Fifth Dhyana Level | The Six Paramitas

The fifth dhyana is the dhyana of the Supreme Vehicle, also called the Dhyana of the Tathagata.5 It is also called the Dhyana of the Patriarch because it refers to Bodhidharma, the first patriarch of Chan Buddhism. This is the dhyana of sudden enlightenment and does not require the four dhyanas and eight samadhis. In fact, it is basically the method of no method. When there is no wandering thought in the mind, that is the wisdom of Chan. Though originally transmitted by Bodhidharma, it underwent further development within the Chan School. The dhyana transmitted by Bodhidharma has two aspects: entry by practice and entry by principle. Entry by practice is through cultivation of the methods of enlightenment; entry by principle is through directly perceiving emptiness.

The sixth patriarch Huineng, on the other hand, describes the fifth dhyana level in this way: as long as there is no attachment or self-centered thought in the mind, it is liberation or sudden enlightenment. In Huineng’s Platform Sutra, there is this very important sentence: “Prajna and dhyana are the same. Where there is prajna, there is driyana; where there is dhyana, there is prajna.” This view characterizes the school of sudden enlightenment.

In the gradual enlightenment school, one must sequentially cultivate dhyana for prajna to arise. On the other hand, the sixth patriarch talks about dhyana and prajna arising simultaneously, and more importantly, says that sitting meditation is not necessary as long as one’s mind and body are not in conflict or contradiction. When that happens, it is the Dhyana of the Patriarchs. Such a person is always in dhyana–while eating, sleeping, working. The idea is that life itself is dhyana.

Four fruition levels of the arhat: 1) The stream-entrant, who has erased all doubts about the path. 2) The once-returner, Who will be reborn in samsara only once more. 3) The non-returner, Who will not be reborn in the human realm. 4) The arhat, how has attained liberation in nirvana.

Four dhyana stages: l) relinquishing of desires, 2) joy and one-pointedness, 3) equanimity and 4) equanimity and wakefulness.

There are nine samadhi levels, of which the ninth is the liberation experience of true emptiness by an arhat.

The three realms of existence constitute samsara, where sentient beings are subject to the cycles of birth and death. The three realms are desire, form, and formlessness.

Tathagata: one of the epithets of the Buddha, meaning ‘thus come.’

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