Reading guide
A repeated refrain of fortune
“You're fortunate, mendicants, so very fortunate, to have the opportunity to lead the spiritual life” opens the hell half, opens the heaven half, and closes the whole discourse — three appearances of the same line holding the entire teaching together.
A hell built entirely of unpleasant contact
The hell named “Related to the Six Fields of Contact” has no description beyond this: whatever sight is seen there is unlikable, not likable; undesirable, not desirable; unpleasant, not pleasant — and the same holds for every sound, smell, taste, touch, and idea. The suffering is entirely perceptual, not physical torment.
A mirror-image heaven
The heaven of the same name simply inverts every term: likable, desirable, pleasant, without exception, across all six fields — the same structure, the same vocabulary, every value flipped.
What 'opportunity' actually names
The opportunity (khaṇa) at stake isn't a mystical instant but the ordinary condition of a life where sense experience isn't fixed one way or the other — unlike either named realm here, where it invariably is. Read beside the previous discourse (SN 35.134), that openness to both pleasant and unpleasant contact is exactly what gives trainees room to practice the very diligence just described there.
Key terms
The text
§1“You’re fortunate, mendicants, so very fortunate, to have the opportunity to lead the spiritual life. I’ve seen the hell named ‘Related to the Six Fields of Contact’.
§2There, whatever sight you see with your eye is unlikable, not likable; undesirable, not desirable; unpleasant, not pleasant. Whatever sound you hear … Whatever odor you smell … Whatever flavor you taste … Whatever touch you feel … Whatever idea you know with your mind is unlikable, not likable; undesirable, not desirable; unpleasant, not pleasant.
§3You’re fortunate, mendicants, so very fortunate, to have the opportunity to lead the spiritual life. I’ve seen the heaven called ‘Related to the Six Fields of Contact’. There, whatever sight you see with your eye is likable, not unlikable; desirable, not undesirable; pleasant, not unpleasant.
§4Whatever sound … odor … flavor … touch … Whatever idea you know with your mind is likable, not unlikable; desirable, not undesirable; pleasant, not unpleasant. You’re fortunate, mendicants, so very fortunate, to have the opportunity to lead the spiritual life.”
Self-check quiz
5 questions. Click an answer to see immediate feedback. No score is recorded — this is for your own checking.