Tradition holds that these were the words spoken by Ānanda when reciting the Suttapiṭaka at the First Council following the Buddha’s death. In fact it is a tag signifying that the text has been passed down through oral tradition and the speaker was not present at the events (DN 5:21.10, MN 127:17.4). | This sutta with its commentary was translated by Bhikkhu Bodhi in his The All-Embracing Net of Views.

By convention, suttas do not specify the date, so we have scant internal chronology. | Walk about fifteen kilometers north from Rājagaha (modern Rajgir) to reach Nāḷandā. | “Mendicant” is a literal translation of bhikkhu, one who goes for alms.

A “wanderer” (paribbājaka) was a homeless religious renunciate—male or female—who wandered seeking alms. Kauṭilya describes their lifestyle as “mastery of the senses, abstaining from ritual activities, living without possessions, abandoning attachments, practicing mendicancy, residing in the wilderness but not in a single place, and purifying himself internally and externally” (Arthaśāstra 1.3.12, Olivelle’s translation). | “Resident pupil” (or elsewhere just “pupil”) is antevāsi, a live-in apprentice of a master. | “Student” (māṇava) is a young man who was learning the Vedas from a master.

Today these are called the Triple Gem that makes up the Buddhist religion; however they are not known by that term in the early texts.

While the disagreement of student and teacher signifies their confusion, it also represents the diversity of views within the brahmanical caste and the openness with which a student could disagree with their teacher.

Ambalaṭṭhikā means “place of mango saplings”. It was a rest-house set up by the king of Rājagaha about a day’s journey from the capital. It must have been sizable.

Saṅkhiyadhamma is a unique term. The commentary glosses it as kathādhamma, following which it has been translated as “conversation” or “trend of conversation”. But saṅkhā means “appraisal, assessment, evaluation, measuring, calculating”, and here the subject of discussion is the different ways the two parties assess or judge the Buddha, Dhamma, and Saṅgha. Compare the “appraisal” of the Buddha at DN 19:19.2.

Adhimutti is something that has been decided, a conviction or belief.

This would have been an open air pavilion in the rest-house. By convention, when a teacher or other respected person is to sit, a sitting mat is spread out or made ready for them.

The very first words of the Buddha in the Suttapiṭaka: he asks to hear what others are saying.

Here and in similar passages the Pali repeats all and I abbreviate.

The phrasing here is somewhat unusual and specific. They “should not do” what creates bitterness (i.e. judging others). Compare MN 22, where the same phrases are used. In the Buddha’s case, it has the neutral hoti, while for the mendicants it uses karaṇīya, as here.

Complaining about others does not hurt them, only the one who gets upset.

Equanimity is a prerequisite for evaluating facts.

Ethics (or morality or virtue, sīla) is important, but it pales in comparison with the higher dimensions of the Buddha’s path. For an example of this kind of praise see MN 77:8.1. | The Buddha often referred to himself as “the Realized One” (tathāgata).

Here the Buddha lays out in detail the ethical conduct for mendicant followers.

The first and most important precept. It is not just the negative injunction to avoid killing, but also the positive injunction to have compassion for all creatures. | The Buddha is called “the ascetic Gotama” by non-Buddhists.

An “ordinary person” (puthujjana) is anyone who has not, at minimum, entered the path to stream-entry.

“Chastity” is brahmacariya, literally “divine conduct”. Here it is used in the narrow sense of refraining from sex, but more commonly it has a broader sense of “spiritual life” (SN 42.7:2.6).

This is the first of the four kinds of right speech. Just as the precept of not killing implies the positive injunction to live with compassion, the precepts on speech enjoin a positive and constructive use of speech.

“Harmony” (or “unanimity”, samagga) does not excuse untrue, bigoted, or otherwise harmful speech. True harmony is only achieved in the presence of the Dhamma.

Attha is a polyvalent term, here taking the senses “meaningful” and “beneficial”. Elsewhere it means “goal”, “need”, “purpose”, “lawsuit”, or “ending”, and the senses are not always easy to untangle.

Buddhists generally do not regard plants as sentient, but value them as part of the ecosystem that supports all life.

