Ru-Yi Meditation Center
Aṅguttara Nikāya · Discourse 5.3

Suffering

Dukkhasutta — Sekhabalavagga — the first chapter of the Fives

Setting
None stated; the discourse continues from AN 5.1, whose setting at Sāvatthī in Jeta’s Grove is understood to hold
Speakers
The Buddha alone, addressing the mendicants
Form
Two mirror-image statements — five qualities absent, then the same five present — each naming a this-life and a next-life consequence
Length
~1 minute to read
Northern parallel
The pairing of present unhappiness with future bad rebirth is a standard formula found widely in the Chinese Āgamas; this reading guide does not assert a specific matching sutra number
Difficulty
★★☆☆☆ — short and formulaic, but the first discourse in the chapter to state stakes rather than definitions

Why this discourse

AN 5.1 and 5.2 said what the five powers are. AN 5.3 is the first to say what having or lacking them costs. The cost is stated in two parts, and both parts matter: a present-life condition — distress, anguish, fever, or their absence — and a next-life expectation, a bad or good rebirth. The discourse does not wait until death to make its point; it claims the difference is already felt now, in how a mendicant’s days go.

Reading guide

The teaching in one sentence

A mendicant lacking faith, conscience, prudence, energy, and wisdom lives now with distress, anguish, and fever and can expect a bad rebirth; one who has all five lives now without them and can expect a good rebirth.

Three words, kept together

The present-life half of the formula is not just ‘unhappily’; the Pāli gives three terms together — savighātaṁ saupāyāsaṁ sapariḷāhaṁ, with distress, with anguish, with fever — and Sujato keeps all three rather than collapsing them into one English word. The repetition is doing work: this is not a mild discomfort but a compounding one, named three ways so that no single English translation of the first term lets the reader round it down.

Two timeframes, not one

It would be easy to read this discourse as being about karma and future rebirth alone, since that is the more dramatic half. But the sentence opens with diṭṭheva dhamme, ‘in this very life’, before it ever reaches the next one. The discourse insists on a present cost, felt inside the years a person is actually living, and only then adds the further one. Reading past the first half to get to the second misses half of what is being claimed.

The list, again, doing no new work

The five qualities named here are the identical five from AN 5.1 and 5.2, worded the same way — faithless, shameless, imprudent, lazy, witless against their opposites. This discourse adds no new definition of any of them; its only contribution is the consequence attached. That is worth naming plainly rather than re-explaining the five again, since AN 5.2 already did that work in full.

A pattern the chapter will repeat

This discourse, its five-quality list, and its two mirror-image halves establish a template AN 5.4, 5.8, 5.9, and 5.10 will all reuse with small variations: the same wording for lacking or having the five, attached each time to a different consequence. Reading them as variations on one template, rather than as five separate arguments, is the efficient way through the rest of this chapter.

Key terms

dukkha — “suffering” — this discourse’s title, and the general condition the three-part present-life formula spells out in specific terms.
savighāta — “with distress” — the first of three terms describing the present cost of lacking the five powers, kept distinct from the other two rather than merged.
saupāyāsa — “with anguish” — the second of the three; a mental rather than physical term, paired with the physical sapariḷāha.
sapariḷāha — “with fever” — the third of the three, a burning quality carried over from ordinary physical fever into a description of mental state.
diṭṭheva dhamme — “in this very life” — the phrase that opens both halves of the formula, marking the discourse’s claim as present, not only about a future rebirth.

The text

The discourse in full: the five qualities absent, with their present and future cost, then the same five present, with the reverse. Translation: Bhikkhu Sujato (CC0, SuttaCentral).

Lacking the five

§1“Mendicants, when a mendicant has five qualities they live unhappily in this very life—with distress, anguish, and fever—and when the body breaks up, after death, they can expect a bad rebirth. What five? It’s when a mendicant is faithless, shameless, imprudent, lazy, and witless. When a mendicant possesses these five qualities they live unhappily in this very life—with distress, anguish, and fever—and when the body breaks up, after death, they can expect a bad rebirth.

Having the five

§2When a mendicant has five qualities they live happily in this very life—without distress, distress, or fever—and when the body breaks up, after death, they can expect a good rebirth. What five? It’s when a mendicant is faithful, conscientious, prudent, energetic, and wise. When a mendicant possesses these five qualities they live happily in this very life—without distress, anguish, or fever—and when the body breaks up, after death, they can expect a good rebirth.”

· · ·

Self-check quiz

Ten questions. Click an answer to see immediate feedback. No score is recorded — this is for your own checking.

Question 1 of 10
What two kinds of consequence does AN 5.3 attach to the five powers?
Correct: B. Diṭṭheva dhamme, 'in this very life', opens both halves before either reaches rebirth.
Question 2 of 10
What three Pāli terms describe the present-life cost of lacking the five powers?
Correct: A. Savighāta, saupāyāsa, sapariḷāha — three terms, not collapsed into one.
Question 3 of 10
What five qualities does AN 5.3 use, and how do they compare to AN 5.1 and 5.2's list?
Correct: B. AN 5.3 adds a consequence, not a new definition — that work was already done at AN 5.2.
Question 4 of 10
Why does the guide caution against reading this discourse as only about future rebirth?
Correct: B. Diṭṭheva dhamme comes first in the sentence, and does real work.
Question 5 of 10
What happens to a mendicant who has all five powers, according to this discourse?
Correct: A. The exact mirror image of the negative half.
Question 6 of 10
What later discourses in this chapter reuse this same mirror-image template?
Correct: B. A template worth recognizing rather than re-reading as five separate arguments.
Question 7 of 10
What does 'sapariḷāha' literally carry over from ordinary usage?
Correct: A. Fever’s heat, applied to a state of mind.
Question 8 of 10
Does AN 5.3 offer a simile or story to illustrate its claim?
Correct: B. Consistent with the terse, formulaic character of this discourse.
Question 9 of 10
What is the effect of keeping distress, anguish, and fever as three separate terms rather than one English word?
Correct: B. Three named terms resist being rounded down to something milder.
Question 10 of 10
What is the setting of AN 5.3?
Correct: B. Consistent with every discourse in this chapter after the first.
Answered 0 of 10 · Correct 0

Further reading

← PreviousAN 5.2 · In Detail