Eight Inopportune Moments - Akkhana Sutta (05-08-2018)

​Namo  Tassa  Bhagavato  Arahato  Samma  Sambuddhassa !
Homage to the Blessed One, the Worthy One, the Supremely Enlightened One !
Akkhana Sutta - Eight Inopportune Moments - Numerical Discourses of the Buddha. Translated from the Pali by Ven. Bhikkhu Bodh Thero. –  Wisdom Publications.
"Monks, the uninstructed worldling says: ‘The world has gained the opportunity! The world has gained the opportunity!’ but he does not know what is an opportunity and what is not an opportunity. There are, monks, these eight inopportune moments that are not right occasions for living the spiritual life.
"Here, a Buddha has arisen in the world, an Arahant, Worthy One; Perfectly Enlightened; Accomplished in true knowledge and conduct; Follower of the Noble Path; Knower of worlds; Unsurpassed trainer of persons to be tamed; Teacher of devas and humans; an Enlightened Teacher; a Blessed One, and the Dharma leading to peace, Nirvana, and enlightenment is taught as proclaimed by a Blessed One.

(1) But a person has been reborn in hell. This is the first inopportune moment that is not the right occasion for living the spiritual life.
(2) A person has been reborn in the animal realm.
(3) A person has been reborn in the world of afflicted spirits.
(4) A person has been reborn in a certain order of long-lived devas.
(5) A person has been reborn in the remote provinces among the uncivilized foreigners, a place to which monks, nuns, male lay followers, and female lay followers do not travel.
(6) A person has been reborn in the central provinces, but he holds wrong view and has a distorted perspective: ‘There is nothing given, nothing sacrificed, nothing offered; there is no fruit or result of good and bad actions; there is no this world, no other world; there is no mother, no father; there are no beings spontaneously reborn; there are in the world no ascetics and brahmins of right conduct and right practice who, having realized this world and the other world for themselves by direct knowledge, make them known to others.’
(7) A person has been reborn in the central provinces, but he is unwise, stupid, and unable to understand the meaning of what has been well stated and badly stated.  
(8) "Again, a Buddha has not arisen in the world and the Dharma is not taught as proclaimed by a Blessed One. But a person has been reborn in the central provinces, and he is wise, intelligent, smart, and able to understand the meaning of what has been well stated and badly stated.
"There is, monks, one unique opportune moment that is the right occasion for living the spiritual life. Here, a Buddha has arisen in the world, and the Dharma is taught as proclaimed by a Blessed One. And a person has been reborn in the central provinces, and he is wise, intelligent, smart, and able to understand the meaning of what has been well stated and badly stated. This, monks, is the one unique opportune moment that is the right occasion for living the spiritual life."
"Having obtained the human state when the good Dharma has been well proclaimed, those who do not seize the moment have let the right moment slip by. For many inopportune times are spoken of, occasions obstructive to the path; for it is only sometimes, on occasion, that Buddhas arise in the world.
If one has directly encountered them, fortune rarely gained in the world, if one has obtained the human state, and the good Dharma is being taught, for a person desiring his own good, this is incentive enough to strive. How can one understand the good Dharma, so that the moment won’t slip by? For those who miss the moment grieve when they are reborn in hell. One here, who has failed to obtain the fixed course of the good Dharma, will come to regret it for a long time like a merchant who has missed a profit.
A person hindered by ignorance who has failed in the good Dharma will long experience wandering on in the round of birth and death. But those who gain the human state when the good Dharma is well proclaimed, have accomplished the Teacher's word, or will do so, or are doing so now. Those who have practiced the path, proclaimed by the Buddha, have penetrated the right moment in the world the unsurpassed spiritual life.       
You should dwell without leakages, guarded, ever-mindful in the restraints taught by the One with Vision, the Kinsman of the Sun. Having cut off all underlying tendencies that follow one drifting in Māra's domain, those who attain the destruction of the taints, though in the world, have gone beyond. "                                                     
Saadu !   Saadu !!   Saadu !!!

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