“Doṇa, the brahmin seers of the past were Aṭṭhaka, Vāmaka, Vāmadeva, Vessāmitta, Yamadaggi, Aṅgīrasa, Bhāradvāja, Vāseṭṭha, Kassapa, and Bhagu. They were the authors and propagators of the hymns, whose hymnal was sung and propagated and compiled in ancient times. These days, Brahmins continue to sing and chant it. They continue chanting what was chanted, reciting what was recited, and teaching what was taught.
Those seers described five kinds of brahmins. A brahmin who is equal to Brahmā, one who is equal to a god, one who toes the line, one who crosses the line, and the fifth is a brahmin outcaste. Which one of these are you, Doṇa?”
“Master Gotama, we don’t know about these five kinds of brahmins. We just know the word ‘brahmin’. Master Gotama, please teach me this matter so I can learn about these five brahmins.”
“Well then, brahmin, listen and pay close attention, I will speak.”
“Yes sir,” Doṇa replied.
The Buddha said this:
“Doṇa, how is a brahmin equal to Brahmā? It’s when a brahmin is well born on both the mother’s and the father’s sides, coming from a clean womb back to the seventh paternal generation, incontestable and irreproachable in discussions about ancestry. For forty-eight years he lives the spiritual life, from childhood, studying the hymns. Then he seeks a fee for his teacher, but only by legitimate means, not illegitimate.
In this context, Doṇa, what is legitimate?
Not by farming, trade, raising cattle, archery, government service, or one of the professions, but solely by living on alms, not scorning the alms bowl. Having offered the fee to his teacher, he shaves off his hair and beard, dresses in ocher robes, and goes forth from the lay life to homelessness.
Then they meditate spreading a heart full of love to one direction, and to the second, and to the third, and to the fourth. In the same way above, below, across, everywhere, all around, they spread a heart full of love to the whole world—abundant, expansive, limitless, free of enmity and ill will.
They meditate spreading a heart full of compassion … rejoicing … equanimity to one direction, and to the second, and to the third, and to the fourth. In the same way above, below, across, everywhere, all around, they spread a heart full of equanimity to the whole world—abundant, expansive, limitless, free of enmity and ill will.
Having developed these four Brahmā meditations, when the body breaks up, after death, they’re reborn in a good place, a Brahmā realm.
That’s how a brahmin is equal to Brahmā."
An 5.192 (part one)
Author: Matthew Simpson
