December 16, 2024 at 12:14 pm
#52906
Keymaster
The English translation is incomplete and does not give the main idea: “Aggañña Sutta (DN 27).”
- In those days, there were four “classes” of people: (khattiyā, brāhmaṇā, vessā, and suddā.) The English translation in the link lists them as aristocrats (kings and high-level administrators), brahmins (who were knowledgeable in the Vedas, performed religious rituals, and advised the aristocrats), peasants (middle/lower class population), and menials (lowest “class” who performed manual labor; they were prohibited from learning the Vedas or even to associate with others).
- The Buddha explained in the rest of the sutta that all four “classes” descended from the same “early humans” who populated the Earth after the “reformation” of it. They all had lived in the Abhssara Brahma realm during the period (billions of years) when the Earth was destroyed and then re-formed.
- After the Earth had reformed, they all returned to the newly-formed Earth. It happens automatically because, by that time, their lifetime in the Abhssara Brahma realm would have expired.
- All those “early humans” would have “Brahma-like” bodies (not physical, dense bodies like current humans.) They could travel through the air and did not even need to eat.
- Initially, a freely available “yogurt-like” substance appeared due to kammic energy. They taste that and attached to that taste. Then, their bodies become denser. Gradually, they start eating denser food, and their bodies get denser, too. That happens after millions of years when their “old gati” start coming back.
- Then, they start “hoarding the free food” for later consumption (due to greed). When their gati change, the environment changes accordingly, food becomes scarce, and some resort to stealing.
- That is discussed in the two posts: Aggañña Sutta Discussion – Introduction and Buddhism and Evolution – Aggañña Sutta (DN 27)
- The degradation of moral values leads to engaging in akusala kamma. That leads to births in the lower realms. Even when born in the human realm, some will be born into “higher classes” and others to “lower classes.” That happens according to the types of kamma that they engage in. Those who engaged in the worst deeds were born in the lower realms, e.g., as animals. That is the main idea. For example, one can be born to a family of Brahmins; but if they lived immoral lives, their next birth could be a “lower caste/class” or even as an animal.