Arhat

A Chinese Luohan statue from the Liao Dynasty (907–1125) in Hebei Province, China

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In the sramanic traditions of ancient India (most notably those of Mahavira and Gautama Buddha) arhat (Sanskrit) or arahant (Pali) signified a spiritual practitioner who had—to use an expression common in the tipitaka—"laid down the burden"—and realised the goal of nirvana, the culmination of the spiritual life (brahmacarya). Such a person, having removed all causes for future becoming, is not reborn after biological death into any samsaric realm.

Contents

Origin

A Luohan, by Liu Songnian, late 12th-early 13th century, Song Dynasty.

The word "arahan" literally means "worthy one"[1] (an alternative folk etymology is "foe-destroyer" or "vanquisher of enemies"[2]) and constitutes the highest grade of noble person—ariya-puggala—described by the Buddha as recorded in the Pali canon. The word was used (as it is today in the liturgy of Theravada Buddhism) as an epithet of the Buddha himself as well as of his enlightened disciples. The most widely recited liturgical reference is perhaps the homage: Namo Tassa Bhagavato, Arahato, Samma-sammbuddhassa.—Homage to him, the Blessed One, the Worthy One, the perfectly enlightened Buddha.

Variations

Theravada Buddhism

In Theravada Buddhism the Buddha himself is first named as an arahant, as were his enlightened followers, since he is free from all defilements, without greed, hatred, and delusion, rid of ignorance and craving, having no "assets" that will lead to a future birth, knowing and seeing the real here and now. This virtue shows stainless purity, true worth, and the accomplishment of the end, nibbana.[3]

In the Pali canon, Ānanda states that he has known monastics to achieve nibbana in one of four ways:

In Theravada, although the Arahants have achieved the same goals as the Buddha, there are some differences among Arahants due to the way of their practice.

Mahayana Buddhism

Arhat figurines in the Huating Temple in the Western Hills near Kunming, China
A garden featuring depictions of various arhats (Hsi Lai Temple, California)

Mahayana Buddhists see the Buddha himself as the ideal towards which one should aim in one's spiritual aspirations. Hence the arhat, as an enlightened disciple of the Buddha, is not regarded as a goal as much as the bodhisattva. In the Mahayana tradition, Bodhisattva carries a meaning different from that in Theravada Buddhism. In the Pali scriptures the Tathagata, when relating his own experiences of self-development, often uses the phrase "when I was an unenlightened bodhisattva". Bodhisattva thus connotes here the absence of enlightenment of a person working towards that goal. In Mahayana Buddhism, on the other hand, a bodhisattva is someone who seeks to put the welfare of others before their own, forfeiting their own enlightenment until all beings are saved. Such a person is said to have achieved a proto-enlightenment called bodhicitta.

Jainism

Pre-Kushana Jain Arhat from Mathura

In Jainism, the term "arhat" or "arihant" is a synonym for jina and is a siddha who has not yet died and thereby lost all aghatiya karma.

It is not a synonym of Tirthankar, which refers specifically to certain arhats who have certain karmas that enable them to become teachers of Jainism. The Jain Navakar Mantra starts with "Namo Arhantanam".

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ An authoritative Pali-to-English translation of "arahant" can be found in Rhys Davids & Stede (1921–25), p. 77.[1]
  2. ↑ See Mitra, Rajendralala (ed) 1877 Lalitavistara or Memoirs of the Early Life of Sakya Sinha, Calcutta: Asiatic Society of Bengal, English appendix page 10(658).[2]
  3. ↑ Khantipalo (1989), "Introduction".[3]
  4. ↑ Ānanda's teaching on achieving arhantship can be found in AN 4.170. Translations for this sutta can be found in Bodhi (2005) pp. 268–9, 439, and Thanissaro (1998).
  5. ↑ Bodhi (2005), p. 268, translates this fourth way as: "a monk's mind is seized by agitation about the teaching." Thanissaro (1998) gives a seemingly contrary interpretation of: "a monk's mind has its restlessness concerning the Dhamma [Comm: the corruptions of insight] well under control." Thus, it appears possible to interpret the excitation (Pali: uddhacca, see Rhys Davids & Stede, 1921–25) as either something that the future arahant uses to impel their pursuit of the path or something that the future arahant controls in order to pursue the path.

References

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