Practice · SīlaVolume FourPart II · Āgama PreceptsPaper 8 of 30

Sīla-gandha

中文主題：戒香

Author: Shi Huijing 釋慧鏡

Date: Spring 2026

Version: 1.0

ID: SILA-P08

Abstract

The first three papers of Part II of the present volume have established the three ethical limbs of the noble eightfold path (P05), the canonical scope of the five precepts (P06), and the periodic-renunciation mechanism of the eight-factor uposatha (P07). The periodic-renunciation layer is, however, by design an exceptional elevation; the question of how the lay practitioner's daily five-precept observance manifests in the social field requires its own canonical articulation. The present paper argues that sīla-gandha (the fragrance of virtue) is not mere literary metaphor but the canonical doctrine-name for sīla's social-domain effect, encoded across three textual strata — sutta, abhidharmic, and vinaya-commentarial — woven together as canonical structural teaching. At the sutta stratum, the three-witness Chinese cross-recension of Saṃyukta-āgama fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 Sīla-gandha-sūtra (T0099) + Bieyi-za-ahanjing fascicle 1 sūtra 12 Gandha-sūtra (T0100) + Ekottara-āgama fascicle 13 Gandha-varga (T0125) exhibits 250-year architectural stability across the Aṅguttara 3.79 Gandha-sutta archetype. At the abhidharmic stratum, Xuanzang's translation of Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 Viniścaya-saṃgrahaṇī Śrāvakabhūmi (T1579) articulates the sīla-skandha's three aspects — non-violation, intrinsic-nature, and intrinsic-merit — and six canonical names (ṣaṭ-paryāya), of which sīla-gandha, sīla-vāsana (the fragrance of permeation), and sīla-vilepana (the unguent of sīla) constitute the fragrance-related triad. At the vinaya-commentarial stratum, Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao cites the Avataṃsaka's three-fragrance verse 「戒香定香解脫香」at Taishō 40 p.0036c09–11, mapping three fragrances ladder-wise onto the five-dhamma-skandha framework. The Kimatthiyasutta (AN 11.1) and its eleven-link chain sīla → avippaṭisāra → pāmojja → pīti → passaddhi → sukha → samādhi → ... further articulate the sīla-skandha as a developmental sequence rather than a static set; the perceivable effect of sīla-gandha is the lay-perceivable entry-point to that sequence, opening onto the five-dhamma-skandhas as the canonical stratified cultivation system.

I. The Problem

P07 has established the eight-factor uposatha (aṭṭhaṅga-uposatha) as the periodic-renunciation mechanism — the lay practitioner, on the observance day, borrows the monastic restraints for a single day and night (ahorātrika-saṃvara, the day-and-night or "near-dwelling" restraint), emulating the Arahants' mode of dwelling under the canonical formula arahataṁ anukaromi ("I imitate the Arahants," Sujato, trans., CC0). The ritual structure of this periodic-renunciation layer is, however, by design an exceptional elevation; it is not the canonical representative articulation of the lay practitioner's daily ethical observance. On the baseline of daily five-precept observance — abstention from killing, taking what is not given, sexual misconduct, false speech, and intoxicants — even without taking up the periodic eight-precept uposatha, how does the lay practitioner's standing sīla manifest in the social field? Even without entering the periodic-renunciation ritual layer, even when only the lay-side five-precept baseline is sustained, is the perceivable effect of pure ethical conduct registered within the social domain? The answer to this question receives its canonical-internal articulation at Saṃyukta-āgama fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 — the Chinese parallel to Aṅguttara 3.79 Gandha-sutta.¹

The sūtra's narrative frame is given by Venerable Ānanda, who, dwelling alone in a quiet place, reflects: "There are three kinds of fragrance that travel with the wind but cannot travel against it. What three? The fragrance of root, the fragrance of stem, the fragrance of flower. Is there a fragrance that travels with the wind, also against the wind, also both with and against the wind?" The Buddha confirms the question and answers: "There are sons and daughters of good family who, in any town or settlement, accomplished in the true Dhamma, throughout the entire span of their lives do not kill, do not steal, do not engage in sexual misconduct, do not speak falsely, do not partake of intoxicants. Of such sons and daughters of good family, in the eight directions, above and below, those devoted to the good never fail to praise them, saying: 'In such-and-such a direction, in such-and-such a settlement, this son or daughter of good family is pure in ethical conduct, accomplished in the true Dhamma.'" The discourse closes with the verse: "Not the fragrance of root, stem, or flower can travel against the wind to permeate; only the good son's and good daughter's pure-precepts fragrance, traveling with-and-against the wind, fills all directions and is universally heard."² This phrase — the good son's and good daughter's fragrance (Pāli equivalent sappurisa-gandha) — is not a ritualised expression of the monastic Saṅgha's pastoral hope for the laity but the discourse's own architectural syntax, explicitly marking the perceivable effect of pure ethical conduct in the social field as crossing the physical limit of natural fragrance as a canonical-internal articulation.

The reading of sīla-gandha as crossing the physical limit of natural fragrance is not mere literary metaphor at the discourse layer. In Xuanzang's translation of Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22, the Viniścaya-saṃgrahaṇī division of the Śrāvakabhūmi explicitly lists the sīla-skandha's "summary meaning" as having "three aspects: first, the aspect of non-violation; second, the aspect of intrinsic-nature; third, the aspect of intrinsic-merit," and within the six canonical names (Sanskrit ṣaṭ-paryāya, the six official doctrinal designations of sīla), explicitly enumerates sīla-vāsana (戒薰香, the fragrance of permeation from sīla) and sīla-vilepana (戒塗香, the unguent of sīla) as official names for sīla itself: "In some passages the World-Honoured One declares sīla to be named 'fragrance of permeation.' As the verse says: 'Ānanda! There is a kind of fragrance that travels with the wind and is well able to permeate; against the wind it is also able to permeate; with-and-against the wind it permeates as well.'" The Buddha then explains: "The person of good family endowed with sīla — throughout every direction, the marvellous reputation, hymns and verses of praise are universally heard.... Therefore sīla is named 'fragrance of permeation.'"³ Sīla-gandha is metaphor at the discourse layer; at the abhidharmic-treatise layer it is elevated to the position of official doctrine-name — the canonical-doctrinal designation for "the person endowed with sīla, throughout every direction, having the marvellous reputation and hymns of praise universally heard" as the social-domain perceivable architectural articulation.

This architectural reading is further supported by cross-recension stability. The Chinese side provides three-witness corroboration: T0099 Saṃyukta-āgama fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 Sīla-gandha-sūtra (Guṇabhadra 求那跋陀羅, Liu Song Yuánjiā 元嘉, 435–443 CE, Sarvāstivāda-transmitted), T0100 Bieyi-za-ahanjing fascicle 1 sūtra 12 Gandha-sūtra (anonymous, ca. 4–5 c.), and T0125 Ekottara-āgama fascicle 13 Gandha-varga 香品 (Gautama Saṅghadeva 瞿曇僧伽提婆, Eastern Jin, 4–5 c., Mahāsaṅghika-related transmission). The doctrinal core syntax preserved in all three witnesses — the bidirectional contrast between the three natural fragrances and the fragrance of virtue, the superiority phrase "the fragrance of virtue stands supreme" (or "the fragrance of virtue is foremost"), and the social-broadcast formula "fills all directions" / "is heard in the ten directions" / "is heard with-and-against the wind" — exhibits no deletion, no addition, and no inversion across the three translation events. This cross-recension architectural stability is the philological evidence that sīla-gandha doctrine constitutes canonical structural teaching, not derivative literary production. The imagery is anchored at its origin in the Indian Pāli-and-Sanskrit canonical strata — AN 3.79 Gandha-sutta in the Pāli tradition, Dhammapada 54–56 Puppha-vagga as the second Pāli locus, and Xuanzang's direct rendering of the Yogācārabhūmi's Sanskrit reception of the same imagery — and is then carried forward into the Chinese vinaya-commentarial reception with no doctrinal innovation.⁴

The thesis of the present paper is therefore: the architectural mechanism of sīla-gandha doctrine is not mere literary metaphor at the discourse layer but the canonical doctrine-name for sīla's social-domain effect, woven across three strata — the sutta layer (AN 3.79 + Chinese three-witness cross-recension), the abhidharmic layer (Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22's sīla-skandha three aspects + six canonical names), and the vinaya-commentarial layer (Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao citation of the Avataṃsaka's three-fragrance verse). The Kimatthiyasutta (AN 11.1) further articulates that the perceivable effect of sīla-gandha is not a static property but the lay-perceivable entry-point to the developmental sequence "progressively leading up to the highest" (anupubbena aggāya parentī) — through which the practitioner enters the five-dhamma-skandhas (pañca-dhamma-kkhandha: sīla-skandha + samādhi-skandha + paññā-skandha + vimutti-skandha + vimutti-ñāṇadassana-skandha; not the five aggregates of clinging) as the canonical stratified cultivation system.

II. Canonical Sources

2.1 The Pāli axis: honest disclosure and the independent anchor of the Kimatthiyasutta

The Pāli anchor of the present paper bears a distinctive condition that must be honestly disclosed. Aṅguttara 3.79 Gandha-sutta (PTS AN i ~225, in the Ānanda-vagga of the Book of Threes), although a stable canonical fragment in the Southern Theravāda Pāli tradition, is among the twenty-seven Aṅguttara discourses for which the Pāli source text used in the present paper's research vault does not contain the verbatim original; AN 3.79 and AN 3.80 are both absent.⁴ Likewise, Dhammapada verses 54–56 (Dhp 54–56, Puppha-vagga — the second locus of the sīla-gandha imagery in the Pāli tradition) are absent from the present paper's Pāli vault.⁵ Further, the Sāmaññaphala-sutta (DN 2), Saṅgītisutta (DN 33), Dasuttarasutta (DN 34), Cūḷahatthipadopama-sutta (MN 27), Mahātaṇhāsaṅkhaya-sutta (MN 38), Kandaraka-sutta (MN 51), Gaṇakamoggallāna-sutta (MN 107), Itivuttaka 51, and the body of Visuddhimagga Chapter 1 — nine further important Pāli anchors — are all absent from the present paper's vault.⁶ Pāli citations in the present paper are therefore given by PTS reference only and are not blockquoted verbatim; the three Chinese witnesses serve as the primary textual anchor.

