To Māgaṇḍiya

"Even when I saw Craving, Discontent, and Lust,"

*(said the Buddha,)*

"I felt no desire for sex.

What is this thing, full of piss and shit?

I wouldn't even touch it with my foot."

"If you don't want a gem like this,"

*(said Māgaṇḍiya,)*

"a woman many kings desire —

what view, what practice, what life,

what rebirth do you preach?"

"'I assert this' — that thought doesn't come to me,"

*(the Buddha said to Māgaṇḍiya,)*

"considering what's tightly held in the teachings,

seeing into views without taking any up.

Searching, I saw the peace within."

"Judgments that have been formed —"

*(said Māgaṇḍiya,)*

"those, sage, you speak of without taking any up.

This matter you call 'the peace within' —

how do the wise describe it?"

"Not by view, not by tradition, not by knowledge,"

*(the Buddha said to Māgaṇḍiya,)*

"not by practice — purity isn't named this way.

Not by lack of view, tradition, knowledge, or practice either.

Letting these go, taking nothing up,

peaceful, leaning on nothing —

they wouldn't long for existence."

"If purity isn't by view, tradition, knowledge,"

*(said Māgaṇḍiya,)*

"or by practice — that's what you said.

Nor by lack of view, tradition, knowledge, or practice either.

Then this teaching is utter confusion, I think —

some hold purity comes from a view."

"Leaning on a view, asking again,"

*(the Buddha said to Māgaṇḍiya,)*

"you've gotten lost in what's tightly held.

From this, you haven't seen the slightest insight —

so you call it foolishness.

Whoever thinks "I'm equal, better, or lesser"

argues on that ground.

The one who doesn't waver in the three —

for them, no "equal, better."

What would that brahmin call true?

With whom dispute as "false"?

The one with no "equal" or "unequal" in them —

with whom would they take up debate?

Having left home, wandering homeless,

the sage makes no intimacies in town,

empty of sensual pleasures, favoring nothing ahead —

how could they take up a quarrel with anyone?

Things from which they live aloof in the world —

they don't take them up to speak.

Like a thorny lotus, water-born,

unstained by water or mud,

so the sage, speaker of peace, ungrasping,

is unstained by sensual pleasure and the world.

They don't reach knowing by view or reasoning,

don't fall into conceit — they're not made of that.

Not led by deeds or tradition,

they aren't drawn into settling anywhere.

For one whose perceptions have cooled, no knots;

for one freed by wisdom, no delusions.

But those who grasped perception and view —

they wander the world bumping into each other."