The Buddha: Progress of the Disciple

German born author Ven. Nyanatiloka

The Buddha taught not sudden enlightenment (satori) but gradual development of the Noble (Ennobling) Eightfold Path to bodhi:

In many discourses or sutras there occurs an identical passage that outlines the gradual course of development in the progress of the disciple. There it is shown how this development takes place gradually, in conformity with natural laws or fixed regularities of the universe, from the very first hearing of the Dharma (the Enlightened One's Doctrine), to germinating confidence/faith (saddha) and dim comprehension, up to the final realization (bodhi) of liberation (nirvana) from all suffering.

"After hearing the Dharma, one is filled with confidence, and one thinks: 'Full of hindrances is household life, a refuse heap. But the left-home life (of a Buddhist monastic) is like the open air. It is not easy, when one lives at home, to fulfill in all points the rules of the supreme life. How now if I were to cut off hair, put on saffron robes, and go forth from home to the left-home life?'

"And after a short time, having let go of one's possessions, whether they be great or small, having forsaken a circle of relations, small or large, one cuts off hair, puts on saffron robes, and goes forth from home to the left-home life.

Having thus left the world, one fulfills the monastic rules:

1. One abstains and avoids killing living beings, having abandoned cudgel and knife, conscientious, full of sympathy, desiring the welfare of all living beings.
2. One avoids stealing (taking what is not given)...
3. One avoids unchastity...
4. One avoids lying...
5. One avoids tale-bearing...
6. One avoids harsh speech...
7. One avoids idle chitchat.
8. One abstains from destroying vegetal seeds and plants.
9. One eats only at one time of day [after dawn but before noon].
10. One keeps aloof from dance, song, music, and visiting unseemly shows.
11. One rejects floral adornments, perfumes, ointments, as well as any other kind of embellishments. 
12. One avoids using high and luxurious beds and seats.
13. One avoids accepting gold and silver...
14. One keeps aloof from buying and selling....
15. One contents oneself with the robe that protects one's body and with the alms bowl with which one keeps oneself alive: Wherever one goes, one is provided with these two things, just as a winged bird in flying carries along its two wings.

"By fulfilling this noble domain of virtue (sīla) one feels in one's heart an irreproachable happiness."

In what follows thereafter it is shown how the disciple watches over the five senses and the mind and by this noble restraint of the senses (indriya-samvara) feels at heart an unblemished happiness.

It is shown how in all one's actions one is ever mindful and clearly conscious and how, being equipped with this lofty virtue and with this noble restraint of the senses, and with mindfulness and clear comprehension (sati-sampajañña), one chooses a secluded dwelling.

Freeing the mind from the Five Hindrances (nīvarana), one reaches full absorption (samādhi).

Thereafter, by developing insight (vipassanā, lit. "clear seeing") with regard to the radical

1. impermanence (anicca),
2. disappointment (dukkha), and
3. impersonal (anattā) nature of all phenomena of existence [summarized as the Five Aggregates clung to as self],

one finally realizes liberation from all cankers and defilements, and this certainty and assurance arises:

"Forever is liberation achieved,

This is the last time I am reborn,

No new rebirth awaits me."

Cf. D.1, 2f; M. 27, 38, 51, 60, 76; A. IV, 198; X, 99: Pug. 239, etc.

• Ven. Nyanatiloka (Anton Gueth), Buddhist Dictionary, edited by Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly