The Connected Discourses of the Buddha

by Bhikkhu Bodhi

  18 Spk: Why does he speak thus? During that half-month, it is said, he had no one to guide. Then he thought, “I will pass this half-month in the bliss of fruition attainment. Thus I will enjoy a pleasant abiding and set an example for future generations.”

  19 Spk takes this to refer to the Buddha’s forty-nine days of meditation in the vicinity of the Bodhi Tree just after his enlightenment. During that period (according to Spk) he contemplated the aggregates, sense bases, elements, Four Noble Truths, etc., in full (nippadesa); but now he contemplated them only partly (padesena), namely, in relation to feeling. Spk gives examples of how feelings arise conditioned by wrong view and by right view. The sutta is referred to at As 30-31 as “proof” that the Buddha taught the Abhidhamma. Vism 519 (Ppn 17:9) also cites the sutta in arguing against the view that dependent origination is a “simple arising.”

  20 Spk: Feeling with desire (chanda) as condition is the feeling associated with the eight cittas accompanied by greed (see CMA 1:4); that conditioned by thought is the feeling in the first jhāna; that conditioned by perception is the feeling in the six meditative attainments from the second jhāna through the base of nothingness.

  21 The passage in brackets is not in Be and may have been imported into the Sinhalese tradition from Spk. Spk explains the feeling when none of the three have subsided as the feeling associated with the eight cittas accompanied by greed. The feeling when desire alone has subsided is that of the first jhāna; the feeling when perception alone remains is that of the second and higher jhānas. The feeling when all three have subsided is that of the base of neither-perception-nor-nonperception. The “as-yet-unattained” is the fruit of arahantship. The last expression includes the supramundane feeling accompanying the four paths. The word rendered “effort” here is āyāma, effectively synonymous with vāyāma, the actual reading in some mss. Spk glosses with viriya.

  22 Spk: The subsiding of wrong view means right view; therefore the feeling said to be conditioned by right view is the same as the feeling conditioned by the subsiding of wrong view. But in this sutta they (the ancients) do not include resultant feeling (vipākavedanā), thinking it is too remote. For whenever a feeling is said to be conditioned by the subsiding of a particular state, we should understand that it is conditioned by the quality opposed to that state. Feeling conditioned by the subsiding of desire is the feeling of the first jhāna; by the subsiding of thought, the feeling of the second jhāna; by the subsiding of perception, the feeling of the base of neither-perception-nor-nonperception.

  23 Se and Ee: Bhaddako te āvuso Bhadda ummaggo. Be has ummaṅgo. Bhaddako almost surely involves a word play on the elder’s name. Spk (Se): Ummaggo ti pañha-ummaggo; pañhavīmaṃsanaṃ pañhagavesanan ti attho; “‘Intelligence’: intelligence (in forming) a question; the meaning is, investigating a question, seeking out a question.” (Here Se pañha- is preferable to Be paññā-.)

  24 I translate ñāyaṃ dhammaṃ following Spk’s gloss of the term as ariyamaggadhammaṃ. The sutta is the basis for a “dilemma” at Mil 242-43.

  25 The two additional qualities are micchāñāṇī and micchāvimutti . Spk glosses the former as micchāpaccavekkhaṇa, “wrong reviewing,” on which Spk-pṭ says: “When one has done something evil, one reviews it with the idea that it was good.” Spk explains micchāvimutti as a false liberation (ayāthāvavimutti), a nonemancipating liberation (aniyyānikavimutti ).

  26 Sa-upanisaṃ saparikkhāraṃ. For a fuller analysis, see MN No. 117. The definition of noble right concentration just below rests on the conception of the mind as a constellation of mental factors each performing its own distinct function in coordination with the others. On the treatment of the path from this angle, see Introduction to Part V, pp. 1488-90.

  27 Spk: While the former sutta is explained in terms of qualities (dhammavasena), this one is explained in terms of persons (puggalavasena).

  28 Though all three eds. have aṭṭhaṅgiko here, I suggest deleting it to bring the wording into conformity with 46:18, 47:33, and 51:2.

  29 Read: apārā pāraṃ gamanāya saṃvattanti. Spk: “To going from the round of existence to Nibbāna.” Woodward has mistranslated as “conduce to that state in which no further shore and no higher shore exist.” The verses just below are also at Dhp 85-89.

  30 At this point Ee stops numbering these groups of suttas and designates them merely as peyyāla, “repetitions,” not as vagga; Se also calls them peyyāla but numbers them; Be numbers them and calls them peyyālavagga, “repetition groups.” My scheme for numbering the vaggas corresponds closest to Se, but my numbering of the suttas agrees with Ee straight through to the end.

