..續本文上一頁e object, applied thought directing the mind to the object, sustained thought anchoring it there, rapture creating an interest in it, happiness experiencing its affective quality, and one-pointed-ness focusing the mind on the object.

　　In the access attainment the jhana factors are strong enough to keep the hindrances suppressed, but not yet strong enough to place the mind in absorption. They still stand in need of maturation. Maturation comes as a result of continued practice, which gives them the power to lift the mind beyond the threshold plane of access and plunge it into the object with the unshakable force of full absorption. In the state of absorption the mind fixes upon its object with such a high intensity of concentration that subjective discriminations between the two no longer occur. The waves of discursive thinking have at last subsided, and the mind abides without straying even the least from its base of stabilization. Nevertheless, even full concentration admits of degrees. At the plane of absorption concentration is pided into four levels called the four jhanas. These are distinguished by the aggregation of factors present in each attainment, the order of the four being determined by the successive elimination of the comparatively courser factors. In the first jhana all five jhana factors are present; in the second applied and sustained thought are eliminated, in the third rapture is made to fade away; and in the fourth the feeling of happiness is replaced by equanimity, the peaceful feeling-tone which veers neither toward pleasure nor toward pain. One-pointed-ness remains present in all four jhanas, the one constant in the series. To rise from the first jhana to the second, the yogin, after emerging from the first jhana, must reflect upon the coarseness of applied and sustained thought and the first jhanas inadequacy due to the proximity of the hindrances. Then he must consider the second jhana as more peaceful and sublime, arouse the aspiration to attain it, and exert his energy to achieve a stronger degree of mental unification. Similarly, to rise from the second to the third jhana he must repeat the same procedure taking rapture as the coarse factor needing to be eliminated, and to rise from the third to the fourth jhana he must reflect on the coarseness of happiness and the superiority of neutral, equanimous feeling.

　　Beyond the fourth jhana lie four even subtler stages of concentration called the four formless attainments (arupasamapatti). In these attainments the luminous counterpart sign serving as the object of the jhanas is replaced by four successively more refined formless objects, which give their names to their respective attainments -- the base of infinite space, the base of infinite consciousness, the base of nothingness, and the base of neither perception nor non-perception. At the peak of this scale of meditative equipoise consciousness arrives at a point of unification so fine that, like the geometric point, it eludes detection, and its presence can be neither affirmed nor denied.

　　Knowledge and Vision (Ñana dassana)

　　"Concentration is the supporting condition for the knowledge and vision of things as they really are": Despite the loftiness and sublimity of these exalted attainments, immersion in deep concentration is not the end of the Buddhist path. The unification of consciousness effected by serenity meditation is only a means to a further stage of practice. This stage, ushered in by the next link in the series, "the knowledge and vision of things as they really are" (yathabhuta-ñanadassana), is the development of insight (vipassana bhávaná).

　　Through his deep concentration the yogin is able to suppress the defilements, to bring them to a state of quiescence where they no long…

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