Although direct verbatim citation of the Pāli original is not available in the vault, the architectural imagery of the AN 3.79 sīla-gandha fragment is a stable text repeatedly cited and discussed in contemporary Pāli scholarship — by Bhikkhu Bodhi's Numerical Discourses of the Buddha (2012, Wisdom) and Bhikkhu Sujato's CC0 open translation hosted at SuttaCentral, among others. The core architectural syntax of the three Chinese witnesses and the Pāli tradition exhibits no divergence; the disclosure made here is a discipline of contemporary digital philology and does not affect the substance of the present paper's cross-recension architectural stability claim. A second precaution must be added concerning the imagery's textual provenance: the sīla-gandha imagery is anchored at its origin in the Indian Pāli-and-Sanskrit canonical strata, with dual Pāli-canonical bases at AN 3.79 + Dhammapada 54–56 Puppha-vagga and Sanskrit cross-validation through Xuanzang's direct rendering of the Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 (treated in §V.1). The Indian Pāli-Sanskrit canonical anchorage is doctrinally and philologically primary; the Chinese translation witnesses are receptions of that anchorage, not innovations upon it.

Independent of the AN 3.79 Gandha-sutta, the second Pāli main anchor for the present paper is the Kimatthiyasutta (AN 11.1) — the Chinese parallel of which is preserved as Madhyama-āgama fascicle 10 sūtra 42 Kimatthiya-sūtra 何義經, translated by Saṅghadeva (僧伽提婆) during the Eastern Jin Lóng-ān period (隆安, 397–398 CE). The Pāli original of the Kimatthiyasutta is fully present in the vault (Bhikkhu Sujato CC0 translation): "kimatthiyāni, bhante, kusalāni sīlāni kimānisaṁsānī'ti? 'Avippaṭisāratthāni kho, ānanda, kusalāni sīlāni avippaṭisārānisaṁsānī'ti. ... Iti kho, ānanda, kusalāni sīlāni anupubbena aggāya parentī'ti." — "What is the purpose of skillful ethics, sir? What is their benefit? — Their purpose is freedom from regret, Ānanda, their benefit is freedom from regret. ... So, Ānanda, skillful ethics progressively lead up to the highest" (Sujato, trans., CC0).⁷ The eleven-link chain — sīla → avippaṭisāra → pāmojja → pīti → passaddhi → sukha → samādhi → yathābhūta-ñāṇadassana → nibbidā → virāga → vimutti-ñāṇadassana (ethics → freedom from regret → joy → rapture → tranquility → bliss → concentration → knowledge-and-vision of things as they really are → disenchantment → dispassion → knowledge-and-vision of liberation) — is the Pāli-canonical evidence for sīla as a developmental sequence and serves as the core anchor of §III.3 below. AN 5.32 Cundīsutta and its ariyakanta-sīla axis ("ethics loved by the noble ones," Sujato CC0) — the sotāpattiyaṅga anchor that debuts in P02 — provides a secondary supplementary anchor for the present paper.⁸

2.2 The three Chinese witnesses: 250-year architectural stability

The primary Chinese textual anchor is Saṃyukta-āgama fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 Sīla-gandha-sūtra (Guṇabhadra, Liu Song Yuánjiā 元嘉, 435–443 CE, Sarvāstivāda-transmitted). The opening narrative and the five-precept enumeration have been quoted at §I; the complete twelve-line verse runs:

"Not the fragrance of root, stem, or flower / can travel against the wind to permeate. / Only the good son's and good daughter's / fragrance of pure-precept-keeping / fills all directions with-and-against the wind, / is universally heard without exception. / Takkola, sandalwood, uppala, and jasmine — / among such fragrances, the fragrance of virtue is foremost. / Sandalwood and the rest are limited in the extent they permeate, / but only the fragrance of virtue's pure conduct / rises and permeates to the heavens above. / Such pure-precepts fragrance, in concentration without negligence, / right knowledge equal in liberation — Māra's path cannot enter. / This is named the path of peace, this is the path that is pure. / Right-facing the marvellous concentration, / cutting the bonds and fetters of Māra."²

The final four lines of the verse — "this is named the path of peace, this is the path that is pure; right-facing the marvellous concentration, cutting the bonds and fetters of Māra" — advance from "the perceivable manifestation in the social domain" to "the orientation toward concentration (samādhi)" and "the cutting of the bonds of Māra," and thus carry an internal foreshadowing within the discourse itself of sīla's movement into samādhi (developed below at §III.3 + §VI, where the foreshadowing of P24 Śūraṅgama's four pure-clear admonitions is laid down).

The second Chinese witness is Ekottara-āgama fascicle 13 Gandha-varga 香品 (Gautama Saṅghadeva, Eastern Jin, 4–5 c., Mahāsaṅghika-related transmission):

The World-Honoured One said: "These three kinds of fragrance travel against the wind, with the wind, and both with and against the wind." Ānanda asked: "What three?" The World-Honoured One said: "The fragrance of virtue, the fragrance of learning, the fragrance of giving. These, Ānanda! Are the three fragrances that travel against the wind, with the wind, and both with and against the wind. Of all the fragrances of the world, these three are foremost, supreme — none can equal them, none can match them. ...

Sweet aloe and sandalwood, uppala and other fragrances, / and all the various kinds of fragrance — / among them the fragrance of virtue is foremost. / By accomplishment of this discipline, free of craving, untainted, / equal in knowledge and in liberation, / one passes beyond where Māra cannot reach. / These fragrances, though excellent, and sandalwood and aloe, / yet the fragrance of virtue is the most excellent / and is heard in the ten directions."⁹

The three-fragrance classification in T0125 — "the fragrance of virtue, the fragrance of learning, the fragrance of giving" — places all three at the same level, each bidirectional, with the fragrance of virtue as the foremost. This same-level three-fragrance classification supplies the discourse-layer evidence for the three-fragrance hierarchy reading developed in §III.2.

The third Chinese witness is Bieyi-za-ahanjing fascicle 1 sūtra 12 Gandha-sūtra (anonymous, ca. 4–5 c.). Its verse is succinct:

"The man of true ethical conduct / has a fragrance that permeates all worlds; / his good name fills the ten directions, / heard with-and-against the wind without exception."¹⁰

Though briefer in length, T0100 preserves the social-broadcast formula "heard with-and-against the wind without exception," which is fully aligned in core syntax with T0099's "fills all directions, is universally heard" and T0125's "is heard in the ten directions." Across the three Chinese translations, the doctrinal core syntax — the bidirectional contrast between the three natural fragrances and the fragrance of virtue, the superiority phrase "the fragrance of virtue is foremost," and the social-broadcast formula "fills all directions / ten directions / with-and-against the wind" — exhibits, across roughly 250 years of three distinct translation events (Liu Song / Eastern Jin / anonymous), no deletion, no addition, and no inversion. This cross-recension architectural stability is the philological evidence that sīla-gandha doctrine is canonical structural teaching, not a pastoral metaphor at the lay-realm interface and not a product of later Chinese canonical synthesis.

2.3 Supplementary Chinese witnesses: the Sāmaññaphala-sūtra narrative frame and the three- and five-skandha enumerations

A third layer of Chinese-side supplementary evidence is provided by Dīrgha-āgama fascicle 17 Sāmaññaphala-sūtra 沙門果經 (Buddhayaśas 佛陀耶舍 + Zhu Fonian 竺佛念, Later Qin Hong-shi 弘始, 412–413 CE, Dharmaguptaka). The Pāli correspondent is DN 2, structured around King Ajātasattu's request to the Buddha concerning the fruits of recluseship, in which the Buddha replies first by way of the sīla-skandha enumerated through its three strata (cūḷasīla / majjhimasīla / mahāsīla, the lesser, middle, and great ethical conduct). In the present paper's vault, however, although T0001 fascicle 17 preserves the Ajātasattu narrative frame, the full sīla-skandha three-stratum enumeration paragraph is not present.¹¹ T0001 fascicle 17 is therefore cited in the present paper only as narrative-frame supplementary evidence; the abhidharmic codification of the sīla-skandha three aspects is anchored at Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 (§V.1 below). The three-skandha (sīla / samādhi / paññā) and five-dhamma-skandha (sīla / samādhi / paññā / vimutti / vimutti-ñāṇadassana) enumerations also appear at Dīrgha-āgama fascicle 8 Saṅgīti-sūtra 眾集經 (DN 33 parallel) and fascicle 9 Dasuttara-sūtra 十上經 (DN 34 parallel), cited here as supplementary evidence.¹²

III. The Sutta-Layer Architectural Reading

3.1 The four-fold syntax of the Sīla-gandha-sūtra: bidirectional fragrance and social-domain perceivability

The sutta-layer architecture of T0099 Sīla-gandha-sūtra can be analysed as a four-fold syntactic structure.

The first stratum is Ānanda's opening interrogative: "There are three kinds of fragrance that travel with the wind and cannot travel against it. What three? The fragrance of root, the fragrance of stem, the fragrance of flower. Is there a fragrance that travels with the wind, also against the wind, also both with and against the wind?" The architectural significance of this question lies not in any simple curiosity concerning the physical phenomenon of natural fragrance but in Ānanda's deploying, before the Buddha, a hypothetical-rhetorical syntax that pre-supposes the possibility of a class of fragrance crossing natural physical limits. Ānanda is not asking whether there exists a fragrance that travels against the wind; he is inviting the Buddha to affirm such a fragrance and to name it. The tone of the question already implies the answer: such a fragrance exists, but the Buddha must disclose it.

The second stratum is the Buddha's affirmative reply: "It is so! It is so! There are three fragrances that travel with the wind and cannot travel against it.... Ānanda! There is also a fragrance that travels with the wind, against the wind, with-and-against the wind." The threefold layering of "with-the-wind, against-the-wind, with-and-against-the-wind" — bidirectional plus bi-bidirectional — produces, in the Chinese grammatical accumulation, the canonical-internal articulation of sīla's exceeding the natural unidirectional physical limit. The bidirectionality is not exhausted by "against the wind"; it includes the full directional set of "with-and-against," that is, the directional basis for the social-broadcast formula "filling all directions" / "the eight directions, above and below" / "the ten directions."

The third stratum is the Buddha's social-domain specification: "There are sons and daughters of good family who, in any town or settlement, accomplished in the true Dhamma, throughout the entire span of their lives do not kill, do not steal, do not engage in sexual misconduct, do not speak falsely, do not partake of intoxicants. Of such sons and daughters of good family, in the eight directions, above and below, those devoted to the good never fail to praise them, saying: 'In such-and-such a direction, in such-and-such a settlement, this son or daughter of good family is pure in ethical conduct, accomplished in the true Dhamma.'" The architectural import of this passage is decisive: the bearer of the bidirectional with-and-against-the-wind fragrance is not a class of fragrance but the socially perceivable existence of the good son and good daughter. Fragrance is not a substance; the fragrance is the good son and the good daughter; the bidirectionality is not a physical fragrance phenomenon but the dissemination of the "marvellous reputation and hymns of praise" (the Yogācārabhūmi's Xuanzang rendering, treated below at §V.1) in the social field.

