What Path Does Meditative Concentration Belong To?

The Path is divided into worldly paths and supramundane paths. The worldly path is also called the outer path (non-Buddhist path), a path external to the Buddha-Dharma; it has only the four dhyānas and eight samādhis, without the wisdom of liberation, and does not realize the fruits of liberation. The supramundane path is divided into the Buddha path, the bodhisattva path, the pratyekabuddha path, and the śrāvaka path. The Buddha path and the bodhisattva path are paths of liberation that combine the four dhyānas and eight samādhis with Mahāyāna prajñā and Yogācāra wisdom; the pratyekabuddha path is a path of liberation that combines the four dhyānas and eight samādhis with the wisdom of the twelve links of dependent arising; the śrāvaka path is a path of liberation that combines the four dhyānas and eight samādhis with the wisdom of the Four Noble Truths. All four paths have their corresponding fruits of liberation. If a supramundane path has only the four dhyānas and eight samādhis but not yet the wisdom of liberation, one cannot attain liberation—yet this is still far better than non-Buddhists who do not cultivate the Buddha-Dharma. With the four dhyānas and eight samādhis come the five supernatural powers; compared with those without meditative concentration, one is relatively at ease regarding birth and death, temporarily able to exercise self-mastery within a certain range, but beyond that range one cannot exercise mastery. In the long run, one is still not at ease regarding birth and death and cannot escape the cycle of the six realms of rebirth.

During the Tang dynasty, the teacher of Chan Master Yunmen of the Yunmen school was called Muzhou. Chan Master Muzhou possessed supernatural powers. The emperor once invited Muzhou to serve as the National Preceptor, but Muzhou was unwilling to remain constrained at the emperor's side, and insisted on living alone in the mountains to propagate the Dharma. He had many disciples under him, yet he refused to appoint a head seat (shouzuo), because he was not satisfied with any of the disciples around him. He had set his sights only on Yunmen—and at that time Yunmen had not yet even left home, indeed had not yet even been born. So although Chan Master Muzhou had been transforming sentient beings for over ten years and had dwelt in the mountains for nearly twenty years, he still did not appoint a head seat; the position of head seat was kept reserved for Yunmen all along. One day he said to his assembled disciples: "My disciple Yunmen has just been born." His supernatural powers were considerable—knowing the very moment Yunmen was born. When Yunmen grew to over ten years of age and began herding cattle, he said to the assembly, "My disciple Yunmen is now herding cattle."

When Yunmen reached adulthood, he began wandering through the mountains, visiting various monasteries. One day Chan Master Muzhou told all his disciples: "My head seat has come." At that time Yunmen, still a layperson, came walking from afar carrying his bundle. At that time he had neither supernatural powers nor meditative concentration, yet Muzhou came out to greet him and make him head seat. Upon entering the monastery, Yunmen was tonsured, and directly became the head seat. Muzhou's character was such that he would rather leave the position vacant than fill it with someone unworthy; he acknowledged only one disciple and looked down on all others, so he appointed no head seat. What is the head seat? The head seat is the foremost disciple of the presiding master, the supervisor of all matters great and small in the monastery—including the study of Dharma and meditative concentration, as well as all the monastery's affairs, large and small, all managed by the head seat. Apart from the master, he was number one.

During the Tang and Song dynasties there were many Chan masters with supernatural powers like Muzhou. Although some of them had awakened to the Way, their attainment mainly manifested in possessing the four dhyānas. With the four dhyānas, one can be at ease regarding birth and death within a certain range, able to pass into rebirth anytime and anywhere, generally being reborn in the human world—reborn into whichever family one wishes, merely by greeting the head of that household. There were also those who could be born immediately on the second day or a few days after conception; those of great merit could seize a womb and be born early, without having to dwell in the womb for ten months. One Chan master, wishing to prove he had attained the Way, demonstrated his freedom over birth and death: he lit a stick of incense, and before the incense had finished burning, he passed into rebirth. Even so, a Chan master who had truly attained the Way would say: "Even though you have the ability to leave whenever you wish, this does not mean you are free from birth and death, because you have not awakened to the Way and cannot escape the cycle of the six realms of rebirth. This life you may avoid evil destinations, but next life you will not be spared." 

There was also a Chan master who, after cultivating supernatural powers, learned that in the south there was a woman who had been pregnant for three years without giving birth—she was waiting for him to enter her womb and be born. His fellow Chan practitioners repeatedly invited him to travel to the south, and finally, having no other choice, he went along with them. Halfway there, by a riverside, he saw the pregnant woman washing clothes by the river. Knowing he could no longer escape, he said to his companions: "I cannot accompany you any further, for I must now go into the womb. After I take rebirth, in the ninth year, when you come to the south you will see a nine-year-old boy riding on the back of an ox playing a flute—that child will be me." Sure enough, nine years later his companion arrived at that place and saw a young boy riding on the back of an ox playing a flute. Although the Chan master had such supernatural powers, this did not mean he had attained the Way.

