Enlightenment the process of understanding
Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia is now 14 years old
Our Encyclopedia recently received a wonderful opportunity for a major renewal on its 14th birthday . After many years of growing our Encyclopedia had become bit slow and sometimes even decided not to answer when people knocked on the door.
A very big thank you and blessings to Dmytro Rudiy (rudiy.nl) for his great work in upgrading the server, website and all of the infrastructure and helping make TBE fast and reliable again for everyone! 🙏🙏🙏
We kindly ask our readers to help us cover the cost of this important upgrade and also help with the ongoing costs of keeping the Encyclopedia alive and freely available.
or card
Every little donation helps and every one is deeply appreciated. 🙏🙏🙏
OM AH HUM VAJRA GURU PADMA SIDDHI HUM 🙏🙏🙏
May blessings shower down on all of yous 🙏🙏🙏
While the English word enlightenment refers to the process of understanding, the Pāḷi word usually translated as enlightenment, bodhi, both means ‘to awaken,’ or ‘to understand,’ i.e. to open the eyes. When, as a result of practising the Buddha’s Dhamma, one deeply, fully and directly realizes the impermanent, inadequate and selfless nature of
conditioned phenomenon one is said to have become or to have attained enlightenment. Quite automatically, this realization brings about a radical change in one’s experience and one’s behaviour. Frustration, anxiety and
fear are replaced by peace and joy. A person who is enlightened is called either a Buddha or an arahat. The state itself is also often called Nirvāṇa.
According to the Buddha enlightenment comes in four stages, each triggered by the presence of particular spiritual qualities and the realization of certain truths. The first of these stages, Stream Winning (sotapāpatti), starts a process which
inevitably leads to complete enlightenment, either within a matter of minutes or perhaps a few lifetimes. Stream Winning is characterized by unshakable sense of certainty about the Three Refuges (aveccapasāda), effortless morality
(sīla), a realization that the body is not the self (sakkāyadiṭṭhi) and no longer clinging to morality and rules (sīlavataparamāsa, D.III,227). The other stages are called Once Returning (sakadāgāmitā), Non Returning (anāgāmitā) and the final stage, complete enlightenment (arahatta).