Guhatthaka Sutta

Category: Atthaka Vagga

From Buddhist Encyclopedia

• Translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu

Staying attached to the cave, covered heavily over,1 a person sunk in confusion is far from seclusion — for sensual pleasures sensual desires2 in the world are not lightly let go.

Those chained by desire, bound by becoming's allure, aren't easily released for there's no liberation by others. Intent, in front or behind,3 on hunger for sensual pleasures here or before — greedy for sensual pleasures, busy, deluded, ungenerous, entrenched in the out-of-tune way,4 they — impelled into pain — lament: "What will we be when we pass on from here?"

So a person should train right here & now. Whatever you know as out-of-tune in the world, don't, for its sake, act out-of-tune, for that life, the enlightened say, is short.

I see them, in the world, floundering around, people immersed in craving for states of becoming. Base people moan in the mouth of death, their craving, for states of becoming & not-,5 unallayed.

See them, floundering in their sense of mine, like fish in the puddles of a dried-up stream — and, seeing this, live with no mine, not forming attachment for states of becoming. Subdue desire for both sides,6 comprehending7 sensory contact, with no greed.

Doing nothing for which he himself would rebuke himself, the enlightened person doesn't adhere to what's seen, to what's heard. Comprehending perception, he'd cross over the flood — the sage not stuck on possessions. Then, with arrow removed, living heedfully, he longs for neither — this world, the next.