Khuddaka Nikaya - Sutta Nipata - Purabheda Sutta

Sn 4.10
Purabheda Sutta
Before the Break-up of the Body
Translated from the Pali by
Thanissaro BhikkhuPTS: Sn 848-861



Source: Transcribed from a file provided by the translator.



Copyright © 1994 Thanissaro Bhikkhu.
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For free distribution. This work may be republished, reformatted,
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"Seeing how,
behaving how,
is one said to be
at peace?
Gotama, tell me about
— when asked about —
the ultimate person."

The Buddha:

"Free from craving
before the break-up
[of the body],
independent
of before
& the end,1
not classified in between,2
no yearning is his.

Un- angered,
un- startled,
un- boastful,
un- anxious,
giving counsel unruffled,
he is a sage,
his speech
under control.

Free from attachment
with regard to the future,
not sorrowing
over the past,
he sees seclusion
in the midst of sensory contacts.3
He can't be led
in terms of views.4

Withdrawn, un-
deceitful, not
stingy, not
miserly, not
insolent, in-
offensive,
he doesn't engage in
divisive speech.

Not intoxicated with enticements,
nor given to pride,
he's gentle, quick-witted,
beyond conviction & dispassion.5

Not in hopes of material gain
does he take on the training;
when without material gain
he isn't upset.

Unobstructed by craving,
he doesn't through craving6
hunger for flavors.

Equanimous — always — mindful,
he doesn't conceive himself as
equal,
superior,
inferior,
in the world.
No swellings of pride
are his.

Whose dependencies
don't exist
when, on knowing the Dhamma,
he's in-
dependent;
in whom no craving is found
for becoming or not-:
he is said
to be at peace,
un-intent
on sensual pleasures,
with nothing at all
to tie him down:
one who's crossed over attachment.

He has no children
cattle,
fields,
land.
In him you can't pin down
what's embraced
or rejected.7
He has no yearning
for that which people run-of-the-mill
or priests & contemplatives
might blame —
which is why
he is unperturbed
with regard to their words.

His greed gone,
not miserly,
the sage
doesn't speak of himself
as among those who are higher,
equal,
or lower.
He,
conjuring-free,
doesn't submit
to conjuring,
to the cycling of time.8

For whom
nothing in the world
is his own,
who doesn't grieve
over what is not,
who doesn't enter into
doctrines
phenomena:9
he is said
to be
at peace."



Notes
1. Nd.I: "Independent of before & the end" = no craving or view with regard to
past or future.
2. For discussions of how the awakened one cannot be classified even in the
present, see MN 72 and SN 22.85-86.
3. Nd.I: "He sees seclusion in the midst of sensory contacts" = he sees contact
as empty of self. This passage may also refer to the fact that the awakened
person experiences sensory contact as if disjoined from it. On this point, see
MN 140 and MN 146, quoted in The Mind Like Fire Unbound, pp. 116 and 113.
4. See AN 10.93.
5. Beyond conviction & dispassion — The Pali here can also mean, "A person of no
conviction, he does not put away passion." This is an example of the kind of pun
occasionally used in Pali poetry for its shock value. Other examples are at Dhp
97 and the end of Sn 4.13. For an explanation of what is meant by being beyond
dispassion, see note 2 to Sn 4.6.
6. The Pali word tanhaya — by/through craving — here is a "lamp," i.e., a single
word that functions in two separate phrases.
7. This reading follows the Thai and PTS editions: atta,m vaa-pi niratta,m vaa.
The Burmese and Sri Lankan editions read, attaa vaa-pi nirattaa vaa: "self or
what's opposed to self." The first reading seems preferable for two reasons:
First, it follows the theme established in Sn 4.3 and Sn 4.4 (and also followed
in Sn 4.15 and Sn 5.11) that the awakened person has gone beyond embracing or
rejecting views. Second, the word nirattaa is found nowhere else in the Canon
aside from the two other verses in the Sutta Nipata (Sn 4.3 and Sn 4.14) where
it is offered as a possible alternative for niratta (released, rejected). As
niratta is clearly the preferable alternative in Sn 4.3, I have adopted it here
and in Sn 4.14 as well.
8. "Conjuring, the cycling of time" — two meanings of the Pali word, kappam.
9. "Doctrines, phenomena" — two meanings of the Pali word, dhamma.