The fourth stratum is the closing verse. Its twelve lines move from the negative "not the fragrance of root, stem, or flower" to the affirmative "only the good son and good daughter, fragrance of pure precept-keeping," to the social-domain expansion "with-and-against the wind, fills all directions, universally heard without exception," to the superiority clause "the fragrance of virtue is foremost," and finally to the sīla-to-samādhi chain "right-facing the marvellous concentration, cutting the bonds of Māra" — a discourse-internal foreshadowing of the AN 11.1 eleven-link chain. The four-fold syntax is not a literary deployment of a "metaphor of fragrance" but the canonical-internal articulation of sīla's social-domain effect.

3.2 The three-fragrance hierarchy: the Ekottara-āgama Gandha-varga's same-level triad and Dàoxuān's Avataṃsaka hierarchical expansion

The three-fragrance classification of Ekottara-āgama fascicle 13 Gandha-varga — "the fragrance of virtue, the fragrance of learning, the fragrance of giving" — supplies the second architectural expansion of the sīla-gandha doctrine on the Chinese side. The three fragrances are all bidirectional, "with-the-wind, against-the-wind, with-and-against-the-wind"; the superiority phrase "the fragrance of virtue is foremost" and "the fragrance of virtue is most excellent, heard in the ten directions" specify that the fragrance of virtue heads the triad's relative ordering.

This three-fragrance classification receives a higher-order three-fragrance expansion in the Chinese vinaya-commentarial layer. Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao fascicle 下 (T1804, Tang seventh century, Nánshān vinaya school), within the procedural section on the uposatha observance for the eight-precept observance, cites the three-fragrance verse from the Avataṃsaka as a fragrance-offering gāthā:

Reciting verses, each saying — [as] the Avataṃsaka puts it: "The fragrance of virtue, the fragrance of concentration, the fragrance of liberation: with their radiance and cloud-dais they pervade the Dharma-realm, making offering to the immeasurable Buddhas of the ten directions, and through seeing-and-hearing the universal permeation realising the quiescent extinction."¹³

This higher-order three fragrances — sīla-gandha / samādhi-gandha / vimutti-gandha — recodes T0125's social-domain three-fragrance triad of "virtue / learning / giving" as the three-skandha cultivation-ladder mapping of "sīla-skandha / samādhi-skandha / vimutti-skandha." The three-skandha set further expands into the five-dhamma-skandhas (pañca-dhamma-kkhandha): sīla-skandha / samādhi-skandha / paññā-skandha / vimutti-skandha / vimutti-ñāṇadassana-skandha (as enumerated in the Pāli archetypes of Itivuttaka 51 + DN 33 + DN 34, here cited by PTS reference only). Within this five-skandha architecture, sīla-gandha occupies the entry-point position — entering from the socially perceivable layer, traveling inward along the three-fragrance ladder, and arriving at the depth of the five-dhamma-skandha stratified cultivation system. This canonical-internal mapping supplies the discourse-layer basis for the Dàoxuān Avataṃsaka three-fragrance expansion treated below at §V.5.

3.3 The Kimatthiyasutta's eleven-link chain: sīla as developmental sequence, not static set

The third stratum of the architectural reading of the sīla-gandha doctrine is the articulation supplied by the Kimatthiyasutta (AN 11.1) and its eleven-link chain — namely, the doctrinal claim that the sīla-skandha is a developmental sequence, not a static set. This claim is one of the principal architectural foreshadowings of the SĪLA volume.

The eleven-link chain runs: sīla (ethics) → avippaṭisāra (freedom from regret) → pāmojja (joy) → pīti (rapture) → passaddhi (tranquility) → sukha (bliss) → samādhi (concentration) → yathābhūta-ñāṇadassana (knowledge-and-vision of things as they really are) → nibbidā (disenchantment) → virāga (dispassion) → vimutti-ñāṇadassana (knowledge-and-vision of liberation). The closing formula reads: iti kho, ānanda, kusalāni sīlāni anupubbena aggāya parentī — "So, Ānanda, skillful ethics progressively lead up to the highest" (Sujato, trans., CC0).

The phrase anupubbena aggāya parentī — "progressively lead up to the highest" — articulates a decisive architectural claim: the sīla-skandha is not a categorial static set but the entry-point of a developmental sequence. As the first of the five-dhamma-skandhas, the sīla-skandha is not a categorial item arrayed alongside the other four; it is the point of departure for a developmental sequence progressively leading, along the eleven-link chain, into samādhi, paññā, vimutti, and vimutti-ñāṇadassana. This developmental-sequence claim is reciprocally confirmed by the closing lines of the T0099 Sīla-gandha-sūtra verse, "right-facing the marvellous concentration, cutting the bonds and fetters of Māra" — the discourse's own internal foreshadowing of the sīla-to-samādhi chain. The socially perceivable layer of sīla-gandha is not the terminus of sīla; it is the lay-perceivable entry-point of sīla's developmental sequence.

The perceivable effect of sīla-gandha in the social field is therefore not a self-contained lay-realm ethical statement; it is the lay-side entry-point of the eleven-link chain — meaning that even when the lay practitioner has not advanced into the contemplative depth of the seven-link sequence (sīla → avippaṭisāra → pāmojja → pīti → passaddhi → sukha → samādhi), her perceivable conduct in the social field, sustained in the daily observance of the five precepts, is already in motion at the first link of the developmental sequence (sīla → avippaṭisāra, freedom from regret). The discourse-internal articulation of this sīla-to-avippaṭisāra movement is present in the T0099 verse's line "such pure-precepts fragrance, in concentration without negligence" — where "concentration without negligence" (appamādo samādhi, appamāda the standing ethical vigilance that funds the first stage of samādhi). The first seven links of the eleven-link chain — sīla → ... → samādhi — are the canonical sequence of sīla's natural emergence into concentration; they constitute the foreshadowing carried forward in P24 Śūraṅgama on the four pure-clear admonitions for the sīla-to-samādhi handoff (where the present paper, on the lay side, pre-positions the lay-perceivable rehearsal of the same architectural sequence; the full eleven-link unpacking is reserved for P24).

3.4 The intoxicant-precept architectural divergence: P06 carry-forward and P08 deepening

In the five-precept enumeration of the T0099 Sīla-gandha-sūtra cited in §I — "does not kill, does not steal, does not engage in sexual misconduct, does not speak falsely, does not partake of intoxicants" — the five precepts are listed as the integrated carriers of sīla-gandha's social-domain effect, with the intoxicant precept placed at full parity with the other four. P06 has, however, established that the intoxicant precept is not among the canonical four roots (killing / stealing / sexual misconduct / false speech) of the abhidharmic ten karmapathāḥ (daśa karmapathāḥ). Asaṅga's Abhidharma-samuccaya fascicle 4 (T1605, Xuanzang trans.) and Sthiramati's Abhidharma-samuccaya-vyākhyā fascicles 7–8 (T1606, Xuanzang trans.) enumerate ten karmapathāḥ — killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, false speech, divisive speech, harsh speech, idle chatter, covetousness, ill-will, and wrong view — and the intoxicant precept is not included within the ten.¹⁴¹⁵

The divergence between the abhidharmic ten karmapathāḥ and the sutta-layer five-precept enumeration in the sīla-gandha discourse is not a doctrinal contradiction but an architectural division of strata:

The abhidharmic layer (T1605 + T1606's ten karmapathāḥ) is a categorial enumeration of karma-paths — categorised by the ultimate motive of the action (killing = anger-terminated; stealing and sexual misconduct = greed-terminated; false speech = terminated in any one of the three poisons). The intoxicant precept does not enter the ten karmapathāḥ because the act of partaking of intoxicants is not itself a "karma-path ultimate motive"; rather, it has a path-protecting character (P06's principal scene) — the danger of intoxicants lies not in karmic defilement per se but in the failure of mindfulness that compromises the keeping of the other four precepts.

The sutta layer (T0099 Sīla-gandha-sūtra's five-precept enumeration) is an enumeration of "sīla-gandha's socially perceivable carriers" — categorised by the criterion of "the manifestation of pure ethical conduct in the social field." Under this criterion, the keeping of the intoxicant precept is no less socially perceivable than the others: the social-field praise "in such-and-such a direction, in such-and-such a settlement, the son or daughter of good family is pure in ethical conduct" naturally includes non-violation of the intoxicant precept.

The architectural import of this divergence is the following: the intoxicant precept's socially perceivable effect, although lacking the ontological standing of a "karma-path defilement-terminus," nevertheless manifests at the perceivable layer of sīla-gandha in the social field. The path-protecting character does not exclude the social-perceivability character — this is the P08 deepening of the canonical-scope cross-precept differential established at P06 (which the present paper's two-stratum reading further extends).

IV. Scholarly Dialogue

The two-step Concede + Extend structure of scholarly dialogue established from P04 onward is continued through P05, P06, and P07 of the present volume. As Part II's fourth paper, the present paper continues the same three-scholar cast — Bhikkhu Anālayo, Rupert Gethin, and Bhikkhu Bodhi — with Peter Harvey cited at the secondary tier (following the secondary-tier discipline carried forward from P06 + P07).

4.1 Bhikkhu Anālayo: from cross-recension philological stability to architectural doctrinal typology

Concede: Bhikkhu Anālayo's Saṃyukta-āgama Studies (Dharma Drum Publishing, 2015) is the contemporary methodological template for cross-recension philological stability between the Chinese Āgamas and the Pāli Nikāyas. His comparative reading practice — across Saṃyukta-āgama, Ekottara-āgama, Dīrgha-āgama on the Chinese side and Aṅguttara, Dīgha on the Pāli side — is the principal methodological exemplar in contemporary scholarship for cross-recension comparative work. The present paper's application of cross-recension stability to the three Chinese witnesses of AN 3.79 (T0099 + T0100 + T0125) draws directly from Anālayo's method.

