Reading guide
The teaching in one sentence
The same five groundings and six recollections taught at AN 11.11, now with an explicit instruction that each recollection should be developed in every posture and occasion of daily life, not reserved for formal meditation alone.
A recovering man's question
The occasion this time is personal: Mahānāma has recently recovered from an illness when he hears the same news of the Buddha's coming departure and asks the same question — a small but telling detail absent from AN 11.11, suggesting a mind newly alert to how life should be practiced after a brush with mortality.
Life as the container for recollection
The discourse's real addition is its closing phrase, repeated for each of the six recollections: develop this ‘while walking, standing, sitting, lying down, while working, and while at home with your children’ — explicitly extending the practice beyond seated retreat into a layperson's full domestic and working life.
A teaching addressed to a householder
Unlike many discourses in this project addressed to mendicants, both Mahānāma discourses speak directly to a lay follower with a household and children, and this discourse in particular makes that audience explicit in its own closing formula, treating recollection as compatible with, not opposed to, an active family life.
Key terms
The text
Mahānāma's question, having recovered from illness
§1At one time the Buddha was staying in the land of the Sakyans, near Kapilavatthu in the Banyan Tree Monastery. Now at that time Mahānāma the Sakyan had recently recovered from an illness. At that time several mendicants were making a robe for the Buddha … Mahānāma the Sakyan heard about this. He went up to the Buddha, bowed, sat down to one side, and said to him: “Sir, I have heard that several mendicants are making a robe for the Buddha, thinking that when his robe was finished and the three months of the rains residence had passed the Buddha would set out wandering. Now, we spend our life in various ways. Which of these should we practice?”
Five groundings, six recollections, for every occasion
§2“Good, good, Mahānāma! It’s appropriate that gentlemen such as you come to me and ask: ‘We spend our life in various ways. Which of these should we practice?’ The faithful succeed, not the faithless. The energetic succeed, not the lazy. The mindful succeed, not the unmindful. Those with immersion succeed, not those without immersion. The wise succeed, not the witless. When you’re grounded on these five things, go on to develop six further things. Firstly, you should recollect the Realized One: ‘That Blessed One is perfected, a fully awakened Buddha, accomplished in knowledge and conduct, holy, knower of the world, supreme guide for those fit for training, teacher of gods and humans, awakened, blessed.’ When a noble disciple recollects the Realized One their mind is not full of greed, hate, and delusion. At that time their mind is quite unswerving, based on the Realized One. A noble disciple whose mind is unswerving finds inspiration in the meaning and the teaching, and finds joy connected with the teaching. When they’re joyful, rapture springs up. When the mind is full of rapture, the body becomes tranquil. When the body is tranquil, they feel bliss. And when they’re blissful, the mind becomes immersed in samādhi. You should develop this recollection of the Buddha while walking, standing, sitting, lying down, while working, and while at home with your children. Furthermore, you should recollect the teaching … the Saṅgha … your own ethical conduct … your own generosity … the deities … When a noble disciple recollects the faith, ethics, learning, generosity, and wisdom of both themselves and the deities their mind is not full of greed, hate, and delusion. At that time their mind is quite unswerving, based on the deities. A noble disciple whose mind is unswerving finds inspiration in the meaning and the teaching, and finds joy connected with the teaching. When they’re joyful, rapture springs up. When the mind is full of rapture, the body becomes tranquil. When the body is tranquil, they feel bliss. And when they’re blissful, the mind becomes immersed in samādhi. You should develop this recollection of the deities while walking, standing, sitting, lying down, while working, and while at home with your children.”
Self-check quiz
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