Through a comparative analysis of early Buddhist discourses in Pāli and their Chinese and Sanskrit parallels, this article argues that the definition of right concentration as the attainment of the four absorptions (jhānas) represents a later stage of textual evolution. The author demonstrates that parallel versions of key Pāli texts which define right concentration this way either lack a definition entirely or describe it differently, often as a mind unified and endowed with the other seven factors of the Noble Eightfold Path. This historical-critical perspective suggests that the earliest understanding of right concentration was more integrated with the other path factors and did not necessitate deep absorptive states. Consequently, the author concludes that the ability to attain the four absorptions is not a necessary condition for reaching stream-entry, the first stage of awakening.
