SuttaCentral
@cdpatton (or anyone else!),
In the Āgamas, we often come across sūtras where the opening nidāna depicts a monk coming to some insight while sitting in seclusion and then arising from his seclusion to inquire, confirm, or otherwise consult with the Buddha regarding that insight. I’m having trouble finding a corresponding opening formula in the Nikāyas. Is it there?
It seems like it’s the other way around, such as in AN8.30 , in the Pali suttas.
Yes, we do find this in the Pali suttas too. A SuttaCentral search for “in private retreat” brings up 40 results among which are cases of the sort Ven. @Pasanna posted, i.e. someone has a thought in private retreat, the Buddha reads their mind and then discusses their thought with them, and also a number of cases where the person in retreat goes to the Buddha to converse about the topic.
For the first case, see for example AN6.55, where the Buddha says to Venerable Soṇa:
“Soṇa, as you were in private retreat didn’t this thought come to your mind: …
The second case is for example in Snp2.12. Here it’s Venerable Vaṅgīsa who, after rising from retreat, goes to the Buddha and says:
“Just now, sir, as I was in private retreat this thought came to mind. …
Similarly Venerable Udāyī in MN66, and there are more. Maybe a search for “Just now, sir, as I was in private retreat”, catches them all. It returns 8 results.
Thank you, Vens.!
I’m only permitted one “solution,” but, in my mind, I gave it to both of you!
Thank you!
I wasn’t sure if my answer was what you were after because the Buddha goes to the meditator, rather than the meditators going to the Buddha
Well, I wouldn’t say it wasn’t what I wanted as much as I’d say it was unexpected: I wasn’t aware of such a formula existing.
There are cases of this that don’t involve miraculous powers, but it’s not always in the opening of the sutra. Ananda does this a number of times, such as in DA 4 when he wonders where various people who’ve passed away have gone … which is not paralleled in DN 18.
It’s not as common as I recall, and maybe it happens more often in the Agamas. I just spent time trying to find examples, and there aren’t that many. Some of the more important sutras like DN 15 begin this way, but they often are embellished with miraculous powers (IMHO). SA 473 has a monk thinking to himself and then going to the Buddha with a question, but the introduction is abbreviated away in SN 36.11. In Pali, the monk tells the Buddha that he had been thinking to himself when asking his question.
There’s quite a few sutras in which an interlocutor “gets up from quiet repose late in the day” and goes to ask the Buddha a question. I think these are the same scenario, but we aren’t explicitly told that they had had a thought occur to them. We just hear what they ask the Buddha.
I don’t currently collect these in the CIPS. I’m curious where you might have looked there. That way I could add them. I currently have lots of things under “Buddha, the> Buddha visits X”. “Buddha, the>Buddha visited by X” feels a bit vague. Likewise, “Monastics>visit the Buddha” could be a bit too broad.
But, wait (and this brings me to a point I wanted to make), DN 15 doesn’t actually begin this way.
Unlike all four of the Āgama versions, DN 15 begins with Ānanda’s approach and query sans any prelude. However, in the DN 15 commentary, Buddhaghosa gives the backstory in great detail: Ānanda’s realization while in meditation, the decision to approach the Buddha, etc.
I wonder, then, how many more suttas there are where the Āgama versions have the pre-approach formula in the mūla but where the Pāli has to be supplemented with the commentary.
Oh! Oops. I caught myself saying that about DN 18 too, and then I saw that it doesn’t. Perhaps this is some sort of regional literary difference then. To be honest, it feels like a case of textual expansion in later eras. The question is reiterated for the sake of repetition by having the interlocutor first think of the question to himself and then bring it to the Buddha.