Aṇguttara Nikāya
XI. Ekā-Dasaka Nipāta
II. Anussati Vagga
Sutta 17
Aṭṭhakanāgara Suttaṃ
aka
Dasama Sutta
To Dasama
Translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu.
Provenance, terms and conditons
[1][pts][olds] On one occasion Ven. Ānanda was staying near Vesali at Veluvagamaka.
Now on that occasion Dasama the householder from Atthakanagara had arrived at Pataliputta on some business.
Then he went to a certain monk at Kukkata Monastery and on arrival said to him, "Where is Ven. Ānanda staying now?
I'd like to see him."
"Householder, the Ven. Ānanda is staying near Vesali at Veluvagamaka."
Then Dasama the householder from Atthakanagara, on completing his business at Pataliputta, went to Ven. Ānanda at Veluvagamaka near Vesali.
On arrival, having bowed down to him, he sat to one side.
As he was sitting there, he said to Ven. Ānanda:
"Venerable sir, is there a single quality declared by the Blessed One — the one who knows, the one who sees, worthy and rightly self-awakened — where the unreleased mind of a monk who dwells there heedful, ardent, and resolute becomes released, or his unended effluents go to their total ending, or he attains the unexcelled security from the yoke that he had not attained before?"
"Yes, householder, there is..."
"And what is that one quality, venerable sir...?"
"There is the case, householder, where a monk, withdrawn from sensuality, withdrawn from unskillful qualities, enters and remains in the first jhāna: rapture and pleasure born from withdrawal, accompanied by directed thought and evaluation.
He reflects on this and discerns, 'This first jhāna is fabricated and intended.
Now whatever is fabricated and intended is inconstant and subject to cessation.'
Staying right there, he reaches the ending of the mental effluents.
Or, if not, then — through this very Dhamma-passion, this Dhamma-delight, and from the total wasting away of the first five Fetters[1] — he is due to be reborn [in the Pure Abodes], there to be totally unbound, never again to return from that world.
"This, householder, is a single quality declared by the Blessed One — the one who knows, the one who sees, worthy and rightly self-awakened — where the unreleased mind of a monk who dwells there heedful, ardent, and resolute becomes released, or his unended effluents go to their total ending, or he attains the unexcelled security from the yoke that he had not attained before.
[Similarly with the second, third, and fourth jhānas.]
"Then again, a monk keeps pervading the first direction [the east] with an awareness imbued with good will, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the fourth.
Thus above, below, and all around, everywhere, in its entirety, he keeps pervading the all-encompassing cosmos with an awareness imbued with good will — abundant, expansive, immeasurable, without hostility, without ill will.
He reflects on this and discerns, 'This release of awareness through good will is fabricated and intended.
Now whatever is fabricated and intended is inconstant and subject to cessation.'
Staying right there, he reaches the ending of the mental effluents.
Or, if not, then — through this very Dhamma-passion, this Dhamma-delight, and from the total wasting away of the first five Fetters — he is due to be reborn [in the Pure Abodes], there to be totally unbound, never again to return from that world.
"This too, householder, is a single quality declared by the Blessed One — the one who knows, the one who sees, worthy and rightly self-awakened — where the unreleased mind of a monk who dwells there heedful, ardent, and resolute becomes released, or his unended effluents go to their total ending, or he attains the unexcelled security from the yoke that he had not attained before.
[Similarly with release of awareness through compassion, through appreciation, and through equanimity.]
"Then again, a monk — with the complete transcending of perceptions of [physical] form, with the disappearance of perceptions of resistance, and not heeding perceptions of diversity, thinking, 'Infinite space' — enters and remains in the dimension of the infinitude of space.
He reflects on this and discerns, 'This attainment of the infinitude of space is fabricated and intended. Now whatever is fabricated and intended is inconstant and subject to cessation.'
Staying right there, he reaches the ending of the mental effluents.
Or, if not, then — through this very Dhamma-passion, this Dhamma-delight, and from the total wasting away of the first five Fetters — he is due to be reborn [in the Pure Abodes], there to be totally unbound, never again to return from that world.
"This too, householder, is a single quality declared by the Blessed One — the one who knows, the one who sees, worthy and rightly self-awakened — where the unreleased mind of a monk who dwells there heedful, ardent, and resolute becomes released, or his unended effluents go to their total ending, or he attains the unexcelled security from the yoke that he had not attained before.
[Similarly with the dimension of the infinitude of consciousness and the dimension of nothingness.]
When this was said, Dasama the householder from Atthakanagara said to Ven. Ānanda, "Venerable Ānanda, just as if a man seeking a single opening onto treasure were all at once to come upon eleven openings onto treasure, in the same way I — seeking a single doorway to the Deathless — have all at once come to hear of eleven doorways to the Deathless.
And just as if a man whose house had eleven doors could take himself to safety by means of any one of those doors, in the same way I can take myself to safety by means of any one of these eleven doors to the Deathless.
Venerable sir, when sectarians search for a teacher's fee for their teachers, why shouldn't I pay homage to Ven. Ānanda?"
So Dasama the householder from Atthakanagara, having assembled the community of monks from Vesali and Pataliputta, with his own hands served and satisfied them with refined staple and non-staple foods.
He presented a pair of cloths to each monk, and a triple robe to Ven. Ānanda.
And, for Ven. Ānanda, he had a dwelling worth five hundred [kahapanas].
[1]Sanyojana. self-identity views, grasping at precepts and practices, uncertainty, sensual passion, and irritation.
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