What is Enlightenment?

Drawing on a Bodhi Tree Leaf (18th century)

When I first embraced Buddhism I, like many Westerners, read a bunch of books which were mostly of the Theravada tradition. After years of dipping my toe in that tradition (and finding I really didn’t like mindfulness meditation terribly much) I gradually moved over to Mahayana Buddhism. It was the practices of Mahayana that drew me in (chanting mantras), and then the community which I found myself pulled into. I read Mahayana literature as I transitioned but I did not entirely understand how fundamentally different the Theravada and Mahayana perspective on enlightenment was until relatively recently. Still less so did I understand the differing views amongst the Mahayana schools. I had an idea in my head that Mahayana Buddhists essentially have the same view of nirvana as the Theravada, with the difference being that Mahayana Buddhists seek to delay their own enlightenment so they can bring other beings to enlightenment, ie, to be a Bodhisattva. My understanding was not wrong, but it was shallow and confused.

Bodhisattva literally means “enlightened being”. It is the ninth realm within the context of the ten realms of reality.* It is a state characterised by compassion but I have found that the goal of living compassionately can be a little frustrating. Compassion for compassion’s sake lacks focus, and for an introvert such as myself it does not come easy. I need a loftier goal, or a purpose around which compassion can orient itself. That goal is Buddhahood – the tenth and ultimate state.

Buddhahood is a state in which the true aspect of all phenomena, or the true nature of life, is realised. Reality is perceived, ultimate truth is understood.

“The Mahayana … emphasises the realisation of dharma, and de-emphasises nirvana [the cessation of suffering] … The Mahayana came to regard the essential Buddha not as a human being, but as the omnipresent truth (dharma) manifest in all things. To emphasise this distinction, Mahayana Buddhism refers to the dharmakaya or “truth-body” of the Buddha [Reat at 53] …”

Truth is Enlightenment and the Buddha is Truth

There is an ancient sutra which records the historical Buddha saying “whoever sees dharma sees me”. Mahayana Buddhism drew out this teaching, so that as dharma is equated with truth, so too is the Buddha. The Buddha is thus not merely a historical man but an eternal and omnipresent truth.

“… In early discussions of the true nature of the Buddha, especially regarding the person of the Buddha to whom one goes for refuge … the term dharmakaya seems to have been coined to refer to the corpus … of the auspicious qualities (dharma) of the Buddha, including his wisdom, his compassion, his various powers, etc; it also referred to the entire corpus (kaya) of the Buddha’s teachings (dharma). In the Mahayana, the term evolved into a kind of cosmic principle that was regarded as the true nature of the Buddha and the source from which his various other forms derived [Buswell & Lopez at 246] …”