Suppose a man were sitting wrapped in white cloth covering his whole body from head to toes, so that there were not a single spot of his body that is not covered by the white cloth. Similarly the bhikkhu sits pervading his whole body with a pure and lucid mind so that not a single spot of his entire body is left unpervaded by that pure and lucid mind.1 (Wr. tr.).
The Abhidhammic system counts thirty factors in the fourth jhāna. From the original set of thirty-three, vitakka, vicāra and pīti are excluded, and the feeling is changed to adukkhamasukha. Compassion and sympathetic joy do not unite with this jhāna, as they require association with pleasant feeling while this jhāna has neutral feeling.
consideration for the differing inclinations of individuals (puggalajjhāsaya), the other is for the sake of elegance of teaching (desanāvilāsa). It explains the first by reference to the tradition that the Buddha first expounded the Abhidhammapi:aka to the devas of the heavenly worlds:
In the assembled gathering of the spirits (devas), to some spirits only initial application of mind appeared gross, and sustained application of mind, rapture, pleasure, one-pointedness of mind appeared good.1
It was for the benefit of those devas, according to the Dhammasa/ga5i A((hakathā that the Buddha expanded the fourfold scheme of jhānas into a fivefold scheme. In explanation of the second reason the commentary says:
Hence, because of the vastness of his knowledge, the Teacher, who is skillful in arranging his teaching, and who has attained the [art of] embellishing it, fixes that teaching by whatever factor that has come to hand, and in any way he chooses.2
In following the fivefold system of jhānas, a meditator who has mastered the first jhāna and aspires to go higher reviews its factors and finds only applied thought (vitakka) to be gross. Thus he endeavors to eliminate only applied thought, and attains a second jhāna which is devoid of applied thought (avitakka.) but still associated with sustained thought (vicāramatta.). This second jhāna of the fivefold scheme is the addition which is not present in the fourfold scheme. After mastering the second jhāna, the meditator finds sustained thought to be gross, eliminates it, and attains a third jhāna which is identical with the second jhāna of the fourfold system. The fourth and fifth jhānas of the fivefold system are the same as the third and fourth jhānas of the fourfold system, respectively.
The two different systems seem to answer to the differing capacities of meditators for progressing along the scale of mental unification. This difference in capacity could stem either from their differing abilities to comprehend vitakka and vicāra simultaneously or from their differing abilities to abandon them simultaneously. The progress of one following the fourfold method is more rapid, as he eliminates two factors in moving from the first to second jhāna. Yet both start from the same place, move through the same range of spiritual experience, and (providing they succeed in reaching the highest jhāna in their respective systems) arrive in the end at the same destination.
The two meditators can be compared to two mountain climbers. Both start out at the foot of a mountain at the same time. Both may reach the same initial rest station at the same time. But then their rates of progress may show a difference. The stronger may continue on more quickly, bypass the second rest station, and go right on to the third before stopping. The weaker will advance more slowly and have to make separate stops at the
1. Expositor, 1:239. “Sannisinnadevaparisāya kira ekaccānaJ devānaJ vitakko eva oXārikato upa::hāti, vicārapītisukh’ekaggatā santato.” Dhs.A., p. 223.
2. Expositor, 1:240. “Tasmā ñāLamahattatāya desanāvidhānesu kusalo desanā vilāsappatto satthā yaJ yaJ aLgaJ labbhati; tassa tassa vasena yathā yathā labbhati tathā tathā desanaJ niyameti.” Dhs.A., p. 224.
second and third rest stations. Both will stop at the fourth and at the fifth station at the top. Thus for both mountain climbers their position is the same when starting out at the bottom of the mountain, at the first station, and when reaching the top. They differ only in their rates of progress and in the number of stops they have to make to arrive at the top. Similarly for the two meditators of the fourfold and fivefold systems. Their first jhāna is the same, and their final achievement is the same. But the follower of the fivefold system has made an additional stop passed over by the follower of the fourfold system. This stop is the added second jhāna of the fivefold system, free from applied thought but having sustained thought.
