..續本文上一頁speech. As long as any imperfection in body or speech remains, morality in the true sense is lacking. When it has been perfected, that is, when tranquillity of bodily activities and speech has been achieved, the result is bound to be mental tranquillity, conducive in its turn to the further stages of purification: freedom from misunderstanding, freedom from doubt, knowledge as to what is the Path to be followed and what is not, knowledge and vision of the progress along the Path and finally full intuitive insight. These last five stages constitute vipassana proper. Purification of conduct and mind are merely the entrance into the path of vipassana.
THE SEVEN PURIFICATIONS, THE FIVE STAGES IN VIPASSANA, AND THE NINE STEPS IN THE PERFECTION OF KNOWLEDGE I Moral purity II Mental purity III(1) Freedom from false views IV (2) Freedom from doubt V (3) Knowledge and vision of what is the true Path VI (4) Knowledge and vision of the progress along the Path (a) Knowledge of arising and passing away (b) Knowledge of passing away (c) Awareness of fearsomeness (d) Awareness of danger (e) Disenchantment (f) Desire for freedom (g) Struggle to escape (h) Imperturbability (i) Readiness to perceive the Four Noble Truths VII (5) Full Intuitive Insight
The Purification consisting of freedom from misunderstanding implies the elimination of all false views, both inborn and acquired. It covers the whole range from irrational belief in magic to false ideas as to the true nature of things-for instance, regarding this body and mind as something enduring, something worthwhile, a self; seeing it as animal, human being, celestial being, or god, or as something magical or sacred; failing to perceive that it consists of just the four elements, or of just body plus mind, and regarding it instead as a self, as possessing a soul or spirit, which enters and leaves it; failing to see it as consisting of the five aggregates: body, feeling, perception, active thinking and consciousness; failing to see it as just a mass of perceptions received by way of the eye, ear, nose, tongue, body and mind. False views lead to belief in magic and sacred objects, and so give rise to fear. Rites and rituals are then performed to neutralize the fear, and the end result is firm attachment to rites and rituals-all on account of false views. Such a situation indicates views that are not as yet faultless. To have given up false views is to have attained what was originally called the third Purification, and what later teachers classed the first stage in vipassana.
The Purification consisting of freedom from doubt is brought about by introspection into causes. With freedom from false views, one sees oneself as just body plus mind. Freedom from doubt consists in perceiving the nature of the causes responsible for the coming into existence of the body-mind complex. One sees penetratingly and in fine detail the coming into existence and the interaction of ignorance, desire, grasping and clinging karma, "nutriment," and so on, to form body and mind. Freedom from doubt results simply from this clear knowledge of the causes and effects of all things. In the vipassana system, teachers recognize twenty or thirty kinds of doubt, but summed up they all amount to doubt as to whether or not "one”s self" exists, whether or not "one”s self" existed previously, whether or not "one”s self" will continue to exist in the future and, if so, in what form. The only way doubt can be completely dispelled is to realize that there is no "I," but only elements, aggregates, a nervous system together with such causes as ignorance, craving and attachment, karma, "nutriment," and so on. Because no real "I" is involved at all, one starts giving up the foolish idea: "I am, I have been, I shall be." With the complete…
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