Reading guide
The teaching in one sentence
A corrupt monk relishes schism in the Saṅgha because division protects him from expulsion or from losing the honor he craves — four distinct motives, all rooted in self-protection.
A crisis, not an abstraction
The discourse opens at Ghosita’s Monastery in Kosambī — a location the wider canon associates with one of the most serious internal disputes the early community faced, a schism remembered at length in the Vinaya and at MN 48. Whether this particular discourse describes that same famous episode or a separate, smaller crisis at the same monastery, the text does not say, and this reading guide does not assert an identification either way. What is certain is that the Buddha asks Ānanda a direct question — has that disciplinary issue been settled yet? — and receives a direct answer: it has not, because the monk driving it, Bāhiya, remains committed, and the senior monk responsible for him, Anuruddha, will not say a word.
Readers meeting the name Bāhiya here should not confuse him with the far more famous Bāhiya of the bark-cloth, Bāhiya Dāruciriya of the Udāna, who has no connection to this passage. Names repeat across a canon this large.
A correction before the teaching begins
The Buddha’s first response is not to the schism itself but to Ānanda’s framing of it: since when has Anuruddha been involved in disciplinary issues in the midst of the Saṅgha? He then names who the responsibility actually belongs to — Ānanda himself, together with Sāriputta and Moggallāna. This is worth reading as content in its own right, not merely as a narrative frame around the four reasons that follow: a senior disciple is being redirected away from a role that was never his, toward those whose role it is.
The four reasons, and what they share
A bad monk relishes division because a divided community will not expel him for being unethical, for wrong view, or for wrong livelihood — and because a divided community, split into factions competing for followers, will still honor him even when a united one would not. The first three reasons are versions of the same fear, escaping accountability; the fourth inverts it into an appetite, gaining status through factional loyalty rather than merit.
What unites all four is that schism is never described here as a matter of doctrine or principle for the person who relishes it. It is a strategy for personal protection and advancement, pursued by someone the discourse has already, in its opening definition, called rotten inside, festering, and depraved.
Reading this discourse honestly
This discourse names an internal, structural failure mode the tradition apparently considered serious enough to diagnose in clinical detail, in the middle of an unresolved case rather than as safely settled history. It is worth resisting the urge to read the Buddha’s redirection of Ānanda as a full resolution; the text simply moves from the specific crisis to the general teaching and does not report what happened next.
Key terms
The text
Ānanda's report
§1At one time the Buddha was staying near Kosambī, in Ghosita’s Monastery. Then Venerable Ānanda went up to the Buddha, bowed, and sat down to one side. The Buddha said to him, “Well, Ānanda, has that disciplinary issue been settled yet?” “How could it be, sir? Venerable Anuruddha’s protégé Bāhiya remains entirely committed to creating a schism in the Saṅgha. But Anuruddha doesn’t think to say a single word about it.”
The Buddha's redirection
§2“But Ānanda, since when has Anuruddha been involved in disciplinary issues in the midst of the Saṅgha? Shouldn’t you, together with Sāriputta and Moggallāna, settle all disciplinary issues that come up?
The first reason: escaping expulsion for bad conduct
§3A bad monk sees four reasons to relish schism in the Saṅgha. What four? Take an unethical monk, of bad qualities, filthy, with suspicious behavior, underhand, no true ascetic or spiritual practitioner—though claiming to be one—rotten inside, festering, and depraved. He thinks: ‘Suppose the monks know that I’m a bad monk … If they’re in harmony, they’ll expel me, but if they’re divided they won’t.’ A bad monk sees this as the first reason to relish schism in the Saṅgha.
The second reason: escaping exposure for wrong view
§4Furthermore, a bad monk has wrong view, he’s attached to an extremist view. He thinks: ‘Suppose the monks know that I have wrong view … If they’re in harmony they’ll expel me, but if they’re divided they won’t.’ A bad monk sees this as the second reason to relish schism in the Saṅgha.
The third reason: escaping exposure for wrong livelihood
§5Furthermore, a bad monk has wrong livelihood and earns a living by wrong livelihood. He thinks: ‘Suppose the monks know that I have wrong livelihood … If they’re in harmony they’ll expel me, but if they’re divided they won’t.’ A bad monk sees this as the third reason to relish schism in the Saṅgha.
The fourth reason: gaining honor through division
§6Furthermore, a bad monk desires material things, honor, and admiration. He thinks: ‘Suppose the monks know that I desire material things, honor, and admiration. If they’re in harmony they won’t honor, respect, revere, or venerate me, but if they’re divided they will.’ A bad monk sees this as the fourth reason to relish schism in the Saṅgha. A bad monk sees these four reasons to relish schism in the Saṅgha.”
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