Can a layperson cultivate to the level of a fourth-fruit arhat?

Answer: First of all, a person who has completely eliminated innate self-grasping is, in the Small Vehicle, a great arhat of the fourth fruit, and in the Great Vehicle, an eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva. A layperson cannot possibly cultivate to become a great arhat of the fourth fruit; the highest a layperson can reach is the third fruit, and reaching the third fruit is extremely difficult. A person of the third fruit is almost entirely uninterested in worldly dharmas in secular life and will certainly find a way to leave home; moreover, opportunities to do so are very numerous, and such a person has even less interest in family. If they do not leave home, most simply live out their days according to conditions, but there still remain some attachments not yet eliminated; regarding household life and work, they go along with conditions, without strong attachment.

As for the Great Vehicle, an arhat of the fourth fruit abides at the eighth-bhūmi bodhisattva stage. Such beings generally do not come to the Sahā world; even if they come to this world, they would not live as householders engaged in secular life, such as working to support a family—that is utterly impossible. Their merit is immensely vast; how could they stoop to such a lowly thing as doing secular work to get by? Their work of liberating sentient beings follows conditions, without a trace of attachment, so why would they demean themselves by working and supporting a family? In fact, even finding a first-bhūmi bodhisattva or a person of the third fruit in the Sahā world is extremely rare. Bodhisattvas who have attained the bhūmis generally do not remain as householders; they all leave home to liberate sentient beings—unless there are so many bodhisattvas that not all of them need to leave home to serve as exemplars for sentient beings.