清淨道論 義疏通講 · 冊1Visuddhimagga · Exposition Throughout · Vol. 1

Before Practice, How Do You Live? | Why an Eight-Hundred-Page Book Begins with “Keeping Virtue”

The Big Picture — What This Chapter Teaches and Why It Has to Come First

The whole Visuddhimagga is, in effect, one four-line verse unfolded: the Buddha says, “A wise person established in virtue develops mind and wisdom … and can disentangle this tangle.” The three words virtue, mind (concentration), and wisdom form the skeleton of the whole work; its eight hundred pages are a word-by-word commentary on that verse, and the first chapter explains the first word. 〔Verse and outline: Vernacular §1〕

The question is therefore plain: before practice, how must you live? The book’s answer is “first keep virtue.” Its reason is not moral exhortation but something like engineering: without virtue as the foundation, concentration will not stand and wisdom will not grow.

Yet the true subtlety of this chapter does not lie in “teaching you to follow rules.” Virtue is easily read as “a list of prohibitions” or “a medal of piety,” but the chapter’s claim is far more precise: virtue is the ground of the mind, not a list of prohibitions; and the highest grade of virtue is virtue that is “ungrasped.” Once virtue becomes the self-image “I am a virtuous person,” it turns over from being the ground and binds you instead. This is the first appearance of the measure used by this exposition—it returns in Chapter 9’s “near enemies” and Chapter 20’s “ten imperfections of insight.” Virtue is the first step in this lesson.

This chapter follows an internal unit system of ten units: Introduction and Outline Verse [this unit]; the nature and benefits of virtue, 01-02; the general classification of virtue, 01-03; virtue as restraint by the Pātimokkha, 01-04; virtue as restraint of the faculties, 01-05; virtue as purification of livelihood, 01-06; virtue concerning the use of requisites, 01-07; the method of accomplishing the fourfold purification of virtue, 01-08; the fivefold classifications of virtue, 01-09; and the defilement and purification of virtue, 01-10. This unit is the introduction to the whole book: the origin of the verse, the author’s statement of intention, a word-by-word explanation of the verse, and an inventory showing how much “virtue, concentration, and wisdom” can support.

§01 One Verse Supports the Whole Book 〔Reading〕 → Vernacular §1

The point to carry away is this: what you are reading is not a code of rules but the first stretch of the path that disentangles the tangle (virtue → concentration → wisdom). Buddhaghosa does not invent a new starting point. He begins with one statement by the Buddha, and the entire book simply writes an extended section on each of these three words. (For the verse, source, and this edition’s own rendering, see Vernacular §1.)

The author first explains why the verse was spoken (Vernacular §1). A deity comes to the Buddha at Sāvatthī by night and asks: “An inner tangle and an outer tangle—people are entangled in a tangle. Who can disentangle this tangle?” Tangle is a designation for craving: it arises again and again from below upward upon visible form and other objects and interweaves like the network of branches in a bamboo thicket. It arises in one’s own requisites and those of others, in one’s own person and those of others, and in the internal and external sense bases; hence there are an inner and an outer tangle. The mass of beings is thus entangled, bound, and interwoven. The Buddha answers with the verse “A wise person established in virtue ….” 〔Reading〕 Notice the shape of the question. It does not ask “What is liberation?” but “Who can disentangle it?” The answer is therefore not a noun but the portrait of a person: established in virtue, wise, developing mind and wisdom, ardent, and prudent.

§02 The Author’s Statement—“Purity” Is Nibbāna; “Path” Is the Means of Attainment → Vernacular §2

The author states his purpose in five verses (Vernacular §2): some obtain the exceedingly rare going forth but do not know “the secure and direct path to purity that comprises virtue and the rest”; though they wish for purity and strive, they do not attain it. To bring them gladness, he will expound the Path of Purity, “whose analysis is thoroughly purified and which rests upon the method of teaching of those who dwell at the Great Monastery.” He then defines his terms: “purity” is nibbāna, free from every stain and utterly pure; “path” is the means of attainment. Next he gives five ways of speaking about the path to purity: solely in terms of insight (the verse “All formations are impermanent”), in terms of absorption and wisdom, in terms of action and the rest (“Action, knowledge, and Dhamma; virtue and the highest livelihood”), in terms of virtue and the rest (“Ever possessed of virtue, wise and well concentrated … crosses the flood so difficult to cross”), and in terms of the establishments of mindfulness (the one-way path is the four establishments of mindfulness); the same applies to the right strivings and the rest. This question and answer, however, teaches it in terms of virtue and the rest. 〔Reading〕 This paragraph fixes the position of the whole book: the path to purity can be described in more than one way, and this book chooses the route of “virtue, concentration, and wisdom.” That is why its first chapter is virtue.

§03 The Verse Word by Word—Six Qualities and the Knife → Vernacular §3

The word-by-word explanation (Vernacular §3) says: only a person who is fulfilling virtue is called “established in virtue”; the “wise person” possesses wisdom born of a three-rooted rebirth-linking consciousness produced by kamma; to “develop mind and wisdom” is to develop concentration and insight (“mind” indicates concentration and “wisdom” insight); an “ardent person” possesses energy—energy is called ardor because it burns the defilements; and a “prudent person” possesses safeguarding wisdom. The author points out that wisdom appears three times in the verse: innate wisdom, insight-wisdom, and safeguarding wisdom, which guides every task. A “bhikkhu” is one who sees danger in saṃsāra. Taken together, the disentangler is a bhikkhu possessing six qualities: virtue, concentration, three kinds of wisdom, and ardor. Then comes this unit’s most vivid simile: standing upon the earth of virtue, with the hand of safeguarding wisdom held up by the strength of energy, he raises the knife of insight-wisdom sharpened on the whetstone of concentration and disentangles, cuts through, and breaks apart the whole tangle of craving that has fallen upon his continuum. At the moment of the path he is called one who disentangles; at the moment of fruition he has disentangled it and becomes the foremost recipient of gifts in the world together with its deities. 〔Reading〕 This simile already states the division of labor for the whole book: virtue is the earth, concentration the whetstone, wisdom the knife, and energy the hand. If any one is missing, the knife cannot be raised.

§04 The Nine Triads Supported by Virtue, Concentration, and Wisdom → Vernacular §4

The paragraph begins with a correction (Vernacular §4): the wisdom meant by “wise person” is already accomplished by past kamma, and nothing need be done about it. What must be done is to act continuously with energy, act with clear comprehension, stand established in virtue, and develop serenity and insight. Thus the Blessed One reveals the Path of Purity through virtue, concentration, and wisdom. The author then gives an inventory of nine triads revealed “thus far”: the three trainings (higher virtue, higher mind, and higher wisdom); the Dispensation good in three ways (virtue is its goodness in the beginning because it brings nonremorse and other qualities; concentration its goodness in the middle because it brings the kinds of supernormal power; wisdom its goodness at the end because it brings sameness toward what is agreeable and disagreeable—the verse on “a solid mass of rock not shaken by the wind”); the supporting conditions for the three knowledges and the rest (virtue → three knowledges, concentration → six direct knowledges, wisdom → four analytic knowledges); avoidance of the two extremes and cultivation of the middle way (virtue abandons devotion to sensual pleasure, concentration devotion to self-mortification, wisdom cultivates the middle way); the means of surmounting bad destinations and the rest (virtue surmounts bad destinations, concentration the sensual realm, wisdom all becoming); three modes of abandoning the defilements (virtue abandons by substitution, concentration by suppression, wisdom by cutting off); the antidotes to transgression and the rest (virtue counteracts transgression, concentration obsessive arising, wisdom latent tendency); purification from three defilements (virtue purifies misconduct, concentration craving, wisdom views); and the causes of stream-entry and the other attainments (virtue is the cause of stream-entry and once-return, concentration of non-return, and wisdom of arahantship—the stream-enterer and once-returner are “ones who completely fulfill the virtues,” the non-returner “one who completely fulfills concentration,” and the arahant “one who completely fulfills wisdom”). 〔Reading〕 The column in this inventory that most deserves attention is the “virtue” column: goodness in the beginning, surmounting bad destinations, abandonment by substitution, counteracting transgression, purifying misconduct, and causing stream-entry and once-return. What virtue can do has a definite boundary and definite weight. It is not everything, but without it nothing can begin.

For the General Reader

If you retain only one thing from this unit, let it be the knife simile (Vernacular §3): virtue is the ground on which you stand. If you do not stand firmly, the knife cannot be raised; once you stand firmly, you still need the whetstone (concentration) and the knife (wisdom). The next ten units of this chapter explain this “ground” inch by inch—what virtue is (01-02), how many kinds there are (01-03), what each of the four kinds of purified virtue is (01-04–01-07), how they are accomplished (01-08), the fivefold classifications of virtue (01-09), and how virtue is defiled and purified (01-10).

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §1–§4 is a complete passage-by-passage rendering of the introduction (tr. mine, from the public-domain Pāli original); other translations that may be consulted include Ye Jun’s Chinese version, Chapter 1, and Ñāṇamoli’s English translation, Chapter 1.

The Proximate Cause of Virtue Is Shame and Moral Dread—a Counterintuitive Point

The Big Picture — Seven Questions, and the First Four Answered in This Unit

After the introduction, the author says that although the Path of Purity has already been taught through the gateways of virtue, concentration, and wisdom, it remains extremely condensed and “not enough to benefit everyone.” He therefore poses seven questions about virtue (Vernacular §1): What is virtue? In what sense is it called virtue? What are its characteristic, function, manifestation, and proximate cause? Its benefits? Its kinds? Its defilement? Its cleansing? These seven questions form the skeleton of this chapter (see 01-01, Larger View, for the sequence of its ten units). This unit answers the first four (§1–§4); 01-03 through 01-09 answer the fifth, “How many kinds?”; and 01-10 answers the final two. Once this framework is held in view, the chapter no longer appears fragmentary. 〔What Is Seen〕

§01 What Is Virtue?—Volition, Mental Factor, Restraint, Non-Transgression → Vernacular §1

“What is virtue?” (Vernacular §1): it is volition and the other phenomena in someone who abstains from killing living beings and so forth or fulfills prescribed duties. According to the Paṭisambhidāmagga, volition is virtue, a mental factor is virtue, restraint is virtue, non-transgression is virtue. Volition is the volition of someone abstaining from killing and so forth or fulfilling prescribed duties, and also the seven volitions belonging to the courses of action in someone abandoning killing and so forth. Mental factor means abstinence from killing and so forth, and also the three phenomena non-covetousness, non-ill will, and right view. Restraint is fivefold: restraint by the code (“endowed, fully endowed, with this restraint by the code”); restraint by mindfulness (“guards the eye faculty and undertakes restraint of the eye faculty”); restraint by knowledge (the verse to Ajita: mindfulness bars the streams and wisdom dams them—the use of requisites is also included here); restraint by patience (“endures cold and heat,” and so forth); and restraint by energy (“does not tolerate a sensual thought that has arisen,” and so forth—purification of livelihood is also included here). Together with the abstinence of a good person fearful of evil when an occasion presents itself, all are virtue consisting in restraint. Non-transgression is bodily and verbal non-transgression by someone who has undertaken the precepts. 〔Reading〕 This answer has already planted the four seeds of the fourfold purification of virtue: restraint by the code; restraint by mindfulness, which is restraint of the faculties; restraint by knowledge, which includes the use of requisites; and restraint by energy, which includes purification of livelihood. The fourfold purification of virtue is not a separate list newly introduced later; it unfolds what is already contained in the five restraints.