From MN 66:6.4 and MN 70:4.8 we can see that “at night” means after dark, while “at the wrong time” means in the afternoon. More explicitly, these are the “wrong time at night” and the “wrong time in the day”, in which case they are both the “wrong time”.

Such sensual entertainments distract and excite the mind. This and the next three precepts encourage peace of mind for meditation.

This was ignored by the Buddha’s cousin, Nanda (SN 21.8:1.2).

To avoid sleeping too much.

Literally “gold and silver” (jātarūparajata), but rajata is explained in Bu NP 18:2.8 as currency of any kind.

Mendicants receive only the day’s meal and do not store or cook food.

According to ancient Indian law (Arthaśāstra 3.13), a person in a time of trouble may bind themselves in service for a fee. Such bondservants were protected against cruelty, sexual abuse, and unfair work. After earning back the fee of their indenture they were freed, retaining their original inheritance and status.

These are animals raised for food.

Land for a monastery may be accepted by the Saṅgha as a community, but not by individual mendicants.

These items are discussed in detail below. | Acting as a go-between for lay business was tempting due to the mendicants’ wandering lifestyle. However, it exposes them to risk if the message is not delivered or if it is bad news.

For example, trading in monastery property.

This section expands some of the former section in further detail. | The “middle” and “large” sections on ethics are not found in briefer presentations such as MN 27:14.1.

That these are not five “kinds of seeds” but five kinds of “plants grown from seeds” is clear from the Vinaya and its commentary (Bu Pc 11: Bhūtagāmo nāma pañca bījajātāni).

For storing up food as a sign of decline, see DN 27:17.5.

Sobhanaka (“beauty pageant”) is explained by the commentary as the movement (or “sprinkling”) of dancers, or their beautification and painting. The PTS reading sobha-nagarakaṁ, supported by an unrelated reference to a gandhabba city of that name, is spurious. | Caṇḍālaṁ vaṁsaṁ dhovanaṁ should be a compound, as shown by the prose to Ja 498, where it is a performance by corpse-workers (caṇḍāla) in Ujjenī. Vaṁsa is the bamboo used by caṇḍāla acrobats (SN 47.19). Dhovana is referred by the commentary to AN 10.107, where it is a southern ceremony accompanied by drink and dance. The commentaries to AN and DN say it was the ritual washing of the bones of the buried dead after the decomposition of the flesh. Such “second funeral” rites have been observed world-wide. From the Jātaka it appears that the tradition had declined to a mere display for passers-by, perhaps featuring naked tribal girls. | Uyodhika is sometimes said to be “sham fights”, but at AN 10.30 it is not a sham. And the definition at Bu Pc 50 says “where strife is seen”.

See too DN 31:11.1.

“Checkers” (aṭṭhapada) was presumably the ancestor of the Gupta period caturaṅga and hence modern chess. | Yathāvajja is explained in the commentary as “mimicking deformities”, but I cannot find support elsewhere in Pali or Sanskrit for vajja in this sense. More likely it refers to musical instruments (Sanskrit vādya).

Tiracchānakathā literally means “animal talk”. The Pali word for animal, tiracchāna has the sense of “moving horizontally”, and “low talk” is that which does not elevate.

Bhavābhava does not mean “existence and non-existence” but is a distributive compound, “this or that state of existence”. Indian religious texts are full of discussions about different heavens and hells.

The folly of disputatiousness is a consistent theme in the suttas, but is a special focus of the Aṭṭhakavagga of the Suttanipāta.

“Rulers” (raññaṁ, genitive plural) include hereditary kings as well as the elected joint leaders of republican states such as the Sakyans or Vajjis.

Some renunciants like to butter up potential donors, or make ostentatious displays to prompt further donations. | “Using material possessions to chase after other material possessions” includes trading monastery property for profit.

This section focuses on practices that are wrong livelihood for a mendicant, though not for lay people. The Vinaya explains “low lore” as whatever is non-Buddhist or useless (Bi Pc 49), while the commentary says it leads not to emancipation but to heaven. Most of the items in this and the following sections are detailed in later astrological texts such as Varāhamihira’s Bṛhatsaṁhitā. There are too many correspondences to cite, so I’ll only mention those that impact the translation.

