Reading guide
The teaching in one sentence
The principle that leads to accumulation is the ten wrong factors from wrong view to wrong freedom; the principle that leads to dispersal is the ten right factors from right view to right freedom.
Building up what should be taken apart
Ācaya, accumulation, and apacaya, dispersal, evoke construction and demolition — but applied to the wrong and right factors, the valence is reversed from ordinary usage: accumulation, usually positive, describes the wrong factors' effect of building up continued existence, while dispersal, usually negative, describes the right factors' effect of breaking that continued existence down.
A rare architectural register in this chapter's run
Where most of this chapter's word-pairs draw on ethical, social, or bodily vocabulary, this discourse alone reaches for a spatial, structural image — something being built up layer by layer, or deliberately dismantled — giving the familiar ten factors a genuinely different kind of imagery than any other discourse in this chapter's set.
What, specifically, accumulates or disperses
Though the discourse itself does not state the object explicitly, the traditional understanding of ācaya in this context points to continued existence itself, bhava — the wrong factors build up conditions for further rebirth, while the right factors dismantle them, aligning this discourse's imagery with the entire project's recurring concern with ending the cycle of rebirth.
Key terms
The text
Leading to accumulation, and to dispersal
§1“I will teach you the principle that leads to accumulation and that which leads to dispersal. … And what is the principle that leads to accumulation? Wrong view, wrong purpose, wrong speech, wrong action, wrong livelihood, wrong effort, wrong mindfulness, wrong immersion, wrong knowledge, and wrong freedom. This is called the principle that leads to accumulation. And what is the principle that leads to dispersal? Right view, right purpose, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right immersion, right knowledge, and right freedom. This is called the principle that leads to dispersal.”
Self-check quiz
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