Ten states of mind in Buddhism

1^st to 3^rd states: Pre-Buddhist stages: worldly “vehicles” of samsaric entrapment:

1^st state: “The mind of the goat foolishly transmigrating in the six destinies (or realms)” (ishô teiyô-shin): The state of desire driven by animal instincts without moral restraint; the stage to which belong common people, hell-beings, hungry-ghosts, beasts, asuras (“titans”), and various deities or celestial beings trapped in their samsaricdestinies.

2^nd state: “The mind of the child tempered but ignorantly obsessed with moral precepts” (gudô jisai-shin): The state of ethical actions and virtue that promote social order but without any “religious” goal; the stage to which belong Confucianism and the Buddhist precepts (ritsu) for the laity.

3^rd state: “The mind of the child composed and fearing nothing” (yodô mui-shin): The state of deity worship and extrinsic magico-religious practice for the sake of overcoming anxiety with the thought of attaining supernatural powers or immortality, or reaching an eternal and blissful heaven; the stage to which belong Taoism and various forms of Hinduism or Brahmanism.

4^th to 10^th states: Buddhist stages (the fourth to ninth being exoteric Buddhism and the tenth being esoteric Buddhism):

4^th to 5^th states: Hinâyâna stages: “vehicles” of those who aspire towards self-enlightenment without caring for the enlightenment of others.

4^th state: “The mind of one affirming only the elements and negating the self” (yuiun muga-shin): The state of the śrâvaka who analyzes phenomena into the psycho-physical “aggregates” (skandhas) and/or the elements (dharmas), to thus negate any belief in a permanent ego (atman); the stage to which belong the teachings of the historical Buddha and his direct disciples and of the Abhidharma scholastics. While the substantiality of reality is thus deconstructed into its elemental dharmas, thedharmas themselves however become fetters, thus taking from three lives to sixty aeons to achieve liberation.

5^th state: “The mind freed from karmic seeds” (batsu gôinju-shin): The state of the pratyeka-buddha, who, masterless on his own, attains insight into the chain of dependent origination to recognize the impermanence, self-less-ness, and non-substantiality of all, thus preventing new karma to arise. But in enjoying a certain level of “enlightenment,” he falls back into the “egoism” of self-complacency, compassionless apathy towards fellow beings, and the narrow vision of other-worldliness. Hence he has not yet reached complete enlightenment. The Sautrântika school belongs to this stage.

6^th to 9^th states: Mahâyâna stages: “vehicles” of the bodhisattvas, those who seek enlightenment both for self and for others, by overcoming self-other duality and recognizing the interdependency between self-enlightenment and other-enlightenment and between wisdom and compassion.

6^th state: “The mind of the Mahâyâna adherent who is concerned with others” (taen daijô-shin): The state of Yogâcâra with its Vijñapti-mâtratâ (Jpn: yuishiki) standpoint that everything is “mind-only,” reached by its analysis of thing-events as phenomena of consciousness originating from a deep un-conscious “storehouse” or “receptacle consciousness” (âlaya-vijñâna). Its point is to detach oneself from the discriminating objectification of phenomena in order to realize the tranquility of “mind-only” from a non-discriminating perspective, which would allow the practice of “great compassion.” And yet this still takes several aeons of practice to achieve and is not the final state.

7^th state: “The mind of one who realizes non-origination” (kakushin fushô-shin): The state of Mâdhyamaka with its śûnyavâda (Jpn: kûgan) standpoint that everything is empty. Here reifying and substantializing conceptions — including both objects and mind — that act as fetters are eliminated through Nâgârjuna's eight-fold negations which via their dependent origination show their emptiness.

8^th state: “The mind of one who realizes harmony with the one path of truth” (nyojitsu ichidô-shin or ichidô muishin): The state of T’ien-t’ai with its standpoint of “oneness of all,” wherein one realizes that one moment contains eternity, a single thought contains all possible worlds, and a sesame seed contains a mountain, i.e. the non-duality between one and many; and between emptiness, dependent origination, and their “middle.”

9^th state: “The mind of one who realizes the absence of substance within ultimate truth” (goku mujishô-shin): The state of Hua-yen with its standpoint of the mutual non-obstruction and interpenetration between the patternment (Chn: li; Jpn: ri) of all and the concrete thing-events (Chn: shih; Jpn: ji) on the basis of their emptiness, whereby one and many are non-dualistic. This non-duality is extended to the level of the entire dharmadhâtu.

10^th state: Both Tendai and Kegon for Kûkai however lack the crucial element of direct experiential understanding to truly realize what they preach. One must thus proceed further by means of bodily ritual practice provided by the next and final state: Mantrayâna: “The mind of secret sublimity” (himitsu shôgon-shin). This is the state of Shingon, whose esoteric teachings and bodily experiential practice constitute the summit of the development of the mind. At this summit hosshin seppô is revealed and one attains sokushinjôbutsu through the micro-macro-cosmic correlativity of the three mysteries and through kaji.

-quote from a buddhist website