The list has both aṅga and aṅgavijjā, and it’s hard to disambiguate them; the commentary tries, unpersuasively. BS 50 has aṅgavidyā, which is various kinds of “limb-reading” (compare modern “palmistry”) but no equivalent to aṅga. Perhaps it is a misspelling of the less-familiar aṅka, “mark, sign”, hence “augury”. | “Portents” (uppāta are discussed at BS 45. | Lakkhaṇa is detailed at BS 67–69 as a thorough assessment of the features of men and women, including physical marks, character, voice, gait, and so on. | Read khattavijjā (“political science”) per variant as khettavijjā (“geomancy”). | Sara in saraparitta means “sound” not “arrow”; compare with sarabhañña “chanting”. | Migacakka is explained in the commentary, supported by Bṛhatsaṁhitā, as interpretation of the cries and behaviors of wild animals. Here the suffix -cakka refers to the field of study. See also Mil 5.3.7:6.1 sācakkaṁ migacakkaṁ antaracakkaṁ (“divining omens from dogs, wild animals, and the directions around”), terms which are also found at Bṛhatsaṁhitā 2.17.

The commentary oddly has “earrings or house-gables” for kaṇṇika (“eared one”), but it must be “rabbit”, for which see sasakaṇṇikā at Ja 535:76.

Despite this, astrology is commonly practiced today among Buddhist mendicants. | (Up)pathagamana can hardly mean that the sun, moon, and stars will “go astray”. Rather, patha here has the sense of “range”, so it means “come within range”, which describes an astrological conjunction. | For “fiery sky” (disāḍāha), i.e. a glow on the horizon, as an omen, see diśāṁ dāhe at Manusmṛti 4.115 and digdāha in BS 31.

“Cosmology” (lokāyata) in early Buddhist texts is not, as it later became known, the heterodox school of materialism. Rather, it was a branch of worldly knowledge within regular Vedic studies concerned with the nature and extent of the world and how this may be known (AN 9.38, SN 12.48; cf. Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 3.3.1).

The commentary has saṅkiraṇa/vikiraṇa as “saving and spending” (cp. Snp 1.6:23.1), but it seems unlikely. Vikiraṇa means “scattering” food or sand, while Sanskrit vikira is the ritual scattering of rice. Given the context, I think it refers to the custom of scattering rice at a wedding. | For viruddhagabbhakaraṇa, viruddha means “obstructed”. The commentary here, in general agreement with the Niddesa on gabbhakaraṇa at Snp 4.14, explains as giving treatments for the survival of the fetus. | I omit hanujappana as it is absent from the commentary and seems to have just arisen by confusion.

Medicine is right livelihood, but a mendicant should not make a living from it. They may treat fellow mendicants, family members, or those close to the monastery. | Santikamma is the Sanskrit śāntikakarman, a rite for averting evil. | For vassakamma and vossakamma, the commentary has “fertile and infertile men” (vassoti puriso, vossoti paṇḍako), taking “rain” as a metaphor for semen. Such usages do have precedent elsewhere. But in context I take vassa simply as “rain” and vossa as equivalent to Sanskrit vyavasya in the sense of making a settlement for land. | I take paṭimokkho in the sense of “binding”; see pratimuñcate at Rig Veda 4.53.2, 5.81.2; paṭimokka at Ja 524:10, Ja 513:6; paṭimukka at MN 38:41.11 etc., rather than the commentary’s “release” (from the effects of caustic medicines; cf. Tha Ap 25:5.4).

