avijja: "Not seeing things as they actually are." The tenth fetter.
Vijjā means "seeing" (cognate with "vision") and also understanding what you see. In this case, it means seeing the world and everything in it as it actually is, without projecting viewpoints upon what you are looking at, which make it appear otherwise. This means "correct seeing" or "right view". Seeing correctly means seeing unsatisfactory things as unsatisfactory and satisfactory things as satisfactory.
Avijjā (a + vijjā) means not seeing things as they actually are. Not seeing unsatisfactory things as unsatisfactory.
This is first step in the Dependent Origination. It is also the primary fetter . If we see unsatisfactory things as in some way satisfactory, then we cling to them and make of them a fetter. This fetter binds us to the level of unsatisfactory things; the level on which beings experience birth, sickness, old age and death. That is, it keeps us in the sangsara. Forever.
If we have succeeded in releasing ourselves from all these fetters during this sequence of projects, we are Arahats. If we haven't, we can use them as a tool to see and identify those things which arise in the mind and keep us trapped in a world of suffering. We can patiently weaken them and, ultimately, free ourselves from them forever.
New Project: Seeing and Knowing
(See Sanyojana The Buddha's Doctrine of the TEN FETTERS)
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