What Makes a Faculty Dominant?
This page carries Ru-Yi's complete translation of fascicle 3: the whole of Chapter 2 (根品, the Indriya-nirdeśa, "Exposition of the Faculties"). It covers what "faculty" means as a technical term, the dominant function and essential nature of each of the twenty-two faculties, the famous account of an arhat's power to consciously extend or relinquish a lifespan, and a full cross-classification of all twenty-two faculties by contamination, moral quality, cosmological realm, karmic ripening, what is cut off by seeing versus cultivation, and the complete map of which faculties necessarily travel together.
1. What Does "Faculty" Mean? Opening Chapter Two
Fascicle 3 opens Chapter 2 exactly where fascicle 2 left off — the twenty-two faculties were just listed and mapped onto the eighteen elements — and now asks what "faculty" itself means as a technical term.
如是因界已列諸根，即於此中根是何義？最勝自在光顯名根，由此總成根增上義。此增上義誰望於誰？頌曰：傳說五於四，四根於二種，五八染淨中，各別為增上。
Thus, by way of the elements, the faculties have already been listed. Now, within this topic, what does "faculty" mean? What is supreme, autonomous, and manifest is named "faculty" — by this, altogether, the meaning of a faculty's dominant function is established. This dominant function — dominant over what, relative to what? A verse states: tradition holds that five are dominant over four matters; four faculties, over two kinds each; five and eight, amid defilement and purity, are each respectively dominant.
Chapter 2 (根品, the Indriya-nirdeśa) picks up directly from where Chapter 1 closed: the twenty-two faculties were just named and mapped onto the eighteen elements at the very end of fascicle 2. Now the treatise asks a deeper question — what does "faculty" (根, indriya, literally "root") actually mean? The answer is a threefold definition: something counts as a faculty when it is supreme in its domain, autonomous — not dependent on something else for its characteristic action — and manifest, its effect being evident and observable. Together these constitute what the tradition calls a faculty's "dominant function" (增上義, adhipatya-artha).
Since "dominant" is inherently relational — dominant over something — the immediate question is what, exactly, each faculty dominates. The verse previews the shape of the answer before filling in any content: the five physical senses are each dominant over four matters; a further group of four faculties are each dominant over two; and the remaining thirteen — split as five and eight — are dominant specifically with respect to defilement and purity. What each of these groupings actually consists of is what the rest of this chapter spells out, faculty by faculty.
2. The Five Senses' Four Dominant Functions
The prose fills in the first group from the verse: the eye and the other four physical faculties are each dominant in exactly the same four respects.
論曰：眼等五根各於四事能為增上：一莊嚴身、二導養身、三生識等、四不共事。且眼耳根莊嚴身者，謂若盲聾身醜陋故。導養身者，謂因見聞避險難故。生識等者，謂發二識及相應故。不共事者，謂能見色聞聲別故。
Prose: The eye and the other four faculties are each dominant over four matters: first, adorning the body; second, guiding and nourishing the body; third, generating consciousness and its associates; fourth, their own exclusive function. As for the eye and ear faculties adorning the body: this means that if one were blind or deaf, the body would be disfigured. As for guiding and nourishing the body: this means that, through seeing and hearing, one avoids danger and difficulty. As for generating consciousness and its associates: this means that they give rise to their respective two consciousnesses together with the mental factors that accompany them. As for their exclusive function: this means their distinct capacity to see form and to hear sound.
鼻舌身根莊嚴身者，如眼耳說。導養身者，謂於段食能受用故。生識等者，謂發三識及相應故。不共事者，謂嗅甞覺香味觸故。
As for the nose, tongue, and body faculties adorning the body: this is as explained for the eye and ear. As for guiding and nourishing the body: this means that, through them, one is able to partake of physical food. As for generating consciousness and its associates: this means that they give rise to their respective three consciousnesses together with the mental factors that accompany them. As for their exclusive function: this means their distinct capacity to smell fragrance, taste flavor, and feel touch.
The same four-function template is applied identically to all five physical senses. "Adorning the body" echoes a discussion from far back in fascicle 1, about why the eye and ear come in pairs — there the reasoning was rejected as an explanation for why there are two, but the aesthetic dimension resurfaces here in a different role: a blind or deaf body is conventionally regarded as disfigured by the very absence of these faculties, so their presence is credited with adorning it. "Guiding and nourishing" splits naturally along the reach of each sense: the two distance senses, eye and ear, help one navigate away from danger, while the three contact senses, nose, tongue, and body, directly enable partaking of physical food — smell and taste connect to food obviously enough, and the body faculty's role becomes clear once one recalls that eating and digesting are themselves tactile, bodily processes. "Generating consciousness" is the most expected function of all — each faculty gives rise to its own dedicated consciousness. "Exclusive function" names what only that faculty, and no other, can do: only the eye sees form, only the ear hears sound, and so on through smell, taste, and touch.
3. Female and Male: Marking Out the Sexes
The second group from the verse begins: the female and male faculties, each dominant over two matters of their own.
女、男、命、意各於二事能為增上。且女、男根二增上者，一有情異、二分別異。有情異者，由此二根令諸有情女男類別。分別異者，由此二根形相言音乳房等別。
The female, male, life, and mind faculties are each dominant over two matters. As for the female and male faculties' two dominant functions: first, differentiating beings; second, differentiating characteristics. "Differentiating beings" means that, by means of these two faculties, sentient beings are distinguished into the female and male kinds. "Differentiating characteristics" means that, by means of these two faculties, bodily form, voice, the breasts, and so on are differentiated between the sexes.
The sex faculties' two dominant functions operate at two different levels. "Differentiating beings" is almost definitional: having a female or male faculty is precisely what sorts a given being into one sex-category or the other in the first place. "Differentiating characteristics" is the observable, downstream consequence — body shape, voice, and secondary sexual characteristics such as the breasts all follow from, and are credited to, that underlying faculty.
4. An Alternate View: Sex, Defilement, and Purity
A rival opinion reframes the sex faculties' dominant function away from sex-differentiation and toward a claim about the full range of moral and spiritual possibility.
有說：此於染淨增上故言於二。所以者何？本性損壞。扇搋半擇及二形人無不律儀無間斷善諸雜染法，亦無律儀得果離染諸清淨法。
Some say instead: these two faculties are dominant with respect to defilement and purity, and that is why it is said they are dominant "over two." Why is this? Because of a fundamentally damaged nature. Ṣaṇḍhas, paṇḍakas, and hermaphrodites have neither the capacity for formal non-restraint nor for the uninterrupted cutting-off of wholesome roots, nor any of the various afflictive dharmas that depend on these; nor do they have the capacity for formal restraint, the attainment of the noble fruits, or any of the various purifying dharmas free from defilement.
On this alternate view, having an unambiguous, functioning sex faculty is what makes a person capable of the full range from one moral extreme to the other: capable of formally undertaking non-restraint (非律儀, a technical category for publicly vowing to a livelihood built on killing, such as a hunter or butcher — understood in this tradition as a formal negative commitment carrying real karmic weight) and everything that follows from it, all the way to formal monastic restraint and the attainment of the noble fruits.
The claim is that people the tradition classifies as ṣaṇḍha (traditionally, those without male generative capacity), paṇḍaka (a broader classical category for men considered incapable of ordinary sexual function), and hermaphrodites (二形人, beings held to possess both sex faculties) were excluded, in classical Vinaya, from both extremes — barred from full ordination and from the fruits of the path, on the reasoning that their sex faculty was itself considered "damaged." This reflects a specific, historically situated Vinaya doctrine about ordination eligibility that predates and differs sharply from how gender and embodiment are understood today. It is translated here for accuracy to the source, not as an endorsement, and remains a subject of ongoing scholarly and doctrinal reconsideration within contemporary Buddhist communities.
5. Life and Mind: Sustaining a Being, and Carrying It Onward
The verse's second group continues with the life faculty's own two functions, and the mind faculty's — the first of which reaches back to the mechanics of rebirth itself.
命根二者，謂於眾同分能續及能持。
The life faculty's two dominant functions are: sustaining continuity within one's own class of being, and maintaining that continuity.
意根二者，謂能續後有及自在隨行。能續後有者，如契經言：時健達縛於二心內隨一現前，謂或愛俱、或恚俱等。
The mind faculty's two dominant functions are: the capacity to continue into a subsequent existence, and autonomous accompanying activity. As for "the capacity to continue into a subsequent existence" — a sutra says: at that time, the gandharva has one of two states of mind present — that is, either accompanied by desire, or accompanied by aversion, and so on.
"Class-commonality" (眾同分, nikāya-sabhāga) is a specific Abhidharma category — a formation dissociated from mind — that accounts for why members of the same species or realm of birth genuinely share a common nature, distinct from other kinds of being. The life faculty's job is to sustain a being's continuity within that shared class across a single lifetime: first establishing it, then upholding it moment to moment until death.
The mind faculty's first function reaches into the mechanics of rebirth itself. "Gandharva" (健達縛) is this tradition's technical term for the intermediate-state being — the being that exists briefly between one life's death and the next life's conception — and the cited sutra describes it as drawn toward its future rebirth by one of two possible orientations: desire or aversion toward the scene of its coming conception. The mind faculty's second function, "autonomous accompanying activity," is still to be explained in what follows.
6. The Mind's Autonomy: A Famous Verse on Mind's Primacy
The mind faculty's second dominant function closes the "four faculties, two matters each" group with a well-known canonical statement of mind's reach.
自在隨行者，如契經言：心能導世間，心能遍攝受，如是心一法，皆自在隨行。
As for "autonomous accompanying activity" — a sutra says: mind can guide the world; mind can universally gather and receive it. Thus this single dharma, mind, in all things acts autonomously and accompanies them.
This is a well-known canonical verse celebrating mind's primacy, echoing the same sentiment found across Buddhist literature that mind precedes and leads all things. Where "continuing into a subsequent existence" named mind's specific role in driving rebirth, "autonomous accompanying activity" makes a broader claim: mind leads and gathers in the world at large — every experience, every action, is something mind actively directs and takes hold of, rather than something that merely happens to it. This closes the mind faculty's two dominant functions, completing the group of four faculties — female, male, life, mind — each dominant over two matters, as the chapter's opening verse promised.
7. Feelings and the Path-Faculties: Defilement Versus Purity
The verse's final grouping arrives: thirteen remaining faculties, split five and eight, dominant respectively over defilement and over purity.
樂等五受、信等八根，於染淨中如次增上。樂等五受染增上者，貪等隨眠所隨增故。信等八根淨增上者，諸清淨法隨生長故。
The five feelings — pleasure and the rest — and the eight faculties — faith and the rest — are dominant, respectively in order, with respect to defilement and purity. As for the five feelings being dominant with respect to defilement: this is because the latent afflictions, such as greed, increase in dependence on them. As for the eight faculties being dominant with respect to purity: this is because the various purifying dharmas grow in dependence on them.
This completes the chapter's opening verse: thirteen remaining faculties split five and eight between defilement and purity. The five feelings — pleasure, pain, joy, distress, equanimity — are dominant over the defiled side, because the latent afflictions (隨眠, anuśaya — the dormant, deeply rooted tendencies toward greed, hatred, and the rest) are said to increase in dependence on feeling; feeling is what these afflictions cling to and grow from. The eight remaining faculties — the five spiritual faculties (faith, diligence, mindfulness, concentration, wisdom) plus the three "pure" faculties tied to progressively realizing the noble truths — are dominant over the pure side, because the qualities of the path develop in dependence on them. With this, all twenty-two faculties have been assigned their dominant function, exactly matching the shape the opening verse previewed.
8. A Dissenting View: Feelings Can Also Purify
A minority opinion complicates the clean division just drawn, citing canonical formulas that tie specific feelings directly to stages of the path.
有餘師說：樂等於淨亦為增上。如契經說：「樂故心定」、「苦為信依」，亦「出離依喜及憂、捨」。毘婆沙師傳說如此。
Other masters say: pleasure and the rest are also dominant with respect to purity. As a sutra says: "through pleasure, the mind becomes concentrated"; "suffering is the basis for faith"; and also, "renunciation depends on joy, and on distress and equanimity." This is what the Vaibhāṣika masters traditionally say.
This dissenting view complicates the tidy five-defiled, eight-pure split just established, by citing canonical formulas that tie each of the five feelings directly to a specific stage of spiritual progress rather than treating all five as uniformly defilement-generating: pleasure is said to be the condition for concentration to arise, pain the condition for faith to take root, and joy, distress, and equanimity are each said to support renunciation in turn. If feelings can support the path this directly, they cannot be neatly confined to the defiled side alone — a genuine complication the treatise records rather than resolves outright. The closing attribution to the Vaibhāṣika masters describes the preceding mainstream position, the clean five-and-eight division, marking this section's dissenting view as a minority opinion weighed against that consensus rather than replacing it.
