Iti 20 · uttaka 20
This was said by the Blessed One, said by the Arahant, so I have heard: “Monks, there is the case where a certain person is corrupt-minded. Having encompassed that mind with [my] awareness, I discern, ‘If this person were to die at this instant, then as if he were to be carried off, he would thus be placed in hell.’ Why is that? Because his mind is corrupt. It’s because of corrupt-mindedness that there are cases where beings–at the break-up of the body, after death–reappear in a plane of deprivation, a bad destination, a lower realm, hell.”
Knowing the case
of a corrupt-minded person,
the One Awakened explained its meaning
in the presence of the monks.
If that person
were to die at this instant,
he’d reappear in hell
because his mind is corrupt–
as if he were carried off
and placed there.
It’s because of corrupt-mindedness
that beings go
to a bad destination.
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).
