The Related Discourses

13. Factors of the Noble Path

27 (772). The Other Shore (2)

1. Thus have I heard:[1] One time, the Buddha was staying at Anāthapiṇḍada’s Park in Jeta’s Grove of Śrāvastī.

2. A certain monk then came to visit the Buddha, prostrated at his feet, and withdrew to sit at one side. He said, “Bhagavān, there is what’s not the other shore and what is the other shore. Bhagavān, what’s not the other shore, and what is the other shore?”

3.The Buddha told that monk, “Wrong view is not the other shore, but right view is the other shore. Wrong intention … wrong speech … wrong action … wrong livelihood … wrong method … wrong mindfulness … wrong samādhi is not the other shore, but right intention … right speech … right action … right livelihood … right method … right mindfulness … right samādhi is the other shore.”

4. The Bhagavān then spoke in verse:

• “Rare are the people who can
  Cross over to the other shore;
  Everyone else in the world
  Wander around on this shore.

• Of this right teaching and discipline,
  There are some who can follow it;
  They are the ones who can cross over
  That difficult ford of birth-and-death.”

5. After the Buddha spoke this sūtra, the monks who heard what the Buddha taught rejoiced and approved.

Notes

1. This sūtra is reconstituted according to a variant note that follows SĀ 13.26, which replaces the interlocutor with “a certain monk” and “Venerable Ānanda,” and the Buddha asks the monks in a third version. It’s parallel with AN 10.117 and SN 45.34, but the Pali doesn’t have a variant with this interlocutor. [back]

Translator: Charles Patton

Last Revised: 10 November 2023