Reading guide
The teaching in one sentence
A mendicant who meditates wakeful — mindful, aware, joyful, and clear, discerning skillful qualities at the right time — can expect one of two results, enlightenment in this very life or non-return, and the verses turn this practice into a direct call: wakefulness is better than sleep, and the wakeful have nothing to fear.
No narrative frame
As with almost every discourse in this collection, no place, audience, or occasion is given; the teaching opens directly with the Itivuttaka's formula.
Meditating wakeful
The opening line describes a specific way of meditating: "A mendicant should meditate wakeful, mendicants, mindful and aware, joyful and clear, and at times discern the skillful qualities in that state." Jāgariya, "wakefulness," is paired here with a cluster of qualities — mindfulness and awareness (sati-sampajañña), a joyful clarity (pamudito vippasanno), and periodic discernment of what is skillful. As in Iti 45 and 46, this way of living is followed by the identical "two results" formula: enlightenment in this very life, or, if residue remains, non-return.
"Wakefulness is better than sleep"
The first verse opens with a direct address rather than a description: "Listen up, wakeful ones! And those asleep, wake up! Wakefulness is better than sleep, the wakeful have nothing to fear." Of the three consecutive discourses sharing this formula (Iti 45–47), this is the only one whose verse speaks directly to two different audiences at once — those already wakeful, and those still "asleep" — making the contrast between vigilance and negligence an explicit call rather than only an observation.
Investigating the Dhamma, banishing darkness
The second verse describes what the wakeful actually do with that wakefulness: "immersed in samādhi, joyful and clear, rightly investigating the Dhamma in good time, at one, would banish the darkness." Wakefulness here is not simply staying alert; it is paired with concentration and used for a specific purpose — the ongoing, well-timed investigation of the teaching.
A third verse: cutting the fetter
Unlike Iti 45 and 46, which each close after two verses, this discourse adds a third: "That's why you should apply yourself to wakefulness. A keen and alert mendicant, possessing absorption, having cut the fetter of birth and old age, would experience supreme awakening in this very life." The extra verse turns the whole discourse's earlier description into a final, direct instruction — apply yourself — before naming its outcome as "supreme awakening in this very life," the same result the "two results" formula named as one of the two possible endpoints.
Key terms
The text
§1This was said by the Buddha, the Perfected One: that is what I heard.
§2“A mendicant should meditate wakeful, mendicants, mindful and aware, joyful and clear, and at times discern the skillful qualities in that state. A mendicant who meditates in this way can expect one of two results: enlightenment in this very life, or if there’s residue left behind, non-return.”
The Buddha spoke this matter. On this it is said:
§3“Listen up, wakeful ones! And those asleep, wake up! Wakefulness is better than sleep, the wakeful have nothing to fear.
§4Those who are wakeful, mindful and aware, immersed in samādhi, joyful and clear, rightly investigating the Dhamma in good time, at one, would banish the darkness.
§5That’s why you should apply yourself to wakefulness. A keen and alert mendicant, possessing absorption, having cut the fetter of birth and old age, would experience supreme awakening in this very life.”
§6This too is a matter that was spoken by the Blessed One: that is what I heard.
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