9. A Sharper Objection, and the Treatise's Real Answer
A genuinely sharp critique of the earlier fourfold account triggers a single, condensed verse that restates all twenty-two faculties' dominant functions on cleaner grounds.
有餘師說：能導養身非眼等用，是識增上，識了方能避於險難，受段食故。見色等用亦非異識，故不共事於眼等根，不可立為別增上用，故非由此眼等成根。若爾，云何？頌曰：
Other masters say: "guiding and nourishing the body" is not actually a function of the eye and the other senses, but rather is the dominant function of consciousness — because it is only once consciousness has cognized something that one can avoid danger and difficulty, or partake of physical food. Moreover, functions like "seeing form" are likewise not distinct from consciousness; therefore, "exclusive function," with respect to the eye and the other faculties, cannot be established as a separate dominant function, and so it is not by virtue of this that the eye and the rest become faculties. If that is so, then how should it be explained? A verse states:
了自境增上，總立於六根，從身立二根，女男性增上，於同住雜染，清淨增上故。應知命五受，信等立為根，未當知已知，具知根亦爾，於得後後道，涅槃等增上。
Cognizing one's own object is the dominant function by which, altogether, the six faculties are established. From the body faculty, the two faculties are established, their dominant function being the establishing of sexual nature. With respect to sustaining continuity, and to defilement, and to purity — accordingly, life, the five feelings, and faith and the rest should be understood as established as faculties. The faculties of "I shall come to know what is not yet known," "full knowledge," and "having complete knowledge" are likewise so, their dominant function lying in attaining each subsequent stage of the path, and in nirvana.
The objection is a genuine philosophical point, not a technicality: of the earlier fourfold account (adorning the body, guiding and nourishing it, generating consciousness, exclusive function), two of the four — guiding/nourishing and exclusive function — are said to belong not to the bare sense organ at all, but to consciousness, since it is only once a cognitive act has actually occurred that danger gets avoided or food gets eaten. The eye by itself, apart from consciousness, does nothing; it is always consciousness that does the seeing. This is the same theme fascicle 2 explored at length in its debate over whether the eye or the eye-consciousness truly sees.
The verse's answer sidesteps that whole fourfold framework in favor of one clean criterion for the six sense-and-mind faculties: "cognizing one's own object." Each of the six is dominant simply insofar as it is what makes cognition of its own specific domain possible — the eye for form, the ear for sound, mind for whatever only mind can access — a criterion that survives the objection because it never claims the raw organ does the avoiding, eating, or seeing itself, only that it is what enables cognizing its object in the first place. The rest of the verse then restates, in extremely compressed form, everything already explained about the remaining sixteen faculties — sex, life, feelings, and the path-faculties — confirming they all hold up under this same underlying approach.
10. The Three Pure Faculties, Explained Two Ways
The verse's final, newest claim gets its own prose elaboration: two different ways of understanding how the three "pure" faculties build toward liberation.
論曰：言亦爾者，類顯一一各能為根，謂未知當知根於得已知根道有增上用，已知根於得具知根道有增上用，具知根於得涅槃有增上用，非心未解脫能般涅槃故。
Prose: As for saying "likewise so" — this indicates, by analogy, that each one individually can serve as a faculty. That is: the faculty of "I shall come to know what is not yet known" has its dominant function in attaining the path of "full knowledge"; the faculty of "full knowledge" has its dominant function in attaining the path of "having complete knowledge"; the faculty of "having complete knowledge" has its dominant function in attaining nirvana — since a mind not yet liberated cannot achieve final nirvana.
等言為顯復有異門。云何異門？謂見所斷煩惱滅中未知當知根有增上用，於修所斷煩惱滅中已知根有增上用，於現法樂住中具知根有增上用，由此能領受解脫喜樂故。
The word "and the like" is meant to indicate that there is yet another explanatory approach. What is this other approach? Within the cessation of the afflictions to be cut off by seeing the truths, the faculty of "I shall come to know what is not yet known" has its dominant function; within the cessation of the afflictions to be cut off by cultivation, the faculty of "full knowledge" has its dominant function; within dwelling in present-life bliss, the faculty of "having complete knowledge" has its dominant function — because, through it, one is able to experience the joy and bliss of liberation.
The treatise records two rival readings of the three pure faculties' progression rather than choosing between them. The first is sequential: each faculty's dominant achievement is unlocking the next one's stage — the first enables reaching the second, the second the third, and the third enables nirvana itself, since, as the text notes, an unliberated mind cannot achieve final nirvana. This maps the three onto successive milestones along a single continuous path.
The second reading instead ties each faculty to a distinct type of affliction being eliminated. The first is dominant specifically during the cutting-off of intellectually-produced afflictions — the path of seeing, when wrong views collapse all at once upon a first genuine insight, the same "cut off by seeing" territory covered much earlier in this translation. The second is dominant during the gradual cutting-off of habitually-produced afflictions, the path of cultivation. The third is dominant specifically during "dwelling in present-life bliss" (現法樂住), the technical term for an arhat's blissful abiding after full liberation but before physical death. This second reading locates each faculty's dominance in a distinct mode of lived experience rather than a stage reached — the same three milestones, seen through a different lens.
11. The Real Test: Six Roles That Complete a Being's Existence
The objection about ignorance and ordinary bodily organs gets its full, considered answer, closing the entire opening inquiry of Chapter Two.
如是等事不應立根，由所許根有如是相。頌曰：心所依此別，此住此雜染，此資糧此淨，由此量立根。
Such things as these should not be established as faculties, because what is accepted as a "faculty" has specifically this character. A verse states: mind's support, this differentiation, this continuance, this defilement, this provision, this purification — by this measure, the faculties are established.
論曰：心所依者，眼等六根。此內六處是有情本，此相差別由女男根，復由命根此一期住。此成雜染由五受根，此淨資糧由信等五，此成清淨由後三根，由此立根事皆究竟。是故不應許無明等及語具等亦立為根，彼無此中增上用故。
Prose: "Mind's support" refers to the eye and the other faculties — these six internal fields are the root of a sentient being. This differentiation is accounted for by the female and male faculties. This continuance for one lifetime, in turn, is accounted for by the life faculty. This becoming defiled is accounted for by the five feeling faculties. This provision for purity is accounted for by faith and the other four. This becoming pure is accounted for by the last three faculties. By this, the matter of establishing the faculties is entirely complete. Therefore, one should not accept that ignorance and the like, or the organs of speech and the like, should also be established as faculties, since they lack a dominant function in this specific sense.
The real criterion for "faculty" was never simply "has some dominant function over some effect" — that loose test was exactly what let ignorance and ordinary bodily organs slip in, since they too obviously dominate their own respective effects. The actual criterion is narrower and more structured: a faculty is dominant with respect to one of exactly six roles that, together, comprehensively map a sentient being's whole existential trajectory. What supports its basic capacity for cognition: the six sense-and-mind faculties. What differentiates it by sex: the two sex faculties. What sustains it through one lifetime: the life faculty. What causes it to become defiled: the five feelings. What provisions the path toward purification: the five spiritual faculties. And what completes its actual purification: the three pure faculties.
Ignorance and the speech, hand, and foot organs, however genuinely "dominant" over their own narrow effects, simply do not correspond to any of these six comprehensive roles — they are dominant over some local process, not over one of the six dimensions that define a being's total arc from arising to liberation. With this, the objection is fully answered, and the entire opening inquiry of Chapter 2 — what makes something a faculty at all — reaches its considered, complete resolution.
12. A Mirror-Image Scheme: Fourteen Faculties for Saṃsāra, Eight for Liberation
A second complete accounting of all twenty-two faculties follows immediately, built on an entirely different organizing principle yet landing on the identical total.
復有餘師別說根相。頌曰：或流轉所依，及生住受用，建立前十四，還滅後亦然。
There are, moreover, other masters who explain the character of the faculties differently. A verse states: alternatively, by the support of transmigration, and by arising, sustaining, and experiencing, the first fourteen are established; and likewise, by cessation, for the latter as well.
論曰：或言顯此是餘師意，約流轉還滅立二十二根。流轉所依謂眼等六，生由女男從彼生故。住由命根，仗彼住故。受用由五受因，彼領納故。約此建立前十四根。
Prose: The word "alternatively" indicates that this represents another master's view: organizing the twenty-two faculties according to transmigration and cessation. The support of transmigration refers to the eye and the other five faculties, together six. Arising is accounted for by the female and male faculties, since beings arise from them. Sustaining is accounted for by the life faculty, since a being relies on it to continue. Experiencing is accounted for by the cause of the five feelings, since they register experience. By this, the first fourteen faculties are established.
還滅位中即約此四義類別故立後八根。還滅所依謂信等五，於三無漏由初故生，由次故住，由後受用，根量由此無減無增。
Within the stage of cessation, it is likewise by category of these same four meanings that the latter eight faculties are established. The support of cessation refers to faith and the other four. Among the three uncontaminated faculties, by the first, purification arises; by the next, it continues; by the last, it is experienced. By this, the count of the faculties is neither deficient nor excessive.
This alternate scheme reorganizes the same twenty-two faculties around Buddhism's two grand structural poles: transmigration (流轉, the forward current of saṃsāra) and cessation (還滅, the reverse current toward liberation). The same four-part logic — a support, an arising, a sustaining, and an experiencing — is applied to both sides in turn.
On the saṃsāric side: the six sense-and-mind faculties are what one relies on at all, the support; the two sex faculties are what a being arises from; the life faculty is what sustains a being through its lifetime; the five feelings are what registers lived experience — six plus two plus one plus five makes fourteen. On the liberating side, the same four roles recur in miniature: the five spiritual faculties are the support for the path, and the three pure faculties divide the remaining three roles among themselves — the first is when purification arises, the second when it continues, the third when it is fully experienced — five plus three makes eight. Fourteen plus eight is exactly twenty-two, with nothing left over and nothing missing: a second complete accounting of all twenty-two faculties, built on a wholly different organizing principle than the six-role scheme of the previous section, yet arriving at the identical total.
13. Closing the Reductio: Snakes, Gravity, and Where the Line Has to Be Drawn
The rebuttal turns concrete and almost empirical, working through hands, feet, and the excretory organs one by one before pushing the objection to a deliberate absurdity.
謂即手足異處異相差別生時名執行故。又離手足亦有執行，如腹行類。是故手足不可於彼建立為根。出大便處於能棄事不應立根，重物於空遍墮落故，又由風力引令出故。出小便處於生樂事不應立根，即女男根起此樂故。
That is: it is precisely when the hands and feet, in their different locations, generate their differentiated characteristics, that this is called "grasping and moving." Moreover, apart from the hands and feet, there is also grasping and moving — as with creatures that move upon their belly. Therefore, the hands and feet cannot be established as a faculty with respect to that function. The organ of defecation should not be established as a faculty with respect to the function of eliminating waste, because heavy objects fall downward through empty space on their own, and also because it is the force of wind that draws it out. The organ of urination should not be established as a faculty with respect to producing pleasure, because it is the female or male faculty that gives rise to this pleasure.
又諸喉齒眼瞼支節應立為根，於能吞嚼開閉屈申有力用故。或一切因於自所作有力用故皆應立根，彼雖有用非增上故。不立根者，此語具等亦非增上不應立根。
Moreover, by this same reasoning, the throat, teeth, eyelids, and joints should also be established as faculties, since they have real functional capacity for swallowing, chewing, opening and closing, and bending and stretching. Or, taking it further: every cause has functional capacity with respect to its own effect, so by this logic everything should be established as a faculty. Though these all genuinely have function, they are not dominant in the relevant sense — and this is why they are not established as faculties. In just the same way, the organs of speech and the like are also not dominant in this sense, and so should not be established as faculties.
Hands and feet fail twice over: they have no nature distinct from the body faculty itself — they are just differently located, differently shaped portions of that same faculty — and their supposed function is not even exclusive to having hands and feet at all, since legless, belly-crawling creatures plainly move without them. The excretory organs get their own dismissals: waste falls out simply because heavy things fall, and because the body's internal "wind" pushes it along; any pleasure near the urinary organ is credited to the sex faculty rather than treated as a function of its own.
The argument then escalates deliberately into absurdity: if any body part with a working function counted as a faculty, the list would explode to include the throat, teeth, eyelids, and joints — and pushed to its limit, literally every cause with any effect at all would qualify, which is plainly untenable. That absurdity is the whole point: it proves the criterion was never "has some function," only the six comprehensive roles established two sections ago. With this, the treatise's defense of the twenty-two faculties' exact count is complete.
14. Why Only Eight Faculties Still Need Explaining
Before naming any more faculties, the treatise explains why most of the twenty-two already have a home elsewhere in the treatise — leaving only eight still needing definition here.
命根體是不相應故，不相應中自當廣辯。信等體是心所法故，心所法中亦當廣辯。樂等五受、三無漏根，更無辯處故今應釋。
The life faculty's essential nature is that of a formation dissociated from mind, so this will be explained in full within the later discussion of dharmas dissociated from mind. As for faith and the rest, their essential nature is that of mental factors, so this too will be explained in full within the discussion of mental factors. As for the five feelings — pleasure and the rest — and the three uncontaminated faculties, there is no other place where they will be explained, so they should be explained now.
頌曰：身不悅名苦，即此悅名樂，及三定心悅，餘處此名喜，心不悅名憂，中捨二無別，見修無學道，依九立三根。
Verse: Bodily displeasure is called pain; this same bodily sensation, when pleasant, is called pleasure. Mental pleasantness in the third absorption is also called pleasure; in the lower grounds, this same mental pleasantness is instead called joy. Mental displeasure is called distress. The middle state, equanimity, is undifferentiated between body and mind. Based on these nine faculties across the paths of seeing, cultivation, and no-more-learning, the three pure faculties are established.
This is useful housekeeping: most of the twenty-two faculties will get their essential-nature explained elsewhere in the treatise, in the chapters dedicated to their actual ontological category — the life faculty among the formations dissociated from mind, faith and the four other spiritual faculties among the mental factors generally. Only the five feelings and the three pure faculties have no other designated home, so this chapter takes them up directly, right now.
The verse's definitions are more precise than they first appear. Pain and bodily pleasure are strictly bodily — feeling tied to the five physical sense-consciousnesses. Mental pleasantness splits by the texture of the ground it occurs in: in the third absorption specifically, it is calm and settled, and so is called "pleasure," the same name used for bodily pleasantness; in the lower grounds — the desire realm together with the first and second absorptions — that same mental pleasantness is coarser and more agitated, still carrying a craving for its own excitement, and so is called "joy" instead. Distress is mental displeasure, and equanimity sits in the middle, neutral with respect to both body and mind at once — arising spontaneously and without the discrimination that pain and pleasure involve, which is exactly why, unlike pain and pleasure, it is established as a single faculty shared by body and mind rather than split into separate bodily and mental versions. The verse's final line looks ahead to the three pure faculties' own definition, built out of nine specific faculties — mind, pleasure, joy, equanimity, and the five spiritual faculties — each operating within one of the three stages of the path in turn, the details of which the next section will unpack.
Correction: this section originally had the joy/pleasure mapping backwards — stating that mental pleasantness within absorption was called "pleasure" and everything else "joy." The prose commentary (confirmed against a directly-read PDF source after repeated unreliable fetches of the raw CBETA XML) shows the correct mapping: joy belongs to the coarser desire realm, first, and second absorptions, while pleasure belongs specifically to the calmer third absorption — matching the well-established doctrine that joy (prīti) is present in the first two dhyānas and drops away from the third onward. An earlier version of this note also over-specified "outside absorption" as a third bucket for pleasure; the source text does not support that distinction, so it has been removed. Corrected here rather than silently, per this project's practice.
15. Pain, Pleasure, and Why the Third Absorption Gets Its Own Reasoning
The prose fills in exactly why the line between joy and pleasure falls where it does, and why the third absorption is a genuinely special case.
論曰：身謂身受，依身起故，即五識相應受。言不悅者是損惱義，於身受內能損惱者名為苦根。所言悅者是攝益義，即身受內能攝益者名為樂根。及第三定心相應受能攝益者亦名樂根，第三定中無有身受，五識無故心悅名樂。即此心悅除第三定，於下三地名為喜根。第三靜慮心悅安靜，離喜貪故唯名樂根。下三地中心悅麁動有喜貪故，唯名喜根。
Prose: "Body" means bodily feeling, since it arises in dependence on the body — that is, feeling associated with the five sense-consciousnesses. As for saying "displeasure," this carries the meaning of harm; among bodily feelings, what is harmful is called the pain faculty. As for saying "pleasantness," this carries the meaning of benefit; among bodily feelings, what is beneficial is called the pleasure faculty. The mental feeling of the third absorption, when beneficial, is also called the pleasure faculty — within the third absorption there is no bodily feeling at all, since the five sense-consciousnesses are absent there, so mental pleasantness is what gets called "pleasure." This same mental pleasantness, apart from the third absorption, in the lower grounds is called the joy faculty. In the third absorption, mental pleasantness is calm and settled, free from joy's craving-excitement, and so is named only the pleasure faculty. In the lower grounds, mental pleasantness is coarse and agitated, still carrying joy's craving-excitement, and so is named only the joy faculty.
Pain and pleasure are defined as strictly bodily precisely because they are tied to the five sense-consciousnesses — and the third absorption becomes a special case for exactly this reason: a being fully absorbed there has no functioning eye, ear, nose, tongue, or body-consciousness at all, only mind-consciousness, so bodily feeling in the ordinary sense simply cannot occur. Whatever pleasantness is present must be purely mental, yet the treatise still groups it under "pleasure" rather than "joy," specifically because of its quality: calm and settled, free of joy's excited, craving-tinged character.
This gives a satisfying reason for why the line falls exactly between the second and third absorption, rather than anywhere else: it is not an arbitrary cutoff but tracks a genuine experiential shift, matching the classic formula praising the third dhyāna as "free from joy, dwelling in subtle pleasure" — one of the most celebrated turning points in the entire system of meditative absorption.
16. Distress and Equanimity: One Faculty for Both Body and Mind
Distress gets a quick definition; equanimity gets a much more interesting one, explaining why it alone spans both body and mind as a single faculty.
意識相應能損惱受，是心不悅，名曰憂根。中謂非悅非不悅，即是不苦不樂受，此處中受名為捨根。如是捨根為是身受、為是心受？應言通二。何因此二總立一根？此受在身心，同無分別故。
Feeling associated with mind-consciousness that is harmful is mental displeasure, named the distress faculty. "The middle" means neither pleasant nor displeasurable — that is, feeling that is neither painful nor pleasurable; this middle feeling is named the equanimity faculty. Is this equanimity faculty, then, a bodily feeling or a mental feeling? It should be said: it is common to both. Why are these two together established as a single faculty? Because this feeling, in body and in mind, is equally without discrimination.
在心苦樂多分別生，在身不然，隨境力故。阿羅漢等亦如是生，故此立根，身心各別，捨無分別任運而生，是故立根，身心合一。又苦樂受在身在心為損為益，其相各異，故別立根。捨在身心同無分別，非損非益其相無異，故總立根。
In the mind, pain and pleasure arise with much discrimination; in the body, this is not so — there, feeling simply follows the strength of the object. Even arhats give rise to bodily pain and pleasure in just the same way as ordinary beings, and this is why pain and pleasure are established as separate faculties for body and for mind respectively. Equanimity, by contrast, arises spontaneously without discrimination — this is why it is established as a single faculty uniting body and mind. Moreover, pain and pleasure, whether in body or in mind, involve either harm or benefit, and their characteristics differ from one another; hence they are established as separate faculties. Equanimity, in body and in mind alike, is equally without discrimination, being neither harmful nor beneficial, its character not differing; hence it is established as a single, unified faculty.
The reasoning hinges on discrimination (分別): mental pain and pleasure are said to involve active interpretation — the mind construes something as good or bad, layering judgment onto raw sensation — whereas bodily pain and pleasure simply track the object's own force, a sharp object hurting regardless of what one thinks about it. That qualitative difference is what justifies keeping pain and pleasure as genuinely separate faculties, one for body and one for mind.
A striking aside is dropped in almost as an afterthought: arhats, despite being fully liberated, still experience ordinary bodily pain and pleasure exactly as unliberated beings do. Liberation removes the discriminating, judgment-laden mental afflictions built on top of feeling, not raw bodily sensation itself. Equanimity escapes the body/mind split entirely because it arises spontaneously, without either body's object-driven quality or mind's discriminating quality creating any real difference between its bodily and mental versions — there is simply nothing left to differentiate, so one faculty suffices for both.
17. Nine Faculties, Three Configurations: How the Pure Faculties Are Built
The three pure faculties turn out not to be exotic new entities at all, but the same nine familiar faculties, reappearing in three different configurations across the path.
意樂喜捨信等五根，如是九根在於三道，如次建立三無漏根。謂在見道依意等九立未知當知根，若在修道即依此九立已知根，在無學道亦依此九立具知根。
Mind, pleasure, joy, equanimity, and faith and the other four — these nine faculties, distributed across the three paths in turn, establish the three uncontaminated faculties. That is: on the path of seeing, based on mind and the other eight, the faculty of "I shall come to know what is not yet known" is established; on the path of cultivation, based on these same nine, the faculty of "full knowledge" is established; on the path of no-more-learning, likewise based on these same nine, the faculty of "having complete knowledge" is established.
如是三名因何而立？謂在見道有未曾知當知行轉故，說彼名未知當知。若在修道無未曾知，但為斷除餘隨眠故，即於彼境復數了知，是故說彼名為已知。在無學道知己已知故名為知，有此知者名為具知。或習此知已成性者名為具知，謂得盡智、無生智故如實自知：我遍知苦，不復遍知。乃至廣說。彼所有根名為未知當知根等，如是已釋根體不同，當辯諸門義類差別。
How, then, are these three names established? On the path of seeing there is the activity of coming to know what has not been known before, hence it is named "I shall come to know what is not yet known." On the path of cultivation there is nothing not-yet-known in that sense, but, in order to cut off the remaining latent afflictions, one comes to know that same object again and again, and so it is named "full knowledge." On the path of no-more-learning, one knows that one has already known, and so is named "knowing" — one who has this knowledge is called "one who possesses complete knowledge." Or: one who has so cultivated this knowledge that it has become an established nature is called "one who possesses complete knowledge" — that is, having attained the knowledge of extinction and the knowledge of non-arising, one truly knows for oneself: "I have fully known suffering, and need not fully know it again," and so on, as explained in full elsewhere. The faculties belonging to these stages are named the faculty of "I shall come to know what is not yet known" and the rest accordingly. With this, the essential natures of the faculties have been explained; their various further distinguishing characteristics should be discussed next.
This is an elegant structural payoff: the three pure faculties are each simply the same nine underlying faculties — mind, the three feelings pleasure, joy, and equanimity, and the five spiritual faculties faith, diligence, mindfulness, concentration, and wisdom — operating within one specific stage of the path. "I shall come to know what is not yet known" is these nine as they function during the path of seeing, the moment of first breakthrough insight. "Full knowledge" is the same nine as they function during the path of cultivation, the gradual, repeated re-confirming of what has already been seen, aimed at uprooting the subtler, habitually produced afflictions rather than discovering anything new. "Having complete knowledge" is the same nine once the path is fully complete — an arhat's settled, permanent self-knowledge that the task is done, traditionally expressed as the knowledge that afflictions have ended and the knowledge that they will never arise again.
With this, the entire extended inquiry into the twenty-two faculties' essential natures — what they are, why exactly twenty-two and no more, and now what each one's inner nature consists of — reaches its close, and the treatise turns to a fresh angle: classifying all twenty-two faculties by further distinguishing features.
18. Which Faculties Are Contaminated, Which Aren't
The cross-classification begins with a clean three-way split: purely uncontaminated, purely contaminated, and genuinely amphibious.
此二十二根中幾有漏、幾無漏？頌曰：唯無漏後三，有色命憂苦，當知唯有漏，通二餘九根。
Among these twenty-two faculties, how many are contaminated, how many uncontaminated? A verse states: only uncontaminated are the last three; possessing form, together with life, distress, and pain, should be known as only contaminated; the remaining nine are common to both.
論曰：次前所說最後三根，體唯無漏是無垢義。垢之與漏名異體同。七有色根及命憂苦一向有漏。七有色者，眼等五根及女男根，色蘊攝故。意樂喜捨信等五根，此九皆通有漏無漏。
Prose: The three faculties just discussed are, in their essential nature, only uncontaminated — this is the meaning of "stainless." "Stain" and "contamination" are different names for the same reality. The seven form-possessing faculties, together with life, distress, and pain, are exclusively contaminated. The "seven possessing form" are the eye and the other four faculties, together with the female and male faculties, since these are subsumed under the aggregate of form. Mind, pleasure, joy, equanimity, and faith and the other four — these nine faculties are all common to both contaminated and uncontaminated.
The three pure faculties are unsurprisingly purely uncontaminated — they are, by definition, the noble path's own faculties. Seven physical faculties (the five senses plus the two sex faculties, all classified as form), together with life, distress, and pain, are exclusively contaminated: an ordinary being's embodiment, felt distress, and felt pain never transcend the mundane, even in a noble being who still possesses a body. The remaining nine — mind, the three "higher" feelings, and the five spiritual faculties — are genuinely amphibious, occurring in both ordinary, worldly form and in a purified, noble form depending on context. That ambiguity is exactly what the next section puts under real pressure.
19. A Dissenting View on Faith and the Rest, Refuted Three Ways
A rival opinion claims the five spiritual faculties are always uncontaminated, backed by a scriptural quotation — and the mainstream position takes it apart with three separate arguments.
