The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha - Bhikkhu Nanamoli [234]
“Then, Puṇṇa, listen and attend closely to what I shall say.”—“Yes, venerable sir,” he replied. The Blessed One said this:
7. “Puṇṇa, there are four kinds of action proclaimed by me after realising them for myself with direct knowledge. What are the four? There is dark action with dark result; there is bright action with bright result; there is dark-and-bright action with dark-and-bright result; and there is action that is neither dark nor bright with neither-dark-nor-bright result, action that leads to the destruction of action.
8. “And what, Puṇṇa, is dark action with dark result? Here someone generates an afflictive bodily formation, an afflictive verbal formation, an afflictive mental formation.602 Having generated an afflictive bodily formation, an afflictive verbal formation, an afflictive mental formation, he reappears in an afflictive world.603 When he has reappeared in an afflictive world, afflictive contacts touch him. Being touched by afflictive contacts, he feels afflictive feelings, exclusively painful, as in the case of the beings in [390] hell. Thus a being’s reappearance is due to a being:604 one reappears through the actions one has performed. When one has reappeared, contacts touch one. Thus I say beings are the heirs of their actions. This is called dark action with dark result.
9. “And what, Puṇṇa, is bright action with bright result? Here someone generates an unafflictive bodily formation, an unafflictive verbal formation, an unafflictive mental formation.605 Having generated an unafflictive bodily formation, an unafflictive verbal formation, an unafflictive mental formation, he reappears in an unafflictive world.606 When he has reappeared in an unafflictive world, unafflictive contacts touch him. Being touched by unafflictive contacts, he feels unafflictive feelings, exclusively pleasant, as in the case of the gods of Refulgent Glory. Thus a being’s reappearance is due to a being; one reappears through the actions one has performed. When one has reappeared, contacts touch one. Thus I say beings are the heirs of their actions. This is called bright action with bright result.
10. “And what, Puṇṇa, is dark-and-bright action with dark-and-bright result? Here someone generates a bodily formation that is both afflictive and unafflictive, a verbal formation that is both afflictive and unafflictive, a mental formation that is both afflictive and unafflictive.607 Having generated a bodily formation, a verbal formation, a mental formation that is both afflictive and unafflictive, he reappears in a world that is both afflictive and unafflictive. When he has reappeared in a world that is both afflictive and unafflictive, both afflictive and unafflictive contacts touch him. Being touched by both afflictive and unafflictive contacts, he feels both afflictive and unafflictive feelings, mingled pleasure and pain, as in the case of human beings and some gods and some beings in the lower worlds. Thus a being’s reappearance is due to a being: one reappears through the actions one has performed. When one has reappeared, contacts touch one. Thus I say beings are the heirs to their actions. This is called dark-and-bright action with dark-and-bright result. [391]
11. “And what, Puṇṇa, is action that is neither dark nor bright with neither-dark-nor-bright result, action that leads to the destruction of action? Therein, the volition for abandoning the kind of action that is dark with dark result, and the volition for abandoning the kind of action that is bright with bright result, and the volition for abandoning the kind of action that is dark and bright with dark-and-bright result: this is called action that is neither dark nor bright with neither-dark-nor-bright