The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha - Bhikkhu Nanamoli [294]
24. “So too, Māgandiya, if I were to teach you the Dhamma thus: ‘This is that health, this is that Nibbāna,’ you might know health and see Nibbāna. Together with the arising of your vision, your desire and lust for the five aggregates affected by clinging might be abandoned. Then perhaps you might think: ‘Indeed, I have long been tricked, cheated, and defrauded by this mind. For when clinging, I have been clinging just to material form, I have been clinging just to feeling, I have been clinging just to perception, I have been clinging just to formations, I have been clinging just to consciousness.746 With my clinging as condition, being [comes to be]; with being as condition, birth; with birth as condition, ageing and death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, [512] and despair come to be. Such is the origin of this whole mass of suffering.’”
25. “I have confidence in Master Gotama thus: ‘Master Gotama is capable of teaching me the Dhamma in such a way that I might rise up from this seat cured of my blindness.’”
“Then, Māgandiya, associate with true men. When you associate with true men, you will hear the true Dhamma. When you hear the true Dhamma, you will practise in accordance with the true Dhamma. When you practise in accordance with the true Dhamma, you will know and see for yourself thus: ‘These are diseases, tumours, and darts; but here these diseases, tumours, and darts cease without remainder.747 With the cessation of my clinging comes cessation of being; with the cessation of being, cessation of birth; with the cessation of birth, ageing and death, sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair cease. Such is the cessation of this whole mass of suffering.’”
26. When this was said, the wanderer Māgandiya said: “Magnificent, Master Gotama! Magnificent, Master Gotama! Master Gotama has made the Dhamma clear in many ways, as though he were turning upright what had been overthrown, revealing what was hidden, showing the way to one who was lost, or holding up a lamp in the dark for those with eyesight to see forms. I go to Master Gotama for refuge and to the Dhamma and to the Sangha of bhikkhus. I would receive the going forth under Master Gotama. I would receive the full admission.”
27. “Māgandiya, one who formerly belonged to another sect and desires the going forth and the full admission in this Dhamma and Discipline lives on probation for four months. At the end of four months, if the bhikkhus are satisfied with him, they give him the going forth and the full admission to the bhikkhus’ state. But I recognise individual differences in this matter.”
“Venerable sir, if those who formerly belonged to another sect and desire the going forth and the full admission in this Dhamma and Discipline live on probation for four months, and if at the end of the four months the bhikkhus being satisfied with them give them the going forth and the full admission to the bhikkhus’ state, then I will live on probation for four years. At the end of the four years if the bhikkhus are satisfied with me, let them give me the going forth and the full admission to the bhikkhus’ state.” [513]
28. Then the wanderer Māgandiya received the going forth under the Blessed One, and he received the full admission. And soon, not long after his full admission, dwelling alone, withdrawn, diligent, ardent, and resolute, the venerable Māgandiya, by realising for himself with direct knowledge, here and now entered upon and abided in that supreme goal of the holy life for the sake of which clansmen rightly go forth from the home life into homelessness. He directly knew: “Birth is destroyed, the holy life has been lived,