How many factors does each of the 4 jhānas have?
Here’s a radical concept. Instead of relying on Theravada propaganda claiming that 4 jhānas have 5 jhana factors dropping out in each
successive jhana, why not learn what jhanas are the traditional,
original way? You memorize the STED four jhana formula. It’s short, only
takes 48 seconds to chant once you’re familiar with it. And you’ll
never have to wonder how many factors are in each jhana because you can
just recall from memory and examine each factor on the fly.
(sutta text and audio here)
https://audtip.blogspot.com/2019/03/48-seconds-to-chant-in-pali-standard.html
The STED 4 jhanas formula are meditation instructions.
They occur in well over 120 suttas, probably a lot more, because it's
hard to get an accurate count from ellisions. But having tracked down
every single reference to first jhana with a pattern search, see
☸4nt → 8aam #8🌄: STED (smd 1) 🌘 paṭhamaṃ jhānaṃ:
almost of those references are to all 4 jhanas, not just the first.
MN 53 STED 4j are meditation instructions!
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Kathañca, mahānāma,
ariyasāvako catunnaṃ jhānānaṃ ābhicetasikānaṃ diṭṭhadhammasukhavihārānaṃ
nikāmalābhī hoti akicchalābhī akasiralābhī?
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And how does a noble disciple get the four
absorptions—blissful meditations in the present life that belong to the
higher mind—when they want, without trouble or difficulty? |
It’s when a noble disciple, quite secluded from sensual pleasures,
secluded from unskillful qualities, enters and remains in the first
absorption … Idha, mahānāma, ariyasāv
You could say First jhāna has 4 factors.
If you go strictly by STED first jhāna formula.
excerpt from Leigh B’s website
http://www.leighb.com/jhana_4factors.htm
Five Factors for the First Jhana - NOT!
There is a wide spread misunderstanding that the first jhana has 5
factors. But this is not what is described in the suttas and is
certainly not what the Buddha taught and practiced. The first jhana has 4
factors (Yes! Four - look it up, see it in Pali):
vitakka - thinking
vicara - more thinking, examining
piti - rapture, glee, zest
sukha - happiness
In the vast majority of cases - over 100 suttas, the first jhana is
described as having only the 4 factors listed above. However the
Abhidhamma and the Commentaries do speak of 5 factors for the first
jhana - they add ekaggata (one-pointedness). Ekaggata isn't mentioned in
the suttas because it is not and cannot be part of the formula. In the
first place, vitakka and vicara always and only mean "thinking" and
"examining" in the suttas - there is no place where they can be
interpreted to mean "initial and sustained attention" or any such thing.
It is even explicit in the canon that vitakka and vicara refer to
thinking in the context of the first jhana - see for example SN 21:1.
There "Noble Silence" is defined as the 2nd Jhana because vitakka and
vicara are now absent. It is simply not possible to have one-pointedness
and thinking at the same time, so experiencing ekaggata in the same
jhana as vitakka and vicara makes no sense whatsoever.
Furthermore in the 2nd Jhana, vitakka and vicara are replaced with
"vupasama, ajjhattam sampasadanam" and "ekodi-bhavam" - "inner
tranquility" and "unification of mind." If there was ekaggata in 1st
Jhana, there would be no need to specify the gaining of "ekodi-bhavam"
to replace vitakka and vicara in the 2nd Jhana.
Now there are 2 suttas where 5 factors are given for the first jhana and
a 3rd sutta where unification of mind is mentioned in regard to the 1st
Jhana:
M I 294 - MN 43 "The Greater Set of Questions-and-Answers"
M III 25-29 - MN 111 "One After Another"
S IV 263 - SN 40.1 "The First Jhana" (not ekaggata, but ekodim; the
context makes it a real stretch to consider this a 5th factor!)
But all of these appear to be "late" suttas - written at the close of
the sutta era and the beginning of the abhidhamma era. Sutta MN 111 is
actually internally contradictory: it first gives the standard 1st jhana
formula with vitakka and vicara and then says Sariputta examined the
factors of the 1st jhana and found ekaggata. As mentioned above, you
just can't have ekaggata and vitakka & vicara happening at the same
time.
Of course this was a problem for the abhidhammaikas and the
commentators. So they redefined vitakka and vicara to mean initial and
sustained attention. But clearly the Abhidhamma has tinkered with the
definitions of the jhanas, converting the first jhana into 2 different
states: one with vitakka & vicara and one with only vicara. There is
no basis for this in the suttas except again in a couple of "late"
suttas.
And by the time of the Visuddhimagga, the definitions of what
constitutes a jhana had diverged significantly from the sutta
definitions. The Visuddhimagga has made the jhanas so difficult that
only one in a million who come to meditation can enter the first jhana
(section XII.8) - while in the suttas, the monks and nuns were all
practicing jhana (the Buddha didn't have millions of followers -
probably only a few thousand at most, yet there are many accounts of
monastics successfully practicing the jhanas). The absorption level
described in the Visuddhimagga is so deep that "sounds are a thorn to
the 1st jhana" as found in AN 10.72 makes no sense at all.
Clearly ekaggata as a factor of the 1st jhana is a later addition making
the 5 factors of the 1st jhana a later schema. In fact, looking at the
jhanas with the traditional abhidhamma/commentarial factors misses some
of the important information in the sutta schema - see
http://leighb.com/jhanatrd.htm
