འདལ་བ་གཞ intro.71
The Chapter on Going Forth; The Chapter on the Restoration Rite; The Chapter on Lifting Restrictions; The Chapter on the Rains; The Chapter on Medicines intro.71
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intro.71
The phrase also figures prominently in Śāriputra and Maudgalyāyana’s questions for the six tīrthika teachers: “What is the result of living the holy life? What are its benefits?” Although the exact meaning of the phrase is never spelled out, the commentator Kalyāṇamitra glosses it as a life of “hardships” or “austerities.”⁴⁶ Kalyāṇamitra’s interpretation is probably best understood as an explanation of Śāriputra and Maudgalyāyana’s assumptions about what it meant to “live the holy life.” For, as a Jain, Jñātiputra would certainly have equated “the holy life” with austerities, but it is not certain whether any of the other five would have.⁴⁷ It does, however, seem likely that many of these teachers would have understood “the holy life” to entail celibacy; and that is how the term is now understood in the Buddhist tradition, where a lay vow holder who takes a vow of celibacy is described as a brahmacārin upāsaka (Tib. tshangs spyod dge bsnyen).