Two Schools on the Nature of Absorption

I. The Question: The Āgamas Name Concentration a Faculty but Never Ask What It Is

The Āgamas knew very well how to speak of concentration. They list it among the five faculties, set it as the eighth limb of the noble eightfold path, and tell you without hedging what it contains:

"What is the concentration-faculty? The samādhi that arises in one who has first given rise to the mind set on awakening in the Tathāgata — this is called the concentration-faculty."¹

The concentration-faculty is samādhi. Elsewhere the content of that one faculty is opened out directly into the four jhānas:

"What is the concentration-faculty? If a monk, secluded from sensual desires, secluded from unwholesome states, with awareness and with examining, with rapture-and-bliss born of seclusion … on up to the fourth jhāna, enters and abides — this is called the concentration-faculty."²

So in the suttas "concentration" is clear enough: it is a capacity, a path-limb, a course one can enter by leaving sensual desire behind and deepen layer by layer. But notice what the Āgamas do say and what, throughout, they never say. They tell you what concentration does (it settles the mind, turns it toward good destinations, exhausts suffering); what it looks like (the falling-away sequence of the four jhānas); what it is for (knowing and seeing as things really are). What they never ask is whether concentration is itself a thing — whether it has its own substance, distinct from the mind. Is it one and the same item that, once cultivated, can be held in possession, lost, and re-entered? Or is it a state that has to be freshly produced moment after moment? That question the suttas do not raise.

The one who pried it open was the Abhidharma; what this chapter tracks is precisely what happened after that scalpel went in. Three boundaries must be drawn first, or the whole discussion will list to one side.

First, concentration is not a checklist. To treat it as a set of capacities one acquires item by item, pockets, and keeps in long-term possession is to misread the Sarvāstivāda doctrine of "one dharma in five roles" (which comes below) as a kind of warehousing.

Second, concentration is not three practices. The relished, pure, and undefiled absorptions met below are three states one and the same absorption may be in — defiled by craving, a pure mundane good, or undefiled with the noble path — not three roads one may choose to walk.

Third, concentration is not a tribunal. To collate two traditions, and a third voice, is to see clearly how each answers the ontological question "does concentration have an own-substance," not to rule which tradition's meditation is the orthodox article. This is diagnosis, not verdict.

One inherited line must be set in place at once: concentration is not mindfulness. One-pointedness of mind, ekaggatā — both traditions classify it as a mental factor distinct from mindfulness (sati). Mindfulness is the function of clear, unforgetting registration; concentration is the function of the mind's being one upon its object. Conflate the two and every later step warps.³

As to its place in Part III: the first chapter (the axis of the person) asked "who cultivates concentration," the second (the axis of the jhāna-factor) asked "of what constituents is concentration built, and how do they fall away layer by layer." That second chapter, at its close, said plainly that what it had not yet touched was the substance of absorption itself — whether concentration is nothing but one-pointedness, how the relished / pure / undefiled triad divides, where the difference among the composed, the attained, and the held-in-concentration lies. This chapter takes up exactly that, and seals the three axes.

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II. The Common Ground: The Sutta Seeds, and a Question the Suttas Never Asked

Neither tradition built its ontology out of thin air; both raised it on language the Āgamas had already supplied.

The concentration-faculty is the four jhānas, is samādhi (quoted above); so too right concentration. The Madhyama Āgama glosses right concentration with "secluded from sensual desires, secluded from unwholesome states … he enters and abides in the fourth jhāna," and takes "the mind made one" as its core verb. The Saṃyukta Āgama goes further and cuts right concentration into two layers:

"Right concentration is of two kinds. There is a right concentration that is worldly and ordinary, with taints, with grasping, turning toward good destinations; and there is a right concentration that is noble and supramundane, untainted, without grasping, rightly exhausting suffering … if the mind dwells unscattered, unmoving, gathered in, stilled — samādhi, the mind one — this is called right concentration."⁴

Two things here are worth keeping. First, "the mind made one," "the mind one," "the mind dwells unscattered" — these are the very seeds of the later Abhidharma term cittaikāgratā, one-pointedness of mind; the suttas already say the mind is "one," and the treatises only cast that into a technical term. Second, the suttas already divide tainted from untainted right concentration; this taint / no-taint axis has a canonical warrant, and it will grow, in §V, into one limb of the relished / pure / undefiled triad.

But this is exactly where the common ground ends. The suttas gave "the concentration-faculty is the four jhānas," gave "the mind made one," gave "tainted and untainted"; what they did not give is whether concentration has an own-substance. They never take concentration as an object and ask whether, under ultimate analysis, anything of it is left over — whether it is a real dharma or merely a phase of the mind. To put it in the one sentence this chapter most wants kept: the Sarvāstivāda realism about the substance of absorption, and the Theravāda thesis that ekaggatā is an ultimate real, are both answers to a question the Āgamas never posed. The two answers are not the same; but the question they answer is one and the same sutta-unasked question. It is precisely these two answers — and a third — to "what is concentration" that this chapter sets side by side.

(The internal mechanics of the jhāna-factors — how applied and sustained thought come to rest, how the intermediate dhyāna is set up — belong to the preceding chapter; so does the construction of the four-jhāna ladder itself. Here only their conclusion is taken as floor, not re-walked.)

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III. Axis One — The Dispute over the Substance of Absorption: Is One-Pointedness a Separate Real Dharma?

This is the chapter with the strongest mechanism of the three. The question is plain: is concentration — that "being one" by which the mind is fixed on a single object — a dharma distinct from the mind, one that stands on its own feet?

The Sarvāstivāda answer: yes, and it is a universally-present factor

The Sarvāstivāda definition makes concentration, from the outset, a dharma with an own-nature:

"As to the substance of meditative absorption (dhyāna), spoken of in sum: it is, on the side of the wholesome, one-pointedness of mind, for its own-nature is wholesome samādhi; if taken together with its helpers, it has the five aggregates for its nature. What is one-pointedness? It means being fixed on a single object."⁵

The foot-treatises of the Abhidharma speak with one voice. The Prakaraṇapāda gives the tersest line: "What is concentration? One-pointedness of mind."⁶ And it lays this out into a full chain of synonyms: "It makes the mind dwell, dwell evenly, dwell settled, dwell close, dwell firm — unscattered, undistracted, gathered, held-in-samādhi, one-pointed; this is called concentration."⁷ The Mahāvibhāṣā, for its part, separates this one factor cleanly from the whole event of absorption: "One-pointedness of mind is dhyāna, for samādhi is its own-nature" — the event of dhyāna has the five aggregates for its substance, while the factor within it called "concentration" has, for its own-nature, that one mental factor: samādhi, one-pointedness of mind.⁸

The Sarvāstivāda then pushes this really-existent factor onto a decisive footing: it is a universally-present factor (mahābhūmika), present in every single mind-moment.

