Five purifications

Five purifications [alt. "five purifications pertaining to wisdom"]. The last five of the seven purifications, which pertain to wisdom (prajñā).

These five are:

1. Purification of view (ditthi-visuddhi)
2. Purification by overcoming doubt (kankha-vitarana-visuddhi)
3. Purification by knowledge and vision of what is path and not-path (maggamagga-nanadassana-visuddhi)
4. Purification by knowledge and vision of the course of practice (patipada–nanadassana-visuddhi)
5. Purification by knowledge and vision (nanadassana-visuddhi)

Venerable Uttamo Thera states:

In the Path of Purification, Buddhaghosa explained the soil of understanding and its development in brief. The soil of understanding was classed as—khandhas (aggregates), āyatanas (bases), dhatus (elements), indriyas (faculties), saccas (truths), paṭicca-samuppāda (dependent origination), etc.

The first two purifications of virtue (sīla) and consciousness (citta) are the roots of soil of knowledge. The other five - purification of view, by overcoming doubt, by knowledge and vision of what is the path and what is not the path, by knowledge and vision of the way and by knowledge and vision - are the trunk.

Therefore, a yogi who wants to perfect these should first fortify his knowledge by learning and questioning about these things that are the soil. After he has perfected sīla and samādhi that are the roots. Then he can develop the last five purifications that are the trunk.

Here we can take the development of the last five purifications as bhāvanā contemplation. The three kinds of full understanding (tisso pariññā); i.e., the full understanding of the known (ñāta pariññā), full understating by scrutinization (tīraṇa pariññā) and full understanding by abandoning (pahāna pariññā) are its development.

One Teacher, Many Traditions states:

The wisdom arising from meditation may be spoken of in two ways: the five mundane superknowledges (Vism 12–13) and the five purifications. Purification of view, purification by overcoming doubt, purification by knowledge and vision of what is and is not the path, and purification by knowledge and vision of the way are mundane purifications. Purification by knowledge and vision is the supramundane knowledge of the four ariya paths (Vism 18–22).

See also

• Prajna-paramita (bodhisattva path)
• Seven purifications

Sources

• Dalai Lama; Thubten Chodron (2014), Buddhism: One Teacher, Many Traditions, Wisdom Publications 

Further reading

• Purifications (Buddhism), Encyclopedia of World Problems and Human Potential