The History of Buddhist Thought c24.4

c24.4

¹ The *Sigālovāda-sutta*, *Dīgha*, iii, 180, is well known. It has been called the householder's book of discipline (*gihi-vinaya*). It is not in the ordinary sense a discourse, but consists of a poem of twenty-six verses with an introductory legend and a commentary. The question whether a layman can become an arhat is a perversity of expression. The real question is what are the conditions for becoming an arhat. If a layman can fulfil these conditions (and sudden conversion and insight are admitted), then, of course, he becomes an arhat. But in so doing he has cut off everything that binds him to the world, and even if he lives in a house he is exempt from the passions. The problem appears to have arisen from the fact that legends of the earliest period speak of laymen attaining arhatship at once. These do not belong to serious history.