§02 In What Sense Is It Called Virtue?—Coordinating and Upholding → Vernacular §2

“Virtue” takes its name from the sense of composing (Vernacular §2). Composing has two meanings: coordinating—bodily action and the rest do not scatter because of good virtue; and upholding—serving as the supporting foundation on which wholesome phenomena stand. Those versed in the characteristics of language accept these two meanings; others explain it as “the meaning of head” or “the meaning of coolness,” which the treatise records without adjudication. 〔Reading〕 “Coordinating” and “upholding” draw inward and extend outward: inwardly, conduct does not scatter; outwardly, wholesome phenomena are given a place to stand. The reason Chapter 1 is the foundation lies precisely in this “upholding.”

§03 Characteristic, Function, Manifestation, and Proximate Cause → Vernacular §3

The fourfold definition (Vernacular §3): the characteristic is composing—just as material form may differ as blue and yellow while sharing visibility as its characteristic, virtue may be divided in many ways while sharing coordinating and upholding as its characteristic. The function is twofold: as task, crushing immorality; as accomplishment, blamelessness. The manifestation is cleanliness—bodily cleanliness, verbal cleanliness, and mental cleanliness. The proximate cause is shame and moral dread: when shame and moral dread are present, virtue arises and remains; without them, it neither arises nor remains.

〔Reading〕 Of these four definitions, the point at which a modern reader should pause is the last: proximate cause = shame and moral dread. It says something counterintuitive: virtue is not sustained by external punishment; it is sustained by inward shame and moral dread. Without shame and moral dread, however many rules there are, they cannot hold a person. When shame and moral dread are present, the rules merely put into words what is already in the heart. In other words, external training rules are virtue’s shell; shame and moral dread are its lifeblood. This is the seed of the dismantling of attachment in 01-10: if even “keeping virtue” can be appropriated by self-clinging, then what sustains virtue cannot be regulation alone; it must be a clarity able to see the mind’s own first stirrings.

§04 The Benefits of Virtue—Beginning with Non-Remorse → Vernacular §4

“What are the benefits of virtue?” (Vernacular §4): its benefit is the acquisition of many qualities beginning with non-remorse—“wholesome virtues have non-remorse as their purpose and non-remorse as their benefit.” The author cites three bodies of material: the five benefits taught to householders (owing to diligence, acquiring a great mass of wealth; a good reputation spreading abroad; entering any assembly confidently; dying unconfused; and, after the breakup of the body, rebirth in a good destination, in a heavenly world); the many benefits taught to bhikkhus, beginning with being dear to companions in the holy life and ending with the destruction of the influxes; and ten verses in praise of virtue. The stain that five great rivers cannot wash away is washed away by the water of virtue. The burning that rain-laden winds, yellow sandalwood, garlands, gems, and moonlight cannot calm is calmed by utterly cooling noble virtue. The fragrance of virtue travels both with and against the wind. Virtue is the stairway to heaven and the gate to the city of nibbāna. Its adornment surpasses the jeweled adornments of kings. It destroys the fears beginning with self-reproach and gives reputation and gladness—“the root of qualities and the slayer of the power of faults.” 〔Reading〕 All ten verses follow the same form: “what other things cannot do, virtue does.” Rivers, fragrance, adornment, stairway, and gate—each is among the finest things in the world, set beside something still more fundamental.

For the General Reader

If you retain only one thing from this unit, let it be this: virtue is not moral fastidiousness; it is the ground on which the mind can sleep at night and sit steadily by day. Here the author begins the benefits of virtue with “non-remorse” (Vernacular §4). The next unit cites the Vinaya and extends non-remorse into a causal sequence—restraint → non-remorse → gladness → joy → tranquility → pleasure → concentration—worth committing to memory (the full form appears in the seventh dyad in 01-03, Vernacular §2). The most immediate return of keeping virtue is not in a future life but tonight: a mind without a guilty burden is relaxed, and a relaxed mind can remain seated. This is why virtue precedes concentration. It is not a moral threshold; it is concentration’s prerequisite.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §1–§4 is the complete passage-by-passage translation of the first four answers to the seven questions.

“Half a Sheet of Virtue” and a Net Covering the Whole of Life

The Big Picture — The General Matrix Answering the Fifth Question, “How Many Kinds of Virtue Are There?”

The author’s answer to the fifth of the seven questions, “How many kinds of virtue are there?”, is to count from one kind through five kinds (Vernacular §1 gives the matrix; §2–§5 unfold the dyads, triads, and tetrads item by item). The fivefold classification, and the detailed treatment of the weightiest tetrad—the fourfold purification of virtue—belong respectively to later units (01-09 and 01-04 through 01-08). This unit is the master table and the classificatory skeleton of the chapter: one kind (composing as characteristic), seven dyads, five triads, four tetrads, and two pentads. 〔What Is Seen〕 The way to read it is not to memorize the numbers but to ask what each pair of classifications distinguishes. Doing and keeping distinguish “doing” from “not doing”; dependent and independent distinguish motive; limited and unlimited distinguish “what would make you break it”; mundane and supramundane distinguish “where it takes you.”

§01 General Matrix—One, Two, Three, Four, and Five Kinds → Vernacular §1

All virtue is of one kind in having “composing as its characteristic.” The seven dyads are doing / keeping; virtue of higher conduct / virtue fundamental to the holy life; abstinence / non-abstinence; dependent / independent; temporary / lifelong; limited / unlimited; mundane / supramundane. The five triads are inferior / middling / superior; governed by self / governed by the world / governed by Dhamma; grasped / ungrasped / tranquilized; pure / impure / doubtful; trainee / beyond-training adept / neither trainee nor beyond-training adept. The four tetrads are partaking of decline / stasis / distinction / penetration; virtue of bhikkhus / bhikkhunīs / those not fully admitted / householders; natural / customary / fixed-nature / prior-cause virtue; and the fourfold purification of virtue. The two pentads are the five beginning with limited purification (from the Paṭisambhidāmagga) and abandoning / abstinence / volition / restraint / non-transgression.

§02 Seven Dyads—from “Doing and Not Doing” to “Mundane and Supramundane” → Vernacular §2

Doing / keeping: fulfilling what was laid down as “This should be done” is doing; not doing what was prohibited as “This should not be done” is keeping. Doing is accomplished through faith and energy, keeping through faith. 〔Reading〕 Most people think of “virtue” only as the string of negatives—“do not kill, do not steal, do not lie”—but that is only keeping. Virtue has another half: doing—support what should be supported and fulfill what should be fulfilled. Virtue consisting only of “do not” is half a sheet of virtue. Virtue of higher conduct / virtue fundamental to the holy life: the former is the virtue other than that whose eighth member is livelihood—the minor training rules and the duties included in the Khandhakas—while the latter is the virtue whose eighth member is livelihood, the beginning of the holy life of the path and what is included in the two Vibhaṅgas. To fulfill what is fundamental to the holy life without fulfilling the Dhamma of higher conduct “is impossible.” Abstinence / non-abstinence: mere abstinence from killing and so forth is virtue as abstinence; the remaining volition and so forth are non-abstinence. Dependent / independent: dependence is twofold—dependence on craving (“Through this virtue I shall become a deva”) and dependence on views (“Purification comes through virtue”); supramundane virtue and the mundane virtue serving as its requisite are independent. Temporary / lifelong. Limited / unlimited: virtue broken at the limit of gain, fame, kin, limbs, or life is limited; when not even a mind to transgress arises, it is unlimited. Mundane / supramundane: what is subject to influxes is mundane, bringing a special kind of becoming and serving as a requisite for escape. Here the author cites the long sequence—restraint → non-remorse → gladness → joy → tranquility → pleasure → concentration → knowledge and vision of things as they really are → disenchantment → dispassion → liberation → knowledge and vision of liberation → final nibbāna without grasping—“namely, the liberation of the mind through non-grasping.” What is free of influxes is supramundane, bringing escape and serving as the plane for reviewing knowledge. 〔Reading〕 This sequence is a miniature of the whole work: virtue stands first and nibbāna last, with every link in between being “for” the next. It is the clearest evidence for why Chapter 1 is Chapter 1.

§03 Five Triads—Inferior, Middling, Superior; Predominance; Grasping; Purity and Doubt; Stages of Training → Vernacular §3

Inferior / middling / superior is analyzed in four ways: by the inferior, middling, or superior strength of desire, mind, energy, and investigation; by what is sought (fame / fruit of merit / noble nature and “This simply ought to be done”); by defilement or its absence (virtue defiled by the thought “I am virtuous and they are immoral” is inferior, undefiled mundane virtue is middling, supramundane virtue superior); and by purpose (for becoming and enjoyment, inferior; for personal liberation, middling; virtue as a perfection for the liberation of all beings, superior). Governed by self / world / Dhamma: undertaken through respect for oneself, avoidance of the world’s reproach, or honor for the greatness of Dhamma. Grasped / ungrasped / tranquilized: dependent virtue grasped by craving and views is grasped; the virtue of a good ordinary person serving as a requisite of the path and a trainee’s path-associated virtue is ungrasped; fruition-associated virtue of trainees and beyond-training adepts is tranquilized. Pure / impure / doubtful: not offending, or rehabilitating after an offense, is pure; offending without rehabilitation is impure; doubt about the matter, offense, or transgression is doubtful virtue—the practitioner should purify the impure and dispel doubt, “thus it will be comfortable for him.” Trainee / beyond-training adept / neither trainee nor beyond-training adept. A further note: the Paṭisambhidāmagga’s three kinds, “wholesome, unwholesome, and indeterminate virtue,” use the ordinary meaning “disposition.” They do not fit the virtue established in this treatise and are not admitted here. 〔Reading〕 The third analysis of “inferior / middling / superior” carries the most weight: virtue defiled by “I am purer than they are” is inferior—already announcing the measuring edge used in 01-10.

§04 The First Three Tetrads—Decline, Stasis, Distinction, and Penetration; Virtue of Four Communities; Natural, Customary, Fixed-Nature, and Prior-Cause Virtue → Vernacular §4

Partaking of decline / stasis / distinction / penetration (four verse groups): associating with the immoral, failing to see fault in transgression, having many wrong intentions, and not guarding the faculties—decline; being self-satisfied with fulfilled virtue, not cultivating a meditation subject, and being content with virtue alone—stasis; having fulfilled virtue and striving for concentration—distinction; not being content with virtue and applying oneself to disenchantment—penetration. Virtue of bhikkhus / bhikkhunīs / those not fully admitted / householders (the last two: ten precepts for male and female novices; five as permanent virtue for male and female lay followers, ten when there is willingness, and eight on an observance day). Natural / customary / fixed-nature / prior-cause virtue: non-transgression among the people of Uttarakuru is natural; the boundaries and customs of each family, region, and religious community are customary; the Bodhisatta’s mother’s freedom from sensual thought when he descends into the womb is fixed nature; the virtue of pure beings such as Mahākassapa and the Bodhisatta’s virtue in various lives is due to a prior cause. 〔Reading〕 The first tetrad is the place to pause: “being content with virtue” belongs to stasis. However well virtue is kept, stopping at virtue is still stopping.

