Reading guide
A different structure, a different verb
Where Nānattavagga's chains used paṭicca uppajjati, “arises dependent on,” this discourse's first answer uses paṭicca paññāyati, “appears,” or “is discerned, dependent on” — contrast making something knowable, not causation producing it.
Seven elements, each known by its opposite
Light appears by contrast with darkness, beauty with ugliness, infinite space with form, and so on up the sequence — each element in this list becomes discernible only against the specific state it leaves behind.
A seventh element that folds back on itself
Six elements are each discerned against something clearly distinct from itself; the seventh, cessation of perception and feeling, is said to appear dependent on cessation itself — a genuinely puzzling self-reference this reading guide doesn't resolve, since the source offers no further gloss.
Three kinds of attainment, not seven equal ones
The second answer doesn't treat all seven elements alike: five (light through nothingness) are attainments with perception, one (neither perception nor non-perception) is an attainment with residual conditioned phenomena, and the last (cessation) is its own kind of attainment entirely.
A recognizable ladder, named rather than described
Readers familiar with the four formless jhānas and the cessation attainment discussed at length elsewhere in the canon will recognize this discourse's list immediately; what's distinctive here is the compact, purely technical treatment, naming the stages without walking through how to reach them.
Key terms
The text
§1At Sāvatthī. “Mendicants, there are these seven elements. What seven? The element of luminosity, the element of beauty, the element of the dimension of infinite space, the element of the dimension of infinite consciousness, the element of the dimension of nothingness, the element of the dimension of neither perception nor non-perception, and the element of the cessation of perception and feeling. These are the seven elements.”
§2When he said this, one of the mendicants asked the Buddha, “Sir, due to what does each of these elements appear?”
§3“Mendicant, the element of light appears due to the element of darkness. The element of beauty appears due to the element of ugliness. The element of the dimension of infinite space appears due to the element of form. The element of the dimension of infinite consciousness appears due to the element of the dimension of infinite space. The element of the dimension of nothingness appears due to the element of the dimension of infinite consciousness. The element of the dimension of neither perception nor non-perception appears due to the element of the dimension of nothingness. The element of the cessation of perception and feeling appears due to the element of cessation.”
§4“Sir, how is each of these elements to be attained?”
§5“The elements of light, beauty, the dimension of infinite space, the dimension of infinite consciousness, and the dimension of nothingness are attainments with perception. The element of the dimension of neither perception nor non-perception is an attainment with residual conditioned phenomena. The element of the cessation of perception and feeling is an attainment of cessation.”
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