6. The Ninefold Thread in the Mode of Conveying a Fourfold Array
184. Herein, what is the Conveying of a Fourfold Array? [It is] this:
“By way of phrasing, (i) the Linguistic,
(ii) the Purport, and (iii) the teaching’s Source,
And (iv) the Consecutive-Sequence:
This Mode Conveys a Fourfold Array”.
By way of the phrasing, the Thread’s Linguistic, its purport (intention), its source [as the circumstance of its utterance], and its consecutive-sequence, should be examined.
[(i) Linguistic]
185. Herein, what is the linguistic? It is any language employing terms, any knowledge of ideas by name.
186. For when a bhikkhu knows the name of a meaning and knows the name of an idea, and he applies it accordingly, he is called skilled in meanings and skilled in ideas, skilled in phrasing, skilled in language, skilled in consecutivity (syntax), skilled in the teaching, skilled in designations of past [tenses], skilled in designations of future [tenses], skilled in designations of presently-arisen [tenses], skilled in designations of the feminine [gender], skilled in designations of the masculine [gender], skilled in designations of the neuter [gender], skilled in designations of the singular [number], skilled in designations of the plural [number]. All regional linguistics and all regional languages can be treated in this way. This is “language employing terms”.
[(ii) Purport (intent)]
187. Herein, what is the purport (intent)? [Take, for example the following passage:]
The True Ideal guards him that walks therein
As does a big umbrella in time of rain.
The Ideal’s reward, when walked in right, is this:
Who walks therein has no bad destination.
What is the Blessed One’s purport (intent) here? [It is that] those who desire to be liberated from the states of deprivation will be those who walk in the True Idea: this is the Blessed One’s purport here.
188. [Again:]
Just as a robber taken in house-breaking
Is haunted by and responsible for his act,
So too a man hereafter, when departed,
Is haunted by and responsible for his act.
What is the Blessed One’s purport (intent) here? [It is that] when acts have been done by someone’s own choice and stored up to be felt (experienced) as pain, their un-wished-for and disagreeable ripening will be coessential [with a future state]. This is the Blessed One’s purport here.
189. [Again:]
Who with the rod is cruel to beings
That are desirous to find pleasure
Shall find no pleasure when departed,
For all the pleasure he may seek.
What is the Blessed One’s purport here? [It is that] those who would seek pleasure, let them not do evil acts: this is the Blessed One’s purport here.
190. [Again:]
A dullard drowsy with much gluttony,
Engrossed in sleep, who wallows as he lies
Like a great porker stuffed with fatting food,
Comes ever and again back to the world.
What is the Blessed One’s purport here? [It is that] those who desire not to be distressed by ageing and death will be such as know the [right] amount in eating, keep the doors of their faculties guarded, are devoted to wakefulness in the first and last [of the three] watches of the night, practise insight with regard to profitable ideas, and respect their companions in the divine life whether elder or new or middle [bhikkhus] this is the Blessed One’s purport here.
191. [Again:]
The Deathless State is diligence;
That of Mortality, neglect:
The diligent will never die;
As good as dead the negligent.
What is the Blessed One’s purport here? [It is that] those who desire to pursue the search for the Deathless will abide diligent. This is the Blessed One’s purport here.
[(iii) Source]
192. Herein, what is a source? [It is the reason for the utterance of a Thread, for example,] according as the cattle-owner Dhaniya said to the Blessed One
“A man with children finds relish through his children;
And a cattle-owner likewise through his cattle.
These essentials of existence are a man’s relish;
Who has them not will never relish find”,
and as the Blessed One replied
“A man with children finds sorrow through his children;
And a cattle-owner likewise through his cattle.
These essentials of existence are a man’s sorrow;
Who has them not will never sorrow find”.
Here it is known that with this as circumstance, with this as source, the Blessed One speaks of an external chattel as an essential of existence.
193. And according as, when the Evil One, Māra, let fall a large stone from the Vulture-Peak Rock, the Blessed One said
“Even if you choose to move
The whole of Vulture-Peak, for sure
No fully freed Awakened One
Would be perturbed on that account”),
[and]
“Were heaven to split, were earth to quake, were all
The things that breathe to fear, were you to plunge
A dagger in his heart, no Wakened One
Takes shelter in essentials of existence”.
