The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha - Bhikkhu Nanamoli [623]
916 As at MN 27.2.
SUTTA 100
917 Dhānañjānı̄ was a stream-enterer. MA says that Sangārava was her husband’s younger brother.
918 Diṭṭadhammābhiññāvosānapāramippattā ādibrahmacariyaṁ paṭijānanti. MA glosses: They claim to be the originators, creators, producers of a holy life, saying: “Having directly known here and now in this present existence and having reached the consummation, we have attained Nibbāna, called ‘perfection’ because it is the transcendence of everything.”
919 It is puzzling that the reasoners and investigators (takkı̄, vı̄maṁsı̄) are here said to rely on the basis of mere faith (saddhāmattakena). Elsewhere faith and reasoning are contrasted as two different grounds of conviction (MN 95.14), and “mere faith” seems more closely allied with reliance on oral tradition than with reasoning and investigation.
920 Sāmaṁ yeva dhammaṁ abhiññāya. This phrase emphasises direct personal realisation as the foundation for promulgating a holy life.
921 MA says that Sangārava had the idea that the Buddha spoke thus without actual knowledge, and he therefore accuses the Buddha of false speech. The sequence of ideas in this passage is difficult to follow and it is likely that the text is corrupt. K.R. Norman has proposed a reconstruction of this portion of the dialogue, but it is hard to follow him in details. See Norman, Collected Papers, 2:1–8.
SUTTA 101
922 This doctrine, which is here ascribed to the Jains, is also taken up for criticism by the Buddha at SN 36:21/ iv.230–31 and AN 3:61/i.173–74. The Buddha’s teaching recognises the existence of feeling that is not the result of past action but a concomitant of present action, and also admits feeling that is neither kammically active nor kammic result.
923 From here until §5, “That being so…,” also at MN 14.17–19. The statement of the Niga˚ṭha Nātaputta, which at MN 14.17 introduces the Niga˚ṭhas’ position, here comes afterwards, at §10, as the Niga˚ṭhas’ justification for their assertion.
924 As at MN 95.14.
925 It is not fitting for them to make that declaration because their “intense exertion,” i.e., their ascetic practice, is the cause for their painful feelings, as the Buddha states in §15.
926 This is a technical expression for an action that is to ripen in this present life.
927 MA: “An action [whose result] is to be experienced in a matured [personality]” is a synonym for an action [whose result] is to be experienced here and now. “An action [whose result] is to be experienced in an unmatured personality” is a synonym for action [whose result] is to be experienced in the next life. But a specification is made as follows: any action that yields its result in the same life is one to be experienced here and now, but only an action that produces its result within seven days is called one to be experienced in a matured personality.
928 This is an action that does not gain the opportunity to yield its result and thereby becomes defunct.
929 Issaranimmānahetu. This doctrine of the theists is criticised by the Buddha at AN 3:61/i.174.
930 Sangatibhāvahetu. This alludes to the doctrine of Makkhali Gosāla, criticised at length at MN 60.21 and AN 3:61/ i.175.
931 Abhijātihetu. This also refers to a tenet of Makkhali Gosāla.
932 This is a formulation of the Buddha’s Middle Way, which avoids the extreme of self-mortification without falling into the other extreme of infatuation with sensual pleasure.
933 MA explains the source of suffering to be craving, so called because it is the root of the suffering comprised in the five aggregates.