The History of Buddhist Thought c12.71

c12.71

The eight Stages of Release (*vimokkha*) are also a mode of concentration by which one became trained in stages for still higher worlds—from the formless world above the world of form up to the limit of existence. It still remains in the lists of exercises, but its original use has been modified by taking the fourth to the seventh stages and making them extensions of the four trances. These four are known as the Attainments (*samāpatti*), but they are also treated with the four trances, so that the whole becomes a series of eight. Sometimes the last release is added making nine stages.¹