Here it is known that with this as circumstance, with this as source, the Blessed One speaks of the body as an essential of existence.
194. And according as he said
“The steadfast will never call that a strong bond
Made of iron or consisting of wood or of thongs.
But greed flushed with lusting for jewels [and gems]
And concern for a wife and for children as well: …”.
Here it is known that with this as circumstance, with this as source, the Blessed One speaks of craving for external things.
195. And according as he said
“’Tis these that the steadfast will call a strong bond,
Which pulls a man down, subtle, hard to get free from;
Yet this too they sever and wander [in freedom],
Unconcerned, and [all] sensual pleasures foregone”.
Here it is known that with this as circumstance, with this as source, the Blessed One speaks of abandoning craving for external things.
196. And according as he said
This sick impure foul thing, stinking, Oozing with carcase-exudations
[Unceasingly] by day and night:
[Only] a fool could relish it.
Here it is known that with this as circumstance, with this as source, the Blessed One speaks of abandoning craving for things in oneself.
197. And according as he said
Cut off affection for the self,
As with the hand an autumn lily;
And so pursue the path of peace,
The Quenching the Sublime One taught”.
Here it is known that, with this as circumstance, with this as a source, the Blessed One speaks of abandoning craving for things in oneself.
[(iv) Consecutive Sequence]
198. Herein, what is Consecutive Sequence? It is according to what the Blessed One said, namely:
“Caught in the net of sensual murk,
And blocked by craving’s bondage,
Fenced in by fences of neglect
Like fishes in a funnel-trap,
They follow after ageing and death
As does the sucking-calf its mother”.
What is stated is craving for sensual desires. What consecutive sequence is that construable by?
199. It is according as he said
Who lusts no meaning ever knows,
Who lusts sees never an idea;
The murk of darkness laps a man
When he will suffer lust to be.
200. So it is that same craving that is expressed by [the terms] “murk” and being “caught”. And when it is said “caught in the net of sensual murk, And blocked by craving’s bondage”, and when it is said “Who lusts no meaning ever knows, Who lusts sees never an idea”, it is that same craving that is expressed by these terms [which illustrate] obsession.
201. The “murk” is the origin of suffering, and that is the craving that gives renewal of being.
202. And when it is said “sensual” this is sensual-desire as defilement; and when it is said “caught in the net” obsession is shown by those same sensual desires as means. Consequently craving is called a “fence” by way of defilement and by way of obsession. It is such as these that “follow after ageing and death”.
203. The following verse, as it is presented by the Blessed One, is given in order to show by what power they “follow after ageing and death”:
Who has no steadying points, no diversification.
Who has outstripped the Chain and Bar beside:
Not even the world with all its gods can know
The conduct of that Stilled One free from craving.
204. The “diversifications” are craving, views, and conceit, and the determinations thereby actively determined. The “steadying-points” are the underlying-tendencies. The “Chain” is obsession by craving, which is the thirty-six ways explored by the net of craving. The “Bar” is delusion. The determinations [determined] by the diversifications, and the steadying-points, and the Chain, and the Bar: whoever has surmounted all those is called “free from craving”.
205. Herein, determinations due to obsession can be felt (experienced) here and now [in their ripening] or they can be felt on next reappearance, or they can be felt in some subsequent period. So craving gives fruit in three ways: here and now [in this existence], or on next reappearance, or in some subsequent period.
206. So the Blessed One said: (Whatever action he does effected out of greed by body or speech or mind, makes his existence coessential with its ripening, either here and now or on next reappearance or in some subsequent period).
This is construed with a consecutive sequence of the Blessed One’s statements.
207. Herein, obsession is action [whose ripening] can be felt here and now, or it is action [whose ripening can be felt] on next reappearance, or it is action [whose ripening can be felt] in some subsequent period. So action ripens in these three ways: here and now [in this existence] or on next reappearance or in some subsequent period. According as it is said:
208. (And when a fool is one who here kills breathing things, … holds wrong view, in consequence he feels the ripening of that here and now or on next reappearance or in some subsequent period).
