Reading guide
Six stages, not one direct flow
Confirmed by direct reading, this project's own comparison to the recurring Gaṅgā-peyyāla formula met throughout Book V: that formula describes a single river slanting directly toward the ocean, while this discourse traces water through a genuinely longer cascade — hollows filling first, then pools, then lakes, then streams, then rivers, only then the ocean — a more elaborate image for the same underlying point.
The far shore, reached at the very end
Confirmed by direct reading, this discourse's own closing line explicitly names “the far shore” and “the ending of defilements” as the four factors' own ultimate destination — the identical crossing-metaphor already confirmed recurring throughout this project's own earlier work on Book V.
Key terms
The text
§1“Mendicants, suppose the heavens rain heavily on a mountain top, and the water flows downhill to fill the hollows, crevices, and creeks. As they become full, they fill up the pools. The pools fill up the lakes, the lakes fill up the streams, and the streams fill up the rivers. And as the rivers become full, they fill up the ocean. In the same way, a noble disciple has experiential confidence in the Buddha, the teaching, and the Saṅgha, and the ethics loved by the noble ones. These things flow onwards; and, after crossing to the far shore, they lead to the ending of defilements.”
Self-check quiz
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