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**RLRWai4B** · 09-19-2011, 10:28 AM

I think the necessary information that might explain those images in the sutta passages above has been lost in the intervening 2,500 years. At least, I haven't been able to find explanations for them.

You have given up already!

I sense there is more to the similes.

When I read those passages, I just take the obvious advice about cultivating dispassion towards, food, sense impressions, volition and consciousness. These are things that we ordinarily attach to, cling to, chase after and/or be enamored of, but they all bear the 3 marks of existence, so they are ultimately unsatisfactory.

Sure.

But if the Buddha was just exhorting non-attachment, he already taught about not attaching to the five aggregates, to the six sense bases, etc

I suppose my inquiry is why did the Buddha decide to make a special teaching out of these four things and called them 'nutriment'?

09-19-2011, 10:28 AM	#8
RLRWai4B Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 447 Senior Member	I think the necessary information that might explain those images in the sutta passages above has been lost in the intervening 2,500 years. At least, I haven't been able to find explanations for them. You have given up already! I sense there is more to the similes. When I read those passages, I just take the obvious advice about cultivating dispassion towards, food, sense impressions, volition and consciousness. These are things that we ordinarily attach to, cling to, chase after and/or be enamored of, but they all bear the 3 marks of existence, so they are ultimately unsatisfactory. Sure. But if the Buddha was just exhorting non-attachment, he already taught about not attaching to the five aggregates, to the six sense bases, etc I suppose my inquiry is why did the Buddha decide to make a special teaching out of these four things and called them 'nutriment'?
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