- In the Buddha’s Words
- Cover
- Title Page
- Contents
- Foreword
- Preface
- List of Abbreviations
- Key to the Pronunciation of Pāli
- Detailed List of Contents
- General Introduction
- I. The Human Condition
- Introduction
- 1. Old Age, Illness, and Death
- (1) Aging and Death
- (2) The Simile of the Mountain
- (3) The Divine Messengers
- 2. The Tribulations of Unreflective Living
- (1) The Dart of Painful Feeling
- (2) The Vicissitudes of Life
- (3) Anxiety Due to Change
- 3. A World in Turmoil
- (1) The Origin of Conflict
- (2) Why Do Beings Live in Hate?
- (3) The Dark Chain of Causation
- (4) The Roots of Violence and Oppression
- 4. Without Discoverable Beginning
- (1) Grass and Sticks
- (2) Balls of Clay
- (3) The Mountain
- (4) The River Ganges
- (5) Dog on a Leash
- II. The Bringer of Light
- III. Approaching the Dhamma
- IV. The Happiness Visible in This Present Life
- Introduction
- 1. Upholding the Dhamma in Society
- (1) The King of the Dhamma
- (2) Worshipping the Six Directions
- 2. The Family
- (1) Parents and Children
- (a) Respect for Parents
- (b) Repaying One’s Parents
- (2) Husbands and Wives
- (a) Different Kinds of Marriages
- (b) How to Be United in Future Lives
- (c) Seven Kinds of Wives
- 3. Present Welfare, Future Welfare
- 4. Right Livelihood
- (1) Avoiding Wrong Livelihood
- (2) The Proper Use of Wealth
- (3) A Family Man’s Happiness
- 5. The Woman of the Home
- 6. The Community
- (1) Six Roots of Dispute
- (2) Six Principles of Cordiality
- (3) Purification Is for All Four Castes
- (4) Seven Principles of Social Stability
- (5) The Wheel-Turning Monarch
- (6) Bringing Tranquillity to the Land
- V. The Way to a Fortunate Rebirth
- Introduction
- 1. The Law of Kamma
- (1) Four Kinds of Kamma
- (2) Why Beings Fare as They Do After Death
- (3) Kamma and Its Fruits
- 2. Merit: The Key to Good Fortune
- (1) Meritorious Deeds
- (2) Three Bases of Merit
- (3) The Best Kinds of Confidence
- 3. Giving
- (1) If People Knew the Result of Giving
- (2) Reasons for Giving
- (3) The Gift of Food
- (4) A Superior Person’s Gifts
- (5) Mutual Support
- (6) Rebirth on Account of Giving
- 4. Moral Discipline
- (1) The Five Precepts
- (2) The Uposatha Observance
- 5. Meditation
- (1) The Development of Loving-Kindness
- (2) The Four Divine Abodes
- (3) Insight Surpasses All
- VI. Deepening One’s Perspective on the World
- Introduction
- 1. Four Wonderful Things
- 2. Gratification, Danger, and Escape
- (1) Before My Enlightenment
- (2) I Set Out Seeking
- (3) If There Were No Gratification
- 3. Properly Appraising Objects of Attachment
- 4. The Pitfalls in Sensual Pleasures
- (1) Cutting Off All Affairs
- (2) The Fever of Sensual Pleasures
- 5. Life is Short and Fleeting
- 6. Four Summaries of the Dhamma
- 7. The Danger in Views
- (1) A Miscellany on Wrong View
- (2) The Blind Men and the Elephant
- (3) Held by Two Kinds of Views
- 8. From the Divine Realms to the Infernal
- 9. The Perils of Saṃsāra
- (1) The Stream of Tears
- (2) The Stream of Blood
- VII. The Path to Liberation
- VIII. Mastering the Mind
- Introduction
- 1. The Mind Is the Key
- 2. Developing a Pair of Skills
- (1) Serenity and Insight
- (2) Four Ways to Arahantship
- (3) Four Kinds of Persons
