would practicing the 8 precepts everyday help someone realize stream entry faster?
Thera are too many factors to calculate such things, the Dhamma is for wise, not unwise, and without fulfilling this condition, no other things can be helpful.
But I think it safely can be said, that keeping 8 precepts should be more fruitful than 5. To keep celibacy is a very good idea per se.
According to many sutta, one needs to see other nobles first.
Like MN 2.
But take a learned noble disciple who has seen the noble ones, and is skilled and trained in the teaching of the noble ones. Theyāve seen true persons, and are skilled and trained in the teaching of the true persons.
Ex: Sariputta saw Ven Assajji in Vinaya or MN 56, etc
Arising of right view requirements are:
Voice of another and yoniso manasikara
MN 43
Yes, with all other things being equal, I believe that keeping the 8 precepts in daily life (in other words renunciation from sense pleasures like over-eating and entertaiment) will make the path to stream entry quicker.
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I feel like it would help with sense restraint towards the gender your attracted to which would help diminish lust an unskillful mental state. Renouncing strong worldly pleasures such as food, sex and entertainment would be a wholesome citta.
The Eight Precepts are not always better than the Five. Trying to practice advanced precepts in unfavorable environments can disturb your mind and cause irritation towards people who are somehow āinterferingā with your practice.
Here are some factors that contribute to achieving stream-entry:
- Faith in the Buddha
- Faith in the Dhamma
- Faith in the Sangha
- Advanced virtue that supports concentration
- Generosity, which is a requirement for developing advanced virtue.
- Good friendships
- Wise attention to phenomena (especially impermanence)
- Listening to the true Dhamma
ā Hearing directly from a noble disciple is far better, but readings, recordings, and online forums also help. - Studying the Blessed Oneās discourses that are deep, profound, transcendent, dealing with emptiness/voidness.
If some of these factors are not strong enough, an excessive focus on virtue/precepts may actually hinder your practice.
- If you live alone, the Eight Precepts are quite feasible, unless you have strong desires for sensory stimulation (not just sexual, but any type of sensory excitement). In this case, you can be more flexible with the last precepts, but never with the first five.
āBeing flexible doesnāt mean being complacent; it means not exceeding your limits or making the practice too difficult. - If you live with non-Buddhists, practicing the Eight Precepts in the Uposathas can be difficult, and daily practice is nearly impossible (speaking from personal experience).
- If you live with Buddhists, the level of difficulty varies ā do you have a girlfriend? Are you married? Do you have children? Are those you live with interested in advanced meditation practice?
In the time of the Buddha, it was very common for lay disciples, including stream-enterers, to focus more on the Five Precepts, along with the Uposathas.
[SuttaCentral](https://Dhammadinna Sutta SN 55.53 )
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Thank you for that reply
The 8 precepts vs the 5 are an increased version of sense restraint. So map this onto the gradual training (any of the first suttas in DN) and you will see the things which make sense restraint easier. So, as well as practicing 8 precepts one would want to understand WHY sila is important and have that based on both oneās personal values, as well as faith in the Triple Gem.
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On this topic, can I ask why your bed on the floor vs up on a base actually matters?
In my povo days I have just had a mattress on the floor and it didnāt bother me, but I do think now, what would one realistically gain by being closer to a floor that gets dust/ dirt on it and that would be harder & harder to get up from the more elderly someone became. 
How is that going to affect attachment, virtue, etc?
Edit to add: ā¦ and why does it matter what time you eat? I actually only eat a few times a week - but never in the morning. No particular reason for my eating habits - I just rarely feel hungry so donāt bother. Seems weird to me that if I ate every day and in the morning instead, it would (like the bed thing) somehow add up to any moral outcome.
Or is the morning munchies thing just more a tradition coz the Buddha went out in the daylight times for food?
Oh ā¦ and is it really offensive to take food Dana and not eat yourself? I tried that and got told (by a lay woman) I would offend people if I did not eat, so felt obliged to eat when I did not want to.