有餘師說：信等五根亦唯無漏，故世尊說：若全無此信等五根，我說彼住外異生品。此非誠證，依無漏根說此言故。云何知然？先依無漏信等五根建立諸聖位差別已說此言故。或諸異生略有二種：一內、二外。內謂不斷善根，外謂善根已斷。依外異生作如是說：若全無此信等五根，我說彼住外異生品。
Other masters say: faith and the other five faculties are also only uncontaminated — for the World-Honored One said: "If one entirely lacks these five faculties, faith and the rest, I say that such a one dwells in the class of an 'outsider,' an ordinary worldling." This is not a valid proof, because this statement was made with reference to the uncontaminated versions of the faculties. How do we know this is so? Because the Buddha had already, just before, established the distinctions among the noble stages based on the uncontaminated faith and other faculties, when he made this statement. Or: ordinary worldlings are broadly of two kinds — inner and outer. "Inner" means one who has not cut off wholesome roots; "outer" means one whose wholesome roots have already been cut off. It is with reference to the outer ordinary worldling that this statement was made.
又契經說：有諸有情處在世間，或生或長，有上中下諸根差別。是佛猶未轉法輪時，故知信等亦通有漏。又世尊說：我若於此信等五根，未如實知是集沒味過患出離，未能超此天人世間及魔梵等，乃至未能證得無上正等菩提。乃至廣說。非無漏法可作如是品類觀察故，信等五根通有漏無漏。如是已說有漏無漏。
Moreover, a sutra says: "There are sentient beings dwelling in the world, whether newly born or grown, who have superior, middling, and inferior differences among their faculties" — this was said at a time when the Buddha had not yet turned the wheel of the Dharma, hence it is known that faith and the rest are also common to the contaminated. Moreover, the World-Honored One said: "If, with respect to these five faculties, faith and the rest, I had not truly known their arising, their cessation, their savor, their danger, and the escape from them, I would not have been able to transcend this world of gods and humans, along with Māra and Brahmā, and so on — nor would I have been able to attain unsurpassed, perfect enlightenment" — and so on, as explained at length elsewhere. Uncontaminated dharmas cannot be examined in terms of categories like arising, cessation, savor, danger, and escape in this way — therefore, faith and the other five faculties are common to both contaminated and uncontaminated. Thus the topic of contaminated and uncontaminated has now been explained.
The dissenting view's proof-text — "without faith and the rest, one is an outsider" — sounds decisive until the mainstream position points out it is ambiguous about which faith is meant. Two readings both save the "faith can be contaminated too" position: either the statement concerns specifically the already-uncontaminated faith that marks the noble stages, saying nothing about ordinary faith at all, or "outsider" itself splits into two kinds of worldling — one whose wholesome roots are still intact, one whose roots are already severed — and the statement targets only the latter, most extreme case.
The second argument is a clever piece of textual dating: a sutra describes ordinary beings having varying degrees of faith before the Buddha had taught anything at all — so whatever faith is being measured there cannot possibly be the noble, post-realization kind, proving an ordinary, contaminated version must exist. The third argument is almost purely logical: the Buddha describes needing to understand faith's arising, cessation, savor, danger, and escape — the classic fivefold analytical framework normally applied to things worth being wary of — but uncontaminated dharmas, being already free of every danger, would never need this kind of scrutiny in the first place. Only something that can be contaminated calls for this treatment at all.
20. Karmic Ripening: Only the Life Faculty Is Purely a Result — Until an Arhat Extends It
A new cross-classification opens with a clean rule that immediately meets a famous challenge case: an arhat's power to consciously extend a lifespan.
二十二根中幾是異熟、幾非異熟？頌曰：命唯是異熟，憂及後八非，色意餘四受，一一皆通二。論曰：唯一命根定是異熟。
Among the twenty-two faculties, how many are karmic-ripening results, and how many are not? A verse states: life alone is karmic-ripening; distress, and the last eight, are not; form, mind, and the remaining four feelings, each individually are common to both. Prose: Only the single life faculty is definitely karmic-ripening.
若如是者，諸阿羅漢留多壽行此即命根，如是命根誰之異熟？如本論說：云何苾芻留多壽行？謂阿羅漢成就神通得心自在。若於僧眾、若於別人以諸命緣衣鉢等物隨分布施，施已發願，即入第四邊際靜慮，從定起已心念口言：諸我能感……
If that is so, then what of arhats who "extend their remaining lifespan through the practice of retaining vitality" — is this not also the life faculty? Whose karmic ripening, then, is this particular life faculty? As the root treatise explains: What is meant by a monk's "practice of retaining vitality to extend the lifespan"? It means: an arhat who has accomplished supernormal powers and attained mastery over the mind, who distributes to the monastic community or to individuals the requisites for sustaining life — robes, bowls, and the like — accordingly; and having given, makes a vow, then enters the fourth, ultimate degree of meditative absorption; rising from that absorption, he reflects in mind and declares aloud: "Whatever karmic potential I am capable of experiencing …"
The life faculty (jīvitendriya) is initially declared the one faculty that is purely and always karmic ripening — the direct result of past karma, nothing else. This immediately runs into a famous challenge: the traditional account of an arhat's power to consciously "extend the remaining lifespan," through a specific ritual sequence — distributing one's life-sustaining possessions as a final act of generosity, making a vow, entering the deepest degree of the fourth meditative absorption, and then, on emerging, formally resolving to extend one's own remaining time in the world.
If a lifespan can be actively extended this way, through present spiritual power and resolve rather than simply through past karma unfolding, this specific instance of the life faculty seems not to be simple karmic ripening at all — real pressure on the clean rule the verse just laid down. Working out exactly whose karmic ripening this extended life faculty counts as is where the passage heads next.
21. How an Arhat Extends or Relinquishes a Lifespan: Two Explanations
The root treatise's own account of the ritual sequence is quoted directly, along with a first explanation of the mechanism and its mirror-image practice.
從定起已心念口言：諸我能感富異熟業，願皆轉招壽異熟果。時彼能感富異熟業，則皆轉招壽異熟果。復有欲令引取宿業殘異熟果。彼說前生曾所受業有殘異熟，由今所修邊際定力引取受用。
Rising from that absorption, he reflects in mind and declares aloud: "Whatever wealth-ripening karma of mine is capable of bringing about a result, may it all instead be redirected to bring about a ripened result of lifespan." At that time, whatever wealth-ripening karma he had is indeed all redirected to bring about a ripened result of lifespan. There are, moreover, those who hold instead that he draws upon the remaining, not-yet-exhausted ripened results of past karma — they say that karma from a previous life left an unripened remainder, and it is by the power of the ultimate absorption now cultivated that he draws upon and makes use of that remainder.
云何苾芻捨多壽行？謂阿羅漢成就神通得心自在，於僧眾等如前布施，施已發願，即入第四邊際靜慮，從定起已心念口言：諸我能感壽異熟業，願皆轉招富異熟果。時彼能感壽異熟業，則皆轉招富異熟果。
What is meant by a monk's "practice of relinquishing the extended lifespan"? It means: an arhat who has accomplished supernormal powers and attained mastery over the mind, having given as before to the monastic community and others, and having made his vow, enters the fourth, ultimate absorption; rising from it, he reflects in mind and declares aloud: "Whatever lifespan-ripening karma of mine is capable of bringing about a result, may it all instead be redirected to bring about a ripened result of wealth." At that time, whatever lifespan-ripening karma he had is indeed all redirected to bring about a ripened result of wealth.
The mechanism, on this first account, is conversion: an arhat with full mastery can freely redirect one type of ripening karma into another. To extend his lifespan, he converts wealth-producing karmic potential into lifespan-producing potential; to deliberately shorten it, he runs the exchange the other way, converting lifespan-potential into wealth-potential. The two rituals are exact mirror images of each other, down to the wording of the declaration.
A second, rival explanation is recorded alongside the first rather than replacing it: rather than converting one karmic type into another, the arhat instead reaches back and draws upon a genuine remainder of past karma that never fully ripened in a previous life, using his meditative power as the key that unlocks and makes use of that dormant reserve.
22. A Third Explanation, and the Treatise's Own Resolution
A named teacher offers a third account entirely, before the treatise settles the whole question with a clean exception to the general rule.
尊者妙音作如是說：彼起第四邊際定力，引色界大種令身中現前，而彼大種或順壽行或違壽行，由此因緣或留壽行或捨壽行。
The Venerable Ghoṣa explains it this way: that arhat, by arousing the power of the fourth, ultimate absorption, draws forth the primary elements of the form realm, causing them to manifest within his body; and these primary elements either accord with the practice of extending the lifespan or conflict with it — and it is by this cause that he either extends the lifespan or relinquishes it.
應如是說，彼阿羅漢由此自在三摩地力，轉去曾得宿業所生諸根大種住時勢分，引取未曾定力所起諸根大種住時勢分，故此命根非是異熟，所餘一切皆是異熟。
It should be explained thus: that arhat, by the power of this mastery over meditative concentration, sets aside the allotted duration of the faculties and primary elements produced by karma previously obtained, and instead draws in the allotted duration of faculties and primary elements arisen from this never-before-experienced power of concentration. Therefore, this particular instance of the life faculty is not karmic ripening; all the rest of it is karmic ripening.
The Venerable Ghoṣa (妙音), a named Sarvāstivāda teacher whose dissenting opinions this treatise regularly records, offers a third mechanism entirely: rather than converting karma types or drawing on a dormant reserve, the arhat literally imports subtler, form-realm primary elements into his own physical body through the fourth absorption's power, and whether this imported matter happens to support or conflict with sustaining life determines whether the lifespan is extended or cut short.
The treatise's own considered resolution cuts through all three accounts with a clean exception: this one specific, extraordinary instance of the life faculty — produced by present meditative mastery rather than past karma — simply is not karmic ripening, while every other instance of the life faculty, including this same arhat's own life faculty outside this special act, remains karmic ripening as the general rule states. The exception proves the rule rather than overturning it.
23. Why Extend, Why Relinquish? And Who Is Capable of It
A natural follow-up question arrives: what motivates an arhat to choose one practice over the other, met with a genuinely moving verse about facing death.
因論生論，彼阿羅漢有何因緣留多壽行？謂為利益安樂他故，或為聖教久住世故，觀知自身壽行將盡，觀他無此二種堪能。復何因緣捨多壽行？彼阿羅漢自觀住世於他利益安樂事少，或為病等苦逼自身。
One topic naturally raises another: for what reason does an arhat extend the lifespan? It is for the benefit and welfare of others, or so that the sacred teaching may abide long in the world — observing that his own life-force is about to end, and observing that no one else has the capacity for these two purposes. And for what reason does he relinquish it instead? Because, observing his own continued presence in the world, he sees little benefit or welfare for others in it, or because he is oppressed by illness and similar suffering in his own body.
如有頌言：梵行妙成立，聖道已善修，壽盡時歡喜，猶如捨眾病。此中應知，依何處所誰能如是留捨壽行？謂三洲人女男相續，不時解脫得邊際定諸阿羅漢，由彼身中有自在定無煩惱故。
As a verse says: "The holy life has been beautifully established, the noble path well cultivated; when the lifespan comes to its end, one rejoices, just as if setting down a multitude of illnesses." Here one should know: where, and by whom, can this practice of extending or relinquishing the lifespan be performed? By male and female continuums among humans of the three continents — specifically, "unshakeable" arhats who have attained the ultimate absorption — since mastery over concentration, free from affliction, exists within their bodies.
The motivations given are entirely other-directed: an arhat extends his life specifically to keep benefiting others or preserving the teaching when no one else can fill that role, and relinquishes it when he judges there is little more good he can do and the body's suffering has become a burden. The verse strikes an unusually tender note for a technical treatise — facing death not with fear but with the relief of setting down a long illness, the natural culmination of a life fully lived out.
The eligibility restriction is precise: only humans of the three continents (excluding the northern continent of classical cosmology) and specifically the "unshakeable," non-timely-liberated type of arhat — one who attained liberation through his own effort rather than favorable circumstance — and only those who have also mastered the ultimate degree of the fourth absorption. This is a rare, demanding combination of conditions, not something available to any liberated being.
24. Is "Life" the Same as "Lifespan"? A Terminological Digression
A brief but genuinely interesting side question opens: are "life" and "lifespan," used in the same sutra passage about the Buddha himself, really synonyms?
經說：世尊留多命行、捨多壽行。命壽何別？有言：無別。如本論言：云何命根？謂三界壽。有餘師說：先世業果名為壽行，現在業果名為命行。有說：由此眾同分住名為壽行，由此暫住名為命行。
A sutra says: the World-Honored One retained an extended life-force and relinquished an extended lifespan. What is the difference between "life" and "lifespan"? Some say: there is no difference. As the root treatise states: what is the life faculty? It is the lifespan across the three realms. Other masters say: the fruit of past-life karma is called "lifespan"; the fruit of present karma is called "life." Still others say: that by which one's continuity within one's own class of being is sustained is called "lifespan"; that by which one merely persists momentarily is called "life."
