What are the jhanas (meditative absorptions)? Are jhanas necessary for awakening?
Draft: Ivan
A jhāna is a stable state of deep concentration in which the mind is collected and lets go, step by step, of the components of experience (starting with the coarser ones and moving on to ever subtler ones). The canon describes four levels of depth of such states (that is, the first to the fourth jhāna). The practice of jhāna is part of right concentration (sammā-samādhi), the eighth factor of the path (SN 45.8). In jhānic concentration the practitioner does not fall asleep, does not enter a trance with loss of consciousness and does not suppress thoughts. The practice of jhāna is meant to make the mind less scattered and more fit for knowing (for the realisation of wisdom, paññā).
Entering jhāna is preceded by abandoning the so-called five hindrances to practice:
- sensual desire (kāmacchanda),
- ill will (byāpāda),
- dullness and drowsiness (thīna-middha),
- restlessness and remorse (uddhacca-kukkucca),
- doubt that obstructs practice (vicikicchā).
Most often this is a temporary liberation from the hindrances, enough to reach the necessary level of concentration. They are overcome for good only by an arahant.
The definition of the jhānas (what happens in them and which factors can be observed while abiding in these states) recurs throughout the canon, for instance in MN 39:
- First jhāna: seclusion from sensual pleasures and unwholesome states, applied and sustained attention (vitakka, vicāra), rapture (pīti) and pleasant feeling (sukha) born of seclusion.
- Second: applying and sustaining attention cease; there remain inner confidence, unification of mind, rapture and pleasure (pīti and sukha) born of concentration.
- Third: rapture fades; there remain equanimity (upekkhā), mindfulness, clear comprehension and a still pleasant sukha.
- Fourth: with joy and grief already gone, both pleasant and painful feeling are abandoned; the state is neither pleasant nor painful, with purity of mindfulness due to equanimity.
After the jhānas the canon lists the four formless bases (arūpa-āyatana): infinite space, infinite consciousness, nothingness, neither-perception-nor-non-perception (MN 111). Later literature sometimes calls them formless jhānas, but the suttas use precisely the term “bases”.
Why are the jhānas needed?
The jhānas:
- give a well-being that does not depend on the usual sensual pleasures. This makes it easier to loosen the dependence on a constant search for sensual stimulation.
- make the mind steady: it can investigate experience without distraction and without interruption.
- themselves become an object of insight. The practitioner sees that even an exalted meditative experience is conditioned, impermanent and not “I” or “mine”. MN 111 describes the investigation of the factors of meditative attainments. In MN 36 the Buddha recalls the first jhāna and recognises it as part of the path to awakening, rejecting fruitless self-mortification.
For all the importance of the jhānas, the canon states no rule such as “first master at least the first jhāna, and only then take up insight”. Commentarial Theravāda also allows a path of dry insight (sukkhavipassaka), without first mastering the absorptions, but not without concentration altogether. In this approach, steadiness of attention is considered to develop within the practice of insight itself. At the same time, jhāna practice is mentioned in the canon very often, right concentration is defined through the jhānas (SN 45.8), and they are regarded as a basis for the destruction of the defilements (AN 9.36).
Different traditions and teachers do not agree on how deep concentration has to be to be called jhāna. They also read the strict necessity of attaining jhāna differently: some consider it obligatory, others allow liberation on the basis of some other sufficient collectedness of mind.
A conditioned attainment
The jhānas remain a conditioned attainment and are not enough for liberation on their own. In MN 111 Sāriputta goes through the jhānas and the formless bases, discerning their components one by one: these states, not having been, come to be; having been, they vanish. He is neither drawn to them nor repelled by them, and he sees that there is an escape beyond. Happiness can be experienced in the jhānas - MN 59 sets out a series of ever subtler kinds of it. Yet the formless bases stand above the jhānas, and at the top is the cessation of perception and feeling. Final liberation means not just a special experience, but direct knowledge of the nature of reality and complete freedom from the defilements of the mind.
Hence a practical guideline: develop virtue, mindfulness and steadiness of attention together; judge your practice not only by unusual states, but also by a decrease in greed, hostility and clinging.
Where to read: MN 39, MN 111, MN 59.