Reading guide
Five points, elided since the pattern is now established
"There are ascetics and brahmins who don't truly understand these five grasping aggregates' origin, disappearance, gratification, drawback, and escape..." — the source text elides the remainder with an ellipsis, trusting the reader to supply SN 23.5's own fuller statement with two additional points inserted.
The same explicit verdict, now for the five-point version
The Buddha's judgment — true or false ascetic and brahmin status, realizing or missing the goal of life — carries over unchanged from SN 23.5, now attached to the fuller five-point criterion rather than the bare triad.
A pairing method already seen throughout this book
This triad-then-five-point pairing exactly repeats the structure already used at SN 22.107-108 for the original version of this material — confirming that even when content is transplanted into a new saṃyutta for a new audience, the underlying compositional patterns travel with it unchanged.
Moving toward stream-entry and arahantship
SN 23.7 and SN 23.8 will continue this vagga's reuse pattern, personally restating SN 22.109's stream-enterer formula and SN 22.110's arahant formula for Rādha in turn.
Key terms
The text
§1At Sāvatthī. When Venerable Rādha was seated to one side, the Buddha said to him: “Rādha, there are these five grasping aggregates. What five? The grasping aggregates of form, feeling, perception, choices, and consciousness.
§2There are ascetics and brahmins who don’t truly understand these five grasping aggregates’ origin, disappearance, gratification, drawback, and escape … Those venerables don’t realize the goal of life as an ascetic or brahmin …
§3There are ascetics and brahmins who do truly understand … Those venerables realize the goal of life as an ascetic or brahmin, and live having realized it with their own insight.”
Self-check quiz
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