The Chanting Together

Fives

'There are [sets of] five things perfectly proclaimed ...

[5.01][pts][olds]'Five aggregates: body, feelings, perceptions, mental formations, consciousness.

[5.02][pts][olds]'Five aggregates of grasping (pancupādāna-kkhandhā) (as (1)). [234]

[5.03][pts][olds]'Five strands of sense-desire (pañca kāma-guṇā): a sight seen by the eye, a sound heard by the ear, a smell smelt by the nose, a flavour tasted by the tongue, a tangible object felt by the body as being desirable, attractive, nice, charming, associated with lust and arousing passion.

[5.04][pts][olds]'Five [post-mortem] destinies (gatiyo): hell (nirayo),^[1088] animal-rebirth (tiracchāna-yoni),^[1089] the realm of hungry ghosts (petā), humankind, the deva world.

[5.05][pts][olds]'Five kinds of begrudging (macchariyāni):^[1090] as to dwelling-place, families,^[1091] gains, beauty (vaṇṇa), Dhamma.

[5.06][pts][olds]'Five hindrances: sensuality (kāmacchanda), ill-will (vyāpāda), sloth-and-torpor (thīna-middha), worry-and-flurry (uddhaccu-kukkucca), sceptical doubt (vicikicchā).

[5.07][pts][olds]'Five lower fetters: personality-belief (sakkāya-diṭṭhi), doubt, attachment to rite and ritual (sīlabbata-parāmāsa), sensuality, ill-will.

[5.08][pts][olds]'Five higher fetters: craving for the world of form (rūparāga), craving for the formless world (arūpa-rāga), conceit (māna), restlessness (uddhacca), ignorance. [235]

[5.09][pts][olds]'Five rules of training (sikkhāpadāni): refraining from taking life, taking what is not given, sexual misconduct, lying speech, strong drink and sloth-producing drugs (surā-maraya-majja-pamādaṭṭhānā).

[5.10][pts][olds]'Five impossible things: An Arahant is incapable of (a) deliberately taking the life of a living being; (b) taking what is not given so as to constitute theft; (c) sexual intercourse; (d) telling a deliberate lie; (e) storing up goods for sensual indulgence as he did formerly in the household life (as Sutta 29, verse 26).

[5.11][pts][olds]'Five kinds of loss (vyasanāni): Loss of relatives, wealth, health, morality, [right] view. No beings fall into an evil state, a hell-state ... after death because of loss or relatives, wealth or health; but beings do fall into such states by loss of morality and right view.

[5.12][pts][olds]'Five kinds of gain (sampadā): Gain of relatives, wealth, health, morality, [right] view. No beings arise in a happy, heavenly state after death because of the gain of relatives, [496] wealth or health; but beings are reborn in such states because of gains in morality and right view.

[5.13][pts][olds]'Five dangers to the immoral through lapsing from morality: (as Sutta 16, verse 1.23: In the first place, he suffers great loss of property through neglecting his affairs. In the second place, he gets a bad reputation for immorality and misconduct. In the third place, whatever assembly he approaches, whether of Khattiyas, Brahmins, householders or ascetics, he does so diffidently and shyly. In the fourth place, he dies confused. In the fifth place, after death, at the breaking-up of the body, he arises in an evil state, a bad fate, in suffering and hell.) [236]

[5.14][pts][olds]'Five benefits to the moral through preserving morality: (as Sutta 16, verse 1.24.).

[5.15][pts][olds]'Five points to be borne in mind by a monk wishing to rebuke another: (a) I will speak at the proper time, not the wrong time, (b) I will state the truth, not what is false, (c) I will speak gently, not roughly, (d) I will speak for his good, [237] not for his harm, (e) I will speak with love in my heart, not with enmity.

[5.16][pts][olds]'Five factors of endeavour: Here, a monk (a) has faith, trusting in the enlightenment of the Tathāgata: "Thus this Blessed Lord is an Arahant, a fully-enlightened Buddha ... " (as Sutta 3, verse 1.2), (b) is in good health, suffers little distress or sickness, having a good digestion that is neither too cool nor too hot but of a middling temperature suitable for exertion, (c) is not fraudulent or deceitful, showing himself as he really is to his teacher or to the wise among his companions in the holy life, (d) keeps his energy constantly stirred up for abandoning unwholesome states and arousing wholesome states, and is steadfast, firm in advancing and persisting in wholesome states, (e) is a man of wisdom, endowed with wisdom concerning rising and cessation, with the Ariyan penetration that leads to the complete destruction of suffering.

[5.17][pts][olds]'Five Pure Abodes (Suddhāvāsā):^[1092] Aviha,^[1093] Unworried (Atappā), Clearly Visible (Sudassā), Clear-Sighted (Sudassī), Peerless (Akaniṭṭhā).

[5.18][pts][olds]'Five kinds of Non-Returner (anāgāmī):^[1094] the "lessthan-half-timer", the "more-than-half-timer", the "gainer without exertion", the "gainer with exertion", "he who goes upstream to the highest".

