“The accumulation
of a single person’s
bones for an eon
would be a heap
on a par with the mountain,
so said the Great Seer.
(He declared this to be
the great Mount Vepulla
to the north of Vulture’s Peak
in the mountain-ring
of the Magadhans.)1
But when that person sees
with right discernment
the four noble truths—
stress,
the cause of stress,
the transcending of stress,
& the noble eightfold path,
the way to the stilling of stress—
having wandered on
seven times at most, then,
with the ending of all fetters,
he makes an end
of stress.”
Notes
1. Magadha was a kingdom in the time of the Buddha, corresponding roughly to the present day state of Bihar. Its capital city, Rājagaha, was surrounded by a ring of five mountains. Vulture’s Peak, a secluded rock outcrop in the middle of the ring, was a spot frequented by the Buddha.
Origin URL: https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/SN/SN15_10.html