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Walshe, Maurice, trans. Thus Have I Heard: Long Discourses of the Buddha. London: Wisdom Publications, 1987. Recent translation of the complete Dı̄gha Nikāya.

Watanabe, Fumimaro. Philosophy and its Development in the Nikāyas and Abhidhamma. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1983. Chapters on Abhidhamma elements in the Nikāyas and on the Codes (m̄tik̄).

Wijesekera, O.H. de A. Buddhist and Vedic Studies. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1994.

List of Abbreviations

AN Anguttara Nikāya

BBS Burmese-script Buddhasāsana Samiti edition of the Majjhima Nikāya

BPS Buddhist Publication Society of Kandy, Sri Lanka

CPD Critical Pāli Dictionary

Cv Cū˘avagga (Vinaya Piṭaka)

Dhp Dhammapada

DN Dı̄gha Nikāya

Jāt Jātaka

Kh Khandhaka (Vinaya Piṭaka)

MA Majjhima Nikāya Aṭṭhakathā

Miln Milindapañha

MLS Middle Length Sayings (see Bibliography, Horner)

MN Majjhima Nikāya

Ms Ven. Ñā˚amoli’s manuscript translation of the Majjhima Nikāya

Ṃ Majjhima Nikāya Ṭı̄kā

Mv Mahāvagga (Vinaya Piṭaka)

Ñm Bhikkhu Ñā˚amoli

Pāc Pācittiya

Pār Pārājika

PED Pali-English Dictionary (Pali Text Society)

PTS Pali Text Society

Pṭs Paṭisambhidāmagga

Pug Puggalapaññatti

SBJ Sinhala-script Buddha Jayanti Tripitaka Series edition of the Majjhima Nikāya

SN Saṁyutta Nikāya

Sn Sutta Nipāta

Thag Theragāthā

Ud Udāna

Vbh Vibhanga

Vin Vinaya Piṭaka

Vsm Visuddhimagga

In the case of references containing two figures separated by a slash, the figure to the right of the slash is the volume and page number of the PTS edition of the Pali text. Of the figures to the left of the slash, references to the Saṁyutta Nikāya and the Udāna indicate chapter and sutta number; those to the Anguttara Nikāya indicate division and sutta number; those to the Dı̄gha Nikāya indicate the sutta, section, and verse number assigned in Maurice Walshe’s translation, Thus Have I Heard (see Bibliography). References to the Visuddhimagga are to chapter and section number of Bhikkhu Ñā˚amoli’s translation, The Path of Purification. All references to the Majjhima Nikāya are to the sutta and section number of the present work.

Notes

SUTTA 1

1 For a fuller treatment of this important and difficult sutta, see Bhikkhu Bodhi, Discourse on the Root of Existence. This work contains, besides a translation of the sutta, a lengthy analytical study of its philosophical significance and copious extracts from the very helpful commentarial literature that has accumulated around it. Ñm’s rendering of this sutta in Ms was highly conjectural; thus, while I have retained most of his terminology, I have substituted my own rendering of the syntax to bring out the meaning that accords with the traditional interpretation and that seems warranted by the original Pali text as well. The key passages as Ñm rendered them will be given in the Notes.

2 MA explains that the Buddha delivered this sutta to dispel the conceit that had arisen in five hundred bhikkhus on account of their erudition and intellectual mastery of the Buddha’s teachings. These bhikkhus were formerly brahmins learned in the Vedic literature, and the Buddha’s cryptic utterances may well have been intended to challenge the brahmanic views to which they may still have adhered.

3 Sabbadhammamūlapariyāya. Ṃ explains that the word “all” (sabba) is being used here in the restricted sense of the “all of personal identity” (sakk̄yasabba), that is, with reference to all states or phenomena (dhamm̄) comprised within the five aggregates affected by clinging (see MN 28.4). Supramundane states—the paths, fruits, and Nibbāna—are excluded. The “root of all things”—that is, the special condition that maintains the continuity of the process of repeated existence—Ṃ explains to be craving, conceit, and views (which are the underlying springs of “conceiving”), and these in turn are underlaid by ignorance, suggested in the sutta by the phrase “he has not fully understood it.”

4 The “untaught