§05 Establishing the Fourfold Purification of Virtue—the Four Seeds of This Chapter’s Main Structure → Vernacular §5

The fourth tetrad: virtue consisting in restraint by the code—“dwells restrained by restraint by the code, accomplished in good conduct and resort, sees danger even in the slightest faults, and trains by undertaking the training rules”; virtue consisting in restraint of the faculties—“having seen a visible form with the eye, he does not grasp its sign or features … accomplishes restraint of the eye faculty,” and likewise for ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind; virtue of purification of livelihood—abstaining from wrong livelihood that proceeds through transgressing the six training rules laid down for livelihood and through scheming, talking, hinting, belittling, and pursuing gain with gain; virtue dependent on requisites—using the four requisites after wise reflection, beginning with “uses a robe only for warding off cold.” 〔Reading〕 From outside inward, the fourfold purification of virtue forms a net: guard the training rules → guard the six faculties → guard one’s livelihood → guard daily use. Virtue is not a contract signed once; it is a net covering the whole surface of life. Within it, restraint of the faculties—seeing without sticking—is especially worth practicing in the age of the smartphone. It does not say “do not look”; it says “after looking, do not let the mind be hooked” (see 01-05). The four virtues are explained individually in 01-04 through 01-07, and their accomplishment in 01-08.

§06 Correspondence — Does This Match the Mahāyāna “Three Collections of Pure Precepts”? 〔Optional〕 → Vernacular §2·§5

For readers arriving from a Yogācāra or Mahāyāna bookshelf, a distinction may be placed here lightly so that the two systems are not forced into false alignment.

The principal axis of virtue in this Theravāda chapter is restraint—guarding, regulating, and providing the ground for concentration. Mahāyāna organizes virtue as the three collections of pure precepts: the collection of precepts as restraint (stopping evil), the collection of wholesome qualities (cultivating good), and the collection benefiting sentient beings (benefiting others). The first collection has a similar temper to Theravāda virtue as restraint and corresponds closely to the dyad of keeping / doing in Vernacular §2; the latter two shift the center of gravity toward actively doing good and widely benefiting beings, in accord with the bodhisattva path.

This is not a matter of higher or lower. The same word “virtue” carries different tasks within the two systems. Here the Theravāda first establishes virtue as the foundation for purifying the mind and establishing concentration; Mahāyāna expands it into the provisions for buddhahood. When reading this chapter, return Theravāda virtue to its original place—the first of the three trainings and the ground for concentration and wisdom—and the correspondence becomes clear. (A further note: the “virtue as a perfection undertaken for the liberation of all beings” in Vernacular §3 is the author’s own place for the bodhisattva path within the category of superior virtue.)

For the General Reader

〔The Decoder’s Reading〕 A householder begins with the five precepts (Vernacular §4 on householders’ virtue: five as permanent virtue, ten when there is willingness, and eight on an observance day). Do not memorize them as prohibitions; keep them as a way of “leaving no thorn in the mind.” And remember the dyad doing / keeping in Vernacular §2: virtue made only of “do not” is half a sheet of virtue.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §1–§5 is the complete passage-by-passage translation of the general matrix answering “How many kinds of virtue are there?”

Guard the Training Rules—and Also How You Stand, How You Sit, and Where You Go

The Big Picture — The Place of Restraint by the Code within the Fourfold Purification of Virtue

This is the first of the fourfold purification of virtue (see 01-05, Larger View, for the sequence of the ten units). Its scriptural sentence was already established in 01-03 §5: “dwells restrained by restraint by the code, accomplished in good conduct and resort, sees danger even in the slightest faults, and trains by undertaking the training rules.” This unit completes the word-by-word explanation of that sentence (Vernacular §1–§3). The author’s emphasis is clear: the words “restrained by restraint by the code” suffice to establish this virtue. Everything else—good conduct, resort, seeing danger in the slightest faults, training in the training rules—is spoken to show “that kind of practice”: the virtue is fulfilled in a person who practices in that way (end of Vernacular §3). This is why the unit reads like a list of etiquette while actually saying something larger: virtue is not merely a table of training rules, but a whole posture of life that enables those rules to stand. 〔What Is Seen〕

§01 Word-by-Word Explanation—the Code, Restraint, Dwelling → Vernacular §1

“Here” means in this Dispensation. “Bhikkhu” means a son of good family who sees danger in saṃsāra or wears torn cloth, and who has gone forth through faith. “Code” means virtue as training rules—it liberates the person who guards it from the sufferings of bad destinations and the rest, hence its name. “Restraint” means guarding, the name for bodily and verbal non-transgression; the code itself is restraint. “Restrained by it” means entered into and endowed with it. “Dwells” means conducts himself. 〔Reading〕 The word explanation of pātimokkha is the key to this unit: it is not “virtue binds you,” but “virtue unbinds you”—it releases you from bad destinations.

§02 Good Conduct and Resort—the Canonical Definitions → Vernacular §2

Bad conduct: bodily, verbal, or bodily-and-verbal transgression; all immorality; and making a living through giving bamboo, bowls, flowers, fruit, bathing articles, tooth-sticks, flattery, bean-soup behavior, fondling behavior, serving as a messenger on foot, or other wrong livelihood censured by the Buddha. Good conduct: bodily and verbal non-transgression; all restraint of virtue; and not making a living in those ways. Improper resort: taking as resort the homes of prostitutes, widows, grown unmarried women, paṇḍakas, bhikkhunīs, or a drinking house; maintaining unbecoming association with kings, ministers, other sectarians, and their disciples; or frequenting families that lack faith, abuse the four communities, and wish them no welfare or security. Resort: the opposite—frequenting families with faith and confidence, like public wells, illuminated by ochre robes and swept to and fro by the wind of sages, who wish the four communities welfare and security. To be “possessed, fully possessed, entered, fully entered, furnished, accomplished, and endowed” with both is to be accomplished in good conduct and resort. 〔Reading〕 Notice that “resort” means places and people. Where you habitually go and whom you associate with are counted by the author as part of virtue. Virtue governs not only what you do but also the environment in which you place yourself.

§03 Another Explanation of Good Conduct, Three Resorts, the Slightest Faults, and Training Rules → Vernacular §3

The author gives a further explanation. Bodily bad conduct is a long sequence of details: behaving without respect among the Saṅgha—standing or sitting while jostling elders, standing or sitting ahead of them, sitting on a high seat or with the head covered, speaking while standing or waving the arms; wearing sandals while elders walk without them, walking higher when they walk lower or on a raised walkway when they walk on the ground; pushing in among elders; obstructing newly ordained bhikkhus from a seat; putting wood in a bathhouse and shutting the door without asking elders; jostling elders at the water, bathing or coming out ahead of them; jostling or cutting ahead when entering a household; barging into private rooms where women and girls sit; and stroking a child’s head. Verbal bad conduct: teaching Dhamma, answering questions, or reciting the code without asking elders; entering a household and chattering to women or girls, “Is there porridge? Is there rice? What will you give me?” Good conduct is known by the opposite and is also positively listed: respect and deference, shame and moral dread, proper dress, movements that inspire confidence, lowered eyes, guarded faculty doors, moderation in food, devotion to wakefulness, mindfulness and clear comprehension, few wishes, contentment, aroused energy, and careful performance of higher conduct. Three resorts: resort as support—a good friend endowed with the qualities of the ten topics of discourse (depending on that friend, the unheard is heard, what was heard is purified, doubt is crossed, views are straightened, and the mind gains confidence; by training under that friend, faith, virtue, learning, generosity, and wisdom grow); resort as guarding—walking in a household area with eyes lowered and seeing only a yoke’s length, without looking at elephants, horses, chariots, soldiers, women, men, or the various directions; resort as anchoring—where the mind is anchored, namely the four establishments of mindfulness (“a bhikkhu’s resort, his own ancestral domain”). Seeing danger even in the slightest faults means seeing danger even in an unintentional Sekhiya offense or the arising of an unwholesome mind. Training by undertaking the training rules means correctly undertaking and training in everything to be learned. The conclusion: the words “restrained by restraint by the code” establish the virtue through a teaching based on the person; everything else shows the practice by which it is fulfilled. 〔Reading〕 The three resorts form an excellent self-check: whom do you depend on—the good friend? Where do your eyes ordinarily rest—a yoke’s length? Where is your mind anchored—the four establishments of mindfulness? The three “places” are precisely person, environment, and mind.

For the General Reader

〔The Decoder’s Reading〕 Restraint by the code is the outermost cell of the net: guarding the training rules. Yet this unit teaches more than “what may not be done.” It teaches how to stand, how to sit, where to go, and whom to associate with. These details count as virtue because they form the posture of life that enables the rules to stand (end of Vernacular §3). Lay readers need not copy monastic etiquette, but they can copy the three “places”: depend on someone who truly enables you to hear what was unheard and cross beyond doubt; take care where the eyes ordinarily rest; anchor the mind in a serious practice.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §1–§3 is the complete passage-by-passage translation of virtue consisting in restraint by the code.

What Is Guarded Is Not the Eye but the Moment of Impulsion

The Big Picture — The Place of Restraint of the Faculties within the Fourfold Purification of Virtue

This is the second of the fourfold purification of virtue (the ten units of this chapter are: introduction 01-01; nature and benefits 01-02; general matrix of classification 01-03; restraint by the code 01-04; restraint of the faculties, this unit; purification of livelihood 01-06; dependence on requisites 01-07; accomplishment 01-08; five kinds of virtue 01-09; and defilement and cleansing 01-10). It follows restraint by the code: the “he” in the scriptural expression “Having seen a visible form with the eye …” is precisely the bhikkhu established in restraint by the code (Vernacular §1). The unit is short, a single paragraph in the base, yet it is the most finely grained passage in the chapter. The author first explains the scriptural words (§1–§2), then answers an apparently technical but decisive question: where exactly does restraint occur? (§3). The answer is not in the eye but at the moment of impulsion in the cognitive process. Two city-gate similes make the point transparent. 〔What Is Seen〕

§01 “Having Seen a Visible Form with the Eye”—Neither Eye nor Mind Sees; the Mind Supported by Eye-Sensitivity Sees → Vernacular §1

“He” is the bhikkhu established in virtue consisting in restraint by the code. The author reads the “eye” in “having seen a visible form with the eye” as eye-consciousness, which is capable of seeing and receives the name “eye” because the eye is its cause. A statement of the Ancients deserves pause: the eye does not see, because it has no mind; the mind does not see, because it has no eye; when door and object impinge, the mind whose physical support is eye-sensitivity sees. To say “sees with the eye” is like saying “shoots with a bow.” The bow does not shoot; a person shoots with a bow. This is an “inclusive statement,” which names the instrument along with the action. Thus “having seen a visible form with eye-consciousness” is the meaning of the scriptural sentence. 〔Reading〕 The point is not conceptual play. It moves “seeing” from the organ back to the mind—and restraint can be cultivated precisely because it is an affair of mind.

