Ganges River🌱 simile

The Buddha explains the five lower fetters and the way of practice for abandoning them.

The Buddha explains to a brahmin that the cycle of existence has an inconceivable beginning, and that it is not easy to calculate the number of aeons that have passed by and gone.

Just as it is impossible to make the river Ganges flow against its natural course, so too is it impossible for a bhikkhu whose mind has long been inclined toward seclusion to abandon the Noble Eightfold Path and return to lay life.

Using the metaphor of the Ganges river, the Buddha illustrates how cultivating the four right efforts systematically inclines a practitioner toward Nibbāna.

The Buddha describes the cultivation of four jhānas as leading to Nibbāna.