One meaning of dhamma is “principle” in the sense of a natural law as well as a moral value. | Here begins the famous exposition of the sixty-two views. The subtlety of the analysis lies in how, rather than refuting the details of the views, the Buddha traces them all back to their fundamental psychology. | Pubbanta and aparanta (literally “prior end” and “posterior end”) are technical terms found exclusively in Buddhism, and only used in the context of speculative views. It seems the Buddha had a contextual reason to avoid the generic words for “past” (atīta) and “future” (anāgata), and I reflect that in my translation. Pubbanta is semantically identical with pubbakoti, the “first point” of existence or transmigration (SN 48.50:5.3). This is emphasized by Nāgarjuna, who introduces the terms pubbanta and aparanta immediately after discussing the “first point” of transmigration, and associates them with the “extremes” (anta) of eternalism and annihilationism (Mūlamadhyamakakārikā 25.20–23). Thus such talk is not merely about the past as in what happened yesterday, or the future as in what I’ll do next week, but unmoored speculations about the “first beginning” and the “final end”.

“Hypothesis” is adhimuttipada, literally “statement of conviction”.

In such contexts, the “self” (attā) is a postulated metaphysical entity rather than a simple psychological sense of personal identity. The nature of this “self” or “soul” was endlessly debated. The Buddha rejected all theories of a “self”, and elsewhere it is said that “identity view” underlies all sixty-two views of the Brahmajāla (SN 41.3:4.13). | The “cosmos” is the loka, otherwise translated as “world”. This sometimes refers to the simple physical realm, sometimes to the world of experience, or else, as here, the vast universe as conceived in ancient Indian thought.

“Immersion” (samādhi) is deep meditative stillness. The word conveys the sense of “gathered”, “collected”, with a secondary sense of “ignited”, “illuminated”. The practice of samādhi (or jhāna, “absorption”) has never been regarded as uniquely Buddhist. However, right meditation begins with right view. Since these meditators begin with wrong view, their samādhi is “wrong” because it merely reinforces their error. | These are those who rely on the “known” (viññāta) in the epistemic tetrad (MN 1:19.1).

The recollection of past lives is specific, detailed, and confident as it is based on the clear mind of deep immersion.

This is the Upaniṣadic view of the eternal ātman that is the immanent soul of the world or cosmos, loka. Elsewhere in the suttas such theorists assert that the self and the cosmos are identical (SN 24.3:1.3: so attā so loko).

The eternal “self” is contrasted with the ephemeral lives of beings. | The famous word saṁsara is often understood as a “cycle” of rebirths, but the meaning is, rather, to “wander on” or “transmigrate”. | For the phrase sassatisamaṁ (“lasting forever and ever”), compare Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 5.10.1: “He reaches that world free of sorrow and snow, where he lives forever and ever” (sa lokam āgacchaty aśokam ahimam | tasmin vasati śāśvatīḥ samāḥ).

Their meditative experience revealed a process of transient and changing lives, yet from that they infer that there must be an eternal self.

This differs only in the length of time, which is now up to ten eons. A single eon (kappa) lasts longer than it would take to wear away a huge mountain by stroking it with a cloth once a century SN 15.5, while the number of eons is greater than the sands in the Ganges river SN 15.8. The vast time periods envisaged in early Buddhist texts are comparable with those of modern cosmology in physics.

These theorists used a process of logic (takka) and inquiry (vīmaṁsā), otherwise called “thought” (muta) in the epistemic tetrad (MN 1:19.1). They arrive at the same conclusion as the meditators. Different groups of ascetic philosophers emphasized contemplation or rational inquiry as the means to the truth. The Buddha acknowledged that both are useful but limited because, as here, they can sometimes lead to mistaken conclusions.

I have my doubts about this phrase. Everywhere else, ito bahiddhā means “outside of the Buddhist community”, not “outside of the cases just considered”. Still, the commentary and the Chinese parallel at T 21 agree on this sense.

A “view” (diṭṭhi) is a relatively fixed framework for understanding the world; a “theory”. The “grounds for views” (diṭṭhiṭṭhānāni) are the bases from which the views are derived. In this case these are the meditative experiences or the logical reasoning.

The word parāmasati means “to take hold” and is often used in the sense “to misapprehend”.

Yathābhūtaṁ is often translated as “as it really is”, while I usually render it simply as “truly”. It often has a technical sense of seeing “how things came to be (bhuta)” as a process of conditionality (SN 12.31:7.1). Such direct vision of the truth is an attribute of the stream-enterer, who has realized the first of the four stages of awakening, in contrast with those on the path who still rely on faith or inference (SN 25.1). Here it refers to the understanding of feelings from a fivefold perspective. Feelings underlie intellectual theories and arguments, which serve to sate cravings and fears.