Extend: Anālayo's cross-recension method terminates at the level of "philological-layer textual stability" — that is, it demonstrates that the core syntactic stability across the three witnesses constitutes evidence for "reliable transmission from a shared canonical source." The present paper advances one step further. The 250-year architectural stability across the three Chinese witnesses constitutes evidence not only of reliable common-source transmission but also of "sīla-gandha doctrine as canonical structural teaching, rooted in the Indian Pāli-Sanskrit canonical strata, rather than as pastoral metaphor at the lay-realm interface or as a derivative literary trope of the receiving tradition" — a philological-evidentiary advance. Philological-layer stability is evidence of "transmission reliability"; architectural-layer stability is evidence of "doctrinal character." The latter is the elevated inference from the former on the dimension of doctrinal nature. This elevated inference receives its cross-stratum reciprocal confirmation in the abhidharmic-layer codification of the Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 six canonical names treated below at §V.1.

4.2 Rupert Gethin: from the standard three- / five-skandha enumeration to the AN 11.1 developmental-sequence reading

Concede: Rupert Gethin's The Foundations of Buddhism (Oxford University Press, 1998), Chapter 8, provides the standard architectural enumeration of the three trainings (tisso sikkhā: sīla / samādhi / paññā) and the canonical expansion to the five dhamma-skandhas (sīla / samādhi / paññā / vimutti / vimutti-ñāṇadassana). Gethin's enumeration is the principal contemporary reference for the architectural treatment of the sīla-skandha. Chapter 9, "The Buddhist community," in particular Gethin's framing of the Sangha-lay interface within the social-field framework, bears directly on the present paper's sīla-gandha social-domain theme.

Extend: Gethin's three- / five-skandha enumeration terminates at the level of "doctrinal structural enumeration" — that is, it presents the three trainings and the five-dhamma-skandhas as the standard exposition of the stratified architecture of the canonical doctrine. The present paper advances one step further. The phrase anupubbena aggāya parentī of the Kimatthiyasutta (AN 11.1) eleven-link chain articulates the architectural claim that the sīla-to-vimutti-ñāṇadassana structure of the five-dhamma-skandhas is not a static stratified set but the architectural articulation of a developmental sequence. Sīla-gandha is the lay-perceivable entry-point of that developmental sequence — not an addition layered onto the five-skandha set from outside as a metaphorical ornament but the perceivable manifestation, in the social field, of the first link of the developmental sequence internal to the five-skandhas. Gethin's standard enumeration is the precondition of the present paper's developmental-sequence reading; the developmental-sequence reading is the dynamic-architectural deepening of the standard enumeration.

4.3 Bhikkhu Bodhi: from the fourfold-harmony framework to the abhidharmic codification

Concede: Bhikkhu Bodhi's The Noble Eightfold Path (Buddhist Publication Society, 1984 / Wisdom Publications, 1994) supplies the "social / psychological / karmic / contemplative" fourfold-harmony framework for the three ethical limbs of the path (right speech, right action, right livelihood), a framework that bears directly on the present paper's theme. Bodhi's complete translation of the Aṅguttara, The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha (Wisdom Publications, 2012), is the principal contemporary English rendering of the Aṅguttara; his editorial introduction to the Book of Threes includes the AN 3.79 translation and footnotes. Going for Refuge and Taking the Precepts (Buddhist Publication Society Wheel 282/283/284, 1981), Part II, is the dedicated monograph treatment of the five precepts (P06 carry-forward).

Extend: Bodhi's fourfold-harmony framework terminates at the level of "conceptual integration of the four faces of sīla" — that is, the presentation of sīla's social, psychological, karmic, and contemplative dimensions as a conceptual whole. The present paper advances one step further. Xuanzang's translation of the Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 — with its sīla-skandha three aspects (non-violation / intrinsic-nature / intrinsic-merit) and the six canonical names (sīla-gandha / sīla-vilepana / sīla-vāsana, among others) — is the abhidharmic-layer canonical codification of Bodhi's fourfold-harmony framework within the Yogācāra treatise tradition. Bodhi's fourfold harmony is the discourse-layer conceptual integration; the Yogācārabhūmi's sīla-skandha three aspects plus six canonical names are the abhidharmic-layer doctrinal-official codification. The latter is the canonical structural codification of the former — that is, the elevation of a conceptual integration into doctrinal-official designation. This deepening is the principal content of §V.1 below.

4.4 Peter Harvey: secondary scholarly voice on lay-monastic interface ethics

Peter Harvey's An Introduction to Buddhist Ethics: Foundations, Values and Issues (Cambridge University Press, 2000), Chapters 2–3 on the social baseline of the five precepts and Chapter 4 on the Sangha-lay community interface, are cited as the secondary scholarly voice for the present paper's social-domain theme. As in P06 + P07, Harvey is not enrolled in the §IV three-scholar cast and is cited primarily at the footnote tier.

4.5 Sparse-attention disclosure: Western scholarship on AN 3.79

A literature survey in preparation for the present paper has confirmed an architectural fact that warrants honest disclosure: Western scholarship has produced no dedicated chapter-level monograph treatment of AN 3.79 Gandha-sutta or the sīla-gandha doctrine. Anālayo, Gethin, Bodhi, and Harvey alike — within their respective principal works — devote no dedicated chapter to the AN 3.79 sīla-gandha doctrine; the doctrine appears in Western academic literature mainly through "incidental citation" rather than as a primary subject of academic attention.

This sparse attention itself is an architectural finding. Between the intensity of the sīla-gandha doctrine within the Indian and Chinese architecture, and the sparseness of its reception in the West, there obtains an asymmetric relation. The three-witness 250-year cross-recension architectural stability on the Chinese side, the Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22's six canonical names abhidharmic codification, and the Dàoxuān Sifenlü-xingshichao Avataṃsaka three-fragrance expansion at the vinaya-commentarial layer constitute, in the Indian and Chinese traditions, a doctrinal weaving of high intensity; yet the Western academic reception of this weave is dispersed across incidental footnotes. The present paper is an attempt at chapter-level monograph treatment in contemporary scholarship of the sīla-gandha doctrine, offered as a corrective to this asymmetric sparse attention.

V. Abhidharmic Codification, Commentarial Layer Integration, and Vinaya Cross-Reference

5.1 The Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22: sīla-skandha's three aspects and six canonical names — the present paper's single strongest doctrinal anchor

The present paper's single strongest doctrinal anchor is the sīla-skandha three aspects and six canonical names (ṣaṭ-paryāya) enumeration in Xuanzang's translation of the Yogācārabhūmi (Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra, T1579, Tang Zhēnguān 貞觀, 646–648 CE), fascicle 22, Viniścaya-saṃgrahaṇī (decision-aggregate) division within the Śrāvakabhūmi section. This passage is the decisive codification at which the sīla-gandha doctrine is elevated from sutta-layer literary metaphor to abhidharmic-layer official doctrine-name.

The three aspects of the sīla-skandha (sīla-skandhasya tisro lakṣaṇāḥ) are enumerated:

The World-Honoured One indicates the summary meaning of the sīla-skandha as having three aspects. First, the aspect of non-violation. Second, the aspect of intrinsic-nature. Third, the aspect of intrinsic-merit. What is this? It is said that "abiding endowed with the precepts" — by this is indicated the aspect of non-violation of the prātimokṣa-saṃvara. It is said that "well-guarded by prātimokṣa-saṃvara" — by this is indicated the aspect of the intrinsic-nature of the prātimokṣa-saṃvara. It is said that "the protocol and the sphere of practice are entirely complete" — by this is indicated, of the prātimokṣa-saṃvara, as it is undertaken, the aspect of the intrinsic-merit on the basis of the regard of others.³

The three aspects of the sīla-skandha correspond, respectively, to the undertaking-nature of sīla (the assumption of the precepts), the renunciation-nature of sīla (the prātimokṣa-saṃvara, the pātimokkha-restraint, carried forward from P07), and the practice-nature of sīla (the intrinsic-merit on the basis of the regard of others).

The six canonical names (ṣaṭ-paryāya, the six official doctrinal designations of sīla), among which the fragrance-related ones are:

In some passages the World-Honoured One declares sīla to be named "unguent." As the verse says: "Bhikṣus, bhikṣuṇīs — the unguent of sīla is fully accomplished. In what is unwholesome, they are able to abandon; in what is wholesome, they are able to cultivate."

In some passages the World-Honoured One declares sīla to be named "fragrance of permeation." As the verse says: "Ānanda! There is a kind of fragrance that travels with the wind and is well able to permeate; against the wind it is also able to permeate; with-and-against the wind it permeates as well." [The Buddha] answered: "The pudgala person of good family endowed with sīla — throughout every direction, the marvellous reputation, hymns and verses of praise are universally heard. As when various fragrances of root, stem, and the like rise upon the wind to permeate every direction, with pleasing aroma streaming far. Therefore sīla is named 'fragrance of permeation.'"³

Three Sanskrit registers must here be precisely distinguished:

sīla-gandha （戒香） is the register of "the fragrance itself" — gandha in its proper sense of pure aroma.
sīla-vilepana (戒塗香) is the register of "the fragrant unguent applied to the body" — vilepana in its sense of anointing.
sīla-vāsana (戒薰香) is the register of "the residual fragrance of permeation" — vāsana in its sense of saturating, lingering scent.

The three Sanskrit registers are rendered alike on the Chinese side as "fragrance" or "fragrance of permeation," conflating effect; in the Sanskrit, however, the three terms cover slightly different conceptual ranges. The present paper, in its treatment of the sīla-gandha doctrine, marks these three registers precisely, declining to subsume them under a single English "fragrance." This philological discipline both honours the source-language distinction and avoids the misreadings to which the Chinese homonymic surface would otherwise give rise.

The abhidharmic-layer codification of the sīla-skandha three aspects + six canonical names elevates sīla-gandha from sutta-layer literary metaphor to the standing of an official doctrine-name within the Yogācāra abhidharmic tradition — that is, within the Yogācāra abhidharmic stratum, sīla-gandha is the official doctrinal designation for sīla's social-domain effect, occupying a doctrinal position equivalent to that of sīla itself. This abhidharmic codification is the single strongest evidence for the principal thesis of the present paper.

5.2 The Abhidharma-samuccaya cluster: Asaṅga and Sthiramati on prātimokṣa-saṃvara and the ten karmapathāḥ

The doctrinal architecture of the prātimokṣa-saṃvara is given systematic enumeration in fascicle 4 of Asaṅga's Abhidharma-samuccaya (T1605, Xuanzang trans.); the enumeration and analysis of the ten karmapathāḥ (daśa karmapathāḥ) are developed in detail in fascicles 7–8 of Sthiramati's Abhidharma-samuccaya-vyākhyā (T1606, Xuanzang trans.). In the enumeration of the ten karmapathāḥ, the intoxicant precept is not included (per the discourse-layer / abhidharmic-layer divergence disclosed in §III.4).¹⁴¹⁵ The reference in these two treatises to the three pure precept-collections (the prātimokṣa-saṃvara-precept, the wholesome-dharma-collecting precept, and the sentient-being-benefiting precept) is reserved for full treatment at P12 of the present volume; only a brief mention is made here.