This is construed by a consecutive sequence of the Blessed One’s [statements].
209. Herein, the obsession is abandonable by means of the power of deliberation, the determinations are abandonable by means of the power of seeing, and the thirty-six ways explored by craving are abandonable by means of the power of keeping-in-being. So craving is abandonable in three ways.
210.“Freedom from craving” is the element of extinction with trace left, but with the dissolution of the body it is the element of extinction without trace left. “Diversification” is what keeping bound together is called.
211. And when the Blessed One says (He diversifies instigated by a past, a future, or a presently-arisen form cognizable by the eye) (), and when the Blessed One says (Rādha, do not look back with yearning to past form, do not expectantly relish future form, practise the way to dispassion, fading of lust, ceasing, giving up, and relinquishment, as to presently-arisen form), this is construed by the consecutivity of the Blessed One’s [statement].
212. And while the diversifications, and the determinations, and the relishing of the past, future and presently-arisen, are a singularity, yet the teaching of the True Idea stated by the Blessed One with various other terms, with various other letters, with various other phrases, is of ungauged meaning.
213. That is how the Thread is demonstrated by collating Thread with Thread, adding the sequence together by consecutivity.
[4 kinds of Consecutive Sequence]
214. Now this consecutive sequence is of four kinds: meaning-sequence, phrasing-sequence, teaching-sequence, and demonstration-sequence.
215. (i) Herein, meaning-sequence is the six terms, namely explaining, displaying, divulging, analysing, exhibiting, and describing.
216. (ii) Phrasing-sequence is the six terms, namely letter, term, phrase, mood, language, and demonstration.
217. (iii) Teaching-sequence; he does not meditate with earth as support and yet he meditates as a meditator. He does not meditate with water … fire … air … the base consisting of infiniteness of space … the base consisting of infiniteness of consciousness … the base consisting of no-owning … the base consisting of neither perception nor non-perception … He does not meditate with this world or the other as support, and yet he meditates as a meditator. And what is in between both—the seen, heard, sensed, cognized, reached, sought, thought, explored, and cogitated over with the mind—he does not meditate with that as support too and yet he meditates as a meditator. In the world with its gods, its Māras, and its High Divinities, in this generation with its monks and divines, its princes and men, when one such as this meditates with cognizance unsupported, he is not known. Just as Māra the Evil One, seeking the clansman Godhika’s consciousness, neither knew nor saw it; for with the abandoning of craving he had gone past diversification, and he had no more support for views. And as Godhika, so too Vakkali. When such as these are meditating with unsupported cognizance they are not known by the world with its gods, its Māras, and its High Divinities, by this generation with its monks and divines, its princes and men.
This is teaching-sequence.
218. (iv) Herein, what is demonstration-sequence?
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the unprofitable side; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the profitable side.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of corruption; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of cleansing.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the occurrence of the roundabout; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the non-occurrence of the roundabout.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of craving and ignorance; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of quiet and insight.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of consciencelessness and shamelessness; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of conscience and shame.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of unmindfulness and unawareness; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of mindfulness and awareness.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of what is no reason and by means of unreasoned attention; and those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of what is a reason and by means of reasoned attention.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of idleness and difficult admonishability; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of instigation of energy and easy admonishability.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of faithlessness and negligence; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of faith and diligence.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of hearing what is not the true object of faith and by means of non-restraint; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the true object of faith and by means of restraint.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of covetousness and ill-will; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of non-covetousness and non-ill-will.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the hindrances and the fetters; those with unsupported cognizance by means of the heart-deliverance due to fading of lust and by means of the understanding-deliverance due to fading of ignorance.
Those with supported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the annihilation view and by means of the eternity view; those with unsupported cognizance can be demonstrated by means of the element of extinction with trace left and the element of extinction without trace left.
This is demonstration-sequence.
219. That is why the venerable Mahā-Kaccāna said:
“By way of phrasing, the Linguistic,
The Purport, and the teaching’s Source,
And the Consecutive-Sequence:
This Mode Conveys a Fourfold Array”.
The Mode of Conveying a Fourfold Array is ended.