"Moreover, samādhi is a universally-present factor; it should be that in every mind there is a turning toward one object."⁹

The price of this line is immediately visible: if samādhi is in every mind, then even a scattered mind — even this very mind-moment of yours, restless as a monkey — has a portion of samādhi in it. The Mahāvibhāṣā says exactly that: "even the scattered mind has that samādhi"; in a distracted mind, the faint continuity within it is samādhi too, only so weak you do not notice it.¹⁰ The Sarvāstivāda accepts the inference: the samādhi of non-concentrated states is merely weak, not absent.¹¹ This step is crucial: it means that "concentration" is not something present only on entering absorption and gone on leaving it; it is a real dharma always on the scene, differing only in strength. Set it on the ontological scale, and the scale really does carry one extra item with a weight of its own.

The engineering proof: one dharma in five roles

How does the Sarvāstivāda stabilize this real dharma and fit it into the whole doctrinal frame? The single clearest piece of evidence is in the Dharmaskandha:

"All the mind's dwelling, dwelling evenly … up to one-pointedness of mind, associated with undefiled attention, is together named concentration; it is also named the concentration-faculty, also the concentration-power, also the concentration awakening-factor, also right concentration — the noble, supramundane, untainted, ungrasping path that runs with the path, is co-existent with the path, turns with the path."¹²

One own-substance — one-pointedness of mind — threaded onto four doctrinal roles: among the five faculties it is the concentration-faculty; among the five powers, the concentration-power; among the seven awakening-factors, the concentration awakening-factor; among the eight path-limbs, right concentration. The Mahāvibhāṣā puts it more bluntly still: "yet samādhi may be spoken of as one … among the five faculties it is named the concentration-faculty, among the five powers the concentration-power, among the seven awakening-factors the concentration awakening-factor, among the eight path-limbs right concentration."¹³ Count carefully: this is not five independent items but one substance of concentration given a separate name under each of the four classes — faculty, power, awakening-factor, path-limb. One thing, many names — this is the clearest textual fingerprint of reifying concentration into a stable entity. The scattered "concentration"-words of the various path-set lists in the suttas are, in the treatises' hands, gathered back into one and the same it.

The third voice: the Sautrāntika says the scale carries nothing extra

By this point the Sarvāstivāda and the Theravāda are in fact already on the same side — the next section develops the Theravāda, but both set concentration up as a really-existent dharma with an own-nature. What genuinely unsettles that consensus is a third voice, and it surfaces in the most unexpected of places: inside the Kośa's own chapter on concentration.

Vasubandhu first states the Sarvāstivāda position (the "its own-nature is wholesome samādhi" definition quoted above), and then immediately records the counter:

"If that is so, then it is just the state of the mind being fixed on a single object that the name 'samādhi' is set up upon; there need be no further, separate mental factor. [To claim] a separate dharma that makes the mind turn upon a single object and call that samādhi — [no]: its substance just is the mind."¹⁴

This is the Sautrāntika (Dārṣṭāntika) voice. It says: what you call "concentration" is nothing but the state of the mind being concentrated on a single object; you need not erect, over and above the mind, a further separate dharma named "samādhi" to explain it. The mind's being one upon its object — that fact is itself concentration; concentration has no separate substance; its substance just is the mind. Set concentration on the scale, and the Sautrāntika says: what you are weighing is only this un-scattered mind itself; there is no extra counterweight named "concentration" on the pan.

More telling still is Vasubandhu's own posture. He records this not once; in treating inner clarity (sampasāda), samādhi, and applied-and-sustained thought, he pushes the same subtraction wider:

"Some masters hold: this inner clarity, this samādhi, this applied-and-sustained thought, all have no separate substance. — If they had no separate substance, they could not be set up as mental factors. [Reply:] even a difference of phase in the mind may be named a mental factor. Though this reasoning has merit, it is not the tenet of my school."¹⁵

"Though this reasoning has merit, it is not the tenet of my school" — these words are the pivot of this chapter. Vasubandhu concedes that the "no separate substance" account has merit (though this reasoning has merit), and plainly says it is not the position he holds (it is not the tenet of my school). This is record-plus-respect, not endorsement. The honest reading: the Kośa is a commentary on the Vaibhāṣika, from the hand of an editor sympathetic to the Sautrāntika; it marks the tension out without resolving it for you. So one must never take "concentration has no separate substance" as Vasubandhu's settled doctrine; it is the counter-view he sets down with his own hand, half-grants, and yet finally declines to make his school's. The fault-line is not outside the Kośa; it runs through the Kośa itself.

The orthodox counterstroke: Saṃghabhadra holds the separate substance

The one who hardens the Sarvāstivāda orthodoxy and braces explicitly against that editorial lean is Saṃghabhadra, in the Nyāyānusāra. His argument has three layers, each worth seeing in turn, for each answers the Sautrāntika subtraction head-on.

First, a functional division: settling the mind and cognizing are two different operations, and so require two different substances.

"The function of samādhi is that it can settle the mind; cognizing an object is the function of consciousness … Moreover, the scriptures attest that samādhi really has a separate substance, as a sutta says: two things are to be cultivated, namely calm (śamatha) and insight (vipaśyanā). If one denied any real samādhi, one would contradict these and countless suttas."¹⁶

"Settling the mind" is concentration's function; "cognizing an object" is the mind's (consciousness's) function; functions differing, the substances should not be one. And he calls the Āgamas to witness: the suttas plainly say calm and insight are both to be cultivated — if concentration had no real separate substance, why would the suttas rank it alongside calm-and-insight as a thing to be cultivated?

