Dhyana

Sanskrit ध्यान, "meditation, attention." Equivalent to Tibetan sampten; Pali: jhana; Chinese: Ch’an; Japanese: zenna or zen.

ध्यान dhyana comes from the root ध्यै dhya, "to see, to look." In the earliest Vedas, this became धी dhi, "imagination," the ability to see images internally (which in modern times is called clairvoyance or imagination). Later on, धी dhi became ध्यान, dhyana, meditation, but the connection to internal sight was lost, obscured, or overlooked.

All of this underscores the purpose of meditation: to acquire information that the external senses and the intellect cannot reach.

The Sanskrit term refers to “meditation,” and is used to mean mental stability and active meditative contemplation on the nature of an object.

In Hinduism, Dhyana is the seventh of the eight stages of Patanjali’s Raja Yoga, and refers to state of conscious stillness, with perfect concentration on the object of meditation. From this, the eighth stage of Samadhi can be reached.

In Buddhism, Dhyana is the fifth of the six Paramitas (perfections). In Tibetan, the term sampten or bsam gtan means “definitive” or “established,” because this is the basis from which all conscious realizations are reached. Therefore, in Buddhism, the term Dhyana is equivalent to the Hindu use of Samadhi: they both refer to conscious, meditative absorption.