SUTTA 74

[^730]: Dīghanakha was Ven. Sāriputta's nephew. At the time he approached the Buddha, Sāriputta had been a bhikkhu for only two weeks and was still a stream-enterer.

[^731]: MA holds that Dīghanakha is an annihilationist (ucchedavadin) and explains this assertion to mean: "No [mode of] rebirth is acceptable to me." However, the text itself does not give any concrete evidence supporting this interpretation. It seems much more likely that Dīghanakha's statement, "Nothing is acceptable to me" (sabbarn me na khamati), is intended to apply specifically to other philosophical views, and thus shows Dighanakha to be a radical sceptic of the class satirically characterised at MN 76.30 as "eel-wrigglers". His assertion would then be tantamount to a wholesale repudiation of all philosophical views.

[^732]: This exchange, as interpreted by MA and MT, should be understood as follows: The Buddha suggests, by his question, that Dighanakha's assertion involves an inherent contradiction. For he cannot reject everything without also rejecting his own view, and this would entail the opposite position, namely, that something is acceptable to him. However, though Dighanakha recognises the implication of the Buddha's question, he continues to insist on his view that nothing is acceptable to him.

[^733]: MA says that the first sentence refers to those who first take up a basic eternalist or annihilationist view and then subsequently adopt secondary variations on that view; the second sentence refers to those who abandon their basic view without adopting an alternative. But if, as seems plausible, Dighanakha was a radical sceptic, then the Buddha's statement might be understood to point to an unsatisfactoriness inherent in the sceptic's position: it is psychologically uncomfortable to insist on remaining in the dark. Thus most sceptics, while professing a rejection of all views, surreptitiously adopt some definite view, while a few abandon their scepticism to seek a path to personal knowledge.

[^734]: MA identifies the three views here as eternalism, annihilationism, and partial eternalism. The eternalist view is close to lust (särägäya santike), etc., because it affirms and delights in existence in however sublimated a form; annihilationism is close to non-lust, etc., because, though involving a wrong conception of self, it leads to disenchantment with existence. If the second view is understood as radical scepticism, it could also be seen as close to non-lust in that it expresses disillusionment with the attempt to buttress the attachment to existence with a theoretical foundation and thus represents a tentative, though mistaken, step in the direction of dispassion.

[^735]: MA: This teaching is undertaken to show Dighanakha the danger in his view and thereby encourage him to discard it.

[^736]: MA: At this point Dighanakha has discarded his annihilationist view. Thus the Buddha now undertakes to teach him insight meditation, first by way of the impermanence of the body and then by way of the impermanence of the mental factors under the heading of feeling.

[^737]: MA quotes a verse that says that an arahant may use the words "I" and "mine" without giving rise to conceit or misconceiving them as referring to a self or ego (SN 1:5/i.14). See too DN 9.53/i.202, where the Buddha says of expressions employing the word "self": "These are merely names, expressions, turns of speech, designations in common use in the world, which the Tathāgata uses without misapprehending them."

[^738]: MA: Having reflected on the discourse spoken to his nephew, Ven. Sāriputta developed insight and attained arahantship. Dighanakha attained the fruit of stream-entry.

[^739]: See nn.588-89.