Aṅguttara-Nikāya
Pañcaka-Nipāta
IV. Sumanā Vagga

The Book of the Fives

IV: Sumanā

Sutta 35

Dānā-Nisaṃsa Suttaṃ

The Advantages from Gifts

 

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[41] [32]

Thus have I heard:

Once the Exalted One addressed the monks, saying:

"Monks."

'Yes, lord,' they replied; and the Exalted One said:

"Monks, there are these five advantages from gifts.

What five?

He is good and dear to many folk;
good and wise men love him;
a good report is spread abroad about him;
he strays not from the householder's Dhamma;¹ and,
on the breaking up [33] of the body after death,
he is reborn in the happy heaven-world.

Monks, these are the five advantages from gifts.

Dear is the giver, goodly the way he takes,
Loved² by the good, God-goers,³ self-restrained;
They teach him Dhamma that dispels all Ill,
That Dhamma he here having come to know,⁴
He rid of cankers waneth utterly.'⁵

 

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¹ Gihidhammā anapeto. Comy. akhaṇḍa-pañcasīlā, the Dhamma of a Buddhamātā, J. i, 49.

² Comy. reads santo naṃ bhajanti, S.e. santo bhajanti sappurisā.

³ Brahmacārayo; see Mrs. Rhys Davids' Gotama, 95.

⁴ The last two lines of the text recur at Vin. ii, 148, 164; J. i, 94; below, § 38.

⁵ Parinibbāti.