In the Buddha's Words - Bhikkhu Bodhi [231]
26. While the “discovery of truth” (saccānubodha) in this context seems to mean the attainment of stream-entry, the final arrival at truth (saccānuppatti) must mean the attainment of arahantship. Note that the final arrival at truth does not come about through any new measures, but simply through the repeated development of those same factors that led to the discovery of truth.
27. Ps: The brahmins believed that they themselves were the offspring of Brahmā’s mouth, the khattiyas of his breast, the mercantile class (vessa) of his belly, the workers (sudda) of his legs, and samaṇas of the soles of his feet.
CHAPTER IV: THE HAPPINESS VISIBLE IN THIS PRESENT LIFE
1 As the standard for the wheel-turning monarch, Dhamma is not the Buddha’s teaching but the moral law of justice and righteousness on the basis of which the righteous king rules his country and gains sovereignty over the world. In Indian iconography, the wheel (cakka) is the symbol of sovereignty in both the temporal and spiritual spheres. The world ruler assumes kingship when the mystical “wheel treasure” (cakkaratana) appears to him (see Text IV,6(5)); the wheel treasure persists as the symbol of his rule. Analogously, the Buddha sets in motion the wheel of the Dhamma, which cannot be turned back by anyone in the world.
2 Compare with the shout of the devas at the conclusion of Text II,5.
3 The householder Nakulapitā and the housewife Nakulamātā were the foremost of the Buddha’s lay disciples with regard to their trust in him. See Nyanaponika and Hecker, Great Disciples of the Buddha, pp. 375–78.
4 Anāthapiṇḍika was the Buddha’s foremost male lay supporter. See Nyanaponika and Hecker, Great Disciples of the Buddha, chapter 9.
5 Dāsī: literally, a female slave. Fortunately, in Buddhist societies this recommendation has not been taken very seriously and the first three models of the ideal wife have prevailed.
6 Visākhā was the Buddha’s foremost female lay supporter. The Eastern Park was the monastery she had built for the Buddha in the eastern part of Sāvatthī.
7 This argument is intended to refute the brahmins’ claim that they are born from the mouth of Brahmā.
8 Yona is probably the Greek colony of Bactria, in modern Afghanistan and Pakistan. Greeks lived and ruled here after the conquests of Alexander the Great. Kamboja is probably to the northwest of the Indian “Middle Country.”
9 King Ajātasattu had come to power by killing his father, the virtuous king Bimbisāra, a supporter of the Buddha who had attained stream-entry, the first stage of liberation. Ajātasattu later felt remorse for his heinous deed and, after hearing the Buddha teach the Sāmaññaphala Sutta (DN 2), became his follower. The Vajjian confederacy, north of Magadha, on the other side of the river Ganges, consisted of the Licchavis of Vesālī and the Vedehis (of Videha—to whom Ajātasattu’s mother belonged), whose capital was Mithilā.
10 The uposatha is the day of religious observance in the Indian lunar calendar. It falls on the days of the full moon (the fifteenth of the fortnight), the new moon (the fourteenth or fifteenth of the fortnight), and the two half-moons. The “uposatha day of the fifteenth” referred to here is probably the full-moon uposatha.
11 I correct an error in Walshe’s translation here. Walshe translates as if the virtuous ascetics and brahmins should come to the king to ask for his guidance in what is wholesome and unwholesome. The Pāli text, however, is clear that it is the king who should approach the virtuous ascetics and brahmins to ask for their guidance.