General Prajna and Specific Prajna | The Six Paramitas

The first dichotomy in kinds of prajna is that the Buddha taught general prajna to people with duller karmic roots, and specific prajna to people with sharper karmic roots. People with duller roots include shravakas (people who have heard the Dharma), as well as those already on the bodhisattva path. For them, the Buddha taught liberation methods like The Five skandhas and The Twelve Links (nidanas) of Dependent Origination.1 Of course, since we are ordinary beings with duller roots, this general prajna is good for us. For those with sharper roots, Buddha taught specific prajna. It is important to remember, however, that specific prajna always includes general prajna.

I will give an analogy to explain the difference between general and specific prajna. I recently read about a sixteen-year-old boy who has already earned his doctorate and is ready to teach in a university. Does this young boy with a Ph.D. also have the Knowledge of an elementary school, a high school, and a college student? If this is an appropriate analogy, then you can see that this boy has both the general knowledge of all his education, as well as the specialized knowledge associated with his degree. Would you say that this boy has sharp intellectual roots?

The central teaching of general prajna is that there is no self. This is the essential meaning of the Five skandhas. The first skandha is form, the material aspect of our existence. The other four skandhas-ensation, perception, volition, and consciousness–make up the mental aspects of our existence. Genenl prajna teaches that the interactions between the skandhas give us the illusion of having a self, but since each of the skandhas is in fact empty, there is actually no abiding self.

The Twelve Links of Dependent Origination describe the origin of our existence in time as a causal sequence. It begins with ignorance and goes step by step to the last link, which is death. When we truly understand the twelve links, we see that nowhere in the chain does there arise a true self.

Now what is the content of specific prajna? It teaches that we should not attach to, or fear, ignorance itself, or any of the other links from birth to death. Rather, one should not be affected by ignorance; one should be able to be in the midst of samsara and not be affected. In principle, general prajna has more to do with escaping from ignorance, the source of our suffering. One tries to liberate one’s body and mind from suffering to another state. On the other hand, specific prajna says that one need not escape from one’s body and mind to gain liberation. If one can exist in samsara and not be affected by ignorance and by one’s body and mind, this is liberation itself. There is no need to escape to another world to gain liberation. As long as you can put down attachment to one’s body and mind, it is already liberation. If we can remain in samsara and still be liberated, that would be the bodhisattva ideal. Specific prajna says that one should not think about benefiting ourselves, but only about benefiting all sentient beings, whether close to us or distant. We should think about how we can best serve others, without thought of gain or
loss to ourselves. With an attitude no longer troubled by self-centeredness, we will be practicing the way of a bodhisattva, the Mahayana way.

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