DESCRIPTION
The Fifth Ground is called Sudurjayā, ‘Difficult to Conquer’ 極難勝. It is called this not because the Ground is difficult but rather, the bodhisattva who attains it is ‘difficult to conquer’ or overcome.
Entry into the Fifth Stage
The bodhisattva employs ten types of āśayaviśuddhisamatā - pure, equally regarding states-of-mind toward:
- Dharma of the Buddhas of the Past
- Dharma of the Buddhas of the Future
- Dharma of the Buddhas of the Present
- Moral Precepts
- Minds (self and other)
- Ridding oneself of views, doubts, and perplexity
- Knowledge of what is and what is not the Path
- Knowledge and vision associated with practice
- Achieving ever increasing supremacy in Dharmas constituting the Limbs of Enlightenment
- The equal teaching of beings
Abiding in the Fifth Stage
The bodhisattva knows, in accord with the True Characteristic of Reality:
- The Four Noble Truths: Knowing suffering, the accumulation of suffering, the cessation of the suffering and the Path
- Both the ‘Ultimate Truth’ and the ‘conventional truth’
- Characteristics and differentiations among phenomena
“So it is that the bodhisattva, through the knowledge associated with these Truths, knows all conditioned dharmas as false and deceptive, as characterized by ruination, as merely conventionally and momentarily abiding, and as conducive to the deception and delusion of the common person.”
Practices associated with the Fifth Stage
Contemplation of the causes of Beings’ suffering, accumulation of suffering, etc.
Transference of all ‘Good Roots’ toward anuttarā-saṃyak-saṃbodhi and the liberation of all beings
The use of upāya to aid sentient beings, applying all kinds of ‘worldly’ arts and skills
Analogy of Gold
Is is like the refining of refined gold that, when polished to a luster with musāragalva (alabaster), shines ever more supremely in its brightness
Use of the Four Means of Unification
In whatsoever endeavors they take up, whether that be the practice of giving, kind speech, volunteerism, or cooperation, they never depart from mindfulness of the Buddha, the Dharma, their Bodhisattva Companions, etc.
Association with the Ten Paramitas
Associated with dhyāna
Becoming a World Leader
Bodhisattvas dwelling on the fifth ground often become lords of the Tuṣita Heaven
Acquisition of Samadhis, sight of buddhas, etc.
Acquiring a thousand kotis of samadhis…