§02 Not Grasping the Sign or Its Features—the Elder Mahātissa’s Heap of Bones → Vernacular §2

“Does not grasp the sign”: does not grasp the female sign, male sign, or beauty sign that serves as a basis for defilement; stops at the mere seen. “Does not grasp its features”: hands, feet, smiles, laughter, speech, glances, and other appearances make defilements manifest as they follow upon them one by one, hence the term “features.” He does not grasp them but only what is actually there. What is actually there? The author gives a person: the Elder Mahātissa, who lived at Cetiyapabbata. Going to Anurādhapura for alms, he met on the road a daughter-in-law who had quarreled with her husband and adorned herself like a divine maiden. Her mind distorted, she laughed at the elder. He looked to see “What is this?”, acquired the perception of foulness in the bones of her teeth, and attained arahantship on the spot. Her husband followed and asked whether he had seen a woman. The elder replied that he did not know whether woman or man had passed; he knew only that a heap of bones was moving along the great road. Two verses fasten the story in place. 〔Reading〕 “Grasps only what is actually there” does not mean refusing to look. It means seeing the thing as it actually is—the positive formulation of faculty restraint, more precise than every prohibition to “look away.”

§03 Where Restraint Occurs—the Moment of Impulsion and Two City Gates → Vernacular §3

The scriptural sentence next asks “owing to which cause”: because of non-restraint of the eye faculty, covetousness and the rest invade and pursue a person who does not guard the eye faculty with the gate-panel of mindfulness. “Practices for its restraint” means closing the eye faculty with that gate-panel. A person practicing in this way is said to guard the eye faculty and accomplish its restraint.

Then comes the core determination of this unit: in the eye faculty itself there is neither restraint nor non-restraint, because neither mindfulness nor forgetfulness arises in dependence on eye-sensitivity. The author lays out the entire process of seeing a form. A visible object enters the eye’s range; the life-continuum arises twice and ceases; the functional mind-element performs adverting and ceases; eye-consciousness performs seeing; the resultant mind-element performs receiving; the resultant rootless mind-consciousness-element performs investigating; the functional rootless mind-consciousness-element performs determining; immediately afterward impulsion runs. During the life-continuum and during every position from adverting through determining, there is neither restraint nor non-restraint. Only at the moment of impulsion, if immorality, forgetfulness, ignorance, impatience, or laziness arises, is there non-restraint—and this is called “non-restraint of the eye faculty.” Why attribute an event at impulsion to the eye faculty? Because when it is present, the door, life-continuum, and process minds are all unguarded. It is like a city whose four gates are unguarded: even if inner house doors, gatehouses, and private rooms are secure, none of the city’s goods is protected, because thieves enter through the gates and do as they please. Conversely, when virtue and the rest arise at impulsion, door, life-continuum, and process minds are guarded. It is like closing the city gates: even if nothing inside is guarded, thieves have no way to enter. Thus restraint is said to be “of the eye faculty” although it arises at impulsion. Hearing a sound and the rest follow the same method. The conclusion: virtue consisting in restraint of the faculties has the characteristic of avoiding, with respect to forms and the rest, the grasping of signs followed by defilements.

〔Reading〕 This answers a question every practitioner eventually asks: what exactly am I guarding? The answer is—not the eye, but how the mind runs in that moment. Guard impulsion and the gate is guarded. Fail to guard impulsion and even closing the eyes cannot guard it.

For the General Reader

Within the earlier net “from outside inward” (code → faculties → livelihood → requisites, 01-03 §H), restraint of the faculties is the cell closest to ordinary life: seeing without sticking. As waves of information arrive, the practice is not “do not look” but “after looking, do not let the mind be hooked.” The Elder Mahātissa did not see a woman but a heap of bones (Vernacular §2). 〔The Decoder’s Reading〕 Going a step further, §3 gives a finer measure: the mind is hooked in the step after “seeing.” Placing mindfulness at that step is more useful than merely moving the eyes away.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §1–§3 is the complete passage-by-passage translation of virtue consisting in restraint of the faculties.

A List of Ways to Ruin a Life: Scheming, Talking, Hinting, Belittling, and Pursuing Gain with Gain

The Big Picture — The Place of Purification of Livelihood within the Fourfold Purification of Virtue

This is the third of the fourfold purification of virtue (see the Larger Frame of 01-05 for the sequence of the ten units). The first two virtues guard bodily and verbal action and the six faculties; this one guards livelihood—where a renunciant’s requisites come from and how they are obtained. The author’s method is first to establish the legal basis (the six training rules laid down on account of livelihood, Vernacular §1), then to cite the canonical definitions of five wrong practices (§2), and finally to devote the longest span to a word-by-word explanation of those five (§§3–6): the three bases of scheming, the thirteen items of talking, hinting, belittling, and pursuing gain with gain. Almost every item comes with a story or simile, and the passage finally gathers them under the meaning of “purification of livelihood.” It reads like a behavioral checklist, but it is really a mirror: every item is a posture that distorts the self for the sake of gain, honor, and renown. 〔What Is Seen〕

§01 Six Training Rules—Six Precepts Laid Down on Account of Livelihood, from Gravest to Lightest → Vernacular §1

“On account of livelihood, with livelihood as the reason”: the six training rules are arranged according to the gravity of the offense. Falsely claiming a superhuman state entails defeat (pārājika); acting as a go-between entails a formal meeting of the Order (saṅghādisesa); saying “The bhikkhu living in your monastery is an arahant,” when the other person understands, is grave wrongdoing (thullaccaya); a bhikkhu who is not ill and asks for fine food for himself commits an offense requiring expiation (pācittiya); the corresponding act by a bhikkhunī requires acknowledgement (pāṭidesanīya); and asking for curry or rice for oneself when not ill is wrongdoing (dukkaṭa). 〔Reading〕Notice the two ends of this list: the gravest item is a false claim to attainment, the lightest is asking for a bowl of rice. The list makes immediately visible both how far corruption “for livelihood” can go and how subtle it can become.

§02 Canonical Definitions of the Five Wrong Practices → Vernacular §2

Scheming, talking, hinting, belittling, and pursuing gain with gain each receive a fixed canonical definition, and all five open with the same phrase: “a person who depends upon gain, honor, and renown, who has evil wishes and is overcome by wishes.” The five wrong practices share one root. Scheming is the feigning, posing, and studied posing, the scowling, conduct of a schemer, and state of being schemed that occur “by way of the use of requisites, by way of indirect talk, or by way of deportment.” Talking comprises initiating talk, talking in reply, skillful talk, elevating talk … up to bean-soup behavior and fondling behavior. Hinting comprises a sign, working a sign, an indication, working an indication, indirect talk, and talk around the subject. Belittling comprises abusing, disparaging, censuring, reproaching … up to the state of eating another’s back-flesh. Pursuing gain with gain means taking goods obtained here to someone there, or goods obtained there to someone here, and coveting, seeking, and repeatedly seeking goods by means of goods. This passage is the contents page; §§3–6 unfold it item by item.

§03 Three Bases of Scheming—the Use of Requisites, Indirect Talk, and Deportment → Vernacular §3

First come the three shared expressions. “A person who depends upon gain, honor, and renown” is someone who longs for them; “a person of evil wishes” is someone who wants to display qualities that do not exist; “overcome by wishes” means harassed by wishes. Then, according to the Mahāniddesa, scheming has three bases:

By way of the use of requisites—householders invite him to accept robes and the rest. He really wants them but refuses out of evil wishes. Only after they gain firm confidence that “this venerable is of few wishes and accepts nothing” and bring offerings by the cartload does he accept while presenting it as “solely to embrace them with compassion.” The long citation from the Mahāniddesa plays the scene to its end: he refuses robes, food, lodging, and medicine, repeatedly saying, “What use has an ascetic for expensive things?” He wears and eats what is coarse, leading the householders to regard him as “of few wishes, content, secluded, unsociable, energetic, and an advocate of the ascetic practices.” When they invite him again and again, he explains that “through the presence of three things, a faithful son of good family produces much merit … if I do not accept, you will be excluded from merit. I have no need of this; nevertheless, I accept solely out of compassion for you”—and so he accepts much. By way of indirect talk—a person of evil wishes creates astonishment through language implying that he has attained superhuman states: “The ascetic who wears such a robe is of great power”; “The ascetic who carries such a bowl, water strainer, key, or belt is of great power”; “The ascetic with such a preceptor or teacher”; “the ascetic living in such a monastery, cave, storied dwelling, watchtower, pavilion, or beneath such a tree.” Or, to make people call him “grave upon grave, scowling upon scowling, scheming upon scheming, an obtainer of peaceful abidings and attainments,” he speaks words that are deep, hidden, subtle, concealed, supramundane, and connected with emptiness. Dependent on deportment—he deliberately composes his walking, standing, sitting, and lying down, walks and stands as though concentrated, and even meditates where people can see him. 〔Reading〕The order of the three bases deserves attention: from “manipulating how others give,” to “manipulating how others see,” to “manipulating how the self is seen.” Scheming needs less and less of an object until all that remains is a performed self.

§04 Word-by-Word Explanation of Scheming → Vernacular §4

“By way of what is called the use of requisites” means acting through the use of requisites; “by way of indirect talk” means speech near the intended matter; “by way of deportment” means in the four postures. “Feigning” is posing, deliberate posing; “posing” is the manner of composing oneself; “studied posing” is contrivance, producing an attractive appearance. “Scowling” is knitting the face to display oneself as foremost in strenuous practice; a person habituated to doing this is a scowler, and his condition is the state of scowling. “Scheming” is creating astonishment; the schemer’s action is the conduct of a schemer; the condition of someone who has schemed is the state of being schemed.