多言為顯留捨多念，命行壽行非一剎那，命行壽行有留捨故。有說：此言為遮有一命壽實體經多時住。有說：此言為顯無一實命壽體，但於多行假立如是命壽二名。若謂不然，不應言行。
The word "extended" is meant to show that the retaining and relinquishing spans many moments — that "life" and "lifespan" are not a single instant, and specifically that it is only across multiple moments that they can be retained or relinquished in this deliberate way. Some say: this wording is meant to refute the view that there is a single, real substantial "life" or "lifespan" that persists across a long duration. Others say: this wording is meant to show that there is no single real substance of life or lifespan at all — rather, the two names are merely conventionally applied to a multiplicity of momentary occurrences. If it were not so, it should not be called a "formation" at all.
Three rival glosses are recorded for "life" versus "lifespan" — no difference at all; past-karma's fruit versus present karma's fruit; or long-term class-continuity versus momentary persistence — and the treatise does not pick a winner. The closing point is the sharpest: the very word "extended" (多, "many/multiple") in "extended life-force" and "extended lifespan" is doing real philosophical work. It signals that life and lifespan are never a single indivisible thing lasting through time, but a series of momentary occurrences — which is exactly why they can be "formations" (行, saṃskāra, a term reserved for conditioned, momentary, plural phenomena) at all, and exactly why an arhat's deliberate retaining or relinquishing has to operate across many moments rather than as a single act on some unified, persisting "life-substance."
25. Why the Buddha Chose Exactly Three Months, and Subduing the Four Māras
The whole digression closes by applying everything just explained to a famous, specific detail: the Buddha's own choice, three months before his death, of exactly how long to remain.
世尊何故捨多壽行留多命行？為顯於死得自在故捨多壽行，為顯於活得自在故留多命行。唯留三月不增減者，越此更無所化事故，減此利生不究竟故。
Why did the World-Honored One relinquish an extended lifespan and yet retain an extended life-force? To demonstrate mastery over death, he relinquished the extended lifespan; to demonstrate mastery over continued life, he retained the extended life-force. As for retaining exactly three months, neither more nor less: beyond this period, there would be no further beings left to teach; less than this would not be enough to complete the benefiting of beings.
又為成立先自稱言我：善修行四神足故，欲住一劫或一劫餘，如心所期則便能住。毘婆沙師作如是說：顯今能伏蘊死二魔。世尊先於菩提樹下，已伏天魔煩惱魔故。傍論已竟，正論應辯。
Moreover, this establishes what he had earlier declared of himself: "Because I have well cultivated the four bases of supernormal power, I could remain for an eon, or even more than an eon, according to my own wish, and would indeed be able to remain so." The Vaibhāṣika masters explain it this way: this demonstrates that he was now able to subdue the two remaining māras — the māra of the aggregates and the māra of death — since the World-Honored One had already, earlier, beneath the bodhi tree, subdued the māra of the heavens and the māra of the afflictions. The digression is now complete; let us return to the main topic.
Relinquishing the extended lifespan and retaining the extended life-force look like opposite acts, but the treatise reads them as two demonstrations of the same underlying mastery: choosing when to die proves control over death, choosing to remain alive proves control over life. The specific figure of three months is not arbitrary either — it is calibrated precisely to how much teaching work remains to be done, no more and no less.
The closing reference to the four māras — the affliction-māra and heaven-māra subdued at the moment of enlightenment beneath the bodhi tree, the aggregate-māra and death-māra subdued only now, through this exact act of mastering his own remaining lifespan — gives the whole extended digression its real point: this was never merely a curious technical puzzle about karma and the life faculty, but the doctrinal explanation of one of the most significant moments in the Buddha's own biography. With the digression explicitly closed, the treatise returns to finish classifying the twenty-two faculties by karmic ripening.
26. Closing the Ripening Question: Nourished Faculties and Neutral States
The main line resumes, closing out the fine print on which specific occurrences of the twelve amphibious faculties count as karmic ripening.
憂根及後信等八根皆非異熟，是有記故，餘皆通二。義准已成，謂七色意根除憂餘四受，十二一一皆通二類。
The distress faculty, and the latter eight — faith and the rest — are all not karmic ripening, since they are morally determinate; all the rest are common to both. This conclusion follows by the same reasoning already established: that is, the seven form-faculties and the mind faculty, together with the four remaining feelings excepting distress — these twelve, each individually, are common to both types.
七有色根若所長養則非異熟，餘皆異熟。意及四受若善染污。若威儀路及工巧處并能變化，隨其所應亦非異熟，餘皆異熟。
Among the seven form-possessing faculties, if an instance is nourished through present cultivation, it is not karmic ripening; all the rest are karmic ripening. As for mind and the four feelings: if an instance is wholesome or defiled, it is not karmic ripening. If it occurs within ordinary bodily deportment or in skilled crafts, or is a product of supernormal transformation, these too are not karmic ripening; all the rest are karmic ripening.
Karmic ripening (vipāka) must always be morally neutral — this is a foundational rule, since the mechanism of karmic result is causal, not itself an act of new choice. That is exactly why the distress faculty and the five spiritual faculties, being inherently morally charged rather than neutral, cannot be ripening results. For the twelve genuinely amphibious faculties, the test is always the same: does this particular occurrence come from present, morally-charged effort — nourished practice, wholesome or defiled intention, ordinary skilled activity, or supernormal power — or does it simply arise as the passive, neutral unfolding of past karma? The former is never ripening; only the latter is.
27. Is Distress Really Never a Karmic Result? A Sharp Debate
A sutra's own wording about "distress-conducive karma" seems to threaten the rule just stated — and the ensuing exchange escalates into a genuinely sharp parity challenge between distress and joy.
若說憂根非異熟者，此經所說當云何通？如契經言：有三種業：順喜受業、順憂受業、順捨受業。依受相應言順無過，謂業與憂相應故名順憂受業，如觸與樂相應說名順樂受觸。若爾，順喜順捨受業亦應如是，一經說故。隨汝所欲，於我無違，異熟相應理皆無失，無逃難處。
If one holds that the distress faculty is not karmic ripening, how should the following sutra statement be reconciled? A sutra says: there are three kinds of karma — karma conducive to a joyful feeling, karma conducive to a distressful feeling, karma conducive to an equanimous feeling. Speaking in terms of "associated feeling," describing karma this way is unproblematic: karma is called "conducive to a distressful feeling" because it is associated with distress at the time it is performed, just as contact is called "conducive to a pleasant feeling" when associated with pleasure. If that is so, then "joy-conducive" and "equanimity-conducive" karma should likewise be explained this way, since all three are stated in the same sutra passage. However you take it, it makes no difference to me — the reasoning holds up either way, with no escaping the real difficulty.
作此通經理實何因？憂非異熟，以憂分別差別所生，止息亦然；異熟不爾。若爾，喜根應非異熟，亦由分別生及止息故。若許憂根是異熟者，造無間業已因即生憂，此業爾時應名果已熟。亦應如是徵難喜根，若許喜根是異熟者，造勝福業已因即生喜，此業爾時應名果已熟。
What is the real reason for reconciling the sutra this way? Distress is not karmic ripening because it arises from discriminative differentiation, and likewise ceases through it — karmic ripening is not like this. If that is so, then the joy faculty should also not be karmic ripening, since it too arises from discrimination and likewise ceases through it. If one accepts that the distress faculty is karmic ripening, then, having committed one of the five heinous crimes, distress arises as an immediate result of the cause — and at that very moment, this karma would have to be called "already ripened." The same challenge should equally be raised for the joy faculty: if one accepts that the joy faculty is karmic ripening, then, having performed a supremely meritorious act, joy arises as an immediate result of the cause — and this karma, too, would have to be called "already ripened."
The challenge is genuinely sharp: karmic ripening is supposed to require a substantial gap between cause and mature effect, not instant payout. If the guilt one feels immediately after a heinous crime, or the elation felt right after a great act of merit, counted as that very action's karmic ripening, karma would absurdly "ripen" the instant it is performed — defeating the whole concept of delayed maturation. The objector presses this symmetrically against both distress and joy, refusing to let the treatise get away with treating them differently without a real reason.
28. The Vaibhāṣika Resolution: Distress Vanishes, Joy Persists
The Vaibhāṣika masters answer the parity challenge by pointing to a genuine asymmetry between how distress and joy behave once a being transcends desire.
毘婆沙師咸作是說：已離欲者無憂根故，異熟不然，故非異熟。若爾，應說離欲有情異熟喜根。何相知有？隨彼有相此相亦然，謂善喜根此位容有，無記異熟應類非無。於此位中憂一切種無容有故定非異熟，
The Vaibhāṣika masters all say: because one who has become free of desire lacks the distress faculty altogether, while karmic ripening is not like that — it does not simply vanish based on one's current attainment — therefore distress is not karmic ripening. If that is so, one should say that, for a being free of desire, a karmic-ripening joy faculty should still exist. How do we know this? Wherever a corresponding characteristic exists, this parallel characteristic likewise holds: the wholesome joy faculty is certainly possible in this state, so by the same pattern, the morally neutral, karmic-ripening kind should not be absent either. In this state, distress of every kind has no possibility of occurring at all, and so it is definitely not karmic ripening.
The resolution turns on a real asymmetry rather than special pleading. Distress specifically disappears once a being becomes free of desire — it simply cannot arise in that state at all. But genuine karmic ripening should not behave this way: a ripened result is owed regardless of one's current spiritual attainment, so something that vanishes the moment one transcends desire cannot really be functioning as ripening in the first place. Joy is different: it persists even in beings free of desire — present, for instance, in the joy of the lower meditative absorptions — so there is no obstacle to it also having a genuine karmic-ripening form there, unlike distress, which has no possible occurrence at that level under any description at all.
29. Good Destiny, Bad Destiny: How Karmic Ripening Tracks Rebirth
The debate closes with a clean map of how each faculty's karmic-ripening quality tracks the goodness or badness of the rebirth-destiny it occurs in.
眼等八根若在善趣是善異熟，若在惡趣是惡異熟，意根隨在善趣惡趣是俱異熟，喜樂捨根隨在何趣是善異熟，苦根隨在善趣惡趣是惡異熟。於善趣中有二形者唯根處所，不善業招善趣色根，善業引故。如是已說是異熟等。
The eye and the other eight faculties, if occurring in a good rebirth-destiny, are wholesome karmic ripening; if in a bad rebirth-destiny, are unwholesome karmic ripening. The mind faculty, whether in a good or bad rebirth-destiny, is karmic ripening common to both. The joy, pleasure, and equanimity faculties, in whatever destiny they occur, are wholesome karmic ripening. The pain faculty, in either a good or bad rebirth-destiny, is unwholesome karmic ripening. Among those in a good rebirth-destiny who possess both sex organs, it is only the placement of the faculties that is affected by unwholesome karma, since the physical faculties themselves are otherwise drawn forth by wholesome karma. Thus the topic of what is karmic ripening has now been explained.
The physical faculties and the pleasant feelings track the destiny they belong to: good rebirths yield wholesome-flavored ripening, bad rebirths unwholesome-flavored ripening, and pain is always the unwelcome kind regardless of destiny, since pain by nature is never a "reward." Mind alone is neutral to this split, occurring as ripening in every kind of rebirth without taking on either flavor. The passing note on hermaphrodites in an otherwise good rebirth is a nice piece of precision: even within a fundamentally wholesome-karma rebirth, a specific admixture of unwholesome karma can still show up as an anomaly in exactly where the sex faculties are configured, without undermining the overall wholesome character of the rebirth itself.
30. A New Question: Which Faculties Generate Further Ripening?
A related but distinct question closes this whole arc: not whether a faculty is itself a ripened result, but whether its occurrence carries a karmic consequence of its own.
二十二根中幾有異熟、幾無異熟？頌曰：憂定有異熟，前八後三無，意餘受信等，一一皆通二。論曰：如前所諍，憂根當知定有異熟，依唯越義頌說定聲，謂顯憂根唯有異熟兼具二義故越次說。具二義者，憂非無記，強思起故；亦非無漏，唯散地故。由此越次先說，憂根定有異熟。
Among the twenty-two faculties, how many carry a karmic-ripening consequence, and how many do not? A verse states: distress definitely carries one; the first eight and the last three do not; mind, the remaining feelings, and faith and the rest — each individually are common to both. Prose: As previously disputed, one should know that the distress faculty definitely carries a karmic-ripening consequence. The verse's word "definitely" is used in the specific sense of an exception: it shows that the distress faculty alone carries this consequence while also possessing two further aspects at once, and it is for this reason that it is mentioned out of its expected order. "Possessing two aspects" means: distress is not morally neutral, since it arises through forceful, deliberate thought; nor is it uncontaminated, since it exists only at the level of scattered, unabsorbed mental activity. This is why it is singled out ahead of its place, with the note that the distress faculty definitely carries a karmic-ripening consequence.