  31 Addhānapariññatthaṃ. Spk: When one has reached Nibbāna, the course of saṃsāra is fully understood. Therefore Nibbāna is called the full understanding of the course.

  32 Spk: Good friendship is like the dawn; the noble path along with insight, arisen by relying on good friendship, is like the appearance of the sun.

  33 Spk: “Accomplishment in virtue” (sīlasampadā) is the fourfold purification of virtue (i.e., compliance with the Pātimokkha, restraint of the senses, proper use of the requisites, and right livelihood; see Vism 15-16; Ppn 1:42). “Accomplishment in desire” (chandasampadā) is desire as the wish to accomplish the wholesome (i.e., not desire as craving, another connotation of chanda). “Accomplishment in self” (attasampadā) is completeness of mind (sampannacittatā ). All these suttas were spoken separately by way of the personal inclinations (of those to be taught).

  34 In Ee this vagga does not have a separate number. Be numbers it “1,” as if starting again from scratch, but then assigns each of the four “versions” within this repetition series a separate number. Se keeps the numbering of the vagga continuous, beginning here with “9.” I here follow Se, which seems more logical; I use upper case roman numbers for the sequential vaggas, and lower case roman numbers for the versions corresponding to the vaggas. The four versions are distinguished only by the phrases used to describe the path factors. In Pāli these are: (i) vivekanissitaṃ virāganissitaṃ nirodhanissitaṃ vossaggapariṇāmiṃ; (ii) rāgavinayapariyosānaṃ dosavinayapariyosānaṃ mohavinayapariyosānaṃ ; (iii) amatogadhaṃ amataparāyanaṃ amatapariyosānaṃ ; and (iv) nibbānaninnaṃ nibbānapoṇaṃ nibbānapabbhāraṃ . Spk explains that the different versions of the same sutta were spoken by the Buddha in response to the individual inclinations of the persons to be enlightened.

  35 On nibbānogadha, see III, n. 243.

  36 Ee calls this vagga “Chapter V,” as if all the suttas from 31 to 138 fall under Chapter IV. Be also numbers this “5,” following on the four sections of the Ganges Repetition Series. Since in Be the remaining vaggas of this saṃyutta are numbered 6-8, this means that in Be the saṃyutta includes two series of vaggas numbered 5-8, without any other basis for differentiating them. In Se this vagga is numbered 13 and the numbering continues in unbroken sequence, ending in 16. As this has greater cogency I follow it here. It is inconsistent and illogical, though, for the Ganges Repetition Series to make each repetition cycle a separate vagga, thus creating four vaggas, while the following vaggas, starting with the Appamādavagga, subsume the four repetitions under each individual sutta.

  37 Spk: Diligence is called the chief of all wholesome states because it is by diligence that one acquires all the other wholesome states.

  38 The similes of 45:141-47 are also at 22:102.

  39 Spk: When the female nāgas become pregnant they realize that if they gave birth in the ocean their offspring could be attacked by the supaṇṇas or swept away by a strong current. Thus they ascend the rivers to the Himalayas and give birth there. They then train their young in the mountain ponds until they have mastered the art of swimming.

  40 As at 36:12.

  41 As at 22:101 (III 155, 5-9). See III, n. 214.

  42 As at 36:14.

  43 The simile and its application here parallel 35:244 (IV 191, 1-24).

  44 Spk explains brahmacariyes
anā as the search for a holy life consisting in a wrong view [Spk-pṭ: because the wrong view is the basis for the holy life devised by the theorist].

  45 See IV, n. 274.

  46 This sutta is not found in Se or in SS. Be numbers it separately, Ee does not. I here follow the latter. Both connect the “based upon seclusion” refrain with §170 (10) and the other three refrains with §170 (11). This suggests the two are actually one sutta elaborated by way of alternative forms of the same word, both taṇhā and tasinā being Pāli equivalents of Skt tṛṣṇā.

  47 Spk explains “bodily knot” (kāyagantha) as a knot in the name-body (nāmakāya), a defilement which knots and connects (ganthanaghaṭanakilesa). Spk-pṭ: A defilement which produces connection, bondage, known as the binding to suffering through the connection of cause with effect, of the round of kamma with the round of results. The fourth knot, idaṃsaccābhinivesa kāyagantha, is literally “the bodily knot of adherence to (the view) ‘This (alone) is truth.’”

