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The Buddha teaches the arising and passing away of the four establishments of mindfulness: the body with nutriment, felt experience with contact, the mind with name and form, and mental qualities with the steering of attention.

The Buddha meets Vacchagotta’s question about the self with silence, explaining to Ānanda that answering would endorse eternalism or annihilationism, and only deepen Vacchagotta’s confusion about the nature of not-self.

Not discerning feeling leads to underlying tendencies to desire, aversion, and ignorance.

Cyclic existence is without a conceivable beginning. Like a dog tied to a post, the uninstructed person stays bound to the five aggregates. The mind is more diverse than any picture or than the animal realm; like a painter, one produces only the aggregates. Seeing them as they truly are, there is no more coming to any state of existence.

The Buddha urges the bhikkhus to dwell with themselves and the Dhamma as island and refuge, and to examine the origin of sorrow in regarding the five aggregates as self—showing that seeing their impermanence abandons that sorrow and brings ease.

The eight liberations are to be realized with the body, past lives are to be realized through mindfulness, the passing away and reappearance of beings is to be realized through the eye, and the wearing away of the taints is to be realized through wisdom.

The Buddha explains how the mind can be obsessed by the senses.

The Buddha explains what causes the hindrances to arise and how to abandon them.

The Buddha shares the importance of explaining correctly what is not the Dhamma, Vinaya, spoken or uttered, practiced, and prescribed by the Tathāgata.

The Buddha shares the importance of correctly explaining offenses and non-offenses, and the harm or benefit that comes from doing so.

The Buddha describes the unique qualities of the Tathāgata, the Arahant, the perfectly Awakened One.

The Buddha describes the foremost of his bhikkhu disciples in various categories.

The Buddha describes the foremost of his bhikkhu disciples in various categories.

The Buddha describes the foremost of his bhikkhu disciples in various categories.

The Buddha contrasts the undeveloped and developed mind.

The Buddha describes the foremost of his bhikkhu disciples in various categories.

The Buddha describes the foremost of his bhikkhunī disciples in various categories.

The Buddha describes the foremost of his lay disciples in various categories.

The Buddha describes the foremost of his female lay disciples in various categories.

Short teachings on the impossibility of certain events, actions, or outcomes.

The Buddha shares the importance of recollection of the Buddha, Dhamma, Saṅgha, one’s virtue, generosity, deities, in-and-out breathing, death, body, and peace.

The Buddha describes how wrong view leads to unwholesome qualities and suffering, while right view leads to wholesome qualities and happiness and what kind of attention fuels what kind of view.

Short teachings contrasting the untamed and the tamed mind.

The dangers of wrong view and the benefits of right view. A badly expounded teaching leads even the energetic to suffering, while a well-expounded one rewards the diligent. The Buddha does not praise even a tiny amount of existence.

Using the simile of Jambudīpa's rare delightful parks amid rugged terrain, the Buddha illustrates how rare it is to be reborn as a human, to encounter the Dhamma, and to gain the taste of liberation.

The Buddha shares qualities that inspire confidence in the spiritual life.

How much practice makes one a true practitioner? The Buddha declares that even a “finger snap” of cultivation fulfills the Teacher's instruction. A rapid-fire survey of the path's essential practices, emphasizing that if a moment is worthy, frequent practice is beyond measure.

The Buddha contrasts the misdirected and well-directed mind, and explains the importance of directing the mind.

The Buddha explains the importance of developing a radiant mind, a mind of loving-kindness and the consequences of negligence, diligence, and laziness.

Short teachings on the benefits of cultivating mindfulness of the body.

The Buddha explains the importance of rousing of energy and the consequences of having many desires, few desires, dissatisfaction, contentment, (careless) attention, radical attention, clear comprehension and lack of it, and bad friendship.

The Buddha explains the importance of mindfulness of the body in partaking in the deathless.

The Buddha explains the importance of good friendship, the consequences of habitual engagement in unwholesome and wholesome qualities, wise and superficial attention, the loss or increase of relatives, wealth, and reputation contrasted with the loss or increase of wisdom.

The Buddha explains the consequences of negligence and diligence, idleness and arousing of energy, having many desires and having few wishes, discontentment and contentment, unwise and radical attention, clear awareness and lack of it, bad and good friendships, and good and bad habits.

