Reading guide
A deception aimed at the community, not the teacher
Unlike every earlier discourse in this vagga, where Māra's manifestation or challenge is directed at the Buddha himself, here the actual target is the mendicants' attention — an attempt to disrupt the community's concentration on the teaching rather than to challenge the teacher directly.
A mendicant nearly fooled, caught by the Buddha's intervention
The detail that a mendicant actually warns a companion about the supposed ox is significant: unlike the Buddha, who recognizes Māra immediately in every other discourse, an ordinary practitioner here is briefly deceived, requiring the Buddha to name the trick aloud rather than letting it resolve on its own.
A teaching on the five aggregates, interrupted mid-lesson
The specific subject the Buddha was teaching when interrupted — the five grasping aggregates (form, feeling, perception, consciousness, and volitional formations) — directly supplies the content of his answering verse, which addresses exactly this topic rather than responding only to the ox manifestation itself.
Not this and not mine: the verse's core teaching
The verse's central formula — ‘I am not this’ and ‘this is not mine’, applied to each of the five aggregates — states directly the non-self teaching that the ox-distraction had briefly threatened to eclipse, continuing the very lesson Māra tried to interrupt.
Māra's army, unable to find someone with no fetters left
The verse's closing image — Māra and his army chasing everywhere but never finding someone detached and secure — scales the confrontation beyond this single ox up to Māra's larger forces, framing this particular trick as one instance of a much broader, ultimately futile pursuit.
Key terms
The text
§1At Sāvatthī. Now at that time the Buddha was educating, encouraging, firing up, and inspiring the mendicants with a Dhamma talk on the topic of the five grasping aggregates. And those mendicants were paying attention, applying the mind, concentrating wholeheartedly, and actively listening.
§2Then Māra thought, “This ascetic Gotama is educating, encouraging, firing up, and inspiring the mendicants with a Dhamma talk on the topic of the five grasping aggregates. And the mendicants are paying attention, applying the mind, concentrating wholeheartedly, and actively listening. Why don’t I go and pull the wool over their eyes?”
§3At that time several alms bowls were placed in the open air. Then Māra the Wicked manifested in the form of an ox and approached those bowls. One of the mendicants said to another, “Mendicant, mendicant, that ox will break the bowls.” When this was said, the Buddha said to that mendicant, “Mendicant, that’s no ox. That’s Māra the Wicked come to pull the wool over your eyes!” Then the Buddha, knowing that this was Māra the Wicked, addressed him in verse:
§4“Form, what is felt, and perception, consciousness, and what is chosen: ‘I am not this’ and ‘this is not mine’; that’s how to be free of desire for them.
§5When you’re detached, secure, all fetters transcended, though Māra and his army chase everywhere they never find you.”
§6Then Māra … vanished right there.
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