PRESENTED TO THE BUDDHA CENTER ON SUNDAY, JANUARY 11, 2015 AND AGAIN ON SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2024 (REVISED)

The Discourse on the Threefold Knowledge

Digha Nikaya 13

Country: Kosala

Locale: Manasakata

Speakers: Vasettha, Bharadvaja, the Buddha

Date of Composition: late 5^th to early 4th cent. BCE

Astute students may recognize two English words in the title of this discourse, Tevijja Sutta. Pali te means ‘three’ (or ‘threefold’), whereas vijja clearly means ‘vision’ or, more properly, ‘knowledge’ or ‘wisdom.’ Thus, Walshe translates this as the ‘discourse of the threefold knowledge,’ the opposite of avijja, ‘ignorance’ or ‘not knowing’ (‘no vision’), but with an ironic twist, as we shall see.

Manasakata is the name of a village south of the river Achiravati, now called the river Rapti. The name means ‘mind-begotten.’ Shravasti (Savatthi) also sits on the bank of this river, located in mid-southern Nepal. The Buddha stayed at a mango grove on the bank of this river.

A number of Brahmans stay in the town, described as rich and famous. One of these, Todeyya, is the father of Subha, who asked Ananda after the Buddha’s passing to explain the things that the Buddha praised and dispraised in the Subha Sutta.

Two young Brahmans, Vasettha and Bharadvaja, begin to argue with each other while walking along the road about the right and wrong paths leading to Union with Brahma. Vasettha advocates the philosophy of the Brahman Pokkharasati, while Bharadvaja defends Tarukkha.

Pokkharasati is the Brahman in the Ambattha Sutta, whose student insults the Buddha. The two youths cannot agree on whose teacher is right, each believing that their teacher alone is true. They agree to take the question to the Buddha, who is in the area, and to abide by his decision as arbiter. That they would do this at all tells you something about the Buddha’s reputation and attitude.

The two complain to the Buddha about how many different paths exist, during which they name five Brahmanic schools: the Adhariyans, Tittiriyans, Chandokans, Chandavans, and the Brahmacariyans (or Bavharijans). Walshe describes the first four of these schools as Vedic priests who rely on liturgy, sacrifice, or chanting, contrasting them with some ascetics who practice chastity. We can see the word ‘chanter’ in Chandoka (Chandoga) and ‘chastity’ in Brahmacariya. Tittiriya (Taittiriya) means ‘pupils of the Taittiriyans.’ A better Sanskritist than I might cast further light on the meaning of these words.

Rather than choose one, the Buddha asks Vasettha whether any of these Brahmans, their ancestors, or even the seers—the original makers and expounders of the mantras—ever saw Brahma face-to-face (compare the Biblical tradition of seeing God face to face). The Buddha names ten such seers. This list also appears in the Vinaya Pitaka. In the latter, the Buddha declares that the true Veda revealed itself to the seers but that priestcraft subsequently distorted it. Clearly, the Buddha has great respect for the ancient Indian tradition and its antecedents but sees Brahmanism as a decadent remnant of the primordial spiritual tradition. These are great seers, including six of the Seven Sages (Saptarishi) of Ursa Major, which consists of seven bright stars that point to the Pole Star or Axis Mundi. Interestingly, the Buddha’s passing occurred just about one Ursa Major cycle (2,700 years) after the traditional date of the advent of the Kali Yuga, which places his passing in 402 BCE. The Seven Sages composed different parts of the Vedas and other texts.

Vessamitta (Vessamitto, Vishvamitra): Formerly a king, Vessamitta enjoys reverence as a great and powerful seer of ancient India and the discoverer of the Gayatri mantra. The Gayatri mantra is a Vedic Sanskrit poem from the Rigveda (3.62.10). It associates with Savitr; thus, we call it the Savitr mantra. Literally ‘impeller,’ ‘rouser,’ ‘vivifier,’ Savitr is the son of Aditi, the mother of the gods and the twelve signs of the zodiac. Savitr also connects with the vivifying influence of Surya, the sun, just before sunrise.

[Om bhur bhuvah svah]
tat savitur varen(i)yam
bhargo devasya dhimahi
dhiyo yo nah prachodayat

Vivekananda translates this as “We meditate on the glory of that Being who has produced this universe; may He enlighten our minds.”

Yamataggi (Jamadagni, Jamdagni): One of the Seven Sages and a descendant of Bhrigu.

Angirasa (Angiras, Angiraso): Another of the Seven Sages, the reputed father of humanity’s ancestors, he also serves as a direct ancestor of the Buddha. Tradition says he emerged from the divine intellect of Brahma. Brahma assigns him the task of caring for the welfare of Brahma’s creation.

Bharadvaja* (Bharadwaja, Bharadwajo): A descendant of Angirasa and one of the Seven Sages, renowned for his scholarship and meditative attainments, including egocide. He is the reputed author of the Ayurveda.