5.3 The Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra Śīla-pāramitā chapter and the Upāsaka-śīla-sūtra

The Śīla-pāramitā (尸羅波羅蜜) chapter of the Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra (Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra, Kumārajīva 鳩摩羅什 trans., T1509, Later Qin 401–413 CE), fascicles 13–14, is the principal canonical document for the Mahāyāna expansion of sīla; its main contents, however, are reserved for full treatment at P12 of the present volume, and only a brief citation is offered here.¹⁶

The Upāsaka-śīla-sūtra (Dharmakṣema 曇無讖 trans., T1488, Northern Liáng Xuán-shǐ 玄始, 426 CE, Liángzhou court) is the dedicated Chinese-Mahāyāna sūtra on lay-precept observance. The full text of T1488 fascicles 6 and 7 is, however, absent from the present paper's vault; only the CBETA XML edition is available as the principal textual source.¹⁷ T1488 is here cited only by brief mention — acknowledgement of its standing in the Chinese-Mahāyāna lay-precept tradition — without unfolding its precept-substance doctrinal content (the doctrine of precept-substance is reserved for P16 of the present volume).

5.4 The Vimuttimagga as Theravāda-adjacent precursor; the Visuddhimagga citation discipline

The Vimuttimagga (Saṅghapāla 僧伽婆羅 trans., T1648, Southern Qí, 6 c.) is the Theravāda-related precursor to the Visuddhimagga and preserves on the Chinese side the early form of the Theravāda meditation system. The present paper offers only a brief mention of T1648, registering the parallel articulation of the sīla-skandha architecture within the Theravāda-adjacent Chinese transmission.¹⁸

Buddhaghosa's Visuddhimagga (5 c.), Chapter 1 on the four aspects of sīla, is the most direct Pāli commentarial precursor of the present theme. The body of Visuddhimagga Chapter 1 is, however, absent from the present paper's vault (confirmed at P03, P04, P05, P07, and again at P08); Chapter 7 §4 Sīlānussati-kathā is present in the vault but is released under GRETIL's CC BY-SA 4.0 licence, which is incompatible with the present project's CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 licence. The present paper therefore cites both at chapter-section level only, without verbatim direct quotation and without paragraph numbers.¹⁹

5.5 Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao and the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance citation: the vinaya-commentarial expansion

Dàoxuān (596–667 CE, founder of the Nánshān vinaya school) in his Sifenlü-xingshichao fascicle 下 (T1804, Tang seventh century), within the uposatha observance procedure for the eight-precept observance, cites the three-fragrance verse from the Avataṃsaka as a fragrance-offering gāthā at T40 p.0036c09–11 (the text quoted at §III.2 above). This Avataṃsaka three-fragrance citation — sīla-gandha / samādhi-gandha / vimutti-gandha — has, at the vinaya-commentarial layer, two architectural significations:

First, an expansion of the three-fragrance ladder: T0125's three fragrances (virtue / learning / giving) are a same-level enumeration at the social-domain layer, with "the fragrance of virtue is foremost" as the superiority clause; Dàoxuān's Avataṃsaka three fragrances (virtue / concentration / liberation) are a hierarchical-ladder mapping onto the three-skandha cultivation gradient. This hierarchical mapping is the vinaya-commentarial-layer foundation of the three-fragrance expansion treated at §III.2.

Second, the internal mapping to the five dhamma-skandhas: the three fragrances of sīla / samādhi / vimutti, supplemented by paññā (implicit between sīla and vimutti) and vimutti-ñāṇadassana (implicit after vimutti), together constitute the canonical mapping of the five dhamma-skandhas (sīla-skandha / samādhi-skandha / paññā-skandha / vimutti-skandha / vimutti-ñāṇadassana-skandha). Dàoxuān's incorporation of the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance gāthā into the vinaya school's eight-precept liturgy concretely embeds the social-domain layer, the three-skandha gradient, and the five-skandha cultivation architecture together within the ritual frame of the vinaya school.

Detailed treatment of Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao is reserved for P17 of the present volume; the present paper, in its citation of T1804, draws only on the brief architectural reference to the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance gāthā. The Mūla-sarvāstivāda-vinaya (Yijing 義淨 trans., T1442, Tang 7–8 c.) fascicle 5 provides a further parallel within the vinaya tradition itself — "one possessed of discipline is one possessed of the sīla-skandha; one possessed of excellent good qualities is one possessed of the samādhi-skandha; one of brahmacarya is one of the prajñā-skandha" (具足尸羅者,謂具戒蘊。有勝善法者,謂具定蘊。言梵行者,謂具慧蘊) at T23 p.0685b14–16 — corresponding to the three-skandha (sīla / samādhi / paññā) enumeration within the vinaya canon, in distant resonance with the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance expansion (the main scenes of T1442 are reserved for P09 + P10; only brief mention is made here).²⁰

5.6 The architecturally significant absence: zero sīla-gandha citations in Zhiyi and Yongming Yanshou

The literature survey for the present paper has further confirmed an architectural absence: Zhiyi (智顗, 538–597 CE, founder of the Tiantai school) in Mohe-zhiguan (T1911) and Bodhisattva-precept Commentary (T1812) produces zero citations of sīla-gandha; the broader sīla-vocabulary (持戒 / 尸羅 / 禁戒 / 戒蘊) returns 51 hits in Mohe-zhiguan, but the doctrine-name sīla-gandha in its own right registers zero hits. Yongming Yanshou (永明延壽, 904–975 CE) in Wanshan-tonggui-ji (T2017) also returns zero citations of sīla-gandha.²¹

This architectural absence is not that Zhiyi has no view of the sīla-gandha doctrine but that Zhiyi raises the discourse of sīla to the perfect-sudden precept (圓頓戒) / one-mind precept (一心戒) at the prajñā-Madhyamaka layer, while ceding the socially perceivable layer of sīla-gandha to Dàoxuān's vinaya-commentarial tradition (the Nánshān school). The architectural significance of this doctrinal division of labour is that the same doctrine — sīla's social-domain effect — occupies different positions within different doctrinal systems: within the Yogācāra abhidharmic layer it is the Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 six canonical names official codification; within the vinaya-commentarial layer it is Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao Avataṃsaka three-fragrance expansion; within Tiantai's śamatha-vipaśyanā layer it is raised to the prajñā deepening of the perfect-sudden precept, with the social-domain sīla-gandha articulation ceded to the vinaya school. This honest disclosure is not a critique of Zhiyi but the architectural confirmation of the doctrinal division of labour between Tiantai and the vinaya school: the same canonical doctrine is borne differently in different sectarian systems, with each school deepening a different face of the doctrine, together constituting the internal pattern of doctrinal labour-division within Chinese Buddhism. P07 has recorded the same architectural pattern — Zhiyi's Mohe-zhiguan returns zero hits for the eight-precept uposatha; the present paper's zero-hit finding for sīla-gandha is the continuation of the same division-of-labour pattern: both the periodic-renunciation mechanism of the lay-realm uposatha and the social-domain effect of the lay-realm daily sīla-gandha are ceded, in the Chinese doctrinal division of labour, to the vinaya-commentarial tradition, while the Tiantai śamatha-vipaśyanā layer is elevated to the prajñā-Madhyamaka layer of the perfect-sudden precept.

VI. Conclusion

Part II of the present volume opens with P05 on the architecture of the path; expands at P06 to the canonical-scope cross-precept differential of the five precepts; develops at P07 the periodic-renunciation mechanism of the eight-factor uposatha; and closes at the present paper with the social-domain effect of sīla-gandha. The four-paper graded structure of Part II is herewith complete — the architecture of the path (P05) → the precept content (P06) → the periodic renunciation (P07) → the social-domain effect (P08).

Part III will open with the pātimokkha (波羅提木叉) as the canonical codification of monastic-internal discipline: P09 will treat the categorial-rule architecture of the bhikkhu precepts; P10 will treat the cross-tradition comparative reading of the three vinaya schools. The social-domain effect of sīla-gandha in the present paper is sīla's outward articulation at the Sangha-lay interface; the pātimokkha is the canonical institutional embodiment within the monastic chapter — together, they constitute the bilateral framing of sīla's social-domain effect: outward in the lay community, inward in the monastic chapter.

The socially perceivable effect of sīla-gandha holds a distinctive position within the sīla-to-samādhi handoff. The first seven links of the eleven-link chain of the Kimatthiyasutta (AN 11.1) — sīla → avippaṭisāra → pāmojja → pīti → passaddhi → sukha → samādhi — are the canonical sequence of sīla's natural emergence into concentration. The principal thesis of the present paper is therefore: the socially perceivable effect of sīla-gandha is the lay-perceivable entry-point of this eleven-link chain — even when the lay practitioner has not entered into deeper contemplative cultivation, her daily five-precept observance, in its manifestation across the social field, is already in motion at the first link of the developmental sequence (sīla → avippaṭisāra, freedom from regret). This lay-perceivable entry-point is another direct canonical mechanism for the lay-side pre-positioning of the sīla-to-samādhi handoff developed at P24 (Śūraṅgama four pure-clear admonitions), juxtaposed with the periodic-renunciation mechanism of the eight-factor uposatha established at P07 as the lay-side dual anchor — the former (P07) the ritual entry-point of the periodic elevation, the latter (P08) the entry-point of daily sīla's social-domain manifestation. The two complement one another on the lay side, preparing two canonical pathways for the sīla-to-samādhi handoff.