§05 Thirteen Items of Talking—from “Initiating Talk” to “Fondling Behavior” → Vernacular §5

Each of the thirteen items has its own shape. Initiating talk—on seeing people arrive at the monastery, he speaks first: “Why have you come? To invite the bhikkhus? If so, go ahead; I shall take my bowl and follow,” or puts himself forward: “I am Tissa; the king has confidence in me.” Talking in reply—after being asked, he talks in the same way. Skillful talk—for fear of wearying the householders, he speaks cleverly while repeatedly leaving them room. Elevating talk—“great householder,” “great shipowner,” “great donor.” All-round elevating talk—raising them up in every way. Binding talk—“At this season in former years you gave new grain; why do you not give now?”, continuing until they say, “We shall give, but we have not yet had the opportunity”; or, when someone carries sugarcane, asking, “Where is it from?” “Is it sweet?” and saying, “It would be improper to say, ‘Give sugarcane to the bhikkhu.’” The other person tries to unbind himself, but the speaker keeps wrapping him up. All-round binding talk—binding again and again in every way. Extolling talk—“This family knows only me; if anything is given, they give it only to me” (the story of Telakandarika should be told here). All-round extolling talk—extolling in every way. Ingratiating speech—saying only agreeable things without regard for truth or Dhamma. Flattery—repeatedly placing oneself in an inferior position. Bean-soup behavior—when beans are cooked, one remains uncooked and all the others are done; just so, only a little in a person’s speech is true and all the rest is false. Fondling behavior—carrying another family’s children in the lap or on the shoulder like a nurse. 〔Reading〕The sharpness of these thirteen items lies in their reach beyond “lying”: “sounding too agreeable,” “leaving room too skillfully,” and “raising someone up too artfully” all appear on the list. The essence of talking is not false speech but speech deployed for gain.

§06 Hinting, Belittling, Pursuing Gain with Gain, and the Meaning of “Purification of Livelihood” → Vernacular §6

Hinting: a “sign” is any bodily or verbal action capable of making another person think, “I should give a requisite.” “Working a sign” includes seeing someone carry food and asking, “What food did you get?” An “indication” is talk connected with requisites. “Working an indication” includes asking children tending calves, “Are these milk-drinking calves or buttermilk-drinking calves?”, then saying, “If they were milk-drinking calves, the bhikkhus too would receive milk,” so the children tell their parents. “Indirect talk” draws near to the intended matter. A bhikkhu who frequented a family heard the mistress of the house claim that she had no rice, though he had entered the inner room and seen sugarcane by the door, sugar in a vessel, salted fish in a basket, rice in a jar, and ghee in a pot. He therefore said, “I saw a sign beforehand: a snake like the sugarcane by the door, a stone like the sugar in the vessel …” The woman thought, “This shaveling cannot be deceived,” and gave him everything. “Speaking around the subject” circles the desired thing. Belittling: abusing (through the ten grounds for abuse), disparaging, censuring (“faithless,” “without confidence”), reproaching (“Do not say that here”) and thorough reproaching (including both the matter and its reason, or addressing a non-giver as “Oh, donor!” and “Oh, great donor!”), ridiculing (“What kind of livelihood does this seed-eater have?”) and thorough ridiculing (“He always gives everyone the word ‘nothing’”), denigrating and thorough denigrating (making someone fall into the name or disrepute of a non-giver), carrying tales of discredit (from house to house, village to village, country to country), and the state of eating another’s back-flesh (pleasant speech to his face, discredit behind his back, like eating the back-flesh of someone who has turned away). It is called belittling because it scrapes away the qualities of others as a bamboo scraper removes unguent and crushes those qualities for gain as spices are ground in search of fragrance. Pursuing gain with gain: taking what is obtained from one family to another; coveting, seeking, and repeated seeking correspond synonymously to searching, looking for, and repeated looking. The bhikkhu who gave each portion of almsfood he received to different families’ children and finally obtained milk-rice exemplifies it. In “and other evil practices of this kind,” “other” includes the animal knowledge and wrong livelihood described in the Brahmajāla Sutta—knowledge of bodily marks, omens, portents, dreams, bodily characteristics, mouse-gnawings, fire oblations, ladle oblations, and so forth.

The conclusion: wrong livelihood proceeds from transgressing the six training rules laid down on account of livelihood and from evil practices such as scheming. Abstinence from every such kind of wrong livelihood is virtue consisting in purification of livelihood. Its word meaning is this: since people live by depending on it, it is “livelihood,” namely, the effort of seeking requisites; “purification” is the state of being purified; the purification of livelihood is “purification of livelihood.”

For the General Reader

〔The Decoder’s Reading〕The best way to read this unit is as a mirror, not an indictment. All five wrong practices share the same opening: “a person who depends upon gain, honor, and renown.” A person need not be a renunciant to recognize them: speaking too agreeably in order to be liked (talking), hinting at what somebody should give (hinting), lowering another person to elevate the self (belittling), using benefits received here to obtain benefits there (pursuing gain with gain), or performing “I do not want it” so that others become still more eager to give (scheming). These postures are recognizable in any line of work. Purification of livelihood guards this: the way you make a living does not distort the person you are.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §§1–6 give the complete sequential translation of the passage on virtue consisting in purification of livelihood.

Before Every Act of Wearing, Eating, Dwelling, or Taking Medicine, Ask One Question: “What For?”

The Big Picture — The Place of Dependence on Requisites within the Fourfold Purification of Virtue

This is the last of the fourfold purification of virtue (see the Larger Frame of 01-05 for the sequence of the ten units). The first three virtues guard bodily and verbal action, the six faculties, and livelihood; this virtue guards daily use—how the four requisites of robes, food, lodging, and medicine are used. Its method is one: wise reflection. Before each use, make clear “what for” (Vernacular §1). The author explains word by word the renowned passage of reflection: robes are used “only for warding off cold … for covering the parts that shame is disturbed by exposing” (§1); food is “not for amusement, not for intoxication, not for adornment, not for beautification, but only for the continuance and maintenance of this body … for blamelessness and abiding in comfort” (§§2–3); lodging is used “for removing the danger of climate and for delight in seclusion,” and medicine “for bringing to an end painful feelings that have arisen from affliction” (§4). The passage finally closes with the word meaning of “dependence on requisites.” 〔What Is Seen〕This virtue most clearly shows that “virtue is the ground of the mind.” It does not forbid eating or wearing clothes; it only requires that at the moment of use you know why. Once the boundary of purpose is clearly drawn, greed has nowhere to stand.

§01 “Wise Reflection” and Reflection on Robes → Vernacular §1

“Wise reflection” means reflecting and knowing by a method and a path, “after reviewing”; the reflection expressed in “for warding off cold” and the rest is precisely this. “Robe” means any one of the lower robe and the rest; “use” means wearing or putting it on. “Only for” is an expression that fixes the boundary of purpose—the purpose of using a robe goes no farther. Cold is cold arisen from disturbance of the internal elements or changes in the weather outside. Warding it off means dispelling it so that it does not produce affliction; when the body is assailed by cold, the mind is distracted and cannot strive wisely, so the Blessed One permitted robes. Heat is the scorching of fire. The contact of gadflies, mosquitoes, wind, burning sun, and creeping things—the contact of creeping things is of two kinds, biting and touching. “Only for” appears again to show the boundary of the invariable purpose: covering the parts that shame is disturbed by exposing is invariable; the others arise only from time to time. Those parts are the private places whose exposure disturbs shame. 〔Reading〕Notice how the author turns “warding off cold” into a matter of practice: the point is not fear of cold, but that cold scatters the mind and prevents striving. Every permission returns to its effect on the mind.

§02 Reflection on Food, Part One—Not for Four Purposes, but Only for Maintenance → Vernacular §2

“Almsfood” means any food that falls into a bhikkhu’s bowl through alms-gathering—the falling of morsels. Not for amusement (unlike village children), not for intoxication (unlike boxers and wrestlers), not for adornment (unlike women of the inner court and courtesans), not for beautification (unlike actors and dancers). Each phrase abandons something: not for amusement abandons the proximate support of delusion; not for intoxication, that of hate; not for adornment and beautification, that of greed. The first two also prevent fetters from arising in oneself; the latter two prevent them from arising in another. Together the four express the abandonment of unwise practice and indulgence in sensual pleasure. “Only for the continuance and maintenance of this body” means for the succession to continue without interruption, as the owner of an old house supports it with a prop and a cart driver greases an axle; “continuance” is also a designation for the life faculty. “For ending harm”: harm is hunger, and food treats it like ointment applied to a wound. “For supporting the holy life” means supporting both the holy life of the whole dispensation and the holy life of the path: bodily strength conditioned by food makes devotion to the three trainings and the crossing of the wilderness of becoming possible—like a person crossing a wilderness using the flesh of his child, a person crossing a river using a raft, and a person crossing the ocean using a ship. 〔Reading〕The three similes have different temperatures: prop and grease mean “maintenance,” the child’s flesh means “necessity,” and raft and ship mean “instrument.” In a practitioner’s hands, food is these three things; there is no fourth.

§03 Reflection on Food, Part Two—Removing Old Feeling, Producing No New Feeling, Survival, Blamelessness, and Comfort → Vernacular §3

“I shall remove old feeling and not produce new feeling”: this food removes the old feeling of hunger and does not produce a new feeling through unlimited eating, unlike the five brahmin overeaters (Hand-Reacher, Robe-Is-Enough, Rolling-on-the-Spot, Crow’s-Food-Eater, and Eats-and-Vomits)—as a sick person uses medicine. Another reading: old feeling arises through unsuitable, unlimited food with old kamma as its condition; suitable, measured food destroys its condition. New feeling will arise in the future through accumulated kamma from improper use performed now; proper use prevents its root from arising. This phrase shows the inclusion of proper use, the abandoning of devotion to self-mortification, and the non-abandoning of lawful pleasure. “I shall have survival”: measured use leaves no peril that severs the life faculty or breaks the postures, and the body continues for a long time, like a chronically ill person dependent on medicine. “Blamelessness and abiding in comfort” has three readings: avoiding improper seeking, acceptance, and use brings blamelessness, while measure brings comfort (the contrary brings discontent, sloth, and yawning); absence of censure by the wise brings blamelessness, while bodily strength brings comfort; avoiding food that fills the belly and abandoning the pleasures of lying, reclining, and sleeping brings blamelessness, while eating four or five morsels less than needed makes the body fit for the four postures and brings comfort—“Leaving four or five morsels uneaten, let him drink water; this is enough for a resolute bhikkhu to abide in comfort.” This phrase shows the gathering of purpose and the middle way. 〔Reading〕“Four or five morsels less” is the most immediately practicable line in the whole unit: it is not dieting, but leaving a little room for energy.

§04 Lodging, Medicine, and the Meaning of “Dependence on Requisites” → Vernacular §4

“Lodging” combines a place for lying down and a place for sitting. “For removing the danger of climate and for delight in seclusion”: climate is a danger insofar as it assails; unsuitable climate that afflicts the body and disturbs the mind is removed through lodging, which also serves the happiness of solitude. Here “removing the danger of climate” names the invariable purpose, just as covering the parts that shame is disturbed by exposing does for robes. Another reading divides danger in two: manifest danger (lions, tigers, and the like) and concealed danger (greed, hate, and the like). A person who knows that a lodging does not cause affliction through lack of protection or through seeing unsuitable visible objects, reviews it, and uses it, reflects wisely. “Medicinal requisites for the sick”: a condition for sickness is anything suitable that works against illness; medicine is a physician’s work, permitted by a physician. “Equipment” (parikkhāra) has three meanings—entourage (“the seven kinds of equipment of a city”), ornament (“the chariot has virtue as its equipment”), and supplies (“the supports for life that a renunciant should provide”). Here entourage and supplies both apply: medicine is an entourage of life and supplies that guard life. “Feelings that have arisen, born of affliction” are painful feelings and unwholesome-result feelings from disturbance of the elements and the leprosy, boils, sores, and the like produced by it. “For the utmost freedom from affliction” means until all suffering has been abandoned. The conclusion: virtue dependent on requisites has the characteristic of using requisites with wise reflection. The word meaning is that living beings move and continue by depending and relying on these things, so they are requisites; depending upon those requisites is “dependence on requisites.”