Long texts are sometimes marked by their “recitation sections” (bhāṇavāra), which was the length that would be recited in one session.

Despite being views of the “self and the cosmos”, the main focus in the next four views is the self.

This is the end of an eon. It might be compared with what the physicists call the “big crunch”.

The human and similar realms are destroyed in the conflagration at the end of the universe, but sentient beings are sustained by the power of their past kamma. | The “realm of streaming radiance” is a Brahmā heaven corresponding to the second jhāna.

“Mind-made” (manomaya) beings are spontaneously born due to past kamma, not by sex. | “Rapture” (pīti) is a joyous emotional response to pleasure, usually a spiritual sense of elevation or uplift in meditation. | “Self-lumious” (sayaṁpabhā) as an external representation of the light of absorption through which they attained their exalted status. In the Rig Veda it is used of the divine light of the sun (1.52.9 svaścandram; 6.64.4 svabhāna) or the lightning (5.87.5 svarociṣa; 1.82.2 svabhāna).

This might be compared with the “big bang” of a cyclic universe.

The realms into which beings are reborn exist interdependently with the beings themselves. The different dimensions correspond with different kinds of kamma.

That is, they pass from a world corresponding to the second jhāna to one corresponding to the first jhāna.

This passage echoes the creation myth in Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.4. At 1.4.2, the self-created Divinity feels fearful and alone, and at 1.4.3 and 1.4.17 wishes for a partner. From a Buddhist point of view, this simply shows how even God is trapped by emotional attachments in the cycle of transmigration.

These beings are reborn according to their own kamma, and it is just a coincidence that they appear after the first being made their wish.

His first words ahamasmi brahmā (“I am Brahmā”) are equivalent to aham brahmāsmīti at Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.4.10.

At Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.4.5 the Divinity thinks, “I created all this”.

The other creatures appeared after his wish, not because of it. God confuses correlation with causation, a mistake perpetuated by no small number of his followers.

At Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.4.9–10 the created humans also think first about the Divinity who preceded them, from whose knowledge of self all was created.

Again, their meditation experience is genuine, but what they infer from it goes beyond the facts.

The surviving forms of Indic religion (Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism) typically hold that all creatures ultimately share the same nature and hence can find liberation. Here we see this was not always the case, for these theorists believed that there are inherently different orders of beings in the cosmos. This is not due to their conduct but to the circumstances of their creation.

Delightful as the life of the gods is, even they are supposed to retain a sense of moderation (MN 37:11.2), a lesson forgotten by those “depraved by play” (khiḍḍāpadosikā). | Note that mindfulness (sati) is not held to be a specifically Buddhist virtue. Here it refers to a sense of moral compass and self-awareness, rather than a meditation practice.

Here the difference in beings is attributed not to the circumstances of their creation but to their behavior.

The parallel between manopadosika (“malevolent”) and khiddapadosika (“depraved by play”) suggests a rendering “depraved in mind” for manopadosika. However, elsewhere in the suttas manopadosa consistently means “malicious intent” (MN 56:13.15, MN 93:18.30, DN 26:20.3. Also see mano padūseyya at MN 21:20.1 and MN 28:9.6. Thus the contrast is between greed and hate. | Here, as usual, mano and citta are synonyms for “mind”.

The Buddha critiqued this view at SN 12.61, arguing that the body is, in fact, longer lasting than the mind.

The terms “mind” (citta), “sentience” (mano), and “consciousness” (viññāṇa) are broadly synonymous and in many cases may be substituted for one another. Nonetheless, they each have a particular context in which they predominate. Citta is to be developed, in which respect it pertains to the fourth noble truth, the path. Mano, which I translate here as “sentience” for the sake of disambiguation, is often used in the active sense of the deeds done by the mind, pertaining to the second noble truth, the origin of suffering. Viññāṇa is the key factor in the experince of suffering, pertaining to the first noble truth.

