Ven. Ñāṇamoli attempted to fulfil his guideline of consistency by rendering the word brahma in its various occurrences by “divine” or its cognates. Thus Brahmā the deity was rendered “the Divinity,” brāhmaṇa (= brahmin) was rendered “divine” (as a noun meaning a priestly theologian), and the expression brahmacariya , in which brahma functions as an adjective, was rendered “the Life Divine.” The result of this experiment was again the sacrifice of clarity for the sake of consistency, even at the risk of generating misunderstanding, and therefore in the revisionary process I decided to treat these expressions in line with more conventional practices. Thus Brahmā and brahmin have been left untranslated (the latter word is probably already more familiar to modern readers than the archaic noun “divine”). The word brahma, as it appears in compounds, has usually been rendered “holy”—e.g., brahmacariya as “the holy life” except when it is used to signify total sexual abstinence, in which case it has been rendered in accordance with its intended meaning as “celibacy.” The word “divine” has, however, been retained in the expression brahmavihāra, rendered “divine abode” (MN 83.6) with reference to the “immeasurable” meditations on loving-kindness, compassion, altruistic joy, and equanimity, which are the dwellings of the divinity Brahmā (MN 55.7) and the path to rebirth in the Brahma-world (MN 99.22).
A NOTE ON PRONUNCIATION
The pronunciation of Pali words and names is quite easy providing the following simple rules are heeded. Among the vowels:
Among the consonants, g is pronounced as in “girl,” c as in “church,” ñ as in “canyon.” The cerebrals—ṭ, ḍ, ṇ, ̣— are spoken with the tongue on the roof of the mouth; the dentals—t, d, n, l—with the tongue on the upper teeth. ṁ is a nasal as in “sing.” The aspirates—kh, gh, ch, jh, ṭh, ḍh, th, dh, ph, and bh—are single consonants pronounced with a slight outward puff of breath, e.g., th as in “Thomas” (not as in “that”), ph as in “top hat” (not as in “phone”). Double consonants are always enunciated separately, e.g., dd as in “mad dog,” gg as in “big gun.”
An o and an e always carry a stress, otherwise the stress falls on a long vowel—ā, ī, or ū—or on a double consonant, or on ṁ.
MAJOR CHANGES IN TERMINOLOGY
This list shows the most important of the changes in Ven. Ñāṇamoli’s manuscript terminology that were made for this edition. Changes marked with an asterisk were already introduced by Ven. Khantipālo in A Treasury of the Buddha’s Words.
PALI TERMMS RENDERINGREVISED RENDERING
akusala unprofitable unwholesome
ajjhosāna cleaving holding
abhinivesa insistence adherence
arūpa formless immaterial
*asekha the Adept one beyond training
iddhi success (1) supernormal power;
(2) spiritual power;
(3) success
uddhacca-kukkucca agitation and worry restlessness and remorse
upadhi essentials of existence acquisition(s)
ottappa shame fear of wrongdoing
kāmā sensual desires sensual pleasures
kusala profitable wholesome
khaya exhaustion destruction
*citta cognizance mind
chanda zeal (1) desire; (2) zeal
*jhāna illumination jhāna
*tathāgata the Perfect One the Tathāgata
thīna-middha lethargy and drowsiness sloth and torpor
*dhamma the True Idea the Dhamma
dhammā ideas (1) things, states, factors;
(2) mind-objects;
(3) qualities;
(4) teachings
nandī relishing delight
nāma name mentality
nāmarūpa name-and-form mentality-materiality
*nibbāna extinction Nibbāna
nibbidā dispassion disenchantment
paññā understanding wisdom
paṭigha resistance (1) sensory impact;
(2) aversion
padhāna endeavour striving
papañca diversification proliferation
paritassanā anguish agitation
pīti happiness rapture
*buddha the Enlightened One the Buddha
brahma divine holy, divine
brahmā the Divinity Brahmā
brāhmaṇa divine (caste) brahmin
bhāvanā maintaining in being development
muditā gladness altruistic joy
rūpa form (1) form; form;
(2) material form, materiality;
(3) fine-material (being)
vicāra pondering sustained thought
vicikicchā uncertainty doubt
vitakka thought, thinking thought, applied thought
virāga fading away of lust dispassion
sakkāya embodiment identity
*sankhārā determinations formations
*sangha the Community the Sangha
*sattā creatures beings
samaṇa monk recluse
*sekha the Initiate the disciple in higher training
hiri conscience shame
A Summary of the 152 Suttas
PART ONE: THE ROOT FIFTY DISCOURSES
1. Mūlapariyāya Sutta: The Root of All Things. The Buddha analyses the cognitive processes of four types of individuals—the untaught ordinary person, the disciple in higher training, the arahant, and the Tathāgata. This is one of the deepest and most difficult suttas in the Pali Canon, and it is therefore suggested that the earnest student read it only in a cursory manner on a first reading of the Majjhima Nikāya, returning to it for an in-depth study after completing the entire collection.
