07/06/2026
Nibbฤna โ The Mind Stilled (88)
"To the one attached, there is wavering. To the unattached one, there is no wavering. When there is no wavering, there is calm. When there is calm, there is no inclination. When there is no inclina-tion, there is no coming and going. When there is no coming and going, there is no death and birth. When there is no death and birth, there is neither a 'here' nor a 'there' nor a 'between the two'. This it-self is the end of suffering."
It looks as if the ending of suffering is easy enough. On the face of it, the passage seems to convey this much. To the one who leans on something, there is wavering or movement. He is perturbable. Though the first sentence speaks about the one attached, the rest of the passage is about the unattached one. That is to say, the one re-leased. So here we see the distinction between the two. The one at-tached is movable, whereas the unattached one is not. When there is no wavering or perturbation, there is calm. When there is calm, there is no inclination. The word nati usually means 'bending'. So when there is calm, there is no bending or inclination. When there is no bending or inclination, there is no coming and going. When there is no coming and going, there is no passing away or reappearing. When there is neither a passing away nor a reappearing, there is neither a 'here', nor a 'there', nor any position in between. This itself is the end of suffering.
The sutta passage, at a glance, appears like a jumble of words. It starts by saying something about the one attached, nissita. It is lim-ited to just one sentence: 'To one attached, there is wavering.' But we can infer that, due to his wavering and unsteadiness or restless-ness, there is inclination, nati. The key word of the passage is nati. Because of that inclination or bent, there is a coming and going. Given the twin concept of coming and going, there is the dichotomy between passing away and reappearing, cuti/uppatti. When these two are there, the two concepts 'here' and 'there' also come in. And there is a 'between the two' as well. Wherever there are two ends, there is also a middle. So it seems that in this particular context the word nati has a special significance.
The Dhammapada :The Buddhaโs Path of Wisdom