Here we move from views that conceive of both the self and the cosmos together to those that focus only on the physical extent of the cosmos. It is not clear why these are classified as “views of the past”.

Once again the view is inferred from meditation, showing that meditative experience was regarded by some as revealing genuine truths about the physical realm.

The nature of their meditation is assumed to be the nature of the world itself.

In each of the two previous sets of four views, the views themselves were the same, only the means of knowing them differed. Here the views themselves differ. The differences take the form of a tetralemma: A, not-A, both A and not-A, neither A nor not-A. This pattern is commonly found in early Buddhism, as well as Indian thought more generally. The final two items are not meant to be obscure or mysterious, but to express genuine possibilities that cannot be captured by a simple duality.

It is common today to say that one’s own experience is valid for oneself. Clearly that is not how these philosophers thought.

They perceive the universe as spread out like a disc. One might call it a “discworld”.

The text doesn’t specify what this is, but it might include the view that the ideas “finite” and “infinite” are inadequate to describe the universe. Consider a universe expanding at the speed of light. At any point in time it is not infinite, but as it is impossible to reach its end it is not finite either.

Vikkhepa is “flip-flopping”. | Amarā is explained in the commentary as either “undying” or “eel-like”. However, amarā in the sense of “eel” is found only in the commentary to this term so is probably spurious. The feminine form amarā is attested in Sanskrit (eg. Manu 2.148). See also note to SN 4.1:5.2.

This is a basic requirement for any spiritual teacher.

Despite their dullness, they have a genuine sense of conscience and wish to avoid breaking precepts.

A wise teacher avoids making pronouncements about what they do not understand, but these teachers use this as a cover to hide the fact that they do not understand anything.

Here too they show a certain sincerity to avoid giving rise to unwholesome qualities.

They avoid making statements, not from a sense of conscience, but for fear of public shaming.

Also at MN 76:30.2.

Here begins a series of four tetrads that are commonly encountered in the suttas. The first is the belief in an afterlife.

The denial of an afterlife.

This could include a belief that eternal life is offered only to adherents of a certain religion.

This could include the idea that our intrinsic nature is one with the cosmos, and our separation from that infinitude in this life is only a veil of delusion. Thus there is no other world, because all worlds are this world, but it is also not the case that there is nothing after death.

This is beings such as the gods or various ghosts and spirits, which are not born organically.

This denies the existence of such beings. Not everyone in ancient India believed in the various orders of beings.

The belief that beings are both spontaneously born and organically born. Perhaps this denies that such a distinction can be made clearly, because both kinds of birth take place within the same order of beings.

Beings are reborn in other ways.

This is the standard Buddhist view of kamma, shared with some, but not all, of the other Indian religions of the time.

Doing good or bad has no result; moral nihilism.

Sometimes good and bad deeds have results, other times not.

The results of actions are too subtle to be described as good or bad.

An awakened one, whether the Buddha or anyone else, exists after death, for example in an eternal state of Nirvana.

A sage ceases to exist at the time of death. This assumes there is an enduring “self” that is done away with.

For example, their body does not exist but their mind does.

A sage persists in a subtle state that cannot be characterized in terms of existence or non-existence.

Adhicca is usually translated in this context as “chance”. The root meaning refers to something that has been “lifted out”, making it a “special exception” or “anomaly”. It isn’t used in Sanskrit for a philosophical theory of chance, for which we find instead yadṛcchā (“arbitrariness”, Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad 1.2). The theory proposed here is not that the universe in general operates by chance, but that the happenstance of creation is an “anomaly” in the general scheme of things. At SN 12.24:3.4 and SN 12.25:2.4 we learn that some philosophers who believed in the doctrine of kamma nonetheless argued that suffering arose anomalously.

This is an obscure realm of existence where the operations of consciousness are suspended.

The idea of creation from nothingness is discussed at Rig Veda 10.129, Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 1.2.

First each section is concluded, then the whole first part is concluded. This formalism is a characteristic of oral tradition. It creates a nested hierarchy of content, clarifying the structure and helping to preserve the text in memory.

