[Buddha-l] 8 Freedoms and 10 Favorable Circumstances

[Dan Lusthaus]

Hal asks:

> What are the Eight freedoms and The Ten Favorable Circumstances?

>From Soothill's Chinese-English Buddhist Dictionary:

八解脫 aṣṭa-vimokṣa, mokṣa, vimukti, mukti. Liberation, deliverance, freedom,
emancipation, escape, release―in eight forms; also 八背捨 and cf. 解脫 and 八勝處.
The eight are stages of mental concentration: (1) 内有色想觀外色解脱 Liberation, when
subjective desire arises, by examination of the object, or of all things and
realization of their filthiness. (2) 内無色想觀外色解脫 Liberation, when no
subjective desire arises, by still meditating as above. These two
are　deliverance by meditation on impurity, the next on　purity. (3) 淨身作證具足住解脫
Liberation by concentration on the pure to the realization of a permanent
state of freedom from all desire. The above three "correspond to the four
Dhyānas". (Eitel.) (4) 空無邊處解脫 Liberation in realization of the infinity of
space, or the immaterial. (5) 識無邊處解脫 Liberation in realization of infinite
knowledge. (6) 無所有處解脫Liberation in realization of nothingness, or
nowhereness. (7) 非想非非想處解脫 Liberation in the state of mind where there is
neither thought nor absence of thought. These four arise out of abstract
meditation in regard to desire and form, and are associated with the 四空天.
(8) 滅受 想定解脫 Liberation by means of a state of mind in which there is final
extinction, nirvāṇa, of both sensation, vedanā, and consciousness, saṁjñā.



The "Ten Favorable Circumstances" is less clear. There are a number of
potential candidate lists, but without knowing the original term, it would
be hard to decide which one. Possibilities include the achieving 10
paramitas, etc.

Dan Lusthaus