  48 Spk: The “underlying tendency to sensual lust” (kāmānusaya) is sensual lust itself, which is an “underlying tendency” in the sense that it has gained strength (thāmagataṭṭhena ). Spk-pṭ: “Gained strength” by being firmly implanted in a being’s mental continuum.

  49 These are the fetters that bind beings to the sense-sphere realm (kāmadhātu). The first three are eradicated by the stream-enterer and the once-returner, all five by the nonreturner.

  50 These are the fetters that bind beings to the form realm (rūpadhātu) and the formless realm (arūpadhātu), which are reached respectively through the jhānas and the formless attainments. Only the arahant has eradicated these fetters.46. Bojjhaṅgasaṃyutta

  51 As at 45:151.

  52 Bojjhaṅga is a compound of bodhi + aṅga. Spk offers a twofold definition: “Enlightenment factors are factors of enlightenment or (factors) of the one being enlightened (bodhiyā bodhissa vā aṅgā ti bojjhaṅgā). What is meant? It is through the assemblage of states consisting in mindfulness … equanimity, arisen at the moment of the mundane and supramundane paths (lokiyalokuttaramaggakkhaṇe) … that the noble disciple is enlightened; therefore (that assemblage of states) is called enlightenment. ‘He is enlightened’ means that he rises up from the sleep of the continuum of defilements; what is meant is that he penetrates the Four Noble Truths or realizes Nibbāna. The enlightenment factors are the factors of the enlightenment consisting in that assemblage of states. Also, the noble disciple who becomes enlightened through the aforesaid assemblage of states is called ‘one being enlightened’ (bodhī). The factors of the one being enlightened are enlightenment factors.”In the Abhidhamma Piṭaka, the Bojjhaṅga-vibhaṅga (Vibh 227-29) first explains the enlightenment factors by the sutta method in three ways modelled on 46:3, 46:52 (ii), and the bare vivekanissita formula, respectively. Then it analyses them according to the Abhidhamma method, which treats them solely as factors of the supramundane path (Vibh 229-32). For this reason the definitions in the Abhidhamma commentaries (As 217, Vibh-a 310), parallel to the passage cited from Spk above, omit “mundane” (lokiya) in relation to the path.

  The Buddha’s own definition of bojjhaṅga, at 46:5 below, implies they were originally conceived not as factors that constitute enlightenment (the position taken by the commentaries), but as factors that lead to enlightenment. This is further supported by the sequential account of their origination at 46:3. Hence comparison of the different strata of early Pāli literature shows the usage of the term to have undergone some degree of evolution, from the more general and pragmatic to the more specific and technical.

  53 Nutriment (āhāra) here has the meaning of condition (paccaya ). This portion of the sutta is repeated below at 46:51, to which Spk gives a detailed explanation of the nutriments for the individual enlightenment factors. See below, nn. 85-91. Cp. ANI 3-5.

  54 The sign of the beautiful (subhanimitta) is a sensually attractive object, particularly an object that arouses sexual desire. The word nimitta is difficult to render in a way that fits all the major contexts where it occurs. I returned to “sign” only after several experiments with alternatives—“aspect,” “feature,” and “appearance”—proved unsatisfactory. Elsewhere it clearly means basis, cause, condition (e.g., at 48:40; V 213, 16, etc.).Spk glosses careless attention (ayoniso manasikāra) with “unmethodical attention, offtrack attention” (anupāyamanasikāra , uppathamanasikāra; Spk-pṭ: because it is not the right method for gaining welfare and happiness). The commentaries consistently explain it as attention directed to the impermanent as permanent, to suffering as happiness, to the selfless as self, and to the foul as beautiful. This explanation is found already at Vibh 373.

  55 Paṭighanimitta. Spk: The sign of the repulsive is aversion (paṭigha) or a repulsive object (paṭighārammaṇa).

  56 The terms are defined, mostly by chains of synonyms, at Vibh 352. Spk cites the passage here. They are also mentioned at I, vv. 30-31.

  57 Cetaso avūpasama. Spk: Unsettledness of mind is, in denotation, restlessness and remorse themselves.

  58 Satisambojjhaṅgaṭṭhāniyā dhammā. Spk: The things that become objects of mindfulness [Spk-pṭ: the four establishments of mindfulness], the thirty-seven aids to enlightenment, and the nine supramundane states.

