The arhat (worthy one)

An arhat (Pali arahant) is a person who has reached full liberation in this very lifetime. The word is usually rendered "worthy one"; a traditional play on the word also reads it as "one who has slain the enemies," the enemies being the inner defilements such as greed, hatred, and delusion. Having uprooted these, an arhat is said to be utterly free of craving and clinging, at deep peace, and no longer destined to be reborn into the cycle of birth and death. The Buddha himself was an arhat, and so were many of his most accomplished students.

In the early teachings and in the Theravāda tradition (the older school dominant today in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Myanmar, and nearby regions), becoming an arhat is the highest goal of the path: complete release from suffering. It is reached as the last of four stages of awakening, each marked by shedding more of the "fetters" that bind the mind.

This ideal is one of the points where Buddhist movements differ, which is why scholars flag it as contested. The Mahāyāna traditions (the broad later movement found across East Asia and Tibet) honor the arhat but place an even more expansive aspiration above it: the bodhisattva, who vows to become a fully awakened buddha in order to help liberate all beings, not just to win freedom for oneself. So the arhat is genuinely awakened and free, while different schools weigh how that attainment compares to full buddhahood. Neither side disputes that the arhat has ended suffering; they emphasize different breadths of compassion and scope.