Bhūmis
BHŪMIS. A Sanskrit term that meant “earth, place, or region,” which conveyed the sense of a firm place on which to stand. In Mahãyãna Buddhism, it represented 10, or according to some texts six or seven, stages of the path of the bodhisattva.
The 10 stages were directly connected to the perfections cultivated by the bodhisattva because the mastery of a perfection involved achieving stages of bhūmis.
The 10 stages were the following: joyful (pramu-ditã-bhūmi, in which one practiced charity and self-sacrifice); pure (vimal-bhūmi, freed one from evil conduct
and enabled one to reach inner equanimity); luminous (prabhãkarī-bhūmi, thoughts were pure and constant); radiant (arcis>matī-bhūmi, one perfected knowledge and faith in the three jewels and realized that there was nothing permanent in the world); difficult-to-conquer (sudurjayã-bhūmi, when one realized that everything was empty and comprehended the Four Noble Truths), face-to-face (abhimukhi-bhūmi,
understood the 10 aspects of equality and sameness of all things and encountered reality directly), far going (dūran gama-bhūmi,
acquired great wisdom and conquered all passions), immovable (acalã-bhūmi, when one was not contaminated by karma and false concepts because one was well established in the dharma); good insight (sãdhumatī-bhūmi, knew hearts and minds of others with respect to ethical and moral action); and cloud of doctrine (dhar-mameghã-bhūmi, entered trance states and perfected knowledge).
The Daśabhūmika Sūtra, a part of the larger Avatamsaka Sūtra, and the Bodhisattvabhūmi Sūtra by Asanga from his larger book the Yogãcãrabhūmi were excellent resources for this topic. The latter text discussed a seven-step process, whereas the former ex- pounded a 10-step path.
