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By Root 6367 0

‘Something is acceptable to me, something is not acceptable to me’ considers thus: ‘If I obstinately adhere to my view “Something is acceptable to me, something is not acceptable to me” and declare: “Only this is true, anything else is wrong,” then I may clash with the two others: with a recluse or brahmin who holds the doctrine and view “Everything is acceptable to me” and with a recluse or brahmin who holds the doctrine and view “Nothing is acceptable to me.” I may clash with these two, and when there is a clash, there are disputes; when there are disputes, there are quarrels; when there are quarrels, there is vexation.’ Thus, foreseeing for himself clashes, disputes, quarrels, and vexation, he abandons that view and does not take up some other view. This is how there comes to be the abandoning of these views; this is how there comes to be the relinquishing of these views. [500]

9. “Now, Aggivessana,736 this body made of material form, consisting of the four great elements, procreated by a mother and father, and built up out of boiled rice and porridge, is subject to impermanence, to being worn and rubbed away, to dissolution and disintegration. It should be regarded as impermanent, as suffering, as a disease, as a tumour, as a dart, as a calamity, as an affliction, as alien, as disintegrating, as void, as not self. When one regards this body thus, one abandons desire for the body, affection for the body, subservience to the body.

10. “There are, Aggivessana, three kinds of feeling: pleasant feeling, painful feeling, and neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling. On the occasion when one feels pleasant feeling, one does not feel painful feeling or neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling; on that occasion one feels only pleasant feeling. On the occasion when one feels painful feeling, one does not feel pleasant feeling or neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling; on that occasion one feels only painful feeling. On the occasion when one feels neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling, one does not feel pleasant feeling or painful feeling; on that occasion one feels only neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling.

11. “Pleasant feeling, Aggivessana, is impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, subject to destruction, vanishing, fading away, and ceasing. Painful feeling too is impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, subject to destruction, vanishing, fading away, and ceasing. Neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling too is impermanent, conditioned, dependently arisen, subject to destruction, vanishing, fading away, and ceasing.

12. “Seeing thus, a well-taught noble disciple becomes disenchanted with pleasant feeling, disenchanted with painful feeling, disenchanted with neither-painful-nor-pleasant feeling. Being disenchanted, he becomes dispassionate. Through dispassion [his mind] is liberated. When it is liberated there comes the knowledge: ‘It is liberated.’ He understands: ‘Birth is destroyed, the holy life has been lived, what had to be done has been done, there is no more coming to any state of being.’

13. “A bhikkhu whose mind is liberated thus, Aggivessana, sides with none and disputes with none; he employs the speech currently used in the world without adhering to it.”737

14. Now on that occasion the venerable Sāriputta was standing behind the Blessed One, [501] fanning him. Then he thought: “The Blessed One, indeed, speaks to us of the abandoning of these things through direct knowledge; the Sublime One, indeed, speaks to us of the relinquishing of these things through direct knowledge.” As the venerable Sāriputta considered this, through not clinging his mind was liberated from the taints.738

15. But in the wanderer Dīghanakha the spotless immaculate vision of the Dhamma arose: “All that is subject to arising is subject to cessation.” The wanderer Dīghanakha saw the Dhamma, attained the Dhamma, understood the Dhamma, fathomed the Dhamma; he crossed beyond doubt, did away with perplexity, gained intrepidity, and became independent of others in the Teacher’s Dispensation.739

16. Then he said to the Blessed