References

Primary Sources

Pāli Canon (Mahāsaṅgīti Tipiṭaka Buddhavasse 2500 edition, CC0; Sujato trans. cited where verbatim):

Aṅguttara-nikāya — AN 3.79 Gandha-sutta (PTS AN i ~225) [vault absent · PTS-only firewall · the paṭivātam eti archetype]; AN 5.32 Cundīsutta (PTS AN III 35) [vault hit · ariyakanta-sīla axis · P02 carry]; AN 11.1 Kimatthiyasutta (PTS AN V 1) [vault hit · eleven-link chain · cross-paper anchor P02 + P06 + P07 + P08 + P24]
Vault-absent (PTS-only, not blockquoted): AN 3.79 Gandha-sutta; AN 3.80 Cūḷanikā-sutta; Dhammapada 54–56 Puppha-vagga (PTS Dhp 54–56)
Dīgha-nikāya — DN 1 Brahmajāla-sutta §1.8 cūḷasīla pericope (P06 carry); DN 2 Sāmaññaphala-sutta (PTS DN i 47); DN 33 Saṅgītisutta (PTS DN iii 219); DN 34 Dasuttara-sutta (PTS DN iii 272) [all · PTS-only firewall]
Majjhima-nikāya — MN 27 Cūḷahatthipadopama-sutta (PTS MN i 175); MN 38 Mahātaṇhāsaṅkhaya-sutta (PTS MN i 256); MN 51 Kandaraka-sutta (PTS MN i 339); MN 107 Gaṇakamoggallāna-sutta (PTS MN iii 1) [all · PTS-only firewall · the anupubbasikkhā gradual-training cluster]
Itivuttaka — 51 (PTS Iti 38) [the five-dhamma-skandha enumeration source · PTS-only]

Chinese Canon (CBETA Electronic Tripiṭaka 2024):

Saṃyukta-āgama (Guṇabhadra 求那跋陀羅, Liu Song Yuánjiā 元嘉 435–443 CE, Sarvāstivāda-transmitted): fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 Sīla-gandha-sūtra 戒香經 (T0099) — primary Chinese anchor, verified at CBETA T02n0099_p0278c
Bieyi-za-ahanjing (anonymous, ca. 4–5 c.): fascicle 1 sūtra 12 Gandha-sūtra 香經 (T0100) — second cross-witness · brief verse-form summary
Ekottara-āgama (Saṅghadeva 瞿曇僧伽提婆, Eastern Jin, 4–5 c., Mahāsaṅghika-related transmission): fascicle 13 Gandha-varga 香品 (T0125) — third cross-witness · the three-fragrance triad gandha / suta / cāga
Madhyama-āgama (Saṅghadeva, Eastern Jin Lóng-ān 隆安 397–398 CE; translator-court attribution corrected per the philological correction adopted at P06 + P07): fascicle 10 sūtra 42 Kimatthiya-sūtra 何義經 (T0026) — Chinese parallel to AN 11.1
Dīrgha-āgama (Buddhayaśas 佛陀耶舍 + Zhu Fonian 竺佛念, Later Qin Hong-shi 弘始 412–413 CE, Dharmaguptaka): fascicle 8 Saṅgīti-sūtra 眾集經 + fascicle 9 Dasuttara-sūtra 十上經 + fascicle 17 Sāmaññaphala-sūtra 沙門果經 (T0001) — three-skandha + five-dhamma-skandha enumeration supplementary evidence + the Ajātasattu narrative frame (the sīla-skandha three-stratum enumeration not present; supplementary only)
Upāsaka-śīla-sūtra (Dharmakṣema 曇無讖, Northern Liáng Xuán-shǐ 玄始 426 CE, Liángzhou court; CBETA XML edition): fascicles 6 + 7 (T1488) — Mahāyāna lay-precept treatise; brief citation (precept-substance doctrine reserved for P16)
Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra (Kumārajīva 鳩摩羅什, Later Qin 401–413 CE): fascicles 13–14 Śīla-pāramitā chapter (T1509) — brief citation (P12 reserved)
Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra (Xuanzang 玄奘, Tang Zhēnguān 貞觀 646–648 CE): fascicle 22 Viniścaya-saṃgrahaṇī Śrāvakabhūmi section (T1579) — present paper's single strongest doctrinal anchor · sīla-skandha three aspects + six canonical names ṣaṭ-paryāya + Gandha-sutta gāthā quotation, verified at CBETA T30n1579_p0402a–c
Abhidharma-samuccaya (Asaṅga 無著, Xuanzang trans.): fascicle 4 (T1605) — prātimokṣa-saṃvara + ten karmapathāḥ (intoxicant excluded; P06 carry) + three pure precept-collections (P12 reserved)
Abhidharma-samuccaya-vyākhyā (Sthiramati 安慧, Xuanzang trans.): fascicles 7–8 (T1606) — ten karmapathāḥ motive-categorisation (intoxicant absent)
Vimuttimagga (Saṅghapāla 僧伽婆羅, Southern Qí, 6 c.): fascicles 1–2 (T1648) — Theravāda-related precursor to the Visuddhimagga; parallel sīla-skandha architecture supplementary
Mūla-sarvāstivāda-vinaya (Yijing 義淨, Tang, 7–8 c.): fascicle 5 (T1442) — three-skandha correspondence passage at T23 p.0685b14–16 (P09 + P10 reserved)
Sifenlü-xingshichao (Dàoxuān 道宣， Tang, 7 c.): fascicle 下 cited Avataṃsaka three-fragrance verse "戒香定香解脫香，光明雲臺遍法界，供養十方無量佛，見聞普熏證寂滅" at T40 p.0036c09–11 (T1804) — vinaya-commentarial layer anchor of §V.5 (P17 reserved)
Mohe-zhiguan (Zhiyi 智顗, late Sui, 6 c.): T1911 — architecturally significant absence: zero references to sīla-gandha confirmed by CBETA XML grep (51 hits on broader sīla-vocabulary; §V.6 honest disclosure of the Tiantai / vinaya doctrinal division of labour)
Bodhisattva-precept Commentary (Zhiyi 智顗): T1812 — zero references to sīla-gandha; supplementary absence
Wanshan-tonggui-ji (Yongming Yanshou 永明延壽, Five Dynasties / early Northern Song, 10 c.): T2017 — zero references to sīla-gandha; supplementary absence
Visuddhimagga Chapter 1 Sīla-niddesa (Buddhaghosa, 5 c.): chapter-section reference only (no paragraph numbers; vault absent + GRETIL)
Visuddhimagga Chapter 7 §4 Sīlānussati-kathā (Buddhaghosa): chapter-section reference only — the two-reason explanation of sīla-ānisaṃsa, bridging to P03 sīlānussati

Modern Scholarship

Anālayo, Bhikkhu. Saṃyukta-āgama Studies. Dharma Drum Publishing, 2015. [methodological cross-recension comparison framework; no dedicated sīla-gandha chapter — §IV.1 Concede + Extend from cross-recension stability to canonical doctrinal-property]
Bodhi, Bhikkhu. The Noble Eightfold Path: The Way to the End of Suffering. Buddhist Publication Society, 1984 / Wisdom Publications, 1994. [the fourfold-harmony framework for right speech / right action / right livelihood — §IV.3 Concede + Extend basis]
Bodhi, Bhikkhu. Going for Refuge and Taking the Precepts. Buddhist Publication Society Wheel 282/283/284, 1981. [Part II five precepts · P06 carry · brief citation in present paper]
Bodhi, Bhikkhu, trans. The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha: A Translation of the Aṅguttara Nikāya. Wisdom Publications, 2012. [Book of Threes editorial introduction covers AN 3.79 translation and footnotes — §IV.3 monograph context]
Gethin, Rupert. The Foundations of Buddhism. Oxford University Press, 1998. Chapter 8 "The Buddhist path" — three trainings (tisso sikkhā) and the five-dhamma-skandha standard architectural enumeration; Chapter 9 "The Buddhist community" — Sangha-lay interface social-domain framework. §IV.2 Concede + Extend from static enumeration to AN 11.1 developmental-sequence reading.
Harvey, Peter. An Introduction to Buddhist Ethics: Foundations, Values and Issues. Cambridge University Press, 2000. Chapters 2–4 on lay-monastic ethics and the Sangha-lay social-domain framework [footnote tier; secondary scholarly voice, not in §IV three-scholar cast]
Ñāṇamoli, Bhikkhu, trans. The Path of Purification (Visuddhimagga). Buddhist Publication Society, 4th ed. (chapter-name citation only; no paragraph numbers — Chapter 1 Sīla-niddesa + Chapter 7 §4 Sīlānussati-kathā primary references)
Sujato, Bhikkhu, trans. Aṅguttara Nikāya. SuttaCentral (CC0). [AN 11.1 + AN 5.32 verbatim · AN 3.79 + AN 3.80 PTS-only fallback]

Sūtra & Śāstra Index

Pāli (alphabetical by sutta name):

Aṅguttara-nikāya AN — Mahāsaṅgīti CC0 edition
Cundīsutta — AN 5.32 (PTS AN III 35) — vault hit · P02 carry
Dasuttarasutta — DN 34 (PTS DN iii 272)
Dhammapada — Puppha-vagga vv. 54–56 (PTS Dhp 54–56)
Dīgha-nikāya DN — Mahāsaṅgīti CC0 edition
Gandha-sutta — AN 3.79 (PTS AN i ~225) — ** · PTS-only · the present paper's archetype source**
Itivuttaka 51 — (PTS Iti 38)
Kimatthiyasutta — AN 11.1 (PTS AN V 1) — vault hit · cross-paper anchor P02 + P06 + P07 + P08 + P24
Sāmaññaphala-sutta — DN 2 (PTS DN i 47)
Saṅgītisutta — DN 33 (PTS DN iii 219)

Chinese (numerical by T-number):

T0001 Dīrgha-āgama — fascicle 8 Saṅgīti-sūtra 眾集經 + fascicle 9 Dasuttara-sūtra 十上經 + fascicle 17 Sāmaññaphala-sūtra 沙門果經 (supplementary · narrative frame only · sīla-skandha section )
T0026 Madhyama-āgama — fascicle 10 sūtra 42 Kimatthiya-sūtra 何義經 (AN 11.1 Chinese parallel)
T0099 Saṃyukta-āgama — fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 Sīla-gandha-sūtra 戒香經 — present paper's primary Chinese witness · CBETA T02n0099_p0278c
T0100 Bieyi-za-ahanjing — fascicle 1 sūtra 12 Gandha-sūtra 香經 — second cross-witness · brief verse form
T0125 Ekottara-āgama — fascicle 13 Gandha-varga 香品 — third cross-witness · gandha / suta / cāga triad source
T1442 Mūla-sarvāstivāda-vinaya — fascicle 5 three-skandha correspondence at T23 p.0685b14–16 (P09 + P10 reserved)
T1488 Upāsaka-śīla-sūtra — fascicles 6 + 7 (vault absent · CBETA XML edition · P16 reserved)
T1509 Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra — fascicles 13–14 Śīla-pāramitā (P12 reserved)
T1579 Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra — fascicle 22 Viniścaya-saṃgrahaṇī Śrāvakabhūmi · present paper's single strongest doctrinal anchor · CBETA T30n1579_p0402a–c
T1605 Abhidharma-samuccaya — fascicle 4 (prātimokṣa-saṃvara + ten karmapathāḥ + three pure precept-collections)
T1606 Abhidharma-samuccaya-vyākhyā — fascicles 7–8 (ten karmapathāḥ motive-categorisation)
T1648 Vimuttimagga — fascicles 1–2 (Theravāda-related precursor)
T1804 Sifenlü-xingshichao — fascicle 下 Avataṃsaka three-fragrance verse at T40 p.0036c09–11 — vinaya-commentarial layer anchor · P17 reserved
T1812 Bodhisattva-precept Commentary — zero hits sīla-gandha (supplementary absence)
T1911 Mohe-zhiguan — architecturally significant absence · zero hits sīla-gandha / 51 hits broader sīla-vocabulary · §V.6 disclosure
T2017 Wanshan-tonggui-ji — zero hits sīla-gandha (supplementary absence)

