The psychic factors

The psychic factors

          The aggregates of feeling, perception, and mental formations are called psychic factors or cetasika, because they are associated with consciousness. According to Apidhammatthasangaha, the psychic factors are defined as " those that arise and perish together with consciousness, are associated with consciousness and share the same object and basis with consciousness."

          There are altogether fifty - two psychic factors, two of which are feeling and perception. The remaining fifty are mental formations [ sankhara ]. All of these fifty - two factors are distributed under 3 distinct basic classes, each class consisting of two subclasses as general, unwholesome and wholesome psychic factors. Each of these factors are divided into primary and secondary as follows ;.



          1. General psychic factors, there are 7 primary, and 6 secondary. The 7 primary factors are contact, feeling. perception, intention, one - pointedness, psychic vitality, and attention. These seven factors are common to every act of consciousness. The 6 secondary are ; initial application, sustained application, decision, effort, rapture and active urge. These factors are not found in all types of consciousness, thus they are also called the " particular " or pakinaka.

          2. The unwholesome factors are also divided into primary and secondary. The primary factors are delusion, lack of moral shame, lack of moral dread and relentless. The secondary factors are ten in number, hatred, envy, selfishness, worry, greed, wrong view, conceit, sloth, torpor, and doubt. These factors do not occur in all unwholesome classes of consciousness.

          3. The wholesome or the beautiful universal factors, are also divided into primary and secondary. The primary factors are common in all classes of wholesome consciousness. These primary factors are 19 in number : faith, mindfulness, shame, moral dread, non greed, non hatred, equanimity, calmness of psychic factors, calmness of consciousness, buoyancy of psychic factors, buoyancy of consciousness, fitness of psychic factors, fitness of consciousness, proficiency in psychic factors, proficiency of consciousness, rectitude of psychic factors and rectitude of consciousness.

          The secondary factors are found in some wholesome consciousness. There are six in number ; right livelihood, right action, right speech, compassion, sympathetic joy [ mudita ] and wisdom [ panna ].






By THE BUDDHA'S Core Teachings