This section introduces more tetralemmas. Many of the views describe the self in terms of the five aggregates—form, feeling, perception, choices, and consciousness.

“Percipient beings” are mentioned in the Jain Tattvārthasūtra 2.24.

Usually a self is conceived of as percipient, so that the subject experiences a continuity. | The term aroga (“free of disease”) is explained by the commentary as “permanent” (nicca), drawing on the root sense of the word, “unbroken”. However, aroga is always used in the sense “free of disease, well, healthy” (eg. MN 97:2.4), and this applies to the Brahmanical tradition as well as the Buddhist. Chandogya Upaniṣad 7.26.2 says that one who sees (the self) does not see death, they have no disease or pain. Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 4.4.12 similarly says that one who sees the self will not suffer in the wake of the body, which Śaṅkāra explains, “Struggling with desires for himself, for his son, for his wife, and so on, he is born and dies again and again, and is diseased when his body is diseased.”

Here the self has a physical dimension but no perception. This might include rebirth as a plant or inanimate object.

Buddhism acknowledges a formless realm of neither perception nor non-perception, which is attained through advanced meditation.

These theorists assert the true existence of a being, thus falling into the fallacy of identity view. For the Buddha, the words “being” or a “self” describe an ongoing process that is conditioned and impermanent, and do not correspond to a genuine metaphysical reality. The distinction between contingent, empirical reality and metaphysical, absolute existence is essential to understanding early Buddhism.

This is the materialist view, which accepts only the coarse physical realm. This view is common today, but was also well known in the Buddha’s time. | The “four principal states” are earth, water, fire, and air, i.e. the states of matter: solid, liquid, plasma, and gas.

The theorist accepts multiple selves. As self theories evolve, they typically move from more coarse materialist theories towards more subtle conceptions. Sometimes the former view is rejected as being false. Sometimes, as here, the former view is seen not as false, but as incomplete and shallow.

“Form” (rūpa) includes not just the physical realm of the elements, but various kinds of subtle form (sukhumarūpa). These include the energetic or mind-made bodies of beings in various dimensions. Rūpa ultimately refers to the appearance or manifestation of physical properties, and can even include the perception of colors, lights, and shapes in the mind. Here the bodies of the divine beings are not very distant from our own, as they still consume solid food. This probably refers to various nature deities or entities that were believed to consume the food offered to them by humans.

Whereas the eternalists believe that their heavenly rebirth will last forever, annihilationists believe that even heaven is limited, and it ends in final annihilation.

This is a more subtle kind of divine rebirth, no longer dependent on physical food. The subtle body still takes on a humanoid form, however, appearing complete in all its limbs. It includes realms produced through the practice of the four jhānas. | Sabbaṅga has the sense “whole and healthy of limb” (Rig Veda 10.161.5c, Atharva Veda 8.2.8c, 11.3.32 ff.). One is reborn with “whole body” (sarvatanu, Atharva Veda 5.6.11c, Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa 11.1.8.60, 12.8.3.31). | Paccaṅga means “minor limb”, for example the fingers or internal organs.

Such a rebirth has left even the subtle body behind, becoming sheer consciousness. | The word āyatana is from a root meaning “expanse”. It is prominently used in this context, where it refers to a realm or “dimension” of rebirth, and in the analysis of sense experience, where it refers to a “field” of sense experience.

This phrase appears incongruous as formless beings do not have a body. However the Chinese parallel at DA 21 does not mention kāya here, so it is likely to have arisen as an error in transmission where an earlier phrase was mistakenly copied.

The extension of the normal description of this state with the phrase “this is peaceful, this is sublime” is found only here and at AN 10.99:35.1.

These five theories argue for the extinguishment of suffering through the experience of pleasure in the present life. The Buddha taught extinguishment (nibbāna) in this very life, but not “of an existing being” (sato sattassa) or “self” (attā). The Buddha denied that there is such a thing, pointing out that we are a stream of ever-changing conditions, fueled by desire and attachment, and liable to suffering. With the end of craving there is no fuel to sustain the stream, so suffering comes to an end. | It is unclear why these views of the “present life” (diṭṭhadhamma) are classified under views of the future; see MN 102:2.8.

