Reading guide
A comparison that sounds like a genuine equivalence
The brahmin isn't being hostile or clever for its own sake; his observation — that both he and the Buddha beg for food — is simply, literally true, making the question feel less like a challenge than an honest puzzle.
A shared word doing double duty
Bhikkhaka and bhikkhu are closely related terms sharing the same root, one naming an ordinary beggar and the other the specific word for a Buddhist mendicant; the brahmin's question implicitly asks why one deserves a more elevated meaning than the other.
The overlap accepted, not denied
The Buddha doesn't dispute that both of them beg, or claim some technical exemption from the shared vocabulary; he grants the surface-level similarity fully before locating the real distinction somewhere else entirely.
Domestic entanglement named as a disqualifying condition
The verse specifies that someone who has ‘undertaken domestic duties’ hasn't yet become a mendicant in the fuller sense, regardless of whether they also happen to beg — the disqualifying factor isn't the food source but the underlying way of life.
Two conditions given for the deeper meaning of the word
The verse's positive definition names two things together, not one: having banished both merit and evil, and wandering the world having fully appraised it — a completed transcendence of the moral duality that ordinary alms-seeking, however honest, doesn't by itself require.
Key terms
The text
§1At Sāvatthī. Then a brahmin almsman went up to the Buddha, and exchanged greetings with him. When the greetings and polite conversation were over, he sat down to one side and said to the Buddha, “Worthy Gotama, both you and I are almsmen. What, then, is the difference between us?”
§2“You don’t become an almsman just by begging alms from others. One who has undertaken domestic duties has not yet become a mendicant.
§3But one living a spiritual life who has banished both merit and evil, and wanders having appraised the world, is said to be a mendicant.”
§4When he had spoken, the brahmin almsman said to the Buddha, “Excellent, worthy Gotama! Excellent! … From this day forth, may the worthy Gotama remember me as a lay follower who has gone for refuge for life.”
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