For the General Reader

〔The Decoder’s Reading〕This virtue is the innermost mesh of the net: daily use. It offers an action anyone can perform. Before dressing, eating, dwelling, or taking medicine, ask “What for?”, then retain only the real reason: clothes keep the body from cold and bites and cover private places; food keeps the body going and supplies strength for worthwhile work, not ornament or gratification; lodging avoids an environment that afflicts the body and disturbs the mind; medicine ends pain. The two words “only for” (Vernacular §1) contain the whole technique: draw the boundary of purpose clearly, and whatever exceeds it is greed.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §§1–4 give the complete sequential translation of the passage on virtue dependent on requisites.

Faith, Mindfulness, Energy, and Wisdom—Each Virtue Is Accomplished by a Distinct Power

The Big Picture — How the Four Virtues Are Accomplished, and the Elders Who Embodied Them

The definitions of the fourfold purification of virtue were completed individually in 01-04 through 01-07. This unit asks the next question: How are they accomplished? The author’s answer is exceptionally orderly: restraint by the code is accomplished through faith, restraint of the faculties through mindfulness, purification of livelihood through energy, and dependence on requisites through wisdom (the opening sentence of Vernacular §§1, 2, 5, and 6 respectively). Each virtue is then paired with a group of examples: the elder bound in a wilderness who would not cut the creeper, Vaṅgīsa’s lust, Cittagutta who did not look up at the cave roof for sixty years, Mahāmitta who cured his mother’s abscess with a statement of truth, Sāriputta overturning the milk-rice, and the novice Saṅgharakkhita attaining the fruit on hearing a single sentence. This is the most densely human passage in the chapter. 〔What Is Seen〕Structurally, it does two other things: it gathers the four virtues into four purities (through disclosure, through restraint, of seeking, and through reflection) and establishes four kinds of use (as theft, as debt, as an inheritance, and as an owner), placing squarely on the table the question, “In what capacity do you use requisites?”

§01 Restraint by the Code Is Accomplished through Faith—Not Transgressing Even for the Sake of Life → Vernacular §1

It is achieved by faith because the laying down of training rules lies beyond a disciple’s sphere (the rejection of the request “Please lay down training rules” is the example). Thus a bhikkhu should undertake all the rules through faith, without remainder, disregarding even life: “As a pheasant guards her eggs, as a yak its tail, as someone a beloved child, as someone his single eye”; “Whatever training rule I have laid down for my disciples, my disciples do not transgress it even for the sake of life.” Two stories follow. In the Mahāvattani wilderness, an elder was bound down with black creepers, developed insight for seven days, attained non-returning, died, and was reborn in the Brahmā world. On Tambapaṇṇi Island, another elder was bound down with a putrid creeper and did not cut it even as a forest fire approached; he established insight, became one whose two ends coincided, and attained final nibbāna. The Elder Abhaya, a reciter of the Long Collection, and five hundred bhikkhus built a shrine for him. “Purifying the code, he may indeed abandon life; but let him not break the restraint of virtue laid down by the Protector of the World.” 〔Reading〕The meaning of “accomplished through faith” lies in the first sentence: the training rules were laid down by the Buddha and cannot be determined independently by a disciple. What first enables you to keep them is faith, not having reasoned everything through for yourself.

§02 Restraint of the Faculties Is Accomplished through Mindfulness—the Branch Fence, Village, and Roof → Vernacular §2

It is achieved by mindfulness because when the faculties are steadied by mindfulness, covetousness and the rest cannot leak in. Recollect the “Discourse on Burning”—better that the eye faculty be pierced by a heated iron spike than that a sign be grasped through visible form—and use mindfulness free from forgetfulness to prevent grasping a sign. Without this accomplishment, restraint by the code does not last, like a crop without a branch fence; it is struck down by thieves of defilement, like a village with open gates; lust enters the mind like rain through a badly thatched house—two sets of verses. When it is accomplished, the reverse holds—two answering sets. “This, however, is a supremely rigorous teaching.” 〔Reading〕Each of the three similes speaks to a different level. The branch fence says that restraint of the faculties protects restraint by the code—without it, the rules cannot be kept for long. The village speaks of the doors; the roof, of seepage. Mindfulness is that fence, that gate, that tile.

§03 Removing Arisen Lust through Attention to Foulness—Vaṅgīsa → Vernacular §3

The mind changes swiftly, so arisen lust is removed through attention to foulness. When the newly ordained Vaṅgīsa saw a woman on his alms round and lust arose, he asked Ānanda for “a means of extinguishing.” Ānanda replied: the burning comes from a distortion of perception; avoid the beauty-sign, develop the mind through foulness, and concentrate it; see formations as alien, as suffering, and not as self, and extinguish great lust. After removing lust, the elder continued on his alms round. 〔Reading〕This short passage is for the person who “cannot keep the guard”: restraint of the faculties does not mean that lust never arises, but that when it arises, a method is available.

§04 Two Elders Who Guarded the Faculties—Cittagutta and Mahāmitta → Vernacular §4

Cittagutta lived in the Great Cave of Kuraṇḍaka for more than sixty years without knowing that the cave held paintings of the renunciation of the seven Buddhas. Nor did he ever look up at the great nāga tree by the entrance; he knew it had flowered only from stamens fallen on the ground. Three summonses from the king did not bring him, so the king had the breasts of women with young children bound to compel his visit to the palace; he went for the children’s sake. For seven days, whether the king or queen paid homage, he said only, “May the great king be happy”—“I make no distinction that ‘this is the king’ or ‘this is the queen.’” On the night of his return to the cave, a deity held a torch, his meditation subject appeared with extraordinary purity, and after the middle watch he attained arahantship, making the whole mountain resound. “Like a monkey in the forest, like a startled deer in the wild … he should not be restless-eyed; he should cast his eyes downward and look only a yoke’s length ahead.” Mahāmitta’s mother had a poisonous abscess, and his sister, a bhikkhunī, came seeking medicine. He said, “From the time I went forth, I have never broken the faculties with a mind accompanied by greed and looked upon the visible form of the opposite sex; by this statement of truth, may my mother be well.” His sister stroked their mother’s body, and the abscess dissolved like foam. His mother rose and exclaimed, “If the Perfectly Enlightened One were alive, why would he not stroke the head of a bhikkhu like my son with his net-patterned hand?” 〔Reading〕The two stories have different centers: Cittagutta shows how complete “not looking” can become; Mahāmitta shows that restraint of the faculties, guarded to its furthest extent, becomes a truth upon which an oath can be made. It is not only protection but power.

§05 Purification of Livelihood Is Accomplished through Energy—Purely Originated Requisites and Sāriputta’s Milk-Rice → Vernacular §5

It is achieved by energy because only a person whose energy is rightly aroused can abandon wrong livelihood. Abandon unlawful seeking, accomplish purification through proper seeking such as the alms round, use only requisites of pure origin, and avoid those of impure origin like a venomous snake. The criteria for pure origin are these. For someone who has not undertaken the ascetic practices, what comes from the Order, a group, or people whose confidence arose through his qualities such as teaching Dhamma is of pure origin; what comes through the alms round is of supremely pure origin. For someone who has undertaken the ascetic practices, what is obtained within their limits is of pure origin. Receiving fermented myrobalan and the four sweet substances but taking only a piece of myrobalan and leaving the sweets to companions in the holy life makes him “a bhikkhu of the supreme noble lineage.” What is and is not allowable: with robes and food, making a sign, giving an indication, speaking around the subject, and making an explicit request are all forbidden; with lodging, a person who has not undertaken the ascetic practices may make a sign (“Who is having this built?” “No one”), indicate (“But bhikkhus have no mansion”), and speak around the subject (“The Order’s lodging is cramped”); with medicine all are allowable. May medicine so obtained continue to be used after recovery? The Vinaya experts say yes because the Blessed One opened the door; the Suttanta experts say no because, though not an offense, it corrupts livelihood. A person who does not use even what the Blessed One permitted, who relies only on qualities such as fewness of wishes, and who even at the approach of death uses only requisites not produced through indication is called a practitioner of supreme austerity—like Sāriputta. Afflicted by wind in the belly, he told Moggallāna that unmixed milk-rice prepared by his mother with ghee, honey, and sugar had formerly made him comfortable. A tree deity heard, possessed the eldest son of a supporting family, and compelled the family to prepare such porridge. Moggallāna received a full bowl and brought it back. Sāriputta saw its origin and said, “This almsfood is unfit for use.” Moggallāna did not give rise to even a trace of “He will not eat what someone like me brought”; at one sentence he tipped the bowl aside. When the porridge hit the ground, the illness disappeared and did not return for forty-five years. “Milk-rice produced through verbal request is unfit for use even if the intestines come out and crawl on the ground”—three verses of exclamation. The story of the Elder Mahātissa, Mango Eater and Dweller at Ciragumba, should also be told here. “The discerning ascetic does not give rise even to a thought of unlawful seeking.” 〔Reading〕What most deserves attention in this passage is Moggallāna’s response: not a trace of ‘You will not eat what I brought?’ Purification of livelihood is not only Sāriputta’s virtue; it is an understanding shared between the two chief disciples.

§06 Dependence on Requisites Is Accomplished through Wisdom—Four Kinds of Use, Four Purities, and the Novice Saṅgharakkhita → Vernacular §6

It is achieved by wisdom because a person with wisdom can see the danger and benefit in requisites. Abandon greed and use lawfully and equitably obtained requisites after reflecting on them with wisdom. Reflection occurs at two times: acquisition (setting something aside after reflection in terms of elements or repulsiveness) and use. Four kinds of use: a person of bad virtue uses as theft, even while sitting among the Order; a virtuous person who does not reflect uses as debt—therefore robes are reflected upon at every use and food at every morsel, or, if that is impossible, before or after the meal or in the first, middle, or last watch. If dawn rises without reflection, the person stands in debt. Medicine requires only mindfulness as condition at acceptance and use: mindfulness at acceptance but not at use means an offense; none at acceptance but mindfulness at use means no offense. The use of the seven trainees is as an inheritance: they are sons of the Blessed One and heirs to what belongs to their father (what householders give becomes the Blessed One’s because he permits it; the Discourse on Heirs in Dhamma is the evidence). The use of those whose taints are destroyed is as an owner: they have passed beyond slavery to craving and become owners. Four purities: purity through disclosure is virtue consisting in restraint by the code (purified by disclosure), purity through restraint is virtue consisting in restraint of the faculties (purified by the mind’s determination “I shall not do this again”), purity of seeking is virtue consisting in purification of livelihood (seeking is purified), and purity through reflection is virtue dependent on requisites (purified through reflection). Use as an owner and as an inheritance are allowable for all; use as debt is not, and theft needs no discussion. A virtuous person’s reflected use either becomes use free of debt or falls under use as an inheritance, because possession of this training makes him count as a trainee. Since use as an owner is supreme, the bhikkhu who aspires to it should use requisites after reflection. Four verses follow: use after discrimination; remain unstained like water on a lotus leaf; know the measure like ointment applied while a wound heals; use food like a child’s flesh in a wilderness and grease on an axle. Last comes the novice Saṅgharakkhita, the nephew. While he was eating well-cooled rice, his preceptor said, “Novice, do not burn your tongue through lack of restraint.” He gained a sense of urgency and attained arahantship on that very seat. “Therefore another who aspires to the destruction of suffering should use requisites after wise reflection.” 〔Reading〕The four kinds of use form an unsparing table: at each daily meal, is your capacity that of a thief, a debtor, an heir, or an owner? Reflection is the step from “debt” toward “inheritance.”

