Rūpa

Hinduism

In Hinduism, many compound words are made using rūpa to describe subtle and spiritual realities such as the svarupa, meaning the form of the self. It may be used to express matter or material phenomena, especially that linked to the power of vision in samkhya, In the Bhagavad Gita, the Vishvarupa form, an esoteric conception of the Absolute is described.

Buddhism

Overall, rūpa is the Buddhist concept of material form, including both the body and external matter.

More specifically, in the Pali Canon, rūpa is contextualized in three significant frameworks:

• rūpa-khandha – "material forms," one of the five aggregates (khandha) by which all phenomena can be categorized (see Fig. 1).
• rūpa-āyatana – "visible objects," the external sense objects of the eye, one of the six external sense bases (āyatana) by which the world is known (see Fig. 2).
• nāma-rūpa – "name and form" or "mind and body," which in the causal chain of dependent origination (paticca-samuppāda) arises from consciousness and leads to the arising of the sense bases.

In addition, more generally, rūpa is used to describe a statue, in which it is sometimes called Buddharupa.

Rūpa-khandha

As matter, rūpa is traditionally analysed in two ways: as four primary elements (Pali, mahābhūta); and, as ten or twenty-four secondary or derived elements.

Four primary elements

Existing rūpa consists in the four primary or underived (no-upādā) elements:

• earth or solidity
• fire or heat
• water or cohesion
• air or movement

Derived matter

In the Abhidhamma Pitaka and later Pali literature, rūpa is further analyzed in terms of ten or twenty-three or twenty-four types of secondary or derived (upādā) matter. In the list of ten types of secondary matter, the following are identified:

• eye
• ear
• nose
• tongue
• body
• form
• sound
• odour
• taste
• touch

If twenty-four secondary types are enumerated, then the following fifteen are added to the first nine of the above ten:

• femininity
• masculinity or virility
• life or vitality
• heart or heart-basis
• physical indications (movements that indicate intentions)
• vocal indications
• space element
• physical lightness or buoyancy
• physical yieldingness or plasticity
• physical handiness or wieldiness
• physical grouping or integration
• physical extension or maintenance
• physical aging or decay
• physical impermanence
• food

A list of 23 derived types can be found, for instance, in the Abhidhamma Pitaka's Dhammasaṅgaṇī (e.g., Dhs. 596), which omits the list of 24 derived types' "heart-basis."

Yogacara views

According to the Yogacara school, rūpa is not matter as in the metaphysical substance of materialism. Instead it means both materiality and sensibility—signifying, for example, a tactile object both insofar as that object is made of matter and that the object can be tactically sensed. In fact rūpa is more essentially defined by its amenability to being sensed than its being matter: just like everything else it is defined in terms of its function; what it does, not what it is.

Rūpa-āyatana

Rūpa-āyatana refers to "visual form, visual object, visible object," which is one of the six external sense bases (āyatana) as the object-element (external sense-object) of the sense-element (internal sense-organ) of the eye.

Nāmarūpa

The rūpa jhānas

In the sutras, jhāna is entered when one 'sits down cross-legged and establishes mindfulness'. According to Buddhist tradition, it may be supported by ānāpānasati, mindfulness of breathing, a core meditative practice which can be found in almost all schools of Buddhism. The Suttapiṭaka and the Agamas describe four stages of rūpa jhāna. Rūpa refers to the material realm, in a neutral stance, as different from the kāma-realm (lust, desire) and the arūpa-realm (non-material realm). While interpreted in the Theravada-tradition as describing a deepening concentration and one-pointedness, originally the jhānas seem to describe a development from investigating body and mind and abandoning unwholesome states, to perfected equanimity and watchfulness, an understanding which is retained in Zen and Dzogchen. The stock description of the jhānas, with traditional and alternative interpretations, is as follows:

1. First jhāna:

   Separated (vivicceva) from desire for sensual pleasures, separated (vivicca) from [other] unwholesome states (akusalehi dhammehi, unwholesome dhammas), a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the first jhana, which is [mental] pīti ("rapture," "joy") and [bodily] sukha ("pleasure"; also: 'lasting', in contrast to 'transient' (dukkha)) "born of viveka" (traditionally, "seclusion"; alternatively, "discrimination" (of dhamma's)), accompanied by vitarka-vicara (traditionally, initial and sustained attention to a meditative object; alternatively, initial inquiry and subsequent investigation of dhammas (defilements and wholesome thoughts); also: "discursive thought").

2. Second jhāna:

   Again, with the stilling of vitarka-vicara, a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the second jhana, which is [mental] pīti and [bodily] sukha "born of samadhi" (samadhi-ji; trad. born of "concentration"; altern. "knowing but non-discursive [...] awareness," "bringing the buried latencies or samskaras into full view"), and has sampasadana ("stillness," "inner tranquility") and ekaggata (unification of mind, awareness) without vitarka-vicara;

3. Third jhāna:

   With the fading away of pīti, a bhikkhu abides in upekkhā (equanimity," "affective detachment"), sato (mindful) and [with] sampajañña ("fully knowing," "discerning awareness"). [Still] experiencing sukha with the body, he enters upon and abides in the third jhana, on account of which the noble ones announce, "abiding in [bodily] pleasure, one is equanimous and mindful".

4. Fourth jhāna:

   With the abandoning of [the desire for] sukha ("pleasure") and [aversion to] dukkha ("pain") and with the previous disappearance of [the inner movement between] somanassa ("gladness,") and domanassa ("discontent"), a bhikkhu enters upon and abides in the fourth jhana, which is adukkham asukham ("neither-painful-nor-pleasurable," "freedom from pleasure and pain") and has upekkhā-sati-parisuddhi (complete purity of equanimity and mindfulness).