2. Sabbāsava Sutta: All the Taints. The Buddha teaches the bhikkhus seven methods for restraining and abandoning the taints, the fundamental defilements that maintain bondage to the round of birth and death.
3. Dhammadāyāda Sutta: Heirs in Dhamma. The Buddha enjoins the bhikkhus to be heirs in Dhamma, not heirs in material things. The venerable Sāriputta then continues on the same theme by explaining how disciples should train themselves to become the Buddha’s heirs in Dhamma.
4. Bhayabherava Sutta: Fear and Dread. The Buddha describes to a brahmin the qualities required of a monk who wishes to live alone in the forest. He then relates an account of his own attempts to conquer fear when striving for enlightenment.
5. Anangaṇa Sutta: Without Blemishes. The venerable Sāriputta gives a discourse to the bhikkhus on the meaning of blemishes, explaining that a bhikkhu becomes blemished when he falls under the sway of evil wishes.
6. Ākankheyya Sutta: If a Bhikkhu Should Wish. The Buddha begins by stressing the importance of virtue as the foundation for a bhikkhu’s training; he then goes on to enumerate the benefits that a bhikkhu can reap by properly fulfilling the training.
7. Vatthūpama Sutta: The Simile of the Cloth. With a simple simile the Buddha illustrates the difference between a defiled mind and a pure mind.
8. Sallekha Sutta: Effacement. The Buddha rejects the view that the mere attainment of the meditative absorptions is effacement and explains how effacement is properly practised in his teaching.
9. Sammādiṭṭhi Sutta: Right View. A long and important discourse by the venerable Sāriputta, with separate sections on the wholesome and the unwholesome, nutriment, the Four Noble Truths, the twelve factors of dependent origination, and the taints.
10. Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta: The Foundations of Mindfulness. This is one of the fullest and most important suttas by the Buddha dealing with meditation, with particular emphasis on the development of insight. The Buddha begins by declaring the four foundations of mindfulness to be the direct path for the realisation of Nibbāna, then gives detailed instructions on the four foundations: the contemplation of the body, feelings, mind, and mind-objects.
11. Cūḷasīhanāda Sutta: The Shorter Discourse on the Lion’s Roar. The Buddha declares that only in his Dispensation can the four grades of noble individuals be found, explaining how his teaching can be distinguis
hed from other creeds through its unique rejection of all doctrines of self.
12. Mahāsīhanāda Sutta: The Greater Discourse on the Lion’s Roar. The Buddha expounds the ten powers of a Tathāgata, his four kinds of intrepidity, and other superior qualities, which entitle him to “roar his lion’s roar in the assemblies.”
13. Mahādukkhakkhandha Sutta: The Greater Discourse on the Mass of Suffering. The Buddha explains the full understanding of sensual pleasures, material form, and feelings; there is a long section on the dangers in sensual pleasures.
14. Cūḷadukkhakkhandha Sutta: The Shorter Discourse on the Mass of Suffering. A variation on the preceding, ending in a discussion with Jain ascetics on the nature of pleasure and pain.
15. Anumāna Sutta: Inference. The venerable Mahā Moggallāna enumerates the qualities that make a bhikkhu difficult to admonish and teaches how one should examine oneself to remove the defects in one’s character.
