The fourth path to attaining arahantship

Bhikkhu Bodhi has a footnote about this, which I have decided to disagree with, for the sake of alternative view. However, in his footnote, he points out how there are three variations of this Pali text (PTS, Sinhala, Burmese), including 'dham­muddhac­ca­vig­gahitaṃ mānasaṃ' (which he agrees with, namely, 'manasa' as 'mind' or 'thinking') versus 'dham­muddhac­ca­vig­gahitaṃanā' (which I have decided to agree with). BB rejects the later because it would include the word 'conceit' ('ṃanā'), which he believes is suspicious. However, I have decided to disagree with BB and speculate 'ṃanā' is not suspicious because the other term in the phrase is 'uddhac­ca', namely, restlessness. The other word is 'vig­gahita', which means 'taken hold of, seized; seduced by'.

'Conceit' ('ṃanā') is the 8th fetter; 'restlessness' ('uddhac­ca') is the 9th fetter. Here, in the 4th path, the practitioner is a 'non-returner' ('anāgāmi') seized/seduced by two of the final fetters needed to be broken for arahantship. Thus, in this 4th path, the non-returner has already developed tranquility & insight but encounters a speed bump with the 8th & 9th fetters. But the non-returner settles the mind (citta), breaks the fetters and completes the path.

Since the sutta is strangely attributed to Ananda about arahants making declarations to him, which is even more bizarre, and since this sutta is both a one-off and has varied versions, personally, I would ignore & reject it. The sutta seems typical of the non-sense found in the Anguttara Nikaya.

Bhikkhu Sujato at Sutta Central might take an interest in this. I suggest to start this topic there.

When you read S.N. or A.N. You should connect sutta that come before or after together, too. Obviously, the sequence of everything in contexts are very important to understand tipitaka. This is a reason that why I often said that reciting&memorizing, just pāli, are better than reading, and especially better than reading the translated version.

I don't want to insult anyone. I just try to advise the one way path that intention-cetasika of bodhisatta choose to born to be then buddha force bikkhu to make it done for to be a perfect bhikkhu and for to be ariya (perfect person).

The Answer

Full answers already answered inside yugganaddhakathā of paṭisambihdāmagga, and nettipakaraṇa desanāhāravibhaṅga+nayasamuṭṭhāna. Also, you can use commentary, but you must recite and memorize tipitaka first because comment in commentary is over short, for the reader.

Connect with the previous sutta, Asubha Sutta.

1. Practitioner who hard to meditate, quickly/delayed access to insight = Development of insight preceded by meditating concentration. This practitioner's hindrances often arise between his meditation. He must inhibits hindrances before meditate an insight. So buddha said "Bhikkhu, you must meditate a concentration, bhikkhu who meditated a concentration, will access to insight (5 aggregates)".
2. Practitioner who easily to meditate, quickly/delayed access to insight = Development of concentration preceded by meditating insight. This practitioner's hindrances not often arise between his meditation. So he meditate easily.
3. Practitioner who quickly access to insight, easily/hard to meditate = Tranquility developed in tandem with insight. This practitioner turned to be pro of 1st and 2nd above. He meditating insight at pahāna-pariññā state (from 3 pariññā).
4. Practitioner who delayed access to insight, easily/hard to meditate = Practitioner who has to inhibit hindrances from mind when meditating insight. This practitioner is not pro enough of 1st and 2nd above. He still meditating insight at tīraṇa-pariññā state. So he have to try more to meditate 1st, 2nd to be 3rd. See the advance detail in tipitaka paṭisambhidāmagga (somewhere, I have not read it done), and visuddhimagga understanding-part maggāmaggañāṇadassanavisuddhi-niddesa to (especially from indriyatikkhakāraṇanavaka-kathā to paṭipadāñāṇadassanavisuddhi-niddesa).

Vocabulary in sutta that connect it together:

Paṭipadā=Maggo sañjāyati. Dhammuddhacca=Vipassanpakilesa.

(there are more word, but you should to recite&memorize&meditate from pali of them yourselves with the meditated teacher such as pa-auk teachers).