For the General Reader

〔The Decoder’s Reading〕Each of the four virtues is accomplished by one power: faith, mindfulness, energy, and wisdom (Vernacular §§1, 2, 5, and 6). To choose one thing that can be done today, take the “four kinds of use” (Vernacular §6) as a mirror. Is today’s meal unreflected “use as debt,” or was it reflected upon? Reflection is not difficult; it is the question from 01-07: “What for?” As for the stories of the elders, do not read them as miracles. Read them as samples of how completely a single thing can be carried through.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §§1–6 give the complete sequential translation of the method of accomplishing the fourfold purification of virtue.

From “Virtue Whose Rules Can Be Counted” to “Virtue Whose Fevers Have Subsided”—Completing the Fifth Question

The Big Picture — Two Pentads Complete the Question “How Many Kinds of Virtue Are There?”

These are the final two groups in the answer to the fifth question, “How many kinds of virtue are there?” (Vernacular §§1–4). The first pentad classifies by person: limited purification (those not fully admitted), unlimited purification (those fully admitted), fulfilled purification (good ordinary people), ungrasped purification (the seven trainees), and tranquilized purification (those whose taints are destroyed). It is, in fact, a staircase from the shallower to the deeper, and an elder stands on each step. The second pentad classifies by practice: abandoning, abstinence, volition, restraint, and non-transgression. The item “abandoning” introduces a long Paṭisambhidāmagga list of “X is abandoned through Y,” from the killing of living beings all the way to the path of arahantship; the author then explains in one exceptionally precise sentence why “abandoning” counts as virtue. The final sentence, “At this point … the answers are complete,” closes the first five of the seven questions. The remaining two—defilement and purification—belong to 01-10. 〔What Is Seen〕

§01 The First Pentad—Limited and Unlimited → Vernacular §1

The canonical text: limited purification is the virtue of those not fully admitted, whose training rules have a limit; unlimited purification is the virtue of those fully admitted, whose training rules have no limit; fulfilled purification is the virtue of good ordinary people “engaged in wholesome states, bringing fulfillment up to the limit of trainees, without regard for body or life, having relinquished life”; ungrasped purification is the virtue of the seven trainees; tranquilized purification is the virtue of three groups—the Tathāgata’s disciples whose taints are destroyed, paccekabuddhas, and Tathāgatas who are arahants and perfectly enlightened. The explanation: the virtue of those not fully admitted is limited in terms of number. The virtue of those fully admitted is also numerically limited (the counting verse beginning “Nine thousand koṭis …”), but it is called unlimited because it is undertaken without remainder and no limit is recognized for the sake of gain, renown, relatives, limbs, or life. The Elder Mahātissa, the Mango Eater and Longtime Dweller in a Forest Thicket, exemplifies it: he kept the instruction “limbs, wealth, even life—all should be relinquished by a person recollecting the Dhamma,” did not transgress a training rule when his life was in danger, and attained arahantship on the back of a lay follower (“Neither your father nor your mother … would perform such a service for the sake of a virtuous person”). 〔Reading〕The definition of “unlimited” is the first turn in this unit. It does not mean the number of rules is infinite; it means you will not break them for anything. The same point was stated under “limited / unlimited” in 01-03 §2; here it receives a person.

§02 Fulfilled Purification—the Elder Mahāsaṅgharakkhita’s Sentence at Death → Vernacular §2

From full admission onward, the virtue of a good ordinary person is like a well-washed gem and well-refined gold, without even the stain of a single mind-moment, and serves solely as the proximate cause of arahantship. This is fulfilled purification, exemplified by the Elder Mahāsaṅgharakkhita and his nephew. Mahāsaṅgharakkhita had completed more than sixty rains and lay on his deathbed. Asked by the Order about attainment, he replied, “I have no supramundane state.” His attendant said that people within twelve leagues had gathered and would feel remorse if he died an ordinary person. The elder replied, “I did not establish insight because I thought, ‘I shall see the Blessed One Metteyya,’” asked to be sat up and given space, and attained arahantship at the very moment the attendant went out, signaling with a snap of his fingers. The Order praised the difficult feat of producing a supramundane state at death. The elder said: “This is not difficult. I shall tell you what is difficult: from the time I went forth, I do not see a single deed performed through forgetfulness and ignorance.” His nephew did likewise in his fiftieth rain. Four cases concerning little and much learning close the passage: little learning and unstable virtue draw censure in both; little learning and stable virtue draw praise for virtue and make learning succeed; much learning and unstable virtue draw censure for virtue and make learning fail; much learning and stable virtue draw praise in both. 〔Reading〕The whole passage’s weight falls on that “difficult” sentence: sixty years without a single deed performed in forgetfulness—harder than attainment at death. This is the living temperature of “fulfilled purification.”

§03 Ungrasped Purification and Tranquilized Purification—Two Elders → Vernacular §3

The virtue of trainees is ungrasped by views; that of ordinary people is ungrasped by lust. This is ungrasped purification. The Elder Tissa, a householder’s son, told his enemies, “Having broken both my feet, I shall convince you; I am disgusted and ashamed to die with lust,” examined wisely, and attained arahantship as dawn arrived. Another great elder, gravely ill and immersed in his own urine and excrement, heard a young bhikkhu lament that “the formations of life are suffering.” The elder said, “If I die now, I have no doubt that I will attain heavenly prosperity; but prosperity obtained by breaking this virtue would be like what is obtained after renouncing the training and returning to lay life.” Resolving, “I shall die together with virtue,” he contemplated the illness and attained arahantship, then declared it in verses (the body like a flower lying in dust beneath the sun; impurity reckoned pure; “people heedless and infatuated with it abandon the path to a fortunate rebirth”). The virtue of arahants and the rest is pure because every fever has been tranquilized and is called tranquilized purification. 〔Reading〕“Ungrasped” has two levels here: trainees do not grasp through views, ordinary people through lust. The gravely ill elder demonstrates the second by refusing even the lust for “heavenly prosperity obtained through broken virtue.”

§04 The Second Pentad—Abandoning, Abstinence, Volition, Restraint, Non-Transgression, and Why Abandoning Is Virtue → Vernacular §4

The canonical text: abandoning the killing of living beings is virtue; abstinence, volition, restraint, and non-transgression are virtue; the same applies from taking what is not given through wrong view. Then comes the long series “X is abandoned through Y”: sensual desire through renunciation; ill will through non-hate; sloth and torpor through perception of light; agitation through non-distraction; doubt through discrimination of states; ignorance through knowledge; discontent through gladness; the hindrances through the first jhāna, applied and sustained thought through the second, rapture through the third, and pleasure and pain through the fourth; each preceding perception through the four immaterial attainments; perception of permanence through contemplation of impermanence, perception of pleasure through contemplation of suffering, perception of self through contemplation of not-self, delight through disenchantment, lust through dispassion, origination through cessation, grasping through relinquishment, perception of compactness through contemplation of destruction, accumulation through contemplation of dissolution, perception of lastingness through contemplation of change, the sign through contemplation of the signless, desire through contemplation of the desireless, insistence through contemplation of emptiness, insistence on a core through higher-wisdom insight into phenomena, insistence born of delusion through knowledge and vision according to reality, insistence born of attachment through contemplation of danger, non-reflection through contemplation of reflection, insistence on bondage through contemplation of turning away; defilements sharing a common ground with views through the path of stream-entry, gross defilements through once-returning, subtle concomitant defilements through non-returning, and all defilements through arahantship. Such abandoning is virtue; abstinence, volition, restraint, and non-transgression also are. Such virtues lead to non-remorse, gladness, rapture, tranquillity, joy … up to complete disenchantment, dispassion, cessation, peace, direct knowledge, enlightenment, and nibbāna. The author’s key explanation: apart from their non-arising, there is no separate phenomenon called “abandoning.” Yet each abandoning becomes upholding by serving as the foundation of a wholesome state, and coordinating by making the mind unshaken. These are precisely the two meanings of composing established in 01-02, so abandoning is called virtue. The remaining four are stated in terms of the actual occurrence of mind. The conclusion follows: “At this point, the answers to ‘What is virtue?’ … ‘How many kinds are there?’ are complete.” 〔Reading〕The long list can initially seem off topic. From the killing of living beings to the path of arahantship, how is this still “virtue”? The author’s answer is deft: virtue is defined as upholding and coordinating; whatever gives a wholesome state a place to stand and keeps the mind unshaken is virtue. Thus jhāna, insight, and path each contain a share of virtue. The “virtue” of Chapter 1 is broader than expected.

For the General Reader

〔The Decoder’s Reading〕The first pentad is a staircase. A householder stands on its first step, “limited purification”: the training rules are limited—five, eight, or ten—not inferior, but countable. The upward direction is also clear: break them for nothing (unlimited), perform not a single deed through forgetfulness (fulfilled), and do not grasp even the benefit that broken virtue might bring (ungrasped). The Elder Mahāsaṅgharakkhita’s sentence—“Sixty years without a single deed performed through forgetfulness”—deserves a place on the desk.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §§1–4 give the complete sequential translation of the passage on the five kinds of virtue.

The Highest Virtue Is “Ungrasped”—Virtue Is the Ground, Not a Medal

The Big Picture — the Last Two of the Seven Questions and the Close of the Chapter

The last two of the seven questions (Vernacular §§1–5) ask: What is the defilement of virtue? What is its purification? The author’s answer is extremely concise: the condition of being broken, torn, spotted, and mottled is defilement; the condition of being unbroken, untorn, unspotted, and unmottled is purification. He then unfolds, item by item, the two causes of defilement (breach for gain and so forth; the seven kinds of sexual bond), what purification comprises, and the method for accomplishing purification (seeing the danger in failure and the benefit in fulfillment). This unit contains the longest canonical citation in the chapter (the seven kinds of sexual bond), its fiercest canonical similes (the mass of fire and the six further similes), and the chapter’s final closing sentence. 〔What Is Seen〕It is also the harvest of the seed planted in 01-02—conscience as the proximate cause: the method for purifying virtue is “seeing danger and becoming alarmed,” while the culmination of purified virtue lies in the eight qualities. Among them, “ungrasped” is the first appearance of the measure that runs throughout this exposition.

§01 Defilement—Broken, Torn, Spotted, and Mottled, and Their Two Causes → Vernacular §1

The condition of virtue as broken and the rest is defilement; its condition as unbroken and the rest is purification. The condition of being broken and the rest is comprised under two things: breach for gain, renown, and so forth, and the seven kinds of sexual bond. The four patterns are these. A training rule broken at the beginning or end among the seven aggregates of offenses is broken, like a cloth damaged at its edge. A rule broken in the middle is torn, like a cloth pierced at its center. Two or three rules broken in succession are spotted, like a cow with dissimilar-colored patches on its back or belly. Rules broken at intervals are mottled, like a cow variegated with spots of a dissimilar hue. 〔Reading〕The two similes, cloth and cow, appear again in 07-04, Recollection of Virtue—there positively, as “unbroken, untorn ….” It is the same cloth of virtue: here we see how it is damaged; there, we recollect it whole and unharmed.

§02 The Seven Kinds of Sexual Bond—Without Actually Doing It, the Bond Still Breaks Virtue → Vernacular §2

The canonical passage, addressed to a brahmin, concerns a person professing to live the holy life rightly. Though not engaging in the pair’s attainment with a woman, that person: (1) consents to a woman’s anointing, kneading, bathing, and massaging; (2) laughs, plays, and dallies together with a woman; (3) gazes into a woman’s eyes; (4) listens beyond wall or rampart to a woman’s laughter, speech, singing, or crying; (5) recollects former laughing, talking, and playing with a woman; (6) sees a householder or householder’s son enjoying the five cords of sensual pleasure; or (7) lives the holy life to attain a certain order of devas—“Through this virtue, observance, austerity, or holy life, I shall become a deva or a certain kind of deva.” Each is relished, desired, and gratifying; each is “a breach, a tear, a spot, and a mottle in the holy life,” an impure holy life bound by a sexual bond, not freed from birth, aging, death, and suffering. 〔Reading〕The seven move inward as their outward contact decreases: from bodily touch to sight, hearing, memory, envy of another, and practice for rebirth among devas. None involves “actually doing it,” yet each counts as a bond. The seventh deserves a pause: maintaining virtue to become a deva is itself included among the seven kinds of sexual bond. It drives the question “Why maintain virtue?” into a corner.

§03 Purification—the Condition of Being Unbroken, the Eight Qualities, and Purification’s Two Accomplishments → Vernacular §3

The condition of being unbroken and the rest comprises the following: not breaking any training rule; making amends for amendable breaches; having none of the seven kinds of sexual bond; the non-arising of evil states such as anger, resentment, contempt, domineering, envy, avarice, deceit, fraud, obstinacy, rivalry, conceit, overweening conceit, vanity, and negligence; and the arising of such qualities as fewness of wishes, contentment, and austerity. Virtues like these are called unbroken, untorn, unspotted, and unmottled. Those same virtues are liberating (creating the state of freedom), praised by the wise, ungrasped (not grasped by craving and views), and leading to concentration (leading to access concentration or absorption concentration). Purification is accomplished in two ways: seeing the danger in failure of virtue and seeing the benefit in fulfillment of virtue. The danger is to be seen according to such discourses as “There are these five dangers for an unvirtuous person through failure of virtue.”

〔Reading〕This passage supplies a decisive criterion: the highest mark of virtue is not “stricter,” but “ungrasped” (aparāmaṭṭha). Literally, it is not touched, seized, or clutched. At its culmination, virtue is not held more tightly; the grasping at the very idea “I maintain virtue” is released. Why is this the summit? Because what follows immediately is “leading to concentration.” Virtue that is grasped produces conceit and anxiety; such a mind cannot settle. Only ungrasped virtue lets the mind relax and sit steadily. Virtue joins concentration at this very word. It also carries 01-02’s “conscience as the life-root” to its limit: in the end, even “I am lucidly maintaining virtue” must be released.

§04 Seeing the Danger in Broken Virtue—a Long Series of Similes, the Discourse on the Mass of Fire, Six Further Similes, and Verses of Censure → Vernacular §4

An unvirtuous person is displeasing to devas and human beings, cannot be admonished by companions in the holy life, suffers when unvirtuousness is censured, feels remorse when the virtuous are praised, and is ugly like hempen cloth. Followers of that person’s example are brought to the suffering of a bad destination for a long time; donors obtain no great fruit; that person is hard to cleanse like a cesspit accumulated over years; cast out at both ends like a funeral-pyre firebrand; no bhikkhu despite the claim, like a donkey following a herd of cattle; constantly alarmed like a person with enemies on every side; unfit for communion like a corpse; despite learning, unworthy of veneration like a cemetery fire to brahmins; unable to attain distinction like a blind person unable to see forms; without hope in the true Dhamma like an outcaste boy without hope of kingship; and, though imagining happiness, in fact suffering by sharing the pain of the Discourse on the Mass of Fire. Then comes the Discourse on the Mass of Fire. Which is better: to lie embracing a blazing mass of fire or a khattiya, brahmin, or householder’s maiden? For an unvirtuous person—evil, impure and suspect in conduct, concealing deeds, no ascetic though claiming to be one, rotten within, leaking, and full of filth—embracing the fire is better: it brings only death or suffering equal to death, not rebirth in hell after the breakup of the body. The six further similes follow in the same pattern: a horsehair rope rubbing the shins to the marrow versus accepting homage; an oil-polished sharp knife stabbing the chest versus accepting joined palms; a hot iron sheet wrapping the body versus a robe given in faith; a hot iron stake prising the mouth open and a hot iron ball burning through lips, mouth, tongue, throat, and belly and passing out below with intestines and mesentery versus alms food given in faith; a hot iron bed and chair versus a bed and chair given in faith; and being thrown upside down into a hot iron cauldron and boiling in a swirl of froth versus a lodging given in faith. The twelve verses censure the same things: the bitter fruit is worse than embracing the mass of fire; what happiness can there be in accepting homage with ruined virtue; sweet food is like virulent poison; iron beds and cauldrons torment for a long time; “Shame on the life of the unrestrained—he merely wears the appearance of the ascetic host … carrying around a self he has dug up and ruined”; those who love adornment avoid him like excrement and a corpse; he is freed from no fear, has lost every happiness of attainment, finds heaven’s gate closed, and has mounted the path to deprivation; “Who else could be the object of compassionate people’s compassion like a person of broken virtue?” 〔Reading〕The logic of the fire-mass teaching must be read precisely. It does not say “women are fire”; it says gifts given in faith are fire. Receiving the faithful’s gifts while unvirtuous burns worse than embracing fire; the six similes correspond, item by item, to homage, joined palms, robes, alms food, beds and chairs, and lodgings. It is an accounting for wearing the appearance while accepting offerings.

§05 Seeing the Benefits of Fulfilled Virtue and the Chapter’s Conclusion → Vernacular §5

The danger in failure is as stated; the benefits of fulfillment are known from its opposite. Then come ten verses: carrying bowl and robe inspires confidence and going forth bears fruit; fears such as self-reproach cannot enter the heart, as darkness cannot enter the sun; the virtuous shine like the moon in the sky; even their bodily scent gladdens human beings and devas—how much more the fragrance of virtue, which surpasses every kind of fragrance and wafts unobstructed in every direction; even a small service to the virtuous yields great fruit; present-life influxes do not torment them, and they dig up the root of future suffering; human and deva attainments are not hard to gain; “the mind of a person fulfilled in virtue pursues only the attainment of nibbāna, which is utterly peaceful”; “thus, with virtue as the root of every attainment, a wise person should discern benefits distinguished in manifold ways.” The close: discerning in this way makes a person alarmed at failure and inclines the mind toward fulfillment—having seen danger and benefit, virtue should be purified with every care. The chapter ends: “In the Visuddhimagga, taught through the portals of virtue, concentration, and wisdom in the verse ‘A wise person, established in virtue,’ virtue has now been explained.”

§06 Breaking the Grasp—Virtue Is the Ground, Not a Medal 〔The Decoder’s Reading〕 → Vernacular §§2–3

To put the word in §03—ungrasped—into everyday speech: this is the lesson most worth carrying away from the chapter and the first appearance of this exposition’s governing measure. Mark the voice: this is the decoder’s reading, but it is tied directly to aparāmaṭṭha in Vernacular §3—and to the seventh kind of sexual bond in Vernacular §2, maintaining virtue to become a deva.

Virtue’s most hidden trap is not breaking virtue—that is visibly wrong—but forging virtue into a medal: “I am a person of pure virtue.” As soon as this thought arises, virtue ceases to be “the ground of the mind” and becomes “a new garment for self-grasping.” You think you are cultivating virtue; in fact you are feeding a more refined self.

The canonical texts give this trap a name: grasping at precepts and observances (sīlabbata-parāmāsa)—taking virtue and ritual themselves as the cause of liberation, the third of three fetters abandoned at stream-entry. 〔The three fetters are identity view, doubt, and grasping at precepts and observances—a teaching of the discourses and Abhidhamma, not stated in this chapter, introduced here for comparison.〕 It also has a more everyday form. No belief that a certain ritual will save you is required; quietly feeding the self-image “I am highly virtuous” already begins the slide.

This is the measure to which the exposition repeatedly points: practice often does not mean “adding another good thing”—another rule, another degree of strictness—but seeing through a grasping that impersonates goodness, then releasing it. At virtue’s culmination, even the grasping “I maintain virtue” is relinquished. Return to the word in Vernacular §3: ungrasped. In Chapter 9 you will meet the same measure on the page on the “near enemy,” where attached preference is mistaken for loving-kindness. In Chapter 20 you will see it recur at the highest level in the ten corruptions of insight, where illumination, knowledge, and rapture are mistaken for realization. Virtue is the first step in this lesson—and the step most easily mistaken for the destination.

For the General Reader

If you take only one thing from this unit, let it be this: virtue is not moral fastidiousness; it is the ground that lets the mind sleep at night and sit steadily by day. 〔The Decoder’s Reading〕Keep the measure from §06: if the thought “I am purer than that person” arises while you maintain virtue, see it and release it. That is the everyday form of grasping at precepts and observances. Return to the simple aim of “leaving no thorn in the mind.” The author’s method for purifying virtue is very plain (Vernacular §§3, 5): see the danger in broken virtue and the benefit in fulfilled virtue. The mind naturally becomes alarmed and inclines toward fulfillment—not by compulsion, but by seeing clearly.

To read this unit in full: Vernacular §§1–5 give the complete sequential translation of the entire passage on the defilement and purification of virtue; Chinese readers may compare Ye Jun’s translation of Chapter 1, and English readers Ñāṇamoli’s translation of the same chapter. After reading this exposition, the passage may prove more approachable than expected.

In a single sentence: virtue is the ground, not a medal; at its culmination, virtue lets go even of “I maintain virtue.”