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Good Friendship Is the Whole Path

SN 45.2, the Upaḍḍha Sutta — set 1, Before Any Doctrine

Reading time: about 2 min · 331 words

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Before you read

What happens

Ānanda tells the Buddha that good friendship seems to be half of the spiritual life. The Buddha corrects him and calls it the whole.

Central question

How much of the path depends on having good friends, companions, and examples?

Main point

Good friendship gives you what you need to develop the whole path. The Buddha then points to himself as the decisive example of a good friend: through relying on his teaching, people can practice toward freedom.

Reading tip

The long middle section names all eight parts of the path. You do not need to memorize them here. Follow the repeated point that good friendship supports the development of every part.

This text is not saying

The text is not saying that pleasant company by itself completes the path. Its idea of a good friend is someone whose example and guidance support the entire course of practice.

Key words

These definitions are here so you do not need to know Pali or Buddhist vocabulary before reading.

spiritual life
The Buddhist path of practice as a whole -- not just a set of beliefs, but a whole way of living.
noble eightfold path
The eight-part practice these texts teach: right view, right attitude, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right remembering, and right unification of mind.
right remembering
This project's rendering of the path factor usually translated "right mindfulness" -- keeping what actually matters in view, moment to moment, rather than losing track of it.
right unification of mind
The path factor in which the mind gathers together and becomes unified, supported and directed by the rest of the noble path. The thinking mind and the heart work as one whole; nobody forces them into a trance.
quenching
An extinguishing image for dissatisfaction and its causes going out. Different Pali words use this image on different pages, so the exact scope comes from the sentence.

Translation

Ānanda's Claim

So I heard. At one time the Buddha was staying among the Sakyans, near their town of Nagaraka.

Then Venerable Ānanda went to the Buddha, bowed, sat to one side, and said:

"Bhante, good friendship, good companionship, and good fellowship are half of the spiritual life."

The Whole Spiritual Life

"Don't say that, Ānanda. Don't say that.

Good friendship, good companionship, and good fellowship are the whole of the spiritual life.

You can expect a bhikkhu who has good friends, companions, and fellows to develop the noble eightfold path and to keep developing it.

And how do they do that?

They develop right view supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

They develop right attitude supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

They develop right speech supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

They develop right action supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

They develop right livelihood supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

They develop right effort supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

They develop right remembering supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

They develop right unification of mind supported by seclusion, fading, and quenching, maturing in relinquishment.

That is how a bhikkhu with good friends, companions, and fellows develops the noble eightfold path and keeps developing it.

The Buddha as a Good Friend

Here is another way to understand why good friendship, good companionship, and good fellowship are the whole of the spiritual life.

By relying on me as a good friend, beings subject to birth are freed from birth. Beings subject to ageing are freed from ageing. Beings subject to death are freed from death. Beings subject to sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress are freed from sorrow, lamentation, pain, sadness, and distress.

This is another way to understand why good friendship, good companionship, and good fellowship are the whole of the spiritual life."

The second discourse is finished.

Words used in this translation (17)
Bhante
A respectful way of addressing a senior monastic, roughly "venerable sir." Left untranslated because English has no natural equivalent.
bhikkhu
A Buddhist monk -- someone who has left household life to practise full time. Left untranslated because "monk" carries centuries of unrelated European associations.
birth
This project's rendering of "jāti": birth, coming into being. In the dependent-arising sequence, ageing and dying depend on it. In MN 141 the word appears once in its everyday sense instead, in a simile about a mother.
fading
The fading away of attraction and investment in experience, as passion cools.
noble eightfold path
The eight-part practice these texts teach: right view, right attitude, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right remembering, and right unification of mind.
quenching
An extinguishing image for dissatisfaction and its causes going out. Different Pali words use this image on different pages, so the exact scope comes from the sentence.
relinquishment
This project's rendering of "vossagga" -- letting go, in the sense of releasing a hold rather than pushing something away.
right action
Acting without harming -- a factor of the eightfold path.
right attitude
This project's rendering of the path factor usually translated "right intention" -- the underlying motivation a person brings to their actions.
right effort
Effort that is well aimed: heading off what is unhelpful and building up what helps -- a factor of the eightfold path.
right livelihood
Making a living in a way that does not depend on harming or deceiving anyone -- a factor of the eightfold path.
right remembering
This project's rendering of the path factor usually translated "right mindfulness" -- keeping what actually matters in view, moment to moment, rather than losing track of it.
right speech
Speech that is truthful, kind, timely, and worth saying -- a factor of the eightfold path.
right unification of mind
The path factor in which the mind gathers together and becomes unified, supported and directed by the rest of the noble path. The thinking mind and the heart work as one whole; nobody forces them into a trance.
right view
Seeing how experience and practice actually work -- the first factor of the eightfold path. "Right" here means well-aimed and accurate, not morally righteous.
seclusion
This project's rendering of "viveka" -- being apart from the usual pull of the senses and from unwholesome states. Physical solitude is one form of it, not the whole of it.
spiritual life
The Buddhist path of practice as a whole -- not just a set of beliefs, but a whole way of living.
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