Dhammakaya Meditation

Dhammakaya Meditation on the Vipassana Level

Dhammakaya meditation embarks on the Vipassana level at a later stage than some other meditation schools available in Thailand. In this school, insight relies on purity of ‘seeing and knowing’ (ñānadassana-visuddhi) i.e. a mind that is stable, and has penetrative insight into the reality of life and the world. Such insight will allow the meditator to have penetrative knowledge of the Five Aggregates (khanda) , the Twelve Sense Spheres (āyatana) , the Eighteen Elements (dhātu) , the Twenty-Two Faculties (indriya) , the Four Noble Truths and Dependent Origination. The meditator sees and knows clearly through their insight knowledge that all things composed of the Five Aggregates exhibit the Three marks of existence and for the meditator, there arises dispassion (ekantanibbida] and detachment (viraga) and accomplishes sequential shedding of the defilements until an end to defilements can be reached.

The meditator sees and knows with the latter four of the five eyes the Buddha himself attained - but in Dhammakaya Meditation, the level of attainment is usually explained in terms of equivalent inner bodies which start with the physical human body and the subtle human body (astral body or subtle body) and which go in successively deeper layers until reaching the body of enlightenment (Dhammakaya) of the arahant - the number of bodies totalling eighteen.

Five Eyes of the Buddha	Dhammakaya Meditation Equivalent Inner Bodies	Equivalent jhana level
physical eye (mamsacakkhu)	physical human body subtle human body	first jhana
angelic eye (dibbacakkhu)	coarse angelic body subtle angelic body	second jhana
eye of wisdom (paññâcakkhu)	coarse form brahma body subtle form brahma body	third jhana
eye of omniscience (samantacakkhu)	coarse formless brahma body subtle formless brahma body	fourth jhana
Buddha-eye (Buddhacakkhu)/ Dhamma-eye (Dhammacakkhu)	coarse Gotrabhu Dhammakaya body subtle Gotrabhu Dhammakaya body coarse stream enterer Dhammakaya body subtle stream-enterer Dhammakaya body coarse once-returner Dhammakaya body subtle once-returner Dhammakaya body coarse non-returner Dhammakaya body subtle non-returner Dhammakaya body coarse arahant Dhammakaya body subtle arahant Dhammakaya body	paths and fruits of Nirvana

The process of purification corresponds with that described in the Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta where the arising of brightness is accompanied by the inner eye [cakkhu], knowing [ñāna], wisdom [paññā] and knowledge [vijjā].  The meditator will see the nature of the Dhamma (inner mental phenomena) and according to the Lord Buddha’s advice to Vakkali he who sees the Dhamma will see the Buddha (see also Eternal Buddha). Thus, in Dhammakaya meditation, the Buddha's words are taken literally as seeing one's inner body of enlightenment which is in the form of a Buddha sitting in meditation.
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