Reading guide
A forerunner, not a mere cause
The dawn does not simply precede the sunrise incidentally — it reliably heralds it, confirmed by direct reading of the discourse's own careful phrasing (“forerunner and harbinger,” pubbaṅgama and pubbanimitta). The same reliability is claimed for good friendship: wherever it is genuinely present, the awakening factors can be expected to follow, much as a mendicant with good friends “can expect” to develop them.
Key terms
The text
§1“Mendicants, the dawn is the forerunner and harbinger of the sunrise. In the same way, for a mendicant good friendship is the forerunner and harbinger of the arising of the seven awakening factors. A mendicant with good friends can expect to develop and cultivate the seven awakening factors. And how does a mendicant with good friends develop and cultivate the seven awakening factors? It’s when a mendicant develops the awakening factors of mindfulness, investigation of principles, energy, rapture, tranquility, immersion, and equanimity, which rely on seclusion, fading away, and cessation, and ripen as letting go. That’s how a mendicant with good friends develops and cultivates the seven awakening factors.”
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