..续本文上一页hamma means to view them simply as events or phenomena, as they are directly perceived in and of themselves, seeing the regularity of the principles underlying their behavior. To view them in terms of the world means to view them with regard to their meaning, role, or emotional coloring -- i.e., in terms of how they fit into our view of life and the world.

　　dhatu: Element; potential; property; the elementary properties that make up the inner sense of the body and mind: earth (solidity), water (liquidity), fire (heat), wind (energy or motion), space, and consciousness. The breath is regarded as an aspect of the wind property, and all feelings of energy in the body are classed as breath sensations. According to ancient Indian and Thai physiology, diseases come from an aggravation or imbalance in any of the first four of these properties. Well-being is defined as a state in which none of them is dominant: All are quiet, unaroused, balanced, and still.

　　ekaggatarammana: Singleness of object or preoccupation.

　　jhana: Meditative absorption in a single notion or sensation.

　　khandha: The component parts of sensory perception; physical and mental phenomena as they are directly experienced: rupa (sensations, sense data), vedana (feelings of pleasure, pain, or indifference), sañña (labels, names, concepts, allusions), sankhara (mental fabrications, thought formations), viññana (sensory consciousness).

　　lokavidu: An expert with regard to the cosmos -- an epithet normally used for the Buddha.

　　magga-citta: The state of mind that forms the path leading to the transcendent qualities culminating in Liberation. Phala-citta refers to the mental state that follows immediately on magga-citta and experiences its fruit.

　　nibbana (nirvana): Liberation; the unbinding of the mind from greed, anger, and delusion, from physical sensations and mental acts. As this term is used to refer also to the extinguishing of fire, it carries connotations of stilling, cooling, and peace. (According to the physics taught at the time of the Buddha, the property of fire in a latent state exists to a greater or lesser extent in all objects. When activated, it seizes and gets stuck to its fuel. When extinguished, it is unbound.)

　　nimitta: Mental sign, theme, or image.

　　nivarana: Hindrance. The mental qualities that hinder the mind from becoming centered are five: sensual desire, ill will, torpor & lethargy, restlessness & anxiety, and uncertainty.

　　pali: The name of the most ancient recension of the Buddhist canon now extant and -- by extension -- of the language in which it was composed.

　　samadhi: Concentration; the act of keeping the mind centered or intent on a single preoccupation. The three levels of concentration -- momentary, threshold, and fixed penetration -- can be understood in terms of the first three steps in the section on jhana: Momentary concentration goes no further than step (a); threshold concentration combines steps (a) and (c); fixed penetration combines steps (a), (b), and (c) and goes on to include all higher levels of jhana.

　　sangha: The community of the Buddha”s followers. On the conventional level, this refers to the Buddhist monkhood. On the ideal (ariya) level, it refers to those of the Buddha”s followers -- whether lay or ordained -- who have practiced to the point of gaining at least the first of the transcendent qualities culminating in Liberation.

　　sankhara: Fabrication -- the forces and factors that fabricate things, the process of fabrication, and the fabricated things that result. As the fourth khandha, this refers to the act of fabricating thoughts, urges, etc., within the mind. As a blanket term for all five khandhas, it refers to all things fabricated, compounded, or fashioned by nature. ”Sankharupekkha-ñana” refers to a stage of liberating insight in which all sankharas are viewed with a sense of equanimity.

　　vipassana (-ñana): Liberating insight -- clear, intuitive discernment into physical and mental phenomena as they arise and disappear, seeing them for what they are in terms of the four Noble Truths and the characteristics of inconstancy, stress, and "not-selfness."

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　　If anything in this translation is inaccurate or misleading, I ask forgiveness of the author and reader for having unwittingly stood in their way. As for whatever may be accurate, I hope the reader will make the best use of it, translating it a few steps further, into the heart, so as to attain the truth to which it points.

　　-- The translator

　　Inquiries concerning this book may be addressed to: The Abbot, Metta Forest Monastery, PO Box 1409, Valley Center, CA 92082.

　　Chant for the Dedication of Merit

　　Sabbe satta sada hontu

　　avera sukha-jivino

　　katam puñña-phalam mayham

　　sabbe bhagi bhavantu te

　　May all beings always live happily,

　　free from animosity.

　　May all share in the blessings

　　springing from the good I have done.

《Keeping the Breath in Mind and Lessons in Samadhi》全文阅读结束。