早期佛教四禪之再審視－從巴利四部尼柯耶的用例看禪定在解脫中的地位=Re-examining the four jhānas in early Buddhism from the Pāli Nikāyas: the role of jhāna meditation in the path to liberation
This study attempts to re-examine the role of four-jhānas meditation method in the accomplishment of Buddhist liberation. The paper makes a great effort on searching for every relevant occurrence on the usage and related description of four-jhānas in the four Pāli Nikāyas, and trying to analyze their main meaning or intention appearing in various contexts. The result of some findings is applied to response to a heated discussion issue on Buddhist meditation in recent scholarship, regarding whether the shamatha represents a path of practice which is quite different from the so called vipassanā, and whether the jhāna or jhāna-alike meditation is not a necessary condition for the liberation but the paññā does play such a role. This paper tries to criticize Griffiths' assertion on this issue, and aims to provide evidence, suggesting that the jhāna/shamatha is as important as paññā/vipassanā. This view point is therefore in consistent with the model of liberation as ＂jhāna/shamatha + paññā/vipassanā = liberation.＂