眼等前八及最後三定無異熟，八無記故，三無漏故，餘皆通二。義准已成，謂意根餘四受信等言等取精進等四根，此十一一皆通二類。意樂喜捨若不善善有漏有異熟，若無記無漏無異熟。苦根若善不善有異熟，若無記無異熟。信等五根若有漏有異熟，若無漏無異熟。如是已說有異熟等。
The eye and the other faculties, the first eight, along with the last three, definitely carry no such consequence: the eight because they are morally neutral, the three because they are uncontaminated. All the rest are common to both. This conclusion follows by the same reasoning already established: that is, the mind faculty, the remaining four feelings, and faith and the rest — where "and the rest" includes diligence and the other three — these ten, each individually, are common to both. Mind, pleasure, joy, and equanimity: if unwholesome, wholesome, or otherwise contaminated, they carry a karmic-ripening consequence; if morally neutral or uncontaminated, they do not. The pain faculty: if wholesome or unwholesome, it carries this consequence; if morally neutral, it does not. Faith and the other four faculties: if contaminated, they carry this consequence; if uncontaminated, they do not. Thus the topic of carrying karmic-ripening consequence has now been explained.
This is a different question from the one just closed: not "is this faculty itself a ripened result of past karma," but "does this faculty's occurrence itself generate a karmic consequence yet to ripen." Morally neutral results (the physical faculties, life) and uncontaminated states (the three pure faculties) generate nothing further — neutrality and liberation alike are causally inert in the karmic sense. Distress is flagged as a genuine exception precisely because it is never neutral and never occurs in absorbed meditation, so whenever it arises at all, it is a morally charged, karma-generating event — resolving the earlier debate by showing that distress's special status was never really about whether it CAN be a ripened result, but about the different question of what it produces.
31. Wholesome, Unwholesome, Neutral: A Clean Fourfold Split
A fresh cross-classification opens, and this one resolves cleanly into four groups with no further debate needed.
唯善後八根，憂通善不善，意餘受三種，前八唯無記。論曰：信等八根一向是善，數次雖居後，乘前故先說。憂根唯通善不善性，意及餘受一一通三，眼等八根唯無記性。如是已說善不善等。
Verse: only wholesome are the last eight faculties; distress is common to wholesome and unwholesome; mind and the remaining feelings are of three kinds; the first eight are only morally neutral. Prose: Faith and the other eight faculties are exclusively wholesome — although last in numerical sequence, they are mentioned first here, continuing directly from the preceding discussion. The distress faculty is common only to wholesome and unwholesome natures. Mind and the remaining feelings are each individually common to all three: wholesome, unwholesome, and neutral. The eye and the other eight faculties are only of a morally neutral nature. Thus the topic of wholesome, unwholesome, and neutral has now been explained.
The pattern is now familiar and needs little further comment: the eight faculties tied to the noble path (five spiritual plus three pure) are exclusively wholesome by their very nature; distress, always arising through deliberate, morally charged effort as established earlier, is never neutral; mind and the four ordinary feelings can go any of the three ways depending on context; and the eight physical, karmically-neutral-by-nature faculties (the seven form-faculties plus life) never carry moral charge at all.
32. Which Faculties Belong to Which Cosmological Realm
The classification turns cosmological: as beings ascend from the desire realm through the form realm to the formless, fewer and fewer faculties remain relevant at all.
二十二根中幾欲界繫、幾色界繫、幾無色界繫？頌曰：欲色無色界，如次除後三，兼女男憂苦，并除色喜樂。
Among the twenty-two faculties, how many are bound to the desire realm, how many to the form realm, how many to the formless realm? A verse states: the desire, form, and formless realms, respectively, exclude the last three, together with female, male, distress, and pain, and further exclude form, joy, and pleasure.
論曰：欲界除後三無漏根，由彼三根唯不繫故，准知欲界繫唯有十九根。色界如前，除三無漏兼除男、女、憂、苦四根，准知十五根亦通色界繫。除女男者，色界已離婬欲法故、由女男根身醜陋故。
Prose: The desire realm excludes the last three uncontaminated faculties, since these are, by nature, entirely unbound to any realm — from which it follows that nineteen faculties are bound to the desire realm. The form realm, as before, excludes the three uncontaminated, and further excludes the male, female, distress, and pain faculties — from which it follows that fifteen faculties are bound to the form realm. The female and male faculties are excluded because the form realm has already transcended sexual desire, and because these faculties would make the body appear unseemly.
Nineteen, fifteen, and — as the next section will show — eight: the count shrinks steadily as one ascends, each realm shedding exactly the faculties tied to what it has transcended. The three pure faculties drop out everywhere because liberation itself is never bound to any cosmological location. The form realm additionally sheds sex, distress, and pain the moment it transcends sexual desire and gross suffering — setting up the next section's more surprising point, that "male" still gets used as a description there despite this.
33. Why the Form Realm's Gods Are Still Called "Male," and Why They Feel No Pain or Distress
An apparent contradiction — the form realm has no sex faculties, yet scripture calls rebirth there "male" — gets resolved, before the formless realm's even sparser roster closes the topic.
若爾，何故說彼為男？於何處說？契經中說。如契經言：無處無容女身為梵，有處有容男身為梵。別有男相，謂欲界中男身所有。無苦根者，身淨妙故，又彼無有不善法故。無憂根者，由奢摩他潤相續故，又彼定無惱害事故。
If that is so, why then does scripture speak of them as "male"? Where is this said? It is said in a sutra: "There is no possibility whatsoever for a female body to become a Brahmā; there is the possibility for a male body to become a Brahmā." But this "male" characteristic is distinct — the ordinary male-bodily-characteristic belongs specifically to bodies within the desire realm. As for lacking the pain faculty: their bodies are pure and refined, and moreover they have no unwholesome dharmas. As for lacking the distress faculty: they are continuously pervaded by calm-abiding meditation, and moreover they definitely have no harmful circumstances.
無色如前，除三無漏、女、男、憂、苦，并除五色及喜、樂根，准知餘八根通無色界繫，謂意、命、捨、信等五根。如是已說欲界繫等。
The formless realm, as before, excludes the three uncontaminated, female, male, distress, and pain, and further excludes the five form-faculties and joy and pleasure — from which it follows that the remaining eight faculties are bound to the formless realm: mind, life, equanimity, and faith and the other four. Thus the topic of realm-binding has now been explained.
The resolution separates a general designation from a specific faculty: "male" in "a male body becomes a Brahmā" describes an overall bodily appearance or convention, not the possession of an actual functioning male sex faculty the way an ordinary desire-realm male has one — the form realm has already left behind sex and reproduction as such. Pain and distress drop away for parallel but distinct reasons: pain because the form-realm body is inherently refined and free of the unwholesome conditions that generate it, distress because these beings are steeped in calm-abiding meditation and simply never encounter the kind of harm that would trigger it.
By the formless realm, only eight faculties remain relevant at all: mind, life, equanimity, and the five spiritual faculties. With no physical body whatsoever, all five physical senses drop out entirely, and even joy and pleasure — still present in the form realm — fall away, leaving only the barest, purest mental core: awareness, continuity, an undifferentiated neutral feeling-tone, and the qualities that constitute the path itself.
34. Cut Off by Seeing, by Cultivation, or Never: Sorting All Twenty-Two Faculties
A classification familiar from much earlier in this translation — which afflictions collapse all at once upon insight, and which yield only gradually — is now applied comprehensively to all twenty-two faculties.
二十二根中幾見所斷、幾修所斷、幾非所斷？頌曰：意三受通三，憂見修所斷，九唯修所斷，五修非三非。
Among the twenty-two faculties, how many are cut off by seeing, how many by cultivation, how many not cut off at all? A verse states: mind and the three feelings are common to all three; distress is cut off by seeing and by cultivation; nine are cut off only by cultivation; the five may be cultivation-or-not, the three are not-cut-off only.
論曰：意、喜、樂、捨一一通三，皆通見、修、非所斷故。憂根唯通見修所斷，非無漏故。七色、命、苦唯修所斷，不染污故、非六生故、皆有漏故。信等五根，或修所斷、或非所斷，非染污故、皆通有漏及無漏故。最後三根唯非所斷，皆無漏故、非無過法是所斷故。
Prose: Mind, joy, pleasure, and equanimity are each individually common to all three — cut off by seeing, cut off by cultivation, or not cut off at all. The distress faculty is common only to being cut off by seeing and by cultivation, since it is never uncontaminated. The seven form-faculties, life, and pain are cut off only by cultivation, since they are not themselves defilements, are not directly produced by the root afflictions, and are all contaminated. Faith and the other four faculties are either cut off by cultivation or not cut off at all, since they are not defilements and are common to both contaminated and uncontaminated. The last three faculties are only not cut off, since they are entirely uncontaminated, and dharmas free of fault are never something that needs to be cut off.
"Cut off by seeing" targets the intellectually-produced wrong views that collapse all at once on first genuine insight; "cut off by cultivation" targets the deeper, habitually-produced afflictions that yield only gradually; "not cut off at all" applies to whatever was never a defilement needing removal in the first place. Distress qualifies for the first two but never the third, since it is never uncontaminated. The physical faculties, life, and pain are purely gradual matters — not defilements themselves, and not something a single flash of insight touches. The five spiritual faculties can go either of the two gentler routes depending on whether a given occurrence is contaminated or not, while the three pure faculties, being wholly uncontaminated, were never candidates for cutting off in the first place.
35. How Many Faculties Does a Newborn Have? Womb, Egg, Moisture, and Spontaneous Birth
A vivid new topic opens: at the very first instant of rebirth, how many karmic-ripening faculties does a being actually possess, and how does this vary by mode of birth?
已說諸門義類差別。何界初得幾異熟根？頌曰：欲胎卵濕生，初得二異熟，化生六七八，色六上唯命。
The various distinguishing categories have now been explained. In which realm, upon initial rebirth, how many karmic-ripening faculties are first obtained? A verse states: in the desire realm, womb-born, egg-born, and moisture-born beings initially obtain two karmic-ripening faculties; the spontaneously-born obtain six, seven, or eight; in the form realm, six; above, only life.
論曰：欲胎、卵、濕生初受生位，唯得身與命二異熟根，由此三生根漸起故。彼何不得意、捨二根？此續生時定染污故。化生初位得六七八，謂無形者初得六根，如劫初時。何等為六？所謂眼、耳、鼻、舌、身、命。若一形者初得七根，如諸天等。若二形者初得八根。豈有二形受化生者？惡趣容有二形化生。
Prose: In the desire realm, womb-born, egg-born, and moisture-born beings, at the initial moment of receiving rebirth, obtain only two karmic-ripening faculties — the body and life — because, for these three modes of birth, the other faculties arise only gradually. Why do they not also obtain the mind and equanimity faculties at once? Because the mind at the moment of rebirth-linking is necessarily defiled. Spontaneously-born beings, at the initial stage, obtain six, seven, or eight faculties: those without sexual form obtain six initially, as at the very beginning of the cosmic eon. What are these six? Eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and life. Those with a single sexual form obtain seven initially, as with the various gods. Those with both sexual forms obtain eight initially. But could there really be hermaphrodites among the spontaneously-born? Bad rebirth-destinies can indeed have hermaphrodite spontaneously-born beings.
Womb, egg, and moisture-born beings start minimally — just a body and the life that sustains it, with everything else (the other senses, mind's full engagement) developing only gradually over time, consistent with ordinary embryological experience. Spontaneously-born beings, by contrast, appear instantaneously and therefore fully formed from the first moment, and the count varies by sexual endowment: six faculties for the sexless (the classical account of humanity's first, androgynous generation at the start of the cosmic age), seven for beings with a single sex faculty like the gods, and eight for the rare hermaphrodite case — which the text is careful to confirm does occur, specifically among unfortunate rebirth-destinies.
36. Closing the Newborn's Faculties: Form Realm, Formless Realm
The same question closes out for the two higher realms, with a small etymological aside on why the realms are named as they are.
說欲界中初得根已。今次當說色無色界。欲界欲勝故但言欲，色界色勝故但言色。契經亦言：寂靜解脫，過色無色。色界初得六異熟根，如欲化生無形者說。上唯命者，謂無色界定勝生勝，故說上言。無色界中最初所得異熟根者，唯命非餘。說異熟根最初得已。
Having explained the initially obtained faculties within the desire realm, the form and formless realms should next be explained. The desire realm is called simply "desire" because desire predominates there; the form realm is called simply "form" because form predominates there. A sutra also says: "The peaceful liberation transcends form and the formless." In the form realm, six karmic-ripening faculties are initially obtained, just as explained for the sexless spontaneously-born in the desire realm. "Above, only life" means: the formless realm, being superior both in its meditative attainment and in its resultant rebirth, is referred to by the word "above." In the formless realm, the very first karmic-ripening faculty obtained is life alone, nothing else. Thus the topic of initially obtained karmic-ripening faculties has been explained.
