Dharmacakṣus
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dharmacakṣus (P. dhammacakkhu; T. chos kyi mig ཆོས་ཀྱི་མིག་; C. fayan) is translated as "dharma eye," "eye of the dharma," etc. It is the enlightened capacity to understand the inherent truth of impermanance (anitya).[1]
The dharma eye (dharmacakṣus) is identified as:[1]
- one aspect of the "divine eye" (divyacakṣus)
- one of the five types of seeing (darsana)
In traditional texts, it is often said that a person's "dharma eye" opens when they gain correct understanding of the teachings of the Buddha.[1]
Peter Harvey states:
- What, then, is it to ‘see’ Dhamma with the ‘Dhamma-eye’? At S. III.135, a monk wanting to ‘see’ Dhamma is given a teaching on Conditioned Arising and its stopping, such that Dhamma was ‘penetrated’ by him. Indeed, insight into phenomena as ‘of the nature to arise’ can be seen as knowledge of Conditioned Arising, and insight into them as ‘of the nature to stop’ can be seen as knowledge of Nirvana, the stopping of all the links of Conditioned Arising (S.II.70). Such insight would be focused on the arising (samudaya) of dukkha from craving, and its stopping with the stopping of craving, the focus of the Buddha’s first sermon. Indeed at the end of the Buddha’s first sermon, the Dhamma-eye arose to one of the ascetics that the Buddha was teaching.[2]
Notes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Buswell & Lopez 2014, s.v. dharmacakṣus.
- ↑ Harvey 2013, Chapter 3, Section: The Fourth True Reality for the Spiritually Enobled.
Sources
Buswell, Robert E.; Lopez, Donald S. (2014), The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism, Princeton University
Harvey, Peter (2013), An Introduction to Buddhism (Second ed.), Cambridge University Press