16. Cetokhila Sutta: The Wilderness in the Heart. The Buddha explains to the bhikkhus the five “wildernesses in the heart” and the five “shackles in the heart.”
17. Vanapattha Sutta: Jungle Thickets. A discourse on the conditions under which a meditative monk should remain living in a jungle thicket and the conditions under which he should go elsewhere.
18. Madhupiṇḍika Sutta: The Honeyball. The Buddha utters a deep but enigmatic statement about “the source through which perceptions and notions tinged by mental proliferation beset a man.” This statement is elucidated by the venerable Mahā Kaccāna, whose explanation is praised by the Buddha.
19. Dvedhāvitakka Sutta: Two Kinds of Thought. With reference to his own struggle for enlightenment, the Buddha explains the way to overcome unwholesome thoughts and replace them by wholesome thoughts.
20. Vitakkasaṇṭhāna Sutta: The Removal of Distracting Thoughts. The Buddha teaches five methods for dealing with the unwholesome thoughts that may arise in the course of meditation.
21. Kakacūpama Sutta: The Simile of the Saw. A discourse on the need to maintain patience when addressed with disagreeable words.
22. Alagaddūpama Sutta: The Simile of the Snake. A bhikkhu named Ariṭṭha gives rise to a pernicious view that conduct prohibited by the Buddha is not really an obstruction. The Buddha reprimands him and, with a series of memorable similes, stresses the dangers in misapplying and misrepresenting the Dhamma. The sutta culminates in one of the most impressive disquisitions on non-self found in the Canon.
23. Vammika Sutta: The Ant-hill. A deity presents a monk with an obscure riddle, which is unravelled for him by the Buddha.
24. Rathavinīta Sutta: The Relay Chariots. The venerable Puṇṇa Mantāṇiputta explains to Sāriputta that the goal of the holy life, final Nibbāna, is to be reached by way of the seven stages of purification.
25. Nivāpa Sutta: The Bait. The Buddha uses the analogy of deer-trappers to make known to the bhikkhus the obstacles that confront them in their effort to escape from Māra’s control.
26. Ariyapariyesanā Sutta: The Noble Search. The Buddha gives the bhikkhus a long account of his own quest for enlightenment from the time of his life in the palace up to his transmission of the Dhamma to his first five disciples.
27. Cūḷahatthipadopama Sutta: The Shorter Discourse on the Simile of the Elephant’s Footprint. Using the analogy of a woodsman tracking down a big bull elephant, the Buddha explains how a disciple arrives at complete certainty of the truth of his teaching. The sutta presents a full account of the step-by-step training of the Buddhist monk.
28. Mahāhatthipadopama Sutta: The Greater Discourse on the Simile of the Elephant’s Footprint. The venerable Sāriputta begins with a statement of the Four Noble Truths, which he then expounds by way of the contemplation of the four elements and the dependent origination of the five aggregates.
29. Mahāsāropama Sutta: The Greater Discourse on the Simile of the Heartwood.
30. Cūḷasāropama Sutta: The Shorter Discourse on the Simile of the Heartwood. These two discourses emphasise that the proper goal of the holy life is the unshakeable deliverance of the mind, to which all other benefits are subsidiary.
31. Cūḷagosinga Sutta: The Shorter Discourse in Gosinga. The Buddha meets three bhikkhus who are living in concord, “blending like milk and water,” and inquires how they succeed in living together so harmoniously.
32. Mahāgosinga Sutta: The Greater Discourse in Gosinga. On a beautiful moonlit night a number of senior disciples meet together in a sāla-tree wood and discuss what kind of bhikkhu could illuminate the wood. After each has answered according to his personal ideal, they go to the Buddha, who provides his own answer.
33. Mahāgopālaka Sutta: The Greater Discourse on the Cowherd. The Buddha teaches eleven qualities that prevent a bhikkhu’s growth in the Dhamma and eleven qualities that contribute to his growth.