- 3. The Hindrances to Mental Development
- 4. The Refinement of the Mind
- 5. The Removal of Distracting Thoughts
- 6. The Mind of Loving-Kindness
- 7. The Six Recollections
- 8. The Four Establishments of Mindfulness
- 9. Mindfulness of Breathing
- 10. The Achievement of Mastery
- IX. Shining the Light of Wisdom
- Introduction
- 1. Images of Wisdom
- (1) Wisdom as a Light
- (2) Wisdom as a Knife
- 2. The Conditions for Wisdom
- 3. A Discourse on Right View
- 4. The Domain of Wisdom
- (1) By Way of the Five Aggregates
- (a) Phases of the Aggregates
- (b) A Catechism on the Aggregates
- (c) The Characteristic of Nonself
- (d) Impermanent, Suffering, Nonself
- (e) A Lump of Foam
- (2) By Way of the Six Sense Bases
- (a) Full Understanding
- (b) Burning
- (c) Suitable for Attaining Nibbāna
- (d) Empty Is the World
- (e) Consciousness Too Is Nonself
- (3) By Way of the Elements
- (a) The Eighteen Elements
- (b) The Four Elements
- (c) The Six Elements
- (4) By Way of Dependent Origination
- (a) What Is Dependent Origination?
- (b) The Stableness of the Dhamma
- (c) Forty-Four Cases of Knowledge
- (d) A Teaching by the Middle
- (e) The Continuance of Consciousness
- (f) The Origin and Passing of the World
- (5) By Way of the Four Noble Truths
- (a) The Truths of All Buddhas
- (b) These Four Truths Are Actual
- (c) A Handful of Leaves
- (d) Because of Not Understanding
- (e) The Precipice
- (f) Making the Breakthrough
- (g) The Destruction of the Taints
- 5. The Goal of Wisdom
- (1) What is Nibbāna?
- (2) Thirty-Three Synonyms for Nibbāna
- (3) There Is That Base
- (4) The Unborn
- (5) The Two Nibbāna Elements
- (6) The Fire and the Ocean
- X. The Planes of Realization
- Introduction
- 1. The Field of Merit for the World
- (1) Eight Persons Worthy of Gifts
- (2) Differentiation by Faculties
- (3) In the Dhamma Well Expounded
- (4) The Completeness of the Teaching
- (5) Seven Kinds of Noble Persons
- 2. Stream-Entry
- (1) The Four Factors Leading to Stream-Entry
- (2) Entering the Fixed Course of Rightness
- (3) The Breakthrough to the Dhamma
- (4) The Four Factors of a Stream-Enterer
- (5) Better than Sovereignty over the Earth
- 3. Nonreturning
- (1) Abandoning the Five Lower Fetters
- (2) Four Kinds of Persons
- (3) Six Things that Partake of True Knowledge
- (4) Five Kinds of Nonreturners
- 4. The Arahant
- (1) Removing the Residual Conceit “I Am”
- (2) The Trainee and the Arahant
- (3) A Monk Whose Crossbar Has Been Lifted
- (4) Nine Things an Arahant Cannot Do
- (5) A Mind Unshaken
- (6) The Ten Powers of an Arahant Monk
- (7) The Sage at Peace
- (8) Happy Indeed Are the Arahants
- 5. The Tathāgata
- (1) The Buddha and the Arahant
- (2) For the Welfare of Many
- (3) Sāriputta’s Lofty Utterance
- (4) The Powers and Grounds of Self-Confidence
- (5) The Manifestation of Great Light
- (6) The Man Desiring Our Good
- (7) The Lion
- (8) Why Is He Called the Tathāgata?
- Notes
- Table of Sources
- Glossary
- Bibliography
- Index of Subjects
- Index of Proper Names
- Index of Similes
- Index of Selected Pāli Sutta Titles
- Index of Pāli Terms Discussed in the Notes
- About the Author
- Also Available from Wisdom Publications
- Copyright
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