![[info icon]](./../../../img/question_16.gif "Summary: Mara and the Buddha debate this question: Are possessions a source of joy or of grief?")
Translator's note: In this discourse, Mara and the Buddha are speaking different languages. By "acquisitions" Mara means one's family and physical possessions. The Buddha uses the same word to mean a sense of possession for anything — physical or mental — at all.
I have heard that on one occasion the Blessed One was staying near Savatthi in Jeta's Grove, Anathapindika's monastery. Then Mara the Evil One went to the Blessed One and recited this verse in his presence:
Those with children
delight
because of their children.
Those with cattle
delight
because of their cows.
A person's delight
comes from acquisitions,
since a person with no acquisitions
doesn't delight.
[The Buddha:]
Those with children grieve because of their children. Those with cattle grieve because of their cows. A person's grief comes from acquisitions, since a person with no acquisitions doesn't grieve.Then Mara the Evil One — sad & dejected at realizing, "The Blessed One knows me; the One Well-Gone knows me" — vanished right there.
©1998 Thanissaro Bhikkhu.
The text of this page ("Nandana Sutta: Delight", by Thanissaro Bhikkhu) is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. To view a copy of the license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. Documents linked from this page may be subject to other restrictions.
Transcribed from a file provided by the translator. Last revised for Access to Insight on 30 November 2013.
How to cite this document (a suggested style): "Nandana Sutta: Delight" (SN 4.8), translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Access to Insight (BCBS Edition), 30 November 2013, http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn04/sn04.008.than.html .