Vasettha* (Vasistha, Vassettho): Another of the Seven Sages, he supposedly authored a book on the Vedic system of electional astrology.

Kassapa (Kassapo): Another of the Seven Sages.

Bhagu (Bhrigu): Another of the Seven Sages, inventor of predictive astrology. Krishna compares Bhagu to the “opulence of God” (Bhagavad Gita).

Six of these seers belong to the Seven Sages, but it is impossible to say who the missing seer is, since different lists exist, none of which corresponds to the Buddhist list exactly. Walshe describes these as the ten rishi authors of the Vedic mantras.

The seers, whose number included both men and women, were shamanic seers whose utterance inspired the Vedas, which passed orally from generation to generation. The seers served as enlightened householders, married with descendants. When recited aloud, their verses invoke the divine beings. It is reasonable to suppose that the hymns of the Rigveda inspired by the divine beings emerged when the seers entered ecstatic trance states. A similar cult associates with the ayahuasqueros of Peru. The seers understood the art of traveling in a mental body, which involved creating an imaginal mind-body and projecting it into higher dimensions of reality, with which they conversed with the divine beings and manifested their wisdom, power, and beauty in the form of song. Vivekananda calls them “seers of thought.” Even these divinely inspired seers had not seen Brahma face to face.

Therefore, the Buddha declares, the entire Vedic Brahmanic conceit is ill-founded because it is speculative and not based on experience. The Buddha declares that the Brahmans resemble the blind leading the blind: “The talk of these Brahmans learned in the Three Vedas turns out to be laughable, mere words empty and vain.”

Vasettha agrees with the Buddha that the Brahmans see the sun and the moon just like everybody else and that, though they may pray, sing praises to, and worship the sun and the moon, this does not mean that they know the path to unite with the sun and the moon. We know that even the brahmas cannot predict when, how, or where Brahma would appear; thus, neither did the seers nor the Brahmans know this, nor do they know the way to Union with Brahma.

The Buddha compares the Brahmans, rather ludicrously, to a young man searching for the perfect girlfriend, without knowing when, how, or where he will find her or even what she looks like; to someone building a staircase at a crossroads; or to someone trying to cross a raging river by beckoning to the other side.

Moreover, he says the Brahmans neglect what they should do and do what they should not do. The Buddha frequently criticizes the Brahmans for self-indulgence and general laxness—an accusation, interestingly, made against the Buddha himself. The Buddha also rejects the method of invoking divine beings (including prayer) to attain Union with Brahma. Thus, the Buddha rejects the fundamental premise of theism. He states that the Brahmans enslave themselves to the bonds and fetters of sense desires. In addition, they allow sensuality, anger, sloth-torpor, restlessness-worry, and doubt to hinder them, encumbered by wives, wealth, hatred, anger, impurity, and lack of self-discipline.

By comparison, the Buddha notes that Brahma remains unencumbered by wives, wealth, hatred, anger, impurity, and lack of self-discipline. If one does not possess the characteristics of Brahma at death, then how can they be reborn as Brahma? The Law of Causality forbids it: “Therefore, their threefold knowledge is called the threefold desert, the threefold wilderness, the threefold destruction.” Interestingly, Jesus said something similar when he stated, “Be not as the hypocrites are” (Matt. 6:5).

The Buddha teaches that one must seek the root of all rootless things; that is to say, by overcoming ignorance and desire. In this way, they find the way to Liberation and to the Union with Brahma in the transcendental awareness that illumines reality. Thus, we cannot know the fate of the Brahmans because, in the end, they fail to awaken to the ineffable mystery of their divine nature. The Buddha holds that ignorance, desire, and fear obscure the path to divine truth, and until one discovers the transcendent nature of their own divinity, one will wander endlessly.

The Buddha teaches that, in the end, we all must awaken to our true divine nature and that it is possible for us to achieve Liberation, which leads to Union with Brahma. While some Brahmans may perceive a divine essence within the apparent chaos of existence, they often miss the mark because they fail to see that divine essence as their own. Thus, while Brahmanism professes to contain the Truth, it ultimately presents a barrier to enlightenment, for it insists on separation rather than connection. The path leads through the heart of our own experience, not to some far-off ideal but through the direct encounter with what is here and now.

The Buddha’s answer rings true: It is not a matter of belief but of experience. The Brahmans claim to know, yet they do not truly see. Therefore, true knowledge arises from direct perception, not from speculation or hearsay.

In conclusion, this discourse teaches that the attainment of spiritual wisdom involves an experiential journey rather than adherence to dogmatic principles. The wise embrace the direct encounter with reality. The Buddha calls us to discover that truth within ourselves through our experiences, not through the words or teachings of others.

Such knowledge transcends mere intellectualization. It calls us to cultivate our own direct experience and realization of the ultimate truth.

