Hi Derek,

The attahakavagga is currently one of my themes of study. Truly it is a
wonderful book, and presents some challenging views. Not only on
linguistic and metrical grounds they think it is one of the oldest
parts. It's also because together with the Parayanavagga they are
mentioned and commented in Niddesa. So they must have been around for
quite a while as to deserve a commentary that also belongs to the Canon.

Regarding Añña Kondañña it's said that after the Benares Sermon he went
to the Himalayas, to a place favoured by paccekabuddhas, and spent 12
years before meeting the Buddha again. It was a so long time that he had
to introduce himself : "I am Kondañña, Blessed One! I am Kondañña"

In Samyutta he is mentioned at:

I 290
I 465 n. 524
I 466 n. 525-526
II 1847
II 1962 n. 383

of the new B. Bodhi's edition.

Now other Tipitaka references (not atthakatha included):
J.i.65
Vin.i.12
A.i.23
Thag. 674-88
Thag v.673
Apadana i.48
Jataka n.522 but perhaps not the same


Enjoy!

Rick



Derek Cameron wrote:

>
> Dear Pali people,
>
> Reading the A.t.thakavaggo (Sn IV) I am struck by the enormous gulf
> between the "No View" position it advocates, and the "Right View"
> position repeatedly stressed in the first four Nikaaya-s.
>
> I have read that, on linguistic and metrical grounds, the
> A.t.thakavaggo (Sn IV) is probably one of the oldest parts of the
> Canon. This might lead to the conjecture that, early on in the
> Buddha's teaching career, "Buddhist doctrine" had not yet been
> formally stated. Perhaps the Noble Eightfold Path, including of
> course "Right View," did not exist at the time the A.t.thakavaggo was
> composed.
>
> Yet the Buddha's two very first discourses -- the
> Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta (SN LVI.11) and the Anatta-lakhana Sutta
> (SN XXII.59) -- include all the key points (Middle Way, Four Noble
> Truths, Noble Eightfold Path, Anicca, Anatta, Dukkha) of "Buddhist
> doctrine."
>
> If those two Suttas were actually delivered in the form we now have
> them -- and that is of course a major assumption -- then the Buddha
> did indeed teach Right View from the very beginning.
>
> (The alternative is that "Buddhist doctrine" was retrospectively
> inserted into two very bare-bones accounts of the Buddha re-
> encountering the Group of Five.)
>
> Thanissaro Bhikkhu, in his notes published at Access to Insight,
> reconciles No View and Right View with the raft analogy -- Right View
> is only needed until one has reached the far shore.
>
> If that is true, then where does it leave the A.t.thakavaggo? As a
> teaching for superior people who had no need of the N8FP, etc.?
>
> Perhaps some light can be shed on all these questions by considering
> the process of Sangha formation.
>
> In the early days, when the Buddha's followers were very few, there
> can have been no need for the institution of a formalized Sangha,
> with precepts, patimokkha, ceremonies, etc.
>
> Is it possible that, as the Sangha became formalized, some of the
> Buddha's earliest disciples went their own way, carrying
> the "superior" teachings with them? I have also read that it is known
> that the entire Sangha (which must have by then been huge) was not
> present at the First Council, when the process of Canon formation
> began.
>
> All this is a very long-winded way of arriving at my real question,
> which is ...
>
> "Whatever happened to Añña Kondañña?"
>
> If anyone has the time, inclination, and a copy of the CSCD, I'd be
> interested to know where, apart from the Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta
> (SN LVI.11) and the Anatta-lakhana Sutta (SN XXII.59) there is
> mention of the terms:
>
> (1) "kondañño" or "kondañña" etc (Kondañña)
>
> (2) "pañca vaggi" or "pañcavaggi" etc (The Group of Five)
>
> Thank you,
>
> Derek.
>