Visuddhimagga (the pah of purification)
by Ñāṇamoli Bhikkhu | 1956 | 388,207 words | ISBN-10: 9552400236 | ISBN-13: 9789552400236
This page describes The Two Kinds of Concentration of the section The Earth Kasiṇa (Pathavī-kasiṇa-niddesa) of Part 2 Concentration (Samādhi) of the English translation of the Visuddhimagga (‘the path of purification’) which represents a detailled Buddhist meditation manual, covering all the essential teachings of Buddha as taught in the Pali Tipitaka. It was compiled Buddhaghosa around the 5th Century.
The Two Kinds of Concentration
32. Now, concentration is of two kinds, that is to say, access concentration and absorption concentration: the mind becomes concentrated in two ways, that is, on the plane of access and on the plane of obtainment. Herein, the mind becomes concentrated on the plane of access by the abandonment of the hindrances, and on the plane of obtainment by the manifestation of the jhāna factors.
33. The difference between the two kinds of concentration is this. The factors are not strong in access. It is because they are not strong that when access has arisen, the mind now makes the sign its object and now re-enters the life-continuum,[1] just as when a young child is lifted up and stood on its feet, it repeatedly falls down on the ground. But the factors are strong in absorption. It is because they are strong that when absorption concentration has arisen, the mind, having once interrupted the flow of the life-continuum, carries on with a stream of profitable impulsion for a whole night and for a whole day, just as a healthy man, after rising from his seat, could stand for a whole day.
Footnotes and references:
[1]:
Bhavaṅga (life-continuum, lit. “constituent of becoming”) and javana (impulsion) are first mentioned in this work at I.57 (see n. 16); this is the second mention. The “cognitive series” (citta-vīthi) so extensively used here is unknown as such in the Piṭakas.
Perhaps the seed from which it sprang may exist in, say, such passages as:
“Due to eye and to visible data eye-consciousness arises. The coincidence of the three is contact. With contact as condition there is feeling. What he feels he perceives. What he perceives he thinks about4. What he thinks about he diversifies [by means of craving, pride and false view] … Due to mind and to mental data …” (M I 111).
And:
“Is the eye permanent or impermanent … Are visible objects permanent or impermanent? … Is the mind permanent or impermanent? Are mental data … Is mind-consciousness … Is mind-contact … Is any feeling, any perception, any formation, any consciousness, that arises with mind-contact as condition permanent or impermanent?” (M III 279).
And:
“These five faculties [of eye, etc.] each with its separate objective field and no one of them experiencing as its objective field the province of any other, have mind as their refuge, and mind experiences their provinces as its objective field” (M I 295).
This treatment of consciousness implies, as it were, more than even a “double thickness” of consciousness. An already-formed nucleus of the cognitive series, based on such Sutta Piṭakas material, appears in the Abhidhamma Piṭakas.
The following two quotations show how the commentary (bracketed italics) expands the Abhidhamma Piṭakas treatment.
(i) “Herein, what is eye-consciousness element? Due to eye and to visible data (as support condition, and to functional mind element (= 5-door adverting), as disappearance condition, and to the remaining three immaterial aggregates as conascence condition) there arises consciousness … which is eye-consciousness element. [Similarly with the other four sense elements.] Herein, what is mind element? Eye-consciousness having arisen and ceased, next to that there arises consciousness … which is appropriate (profitable or unprofitable) mind element (in the mode of receiving). [Similarly with the other four sense elements.] Or else it is the first reaction to any mental datum (to be taken as functional mind element in the mode of mind-door adverting). Herein, what is mind-consciousness element? Eye-consciousness having arisen and ceased, next to that there arises mind element. (Resultant) mind element having arisen and ceased, also (next to that there arises resultant mind-consciousness element in the mode of investigating;and that having arisen and ceased, next to that there arises functional mind-consciousness element in the mode of determining; and that having arisen and ceased) next to that there arises consciousness … which is appropriate mindconsciousness element (in the mode of impulsion). [Similarly with the other four sense elements.] Due to (life-continuum) mind and to mental data there arises consciousness … which is appropriate (impulsion) mind-consciousness element (following on the above-mentioned mind-door adverting)” (Vibh 87–90 and Vibh-a 81f.).
(ii) “Eye-consciousness and its associated states are a condition, as proximity condition, for (resultant) mind element and for its associated states. Mind element and its associated states are a condition, as proximity condition, for (root-causeless resultant) mind-consciousness element (in the mode of investigating) and for its associated states. (Next to that, the mind-consciousness elements severally in the modes of determining, impulsion, registration, and life-continuum should be mentioned, though they are not, since the teaching is abbreviated.) [Similarly for the other four senses and mind-consciousness element]. Preceding profitable (impulsion) states are a condition, as proximity condition, for subsequent indeterminate (registration, life-continuum) states [etc.]” (Paṭṭh II, and Comy., 33–34).
The form that the two kinds (5-door and mind-door) of the cognitive series take is shown in Table V. The following are some Piṭakas references for the individual modes: bhavaṅga (life-continuum): Paṭṭh I 159, 160, 169, 324; āvajjana (adverting) Paṭṭh I 159, 160, 169, 324; sampaṭicchana (receiving), santīraṇa (investigating), voṭṭhapana (determining), and tadārammaṇa (registration) appear only in the Commentaries. Javana (impulsion): Paṭis II 73, 76. The following references may also be noted here: anuloma (conformity), Paṭṭh I 325. Cuti-citta (death consciousness), Paṭṭh I 324. Paṭisandhi (rebirthlinking), Vism-mhṭ 1, 320, etc.; Paṭis II 72, etc.