Second, a slippery-slope reductio: if concentration just is the mind, then feeling, perception, and volition should also just be the mind.

"Moreover, if the substance of samādhi just is the mind, then perception and the rest should likewise have no separate nature … the mind's receiving agreeable and disagreeable objects would be called feeling; the mind's fashioning wholesome and unwholesome deeds would be called volition. Then there is mind alone, and there should be no [other] three [aggregates of mental factors]."¹⁷

If you grant that "concentration is no more than a phase of the mind," the same subtraction can swallow feeling, perception, and volition — until only a mind is left and every mental factor is cancelled. The cost, Saṃghabhadra holds, is too high.

Third, an argument from degree: association admits no more-and-less, whereas samādhi admits more-and-less; therefore the two cannot be one and the same thing.

"Mind and mental factors are of the nature of association, not the nature of being-held-in-samādhi. Why? Because in every state their association is without more or less, whereas the nature of samādhi has more and less across the states."¹⁸

The "association" of mind and mental factors is the same in every state, with no question of deeper or shallower; but the "holding" of concentration plainly has degrees — the concentration of the first jhāna is shallower than that of the fourth. Since concentration admits of more-and-less while association does not, concentration cannot be merely another name for "the mind being in association"; it has to be a separate dharma with a more-and-less of its own.

The Chinese world holds one further echo of the third voice. Harivarman's Satyasiddhi-śāstra — a treatise of relatively even hand, which stages both a no-mental-factors chapter and an establishing-mental-factors chapter — on the side it there argues, comes close to the Sautrāntika:

"Therefore know: there is only mind, and no separate mental factors. … I do not say there are no mental factors; I say only that, because they are differentiations of the mind, they are named mental factors."¹⁹

Citing this side calls for honesty: the Satyasiddhi stages both sides, and what is taken here is its "only-mind, nothing-separate" face, not the whole of its conclusion.

By this point the three answers to "does concentration have an own-substance" are complete: the Sarvāstivāda says yes, and a really-existent separate dharma present in every mind at that; the Sautrāntika says no, what you weigh is only the un-scattered mind itself; and Vasubandhu records the latter, half-grants its reasoning, yet declines it as his tenet. This chapter, on the volume's footing, holds a conversation with the Sautrāntika without adopting it — for the whole concentration sequence is unfolded on the side that takes concentration to have an analyzable factor-structure; we let the Sautrāntika subtraction be present, speak, and press, but do not let it serve as the final verdict.

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IV. Axis Two — Samādhi, Samāpatti, Samāhita: Three Terms, Not One Circle

This is the sharpest single stroke of the three axes, and it is purely philological. Chinese translators used several near-synonymous Sanskrit terms to render concepts around "concentration," and Western renderings then flatten them all back into samādhi; the result is that three terms of different extension get pressed into one. The Kośa itself, by a small chapter-boundary, proves they are not synonyms.

The most direct evidence is this chapter-turn:

"The attainments (samāpatti) have now been treated. What is the holding-in-concentration (samādhi)?"²⁰

"We have finished treating the attainments. Now, what is concentration-holding?" — a treatise that took the two for synonyms would never break the chapter and ask afresh like this. The three terms are each at their widest along a different axis; take them one by one.

Samādhi (等持, "concentration-holding"; one-pointedness of mind) — this is that samādhi which is a universally-present factor, present even in a scattered mind (weak, not absent, as seen above). Along the axis of which minds it pervades, it is the widest.

Samāpatti (等至, the attainment one enters) — its peculiarity is that it subsumes the two mindless attainments. The attainment of non-perception and the attainment of cessation are acittaka (mindless): in them there is no mind, and so none of that mental factor one-pointedness; yet they are still counted as samāpatti.²¹ So along the axis of which absorptive states it covers, samāpatti is wider than samādhi: some attainments — those two mindless ones — contain no samādhi at all.

Samāhita (等引, the composed / evenly-led state) — the Kośa gives it no flat "samāhita means …" definition; its sense has to be reconstructed from usage. The treatise says the two mindless attainments are "produced from a mind that is composed" — produced by a mind in a prior composed state.²² Reconstructing from this: samāhita is the state, produced-by-leading, in which mind and mental factors run on level and continuous; it excludes the scattered mind. (Because the Kośa's chapter on concentration gives no nominal definition, the sense of samāhita here is reconstructed from the verb-usage, not a verbatim line of the treatise.)

The Mahāvibhāṣā arranges the difference between samādhi and samāpatti into several paired contrasts, which confirm precisely that they are not co-extensive:

"Question: what is the difference between samādhi and samāpatti? Answer. Some say: samādhi has one thing for its substance, samāpatti the five aggregates. Some say: samādhi is of one instant, samāpatti is continuous. Some say: every samādhi is a samāpatti; there are samāpattis that are not samādhi — namely the attainment of non-perception and the attainment of cessation."²³

Samādhi has one thing (that single mental factor) for its substance, samāpatti the five aggregates; samādhi can be spoken of in a single instant, samāpatti is continuous; and the most decisive line — "there are samāpattis that are not samādhi," namely the two mindless attainments of non-perception and of cessation: they are attainments, yet not samādhi (having no one-pointedness of mind).

How, then, do the three terms close? Each is widest along one axis; they overlap without coinciding — like three half-interlocking circles. Samādhi is widest along which minds it reaches (down to the scattered mind), samāpatti widest along which absorptive states it covers (down to the mindless attainments), samāhita the level state produced by leading. One line is worth adding: when the discussion is of the term concentration as such, samādhi and concentration are different in name, one in substance — "samādhi and concentration are different in name, one in substance … this too is named one-pointedness of mind"²⁴; the discrimination of the three terms does not cancel this core identity, it only returns each of the neighbouring terms — so often conflated with it — to its proper place.

Here one comparative break should be stated honestly. The Theravāda does not replicate this "holding / attainment / composed" architecture of three terms. What the southern tradition divides is samādhi (the mental factor), samāpatti (the attainment one dwells in), and jhāna; and, beyond that, the pair appanā and upacāra (absorption-concentration and access-concentration), a distinction for which the Sarvāstivāda has no counterpart. To force the southern vocabulary into the Kośa's three-term grid would distort it. This section therefore cannot lay out a one-to-one comparison table — and that is exactly where the discipline of "set the two traditions side by side, do not force the seam" applies: in some places the comparison simply breaks, and marking honestly where it breaks is better than welding a false bridge across the gap.

