which the student, in seeking to induce Jhāna, fixes his attention are here classified as having the potentiality to induce a weak or a lofty mood of rapt contemplation. Buddhaghosa describes the former kind of object as having the shallowness of a little sieve, or pot-cover (Asl. 184). See also below, §§ 1019–24. 2 Cf. § 1. 3 In the following condensed passages the question and answer in the text respectively coincides with, and commences like, the precedent given in § 181. [183] . . . [or] when . of infinite extension, but has a limited object of thought [184] . . . [or] when the First Jhana . . . is capable of infinite extension, and has an object of thought capable of infinite extension-then the contact, etc. .. the balance that arises, these are states that are good. ... [185] These four combinations are repeated in the case of the 2nd to the 4th Jhānas on the Fourfold System, and of the 1st to the 5th 1 Jhānas on the Fivefold System. = [Here end] the Four Objects of Thought. [(e) (c and d) The Sixteenfold Combination (s oļa sakkhattuka m).] [186] Which are the states that are good? When, that he may attain to the heavens of Form, he cultivates the way [thereto], aloof from sensuous desires, aloof from evil ideas, and so, by earth-gazing, enters into and abides in the first Jhāna . . 1 In the text, § 185, after p a thamam jha na m read... ре. pañcamam jhānam. So K. Cf. § 180. Again, after a vikk hepo hoti supply . . . pe... ... ... [202] [These sixteen combinations are repeated in the case of the 2nd to the 4th Jhānas on the Fourfold System, and of the 1st to the 5th Jhanas on the Fivefold System.] [Here ends] the Sixteenfold Combination. [2. The Remaining Seven Artifices which may also be developed in sixteenfold combination (att ha kasiņam soļa sakkhattukam).] 2 1 In the text supply parittam before parit tāram manam. 2 The first artifice for the induction of Jhāna having been that of earth-gazing (see above, passim). In the Sutta Piṭaka— viz. in the Mahā Sakuludāyi-Sutta (M. ii, p. 14), and in the Jhāna Vagga (A. i, 41)-ten kasiņas are enumerated, those omitted in the Dhammasangani being the kasiņas of consciousness (v i ñ ñā ņ a) and space (ā kā s a). The fact of the omission and the nature of the two omitted kasiņas are commented on by Buddhaghosa (Asl. 186). He explains the omission of the former by its being identical with the second of the four Aruppa jhānā ni given in §§ 265-8, and that of the latter through its ambiguity. For either it amounts to the "yellow" kasiņa (sun-lit space), or it amounts to the first Aruppajhana [203] Which are the states that are good? When, that he may attain to the heavens of Form, he cultivates the way [thereto], aloof from sensuous desires, aloof from evil ideas, and so, by the artifice of contact, etc., that arises these . . . are states that are good. [Here ends] the Sixteenfold Combination in the case of the seven remaining artifices for induction. 1 [II. The Stations of Mastery 1 (a b hibhāyatan ā n i). 1. Forms as Limited " (r ū pa ni parittan i). [204] Which are the states that are good? (§ 265). The Ceylon tradition has ten kasiņas also, but admits aloka (light) instead of viññāņa. And it includes yet another quasi-kasiņa in the shape of a bhūta-kasiņa, or the four elements taken collectively, after each has been separately dwelt upon. See Yogavacara's Manual, 1896, pp. 48–52. 1 Eight "stations" or "positions of mastery" are given in the Maha-parinibbana-Sutta (pp. 28, 29; see SBE. xi, 49, 50; Dialogues, ii, 118; and in A. iv, 305), but the formulæ of the first four differ slightly from those in our text. The Cy. draws attention to this discrepancy (Asl. 189). In the Suttanta the aesthetic aspect of the objects perceived is taken into account in all four stations, the specific difference replacing it in two of them being the conscious dwelling on some part of one's own bodily frame or rūpas kandha. In the Dhammasangani this consciousness is excluded from all the stations. To teach by way of its inclusion and exclusion is called "merely a jeu d'esprit in the Master's discourse (desana-vilāsa-mattam eva). See following note. |