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One can also be attached to rules. I understand that some basic rules are needed to live together with other people, and to keep prommisses like not killing, lying etc. is really great, but being restraint or discplined by endless rules?..prff. Looks heavy to me.
We can all see that spontanuous people are often more happy, naturally joyful, and people that are very restraint make no happy impression. Also this, i feel, reveals something about the cause of suffering.
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Refraining from over indulging in sleep, eating, and having no sexual activity or entertainment brings up defilements so you can work to diminish those defilements. I believe thatās the idea behind the uposatha.
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The extra training rules are meant for renunciation training, and are not moral in nature.
I think itās good to consider the extra renunciant training rules in terms of the practices in the middle part of the gradual training. Sleeping on a bed that is not excessively comfortable makes devotion to wakefulness easierā¦you are less likely to want to lounge around. If you already have that in place, I donāt see any need for the rule. Similarly, the 6th is about moderation in eating. It sounds like youāre already doing that? Just eating for the purpose of sustaining the body and not for pleasure or other reasons. If youāre already doing that, the specifics of the rule arenāt really relevant, I think.
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Getting to stream entry means attaining to right view, which means clearing out wrong views. The vast majority of our wrong views are hidden from us. They are what prevent us from truly seeing what is wholesome and unwholesome. The renunciant precepts can be helpful for this, because they can help draw out the views you have that prevent you from seeing clearly. Taking them on is useful in that sense because then you can investigate why you feel resistance or difficulty with them, what you are telling yourself to use as an excuse, what are the things you believe that you do not know you believe that support unwholesome mind states and block right view from arising.
I would also say if you arenāt making use of them in this way, if youāre just following rules to follow rules because you think following the rule will get a result, without really understanding the purpose and how to use it, there isnāt really a lot of point in doing it.
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Thank you 
ā¦ that makes it make more sense.
I still like what I do eat to be particularly nice / yummy, ( no spaghetti mixed with ice cream sorta thing like Iāve heard Ajahn Brahm comment on lol 
) but yes itās also very much just to sustain my body. I start to feel nauseous somewhere b/n 5-7 days of not eating, so eat to avoid that kicking in and I figure I better intake some vitamins for my own good too.
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Oh yes. I did go for awhile wondering if I should eat food that wasnāt so good to tame my sensual desire, but my teacher basically told me that was kind of a dumb idea. I do watch my mind while eating and try to let go if I am getting too excited about it. I definitely have a tendency for that. Helps that Iām actually an awesome cook so my meals are great! 
No ice cream and spaghetti for me, either!
Iām a bit envious you can go so long without eating! That would free up a fair amount of my timeā¦
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Nothing to envy, I end up with āvegan diseaseā (my term for being medically confirmed low vitamin levels) ā¦ I once even had a laboratory call me at 11 pm asking if I had any bananas to eat right then coz my K/ potassium was at heart failure levels 
ā¦. And my lack of dairy intake has probably helped my recent osteoporosis diagnosis 30 years too early too. I practically shattered my arm falling over ice skating 6 weeks ago. There are definite positives to eating more than I do 
( not anorexic btw - I weigh 60kg)
Iām thinking it must be hard for monastics who donāt even get a say in what they do get to eat to maintain everything at good levels.
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Positively, as stated in AN8.41
Uposatha, to my recollection of the suttas, is chiefly described as a meritorious memorial of the noble ones of the past. By definition, if youāre taking these precepts temporarily, theyāre not going to directly be a lasting change. But theyāre beneficial in distinguishing these as special days dedicated to the path. In order to follow any sort of rule, you have to be mindful (āmind the gapā to practice safe subway ridership), and so while you follow these observances there is an abiding awareness of what you are doing (imitating the noble ones) and that is beneficial.
But yes, itās fair to observe that the rule against high beds is unlike the rule against killing. Itās stated multiple times that giving up killing grants safety to other beings, who do not want to be killed. Thereās no similar idea that other beings benefit from you abstaining from high beds. But that doesnāt mean theyāre unbenificial.
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