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V. Axis Three — Relished, Pure, Undefiled: Absorption Classified by Defilement

This is the safest and most far-reaching of the three axes: it is pure Abhidharma ontological classification, touching neither the jhāna-factors nor the awakening-factors. The Mahāvibhāṣā sets it out cleanly:

"The first dhyāna is of three kinds: relished-associated, pure, and undefiled. The relished-associated is the craving-associated. Craving can hold the mind in a streaming flow upon its object; because its character accords with concentration, it alone takes the name [relished]. … 'Pure' means the wholesome-with-taints. 'Undefiled' means the noble path."²⁵

Keep firmly in mind that this is the defilement axis. Relished, pure, and undefiled are not three methods one may choose to cultivate, but three moral-ontological states one and the same absorption may be in. The relished absorption is an absorption defiled by craving — you crave the very absorptive state you have entered, and so this absorption is "stuck fast" by craving. The pure absorption is a clean, mundane, wholesome absorption. The undefiled absorption is an absorption associated with the noble path. One and the same first jhāna may be relished, pure, or undefiled, depending on what mental factor accompanies it. The four dhyānas and the lower three formless attainments all admit these three; only the peak — neither-perception-nor-non-perception — having no noble path, admits only the relished and the pure.

The Mahāvibhāṣā fixes the ontological status of the relished absorption precisely:

"Here the relished-associated dhyānas and formless attainments are all obstructive-yet-indeterminate. Because they can obstruct the noble path and its preparatory effort, they are called obstructive (nivṛta); because they do not summon a ripened fruit, they are called indeterminate (avyākṛta)."²⁶

The relished absorption is "obstructive-yet-indeterminate" (nivṛta-avyākṛta) — it can obstruct the noble path (hence "obstructive"), yet it summons no ripened karmic fruit (hence "indeterminate"). This is a diagnostic category: the tradition uses it to name the fault of "craving one's own meditative absorption." Read it as description, never as guide: there is no method here of "how to savour your absorption," only an ontological classification of "how the tradition names a particular fault within absorption."

One important qualification must be added. A rather affecting account — that "the object of the relished absorption is the pure absorption of the preceding instant" — must be handled with care. The Mahāvibhāṣā does record this account, but it is a canvassed opinion ("some masters hold"), set aside by the verdict:

"Some masters hold: this means that immediately after the pure absorption there arises the relished-associated absorption, and the pure absorption is what is relished, being its object … The verdict: know that the first account is the better. For here, in entering and emerging, the discussion is framed throughout on the relished absorption itself."²⁷

"The verdict: know that the first account is the better" — the Mahāvibhāṣā's ruling is that the earlier account is the right one. So if one wishes to use the affecting frame of "the relished absorption craving the prior pure absorption," one must flag it: that is an opinion the Mahāvibhāṣā records and the verdict sets aside, not the Sarvāstivāda's settled doctrine.

Finally, return to this axis's ontological yield: samādhi is one and the same substance of concentration, and the so-called "three kinds" of difference are set up by reference to the different things it counters — this is "one substance, many names" restated along another dimension:

"Question: the substance of concentration is one only — namely, among the mental factors, samādhi. How are three kinds of difference set up? Answer: by the close countering of three obstructions. The emptiness-samādhi closely counters the view of a real self; the wishless-samādhi closely counters the clinging to rules-and-vows; the signless-samādhi closely counters doubt."²⁸

But here lies the chapter's highest risk of confusion, and it must be prised apart on the spot: the Mahāvibhāṣā contains three orthogonal "triads of concentration," which must never be laid over one another.

First, relished / pure / undefiled — the defilement axis (what moral state the absorption is in).

Second, emptiness / signless / wishless — the liberation-gate axis (by which mode of emptiness an undefiled absorption inclines toward release). Note: all three of these belong to the undefiled; the whole family lives inside the single "undefiled" cell of the relished / pure / undefiled triad. They are not parallel alternatives to relished / pure / undefiled, but a sub-division beneath it.

Third, with-applied-and-sustained / with-sustained-alone / with-neither — the applied-thought-stage axis (handled in the preceding chapter; flagged here only for its location²⁹).

The three axes are orthogonal, and whenever they appear together each must be labelled by its own axis. One point demands special vigilance: the Āgamas, too, speak of "three (or four) samādhis," but those belong to the liberation-gate family —

"There is the boundless-mind samādhi, the signless-mind samādhi, the nothingness-mind samādhi, the emptiness-mind samādhi … What is the emptiness samādhi? It is when a noble disciple [contemplates that] the world is empty — contemplates the world as empty as it really is, abiding unchanging, not-self, not-mine; this is called the emptiness-mind samādhi."³⁰

The Āgamas' "three samādhis" (emptiness, signless, nothingness/boundless) are the liberation-gate family, subsumed under the exhaustion of greed, hatred, and delusion; they are homonymous-but-not-identical with the Abhidharma's relished / pure / undefiled defilement triad, with zero overlap of members. Holding to this is the lifeline that keeps the chapter from anachronism.

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VI. One Scale, Three Readings: Modern Interlocutors and the Close of Part III

Gather the whole chapter into one image: the ontological scale. Three houses each set the same "concentration" on the same scale and read off different answers to "is there anything there, and what is it." The Sarvāstivāda says there is indeed an item on the scale — a really-existent separate dharma, present in every mind, perduring across time — so that the concentration you cultivate can be held in possession, lost, and re-entered as one and the same it. The Sautrāntika says there is no extra item on the scale — what you weigh is only this un-scattered mind itself, and "concentration" is merely the name of its phase of being one.