The fivefold reckoning of jhāna first appears in the Abhidhammapi:aka and remains as a distinctive feature of the “Abhidhamma method,” yet this system has a definite basis in the suttas. Though the suttas always speak of four jhānas, they divide concentration (samādhi) into three types: a concentration with applied thought and sustained thought, a concentration without applied thought but with sustained thought, and a concentration without either applied thought or sustained thought.1 Thus in the SaJyutta Nikāya the Buddha calls this threefold concentration the “path to the unconditioned”2 and in the AKguttara Nikāya he declares:
When, monk, this concentration is thus made-become and developed by you, then you should make this concentration become with initial and sustained application [of thought], make it become without initial application [of thought], but with sustained application [of thought] only; make it become without either initial or sustained application [of thought].3
The commentary to the AKguttara Nikāya glosses this as “attaining fourfold and fivefold jhāna.”4 (Wr. tr.). The Dhammasa/ga5i A((hakathā explains that while the fourfold scheme of jhānas includes concentration with both applied and sustained thought and without either of the two, it does not deal with that concentration having only sustained thought; thence an additional jhāna necessitating a fivefold system is required to deal with it.5
In the Abhidhammattha Sa/gaha the five jhānas are presented only in skeletal form, in terms of their defining factors. In the DhammasaKgaLi and the VibhaKga they are presented with full formulas. Their descriptions of the first, third, fourth, and fifth jhānas are identical with each other, and with the standard descriptions of the first, second, third, and fourth jhānas respectively of the fourfold scheme. However, in their formulas for the second jhāna, the two canonical Abhidhamma treatises differ in some
1. The Pāli for the three is: savitakko savicāro samādhi, avitakkavicāramatto samādhi, and avitakko avicāro samādhi.
2. SN. 4:362-63. DN. 3:274.
3. GS. 4:200. “Yato kho te bhikkhu ayaJ samādhi evaJ bhāvito hoti bahulīkato, tato tvaJ bhikkhu imaJ samādiJ savitakkaJpi savicāraJ bhāveyyāsi, avitakkampi vicāramattaJ bhāveyyāsi avitakkaJ pi avicāraJ bhāveyyāsi.” AN. 4:301.
4. “CatukkapañcakajjhānaJ pāpiyamāno.” AN.A. 3:242.
5. Dhs.A., P. 224. Expositor, 1:240.
interesting respects. The DhammasaKgaLi formula runs as follows: “He enters and abides in the second jhāna, which is without applied thought, has only sustained thought, and is filled with rapture and happiness born of concentration.”1 (Wr. tr.). The VibhaKga formula states:
Quite secluded from sense pleasures, secluded from unwholesome states of mind, he enters and dwells in the second jhāna which is accompanied only by sustained thought with rapture and happiness born of seclusion.2 (Wr. tr.).
Thus the VibhaKga version includes a phrase about seclusion from sense pleasures and unwholesome states, while the DhammasaKgaLi version omits this and instead simply describes the jhāna. Again, the two differ in the way they qualify the rapture and happiness existing in the jhāna. The DhammasaKgaLi says they are “born of concentration” (samādhija. pītisukha.), the VibhaKga that they are born of seclusion (vivekaja. pītisukha.).
The preliminary phrase in the VibhaKga version appears to be an inappropriate repetition of the beginning of the first jhāna formula, and thus can perhaps be dismissed as an editorial error made by the ancient redactors of the text. The second difference between the two works, that concerning the cause of rapture and happiness, may also be due to an editorial oversight, but is more difficult to resolve. When explaining the phrase samādhija. in connection with the second jhāna of the tetradic scheme, the Visuddhimagga said that “born of concentration” could be understood to mean that the rapture and happiness of the second jhāna are born of the first jhāna concentration, or born of the associated second jhāna concentration. It then added:
It is only this concentration [of the second jhāna] that is quite worthy to be called ‘concentration’ because of its complete confidence and extreme immobility due to absence of disturbance by applied and sustained thought.3
Now if we accept the idea that the concentration responsible for producing the pīti and sukha of the second tetradic jhāna is the first jhāna concentration, then it follows logically that the pīti and sukha of the second jhāna in the fivefold scheme can also be born of the same concentration. Thus the reading of the DhammasaKgaLi would be correct. However, we also have to take account of the Visuddhimagga’s remark that the word “concentration” is only fully appropriate in the absence of disturbance by applied and sustained thought. Then, because sustained thought is present in the pentadic second jhāna, it is questionable whether the phrase “born of concentration” can belong to the formula. In this case the preference would go to the VibhaKga reading. Due to the ambiguity of interpretative method, the difference seems impossible to settle with complete definiteness, and must just be left for the present as unresolved.
1. “AvitakkaJ vicāramattaJ samādhijaJ pītisukhaJ dutiyaJ jhānaJ upasampajja viharati.” Dhs., p. 47.
2. “Vivicceva kāmehi vivicca akusalehi dhammehi avitakkaJ vicāramattaJ vivekajaJ pītisukhaJ dutiyaJ jhānaJ upasampajja viharati.” Vibh., p. 275.
3. PP., p. 164. “… ayaJ eva samādhi samādhī ti vattabbataJ arahati, vitakkavicārakkhobhavirahena ativiya acalattā suppasannattā ca.” Vism., p. 127.