The Buddha lists the mental qualities that form the internal factors leading to harm or benefit, the qualities that lead to the decline or continuity of the good Dhamma, and the actions that lead to the harm of many people.

Venerable Ānanda asks the Buddha about the purpose and benefit of wholesome ethical conduct. The Buddha explains gradual benefits of wholesome ethical conduct, starting with the immediate one of non-regret to the ultimate one of understanding and insight into liberation.

Approaching wrongness leads to failure, not success. Approaching rightness leads to success, not failure.

With wrong view, all actions lead to suffering. With right view, all actions lead to happiness. The Buddha explains this with an example of seeds.

The Buddha describes the ten bases for the wearing away of the multitude harmful, unwholesome qualities, and for the development of multitude wholesome qualities.

The Buddha illustrates how the path to liberation unfolds organically, with each wholesome quality naturally giving rise to the next without the need for forced willpower. Wholesome ethical conduct organically gives rise to non-regret, joy, and successive refined states, flowing effortlessly toward the ultimate knowledge and vision of liberation.

The Buddha explains to Mahāli that bad kamma is rooted in greed, hatred, delusion, superficial attention, and a wrongly directed mind. Good kamma stems from their opposites, including radical attention, which together distinguish unrighteous conduct from righteous conduct.

The Buddha uses the simile of checking one’s reflection in a mirror to explain how to comprehend one’s own mind. He details how to constantly review mental states and apply urgent effort to abandon harmful qualities while developing wholesome ones.

The Buddha reveals the ten foundational dynamics of all phenomena. Rooted in desire and brought into being through the steering of attention, all phenomena converge on feeling, are surpassed by wisdom, and ultimately culminate in Nibbāna.

Ānanda asks if one can attain collectedness without perceiving the physical elements, formless dimensions, or any world, yet still perceive. The Buddha confirms this occurs when the mind perceives only the sublime peace of Nibbāna.

When the monk Girimānanda becomes gravely ill, the Buddha prescribes ten profound contemplations.

While a first point of ignorance is not discerned, it can be discerned that ignorance has a supporting condition. The Buddha explains the nutriments for ignorance and the nutriments for true knowledge and liberation, along with how they are fulfilled.

The Buddha defines ten types of practitioners accomplished in view, dividing them into five who achieve final awakening in this world and five who achieve it after passing away into higher realms.

The Buddha lists ten things, along with their nutriments and obstructions, that are desirable but rarely gained in the world, including wealth, health, wisdom, and heavens.

When Migasālā questions why her celibate father and married uncle shared an identical destination in the next life, the Buddha outlines ten types of individuals based on their ethical conduct and understanding of liberation, emphasizing that only the Tathāgata can truly discern their differences, and advising against measuring or judging others.

The Buddha outlines a ten-step causal chain revealing how foundational vices like shamelessness lead to suffering, and how cultivating moral prudence and diligence systematically eliminates the root defilements to achieve final liberation.

The Buddha shares the ten grounds for resentment that lead to anger and agitation in the mind.

The Buddha shares ten ways to remove resentment by changing one’s perspective on harmful actions.

Venerable Sāriputta explains the ten strengths of a bhikkhu who has exhausted the defilements.

The Buddha explains how one can independently verify stream-entry. By subsiding the five perilous animosities through ethical restraint, establishing perfect clarity in the Triple Gem, and penetrating dependent co-arising, a disciple of the Noble Ones is assuredly bound for full awakening.

Venerable Ānanda asks the Buddha about the purpose and benefit of wholesome ethical conduct. The Buddha explains gradual benefits of wholesome ethical conduct, starting with the immediate one of non-regret to the ultimate one of understanding and insight into liberation.

11 benefits of cultivating loving-kindness from sleeping with ease to dying unconfused to going to the Brahma world.

The Buddha illustrates how the path to liberation unfolds organically, with each wholesome quality naturally giving rise to the next without the need for forced willpower. Wholesome ethical conduct organically gives rise to non-regret, joy, and successive refined states, flowing effortlessly toward the ultimate knowledge and vision of liberation.

The Buddha explains the proximate causes of non-regret, joy, tranquility, and other qualities leading to liberation, contrasting how they are fulfilled in a virtuous person versus an unprincipled person.

