Snp 2.1 - Sn 2:1 Treasures Translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu Source: https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/KN/StNp/StNp2_1.html License: CC-BY-NC-4.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ Copyright: Copyright 2014 Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, Revised edition 2017 License notice: Copyright 2014 Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, Revised edition 2017 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 Unported. To see a copy of this license visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. “Commercial” shall mean any sale, whether for commercial or non-profit purposes or entities. Questions about this book may be addressed to Metta Forest Monastery Valley Center, CA 92082-1409 U.S.A. Additional resources More Dhamma talks, books and translations by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu are available to download in digital audio and various ebook formats at dhammatalks.org. Printed copy A paperback copy of this book is available free of charge. To request one, write to: Book Request, Metta Forest Monastery, PO Box 1409, Valley Center, CA 92082 USA. Attribution: From Handful of Leaves, Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu; https://www.dhammatalks.org/Archive/Writings/Ebooks/SuttaPitaka_251113.epub. Copyright 2014 Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu, Revised edition 2017 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 Unported. To see a copy of this license visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. “Commercial” shall mean any sale, whether for commercial or non-profit purposes or entities. Questions about this book may be addressed to Metta Forest Monastery Valley Center, CA 92082-1409 U.S.A. Additional resources More Dhamma talks, books and translations by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu are available to download in digital audio and various ebook formats at dhammatalks.org. Printed copy A paperback copy of this book is available free of charge. To request one, write to: Book Request, Metta Forest Monastery, PO Box 1409, Valley Center, CA 92082 USA. Publisher references (not part of the sutta): See also: AN 4:67 Changes: Presentation only: original HTML markup reflowed into plain text; wording, numbering and source repetitions retained. No repetitions expanded. Completeness: ABBREVIATED. Every source-unit character is preserved, including introductions, notes and verse structure. Thanissaro's collection-level note explicitly states that repetitions were cut: https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/about.html. This is evidence about the translation method, not an assertion that every individual unit contains an omission; no repetitions reconstructed. II : The Lesser Chapter (Cūḷa Vagga) 2:1 Treasures (This sutta is identical with Khp 6.) Whatever spirits have gathered here, —on the earth, in the sky— may you all be happy & listen intently to what I say. Thus, spirits, you should all be attentive. Show goodwill to the human race. Day & night they bring offerings, so, being heedful, protect them. Whatever wealth—here or beyond— whatever exquisite treasure in the heavens, does not, for us, equal the Tathāgata. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Buddha. By this truth may there be well-being. The exquisite deathless—ending, dispassion— discovered by the Sakyan Sage in concentration: There is nothing to equal that Dhamma. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Dhamma. By this truth may there be well-being. What the excellent Awakened One extolled as pure and called the concentration of unmediated knowing1: No equal to that concentration can be found. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Dhamma. By this truth may there be well-being. The eight persons—the four pairs— praised by those at peace: They, disciples of the One Well-Gone, deserve offerings. What is given to them bears great fruit. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Saṅgha. By this truth may there be well-being. Those who, devoted, firm-minded, apply themselves to Gotama’s message, on attaining their goal, plunge into the deathless, freely enjoying the liberation they’ve gained. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Saṅgha. By this truth may there be well-being. An Indra pillar,2 planted in the earth, that even the four winds cannot shake: That, I tell you, is like the person of integrity, who—having comprehended the noble truths—sees. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Saṅgha. By this truth may there be well-being. Those who have seen clearly the noble truths well-taught by the one deeply discerning— regardless of what [later] might make them heedless— will come to no eighth state of becoming,3 This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Saṅgha. By this truth may there be well-being. At the moment of attaining sight, one abandons three things: identity-views, uncertainty, & any attachment to habits & practices.4 One is completely released from the four states of deprivation,5 and incapable of committing the six great wrongs.6 This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Saṅgha. By this truth may there be well-being. Whatever bad deed one may do —in body, speech, or in mind— one cannot hide it: an incapability ascribed to one who has seen the Way. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Saṅgha. By this truth may there be well-being. Like a forest grove with flowering tops in the first month of the heat of the summer, so is the foremost Dhamma he taught, for the highest benefit, leading to unbinding. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Buddha. By this truth may there be well-being. Foremost, foremost-knowing, foremost-giving, foremost-bringing, unsurpassed, he taught the foremost Dhamma. This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Buddha. By this truth may there be well-being. Ended the old, there is no new taking birth. Dispassioned their minds toward future becoming, they, with no seed, no desire for growth, enlightened, go out like this flame.7 This, too, is an exquisite treasure in the Saṅgha. By this truth may there be well-being. Whatever spirits have gathered here, —on the earth, in the sky— let us pay homage to the Buddha, the Tathāgata worshipped by beings human & divine. May there be well-being. Whatever spirits have gathered here, —on the earth, in the sky— let us pay homage to the Dhamma & the Tathāgata worshipped by beings human & divine. May there be well-being. Whatever spirits have gathered here, —on the earth, in the sky— let us pay homage to the Saṅgha & the Tathāgata worshipped by beings human & divine. May there be well-being. vv. 222–238 Notes 1. This is apparently equivalent to the liberation of immediacy, mentioned in Thig 5:8, and the concentration that is the fruit of gnosis, mentioned in AN 9:37. 2. Indra-pillar: A tall hardwood pillar, planted at the entrance to a village. Similar analogies for the awakened mind are found at AN 6:55 and AN 9:26. 3. The person who has reached this stage in the practice will be reborn at most seven more times. See AN 3:88. On the danger of heedlessness for one who has reached this level of awakening, see SN 55:40. 4. These three qualities are the fetters abandoned when one gains one’s first glimpse of unbinding at stream-entry (the moment when one enters the stream to full awakening). 5. Four states of deprivation: rebirth as an animal, a hungry ghost, an angry demon, or a denizen of hell. In the Buddhist cosmology, none of these states is eternal. 6. According to SnA, the six great wrongs are: murdering one’s mother, murdering one’s father, murdering an arahant (fully awakened individual), wounding a Buddha, causing a schism in the Saṅgha, or choosing anyone other than a Buddha as one’s foremost teacher. The first five are listed in AN 5:129 as leading immediately to hell after death. 7. See Thig 5:10.