And the Theravāda? This is the third reading held in reserve above and now to be supplied. The Theravāda, too, sets concentration on the scale, and it too reads off "something there": one-pointedness of mind (ekaggatā) is, in the southern Abhidhamma, an ultimate real (paramattha-dhamma), a really-existent mental factor, not a mere nominal designation. But its "something there" is not the Sarvāstivāda's: the Sarvāstivāda's is a substance that perdures across the three times (dravya), the Theravāda's a momentarily arising-and-ceasing (khaṇika) real that has its own nature (sabhāva) and lapses in the very instant. In other words, the weight on the scale, as the Theravāda reads it, falls away each instant and must be raised again instant by instant. So one must never caricature the Theravāda as a nominalist — it affirms that dharmas have own-natures, and is no flat anti-realism; its difference from the Sarvāstivāda lies not in "real versus name" but on the finer graduation of "perduring substance versus momentary real." (The southern account here is carried throughout by doctrinal paraphrase; this chapter quotes no Pāli Abhidhamma or commentarial text verbatim.³¹)

So the truth behind the title's "two schools" emerges: the Sarvāstivāda and the Theravāda are in fact allies — both set concentration up as a really-existent dharma with an own-nature, differing only in chassis (perduring substance versus momentary real). What unsettles that consensus is the third voice that surfaces inside the Kośa.

Western scholarship hands us three serviceable tools here. Collett Cox's reconstruction of how, and why, the Sarvāstivāda pushed these contested dharmas (concentration among them) from a slot in a doctrinal list all the way to dravyasat, a really-existent thing, remains unsurpassed for precision; her thesis "from category to ontology" is the very spine of this chapter's third section.³² But this chapter pushes her question one step further: Cox reads the dispute as an intra-Indian problem of existence; this chapter reads it as a soteriological one — for a meditator, the ruling on "is concentration a thing" bears directly on "is the concentration you cultivate one and the same item you can acquire, hold, lose, and re-enter, or a being-one that must be freshly produced instant by instant." The ontological ruling carries a contemplative consequence Cox does not pursue — but that is a diagnosis, not a manual of practice.

The southern arm rests on Y. Karunadasa's analysis of the paramattha-dhamma framework: dharmas are the irreducible reals reached by ultimate analysis, momentary, each with its own nature, yet wholly conditionally arisen; ekaggatā is just such a really-existent mental factor and not a perduring substance.³³ He holds the line that the Theravāda is no nominalism. This chapter reads the southern momentary-and-own-natured account against the Sarvāstivāda substance-and-mental-factor account, making "the two schools" a structured contrast, and so raising the cross-tradition question that Karunadasa, treating one tradition alone, would not pose.³⁴ As for the modern reconstruction of the Sarvāstivāda caitta architecture — why concentration is listed universally-present, how relished / pure / undefiled are systematically differentiated — K. L. Dhammajoti's northern survey can be consulted (the facet drawn on here is the mental-factor ontological status of concentration and the relished / pure / undefiled classification, distinct from the meditation-object taxonomy borrowed in the preceding chapter).³⁵

The thinness of the scholarship must be stated honestly: there is no sustained Western monograph taking, as its specific object, "the Sarvāstivāda and the Theravāda collated on the ontological status of concentration"; the question is reached only obliquely, through the dharma-theory of unmanifest matter and the mental factors (Cox, Dhammajoti), or through the two systems' general dharma-frameworks (Karunadasa). The two-school collation of the substance of absorption offered here is one small filling-in of that thin commentary.

Two red lines, to be hooked back in at the close. First, this chapter is diagnosis, not verdict: we see clearly how each house answers "does concentration have an own-substance," but rule nothing on whose meditation is the true article. Second, concentration is not mindfulness: the one-pointedness, the ekaggatā, treated throughout has been, from first to last, a mental factor distinct from mindfulness (sati) — a point both traditions share, marked plainly here once.

So Part III closes. The first chapter asked "who cultivates concentration" (the axis of the person); the second, "of what is concentration built" (the axis of the jhāna-factor); this one, "is concentration a thing" (the axis of the substance of absorption). Taken together, the three axes are the Abhidharma's complete dissection of a word — "concentration" — that the suttas had long used but never once taken up as an object of inquiry.

And the scalpel will be whetted once more. Part IV turns to the Mahāyāna: when the perfection of meditative absorption is taken over by the operator that is prajñā, the question "does concentration have an own-substance" will be re-framed — not by reverting to the Sautrāntika's "no separate substance" subtraction (the Sautrāntika is not Madhyamaka; never conflate the two), but by setting the whole scale, reading and all, inside emptiness and asking again. That is for later. This chapter only whets the ontological blade and leaves it here:

Is absorption a thing, or a name?

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References

Primary Buddhist Sources

• Saṃyukta Āgama (《雜阿含經》), tr. Guṇabhadra (Liu Song), Taishō vol. 2, No. 99 (T0099《雜阿含經》Saṃyukta-āgamaT2, No. 99Guṇabhadra (Liu Song, ca. 435 CE)View on CBETA online reader ↗).
• Madhyama Āgama (《中阿含經》), tr. Saṅghadeva (Eastern Jin), Taishō vol. 1, No. 26 (T0026《中阿含經》MadhyamāgamaT1, No. 26View on CBETA online reader ↗).
• Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya (《阿毘達磨俱舍論》), composed by Vasubandhu, tr. Xuanzang (Tang), Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗).
• Nyāyānusāra (《阿毘達磨順正理論》), composed by Saṃghabhadra, tr. Xuanzang (Tang), Taishō vol. 29, No. 1562 (T1562《阿毘達磨順正理論》T29, No. 1562View on CBETA online reader ↗).
• Mahāvibhāṣā (《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》), tr. Xuanzang (Tang), Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗).
• Dharmaskandha (《阿毘達磨法蘊足論》), tr. Xuanzang (Tang), Taishō vol. 26, No. 1537 (T1537《阿毘達磨法蘊足論》T26, No. 1537View on CBETA online reader ↗).
• Prakaraṇapāda (《阿毘達磨品類足論》), composed by Vasumitra, tr. Xuanzang (Tang), Taishō vol. 26, No. 1542 (T1542《阿毘達磨品類足論》T26, No. 1542View on CBETA online reader ↗).
• Satyasiddhi-śāstra (《成實論》), composed by Harivarman, tr. Kumārajīva (Later Qin), Taishō vol. 32, No. 1646 (T1646《成實論》T32, No. 1646View on CBETA online reader ↗).

Pāli Parallels (CC0)

The two Pāli texts below are cited as parallels; the southern Abhidhamma is taken by paraphrase throughout, and embeds none of it verbatim except these CC0 canonical anchors.

