To Anuruddha
Anuruddha Sutta (AN 3:131)
Then Ven. Anuruddha went to Ven. Sāriputta and, on arrival, exchanged courteous greetings with him. After an exchange of friendly greetings & courtesies, he sat to one side. As he was sitting there, he said to Ven. Sāriputta, “Here, by means of the divine eye, purified & surpassing the human, I see the thousand-fold cosmos. And my persistence is aroused & unsluggish. My mindfulness is established & unmuddled.1 My body is calm & unaroused. My mind is concentrated & gathered into singleness. And yet my mind is not released from the effluents through lack of clinging/sustenance.”
Ven. Sāriputta: “My friend, when the thought occurs to you, ‘By means of the divine eye, purified & surpassing the human, I see the thousand-fold cosmos,’ that is related to your conceit. When the thought occurs to you, ‘My persistence is aroused & unsluggish. My mindfulness is established & unmuddled. My body is calm & unaroused. My mind is concentrated & gathered into singleness,’ that is related to your restlessness. When the thought occurs to you, ‘And yet my mind is not released from the effluents through lack of clinging/sustenance,’ that is related to your anxiety. It would be well if—abandoning these three qualities, not attending to these three qualities—you directed your mind to the deathless property.”
So after that, Ven. Anuruddha—abandoning those three qualities, not attending to those three qualities—directed his mind to the deathless property. Dwelling alone, secluded, heedful, ardent, & resolute, he in no long time entered & remained in the unexcelled goal of the holy life for which clansmen rightly go forth from home into homelessness, directly knowing & realizing it for himself in the here & now. He knew, “Birth is ended, the holy life fulfilled, the task done. There is nothing further for the sake of this world.” And thus Ven. Anuruddha became another one of the arahants.
Note
1. Reading asammuṭṭhā with the Burmese and PTS editions. The Thai edition has appamuṭṭhā, “unforgotten.”