Sanskrit śāstra (by author):

Buddhaghosa, Visuddhimagga — Chapter 1 Sīla-niddesa + Chapter 7 §4 Sīlānussati-kathā (paraphrase only · no paragraph numbers)

Cross-References

Within-volume continuity

SILA P01–P04 (Part I foundations): the three-axis articulation of sīla (P01), sīla as the fourth sotāpattiyaṅga (P02 — where AN 5.32 Cundīsutta debuts, here recapped at §II.1 as supplementary anchor), sīla as object of recollection (P03), and the ekaggatā object-structure argument (P04).
SILA P05 (Part II #1): the three ethical limbs of the noble eightfold path as constitutive path-elements (the volume's general thesis on sīla's developmental rather than restraint-based character).
SILA P06 (Part II #2): the five precepts and their canonical-scope cross-precept differential ("same ritual, different scope"). P06's intoxicant-precept "path-protecting character" finding is carried forward into the present paper at §III.4 as the architectural disclosure of the intoxicant-precept's inclusion within the social-domain enumeration of the T0099 Sīla-gandha-sūtra and its exclusion from the abhidharmic ten karmapathāḥ (T1605 / T1606).
SILA P07 (Part II #3, immediately prior): the borrow-and-return architecture of the uposatha as intermittent monasticism. P07 establishes the lay-renunciate intermittent layer; the present paper extends downward to the lay-baseline daily five-precept layer — answering the question P07 leaves open: even without intermittent renunciation, how does the lay practitioner's standing sīla manifest in the social field? Sīla-gandha is that answer. P07's architecturally significant absence finding (Zhiyi's Mohe-zhiguan zero hits on uposatha) continues in the present paper's §V.6 (Zhiyi zero hits on sīla-gandha + Yongming zero hits — the Tiantai-vinaya doctrinal division of labour confirmed for the second time).

Within-volume forward links

SILA P09 (Part III opener): the architecture of the pātimokkha — sīla's social-domain effect (the present paper, the outward face at the lay-Sangha interface) finds its complementary monastic-internal institutional embodiment in the pātimokkha. The two together constitute the bilateral framing of sīla's social-domain effect — outward in the lay community, inward in the monastic chapter.
SILA P10 (Part III #2): the comparative reading of the three vinaya traditions — the vinaya cross-witness supplementary at §V.5 (the Mūla-sarvāstivāda-vinaya fascicle 5 three-skandha correspondence) is unfolded at this stage of the volume.
SILA P12 + P14 + P16 + P17 (Mahāyāna and vinaya strata): the three pure precept-collections (P12, at which T1605's brief reference in §V.2 of the present paper receives full treatment); the nine bodhisattva-precept aspects (P14, at which T1579's full bodhisattvabhūmi śīla-paṭala treatment occurs); the doctrine of precept-substance (P16, at which T1488's six-precept-recipient framework is unfolded); and Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao unfolded in full (P17, at which the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance citation of the present paper receives its full commentarial context).
SILA P24 (Part VIII Mahāyāna Śūraṅgama main scene): the four pure-clear admonitions, at which the sīla-to-dhyāna architectural handoff is consummated. The eleven-link chain of AN 11.1 — cited in the present paper at §III.3 as the developmental-sequence anchor for sīla-gandha as lay-perceivable entry-point — is reserved at P24 for its full eleven-link soteriological unpacking. The present paper and P07 together constitute the lay-side preparatory dual anchor (the periodic-renunciation mechanism of the uposatha + the social-domain effect of sīla-gandha) for the monastic-grade samādhi-prior precept treatment at P24.

Cross-volume relations

NIAN volume: the fourth-sotāpattiyaṅga axis of SILA P02 (in which the practitioner is "imperturbable in the ethics loved by the noble ones") carries forward from the NIAN volume's treatment of the internal expression of recollection; the social-domain effect of sīla-gandha in the present paper is the daily-lay-life external expression of that same imperturbable ethical conduct.
DĀNA volume — P06 carry-forward: the AN 8.39 gift-frame reading of the abstention-from-killing precept (the abhayaṁ deti / averaṁ / abyābajjhaṁ deti triple — "gives freedom from fear / from enmity / from ill-will") supplies the SILA–DĀNA bridge. The present paper's social-domain effect — the lay practitioner's perceived virtue across the eight directions — is congruent with this gift-frame reading: the gift of fearlessness is one mode of sīla-gandha's social-domain manifestation.
SAMĀDHI volume forward: the eleven-link chain of AN 11.1, sīla → avippaṭisāra → pāmojja → pīti → passaddhi → sukha → samādhi → ... — the first seven links of which are cited at §III.3 of the present paper — is the canonical evidence that sīla unfolds naturally into samādhi. The lay-perceivable effect of sīla-gandha is the architectural rehearsal entry-point at the first link (sīla → avippaṭisāra) of this chain. The lay practitioner, even without contemplative depth, is already at first-link engagement through everyday social-domain manifested precept-keeping. The full eleven-link soteriological unpacking is reserved for P24 (Śūraṅgama four pure-clear admonitions) as the Mahāyāna-canonical formulation of the same sīla-to-dhyāna architectural sequence.

Octalogy (sister series) relation

The octalogy (八部曲) series treats sīla doctrinally as one of the three trainings (tri-śikṣā); the SĪLA volume of the Six Practice Gates treats sīla developmentally — the path-oriented (行) counterpart of the doctrinal (見 / 慧學) treatment. The argument of the present paper that sīla-gandha is a canonical doctrine-name is path-oriented (sīla manifests outwardly in the social domain; this outward manifestation is canonical doctrine, not metaphor); the octalogy treats sīla-gandha, where treated at all, at the doctrinal-overview register.

CBETA collation: Pāli anchors (AN 3.79 Gandha-sutta · AN 5.32 Cundīsutta · AN 11.1 Kimatthiyasutta) are cited by PTS reference; AN 11.1 + AN 5.32 follow the Mahāsaṅgīti Tipiṭaka Buddhavasse 2500 (CC0) edition with Sujato CC0 English translations cited inline where verbatim. AN 3.79 + AN 3.80 + Dhammapada 54–56 Puppha-vagga + DN 1 / DN 2 / DN 33 / DN 34 + MN 27 / MN 38 / MN 51 / MN 107 + Itivuttaka 51 + Visuddhimagga Chapter 1 and other targets are cited by PTS reference only and are never blockquoted. Saṃyukta-āgama (T0099 fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 Sīla-gandha-sūtra 戒香經 — primary Chinese anchor at T02n0099_p0278c), Bieyi-za-ahanjing (T0100 fascicle 1 sūtra 12 Gandha-sūtra 香經), Ekottara-āgama (T0125 fascicle 13 Gandha-varga 香品), Madhyama-āgama (T0026 fascicle 10 sūtra 42 Kimatthiya-sūtra 何義經), Dīrgha-āgama (T0001 fascicle 8 Saṅgīti-sūtra + fascicle 9 Dasuttara-sūtra + fascicle 17 Sāmaññaphala-sūtra), Upāsaka-śīla-sūtra (T1488 fascicles 6 + 7

Author: 釋慧鏡 (Shi Huijing) Project: 指月 Point-to-the-moon · 六行門 Six Practice Gates License: CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 Repository: github.com/pointing-at-the-moon/six-practice-gates

