11. ‘Six conditions of welfare will I teach you, O brethren. Listen well, and attend, and I will speak.’
And on their expressing their assent, he spake as follows:
‘So long as the brethren shall persevere in kindness of action, speech, and thought amongst the saints, both in public and in private–so long as they shall divide without partiality, and share in common with the upright and the holy, all such things as they receive in accordance with the just provisions of the order, down even to the mere contents of a begging bowl–so long as the brethren shall live among the saints in the practice, both in public and in private, of those virtues which (unbroken, intact, unspotted, unblemished) are productive of freedom[1], and praised by the wise; which are untarnished by the desire of future life, or by the belief in the efficacy of outward acts[2]; and which are conducive to high and holy thoughts–so long as the brethren shall live among the saints, cherishing, both in public and in private, that noble and saving faith which leads to the complete destruction of the sorrow of him who acts according to it–so long may the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper.
‘So long as these six conditions shall continue to
exist among the brethren so long as they are instructed in these six conditions, so long may the brethren be expected not to decline, but to prosper.’
[1. Buddhaghosa takes this in a spiritual sense, ‘tâni pan’ etâni (sîlâni) tanhâ-dâsavyato moketvâ bhugissa-bhâva-karanato bhugissâni:’ that is, ‘These virtues are bhugissâni because they bring one to the state of a free man by delivering him from the slavery of craving.’
2. ‘Tanhâ-ditthîhi aparâmatthattâ, idam nâma tvam âpannapubbo ti kenaki paramatthum asakkuneyyattâ ka, ‘aparâmatthâni’ (S. V. fol. 116), that is, ‘These virtues are called aparâmatthâni’ because they are untarnished by craving or delusion, and because no one can say of him who practises them, “you have been already guilty of such and such a sin.”‘ Craving is here the hope of a future life in heaven, and delusion the belief in the efficacy of rites and ceremonies (the two nissayas) which are condemned as unworthy inducements to virtue.]
Buddhist Suttas – MAHÂ-PARINIBBÂNA-SUTTANTA
Translated from Pâli by T. W. Rhys Davids [1881]
http://www.sacred-texts.com/bud/sbe11/sbe1103.htm