The Buddha instructs venerable Saddha on the distinction between the meditation of an untrained “wild colt” and a noble “thoroughbred” person. By dissolving all conventional perceptions, including the elements and formless bases, the advanced practitioner meditates without any point of dependence, earning the awe and honor of even the highest deities.

The Buddha explains the faults concerning this life and the next life, the strivings for laypeople and those who have gone forth, the things that cause regret and do not cause regret, the importance of not resting content with wholesome qualities, the two things that cause regret and do not cause regret, the two dark and bright qualities, and the two occasions for approaching the rains retreat.

The Buddha teaches on two hopes that are difficult to abandon, two kinds of people who are rare in the world, two kinds of people who are difficult to satisfy, two causes for the arising of passion, aversion, wrong view, and right view, and two kinds of offenses.

The Buddha contrasts the immature and wise persons, shares on who misrepresents the Buddha, virtuous and unprincipled behavior, wrong and right view, why he dwells in forests and remote lodgings, and the importance of tranquility and penetrative vision.

The Buddha teaches about integrity, gratitude, how one can repay one’s parents, action and non-action, who to make offerings to, persons who are internally or externally fettered, and the importance of right practice and well grasp of the Dhamma. The chapter gets its name from the AN 2.36 discourse.

The Buddha contrasts shallow and deep, factious and unified, worldly and Dhamma-centered assemblies. Communities bound by empty talk, indulgence, and discord decline, while those rooted in seclusion, concord, discipline, inquiry, and the good Dhamma flourish.

The Buddha explains the importance of the Perfectly Awakened One and the wheel-turning monarch, shares about the two types of Buddhas, who does not tremble when a thunder strikes, how living with the unvirtuous and virtuous occurs, and the consequences of not internally settling contention of views and resentment arising from a disciplinary issue.

The Buddha distinguishes between pairs of happiness.

Harmful, unwholesome qualities do not arise out of nowhere. The Buddha shows they always have a basis, and that by abandoning that very basis, they do not come to be.

The Buddha explains the difference between immature and wise persons, and how taints increase or decrease based on how one perceives.

The Buddha uses the gradual purification of gold as a metaphor for mental cultivation through meditation. Just as a goldsmith removes coarse, medium, and subtle impurities until the gold is workable and radiant, a meditator abandons defilements in stages. This gradual refinement leads to deep collectedness of mind, forming the foundation for supernormal abilities and, ultimately, liberation.

Before his awakening, the Bodhisatta reflected on the gratification in the world, the drawback in the world, and the escape from it.

The Buddha describes his quest for gratification in the world, drawback in the world, and the escape from it. He subsequently experientially realized gratification, drawback, and escape as they truly are, leading to his unshakable liberation.

Beings are infatuated with the world because of the gratification found in it, become disenchanted with it because of the drawback, and escape from it because there is an escape.

Singing, dancing, and excessive laughter are all considered inappropriate expressions for the Noble Ones. The appropriate expression of joy for one who delights in the Dhamma is simply a gentle smile, reflecting dignified restraint.

Indulging in 1) excessive sleep, 2) consuming intoxicants, and 3) sexual intercourse gives no satiation.

What are the causes for the arising of kamma? The Buddha explains that greed, aversion, and delusion are the roots of unwholesome kamma, leading to painful results, and leading to further kamma. In contrast, non-greed, non-aversion, and non-delusion are the roots of wholesome kamma, leading to pleasant results and to the cessation of kamma.

What gives rise to kamma? The Buddha explains that the roots of kamma lie in how one relates to the past, future, and present. Through repeated reflections and mental re-examination, desire springs up and binds one to objects of attachment. But when one sees the consequences of those things clearly, one instead turns away from them, leading to kamma arising from complete penetration and wisdom.

Three things thrive when obscured, not when exposed. And three things that shine forth when exposed, not when obscured.

The Buddha describes three persons based on how they respond to anger. One person is like a line etched on rock, another like a line etched on ground, and the third like a line etched on water.

The Buddha shares in brief the three types of growth - 1) confidence, 2) virtue, and 3) wisdom.

The Buddha explains how bodily, verbal, and mental misconduct lead to self-infliction of harm.