• Dīgha Nikāya 22, Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna-sutta (Mahāsaṅgīti CC0 edition; Sujato CC0 translation) — the second jhāna's cetaso ekodibhāvaṁ … samādhijaṁ, ekodibhāva cognate to ekaggatā.
• Aṅguttara Nikāya 11.1, Kimatthiya-sutta (same) — samādhi … yathābhūtañāṇadassanattho, concentration defined by its purpose, not yet reified.

Modern Scholarship (engaged by paraphrase, not quoted)

• Cox, Collett. Disputed Dharmas: Early Buddhist Theories on Existence. An Annotated Translation of the Section on Factors Dissociated from Thought from Saṃghabhadra's Nyāyānusāra. Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1995. (The reconstruction of Sarvāstivāda realism; "from category to ontology.")
• Karunadasa, Y. The Theravāda Abhidhamma: Its Inquiry into the Nature of Conditioned Reality. Hong Kong: Centre of Buddhist Studies, University of Hong Kong, 2010; and The Dhamma Theory: Philosophical Cornerstone of the Abhidhamma. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, 1996. (The paramattha-dhamma framework; the Theravāda is not nominalist.)
• Dhammajoti, K. L. Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma. 4th ed. Hong Kong: Buddha-Dharma Centre of Hong Kong, 2015. (The northern caitta architecture; the relished / pure / undefiled differentiation.)
• (Bench, not housed) Ronkin, Noa. Early Buddhist Metaphysics: The Making of a Philosophical Tradition. London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2005; Stcherbatsky, Th. The Central Conception of Buddhism and the Meaning of the Word "Dharma". London: Royal Asiatic Society, 1923.

Sūtra & Śāstra Index

Short name	Full title	Composer / translator	Taishō no.
Saṃyukta Āgama	Saṃyukta Āgama	tr. Guṇabhadra	T0099《雜阿含經》Saṃyukta-āgamaT2, No. 99Guṇabhadra (Liu Song, ca. 435 CE)View on CBETA online reader ↗
Madhyama Āgama	Madhyama Āgama	tr. Saṅghadeva	T0026《中阿含經》MadhyamāgamaT1, No. 26View on CBETA online reader ↗
Kośa	Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya	Vasubandhu, tr. Xuanzang	T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗
Nyāyānusāra	Nyāyānusāra	Saṃghabhadra, tr. Xuanzang	T1562《阿毘達磨順正理論》T29, No. 1562View on CBETA online reader ↗
Mahāvibhāṣā	Mahāvibhāṣā	tr. Xuanzang	T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗
Dharmaskandha	Dharmaskandha	tr. Xuanzang	T1537《阿毘達磨法蘊足論》T26, No. 1537View on CBETA online reader ↗
Prakaraṇapāda	Prakaraṇapāda	Vasumitra, tr. Xuanzang	T1542《阿毘達磨品類足論》T26, No. 1542View on CBETA online reader ↗
Satyasiddhi	Satyasiddhi-śāstra	Harivarman, tr. Kumārajīva	T1646《成實論》T32, No. 1646View on CBETA online reader ↗
Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna-sutta	Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna-sutta	—	DN 22
Kimatthiya-sutta	Kimatthiya-sutta	—	AN 11.1

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Cross-References

• P09, The Forty Meditation-Objects: A Taxonomy (the axis of the person): who cultivates concentration — the practitioner's standing.
• P10, The Anatomy of a Jhāna-Factor (the axis of the jhāna-factor): of what concentration is built — the layer-by-layer falling-away of the jhāna-factors, the mechanism by which applied and sustained thought come to rest. This chapter takes up the three questions left at its close (the substance of absorption, the three absorptions, the three terms).
• This chapter (the axis of the substance of absorption): is concentration a thing — sealing the three axes of Part III.
• The SĪLA volume, the three houses of the substance of the precept: the parallel realism of the two houses on the substance of absorption, and the three-way dispute over the substance of the precept, are worth viewing together; flagged at footnote level only, not developed.
• Part IV (forthcoming): the Mahāyāna perfection of meditative absorption will re-frame the question of "concentration's own-substance" through prajñā.

Footnotes

1. Saṃyukta Āgama, discourse 659, tr. Guṇabhadra: "What is the concentration-faculty? The samādhi that arises in one who has first given rise to the mind set on awakening in the Tathāgata — this is called the concentration-faculty." Taishō vol. 2, No. 99 (T0099《雜阿含經》Saṃyukta-āgamaT2, No. 99Guṇabhadra (Liu Song, ca. 435 CE)View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

2. Saṃyukta Āgama, discourse 647: "What is the concentration-faculty? If a monk, secluded from sensual desires … on up to the fourth jhāna, enters and abides — this is called the concentration-faculty." Taishō vol. 2, No. 99 (T0099《雜阿含經》Saṃyukta-āgamaT2, No. 99Guṇabhadra (Liu Song, ca. 435 CE)View on CBETA online reader ↗). Cf. SĀ 646 / 658 for the four jhānas glossing the concentration-faculty, and SĀ 698 for the four jhānas glossing the concentration-power. ↩

3. The distinction between mindfulness and concentration runs through this whole volume; in the Abhidharma both are separately established as distinct mental factors, and in the Theravāda each is an independent cetasika. The point is marked here once, not re-argued. ↩

4. Saṃyukta Āgama, discourse 785 (extract): "Right concentration is of two kinds: there is a right concentration that is worldly and ordinary, with taints, with grasping, turning toward good destinations; and there is a right concentration that is noble and supramundane, untainted, without grasping, rightly exhausting suffering … if the mind dwells unscattered, unmoving, gathered in, stilled, samādhi, the mind one, this is called right concentration." Taishō vol. 2, No. 99 (T0099《雜阿含經》Saṃyukta-āgamaT2, No. 99Guṇabhadra (Liu Song, ca. 435 CE)View on CBETA online reader ↗). The tainted / untainted division is the canonical warrant for the "undefiled" limb of the later relished / pure / undefiled triad; but the enumeration of relished, pure, and undefiled as a defilement triad has no canonical counterpart and is a post-canonical Abhidharma construction. Right concentration as the four jhānas, with "the mind made one" as its core verb, is also at the Madhyama Āgama, discourses 189 and 31, tr. Saṅghadeva, Taishō vol. 1, No. 26 (T0026《中阿含經》MadhyamāgamaT1, No. 26View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

5. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya, tr. Xuanzang: "As to the substance of meditative absorption, spoken of in sum: it is, on the side of the wholesome, one-pointedness of mind, for its own-nature is wholesome samādhi; if taken together with its helpers, it has the five aggregates for its nature. What is one-pointedness? It means being fixed on a single object." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

6. Prakaraṇapāda, composed by Vasumitra, tr. Xuanzang: "What is concentration? One-pointedness of mind." Taishō vol. 26, No. 1542 (T1542《阿毘達磨品類足論》T26, No. 1542View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

7. Prakaraṇapāda: "It makes the mind dwell, dwell evenly, dwell settled, dwell close, dwell firm — unscattered, undistracted, gathered, held-in-samādhi, one-pointed; this is called concentration." Taishō vol. 26, No. 1542 (T1542《阿毘達磨品類足論》T26, No. 1542View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

8. Mahāvibhāṣā, tr. Xuanzang: "One-pointedness of mind is dhyāna, for samādhi is its own-nature." Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). To be precise: the Mahāvibhāṣā elsewhere says "the own-nature of dhyāna is the five aggregates," referring to the aggregates co-arising in the whole event of entering absorption; whereas "one-pointedness of mind is dhyāna, samādhi being its own-nature" refers to the one factor within it called "concentration." The Sarvāstivāda ontological claim treated here (concentration as a really-existent separate dharma, a universally-present factor) rests on the latter. ↩

9. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: "Moreover, samādhi is a universally-present factor; it should be that in every mind there is a turning toward one object." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

10. Mahāvibhāṣā: even the scattered mind has that samādhi. Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

11. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: "Not so — the samādhi of the other [non-concentrated] states is merely weak." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

12. Dharmaskandha, tr. Xuanzang: "All the mind's dwelling, dwelling evenly … up to one-pointedness of mind, associated with undefiled attention, is together named concentration; it is also named the concentration-faculty, also the concentration-power, also the concentration awakening-factor, also right concentration." Taishō vol. 26, No. 1537 (T1537《阿毘達磨法蘊足論》T26, No. 1537View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

13. Mahāvibhāṣā: "Yet samādhi may be spoken of as one … among the five faculties it is named the concentration-faculty, among the five powers the concentration-power, among the seven awakening-factors the concentration awakening-factor, among the eight path-limbs right concentration." Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

14. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: "If that is so, then it is just the state of the mind being fixed on a single object that the name 'samādhi' is set up upon; there need be no further, separate mental factor. [To claim] a separate dharma that makes the mind turn upon a single object and call that samādhi — its substance just is the mind." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). This is the counter recorded by Vasubandhu — the Sautrāntika (Dārṣṭāntika) denial of a separate concentration mental factor. The line must be cited whole; excerpting only "its substance just is the mind" reverses the sense. ↩

15. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: "Some masters hold: this inner clarity, this samādhi, this applied-and-sustained thought, all have no separate substance. — If they had no separate substance, they could not be set up as mental factors. [Reply:] even a difference of phase in the mind may be named a mental factor. Though this reasoning has merit, it is not the tenet of my school." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). This line fixes Vasubandhu's posture: he records and respects the counter-view without making it his tenet; one must not read it as "Vasubandhu holds that concentration has no separate substance." The Kośa is itself a commentary on the Vaibhāṣika carrying a Sautrāntika-sympathetic editorial stance — it marks the tension out without resolving it. ↩

16. Nyāyānusāra, composed by Saṃghabhadra, tr. Xuanzang: "The function of samādhi is that it can settle the mind; cognizing an object is the function of consciousness … Moreover, the scriptures attest that samādhi really has a separate substance, as a sutta says: two things are to be cultivated, namely calm and insight. If one denied any real samādhi, one would contradict these and countless suttas." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1562 (T1562《阿毘達磨順正理論》T29, No. 1562View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

17. Nyāyānusāra: "Moreover, if the substance of samādhi just is the mind, then perception and the rest should likewise have no separate nature … the mind's receiving agreeable and disagreeable objects would be called feeling; the mind's fashioning wholesome and unwholesome deeds would be called volition. Then there is mind alone, and there should be no [other] three." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1562 (T1562《阿毘達磨順正理論》T29, No. 1562View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

18. Nyāyānusāra: "Mind and mental factors are of the nature of association, not the nature of being-held-in-samādhi. Why? Because in every state their association is without more or less, whereas the nature of samādhi has more and less across the states." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1562 (T1562《阿毘達磨順正理論》T29, No. 1562View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

19. Satyasiddhi-śāstra, composed by Harivarman, tr. Kumārajīva: "Therefore know: there is only mind, and no separate mental factors. … I do not say there are no mental factors; I say only that, because they are differentiations of the mind, they are named mental factors." Taishō vol. 32, No. 1646 (T1646《成實論》T32, No. 1646View on CBETA online reader ↗). The Satyasiddhi is of relatively even hand, staging both a no-mental-factors chapter and an establishing-mental-factors chapter; in citing this deflationary line, it must be flagged that what is taken is its "only-mind, nothing-separate" face, not the whole of its conclusion. ↩

20. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: "The attainments have now been treated. What is concentration-holding?" Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

21. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: the attainment of non-perception and the attainment of cessation are mindless (acittaka) states, within which there is no mental factor of one-pointedness, yet they are still classed as attainments (samāpatti). Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

22. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: "These two attainments are produced from a mind that is composed." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). The Kośa's chapter on concentration gives no nominal "samāhita means …" definition; the sense of samāhita (the composed / evenly-led state) used in this chapter is reconstructed from the verb-usage "produced from a mind that is composed," not a verbatim line of the treatise. ↩

23. Mahāvibhāṣā: "Question: what is the difference between samādhi and samāpatti? Answer. Some say: samādhi has one thing for its substance, samāpatti the five aggregates. Some say: samādhi is of one instant, samāpatti is continuous. Some say: every samādhi is a samāpatti; there are samāpattis that are not samādhi — namely the attainment of non-perception and the attainment of cessation." Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

24. Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya: "Samādhi and concentration are different in name, one in substance … this too is named one-pointedness of mind." Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558 (T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

25. Mahāvibhāṣā: "The first dhyāna is of three kinds: relished-associated, pure, and undefiled. The relished-associated is the craving-associated. Craving can hold the mind in a streaming flow upon its object; because its character accords with concentration, it alone takes the name. … 'Pure' means the wholesome-with-taints. 'Undefiled' means the noble path." Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). The Kośa concurs (cf. T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). The peak (neither-perception-nor-non-perception) admits only the relished and the pure, having no noble path (cf. Mahāvibhāṣā, T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

26. Mahāvibhāṣā: "Here the relished-associated dhyānas and formless attainments are all obstructive-yet-indeterminate. Because they can obstruct the noble path and its preparatory effort, they are called obstructive; because they do not summon a ripened fruit, they are called indeterminate." Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

27. Mahāvibhāṣā: "Some masters hold: this means that immediately after the pure absorption there arises the relished-associated absorption, and the pure absorption is what is relished, being its object … The verdict: know that the first account is the better. For here, in entering and emerging, the discussion is framed throughout on the relished absorption itself." Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). The "relished absorption craves the prior pure absorption" reading is thus a canvassed opinion ("some masters hold") that the Mahāvibhāṣā's verdict sets aside, not the Sarvāstivāda's settled doctrine. ↩

28. Mahāvibhāṣā: "Question: the substance of concentration is one only — namely, among the mental factors, samādhi. How are three kinds of difference set up? Answer: by the close countering of three obstructions. The emptiness-samādhi closely counters the view of a real self; the wishless-samādhi closely counters the clinging to rules-and-vows; the signless-samādhi closely counters doubt." Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545 (T1545《阿毘達磨大毘婆沙論》T27, No. 1545View on CBETA online reader ↗). ↩

29. The triad of samādhi as with-applied-and-sustained / with-sustained-alone / with-neither belongs to the applied-thought-stage axis, handled in Part III's second chapter (the axis of the jhāna-factor); the Kośa uses this triad to gloss "concentration-holding" (cf. T1558《阿毘達磨俱舍論》Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣyaT29, No. 1558View on CBETA online reader ↗). Flagged here only for its location, not re-walked. ↩

30. Saṃyukta Āgama, discourse 567 (extract): "There is the boundless-mind samādhi, the signless-mind samādhi, the nothingness-mind samādhi, the emptiness-mind samādhi … What is the emptiness samādhi? It is when a noble disciple [contemplates that] the world is empty — contemplates the world as empty as it really is, abiding unchanging, not-self, not-mine; this is called the emptiness-mind samādhi." Taishō vol. 2, No. 99 (T0099《雜阿含經》Saṃyukta-āgamaT2, No. 99Guṇabhadra (Liu Song, ca. 435 CE)View on CBETA online reader ↗). The suttas' "three (or four) samādhis" are the emptiness / signless / nothingness (boundless) liberation-gate family — homonymous-but-not-identical with the Abhidharma's relished / pure / undefiled defilement triad, with zero overlap of members. ↩

31. The southern Abhidhamma account of one-pointedness (ekaggatā) as a mental factor — kusalacittekaggatā, and its fourfold analysis by characteristic, function, manifestation, and proximate cause — is carried throughout this chapter by doctrinal paraphrase; no Visuddhimagga or Pāli Abhidhamma text is quoted verbatim. The only two attestable Pāli anchors (below) are public-domain canonical texts. ↩

32. Collett Cox, Disputed Dharmas: Early Buddhist Theories on Existence — An Annotated Translation of the Section on Factors Dissociated from Thought from Saṃghabhadra's Nyāyānusāra (Tokyo: International Institute for Buddhist Studies, 1995; Studia Philologica Buddhica, Monograph Series XI); see also her "From Category to Ontology: The Changing Role of Dharma in Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma," Journal of Indian Philosophy 32 (2004): 543–597. Her reconstruction of Saṃghabhadra's realist arguments, and her "from category to ontology" thesis, are the principal interlocutor of this chapter's third section; engaged by paraphrase, not quoted. ↩

33. Y. Karunadasa, The Theravāda Abhidhamma: Its Inquiry into the Nature of Conditioned Reality (Hong Kong: Centre of Buddhist Studies, University of Hong Kong, 2010; rpt. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2019); and The Dhamma Theory: Philosophical Cornerstone of the Abhidhamma (Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society, Wheel No. 412/413, 1996). Engaged by paraphrase. ↩

34. This cross-tradition meta-question — whether the two traditions' parallel realism about the substance of absorption runs parallel to the three-way dispute over the "substance of the precept" (śīla) in the Vinaya literature — is flagged only at footnote level. The SĪLA volume treats the three houses of the precept-substance in a dedicated chapter; it is not developed here, nor should the "seed" third house of the precept-substance dispute be transplanted into this chapter's two-school structure, lest a non-existent "third house of the substance of absorption" be fabricated. ↩

35. K. L. Dhammajoti, Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma, 4th ed. (Hong Kong: The Buddha-Dharma Centre of Hong Kong, 2015). The facet drawn on here (the mental-factor ontological status of concentration and the relished / pure / undefiled classification) differs from the one borrowed in the preceding chapter (the northern meditation-object taxonomy), and so is a deliberate re-visit, not a repetition. — The two attestable Pāli anchors: Dīgha Nikāya 22 (Mahāsatipaṭṭhāna), which glosses the second jhāna with cetaso ekodibhāvaṁ … samādhijaṁ — ekodibhāva being a process-word cognate to the Abhidhamma factor ekaggatā; and Aṅguttara Nikāya 11.1 (Kimatthiya), samādhi … yathābhūtañāṇadassanattho, which defines concentration teleologically, by its purpose (knowing-and-seeing as things really are), and not yet by reification. Both follow the Mahāsaṅgīti / Bhikkhu Sujato public-domain (CC0) editions. Note the seam: ekodibhāva is the sutta's process-word, ekaggatā the Abhidhamma's mental factor; the Abhidhamma's substantivizing of the sutta's process-word into a factor is precisely the move this chapter diagnoses — the two are cognate, not identical. ↩