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# Theragatha

## Chapter XVI -- The Twenties

### (Selected suttas)

For free distribution only.

XVI.1 -- Adhimutta and the Bandits {vv. 705-725}
[Thanissaro Bhikkhu, trans.]

> [The bandit chief:]

> > Those who
> > for the sake of sacrifice
> > for the sake of wealth
> > we have killed in the past,
> > against their will
> > have trembled & babbled
> > from fear.
> > But you --
> > you show no fear;
> > your complexion brightens.
> > Why don't you lament
> > in the face of what's greatly to be feared

> [Ven. Adhimutta:]

> > There are no painful mental states, chieftain,
> > in one without longing.
> > In one whose fetters are ended,
> > all fears are overcome.
> > With the ending of [craving]
> > the guide to becoming,
> > when phenomena are seen
> > for what they are,
> > then just as in the laying down of a burden,
> > there's no fear in death.

> > I've lived well the holy life,
> > well-developed the path.
> > Death holds no fear for me.
> > It's like the end of a disease.

> > I've lived well the holy life,
> > well-developed the path,
> > seen states of becoming
> > as devoid of allure,
> > like poison spit out
> > after it's drunk.

> > One gone to the far shore
> > without clinging
> > without effluent
> > his task completed,
> > welcomes the ending of life,
> > as if freed from a place of execution.
> > Having attained the supreme Rightness,
> > unconcerned with all the world,
> > as if released from a burning house,
> > he doesn't sorrow at death.

> > Whatever's compounded,
> > wherever a state of becoming's obtained,
> > all that has no one in charge:
> > so says the Great Seer.
> > Whoever discerns this,
> > as taught by the Awakened One,
> > would no more grasp hold of any state of becoming
> > than he would a hot iron ball.
> > I have no 'I was,'
> > no 'I will be.'
> > Fabrications will simply go out of existence.
> > What's to lament there in that?
> > For one who sees, as it actually is,
> > the pure arising of phenomena,
> > the pure seriality of fabrications,
> > there's no fear.
> > When seeing the world with discernment
> > as on a par with grass & twigs,
> > finding no 'mine-ness,'
> > thinking, 'There's nothing of mine,'
> > he feels no sorrow.
> > Dissatisfied with this carcass,
> > I'm unconcerned with becoming.
> > This body will break up
> > and there will not be another.
> > Do as you like with this carcass.
> > From that I will feel
> > neither hatred nor love.

> Hearing these awesome, hair-raising words,
> the young men threw down their weapons & said:

> > What have you done, sir,
> > or who have you taken as mentor?
> > Because of whose teachings
> > is this lack of sorrow acquired?

> [Ven. Adhimutta:]

> > The all-knowing,
> > all-seeing conqueror:
> > He is my mentor.
> > Greatly compassionate teacher,
> > all the world's healer,
> > this doctrine is his,
> > unexcelled, leading to ending.
> > Because of his teachings
> > is this lack of sorrow acquired.

> The bandits, hearing the good words of the seer,
> threw down their swords & their weapons.
> Some relinquished their life of crime,
> some chose the Going Forth.
> Having gone forth in the teachings
> of the one well-gone,
> developing the powers & factors for Awakening,
> wise, happy,
> exultant in mind,
> their faculties ripened,
> they touched uncompounded Unbinding.

Revised: Fri 12 April 2002