Snp 4.15 - Sn 4:15 The Rod Embraced Translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu Source: https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/KN/StNp/StNp4_15.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. 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. 4:15 The Rod Embraced “When embraced, the rod of violence1 breeds danger & fear: Look at people in strife. I will tell how I experienced terror: Seeing people floundering like fish in small puddles, competing with one another— as I saw this, fear came into me. The world was entirely without substance. All the directions were knocked out of line. Wanting a haven for myself, I saw nothing that wasn’t laid claim to. Seeing nothing in the end but competition, I felt discontent. And then I saw an arrow here, so very hard to see, embedded in the heart. Overcome by this arrow you run in all directions. But simply on pulling it out you don’t run, you don’t sink.2 [Here the trainings are recited.] 3 Whatever things are tied down in the world, you shouldn’t be set on them. Having totally penetrated sensual pleasures, sensual passions,4 you should train for your own unbinding. Be truthful, not insolent, not deceptive, remote from divisiveness. Without anger, the sage should cross over the evil of greed & avarice. He should conquer drowsiness, weariness, sloth; shouldn’t consort with heedlessness, shouldn’t stand firm in his pride— the man with his heart set on unbinding. He shouldn’t engage in lying, shouldn’t create affection for form, should fully fathom conceit, and live refraining from impulsiveness; shouldn’t delight in what’s old, prefer what’s new,5 grieve over decline, get entangled in what’s dazzling & bright.6 I call greed a great flood; hunger, a swift current. Preoccupations are ripples; sensuality, a bog hard to cross over. Not deviating from truth, a sage stands on high ground : a brahman.7 Having relinquished in every way, he is said to be at peace; having clearly known, he is an attainer-of-knowledge; knowing the Dhamma, he’s independent. Moving rightly through the world, he doesn’t envy anyone here. Whoever here has gone beyond sensual passions— an attachment hard to transcend in the world— doesn’t sorrow, doesn’t fret. He, his stream8 cut, is free from bonds. Burn up what’s before, and have nothing for after. If you don’t grasp at what’s in between,9 you will go about, calm. For whom, in name-&-form, in every way, there’s no sense of mine, and who doesn’t grieve over what is not: He, in the world, isn’t defeated, suffers no loss.10 To whom there doesn’t occur ‘This is mine,’ for whom nothing is others’: He, feeling no sense of mine-ness, doesn’t grieve at the thought ‘I have nothing.’ Not harsh, not greedy, not perturbed,11 everywhere concordant12: This is the reward —I say when asked— for those who are free from theorizing. For one unperturbed —who knows— there’s no accumulating. Abstaining, unaroused, he everywhere sees security.13 The sage doesn’t speak of himself as among those who are higher, equal, or lower. At peace, free of stinginess, he doesn’t embrace, doesn’t reject,” the Blessed One said. vv. 935–954 Notes 1. Nd I: The rod of violence takes three forms: physical violence (the three forms of bodily misconduct), verbal violence (the four forms of verbal misconduct), and mental violence (the three forms of mental misconduct). See AN 10:176 and Dhp 129–142. 2. Nd I: “One doesn’t run” to any of the destinations of rebirth; “one doesn’t sink” into any of the four floods of sensuality, views, becoming, and ignorance. See SN 1:1, SN 45:171, and AN 4:10. 3. This phrase, a kind of stage direction, seems to indicate that this poem had a ritual use, as part of a ceremony for giving the precepts. 4. “Sensual pleasure, sensual passions”: two meanings of the word kāma. 5. Nd I: “Old” and “new” mean past and present aggregates. 6. Nd I: “what’s dazzling & bright” = craving and other defilements. 7. See AN 7:15. 8. Nd I: The stream here stands for craving and the various defilements that arise in its wake. See Dhp 251, 337, 339­–340, and 347. It could also stand for the stream of becoming, mentioned in Sn 3:12. 9. Nd I: “Before,” “after,” and “in between” = past, future, and present. 10. “Isn’t defeated, suffers no loss”—two meanings of the Pali phrase, na jiyyati. 11. Nd I defines “perturbation” as meaning “craving,” and “unperturbed” as meaning unmoved by gain, loss, status, loss of status, praise, criticism, pleasure, or pain (see AN 8:6–7). However, when the Buddha discusses the meaning of “unperturbed” in Sn 5:3, he relates it to the practice of concentration. See Sn 5:3, note 5. 12. Sama. See Sn 1:12, note 11. 13. See Ud 2:10.