1. How does the fourth path work? Please elaborate on the fourth path.

You are thinking and pondering about the dhamma you have experiencing

2. How does one practise that? Please provide details.

There is no explicit way to to do this. If you start thinking and pondering on the Dhamma then this happens.

3. Why is vipassana and samatha not required on the fourth path?

Both are required. If you do not do Vipassana you do not experience the Dhamma to think and ponder on. Either Samantha develops or through developing Samantha where you mind is calmed.

I think that comy is almost certainly wrong here and that the 4th path probably refers to people who don't need to do much in terms of learning [pondering] or meditating [for lower attainments] and their mind rather quickly goes to the Deathless [destruction of taints; nibbananirodhadhatu; associated with cessation of perception & feeling] even from the lower jhanas as soon as there is an opening due to the maturity of their insight faculty, these are probably those who end up as released-by-wisdom-arahants lacking the arupa jhanas or as what they call dry-insight worker maybe.

I don't see what else it could be based on other sutta and i think the commentary theory has no basis at all in the sutta.

If one takes the first 3 types to be those whovdeveloped arupa jhana and 4th type as those who didn't then the 4-fold classification makes sense imo.

I wrote a formatted and detailed answer here on my blog, which I cut and paste below the blog post link (losing html formatting).

http://notesonthedhamma.blogspot.com/2021/08/an-4170-forum-question-how-does-4th-way.html

There are 4 permutations of samatha and vipassana, the order in which they're developed.

The 3rd permutations is the ideal scenario, where both are developed in tandem.

The 4th permutation, neither are developed, at first. But then:

Puna caparaṃ, āvuso, bhikkhuno dhammuddhaccaviggahitaṃ mānasaṃ hoti. Another monk’s mind is seized by restlessness to realize the teaching. Hoti so, āvuso, samayo yaṃ taṃ cittaṃ ajjhattameva santiṭṭhati sannisīdati ekodi hoti samādhiyati. But there comes a time when their mind is stilled internally; it settles, unifies, and becomes undistractify-&-lucidifyd in samādhi. Tassa maggo sañjāyati. The path is born in them. So taṃ maggaṃ āsevati bhāveti bahulīkaroti. They cultivate, develop, and make much of it.

To answer the OP questions, two key points need to be understood.

ekodi and samadhi is code phrase indicating second jhana or higher (see MN 20, MN 119, and several others).

dhamma-uddhacca-viggahitaṃ

Uddhacca is referring to the 5 hindrance's restlessnness.

vigggahitam means trying to the ascertain the meaning.

So the meditator, in trying to ascertain the meaning of Dhamma when under the influence of the hindrance of restlessness (4th of 5 hindrances), fails. In other words, he's not doing vipassana successfully because he has insufficient samatha.

But later on, he develops second jhana or higher as indicated by the ekodi and samadhi markers, fullfilling requisite amount of samatha (see SN 46.2, samatha is nutriment for samadhi). Therefore the uddhacca restlessness is no longer a problem, and his Dharma investigation succeeds, his vipassana succeeds because his samatha is good enough.

Since the 4 permutations already covered the samatha preceding vipassanna, then this 4th case is unlikely to be that, and more likely to be having initially no samatha and vipassana, and later samatha and vipassana in tandem.

Conclusion on AN 4.170 So when one considers all 4 permutations, and all 4 attain a path that leads to arahantship, it's clear that samatha and vipassana both need to be present to sufficient quality to succeed, it's just that through inherent weakness in individual meditators, some may mature in samatha first or vipassana first, and not the case that the Buddha recommended one develop samatha before vipassana, or vice versa.

Also, if you study the formula for the four jhanas carefully, and the satipatthana formula carefully, you'll see that 3rd jhana (any of 4 jhanas would fulfill samatha) includes both sati and sampajano (equivalent to pañña and vipassana). And within the satipatthana formula, which also includes sati and sampajano factors, the "vineyya loke abhijja domanassa" is a reference to one having subdued the 5 hindrances, the tough part of samatha training, and putting you right in the doorway of first jhana (which would satisfy samatha). In other words, satipatthana is embedded within jhana, and jhana is embedded within satipatthana. That's the Buddha saying samatha and vipassana is ideally developed in tanndem ( 4 Jhānas🌕 ≈ 4 Satipaṭṭhāna🐘 ).