The etymological aside is a small courtesy: "desire realm" and "form realm" are shorthand names, picking out each realm's single most defining feature (desire, and refined form respectively) rather than exhaustively describing everything present there. The initial-faculty count completes a clean progression: six for a form-realm rebirth (matching the sexless spontaneously-born pattern, since form-realm beings are also spontaneously born and sexless), and, at the very top, just one — life alone — for the formless realm, where a being's very first moment of existence carries nothing but the bare fact of continuing, before mind, equanimity, and the spiritual faculties settle into their steady operation.
37. How Many Faculties Are the Last to Cease at Death?
The mirror-image question to the last several sections: not what a being first acquires at rebirth, but what remains until the very end.
何界死位幾根後滅？頌曰：正死滅諸根，無色三色八，欲頓十九八，漸四善增五。
In which realm, at the moment of death, how many faculties are the last to cease? A verse states: at the moment of actual death, the faculties cease as follows: in the formless realm, three; in the form realm, eight; in the desire realm, for sudden death, ten, nine, or eight; for gradual death, four; for a wholesome death, add five.
論曰：在無色界將命終時，命、意、捨三於最後滅。若在色界將命終時，即前三根及眼等五，如是八種於最後滅。一切化生必具諸根而生死故。
Prose: In the formless realm, when life is about to end, life, mind, and equanimity — these three — are the last to cease. In the form realm, when life is about to end, the aforementioned three faculties together with the eye and the other four senses — eight in total — are the last to cease, because all spontaneously-born beings necessarily possess their full complement of faculties both at birth and at death.
The verse's "ten, nine, eight" for the desire realm's sudden death is three separate figures for three different cases, not one number nineteen — the next section's prose spells out exactly which count applies to whom. As with the earlier discussion of initial faculties at rebirth, the formless and form realms mirror their own rebirth patterns here: since spontaneously-born beings arrive fully formed, they likewise depart fully formed, with their entire complement of relevant faculties present right up to the final moment.
38. Sudden Death Versus Gradual Death, and Dying with a Wholesome Mind
The desire realm's death pattern depends on sexual configuration and on whether death is sudden or gradual — and everything shifts again if the dying mind happens to be wholesome.
若在欲界頓命終時，十、九、八根於最後滅，謂二形者後滅十根，即女男根并前八種。若一形者後滅九根，於女男中隨除一種。若無形者後滅八根，謂無女男，唯有前八。如是所說依頓命終。
In the desire realm, for sudden death, ten, nine, or eight faculties are the last to cease: hermaphrodites lose ten last — the female and male faculties together with the aforementioned eight. Those with a single sex lose nine last, removing one of the female or male faculties. Those without sexual form lose eight last, having neither female nor male, only the aforementioned eight. This is what is meant by "sudden" death.
若漸命終後唯捨四，謂在欲界漸命終時，身、命、意、捨於最後滅，此四必無前後滅義。如是所說，應知但依染無記心而命終者。若在三界善心死時，信等五根必皆具有，故於前說一切位中其數皆應加信等五，謂於無色增至八根，乃至欲界漸終至九，中間多少如理應知。
For gradual death, only four are last: in the desire realm, at gradual death, body, life, mind, and equanimity are the last to cease, and these four necessarily have no sequence of before-and-after in their ceasing — they cease together. What has been explained applies specifically to dying with a defiled or morally neutral mind. If, within any of the three realms, one dies with a wholesome mind, the five spiritual faculties are necessarily all present as well — so to every count given above, five should be added: the formless realm's count rises to eight, all the way through to the desire realm's gradual death reaching nine, with the intermediate figures to be reasoned out accordingly.
Sudden death lets the faculties be observed dropping away in a visible sequence, ending with whichever core cluster remains — hence the count varies by sexual configuration, since the sex faculties are simply one more thing that can drop away earlier or persist to the end. Gradual death, by contrast, collapses straight to the bare minimum — body, life, mind, equanimity — all ceasing together with no observable stages at all. The wholesome-death adjustment is a clean, simple rule layered on top of everything else: whatever the base count, dying with a wholesome mind means the five spiritual faculties are active right up to the end too, so every figure in this whole section simply gains five.
39. Which Faculties Attain Stream-Entry and Arhatship
A genuinely intricate new topic opens: exactly which faculties are active at the moment of attaining each of the four classic fruits of the noble path, starting with the first and the last.
分別根中一切根法皆應思擇，二十二根幾能證得何沙門果？頌曰：九得邊二果，七八九中二，十一阿羅漢，依一容有說。論曰：邊謂預流、阿羅漢果，於沙門果居初後故。中謂一來及不還果，此觀初後在中間故。
Within this analysis of the faculties, every faculty-related dharma should be examined: among the twenty-two faculties, how many enable the attainment of which fruit of the ascetic life? A verse states: nine attain the two "edge" fruits; seven, eight, or nine, the two "middle" fruits; eleven, arhatship; depending on the case, it is sometimes said differently. Prose: "Edge" refers to the stream-enterer's fruit and the arhat's fruit, since among the fruits of the ascetic life these occupy the first and last positions. "Middle" refers to the once-returner's and the non-returner's fruits, since, viewed from first to last, these lie in between.
初預流果由九根得，謂意及捨、信等五根、未知當知、已知為九。未知根在無間道，已知根在解脫道，此二相資得最初果。如其次第，於離繫得能為引因，依因性故。阿羅漢果亦九根得，謂意、信等五、已知、具知，及喜、樂、捨中隨一為九。已知根在無間道，具知根在解脫道，此二相資得最後果。如其次第，於離繫得能為引因，依因性故。
The first, the stream-enterer's fruit, is attained by nine faculties: mind, equanimity, faith and the other four, and "I shall come to know what is not yet known" and "full knowledge" — nine in total. The "not-yet-known" faculty operates during the uninterrupted path; the "already-known" faculty operates during the path of liberation; these two mutually support each other in attaining this very first fruit, each correspondingly serving as a generative cause for the attainment of freedom from bondage. Arhatship, too, is attained by nine faculties: mind, faith and the other four, "full knowledge," "having complete knowledge," and any one of joy, pleasure, or equanimity — nine in total. The "already-known" faculty operates during the uninterrupted path; the "having complete knowledge" faculty operates during the path of liberation; these two likewise mutually support each other in attaining this final fruit, each serving as a generative cause in the same way.
Both "edge" fruits share an elegant structural parallel: mind, the five spiritual faculties, and a pair of the three pure faculties working together — one operating at the "uninterrupted path," the exact instant a defilement is cut off, the other at the immediately following "path of liberation," which confirms that cutting-off. For stream-entry, that pair is the first two pure faculties ("not-yet-known" and "already-known"); for arhatship, it is the last two ("already-known" and "having complete knowledge") — a nice reminder that "already-known" plays a role at both ends, since it marks the transition point common to progress at any stage. The one flexible slot in arhatship's count — any one of joy, pleasure, or equanimity, rather than equanimity fixed as in stream-entry's count — reflects that the specific feeling present varies with which level of absorption the practitioner happens to be in at that culminating moment, exactly as the earlier discussion of feelings across meditative depth would predict.
40. The Two Middle Fruits: Seven, Eight, or Nine Faculties Depending on the Path
The once-returner's and non-returner's fruits each admit three different faculty-counts, depending on whether the path taken is mundane or supramundane, and whether the practitioner progresses in order or leaps ahead.
中間二果，隨其所應，各為七八九根所得。所以者何？且一來果次第證者，依世間道由七根得，謂意及捨、信等五根；依出世道由八根得，謂即前七根、已知根第八。倍離欲貪超越證者，如預流果由九根得；若不還果次第證者，依世間道由七根得，依出世道由八根得。如前次第得一來果。全離欲貪超越證者，由九根得，如前超越得一來果。總說雖然而有差別，謂此依地有差別故，樂、喜、捨中可隨取一。前果超越唯一捨根。
The two middle fruits are each attained, correspondingly, by seven, eight, or nine faculties. Why is this? Take the once-returner's fruit, for the sequential practitioner: via a mundane path, it is attained by seven faculties — mind, equanimity, and faith and the other four. Via a supramundane path, it is attained by eight — the same seven, plus the "already-known" faculty as an eighth. For the practitioner who has already reduced desire-realm craving and attains this fruit by leaping over the ordinary sequence, it is attained by nine faculties, just as with the stream-enterer's fruit. For the non-returner's fruit, attained sequentially: via a mundane path, seven; via a supramundane path, eight — just as with attaining the once-returner's fruit sequentially. For one who has fully eliminated desire-realm craving and attains it by leaping over, nine faculties, just as with leaping over to the once-returner's fruit. Though stated the same way in general, there is a difference: because this depends on which meditative level the practitioner is in, any one of pleasure, joy, or equanimity may fill the ninth slot — whereas for leaping over to the previous fruit, only equanimity alone fills it.
又次第證不還果者，若於第九解脫道中入根本地，依世間道由八根得。彼無間道捨受相應，解脫道中復有喜受，此二相資得第三果。於離繫得二因如前，依出世道由九根得，八根如前，已知第九，無間解脫此俱有故。
Moreover, for the sequential practitioner attaining the non-returner's fruit: if, within the ninth path of liberation, one enters a fundamental meditative level, then via the mundane path it is attained by eight faculties — the uninterrupted path being associated with equanimity, and the path of liberation instead having joy, these two mutually supporting each other in attaining this third fruit, each serving as a generative cause as before. Via the supramundane path, it is attained by nine faculties — the same eight as before, plus "already-known" as the ninth, since the uninterrupted path and the path of liberation are both present together in this case.
Two variables multiply out into the range seven-to-nine: whether the path is mundane (ordinary concentration, without the two pure faculties) or supramundane (adding "already-known" as an extra faculty), and whether the practitioner progresses through the standard sequence or has already reduced desire-realm craving enough to leap ahead, matching the stream-enterer's own nine-faculty count. The one genuinely fine-grained detail is which feeling fills the flexible ninth slot: fixed to equanimity when leaping to the once-returner's fruit, but any of pleasure, joy, or equanimity when leaping to the non-returner's, reflecting that a non-returner can be settled at a wider range of meditative depths than a once-returner can.
41. Nine or Eleven? Reconciling a Discrepancy with the Root Text
A direct conflict with a foundational Abhidharma text gets resolved by distinguishing a single fresh attainment from everything possible across a fluctuating lifetime.
豈不根本阿毘達磨問：由幾根得阿羅漢？答：十一根。云何乃言由九根得？實得第四，但由九根。而本論言十一根者，依一身中容有故說。謂容有一補特伽羅從無學位數數退已，由樂、喜、捨隨一現前，數復證得阿羅漢果。由斯本論說十一根，然無一時三受俱起，是故今說定由九根。
But does not the root Abhidharma text ask: by how many faculties is arhatship attained? And answer: eleven faculties. Why, then, does this treatise say it is attained by nine? The actual, fresh attainment of this fourth fruit uses only nine. But the root treatise's figure of eleven is stated with reference to what is possible within a single continuous existence, across multiple occasions: it is possible for a certain person, having repeatedly fallen back from the stage of no-more-learning, to have any one of pleasure, joy, or equanimity present at different times, and to repeatedly re-attain arhatship again. It is for this reason that the root treatise speaks of eleven faculties — but since no single moment ever has all three feelings arising together, this treatise instead states that any single actual attainment is definitely by nine faculties.
於不還果中何不如是說？以無樂根證不還果，而於後時得有退義。亦無退已，由樂復得，非先離欲超證第三有還退義。此離欲果二道所得，極堅牢故。
Why is this not said the same way for the non-returner's fruit? Because there is no case of attaining the non-returner's fruit via the pleasure faculty and later regressing from it, nor of regressing and then re-attaining it via pleasure — since one who has already transcended desire and attains the third fruit by leaping over has no possibility of regressing at all. This attainment, freed from desire by either path, is extremely firm and stable.
The reconciliation is elegant: "nine" describes any single, genuine act of attaining arhatship, where exactly one specific feeling is present; "eleven" describes the full range of possibilities across a lifetime for a rare type of arhat who, per classical Sarvāstivāda doctrine, can actually regress from arhatship and later re-attain it — since different occasions of re-attainment might each involve a different one of the three feelings, the root text's count folds in all the possibilities rather than any single moment's actual content. The non-returner's fruit needs no such reconciliation because it never permits this regress-and-reattain pattern in the first place: once attained via the advanced "leaping over" route, it is simply permanent.
42. A New Question: Which Faculties Must Travel Together?
A fresh topic opens: given that one possesses some particular faculty, which other faculties are guaranteed to come along with it?
