The early teaching, redux, another "free translation" or "free reconstruction":

The Watercooler
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Yattha sīlaṁ tattha paññā, yattha paññā tattha sīlaṁ.
conduct and knowledge always go together.

Nissaraṇa, or what knowledge is:

Atthi, bhikkhave, aññeva dhammā gambhīrā duddasā duranubodhā santā paṇītā atakkāvacarā nipuṇā paṇḍitavedanīyā, ye tathāgato sayaṁ abhiññā sacchikatvā pavedeti, yehi tathāgatassa yathābhuccaṁ vaṇṇaṁ sammā vadamānā vadeyyuṁ.
“There is a principle—deep, hard to see, hard to understand, peaceful, sublime, beyond the scope of logic, subtle, comprehensible to the astute—which one who has realized it makes known. Those who genuinely praise the one who has realized would rightly speak of this principle.”

Tayidaṁ, bhikkhave, tathāgato pajānāti:
One who has realized, realizes this:

‘ayaṁ kho me kāyo rūpī cātumahābhūtiko mātāpettikasambhavo odanakummāsūpacayo aniccucchādanaparimaddanabhedanaviddhaṁsanadhammo;
“‘This body of mine is physical. It’s made up of the four elements, produced by mother and father, built up from rice and porridge, liable to impermanence, to wearing away and erosion, to breaking up and destruction.”

idañca pana me viññāṇaṁ ettha sitaṁ ettha paṭibaddhan’ti.
“And this consciousness of mine is attached to it, tied to it.’”

‘ime diṭṭhiṭṭhānā evaṅgahitā evaṁparāmaṭṭhā evaṅgatikā bhavanti evaṁabhisamparāyā’ti,
“‘If I hold on to and attach to an attachment, (it’s negation, it’s conjunction, it’s neither,) then the attachment, (it’s negation, it’s conjunction, it’s neither) will have whatever consequences are implied by what I have attached to.’”

tañca tathāgato pajānāti, tato ca uttaritaraṁ pajānāti; tañca pajānanaṁ na parāmasati, aparāmasato cassa paccattaññeva nibbuti viditā.
“Understanding this and what goes beyond this, and not misapprehending that understanding, complete understanding is achieved.”

Vedanānaṁ samudayañca atthaṅgamañca assādañca ādīnavañca nissaraṇañca yathābhūtaṁ viditvā anupādāvimutto, bhikkhave, tathāgato.
“So understanding the coming, going, appeal, danger, and letting go of any attachment, (it’s negation, it’s conjunction, it’s neither) one who has realized this truth is freed through not grasping at these attachments (negations etc).”

Tassa evaṁ jānato evaṁ passato kāmāsavāpi cittaṁ vimuccati, bhavāsavāpi cittaṁ vimuccati, avijjāsavāpi cittaṁ vimuccati,
“Knowing and seeing like this, thier mind is freed from the attachments of desire to experience, desire for meaning, and desire to know.”

vimuttasmiṁ ‘vimuttam’iti ñāṇaṁ hoti
“When freed, one knows they’re freed.”

DN1 DN2 DN3 DN4 …

Attā nirattā na hi tassa atthi,
For picking up and putting down is not what they do;

Adhosi so diṭṭhimidheva sabbanti.
They have shaken off all views in this very life.

Snp4.3 …

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I appreciate these summaries with focus on the gradual training.

The passage on the body and consciousness, though, is unique to DN and one place it seems added to MN, IIRC. It is not in the standard list for the ‘paññā’ section across the principle nikāyas. As such, it does not hold up to the scrutiny of your earlier principles.

On the other hand, the fourfold ‘suffering/origin/cessation/practice’ scheme does appear within the gradual training in the DN and MN, for example. It is also the standard refrain mirroring the ‘undeclared points’ with what the Buddha does declare. See e.g. DN 9 and MN 63. In your classification, the fourfold scheme then is common to both the philosophical discussions of the early prose, including DN, and the gradual training of the early prose. The consciousness-body section is not in either account.

It feels as though you’ve leaned in to a bias against the fourfold scheme in presenting these without it. I suppose you equate it with the 6-fold ‘x/arising/vanishing/gratification/drawback/escape’ scheme, which is of course fair; it’s just textually less prominent in the gradual training discourses.

It is also unclear how you justify ‘desire to know’ for ‘avijjāsava.’ It cannot be glossed as ‘vijjā + āsava’ as the initial word is unambiguously ‘avijjā,’ i.e. ‘non-knowledge.’

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I agree that it does not meet the criteria I have set up for analysis of the strata and development of the texts. I believe it is absent from the Chinese at DA20 for example.

However I think it is very useful philosophically to the exposition of this reconstruction.

So it’s a shame! :slight_smile:

I guess I will revise without it, thanks for catching it :slight_smile:

No bias against the fourfold scheme, I just think it is literally included in the sixfold.

I think that the sixfold list is just as widespread as the fourfold one in the early material, and I think it more or less just saves time to fold it into the main text.

I think in all probability many of these tropes started out as singular recollections that where then pressed into service hundreds of times each through the EBT.

Thus the fact that all the patipada suttas use the four fold list is not really evidence of anything more than that the first one did and the rest copied that. Similarly with the escape (6 fold) trope.

But they are both clearly very early, very important, universally recognised teachings.

And I think they are pretty straightforwardly reconcilable as one being a shortening of the other for terms that have no gratification.

i.e what is the gratification of suffering?

there isn’t one pretty much by definition.

and mentioning it’s danger is redundant too.

So we end up with just 4 relevant factors for things like suffering and poisons.

But this obscures the full scope and power of the Buddha’s insight which includes the savour and the danger of any term or attachment, including lovely stuff.

This one is again just sort of experimental, I am trying to get to the bottom of what the asava’s really meant to the first layer of the EBT, and it seems to me likely that we start out in the early poetry with maybe one or one and a half, that is that the basic idea in the poetry is that:

sensuality is the obstacle to wisdom.

Everything else is just an elaboration of that idea.

kāmāsavāpi cittaṁ vimuccati, the mind is free form sensuality
bhavāsavāpi cittaṁ vimuccati, the mind is free from being
avijjāsavāpi cittaṁ vimuccati, the mind is free from ignorance

I.e wanting to know something that you don’t know, I think “ignorance” sort of obscures the active and pernicious nature of avijjāsavā, all the āsavā appear to be dynamic, formative influences, basically the desire to feel pleasures, the desire to “be” someone, and the desire to know or find certainty, all of these things drive us through life.

These are the things given up by the practitioner.