25. (The deva said:)
"The bhikkhu who is an arahat, who has
accomplished the task (of Magga Practice), in whom the befuddling defilements
are extinct, and who bears the last burden of existence (having no more
rebirth), would such a bhikkhu say, ' I speak' or would he say ' I am spoken
to?"
(The
Bhagava said:)
" The bhikkhu who is an arahat, who has
accomplished the task (of Magga Practice), in whom befuddling defilements are
extinct, and who bears the last burden of existence, might say ' I speak', or
might say ' I am spoken to'. Knowing and being skilled in the conventional
terms of the world, he might use such terms merely as conventional terms."
(The deva said:)
"The bhikkhu-who is an arahat, who has
accomplished the task (of Magga Practice), in whom the befuddling defilements
are extinct, and who bears the last burden of existence, would such a bhikkhu
say, out of conceit, ' I speak'. or would he say 'I am spoken to?"
(The Bhagava said:)
A bhikkhu who has given up conceit has no
bonds; he has destroyed all bonds of conceit. Such a wise one has passed beyond
all concepts of 'mine', 'I' and 'my Self' (being motivated by Craving, conceit
and wrong view).
Such a bhikkhu might say
' I speak', or might say 'I am spoken to'.
Knowing and being
skilled in the conventional terms of the world, he might use such terms merely
as conventional terms."
End of the Arahanta Sutta,
the fifth in this vagga.
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