Kaṇhadinna — The Book of the Twos · Chapter Three · Poem 10 of 10
Setting
No narrative setting; two four-line verses closing Chapter Three, followed in the Pali by an untranslated chapter colophon and mnemonic verse
Speaker
Kaṇhadinna, closing the chapter
Form
Two four-line verses, without a translated attribution, followed by the chapter's own untranslated structural close
Length
under 1 minute to read
Northern parallel
This reading guide does not assert a specific matching text for this poem in other Buddhist literatures.
Difficulty
★☆☆☆☆ — a plain declaration, plus a chapter's own structural close
Why this text
Kaṇhadinna describes learning the teaching by regularly sitting close to true persons, practicing what he learned, and slaying the desire for continued existence so thoroughly that ‘it isn't found in me now’ — closing Chapter Three, whose own colophon breaks from Chapter One and Two's shared formula.
Reading guide
Learning by proximity, then by practice
The first verse credits attainment to a simple, repeated cause: ‘I regularly sat close by true persons and learnt the teaching’, then practiced what was learned, taking ‘the direct route whose objective is freedom from death’.
A phrase shared with Valliya (3rd), earlier in this chapter
‘Añjasaṁ amatogadhaṁ’, ‘the direct route whose objective is freedom from death’, is the identical phrase Valliya used at Thag 2.24 to describe what he was asking to be taught. There, it was the object of a request; here, it names the route actually walked.
Desire for existence, denied in every tense
The second verse states, across four lines, that ‘desire for continued existence’ (bhavarāga) ‘was not, and won't be in me, and isn't found in me now’ — past, future, and present all named explicitly, an unusually thorough grammatical sweep for a single closing claim.
A chapter's own closing formula, broken
Immediately after this poem, the Pali carries vaggo tatiyo, ‘the third chapter is finished’, then this chapter's own uddāna naming all ten monks in sequence — but where Chapter One and Chapter Two both closed with the identical collective epithet ‘dasa therā mahiddhikā’, this chapter's uddāna closes differently: an individual epithet, ‘mahāmuni’, ‘great sage’, attached only to Kaṇhadinna's own name, the way isolated epithets were given to individual monks across several chapters of the Book of the Ones. The two-chapter collective formula was not, after all, fixed for the whole of this book.
Key terms
sappurisā — “true persons” — who the first verse says Kaṇhadinna regularly sat close by, learning the teaching.
añjasaṁ amatogadhaṁ — “the direct route whose objective is freedom from death” — the identical phrase used earlier in this chapter, at Thag 2.24.
bhavarāgo — “desire for continued existence” — what the second verse denies in the past, future, and present tense alike.
vaggo — “chapter” — the structural unit this poem closes, marked in the untranslated Pali colophon ‘vaggo tatiyo’, ‘the third chapter is finished’.
mahāmuni — “great sage” — the individual epithet this chapter's uddāna attaches to Kaṇhadinna's own name, breaking from the collective formula shared by Chapters One and Two.
The text
The text in full: two verses, without a translated attribution. Translation: Bhikkhu Sujato (CC0, SuttaCentral).
§1I regularly sat close by true persons and learnt the teaching. What I learned, I practiced, the direct route whose objective is freedom from death.
§2I’ve slain the desire for continued existence, it won’t be found in me again. It was not, and it won’t be in me, and it isn’t found in me now.
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Self-check quiz
Ten questions. Click an answer to see immediate feedback. No score is recorded — this is for your own checking.
Question 1 of 10
What does the first verse credit for Kaṇhadinna's learning?
Correct: A. A simple, repeated cause opening the poem.
Question 2 of 10
What phrase does this poem share, word for word, with Thag 2.24?
Correct: D. There, the object of a request; here, the route actually walked.
Question 3 of 10
In how many tenses does the second verse deny desire for continued existence?
Correct: C. An unusually thorough grammatical sweep for a single closing claim.
Question 4 of 10
What Pali phrase, left untranslated by Sujato, immediately follows this poem?
Correct: B. The same kind of structural colophon closing each chapter so far.
Question 5 of 10
How does this chapter's closing uddāna differ from Chapter One and Two's?
Correct: D. The 'dasa therā mahiddhikā' formula was not fixed for the whole book.
Question 6 of 10
What epithet does this chapter's uddāna attach to Kaṇhadinna?
Correct: B. An individual epithet, in the style of several Book of the Ones chapters.
Question 7 of 10
What does 'sappurisā' mean?
Correct: A. Who Kaṇhadinna is said to have regularly sat close by.
Question 8 of 10
What does 'bhavarāgo' mean?
Correct: A. Denied in every tense in the poem's closing verse.
Question 9 of 10
Is the chapter's mnemonic verse included in this page's text?
Correct: C. Consistent with how this site handles untranslated structural material.
Question 10 of 10
How many poems make up Chapter Three of the Book of the Twos?
Correct: D. Uttara (2nd) through Kaṇhadinna, named in sequence in the untranslated uddāna.