Footnotes

The present paper carries forward from P07 The Uposatha and the Genius of Intermittent Monasticism on the periodic-renunciation mechanism of the eight-factor uposatha, descending from the exceptional elevation of the periodic-renunciation layer to the question of the social-domain manifestation of the lay practitioner's daily five-precept observance. P07 has established the eight-factor uposatha as the canonical structural design of "five lay precepts plus three monastic borrowings, with borrow-and-return architecture"; the present paper further establishes sīla-gandha as the canonical doctrine-name for "the socially perceivable effect of the lay practitioner's daily ethical observance." ↩
Saṃyukta-āgama fascicle 38 sūtra 1073 Sīla-gandha-sūtra. Guṇabhadra (求那跋陀羅), Liu Song Yuánjiā 元嘉 (435–443 CE), Sarvāstivāda-transmitted. Taishō vol. 2, No. T0099, T02n0099_p0278c. Discourse and verse quoted at §I and §II.2; the principal textual anchor of the present paper. ↩ ↩²
Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra (Yogācārabhūmi) fascicle 22, Viniścaya-saṃgrahaṇī division within the Śrāvakabhūmi. Xuanzang trans., Tang Zhēnguān 貞觀 646–648 CE. Taishō vol. 30, No. T1579, T30n1579_p0402a–c. The sīla-skandha three aspects (non-violation / intrinsic-nature / intrinsic-merit) and six canonical names (ṣaṭ-paryāya; sīla-gandha / sīla-vilepana / sīla-vāsana and other terms) constitute the decisive codification at which the sīla-gandha doctrine is elevated from sutta-layer literary metaphor to abhidharmic-layer official doctrine-name; the present paper's single strongest doctrinal anchor. Passages quoted at §I and §V.1. ↩ ↩² ↩³
Aṅguttara 3.79 Gandha-sutta (PTS AN i ~225), in the Ānanda-vagga of the Book of Threes. The present paper's Pāli source vault (Mahāsaṅgīti Tipiṭaka Buddhavasse 2500) collects twenty-seven Aṅguttara discourses but does not include the verbatim original of AN 3.79 or AN 3.80; AN 3.79 is therefore cited by PTS reference only in the present paper, without verbatim direct quotation. The three Chinese translations (T0099 + T0100 + T0125) serve as the principal textual anchor. Bhikkhu Bodhi's Numerical Discourses of the Buddha (Wisdom Publications, 2012) and Bhikkhu Sujato's CC0 open translation at SuttaCentral both render the discourse in full and supply the academic cross-reference. The imagery is anchored at its origin in the Indian Pāli-Sanskrit canonical strata and is cross-validated by Xuanzang's direct translation of the Sanskrit Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 (§V.1). ↩ ↩²
Dhammapada verses 54–56, in the Puppha-vagga (PTS Dhp 54–56) — na pupphagandho paṭivātam eti / satañca gandho paṭivātam eti ("the fragrance of flowers cannot travel against the wind, but the fragrance of the good is able to travel against the wind"), the second locus of the sīla-gandha imagery in the Pāli tradition. The body of the Dhammapada is not present in the present paper's Pāli source vault; the verses are therefore cited by PTS reference only and not blockquoted verbatim. ↩
Pāli source-vault absent anchors: Sāmaññaphala-sutta (DN 2), Saṅgītisutta (DN 33), Dasuttarasutta (DN 34), Cūḷahatthipadopama-sutta (MN 27), Mahātaṇhāsaṅkhaya-sutta (MN 38), Kandaraka-sutta (MN 51), Gaṇakamoggallāna-sutta (MN 107), Itivuttaka 51, and the body of Visuddhimagga Chapter 1 — these nine important Pāli anchors are all absent from the present paper's Pāli source vault; each is cited by PTS reference only and not blockquoted verbatim. This disclosure is a discipline of contemporary digital philology and does not affect the substance of the present paper's cross-recension architectural stability claim. ↩
Aṅguttara 11.1 Kimatthiyasutta, PTS AN V 1. Bhikkhu Sujato CC0 translation, SuttaCentral. The Chinese parallel is preserved as Madhyama-āgama fascicle 10 sūtra 42 Kimatthiya-sūtra 何義經, translated by Saṅghadeva, Taishō vol. 1, No. T0026, fascicle 10 (the translator-court attribution corrected to Eastern Jin Lóng-ān 隆安 397–398 CE per the philological correction adopted at P06 + P07). The canonical structure of the eleven-link chain is the core anchor of §III.3; this discourse is the cross-paper anchor of the SĪLA series (P02, P06, P07, P08, P24). ↩
Aṅguttara 5.32 Cundīsutta, PTS AN III 35. Bhikkhu Sujato CC0 translation, SuttaCentral. The discourse establishes the sotāpattiyaṅga axis (ariyakanta-sīla, "ethics loved by the noble ones"), the principal anchor at P02; cited here as supplementary evidence to display the internal-external linkage of sīla's social-domain manifestation through the sotāpattiyaṅga dimension. ↩
Ekottara-āgama fascicle 13 Gandha-varga 香品. Saṅghadeva (瞿曇僧伽提婆), Eastern Jin, 4–5 c., Mahāsaṅghika-related transmission. Taishō vol. 2, No. T0125. The three-fragrance classification (virtue / learning / giving) supplies the discourse-layer evidence for the three-fragrance hierarchy reading at §III.2. ↩
Bieyi-za-ahanjing fascicle 1 sūtra 12 Gandha-sūtra. Anonymous, listed under the Song catalogue, ca. 4–5 c. Taishō vol. 2, No. T0100. The third Chinese witness of AN 3.79; the text is briefer, but the social-broadcast formula "heard with-and-against the wind without exception" is fully aligned with T0099 and T0125 in core syntax, providing the third witness of cross-recension architectural stability. ↩
Dīrgha-āgama fascicle 17 Sāmaññaphala-sūtra 沙門果經. Buddhayaśas (佛陀耶舍) + Zhu Fonian (竺佛念), Later Qin Hong-shi 弘始 412–413 CE, Dharmaguptaka. Taishō vol. 1, No. T0001, fascicle 17. The Pāli correspondent is DN 2 Sāmaññaphala-sutta, structured around King Ajātasattu's request to the Buddha concerning the fruits of recluseship. In the present paper's vault, although T0001 fascicle 17 preserves the Ajātasattu narrative frame, the full sīla-skandha three-stratum enumeration paragraph (cūḷasīla / majjhimasīla / mahāsīla) is not present; T0001 fascicle 17 is therefore cited only as narrative-frame supplementary evidence, the abhidharmic codification of the sīla-skandha three aspects being anchored at Yogācārabhūmi fascicle 22 (§V.1). ↩
Dīrgha-āgama fascicle 8 Saṅgīti-sūtra 眾集經 (DN 33 parallel) and fascicle 9 Dasuttara-sūtra 十上經 (DN 34 parallel). Buddhayaśas + Zhu Fonian, Later Qin Hong-shi 412–413 CE. Taishō vol. 1, No. T0001, fascicles 8 and 9. Both texts include the three-skandha (sīla / samādhi / paññā) and five-dhamma-skandha (sīla / samādhi / paññā / vimutti / vimutti-ñāṇadassana) enumerations on the Chinese side; cited as supplementary evidence to display the stratified-enumeration stability of the sīla-skandha architecture within the Chinese Āgama tradition. ↩
Sifenlü-xingshichao fascicle 下. Dàoxuān (道宣, 596–667 CE, founder of the Nánshān vinaya school), Tang, 7 c. Taishō vol. 40, No. T1804, T40 p.0036c09–11. Within the uposatha observance procedure for the eight-precept observance, the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance gāthā ("the fragrance of virtue, the fragrance of concentration, the fragrance of liberation: with their radiance and cloud-dais they pervade the Dharma-realm, making offering to the immeasurable Buddhas of the ten directions, and through seeing-and-hearing the universal permeation realising the quiescent extinction") is cited as the canonical basis of the vinaya-commentarial three-fragrance expansion. Detailed treatment of Dàoxuān's Sifenlü-xingshichao is reserved for P17 of the present volume; the present paper draws only on this brief reference to the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance gāthā. ↩
Abhidharma-samuccaya fascicle 4. Asaṅga (無著), trans. Xuanzang, Tang Zhēnguān 646–648 CE. Taishō vol. 31, No. T1605, fascicle 4. This fascicle's systematic enumeration of the prātimokṣa-saṃvara and ten karmapathāḥ (daśa karmapathāḥ) categorial unfolding, in which the intoxicant precept is not included within the ten karmapathāḥ, is the abhidharmic-layer evidence for the discourse-layer / abhidharmic-layer divergence at §III.4. The reference to the three pure precept-collections is reserved for P12 of the present volume; brief mention only here. ↩ ↩²
Abhidharma-samuccaya-vyākhyā fascicles 7–8. Sthiramati (安慧), trans. Xuanzang, Tang Zhēnguān 646–648 CE. Taishō vol. 31, No. T1606, fascicles 7–8. The analysis of the ten karmapathāḥ (killing = anger-terminated; stealing and sexual misconduct = greed-terminated; false speech = terminated in any one of the three poisons; intoxicants not included within the ten karmapathāḥ) is the abhidharmic-layer doctrinal basis for the karma-path categorial criterion at §III.4. ↩ ↩²
Mahāprajñāpāramitā-śāstra fascicles 13–14, Śīla-pāramitā (尸羅波羅蜜) chapter. Kumārajīva (鳩摩羅什) trans., Later Qin 401–413 CE. Taishō vol. 25, No. T1509, fascicles 13–14. The principal canonical document for the Mahāyāna expansion of sīla. Main contents reserved for P12 of the present volume; brief citation only here, acknowledging the place of the text in the canonical expansion of sīla. ↩
Upāsaka-śīla-sūtra fascicles 6 and 7. Dharmakṣema (曇無讖) trans., Northern Liáng Xuán-shǐ 玄始, year 15 (426 CE), Liángzhou court. Taishō vol. 24, No. T1488, fascicles 6 and 7. The dedicated Chinese-Mahāyāna sūtra on lay-precept observance; the full text of T1488 fascicles 6 and 7 is, however, absent from the present paper's vault, the CBETA Electronic Tripiṭaka XML edition being the principal textual source. Brief citation only here; the doctrine of precept-substance is reserved for P16 of the present volume. ↩
Vimuttimagga fascicles 1–2. Saṅghapāla (僧伽婆羅) trans., Southern Qí, 6 c. Taishō vol. 32, No. T1648. The Theravāda-related precursor to the Visuddhimagga, preserving on the Chinese side the early form of the Theravāda meditation system. Brief citation only here, registering the parallel articulation of the sīla-skandha architecture within the Theravāda-adjacent Chinese transmission. ↩
Visuddhimagga Chapter 1 Sīla-niddesa and Chapter 7 §4 Sīlānussati-kathā. Buddhaghosa, 5 c. The body of Chapter 1 is absent from the present paper's vault (confirmed at P03, P04, P05, P07, and again at P08); Chapter 7 §4 is present in the vault but is released under GRETIL's CC BY-SA 4.0 licence, which is incompatible with the present project's CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 licence. The present paper therefore cites both at chapter-section level only, without verbatim direct quotation and without paragraph numbers; paragraph numbers pending paper collation against Ñāṇamoli's BPS 4th edition. ↩
Mūla-sarvāstivāda-vinaya fascicle 5. Yijing (義淨) trans., Tang, 7–8 c. Taishō vol. 23, No. T1442, T23n1442_p0685b14–16. The three-skandha (sīla / samādhi / paññā) correspondence — "one possessed of discipline is one possessed of the sīla-skandha; one possessed of excellent good qualities is one possessed of the samādhi-skandha; one of brahmacarya is one of the prajñā-skandha" — provides, internal to the vinaya canon, the three-skandha enumeration structure in distant resonance with the Avataṃsaka three-fragrance expansion. Main scenes reserved for P09 + P10; brief mention only here. ↩
Mohe-zhiguan, dictated by Zhiyi (智顗, 538–597 CE, founder of the Tiantai school) and recorded by Guanding, late Sui, 6 c. Taishō vol. 46, No. T1911. Bodhisattva-precept Commentary, by Zhiyi, Sui, 6 c. Taishō vol. 40, No. T1812. Wanshan-tonggui-ji, by Yongming Yanshou (永明延壽, 904–975 CE), Five Dynasties / early Northern Song. Taishō vol. 48, No. T2017. All three works return zero hits for the doctrine-name sīla-gandha; Mohe-zhiguan records 51 hits for the broader sīla-vocabulary (持戒 / 尸羅 / 禁戒 / 戒蘊), but zero hits for sīla-gandha as a doctrine-name in its own right. This architectural absence is evidence of the doctrinal division of labour between the Tiantai school and the vinaya-commentarial tradition. (P07 has recorded the same architectural absence: Mohe-zhiguan returns zero hits for the eight-precept uposatha.) ↩

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