  59 Kaṇhasukkasappaṭibhāga. Spk: Dark states are “with counterparts” because they yield dark results, and bright states because they yield bright results; the meaning is “having similar results.” Or “with counterparts” means “with opposites”: the dark states have the bright as their opposites, the bright the dark. Or “with counterparts” means “with exclusion”: the unwholesome excludes the wholesome and yields its own results, and conversely.An extended example of the opposition between good and bad states is found in MN No. 8, where the Buddha enumerates forty-four pairs of wholesome and unwholesome opposites. The explanation of this enlightenment factor suggests that while “discrimination of states” may be technically identified with paññā, the initial function of paññā as an enlightenment factor is not to discern the three characteristics, etc., but simply to discriminate between the good and bad mental states that become apparent with the deepening of mindfulness.

  60 Spk: The element of arousal (ārambhadhātu) is the initial phase of energy, the element of endeavour (nikkamadhātu) intermediate energy, the element of exertion (parakkamadhātu ) energy at full intensity.

  61 Spk: Tranquillity of body (kāyappassaddhi) is the tranquillizing of distress in the three mental aggregates (feeling, perception, volitional formations), tranquillity of mind (cittappassaddhi ) the tranquillizing of distress in the aggregate of consciousness.The commentaries frequently interpret the pair, body and mind, mentioned in the texts in the light of the Abhidhamma, which draws a contrast between mind (citta), the chief factor in cognition, and its accompanying “body” of mental factors (cetasika), which perform secondary cognitive functions. It seems, however, that in such passages as the present one, “body” was intended quite literally as meaning the physical body, considered as actively contributing to the qualitative tone of an experience.

  62 Spk: The sign of serenity (samathanimitta) is serenity itself as well as its object (Spk-pṭ: the paṭibhāganimitta or counterpart sign); the sign of nondispersal (abyagganimitta) is synonymous with it.

  63 In stating that the satisambojjhaṅga arises by recollecting the Dhamma taught by accomplished monks, the text draws upon the etymological connection between sati as act of remembrance and the verb anussarati, to recollect. Though it has been overshadowed by sati’s more technical sense of awareness of the present, this nuance of the word is still occasionally preserved in Pāli (e.g., in the definition of the faculty of mindfulness at 48:9).The three phrases used to describe the cultivation of each enlightenment factor can be understood to depict three successive stages of development: initial arousal, maturation, and culmination. Spk says that in this sutta the enlightenment factors are to be understood as pertaining to insight in the prelim
inary stage of the path of arahantship. They occur together in one mind-moment, though with different characteristics. The whole pattern is also at 54:13, but beginning with the four establishments of mindfulness as the means of arousing the satisambojjhaṅga.

  64 I follow Be here, which reads simply passaddhakāyassa sukhino cittaṃ samādhiyati. Se and Ee have passaddhakāyassa sukhaṃ hoti, sukhino cittaṃ samādhiyati, “for one whose body is tranquil there is happiness, for one who is happy the mind becomes concentrated.” I suspect this reading has arisen from confusion with such texts as 47:10 and AN V 3, 3-8, where sukha is a distinct stage in the sequence of development. Be is supported here by the Se and Ee reading of the exact parallel at 54:13.

  65 This fivefold typology of nonreturners recurs at 48:15, 24, 66; 51:26; 54:5; and 55:25. Spk explains the antarāparinibbāyī (“attainer of Nibbāna in the interval”) as one reborn in the Pure Abodes who attains arahantship during the first half of the life span. This type is subdivided into three, depending on whether arahantship is reached: (i) on the very day of rebirth; (ii) after one or two hundred aeons have elapsed; or (iii) after four hundred aeons have elapsed. The upahaccaparinibbāyī (“attainer of Nibbāna upon landing”) is explained as one who attains arahantship after passing the first half of the life span. For Spk, the asaṅkhāraparinibbāyī (“attainer without exertion”) and the sasaṅkhāraparinibbāyī (“attainer with exertion”) then become two modes in which the first two types of nonreturners attain the goal. This explanation originates from Pp 16-17 (commented on at Pp-a 198-201). However, not only does this account of the first two types disregard the literal meaning of their names, but it also overrides the sequential and mutually exclusive nature of the five types as delineated elsewhere in the suttas (see below).If we understand the term antarāparinibbāyī literally, as it seems we should, it then means one who attains Nibbāna in the interval between two lives, perhaps while existing in a subtle body in the intermediate state. The upahaccaparinibbāyī then becomes one who attains Nibbāna “upon landing” or “striking ground” in the new existence, i.e., almost immediately after taking rebirth. The next two terms designate two types who attain arahantship in the course of the next life, distinguished by the amount of effort they must make to win the goal. The last, the uddhaṃsota akaniṭṭhagāmī, is one who takes rebirth in successive Pure Abodes, completes the full life span in each, and finally attains arahantship in the Akaniṭṭha realm, the highest Pure Abode.