[5.19][pts][olds]'Five mental blockages (ceto-khīlā): Here, a monk has [238] doubts and hesitations (a) about the Teacher, is dissatisfied and cannot settle in his mind. Thus his mind is not inclined towards ardour, devotion, persistence and effort; (b) about the Dhamma ... ; (c) about the Saṅgha ... ; (d) about the training ... ; (e) he is angry and displeased with his fellows in [497] the holy life, he feels depressed and negative towards them. Thus his mind is not inclined towards ardour, devotion, persistence and effort.

[5.20][pts][olds]'Five mental bondages (cetaso vinibandhā):^[1095] Here, a monk has not got rid of the passion, desire, love, thirst (pipāsa),^[1096] fever, craving (taṇhā) (a) for sense-desires (kāme): thus his mind is not inclined towards ardour, devotion, persistence and effort; (b) for the body (kāye), ... (c) for physical objects (rūpe), ... or (d) having eaten as much as his belly will hold, he abandons himself to the pleasure of lying down, of contact, of sloth; or (e) [239] he practises the holy life for the sake of becoming a member of some body of devas (deva-nikāya), thinking: "By means of these rites or this discipline, this austerity or this holy life I shall become one of the devas, great or small." Thus his mind is not inclined towards ardour, devotion, persistence and effort.

[5.21][pts][olds]'Five faculties (indriyāni): the faculty of eye, ear, nose, tongue, body.

[5.22][pts][olds]'Five more faculties: pleasant [bodily] feeling (sukha), pain (dukkha), gladness (somanassa), sadness (domanassa), indifferent feeling (upekhā).

[5.23][pts][olds]'Five more faculties: faith (saddhā), energy, mindfulness, concentration, wisdom.

[5.24][pts][olds]'Five elements making for deliverance (nissaraṇīyā dhātuyo): (a) Here, when a monk considers sense-desires, his mind does not leap forward and take satisfaction in them, fix on them or make free with them,^[1097] but when he considers renunciation it does leap forward, take satisfaction in it, fix on it, and make free with it. And he gets this thought [240] well-set, well-developed, well raised up, well freed and disconnected from sense-desires. And thus he is freed from the corruptions (āsavā), the vexations and fevers that arise from sense-desires,(and he does not feel that [sensual] feeling. This is called the deliverance from sense-desires. And the same applies to (b) ill-will, (c) cruelty, (d) forms (rūpa),^[1098] (e) personality (sakkāya). [241]

[5.25][pts][olds]'Five bases of deliverance (vimuttāyatanāni): Here, (a) the Teacher or a respected fellow-disciple teaches a monk Dhamma. And as he receives the teaching, he gains a grasp of [498] both the spirit and the letter of the teaching. At this, joy arises in him, and from this joy, delight (pīti); and by this delight his senses are calmed, he feels happiness (sukhaɱ) as a result, and with this happiness his mind is established;^[1099] (b) he has not heard it thus, but in the course of teaching Dhamma to others he has learnt it by heart as he has heard it; or (c) as he is chanting the Dhamma ... ; or (d) [242] ... when he applies his mind to the Dhamma, thinks and ponders over it and concentrates his attention on it (anupekkhati); or (e) when he has properly grasped some concentration-sign (samādhi-nimitaɱ), has well considered it, applied his mind to it (supadhāritaɱ), and has well penetrated it with wisdom (suppaṭividdhaɱ paññāya). At this, joy arises in him, and from this joy, delight; and by this delight his senses are calmed, [243] he feels happiness as a result, and with this happiness his mind is established.

[5.26][pts][olds]'Five perceptions making for maturity of liberation: the perception of impermanence (anicca-saññā), of suffering in impermanence (anicce dukkha-saññā), of impersonality in suffering (dukkhe anatta-saññā), of abandoning (pahāna-saññā), of dispassion (virāga-saññā).

'These are the [sets of] five things which were perfectly proclaimed by the Lord ... '

^[1088] Cf. n.244.

^[1089] Cf. n.244.

^[1090] Faults of begrudging in a monk.

^[1091] Begrudging others the support of a particular family.

^[1092] Realms inhabited by the Non-Returners, who attain to Nibbāna directly from there.

^[1093] The meaning of this name is perhaps 'not falling from prosperity' (see EB).

^[1094] For these scholastic distinctions see BDic or EB.

^[1095] See also MN 12.

^[1096] This, though here used metaphorically, is the word for 'thirst' in the literal sense. Here it means something less strong than taṇhā.

^[1097] Vimuccati, apparently meaning 'is liberated', but glossed by DA as adhimuccati, rendered by RD as 'choose'. The same verb is used in the next sentence with regard to renunciation. I have used 'make free' as a makeshift, free rendering, and suspect a textual corruption.

^[1098] Rūpa here perhaps means 'thing seen'.

^[1099] 'By the samādhi of the fruit of Arahantship' (DA). In this context, it is perhaps worth noting that in Buddhism, as opposed to some non-Buddhist usage, samādhi by itself never means 'liberation' or 'enlightenment' (see n.225).

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