Nyanatiloka Buddhist Dictionary

7 stages of purification (visuddhi V, q.v.).magga-paccaya: 'path as a condition', is one of the 24 conditions (paccaya, q.v.). magical powers: s. iddhi;abhiññá (1).mahá-bhúta: the 4 'primary elements', is another name for the 4 elements (dhátu) underlying allcorporeality; s. dhátu.mahá-brahmáno: the 'great gods', are a class of heavenly beings in the fine-material world; s. deva, II.mahaggata: lit., 'grown great', i.e. 'developed', exalted, supernormal. As mahaggata-citta, it is the state of'developed consciousness', attained in the fine-material and immaterial absorptions (s. jhána); it is mentionedin the mind-contemplation of the Satipatthána Sutta (M. 10). - As mahaggatárammana, it is the 'developedmental object' of those absorptions and is mentioned in the 'object triad' of the Abhidhamma schedule andDhs. (s. Guide, p. 6).mahápurisa-vitakka: the 8 'thoughts of a great man', are described in A. VIII, 30, and D. 34.mahá-vipassaná: the 18 'chief kinds of insight'; s. vipassaná.maintain: effort to maintain wholesome things; s. padhána.majjhimá-patipadá: 'Middle Path', is the Noble Eightfold Path which, by avoiding the two extremes ofsensual lust and self-torment, leads to enlightenment and deliverance from suffering.To give oneself up to indulgence in sensual pleasure (káma-sukha), the base, common, vulgar, unholy,unprofitable; and also to give oneself up to self-torment (atta-kilamatha), the painful, unholy, unprofitable,both these two extremes the Perfect One has avoided and has found the Middle Path (s. magga), whichcauses one both to see and to know, and which leads to peace, to discernment, to enlightenment, to Nibbána.It is the Noble Eightfold Path, the way that leads to the extinction of suffering, namely: right understanding,right thought, right speech, right bodily action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and rightconcentration" (S. LVI, 11).mala: 'stains', is a name for the 3 karmically unwholesome roots (akusala-múla); greed, hate and delusion(lobha, dosa, moha).mána: 'conceit', pride, is one of the 10 fetters binding to existence (s. samyojana). It vanishes completelyonly at the entrance to Arahatship, or Holiness (cf. asmi-mána). It is further one of the proclivities (s.anusaya) and defilements (s. kilesa). "The (equality-) conceit (mána), the inferiority-conceit (omána) and the superiority-conceit (atimána): thisthreefold conceit should be overcome. For, after overcoming this threefold conceit, the monk, through thefull penetration of conceit, is said to have put an end suffering" (A. VI, 49)."Those ascetics and brahman priests who, relying on this impermanent, miserable and transitory nature ofcorporeality, feelings, perceptions, mental formations and consciousness, fancy: 'Better am I', or 'Equal am I',or 'Worse am I', all these imagine thus through not understanding reality" (S. XXII, 49).In reality no ego-entity is to be found. Cf. anattá.manasikára: 'attention', 'mental advertence', 'reflection'.1. As a psychological term, attention belongs to the formation-group (sankhára-kkhandha; s.Tab. II) and is one of the 7 mental factors (cetasika) that are inseparably associated with allstates of consciousness (s. cetaná). In M. 9, it is given as one of the factors representative ofmind (náma) It is the mind's first 'confrontation with an object' and 'binds the associated mentalfactors to the object.' It is, therefore, the prominent factor in two specific classes of