今應思擇，成就何根？彼諸根中幾定成就？頌曰：成就命意捨，各定成就三，若成就樂身，各定成就四，成眼等及喜，各定成五根，若成就苦根，彼定成就七，若成女男憂，信等各成八，二無漏十一，初無漏十三。
Now one should consider: given that one possesses a faculty, how many of the other faculties are definitely also possessed? A verse states: possessing life, mind, or equanimity, each definitely entails possessing these same three. If possessing pleasure or body, each definitely entails possessing four. Possessing the eye and the rest, or joy, each definitely entails possessing five. If possessing the pain faculty, this definitely entails possessing seven. If possessing female, male, or distress, or faith and the rest, each entails possessing eight. The latter two uncontaminated faculties entail eleven; the first uncontaminated faculty entails thirteen.
論曰：命、意、捨中隨成就一，彼定成就如是三根，非此三中隨有所闕可有成就。所餘根者，除此三根餘皆不定，謂或成就或不成就。
Prose: If one possesses any one of life, mind, or equanimity, one definitely possesses all three — it is never the case that, among these three, any one could be missing while still possessing the others. As for the remaining faculties, apart from these three, all are indefinite — one may or may not possess them.
Life, mind, and equanimity form an absolutely inseparable baseline trio: every sentient being, in every circumstance whatsoever, possesses all three together without exception — life sustaining existence, mind providing basic awareness, equanimity standing as the default neutral feeling always at least latently available. Everything else in the twenty-two is conditional, building outward from this fixed core in the entailment chains the rest of this topic works out one by one.
43. Who Lacks What: The Negative Conditions Behind the Entailment Map
Rather than proving each entailment directly, the treatise instead specifies who definitely lacks each faculty — from which the positive entailment structure follows.
此中眼耳鼻舌四根，生無色界定不成就，若生欲界未得已失亦不成就。身根，唯有生無色界定不成就。女男二根，生上二界定不成就，若生欲界未得已失亦不成就。樂根，異生生第四定及無色界定不成就。喜根，異生生三四定及無色界定不成就。苦根，若生色無色界定不成就。憂根，一切離欲貪者定不成就。
Among these: the eye, ear, nose, and tongue faculties — a being born in the formless realm definitely does not possess them; if born in the desire realm, one who has not yet obtained them or has already lost them also does not possess them. The body faculty: only a being born in the formless realm definitely does not possess it. The female and male faculties: a being born in the upper two realms definitely does not possess them; if born in the desire realm, one who has not yet obtained them or has already lost them also does not possess them. The pleasure faculty: an ordinary being born in the fourth absorption or the formless realm definitely does not possess it. The joy faculty: an ordinary being born in the third or fourth absorption, or the formless realm, definitely does not possess it. The pain faculty: a being born in the form or formless realm definitely does not possess it. The distress faculty: anyone entirely free of desire-realm craving definitely does not possess it.
信等五根，善根斷者定不成就。初無漏根，一切異生及已住果定不成就。次無漏根，一切異生見道無學定不成就。後無漏根，一切異生及有學位定不成就。
Faith and the other four faculties: one whose wholesome roots have been cut off definitely does not possess them. The first uncontaminated faculty: all ordinary beings, and those who have already settled into a fruit, definitely do not possess it. The next uncontaminated faculty: all ordinary beings, those on the path of seeing, and those at the stage of no-more-learning definitely do not possess it. The last uncontaminated faculty: all ordinary beings and those still in training definitely do not possess it.
Each faculty's absence is tied to a specific cosmological or spiritual condition: physical senses drop away with the formless realm's bodilessness; sex faculties drop away above the desire realm; pleasure and joy drop away at exactly the meditative depths this fascicle already established they cannot occur in; pain and distress drop away once their triggering conditions — a physical body capable of harm, or unresolved desire-realm craving — are gone. The three pure faculties get precise negative definitions matching their place in the path: the first is absent from anyone not actively between insight and its next stage, the second is absent from anyone not specifically consolidating that insight through cultivation, the third is absent from anyone who has not yet completed the entire path. Working out who lacks what turns out to be the cleaner way to establish who has what — the entailment chains from the previous section follow directly once these exclusions are in place.
44. Completing the Entailment Chains: Ear, Nose, Tongue, Joy, and a Subtlety About Rebirth
The concrete chains work all the way up to thirteen, with one genuinely interesting wrinkle about what a being possesses simply by virtue of where they are reborn.
耳鼻舌根應知亦五，前四如眼，第五自根。若成喜根亦定成五，謂命、意、捨、樂根、喜根。第二靜慮地生未得第三靜慮，捨下未得上，此成何樂根？當言成就第三靜慮染污樂根，餘未得故。
The ear, nose, and tongue faculties should likewise be understood as entailing five: the first four as with the eye, the fifth being the faculty itself. If one possesses the joy faculty, this also definitely entails possessing five: life, mind, equanimity, the pleasure faculty, and the joy faculty. For a being born in the second absorption who has not yet attained the third — having relinquished the lower level but not yet obtained the higher — which pleasure faculty does this being possess? It should be said: this being possesses the ordinary, unrefined pleasure faculty of the third absorption, since the cultivated version has not yet been attained.
若成苦根定成就七，謂身、命、意、四受除憂。若成女根定成就八，七如苦說，第八女根。若成男根亦定成八，七如苦說，第八男根。若成憂根亦定成八，七如苦說，第八憂根。若成信等亦各成八，謂命、意、捨、信等五根。若成具知根定成就十一，謂命與意、樂、喜、捨根、信等五根及具知根。若成已知根亦定成十一，十根如上及已知根。若成未知根定成就十三，謂身、命、意、苦、樂、喜、捨、信等五根及未知根。
If one possesses the pain faculty, this definitely entails possessing seven: body, life, mind, and the four feelings excepting distress. If one possesses the female faculty, this definitely entails eight — the same seven as with pain, plus the female faculty. The male faculty likewise entails eight, and so does the distress faculty, each adding itself as the eighth. If one possesses faith or any of the other four, each entails eight: life, mind, equanimity, and faith and the other four. If one possesses the "having complete knowledge" faculty, this definitely entails eleven: life, mind, pleasure, joy, equanimity, faith and the other four, and this faculty itself. If one possesses the "already-known" faculty, this also entails eleven — the same ten as above, plus this faculty. If one possesses the "not-yet-known" faculty, this definitely entails thirteen: body, life, mind, pain, pleasure, joy, equanimity, faith and the other four, and this faculty itself.
The chains build outward exactly as the pattern from the previous sections would predict, each new faculty simply adding one to whatever core it presupposes. The genuinely interesting wrinkle is the second-absorption case: a being merely reborn at that level, without having personally cultivated the third absorption, still counts as possessing a version of the third absorption's pleasure faculty — an ordinary, uncultivated one, tied simply to the realm of birth rather than to actual meditative attainment. This distinguishes possessing a faculty by birthright from possessing it by genuine practice, a distinction the entailment framework is precise enough to register.
45. The Fewest Faculties a Being Can Have
Two very different beings — one morally ruined, one merely unenlightened — turn out to share the exact same rock-bottom minimum.
諸極少者成就幾根？頌曰：極少八無善，成受身命意，愚生無色界，成善命意捨。
Among all beings, what is the fewest number of faculties one can possess? A verse states: the minimum is eight — one without wholesome roots possesses the feelings, body, life, and mind; a fool born in the formless realm possesses the wholesome, life, mind, and equanimity.
論曰：已斷善根名為無善。彼若極少成就八根，謂五受根及身、命、意。如斷善根極少成八，愚生無色亦成八根。愚謂異生，未見諦故。何等為八？謂信等五、命、意、捨根。信等五根，一向善故總名為善。若爾，應攝三無漏根。不爾，此中依八根故，又說愚生無色界故。
Prose: One whose wholesome roots have been cut off is called "without wholesome roots." Such a person, at minimum, possesses eight faculties: the five feelings, together with body, life, and mind. Just as one who has cut off wholesome roots possesses a minimum of eight, a "fool" born in the formless realm likewise possesses a minimum of eight: faith and the other four, life, mind, and equanimity — "fool" meaning an ordinary being who has not yet seen the truths. If that is so, should this not also include the three uncontaminated faculties, since faith and the rest are also called "wholesome"? Not so — this count is specifically based on eight, and moreover this is discussing a fool, an ordinary being, who by definition cannot possess the noble, uncontaminated faculties at all.
Two beings arrive at the identical floor of eight from opposite directions. One has severed wholesome roots entirely — the most morally ruined state this system recognizes — and is left with only the raw feelings and bare physical existence: pain, pleasure, joy, distress, equanimity, body, life, mind. The other is simply an ordinary, unenlightened being reborn at the very peak of the cosmos, the formless realm — spiritually unremarkable rather than corrupted, yet stripped down by the formless realm's own bodilessness to faith and the four other spiritual faculties, life, mind, and equanimity. Neither the ruined desire-realm being nor the placid formless-realm one can slip below eight; that floor holds regardless of which direction a being approaches it from.
46. The Most Faculties a Being Can Have — And Fascicle 3's Genuine Close
The maximum, too, turns out to be reachable by two very different beings taking opposite trade-offs — closing this long analysis, and fascicle 3 itself, on a note of pleasing symmetry.
諸極多者成就幾根？頌曰：極多成十九，二形除三淨，聖者未離欲，除二淨一形。
Among all beings, what is the greatest number of faculties one can possess? A verse states: the maximum is nineteen — a hermaphrodite, excluding the three pure faculties; a noble one not yet free of desire, excluding two of the pure faculties and one sex faculty.
論曰：諸二形者具眼等根，除三無漏成餘十九。無漏名淨，離二縛故。二形必是欲界異生，未離欲貪故有十九。唯此具十九、為更有耶？聖者未離欲亦具十九，謂聖有學未離欲貪，成就極多亦具十九，除二無漏及除一形。若住見道，除已知根及具知根。若住修道，除未知根及具知根。女男二根隨除一種，以諸聖者無二形故。因分別界根非根差別，乘茲廣辯二十二根竟。
Prose: Hermaphrodites possess the eye and the other faculties in full, excluding only the three uncontaminated, thus possessing the remaining nineteen. Hermaphrodites must necessarily be ordinary beings of the desire realm, and since they have not yet become free of desire-craving, they possess nineteen. Is this the only way to reach nineteen, or is there another? A noble one not yet free of desire also reaches nineteen: a noble person still in training who has not yet become free of desire-craving likewise possesses, at maximum, nineteen — excluding two of the uncontaminated faculties and one sex faculty. If dwelling on the path of seeing, this person excludes the "already-known" and "having complete knowledge" faculties. If dwelling on the path of cultivation, this person excludes the "not-yet-known" and "having complete knowledge" faculties. As for the two sex faculties, one of the two is excluded, since no noble being is ever a hermaphrodite. By way of distinguishing the elements, and the faculties from what is not a faculty, riding on this occasion, the extensive discussion of the twenty-two faculties is now complete.
The maximum, like the minimum, is reached by two very different beings taking opposite trade-offs to arrive at the identical number. A hermaphrodite reaches nineteen by having every ordinary faculty in full — including, unusually, both sex faculties at once — but lacking all three pure faculties, being merely an ordinary being who has not progressed on the noble path at all. A noble trainee not yet free of desire reaches the same nineteen by the opposite route: possessing genuinely only ONE of the three pure faculties (having actually progressed on the path, unlike the hermaphrodite), but lacking one of the two sex faculties, since no noble being is ever a hermaphrodite — trading a spiritual gain for an ordinary loss to land on precisely the same total.
With this elegant closing symmetry, the treatise's extensive analysis of the twenty-two faculties — what "faculty" means, each one's dominant function, essential nature, and full cross-classification by realm, contamination, moral quality, karmic ripening, and mutual entailment — comes to its complete and stated end.
Fascicle 3 Complete
This closes fascicle 3 of Ru-Yi's translation. Fascicle 3 opened by asking what "faculty" itself means as a technical term, then worked through every one of the twenty-two faculties' dominant function — the five physical senses, the two sex faculties, life, mind, the five feelings, the five spiritual faculties, and the three pure faculties tied to the noble path — including a genuinely sharp objection that forced the treatise to replace an earlier fourfold account with a single, cleaner criterion, and a six-role test that finally closed the door on treating ordinary bodily organs as faculties. It then explained each faculty's essential nature, including the famous account of an arhat's power to consciously extend or relinquish a lifespan, before cross-classifying all twenty-two faculties by contamination, moral quality, cosmological realm, karmic ripening, what is cut off by seeing versus cultivation, which faculties a newborn or a dying being possesses, which faculties enable each of the four noble fruits, and finally the complete entailment map of which faculties travel together — closing with the exact minimum and maximum any being can possess. Chapter 2 (根品, the Indriya-nirdeśa) is not yet finished, however — fascicle 4 opens its second part (根品第二之二), turning to which dharmas must arise together in fixed clusters. Ru-Yi's translation will continue there.