The Root of All Things MN1, Simple Translation

“Having perceived earth as earth, he conceives himself as earth, he conceives himself in earth, he conceives himself apart from earth, he conceives earth to be ‘mine,’ he delights in earth. Why is that? Because he has not fully understood it, I say”

In this Sutra, there is a repitation of
Perceive object as object
Conceives himself as object
Conceives himself in object
Conceives himself apart from object
Conceives object to be “mine”
Delight in the object

Now this might all make everyone look up perceive and conceive in a dictionary even though you know the meaning of the words, or make you read it again and again. Therefore, im going to offer a much simpler explanation.

And the Pali text

pathaviṃ pathavito sañjānāti; pathaviṃ pathavito saññatvā pathaviṃ maññati, pathaviyā maññati, pathavito maññati, pathaviṃ meti maññati, pathaviṃ abhinandati. Taṃ kissa hetu

Pali translation and explanation goes like this

Earth is understood as earth, having understood earth as earth he accepts earth is earth( based on how he understood it), he believes he is a product of earth, he believes he is from earth, he believes the earth is “mine” , he shows abhinandan(to believe something as sacred and show faith towards it), why is that? Because he does not know (he is ignorant/delusion), I say

You can keep changing the object in the sutra, with this now.

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i heard that MN 1 and 20 were added around few decades ago. There are only 150 Suttas in Srilankan Majjhima

Sorry, you’ve been misinformed. There’s about 150 suttas in the Majjhima, perhaps this is what you were thinking of.

As far as I know the only substantial addition to the canon in modern times was the addition of the extended passage of the four noble truths to MN10, which was made in Burma in the 19th century, I believe.

In his Anguttara translation Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi now uses “misconceive” instead, see e.g. AN 4.24. This is perhaps even better than “understand” because it makes it clear that the understanding is distorted.

edited now :sweat_smile:

Understood is the right word, reason being, we must first be clear about the fact that in buddhism the 2 true sources of knowledge is
a) perception
b) inference (anumāna)
Therefore, using the word conceive would again cause a little problems, however once clear on the 2 true ways to correct knowledge i.e perception and inference, mind objects can be tackled very well with this sutta.