SUMMARY OF THE MORALITIES

The Tevijja Sutta concludes the first division of the Digha Nikaya, entitled the Moralities. This collection of thirteen discourses features significant repetition, repeatedly referencing various aspects of self-restraint, meditative attainments, insights, the Four Noble Truths, the Noble Eightfold Path, and emancipation. In addition to this exploration, we glean many insights into the nature of the teaching. To conclude, I will briefly summarize what we learned while discussing the first thirteen discourses.

The first lesson in the first discourse of the Sutta Pitaka reveals that the moral rules and regulations may impress people, but they lack the sufficiency and adequacy to describe the Tathagata or to attain awakening or emancipation. Ethics and morality remain “elementary and inferior.” Thus, the Sutta Pitaka paradoxically begins with an extensive exploration of what the teaching is not. In particular, the teaching does not encompass ethics or speculation. The text introduces the centrality of rationality in the spiritual quest. All speculative views find rejection because dualistic rationality cannot penetrate the mystery of the teaching, which is transcendent, trans-rational, and trans-dual. Realization becomes attainable only through direct intuitive experience. Any view conceptualized as a world serves as a trap that leads to rebirth in that specific world. This statement anticipates the quantum physics doctrine of the “act of observation” by over 2,300 years. True awakening surpasses all views and rationality itself; thus, it embodies an uncharacterizable mystery, a “trackless path” in the diction of Krishnamurti.

In the second discourse, we discover the fruits of the monastic life, which include four meditative attainments, culminating in perfect insight; five psychic powers, culminating in the Divine Eye, which allows one to perceive the continuity of cause and effect; and finally, perfect awareness, awakening, and emancipation. In addition, we learn about the centrality of body awareness in Buddhist practice.

In the third discourse, we learn that caste and race are irrelevant.

In the fourth discourse, we begin to see that the Buddha’s teaching aligns with the ancient Indian religion of which contemporary Brahmanism represents merely a degenerate remnant, and that the true Brahman constitutes the spiritual practitioner based on spiritual qualities alone.

In the fifth discourse, we learn how the Buddha reinterprets Brahmanic ritualism in ethical and spiritual terms, aligning with a social and political philosophy that we would today call liberal progressive.

In the sixth discourse, we observe how practitioners practise and experience Buddhist spirituality, including the reality of altered states of consciousness and psychic powers. The Buddha also outlines the path of the arhant and alludes to the mind-stream and the intuition that perceives the body as the reification of sentience.

In the eighth discourse, the Buddha declares that practices of asceticism represent superficial, mechanical observances that anyone can perform, but that true asceticism is mental, along with ten criteria that establish the truth of the Buddha’s speech.

In the ninth discourse, the Buddha asserts the absoluteness of the Law of Causality. Nothing that occurs is uncaused or fails to exert its effect. Further, the Buddha outlines the entire process of awareness (beginning with controlled perception and leading through stages to the limit of perception and cessation). No worlds exist exempt from suffering; thus, attaining emancipation intrinsically transcends all worldly conceptions. We can categorize three kinds of acquired self—gross, mental, and formless—corresponding to the three worlds of sensuality, form, and formlessness; body, speech, and mind; and the three bodies: the ‘created body,’ the ‘bliss body,’ and the ‘real body.’

In the tenth discourse, the Buddha discusses the Threefold Division of the Noble Eightfold Path; rejects religion in the common sense; and reiterates that morality is inadequate, necessitating further action to attain awakening.

In the eleventh discourse, the Buddha declares that three types of miracles exist—psychic powers, telepathy, and the miracle of teaching or instruction, which stands as the greatest miracle of all because it alone leads to emancipation. The first category of miracle includes powers such as self-replication, invisibility, and passing through matter. Although we witness these powers only exceptionally in this world, they typically occur in three contexts: dreams, psychedelic experiences, and the UFO phenomenon. It stretches credulity to suggest that this association is accidental. The miracle of teaching relates to the Power of Truth. We also see that meditative concentration enables access to divine worlds for gaining insights, while the doctrine that God is a fraud emerges. Finally, trans-dual consciousness, where material forms have no basis, features signlessness, boundlessness, and all-luminosity, closely paralleling the Cabalistic trinity of Emptiness, Limitlessness, and Infinite Light. In the twelfth discourse, the Buddha rejects the philosophy of egotism and advocates a philosophy of social responsibility grounded in altruism.

Finally, in the thirteenth discourse, the Buddha declares that the true Veda emerges from the seers, male and female shamans and married householders, whose spirituality grounds itself in ecstatic experience, unlike the Brahmans who lack any connection to experiential spirituality and rely on liturgy, sacrifice, and chanting. Rishi spirituality stems from the soma sacrifice, which originally involved consuming a mind-altering sacrament, not unlike the ayahuasca cult of Peru. The Buddha also reveals the way to Union with Brahma, which consists of self-control, ecstasy, and meditation on loving-kindness directed toward the entire world and all worldly beings, and declares (like Jesus) that only one like Brahma will be reborn in the Brahma worlds.

Revised Saturday, November 29, 2025

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