Correct option is C
The Eightfold Path is a key concept in Buddhism that leads to the cessation of suffering and the achievement of self-awakening. It consists of eight practices divided into three categories: wisdom, ethical conduct, and mental discipline. The last five steps, according to the given question, are as follows:
· Right Conduct (Samyak Karmanta): This involves ethical conduct and behavior that aligns with moral values. It includes abstaining from killing, stealing, and inappropriate sexual conduct.
· Right Livelihood (Samyak Ajiva): This step emphasizes earning a living in a way that does not harm others and is ethically positive. It discourages occupations that involve harm to other beings.
· Right Effort (Samyak Vyayama): This involves cultivating a positive state of mind and eliminating negative states. It includes the effort to prevent the arising of unwholesome states, to abandon existing unwholesome states, to arouse wholesome states, and to maintain them.
· Right Mindfulness (Samyak Smrti): This involves being aware of the body, feelings, mind, and phenomena. It includes practicing meditation and mindfulness to achieve a clear and unbiased awareness of the present moment.
· Right Concentration (Samyak Samadhi): This step involves developing deep concentration and meditation to achieve mental focus and stability. It is about training the mind to maintain focus on a single object and achieving higher states of meditative absorption.
Information Booster:
1. The Eightfold Path is part of the Four Noble Truths in Buddhism.
2. The first three steps (Right View, Right Intention) fall under the wisdom category.
3. Ethical conduct also includes Right Speech, which is about abstaining from lying and harmful speech.
4. The practice of mindfulness (Vipassana) is central to Right Mindfulness.
5. Right Concentration leads to deep states of meditation known as Jhanas.
6. The Eightfold Path is a guideline for ethical and mental development with the goal of freeing an individual from attachments and delusions.
Additional Information:
· Right Conduct (Samyak Karmanta): Involves not just abstaining from harmful actions but also actively engaging in beneficial deeds.
· Right Livelihood (Samyak Ajiva): Includes avoiding trades that harm other beings such as dealing in weapons, intoxicants, and slaughtering animals.
· Right Effort (Samyak Vyayama): Divided into four exertions: preventing unwholesome states, abandoning unwholesome states, developing wholesome states, and maintaining wholesome states.
· Right Mindfulness (Samyak Smrti): Often practiced through the Four Foundations of Mindfulness (Satipatthana), which are mindfulness of body, feelings, mind, and mental objects.
· Right Concentration (Samyak Samadhi): The development of one-pointedness of mind and the attainment of the four stages of meditation.