34. Cụ̄agopālaka Sutta: The Shorter Discourse on the Cowherd. The Buddha explains the types of bhikkhus Cowherd. The Buddha explains the types of bhikkhus who “breast Māra’s stream” and get safely across to the further shore.
35. Cụ̄asaccaka Sutta: The Shorter Discourse to Saccaka. The debater Saccaka boasts that in debate he can shake the Buddha up and down and thump him about, but when he finally meets the Buddha their discussion takes some unexpected turns.
36. Mahāsaccaka Sutta: The Greater Discourse to Saccaka. The Buddha meets again with Saccaka and in the course of a discussion on “development of body” and “development of mind” he relates a detailed narrative on his own spiritual quest.
37. Cụ̄ataṇhāsankhaya Sutta: The Shorter Discourse on the Destruction of Craving. The venerable Mahā Moggallāna overhears the Buddha give a brief explanation to Sakka, ruler of gods, as to how a bhikkhu is liberated through the destruction of craving. Wishing to know if Sakka understood the meaning, he makes a trip to the heaven of the Thirty-three to find out.
38. Mahātaṇhāsankhaya Sutta: The Greater Discourse on the Destruction of Craving. A bhikkhu named Sāti promulgates the pernicious view that the same consciousness transmigrates from life to life. The Buddha reprimands him with a lengthy discourse on dependent origination, showing how all phenomena of existence arise and cease through conditions.
39. Mahā-Assapura Sutta: The Greater Discourse at Assapura. The Buddha elucidates “the things that make one a recluse” with a discourse covering many aspects of the bhikkhu’s training.
40. Cūḷa-Assapura Sutta: The Shorter Discourse at Assapura. The Buddha explains “the way proper to the recluse” to be not the mere outward practice of austerities but the inward purification from defilements.
41. Sāleyyaka Sutta: The Brahmins of Sālā.
42. Verañjaka Sutta: The Brahmins of Verañja. In these two nearly identical suttas the Buddha explains to groups of brahmin householders the courses of conduct leading to rebirth in lower realms and the courses leading to higher rebirth and deliverance.
43. Mahāvedalla Sutta: The Greater Series of Questions and Answers.
44. Cụ̄avedalla Sutta: The Shorter Series of Questions and Answers. These two discourses take the form of discussions on various subtle points of Dhamma, the former between the venerable Mahā Koṭṭhita and the venerable Sāriputta, the latter between the bhikkhunī Dhammadinnā and the lay follower Visākha.
45. Cụ̄adhammasamādāna Sutta: The Shorter Discourse on Ways of Undertaking Things.
46. Mahādhammasamādāna Sutta: The Greater Discourse on Ways of Undertaking Things. The Buddha explains, differently in each of the two suttas, four ways of undertaking things, distinguished according to whether they are painful or pleasant now and whether they ripen in pain or pleasure in the future.
47. Vīmaṁsaka Sutta: The Inquirer. The Buddha invites the bhikkhus to make a thorough investigation of himself in order to find out whether or not he can be accepted as fully enlightened.
48. Kosambiya Sutta: The Kosambians. During the period when the bhikkhus at Kosambi are divided by a dispute, the Buddha teaches them the
six qualities that create love and respect and conduce to unity. He then explains seven extraordinary knowledges possessed by a noble disciple who has realised the fruit of stream-entry.
49. Brahmanimantanika Sutta: The Invitation of a Brahmā. Baka the Brahmā, a high divinity, adopts the pernicious view that the heavenly world over which he presides is eternal and that there is no higher state beyond. The Buddha visits him to dissuade him from that wrong view and engages him in a contest of Olympian dimensions.
50. Māratajjanīya Sutta: The Rebuke to Māra. Māra attempts to harass the venerable Mahā Moggallāna, but the latter relates a story of the distant past to warn Māra of the dangers in creating trouble for a disciple of the Buddha.
PART TWO: THE MIDDLE FIFTY DISCOURSES
51 Kandaraka Sutta: To Kandaraka. The Buddha discusses four kinds of persons found in the world—the one who torments himself, the one who torments others, the one who torments both himself and others, and the one who torments neither but lives a truly holy life.
The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha Page 7