From the various recorded koans concerning Chan masters of the Tang and Song dynasties, we know that at that time practitioners—especially monastics—generally possessed the four dhyānas, and laypeople also had meditative concentration. After leaving home, their main practice was cultivating concentration, and then investigating Chan. Many people investigated Chan without penetrating it, but they all succeeded in cultivating meditative concentration. Why could they all cultivate the four dhyānas while we now cannot? Because people's minds in those days were relatively tranquil (praśama), their roots of goodness and merit were deep, there were not so many complicated interpersonal affairs and social information; people's minds were simple and pure, so it was easy to cultivate meditative concentration. Every monastery had a Chan hall, where monastics sat in meditation, cultivated concentration, and investigated Chan at fixed times every day; even when working in the fields, their minds were always investigating Chan within concentration, applying effort in the Way at every moment. It is not like now, when we are busy all day and unable to cultivate concentration; having learned a bit of Dharma, we fall into emotional speculation and intellectual interpretation—even memorizing it all, yet remaining so far from the Way, unable to cultivate meditative concentration, capable only of intellectual interpretation.

One who possesses the four dhyānas can take rebirth whenever he wishes and be reborn into whichever family he wishes. He can greet the head of the household in advance, and the manner of rebirth can also be quite extraordinary: those of great merit and without desire can take rebirth without passing through the union of man and woman, entering the womb directly, and may even seize a womb and be born early—just like the process by which the Fifth Patriarch took rebirth. When the Fifth Patriarch in his previous life met the Fourth Patriarch, he was a Daoist cultivator, not a Buddhist, and was already very old. The Fourth Patriarch recognized his spiritual faculties and said to him: "This physical body of yours is already failing; exchange it for another body." The Fifth Patriarch immediately understood and went to seek an opportunity for rebirth. Walking along a riverbank, he saw a young girl washing clothes, and greeted her, saying: "I have no place to stay; may I come and stay at your home?" The girl thought he wanted to stay at her parents' house, not knowing he intended to enter the womb, and so she agreed.

Not long after the girl returned home, she felt as if she were pregnant; when the signs of pregnancy became obvious, her parents discovered it. The girl could not explain what had happened, and her parents drove her out of the house. From then on the girl wandered bitterly from place to place, and finally gave birth to the Fifth Patriarch. When the Fifth Patriarch was a few years old, he met the Fourth Patriarch, left home with him, and was tonsured; he awakened to the Way at a very young age. The Fifth Patriarch already had the skill of meditative concentration when he was a non-Buddhist, but a path with only meditative concentration is not the true path of liberation; only the path realized through enlightenment is the true path.

The highest cultivator of meditative concentration among the non-Buddhists was Śākyamuni Buddha's non-Buddhist teacher, the ṛṣi Udraka. When Śākyamuni Buddha first left home, he took Udraka as his teacher to study the four dhyānas and eight samādhis. After the Buddha had cultivated the four dhyānas and eight samādhis to completion, he considered that this was still not the Way, so he abandoned the four dhyānas and eight samādhis and austerities, and resolved to cultivate the path anew. He went to the river to bathe, drank the goat's milk offered by the herdswoman, and then sat in meditation beneath the Bodhi tree; in the middle of the night, upon seeing the morning star, he greatly awakened and attained the Way. After attaining the Way, he wished to liberate his teacher, for the Buddha knew that Udraka, studying non-Buddhist dharmas, could not attain the Way. But He could not find his teacher; looking with the divine eye, the Buddha saw that Udraka was no longer in the human world—he had been reborn in the heaven of neither perception nor non-perception, absorbed in concentration in that heaven for eighty thousand great kalpas, enjoying the blessings of concentration.

Eighty thousand great kalpas is an extraordinarily long time for us, but for one absorbed in concentration, time is very short, passing in the blink of an eye. Because a person in concentration has only a faint mind consciousness, the manas, and the eighth consciousness—just these three consciousnesses—without a physical body, in a state of no-mind, and because meditative concentration is extremely blissful, the passage of time seems very fast. After emerging from concentration at the end of eighty thousand great kalpas, whatever karmic seeds ripen in the tathāgatagarbha, the being will be born into one of the six realms in accordance with those karmic seeds. With the divine eye, Śākyamuni Buddha saw that his teacher, during his cultivation, had once made a vicious vow: while he sat cultivating concentration, the little birds around him chirped incessantly, disturbing his meditation, so he made a venomous vow, saying: "When in a future life I become a great bird, I will kill you all."

After making this vicious vow, he continued cultivating and finally attained the highest meditative concentration in the three realms, and was reborn in the heaven of neither perception nor non-perception. Because of this vicious vow, when he eventually falls from that heaven, his vow will be fulfilled—that is, his wish will be satisfied—and he will be reborn as a great bird and kill all those little birds. In this way he will have committed great evil karma, and at the end of that life, because of this sinful karma, he will fall directly into hell to undergo retributive suffering. The Buddha did not wish Udraka to commit such evil karma in the future, but there was nothing to be done—the Buddha could no longer find him; to this day he remains absorbed in concentration in that heaven.

So we see that the "Way" of cultivating the path includes not only the Buddha path, but also various outer paths external to the Buddha path. The Buddha path is the path of escaping the bitter retribution of birth and death; the outer paths, though possessing profound meditative concentration, lack the wisdom of liberation and do not belong to the paths of liberation of the Greater or Lesser Vehicle. The Buddha path requires not only the four dhyānas and eight samādhis, but also the wisdom of no-self of the Greater and Lesser Vehicles—a path endowed with both concentration and wisdom. Even if one studies Buddhism and cultivates the path, if one has only meditative concentration without eliminating self-view (ātma-dṛṣṭi) and without awakening to the true mind and seeing one's nature, one has not yet attained the Way and cannot escape the suffering of birth and death. Only a path endowed with both concentration and wisdom can be free from the karma of the three evil destinies, be free from the bitter retribution of birth and death, and bring liberation from birth and death. All other paths are not the true path.