The hedonist.

Here we see the philosophical reasoning that prompts the evolution of more refined conceptions of self.

The “absorptions” (jhāna) are central to Buddhist meditation. The Buddha did say that they can be considered “extinguishment in the present life” in a qualified sense (AN 9.51). As we have seen above, however, if they are undertaken with wrong view, the experience itself will tend to reinforce the attachment to a self.

The theorist has an experience of a deeper state of meditation, so they know that the first jhāna cannot be the ultimate.

Jhānas are subtle states of refined consciousness in which nothing is coarse when compared to ordinary consciousness. Within each state, however, certain mental factors are coarse relative to others. A meditator proceeds through the jhānas with the successive stilling of the relatively coarser factors in each state.

Ābhoga (“partaking”) is unique in the early texts in this sense. The commentary says that after emerging from jhāna, one repeatedly partakes and attends to that bliss (for ābhoga with manasikāra, see Mil 5.1.1:8.3). Compare Patañjalī’s commentary on Yogasūtra 1.17: “vitarka is the gross (sthula) partaking in the mental object, vicāra is subtle”.

It is not clear why the still more subtle states of the formless attainments are not included here.

Even the views of annihilation or extinguishment lead to rebirth, contrary to the beliefs of those who hold them.

Here the Buddha brings to the fore the notion of feelings which has been briefly mentioned throughout the text. Views are not objective descriptions of the world, but responses to our innermost needs. The word paritassita (“anxiety”) conveys both fear and desire, while vipphandita (“evasiveness”) captures how attachment to theorizing serves as an avoidance strategy.

The analysis is introducing more elements of dependent origination. The famous twelve links say that contact is the condition for feeling, which in turn causes craving.

The text repeats all, but I abbreviate for legibility. In the oral tradition, extensive repetitions serve to reinforce the learning and ensure reliability of transmission. More subtly, they also help deepen understanding and contemplation. After reciting the extensive and complex treatment of the sixty-two views, the reciter takes the time to go over them again and again, letting them settle and consolidate. True learning takes time, but the repetitions that are reflective and reassuring in recitation become irksome and ponderous in reading.

Finally the process of dependent origination, which has been foreshadowed little by little, is brought to its ultimate conclusion. The full twelve factors of dependent origination are not mentioned, but the process beginning with ignorance is implied throughout. Wrong view is a form of ignorance, and we have seen several examples of how such wrong views prompt intentional choices that generate consciousness in a new life.

“Contact” (phassa) is the conjunction of the sense stimulus, the sense organ, and the associated consciousness.

They cannot see a way past attachment so long as they theorize in terms of an existing self.

The title is explained with a vivid simile. The Buddha was a master of observation, and constantly drew from everyday experience to illustrate his teachings. The metaphor works on a surface level to illustrate how theorists are trapped. But it also conveys something deeper, a sense of pathos and empathy with the helpless creatures who have no idea why they suffer.

The Buddha is not his body, which is merely the remnant of past kamma. | The bhavanetti is “that which leads to continued existence”. Early Sanskrit netrī always retains the expected grammatical sense, a noun from the root “to lead”, i.e. a “leader” (Rig Veda 1.113.4, 4.56.2, 5.50.2, 7.76.6, 7.77.2). Compare the English concept of the psychopomp or ferryman who leads you to the afterlife. Here, the commentary explains, “It is a name for craving. For by it beings are bound in their heart and lead on to life after life, like an ox tethered by the throat.” This suggests the sense of “lead” as in “leash”, which fits the metaphor of “cutting off”.

This metaphor is found at Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 4.3.36, where it refers to the separation of the self from the body at death.

It is not uncommon to find multiple names for the same sutta, and here we see this practice originated with the Buddha himself. When is referred to by name, however, it is always called the Brahmajāla (SN 41.3:2.4, Kd 1:1.8.8, Vb 17:21.3). It is also referred to by the list of views, numbered sixty-three at Snp 3.6:42.1 and sixty at SN 8.2:5.1 = Thag 21.1:9.1.