AN 4:158 · Decline (Parihāni Sutta)

There Ven. Sāriputta addressed the monks, “Friend monks!”

“Yes, friend,” the monks responded to him.

Ven. Sāriputta said, “Friends, any monk or nun who sees four qualities in him- or herself should come to the conclusion, ‘I am declining in skillful qualities. This is called decline by the Blessed One.’ Which four? An increase in passion, an increase in aversion, an increase in delusion, and one’s eye of discernment makes no headway in terms of deep possibilities & impossibilities. Any monk or nun who sees these four qualities in him- or herself should come to the conclusion, ‘I am declining in skillful qualities. This is called decline by the Blessed One.’

“Any monk or nun who sees four qualities in him- or herself should come to the conclusion, ‘I am not declining in skillful qualities. This is called non-decline by the Blessed One.’ Which four? A reduction in passion, a reduction in aversion, a reduction in delusion, and one’s eye of discernment makes headway in terms of deep possibilities & impossibilities. Any monk or nun who sees these four qualities in him- or herself should come to the conclusion, ‘I am not declining in skillful qualities. This is called non-decline by the Blessed One.’”

See also: MN 131; AN 6:19–20; AN 10:51

Translated by Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu. © 2014 / rev. 2017 Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu — released under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 licence, for free distribution only. Source: dhammatalks.org (Metta Forest Monastery).